Okay, please call this meeting to order.

Thank you, Mayor.

This meeting is called to order at 205.

Councilmember Kaplan.

Councilmember Dickinson.

Vice Mayor Talamantes.

Councilmember Pluckybaum.

Councilmember Maple.

Mayor Pro Tem Getta.

Here.

Council Member Jennings.

Here.

Councilmember Vang.

Here.

And Mayor McCarty.

Here.

You do have a quorum.

And I do want to make an announcement that this meeting is running concurrently with a special meeting, which has one item on the agenda.

It's an informational item, notification of parcel map of 3225 D Street.

Um, and that's an informational item, no action taken on that, but it is run can running concurrently with this meeting.

So land acknowledgement.

Thank you, Councilmember Maple.

Can you do the pledge?

Please rise if you are able.

Right, so the opening acknowledgments in honor of Sacramento's indigenous people and tribal lands to the original people of this land, the Nissanan people, the Southern Maidu, Valiant 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 today in the active practice of acknowledgement and appreciation for Sacramento's indigenous people's history, contribution, and lives.

Remain standing, salute and pledge.

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.

City attorney, did we have a report out from closed session?

No.

Are there any members that wish to pull an item or have comments?

I have questions on item seven, and um I may also want to pull that for a separate vote if others want to do the same.

So we'll do a separate vote and discussion on item seven.

Okay, Councilmember Kaplan.

Just quick comments on item six.

Okay, seeing no more queued up.

Councilmember Kaplan comments on item six.

Yes, thank you.

I just want to call out again.

I really appreciate the Sacramento Youth Commission annual report and their 2026 priorities.

I think it would be well worth it for anybody who wants to know how our youth feel and what they want to guide for 2026.

Of truly, it's about building a stronger community partnership and others uh and how do we address mental health in our youth and take action.

So I just want to thank our youth for um their service uh and their voice as they are the official youth voice for the city of Sacramento.

Okay, we're gonna pull item seven for a separate vote.

I do have one comment on item number four, Keith Ellis.

Uh thank you, Council members.

I'm Keith Ellis, I'm the vice chair of the disability advisories commission advisory commission, and I really wanted to stand before you and thank you for uh your support of the longstanding um tradition of having the commission, but also in particular um council members uh Vang Telemontis, uh Kaplan, and Jennings for your support and uh including our commission's request for a citywide accessibility coordinator position uh to be included in the city budget.

We we do understand these are not um positive or surplus budgets uh conditions before the city, but we really truly uh appreciate the city council including these in the discussions and living up to our values of accessibility, diversity, equity, and inclusion for our city.

So, on behalf of the commission, I really want to thank you uh for taking our report uh to heart and living up to those values.

So thank you very much.

Okay, thank you.

So um we have requested that item seven be pulled for a separate vote, so I can entertain a motion on items one through six and eight through thirteen.

So I can entertain a motion on items one through six and eight through thirteen.

All right, we have a motion is second.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Any no's or abstentions?

Hearing none, items pass nine zero.

So council member maple asked that item seven be pulled for a separate vote.

That is a resolution enacting accessory dwelling unit design standards for historic properties.

Thank you, Madam Clark.

I just have a few questions.

Um thank you, and uh apologies I didn't get you these in advance.

I was a little busy running around today, but um I did review some of the uh proposed design standards for ADUs uh and had just had a few questions.

One of the main questions I have is around if we've done any analysis of how this would add cost to the development of an ADU.

So for right now, what the current standards are versus if we add these requirements on.

Sure, thank you for your question.

Uh Sean DeCoursey, preservation director for the city of Sacramento.

And um, these standards are designed in a manner to be objective, and the majority of projects that we come that we see would comply with these standards and would still be reviewed ministerially under state law.

State law does uh acknowledge the need for historic districts to adopt additional standards, and so we're really controlling for that 10% of projects that would not comply with our minimum design expectations for these sensitive areas of the city.

Okay, so for the ones that would that don't normally comply, I what I'm trying to get at here is what this might add in terms of cost to a project.

Um, and so I'm just curious if we've kind of taken a look at that.

So, for example, I've noted like some of the I notice that um I think virtually all of these standards that are proposed in here are aesthetic and there's nothing structural or I mean they are structural in nature, but they they're meant to be aesthetically matching the neighborhood or the building it's the other buildings surrounding it, but it's not necessarily things that are meant for like health and safety or other needs.

Um but my my guess is is that they would also add cost to a project in order.

So if you propose something under the current rules versus if these are then passed and put into place, it would likely be more expensive to do so.

Well, it depends.

Like I said, most projects that come in would already comply with these.

So if you took that project that is already complying with these standards, there would be no additional cost to comply because it already complies.

So if you did have a project, let's say that was proposing materials like T11 siding that's very cheap, and then you said no, there are siding types listed in our objective design criteria that do not include T11, those materials may be more expensive.

But it's just again, it's a small number of projects that come in proposing those those very very inexpensive um and aesthetically unpleasing uh materials.

Okay, and so thank you.

And then so this would for let's say hypothetically speaking, because these only applied to in historic districts.

Um, if I submitted this, does this add a new layer for me to have to get approval for that I've met these standards?

If you live in a historic district and you um apply for a ministerial permit and you comply with the standards, there's no you go straight to a building permit.

There's no additional review.

Okay, but right so versus right now, the current rules in place.

So if I live in a historic district right now and I wanted to apply for an ADU without these um objective standards in place, I could just do that right now, right?

Yeah, but the process is the same.

The process is the same.

You still be reviewed by preservation if you are in a historic district.

Okay, and you'd be compared to the existing standards that we have now, some of which are reiterated in here, like 150% of the height of any adjacent contributing resource, so it limits the height, and it also limits the setback from the main building.

So there's a look uh by preservation staff, there's also a look by planning to make sure that you're complying with all objective criteria.

So the process is the same, and it depends on the individual project whether the whether there'd be additional comments from planning to say, well, you don't comply with this or this or this, but the process itself, it does not add anything to the process.

Okay, so you would still have to go through that same review right now, um, but you we just don't have all of these same objective standards in the current process.

That's true.

The process would be the same because it the process is mandated by state law, it has to go straight from an application to a building permit without an additional level of review.

So that would maintain that is required by state law.

Okay.

Um so maybe in a nutshell, can you uh just synthesize for me what are the main differences between the current design standards for an ADU and historic district and then what's being proposed here?

What are the main changes?

The only things that we can enforce right now are the objective criteria in our code.

So that's setback height, um the 150% height standard, so these objective criteria that are within our code, uh lot coverage.

We can't enforce um the other elements that we've built into this to this set of standards.

nutshell can you uh just synthesize for me what are the main differences between the current design standards for an ADU and historic district and then what's being proposed here what are the main changes the only things that we can uh enforce right now are the objective criteria in our code so that setback height um the the the 150 percent height standard the these objective criteria that are within our code uh lot coverage we can't enforce um the other elements that we've built into this to this set of standards so we uh regulate the the type of roof uh it has to be a it has to be a sloped roof um we mandate windowsills and trim most again most ADUs have these when they come in and they uh wouldn't be they wouldn't go through any additional uh review but if if someone came in with a siding type that wasn't listed on that um on our set of objective standards then they would have to change their sighting type to comply with with those that are listed there um so there are there are additional there are additional requirements and it essentially requires a traditional style building if someone wants to design a modern building in a historic district we have a separate process which is a site plan design review process that um any development goes through okay that's actually really helpful so if I so if I lived in this district and I wanted to build an ADU that had a more modern style I would then have to go through the full formal planning process.

That's right you as though I was building you know maybe a full size home.

Excuse me yes um yes you can deviate from from these criteria you just add that um the application the site plan design of your application that we go through now the majority of these also are reviewed at the staff level so you would probably have to submit a staff level site plan design review application um pay the fee it's about a month um additional time okay all right thank you so much that those are my questions I just want to make a couple of comments um I'm gonna be voting no on this today has nothing to do with the work that you've done I really appreciate all the work that's gone into doing this but I've also been we as a city and some others on this dais have been embarking on a process to make it easier to streamline the building of housing and I know that from my perspective some of the intent of the laws that have been passed at the state level for ADUs is to make it easier faster and for people to do them because it's a great way for people to build more and different housing types I worry even though this is really going to address a pretty small subsect of those ADUs in historic districts I worry that this is a is something that can be used again to make it more um expensive and challenging to navigate the process and I can tell you from just from experience that I've heard from my constituents I don't know if others on this dais have had the same experience it's really challenging already people find it very difficult to navigate our process it's expensive it's time consuming and so I'm really just concerned especially when the things that we're talking about here are all aesthetic which is subjective in nature what's aesthetically pleasing today may not be you know a hundred years from now and so I think that by setting on these standards and making it such that you have to comply with them in order to build in what's probably an already expensive area if you live in a historic district just gives me some pause and so again I don't want to indicate the work that you've done on this I think it's important work but I I I'll be voting no just um on principle thank you.

Councilmember Pleckeyba thank you mayor I share council member maple's concerns will also be voting no three leader yes Councilmember Dickinson thank you uh I I actually appreciate the comments and the questions that have been made but ha having worked with uh a number of uh properties in historic areas trying to uh trying to preserve historic areas uh and and trying to make sure that that um there's a constant and consistent value in historic areas uh I I very much support the uh these measures uh to maintain that character uh of historic areas I don't think that the cost added uh albeit I I'm sure there will be some uh is uh meaningful in in the context of the value that we get if you look at if you look at midtown if you look at parts uh of North Soccer and we don't have that many areas that are that are designated as as historic areas um that that uh the challenge is to maintain that that that sense uh uh that um there's an overall uh consistency in design to uh to historic areas and um we get a lot of value uh from the fact that people uh both want to live in those places and want to visit the those places because of that character and that the history which is preserved so uh if people want to add adus I think that's fine uh I agree about streamlining the that that that process uh consistent with with with state law but we don't have to sacrifice that we don't have to to uh make a choice here I think between preserving the character of our historic areas and uh advancing the cause of additional housing through through ADUs.

In fact, I I suspect that a lot of the people who would come in would be proposing in historic areas these kinds of approaches from a construction standpoint anyway, because they value their their home or their structure anyway.

So this to me is a way in part of preserving our history.

Second, okay.

But can you give us other examples of historic area like the roof line or wind or windows or what other in a practical level help us understand what could happen if an ADU was uh applied for a historic area?

Sure, again, Sean DeCourcy.

Um so if we if we sort of take a step back and think about where this came from, um the majority of projects that are proposed in historic districts, as the council member said, comply with these standards because they're well-designed architecture that is there's no objections to from staff or the preservation community.

But there's a small percentage of projects that come in that um essentially look like um the temporary trailers that a lot of us went to school in, the T11 siding, the uh HVAC put on the wall side of the wall, um, they're highly visible from the neighbors' properties.

Many of them are visible from our alleys, which we're trying to activate.

Um, and they they're out of place in these older parts of the city.

So um also there's only there's a very few number of historic properties that would be affected by these that um historic that ADUs can be can fit on the lot uh under our current rules.

And so we're trying to provide some design criteria that sets a benchmark for these units without putting undue burden on people who want to build ADUs.

As we said, most of them comply.

So this really is trying to control the small percentage of um the most of them are companies who come in and they they quote a very low price so that they can build a very, very cheap unit.

And the product reflects that now.

This this proposal it went to the preservation commission.

Did they did our planning commission also?

Our planning commission reviewed the uh the um Title 17 amendments that allow us to adopt objective design standards.

The uh the criteria were reviewed by the preservation commission and they recommended the approval.

We also did extensive outreach with uh the American Association of Architects Central Valley chapter, who initially raised many of the same concerns that you've here heard today, but um through our outreach and modifications to the original proposed designs, they um they have not objected since since we've revised the standards consistent with their comments.

Okay, thank you.

Okay.

We have a motion a second on this item.

All third, please say aye.

Aye, any no's or abstentions?

No, we'll just hear two.

Unless two no's lucky bomb and maple.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

May are we now to move to item 14 on the discussion calendar, district two enhanced infrastructure financing district or EFID discussion.

Yes, and as staff comes up, I wanted to allow a council member to set the stage here for this proposal.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh, and I uh I want to thank uh my colleagues, uh Mayor Pro Tem Gera, uh Councilmember Maple, Councilmember Talamantes, uh who have uh co-authored this proposal uh that I have made to establish uh uh uh enhanced infrastructure financing district uh in District 2 in North Sacramento.

And uh of course we're not at the stage of uh adopting anything.

We're at the the stage where uh our staff is asking for direction whether they should do further analysis.

Uh I certainly uh hope uh all of us will will support that.

But the the point of of this proposal uh is to uh identify uh and build a sustainable predictable source of funding for infrastructure improvements uh that simply do not exist uh in district two, uh uh despite uh decades literally of it being uh part of the city and and uh certainly deserving uh uh uh the kind of uh same infrastructure, simple things like curbs, gutters, sidewalks, um, street lighting parks that that uh so many other parts of the city and enjoy.

Um it's also though an important uh opportunity for a tool to help us advance the cause of economic development in uh north north sacramento.

Uh we have some uh commercial corridors and other areas that have uh I think tremendous potential, but they don't have the capacity in the in the terms of public infrastructure to accommodate the the kind of development that that uh would be beneficial both to the uh district uh as well as the city as a whole.

The EIFD gives us a tool that that we can employ uh in a way that creates uh funding uh that can be dedicated to the proposition of uh bringing uh district two and north sacramental much closer to the balance of the city in terms of basic infrastructure, but also lay literally the the foundation for economic investment and and development as well as supporting the businesses that are that are there, sustaining those as well and uh a future that uh can be much much brighter.

And so uh given the state legislation that creates this this opportunity, uh I think it's important to take advantage of it.

The city to this point, of course, uh has used this tool, but generally uh it's been in uh combination with what we all call a catalyst project uh and supporting that catalyst project, which is which is certainly a good idea and defensible.

In this case, we have an opportunity to turn that equation around and use this this tool to actually stimulate the investment and the development and the support of those who have who have uh labored for a long long time in that part of the city.

So the again the request today is formative.

Uh it's uh simply asking to to uh have the staff do more work on this, but I wanted to um uh share a word about why this is a tool that I think is so important and meaningful uh for us in uh North Sacramento and in District 2.

Yes, thanks, Mayor.

Okay, thank you.

So we'll uh have our staff present and then come back to council and of course the public.

Please proceed.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council.

My name is Amanda Wallace.

I'm a project manager with the city's Office of Innovation and Economic Development.

Um as the council member discussed, um, this item originated as a request from the council member's office for staff to look into the revenue potential that a D2 enhanced infrastructure, enhanced infrastructure financing district or EIFD, could generate for his district.

Um, as you're familiar with the rail yards and Aggie Square and Enhanced Infrastructure Financing District allows the city to uh dedicate a portion of our tax increment revenue to public improvements within that district or um that serve that district, and so um the city staff works with um environmental uh economic planning systems in order to do a really high-level analysis of what type of revenue this could generate for district two.

And ultimately, we learned that it could generate some revenue, but that in order for us to really understand that in more detail, we're going to need to complete a full fiscal impact analysis.

And so that's what we're here today to ask you for guidance on as the full council is uh moving forward with a full fiscal impact analysis.

That would include um preliminarily defining the EIFD boundary so that it focuses on areas of district two that are most likely to redevelop and and therefore generate tax increment revenue.

We would also build out some um realistic uh build-out and development uh estimates so that we can estimate the revenue that would be generated.

And then importantly, we would also look at um assessing the increased cost to provide services to this new development.

So completing the fiscal impact analysis, we estimate will take around three months, and over that time will require additional outside consultant work and approximately 20 hours of a staff person's time from both economic development and the infrastructure finance division of the finance department, along with 10 percent of corresponding management time from both divisions and then um around five hours of time from our uh IT's GIS team.

So once the fiscal impact analysis is complete, staff will return to council to present the findings and seek further guidance on uh an EIFD and proceeding with the formation process.

But your direction today, as Councilmember Dickinson explained, is in regards to the fiscal impact analysis, um, not in regards to formation of the district, which we will bring this fiscal impact analysis back to council, and it will be a tool that will be used to inform that conversation.

So thank you.

And if you have any other questions, I'm available.

Okay.

Thank you.

We have a few public comments on this item.

Thank you, Mayor.

I have seven speakers, so I'll read off a few.

Shantae Campbell, Andy Hernandez, Rob Kurt, Justin Wilson.

Please feel free to line up in the middle aisle.

So Shantay, Andy, Rob, then Justin Wilson, and Von John Vignotchi.

Please proceed.

Good afternoon, Mayors and City Council members.

My name is Shansei Campbell.

I'm the community outreach liaison for Roberts Family Development Center.

And I'm here.

Um, and I also stand before you as someone who shows up for North Sacramento families every single day.

I'm here in strong support of the enhanced infrastructure financing district for district two.

EIFD is a policy tool that uses future tax growth, not new taxes, to fund infrastructure.

And for district two, that means finally addressing years of disinvestment that has left our neighborhoods without the basics.

At RFDC, we work closely with scholars and families, and what I see every day is this.

This isn't just about infrastructure, it's about equity and safety.

We have neighborhoods in district two where sidewalks and street lights are missing.

That means that our young people are welcome home in the dark.

Families don't have safe access to community spaces.

Businesses are trying to grow in areas that haven't been properly invested in.

That's just not that's not just inconvenient, that's a real barrier to opportunity.

What makes this important is that it allows us to invest in long overdue improvements without putting additional burden on residents.

At RFDC, we work every single day to shift the trajectory of our scholars, but the reality is their environment matters too.

The streets they walk on, the safety of their neighborhoods, the resources around them, all of that plays a vital role in their future.

This is about making sure our communities finally have access to the same basic infrastructure that other parts of Sacramento already enjoy.

This isn't about asking for more, it's about asking us all to commit to looking further into what's long overdue.

If we are serious about the equity in the city, then we have to be just as serious about investing in district two and communities that have gone without for far too long.

Thank you.

Andy Hernandez, then Rob Kern.

Hi, uh Mayor and members of the council.

I'm in Andy Hernandez.

I'm the president of the North Sac Chamber.

And uh, first of all, I do want to uh thank you very much for considering uh studying this EIFD further and seeing where it takes us.

Uh at the chamber, we've uh had a front row seat to business development in North Sacramento for about a hundred years, a little over a hundred years actually.

Uh, and it is a challenging place to do business for a lot of reasons, and this certainly doesn't help.

Um makes it pretty tough for a big company coming in, say you're looking to build an apartment complex to wonder what kind of nightmare might be under the ground.

Uh, if you doubt that, just ask bridge on Oxford Street.

So I again I very much support this.

I I hope you guys will take a closer look at it.

I think it could make a huge, huge difference for business development uh business development in North Sack.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Rob Kurth, then Justin Wilson.

Mayor, council members, great to be here today.

I'm here to support the adoption of the uh enhanced infrastructure financing district and encourage you all to look make this strategic investment for not just NORSAC but the entire city.

Um, since we lost redevelopment a few years ago now, there's really been very few tools that we can apply to the problems in NORSAC.

Uh, this could be one of them, a good one.

And um, you know, the question always arises why not just let the private sector do it.

And I think what we're seeing is the private sector can't do this.

The hurdle is too high, and they just can't clear it with the unknowns and with the offsite infrastructure, all the things that have to be done.

And of course, the private sector is never gonna address the neighborhood problems that we've always had.

And so, with that, I'm encouraging you to do this.

And like so many things in government, this is one of those boring little details that can make all the difference in the long run for an entire community.

So, I commend your attention to it, and I commend my council member, my neighbor, and my friend Roger Dickinson for fighting through the boring stuff.

Thanks.

Justin Wilson, then John Vignoki.

Good evening, Mayor and members of the council.

I stand before you today to raise concerns about the adoption of an enhanced infrastructure financing district in our city.

While the EFID uh promises long-term infrastructure growth, uh, they rest on a critical assumption that future tax revenues will materialize.

If those projections fall short, it is not developers who bear the burden, it is our general fund, which supports parks, public safety, and other vital services.

Moreover, EFIDs can deepen inequity as benefits may flow to certain developers or neighborhoods while others are left behind.

Robla is one of those neighborhoods that has consistently been left out, and this doesn't change that.

And an EFID for Robla specifically, a special designation for Robla in the proposed EFID, or an EFID that is more specific to projects throughout District 2, makes more sense and doesn't carry the same risk.

What we need is a sustainable equitable growth rooted in realistic revenue expectations and rigorous oversight.

I urge you to reconsider this EFID, the way it's structured.

So we don't, so we do not place an undue risk on our district and city's future.

Thank you.

Three more speakers.

John Mynocchi, Tim Smith, then NAS.

Hi, good afternoon, Mayor and members of the city council, John Vinyoki, uh managing partner of urban capital, and I'm here in support of the EIFD.

I think these are great tools to help spur uh economic development like housing and new uh new projects in our districts.

Uh we like them specifically because of their targeted approach, and we're kind of ring fencing taxes around specific infrastructure investments, which will be serving our city and communities for hundreds of years.

So we think this is a great tool.

Uh, and I know the city's um economic development priorities are number one.

So we'd love to see this happen in North Sacramento and other areas as well.

Thank you.

Tim.

Good afternoon, Mr.

Mayor, uh, members of the city council.

Uh it's a pleasure to see you all again.

Um I'm a resident of this district two and district two's representative on the measure you commission.

I rise today in support of an EFID.

I think my colleagues in support have mostly said it all, but I'd like to remind the council that we're not at a major flexion point.

This is to prepare a report to study this further.

I think that's appropriate at this juncture, and I ask you for a line vote.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

And NAS is our final speaker.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

My name is Nas, and I'm a business owner on Del Paso Boulevard.

I am here today to speak in support of establishing an enhanced infrastructure financing district in North Sacramento.

As someone who works in this community every day, I see firsthand the challenges we face.

They are still areas without sidewalks, proper lighting, and safe infra I can't say that word, infrastructure, whatever.

Connecting people to businesses, schools, and transportation.

That doesn't just affect safety, it affects whether businesses like mine can grow and whether customers feel comfortable coming to our area.

And EIFD gives us a real opportunity to change that.

It allows us to invest in long overdue improvements like road sidewalk and public spaces without raising taxes on residents.

This isn't just about infrastructure, it's about opportunity.

When the area is improved, it attracts new business, supports existing ones, and brings in more customers and investment.

It helps corridors like Del Pasa Boulevard reach their full potential.

I also appreciate that this process includes community input and local oversight.

So people most affected have a voice in what gets prioritized.

At its core, this is about equity.

North Sacramento deserves the same level of investment and public infrastructure as other parts of the city.

I strongly urge you to support the EIFD and invest in the future of a community.

Thank you.

Mayor, that concludes our public comment on this item.

Okay, thank you.

Back to the council.

I know a few council members are punched up, and I want to start on this as well.

And I'd like to go back to the testimony of our uh district two resident and former council member.

Did he leave, Mr.

Kirth?

Oh, there he is, yes.

So I I'd like to somewhat use your example to correct you to help express my support.

So you came up and asked for the adoption of the North Sack EIFD.

So that's not what we're doing today.

Um, we're putting forward a process to evaluate the potential um adoption of a NORSAC EIFD.

And I think that's a big picture here because this is a big deal.

Um we usually do I EIFDs, as this council knows for specific major economic development projects, not an entire area, nor the city uh case in case in point, of course, Aggie Square, um, the rail yards just behind us here.

And and this is a bit of a different approach, and and I I think it's worthy of discussion.

That's there's no free lunch in this business, there's risks and rewards, so we need to evaluate what it means because later today and last week we were talking about cutting services in our city budget because we have a deficit, so we need to grow our economy, so you want to be smart as far as using tools, but the flip side, we don't want to give away property tax dollar for decades that need to pay for those same services.

So this is a balancing act, it's an intriguing idea.

Um I think it's worth evaluating.

Um, and so I I support tonight's action to to take the next steps in doing that, but I think there are still plenty of of uh unanswered questions.

And I think the the biggest issue that council member Dickinson is bringing up, which I applaud and and we've seen here is that there are certain areas that have had um substantial um decades long neglect, and this is one of them, and I argue there are a couple in this in this city where through private sector we haven't been able to solve the challenges, even in the era of redevelopment, you know, sewers improvement, sidewalk, street lighting, basic city services, which without that, it's hard to get such big projects there in the first place.

So um I think it's again is worth the uh the work to go forward and look at this, but I know that there are a lot of unanswered questions on the the overall financial impact in the decades ahead.

So with that, uh council member Gera, Mayor Pro Tem Gera.

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you to Councilmember Dickinson for for this, very proud to be a co-author on this, co-sponsor on this, uh, because without a doubt, without question, uh North Sacramento, since it's incorporation, has faced that level of neglect, and a lot of promises were made that were never delivered.

Uh and I I'm uh very appreciative of my own constituent, you know, Nas coming here, uh, because we know that our district also faces certain challenges, but North Sacramento and that area of district two by far has seen uh the lack of failed promises, and I think this is an opportunity to write that that um that ship because um even while we were successful in certain parts of our city to start and spur economic growth, there has been significant challenges in the North Sac area.

Uh and because of it, even when we had you know a boom type era, there wasn't as much activity in that area.

Uh and so what what is the benefit uh uh an EIFD?

It's that if you prime the pump for anyone who works on an old you know four-cycle motor, you know, you can get it started, right?

That's exactly what we're doing.

And if you don't, then nothing will happen.

Uh so basic math.

If nothing happens, zero of zero is still zero.

So if we make sure that we uh encourage and prime that pump so that there is growth, that's when you see more happening.

Why has it been a challenge?

Because many of the people who are interested in investing and growing in North Sacramento are our own small businesses.

These aren't large hedge funds, these aren't uh, you know, Google's and Amazons that are trying to come in.

The cost of infrastructure, the cost of lighting, sidewalks, before you can even begin to look at the facade or a door or a uh a window on a project or a property, those costs have already made a project unrealistic.

The benefit of an EIFD, benefit of this tool is that we're focusing on areas that need that help by doing something that has historically, you know, historically been the government's responsibility, which is public infrastructure, you know, making sure that the sewer and the water, the electrical run, all those things that are not sexy, but for the purposes of investing in a community to build pride back into a community, to grow that community again as itself.

And I've always been a fan since I watched West Sacramento use it in a way that it's livened their waterfront and made it a destination point.

Uh when that happened, I encouraged our city and pushed for more EIFDs in my own council district.

I wanted one over at the Incenter for Innovation on Stockton Boulevard, and obviously was able to be successful in getting square uh uh EIFD put in and uh proud to have chaired that EIFD and now also helped chair and start the rail yards EIFD.

And it's a tool where it's saying we're we're betting on ourselves.

We know that we're committed to this to growing it, but again, without doing anything, zero of zero is still zero.

So let's prime that pump and let's get that engine started.

So I'm uh proud to support this, and whenever the uh it's a direction item, so I support the direction that council member uh Dickinson has pushed us here.

I think we're gonna find out a new approach saying what can we do in this area?

What could we do?

There's no question that the EIR costs are are expensive, but without doing anything new, we're still gonna be in the same situation.

Very proud to support our North Sack community.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Thank you, Councilmember Maple.

Thank you, Mayor.

I'll keep it short and sweet.

Um, really honored to support this um as a fellow district in the city of Sacramento that has a lot of uh what I call like infrastructure infrastructure equity challenges, you know, sidewalks that go to nowhere, um, really disinvested communities over many many years.

Um I know how challenging it is.

And so um I really appreciate you, Councilmember Dickinson, for taking the initiative to do this in your district.

I'm really excited to see what comes of it because I think it can be used as an example of what we can do in other parts of the city as well.

Um, and so I think this is an important test case.

So with that, I'm happy to support uh whatever motion ends up on the table.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Councilmember Vang.

Thanks, Mayor.

I just wanted to echo, and I know that this is really just about next steps and exploration for the community, and especially for a district that has been left behind.

Um, I know we always hear the saying, you know, uh, when one district does well, everyone else does well.

You all have heard the saying of a rising tide lists all votes.

Um, and I see this toll as not just uh rising tides, but also addressing those with votes that have holes in their boats.

And I see this actually as a tool to make sure that we uplift every single neighborhood.

And so really excited about the next step and looking forward to to seeing what that outcome is so that we can also do this in other parts of the city, especially in neighborhoods that has um been often left behind.

So um looks like you're gonna get the votes, Councilmember Dickinson, and great job.

Thank you.

Vice Mayor Talamantes.

Thank you.

Uh District 2 deserves all the love, attention, and resources the city of Sacramento can get.

So I'm happy to support this item.

And thank you guys for being here.

Okay, back to you, Councilmember.

Uh thanks, Mayor.

And uh this asked for direction, so I don't know if you want a motion to give that direction.

I'm happy to make that that motion if that's if that's your pleasure.

Um, but in doing so, I I do want to thank those uh who have come to speak.

Uh I want to thank my fellow council members for the sentiments uh that they've they've expressed.

Uh I think we'll see as we develop this uh that the opportunity here is significant.

Uh and I want to thank the work already that the staff has has done, especially Amanda and Leslie Mike and others who've who've uh been pushed by me to uh uh to uh explore this opportunity as as expeditiously as uh as possible.

We have put, as I think has been mentioned, uh economic development at the top of our list of priorities.

And if we don't grow our local economy, we are not gonna grow out of the budget challenges we face and the daily challenges we face in providing the kind of quality and character to the community that that we aspire to and that our residents deserve.

This is a manner of doing just that.

And I think we'll see that demonstrated as we go through the analysis.

That's why I'm so happy um that we're taking this step, and I look forward to seeing uh the results of the work that we do.

Okay, thank you, Councilmember.

There is no need for a motion here looking for direction.

I think ample direction was given to to continue, and um we'll look forward to the response.

Thank you.

Next item.

May we now move to item 15, which is a city auditors work plan for fiscal year 26-27.

All right, good afternoon, Mayor McCarty and members of the city council.

I'm Farish Darari, your city auditor.

Uh, with me today is Kevin Christensen, my assistant director who uh helped me put this work plan together.

The recommendation that is before you today is to review my proposed work plan for fiscal year 26-27 and pass a motion approving it.

So before we go into the details, I want to do a brief overview of the agenda for today and note that the work plan development process was a little bit different this year.

In past years, my office would typically present our work plan to budget and audit for acceptance and approval that would provide some input and um uh feedback and then submit it for council for final approval.

They would provide some input and feedback and then submit it for council for final approval.

But this year I structured the process in a way that afforded the budget and audit committee a greater opportunity to provide some input on the audits that ultimately made it onto the work plan and some came off the work plan.

This submitted work plan was finalized based on budget and audit committee's deliberation and direction.

So I'll start by briefly reviewing some of the audits and projects that our office has completed and those that we expect to complete by the end of this current fiscal year, and then I'll walk through some projects that are currently on the fiscal year 25-26 work plan that we have not yet initiated, but we plan to begin before the end of the fiscal year.

And then, as you know, the work plan is developed with the intention of trying to initiate all approved projects during the fiscal year.

However, over the past couple of years, we have experienced some vacancies and transitions, so we've been trying to catch up with those.

In addition, audits often can take longer than anticipated or unplanned work, such as investigations and emergence emerging issues can require us to redirect some staff resources.

Because of this, there are some projects on the current work plan that we will not be able to initiate before the end of the fiscal year.

Those projects typically roll over to the next work plan.

However, the budget and audit committee did recommend removing some of those projects to make some room for new priorities.

Finally, I'll walk through the six new projects that were submitted for consideration and selected for the upcoming fiscal year 26-27 work plan.

And these projects were developed through discussions with council members, conversations with the executive team, and the results of our internal risk assessment process.

So this fiscal year we've completed our cannabis business operations tax audit and baseline funding verification for the Sacramento Children's Fund.

We also recently released our 2026 community survey, and we anticipate completing the following projects before the end of the fiscal year.

The audit of emergency medical services, evidence and property division, 2025 workforce cyber city and salary trends, Department of Utilities energy use related to power purchase agreements and solar shares, and the cost and outcomes of the city's homeless shelters.

By the end of the fiscal year in June, we do anticipate that we'll still have the following projects in progress.

An audit of the city's transient occupancy tax, which we do anticipate completing early next fiscal year, a storm drainage fund review, the potential costs savings and revenue recovery audit services of the city's telecommunications and utilities, and an audit of EEO complaint investigation and resolution practices.

And as we complete some of our projects prior to the end of the fiscal year, we also anticipate initiating these the following audits before the end of the year.

The audit of pedestrian safety and the city's radio systems.

We also plan to start our project regarding the comparative cannabis code analysis and part two of our DOU energy use audit focused on fleet electrification.

And we also might be able to initiate one of the new projects that will cover for the fiscal year 26-27 work plan.

As I mentioned before, we have some recurring projects that our office conducts, such as the annual audit of cannabis business operations tax revenue and the baseline funding verification for the Sacramento Children's Fund.

These projects keep our office, uh entire office busy from September through December.

The City Council has also requested our office to regularly conduct diversity assessment for fiscal year 26-27.

We'll be conducting our triennual diversity review of employment applications, hires, and separations.

But with that, the city council does have the authority to change the frequency of the diversity reviews or director office to no longer conduct them.

These are projects that were included in our fiscal year 25-26 work plan that will be rolled over to the next year.

The budget and audit committee chose to roll over the illegal cannabis cultivation audit, but did direct us to put it on pause for fiscal year 26-27 work plan and have it come back for reconsideration in our 27-28 work plan.

But we are still put keeping it on our work plan for now.

And then these projects were included in our fiscal year 26 2526 work plan, but the budget and audit committee recommended we remove them from our 27 work plan.

The reason for this is the special event permitting process is going through some changes, so the committee thought it would be better to hold off on the audit for that.

And then the code enforcement night team audit you'll see was replaced with a broader audit of code enforcement.

And then the BOT review was removed as it appears the finance department already did some of this work during the recent BOT ballot measure work.

And I'm gonna go through the six new audits considered and added by the budget and audit committee to my upcoming work plan.

Note that the committee added all of the proposed projects that were submitted.

So the first audit is another audit of the city's homeless response.

If you recall, in our preliminary report on the city's homeless response, we identified several areas that we could audit.

This is one of those areas that's focused on the city's homeless response protocol and the effectiveness of our interdepartmental coordination efforts.

The audit will evaluate whether a response protocol and department coordination is operating efficiently and effectively.

We'll also review response times and resource deployment and alignment with the federal emergency management agency's national incident management system framework.

The next new audit is of the police department's overtime practices.

The objective of this audit will be to assess whether the department's overtime policies and practices are aligned with applicable laws, labor agreements, city policies, and best practices, and whether the department consistently follows the established policies and procedures.

The audit will also evaluate the effect of staffing vacancies and other operational factors on overtime usage.

The next audit is of community development department's code enforcement operations.

This audit will determine whether the city investigates code enforcement complaints in a timely manner and effectively resolve identified violations in accordance with applicable laws, policies, and service standards.

And as I previously mentioned, this audit replaces the code enforcement night team audit and covers the division more broadly, which could include a review of that night team as well.

This assessment will determine whether the city of Sacramento has designed, implemented, and prioritized policies, street designs, land use strategies, and capital investments that make downtown Sacramento safe and walkable.

Depending on what you'd like to get out of this assessment, this project might need to be contracted out, and if that is the case, we would need to identify funding for the project.

So the budget and audit committee tentatively selected this project with the understanding that we would come back with a more detailed scope and cost for council approval.

And the next audit is of Department of Public Works Urban Forestry Operations and Maintenance.

This audit would assess whether the city's tree inspection and trimming program is effectively and efficiently designed and operating to protect public safety and meet service level expectations.

The audit will evaluate whether service requests are prioritized and completed timely based on risk, whether the tree registry is complete and reliable, whether inspections and trimming occur within established cycles, and whether work is scheduled for geographic efficiency, and whether staffing levels and skill mix are aligned with workload demand and backlog prevention.

And then the last audit is an review of financial management and budgeting practices.

As you heard during recent council meetings, several of you and the city manager have expressed a desire to get an external forensic audit of the city's financial management framework, budgeting practices, financial reporting processes, and internal controls.

Um, as you know, the city does receive an annual audit of its financial statements that includes an assessment of internal controls, and this project would go beyond that annual review and do a more thorough assessment of our financial management framework.

Um, this audit could be contracted out but managed by my office.

And I've had more recent conversations with the city manager, and we did uh agree that the best course of action for this project might be for our office to do a detailed internal assessment of the city's finances and practices, and then come back to city council with any areas that we believe might benefit from external and external friends that got it.

Um that would help ensure that a more targeted and cost effective forensic audit of high risk areas are done, and I would come back to the city council for more detailed scope and costs for uh the council to approve.

Those are all the new audits added to the work plan.

Uh, one final note is that the proposed work plan doesn't reflect uh any potential impacts of a 15% budget balancing strategies submitted by my office.

Um, if those strategies are ultimately selected by the council, we would lose one senior analyst position, which would impact uh the work project uh work plan that we just went over.

Um in addition, one of the proposed strategies is discontinuing the community survey, which would impact future work plans beginning in fiscal year 27-28.

And this concludes my presentation, and I'm happy to answer any questions.

Okay, thank you.

Do we have public comments on this item?

I have no speakers on this agenda item.

Okay, Councilmember Dickinson.

Uh thanks, Mayor.

I think that uh our auditor has outlined uh the discussion that we had at the committee uh uh well.

Uh we recognize that uh there were uh a lot of requests, there's a lot on the plate, and it's a challenging time, particularly in in light of the the budget considerations.

Uh I would make just uh a couple comments that that I think um for the most part reinforce what the auditor had to say.

We we did think that the night code enforcement audit could could be folded into the code enforcement audit overall, and it made some more sense to do a comprehensive audit of code enforcement than than to um single out night code and code enforcement uh also from a uh from a cost standpoint from an efficiency standpoint.

So that's that's one thing I just wanted to note.

And then um uh as as for issues discussed uh with respect to the to the uh the budget um audit and uh the two-way street uh audit for downtown.

Um we thought it was likely that would take external uh resources to to complete complete those.

Um and so the suggestion of the internal assessment first on the budget uh process, uh I think certainly certainly makes sense.

Um there is real interest, uh I think among the committee members in the in the analysis related to to downtown, and there may be a different way to do that.

That maybe that's not an audit, maybe that's through planning.

But um the the potential here, I think we were all uh one degree or another inspired by what we heard at the state of the downtown from Jeff Speck when he when he when he talked uh um about the potential and the possibilities.

So if there's another way to accomplish that, that uh that would be great.

But of course, planning has a has a full load too.

So uh it is something we do think is is worth pursuing, and again, folds into our economic development as well as our community enhancement uh uh strategies.

Uh I I will just uh anecdotally note that if a fire truck wants to get from 13th and and I to 9th and J, it has to go down.

Truck has to go down to 9th and take a left turn and go around and to say the 10th and J and come back around, uh, which frankly uh can take the time that may make the difference in saving a life.

So that there's more than just the economic uh uh aspects of this, there's there's more than than uh community aspects.

There's there's potentially even uh aspects that relate to to the very life and and welfare of uh residents and visitors to to Sacramento.

So uh those were some of the some of the flavor of the comments at the at the committee, mayor.

Thank you.

Other council members seeing none, uh councilmember bank.

Thanks, Mayor.

Um, I just wanted to take this moment to thank Roger Dickinson as chair of budget and audit and the entire committee um for um all your great work to get this item uh in front of us with our city auditor and also just want to say thank you for including the audit of police overtime.

aspects that relate to to the very life and and welfare of uh residents and visitors to to Sacramento so uh th those were some of the some of the flavor of the comments at the at the committee mayor okay thank you other council members seeing none council member bang thanks mayor um I just wanted to take this moment to thank Roger Dickinson as chair of budget and audit and the entire committee um for um all your great work to get this item uh in front of us with our city auditor and also just want to say thank you for including the audit of police overtime I think especially as we face a budget deficit it's really important that we oversee overtime practices to ensure our resources is being used efficiently and responsibly um and in alignment with our broader uh fiscal priorities and so I just really want to thank the committee um and thank the city auditor for including that as part of your scope of work for next year so thank you so much and but by the way I'll move approval of the uh of the auditor's work plan second all right if I may Mayor yes um I will not make long ones because I did during our budget and audit committee meetings I don't need to repeat myself but um I think you did an excellent job of um synthesizing what we said and um I do want to note something that I said there I want to say here too is if we want our fabulous city auditor to be able to complete this work plan of these really important items um including everything from homelessness to um police overtime and and every code enforcement and everything in between I think it's really incumbent upon us to also reflect on that as we go through our budget process I know that we've um asked all of our departments to look at what cuts look like for them but I also know particularly a lot of our offices that report directly to the mayor and council um are already operating at basically a shoestring budget um and really couldn't withstand any additional staffing cuts or changes um and I think that's true of a lot of those departments I don't um but also especially true of the city auditor and so I think if we're going to approve this work plan today we must keep that in mind because if we make any cuts to the city auditors department I would suspect some of this work uh would not be able to move forward and so just want to put that in context of the budget and stuff with that thank you.

Thank you.

No other comments we have a motion and a second to approve your work plan for 26 27 all those in favor please say aye.

Aye.

Any nose or abstentions hearing none absence mayor we now move to item 16 which is a contract purchasing 35 tiny homes to expand Roseville Road North campus good afternoon mayor and council Brian Pedro and director department of community response um here today requesting approval to suspend competitive bidding and execute a contract with uh boss cubes to purchase an additional 35 tiny homes for our Roseville Road campus uh this will be using the encampment uh resolution fund uh grant funding and uh if approved today we will still have to go back to HD HCD to uh amend our budget to ship funding to add the additional 35 homes um so everybody is clear on this as we talk about budget these days um again this is not general fund purchasing these tiny homes this is an encampment resolution fund that we applied for in uh 2024 um i will uh take a minute to brag on the city and our success with uh applying for uh ERF funding uh over the uh between the combination of our uh Xtre Broadway that we did in uh conjunction with um SAC County um our street to housing and this Roseville Road project um in um we're about three percent of our homeless population statewide and we are um in 24 we had a six percent uh ERF funding and in 23 we had nine percent so we're double to triple uh in receiving ERF funding than we are in our overall um homelessness in the state uh this particular one was uh selected for the uh northern uh parkway bike trail uh at the time in 2023 when we did that count there was about 497 individual people that uh we made contact with that were homeless in that area and uh this uh funding is for um street outreach the tiny homes and then um case management and housing navigation uh the um the funds for this were received in 2025 and there's a quick uh expenditure on this it's a hundred percent obligated by uh february twenty seven and then fully expended by uh February of twenty eight so uh in uh following the completion we opened in February of this year we've been open about a month and a half uh just to get an idea of how busy we've been 71 of the units are filled already uh with 89 people so we did bring in some couples um and I think to note is that because this um the ERFs are for specific areas and the area that we selected um there are uh many of the individuals that live in this area that want to stay in the area and so this has been very successful in keeping within um uh the area that they want to be in and have a shelter available to them um I also uh like the uh ERF and I think it's probably the direction we're going because it is more um

There are many of the individuals that live in this area that want to stay in the area.

And so this has been very successful in keeping within the area that they want to be in and have a shelter available to them.

I also uh like the uh ERF, and I think it's probably the direction we're going because it is more um specific to a business model plan where you select an area, uh you select and determine your funding needed, what your goal is that you're trying to accomplish, and have some key metrics and a specific action plan to uh expend the money.

So uh I am particularly um fond of this model versus a hap, which is just a general spending of the funding.

Um so at the time of purchase when we purchased the initial 135 tiny homes, um, we used boss cubes.

They were uh willing to negotiate with us, and uh, because we negotiated down that price of our initial purchase of 135, that saved us 337,000 on the initial purchase, which freed up that money to purchase the additional 35.

Uh we also anticipated a possible expansion when we first did the build out to be able to receive 135 homes, and that meant we uh had a um the infrastructure of a um uh electrical transformer large enough to uh supply energy to 135 homes, and then also set up the fencing that would be inside to allow for 35 more additional homes at the site.

Uh some data that we pulled, so this is most of the data is from the south side of the campus that we've had opened.

Um so the data over the last year, we sheltered uh total of 303 uh individuals.

There were uh 166 total exits that were considered positive.

Um 64 were to permanent housing.

Um, the way that the breakdown is on this, so the exit to improved situations that total 73 is the 64 included into that.

Um the other nine individuals were uh exited into either a recuperative care or skilled nursing facility or some other kind of uh rehabilitative rehabilitation services.

Um the other side of this, the negative exits would be 93, which is about um 56 percent.

So we have a 44 percent uh permanent housing exit rate from this site, uh double to triple our non or our congregate shelters uh if we compare this to Meadow View and X Street, and uh this is a uh challenging uh demographic to bring in straight from the street, and they uh a lot of them not aren't necessarily gonna stay the first time around, but they will come back.

So we're that's where you see the uh the overturn of uh serving 300 people through this site.

Um and then uh lastly uh I would say that uh that we don't forget that amongst all of our contracts and negotiations uh meetings and funding that we are actually here to help and serve people to provide a better place for them to live to stabilize and to move on with their their lives.

And um is somebody that uh has been with us for a couple of years.

Um he actually started it over here on Jenth.

Uh we got him housed into our Roseville Road shelter.

We got him stabilized, he moved on to live with his brother, and his brother actually had substance problems, and Tom did not want to live with his brother in that environment and decided to come back out on the street where we picked him up a second time, and we have them at Roosevelt Road again.

Um he and his dog Zeus are doing fantastic.

They're uh clean and sober, and we're working with him to try and get him housed uh locally and work with a um to get him his full disability that he isn't currently getting.

Um so with that uh I'm open to any questions or comments.

Okay, thank you.

We have one comment from the public.

Uh Michael Melton.

Mr.

Pedro is a liar.

He looked me in my face, shook my hand, told me last week he would have Nathan get more RV out the uh the next day.

Mr.

Pedro is crooked.

He uh has a city's pocketbook and he wants to take the money out.

He wants to uh only help the 55 and up with SSI checks, and uh is corrupting the money that was given to help the homeless.

Not to increase your profits, but uh it's not it's nothing humanitarian about this guy.

Uh he the money that was donated to help the homeless, he's monopolizing it and uh redirecting it to money uh he's using he must be embezzling the money.

He's not a good person, he's not building apartments because uh you see the guy he he just he left the program, but he didn't leave to an apartment, he left to a uh, and he's saying all the people are just leaving it to programs, and he's saying, Oh, let's get uh let's let's let's build a hundred, let's build 35 more of these things.

Give me some more money so I could build some more of these things.

It's not even halfway filled up, or it might be half what was halfway 56 percent?

What's what's what's uh 70 75 out of uh 135, y'all?

Okay, okay, yeah, people getting out again put out in the streets, there's no apartments.

So let me get back to it.

So he's uh making these tough sheds for short-term relief, uh monetary gain, uh they're senseless.

Uh there's there's no home, uh, there's no bathrooms, there's no showers, everybody got bad bladders.

I'm sure those same people will rather be in apartments.

Uh fire uh fire this guy.

Um he shouldn't be trying this hard uh to get tiny homes moved along, uh something's wrong, and somebody's doing something with the money.

Why is there not apartments getting built?

Why I've been on housing uh and and been accepting and say I've been waiting for my keys for over a year, because people like this guy right here that don't want to build no apartments who want to keep on making little small term short-term relief that ain't helping nobody.

Thank you, Mr.

Pedro.

Oh, and can you get my RV out?

You want to tell the people again that you shook my hand, look me in my face, told me I'll get it out for you, I'll call Nathan, and I have him get it out tomorrow.

So if you lie to me, you'll lie to all your comments.

Your time is complete.

Mr.

Mayor, I have no more speakers on this item.

Okay, thank you.

Start with Councilmember Dickinson.

Uh thanks, Mayor.

Uh Brian.

I I did have a question for you.

I uh that occurred to me while you were making your comments, and that's um for the the 35 additional tiny homes.

The focus will continue to be on those coming off the the Sacramento Northern Bike Trail.

Is that correct?

Correct.

Uh yes, because it's uh ERF funding that's specifically slated for that uh bike trail and surrounding area.

Okay.

All right.

Um that's I just wanted to confirm confirm that point.

Uh and I'm not I'm not looking at the moment, but I'll make I'll make the motion to uh approve.

Thank you.

Councilmember Garrett.

Uh thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

I'll go ahead and second the item.

And again, this is uh the fastest way to get people out off the street and into a place of stabilization.

I wanted to just uh only punch up to say thank you to your uh DCR team who've been out on the street.

I spent some time with them on Stockton Boulevard, and uh uh not only uh were they uh extremely professional caring, but uh engaged uh with folks who are needing help and wanted a pathway and set times up for follow-up back again with them.

And uh one I appreciate that commitment to making sure that we uh we make a change there, and we've seen it.

We see the work that you've done on Stockton Boulevard, and we appreciate that.

And we have more definitely to work to do, and I appreciate the fact that this is helping the uh the bike trail in that uh in the northern part of the the city.

So thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Thank you, Councilmember Kaplan.

Mr.

Pedro, just a couple of questions of the 12.4 million that we got in ERF funding, how long is that funding supposed to last through?

Uh so we have uh obligated through fully expended by 28.

Um obligated by uh February of 27.

So it will get us through our contract uh through I believe it's October or November of 28.

Okay, and so because currently we have the gathering in that is providing uh the services and we approve that contract for 2.774 million esque, but that only gets us through the end of 26.

So is there still money left over that will allow services to go through 28?

Yes, we are projected through 27.

And then approximately um how much is it costing us you know per year?

Because if we look at this and we know it's ERF funding and this ends in 28, we also have to acknowledge if we are continuing in this structural budget deficit, where does the source of funding come from and and how much does that cost?

Sure.

So it is about the same cost, whether we're congregate or non-congregate as far as X Street and Meadow View, what our cost is for having 100 in X Street or 100 MetaView versus 100 at Roseville Road.

Uh it's about almost identical cost, actually.

Um so we're we're as lean as we can, other than going to a uh tent model of putting people in tents.

Um basically when the ERF funding runs out, and if we don't have any more, it should come out of our general fund.

Well, HAP still, we still have half funding.

If the state funds it if the state state releases and funds it, sure.

Um so it's noted that the Roseville Road program provides three meals a day, case management and linkage to both surf service social services and housing navigation to insert ensure the success of the participants.

Is this same level of service gonna be provided to the tiny home sites that uh the mayor uh and city manager are putting forward?

Yes, it's the same uh all supportive homeless services that we have intact for all of our shelters, it's the same services that we provided.

So are you saying the gathering in is gonna be brought in and operate the tiny homes?

No, the the model is different in the microcommunities than it is with this, in that these are the service providers are all service pro all of service provision is there at the site with the microcommunities, there'll be case management at the site.

And if somebody a client needs the services, then the service will be provided at that point.

So in reality, it's different because you said it's the same, but but gathering in is at Roseville Road, and we will have no on-site operator like the gathering in on the tiny homes.

Uh you're correct in that the clientele is also a different as a much more stable client that will be in the microcommunities versus bringing someone straight off the street into this uh community.

And then I want to back up because I I I missed it.

Um I went to law school and math was not my favorite.

Um, because in in reading through the report, it says that you had for Roseville Road, 64 have exited to permanent housing, which is about a 21% success rate ending up in permanent housing, but you said there was 44.

Can you walk through those numbers again?

Because I don't understand that.

Sure.

Let me pull that.

All right.

So we had um 166 total exits, and out of the total exits, uh 93 were negative exits.

So we're about 50-50 on our exits.

So of the 50 stairs, then 64 went to permanent housing.

Um, and then we did the breakout of improved situation, which was another nine people that went to skilled nursing recuperative care.

Okay, so how did 21% get to 44 percent with just the addition of nine additional people?

It's the 44 percent is the half that of the months 66 that exited to positive.

So you said there was a hundred and hundred and sixty-six and then it's so 73.

Okay, um, thank you for explaining that.

And then um have we looked at how quickly we feel because our city's motel voucher program.

I know you're looking to switch, um, but we did an audit and that says it cost approximately 8300 per program participant.

What is the breakout of cost here of these um the Roseville Road model versus our um motel voucher program?

Uh well it would if we just went off of straight averages that we served uh uh over 300 people in the year that we're showing data for it's uh about uh nine thousand per person because our contract was 2.7 okay.

Um and then the question becomes uh we know that the city manager has authority to approve contracts with these uh temporary emergency shelters and it hasn't doesn't have to come to council.

Why is this an exemption and coming to council because I haven't had the ability to approve or disapprove the tiny homes or any other emergency shelters?

Yeah, this one I I want I want to be make sure that we have clarity to not only council but uh to our citizens, and especially as we talk about budget.

Um we used a Boss Cube agreement when we made the initial purchase for the initial 135 tiny homes.

Um that was 1.7 million, and then we had that same Boscube agreement available to us.

Uh and we purchased the tiny homes, the bathroom showers, laundry for the micro communities with the using the same purchase or the same Boscube agreement because we had it open at the time.

And so though they're two different projects, we had the agreement opened.

If you put those two 1.7 for the 135 homes and the 3.2 million that we did that we purchased the for the three microcommunities, that's 4.9 million.

And that agreement expired, and so we opened up a new agreement with uh Boss Cubes to purchase this 435.

And I wanted to make sure that everybody was clear that we were not exceeding the five million, that these are two separate projects.

Um we used two separate agreements and uh ensure that it didn't look like we're splitting contracts to make it look like we're under the five million dollars.

And so that's why we're bringing it.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

Um council members, uh, the vice mayor, council member Jennings, and I put in a proposal um to kind of have that discussion of whether the city manager should have that carte bonch authority and whether these contracts should all come to council.

Um at this point, I have not gotten an indication from our city manager or mayor that it'll be referred to committee for up for discussion or even consideration.

Um I get that this is here, and I am supportive of what's happening with the RF funding and and Roseville Road, but at this time, because um not all council members are given the authority or ability to to discuss this uh when a proposal has been put in, I will be voting uh no on this motion a second.

Okay, we have a motion and a second on this.

This was proposed to be on the consent calendar, and I I asked that we uh discuss it because it is a weighty topic, and uh just the big picture as you alluded to.

Uh this is as we've learned the most cost effective.

And taking a step back, you know, for five six years, the city has been in the business of doing homeless response after decades of saying that's the county's job.

And so I think with with your and your department's strong leadership, we're kind of you know flying the plane and fixing it at the same time for the early years, and we figured out what works and what doesn't work, um, what's most uh cost effective, and this one has shown that it is, and more importantly, um it's been most impactful because the look the population coming off the streets don't have a 900 batting average uh moving on from any homeless facility to success.

And so we have to deal with the population that has a plethora of issues going to our facilities, and uh this is of all the programs, this is one that has the most impact on people looking for success, either permanent housing or a better outcome than this.

And I know you've told us this, but I I want to let the council know that I went last week and spent two hours there seeing the work firsthand, talking to residents, ask them why they came here, and they described the same issues that you're alluding to tonight.

So uh I want to thank you for uh uh expanding capacity and and focusing on effective homeless response.

We're not done clearly, but uh we're moving in the right direction.

So thank you for your work.

And with that, we have a motion a second.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any no's or abstentions?

Hearing one and one absence.

Thank you.

Mayor, we now move to item 17, which is early budget work session, budget context and city department reports on departmental budgets, reduction strategies and potential impacts, and that's the Office of the Public Safety Accountability, City Attorney, City Auditor, City Clerk, and City Treasurer.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Mayor, Council members, members of the public.

I'm Pete Coletto, the city's uh finance director.

And today we are conducting your fourth early budget work session where you'll hear from the uh remaining appointed officers.

I will start off with a quick overview for OPSA.

Again, we're looking to address our city structural deficit.

We are forecasting a 66.2 million dollar deficit we have to close in the coming fiscal year.

And as you can see, apps in action, those deficits will continue to grow.

This is the baseline balancing plan that staff has put put forward.

It's more than the 66.2.

And uh that's just due to a number of pending factors.

We'll talk about them later, but the main one is we are in active negotiations with our labor groups.

Uh so I'll kick off the department presentations with a very brief overview of OPSA.

Um, Oaks' mission is to enhance relationships between the City of Sacramento's public safety employees and the community they serve.

Uh their budget is roughly two million dollars, and it supports 11 full-time equivalent uh positions.

Uh as far as the reductions in the baseline plan, uh, there is the elimination of four positions, uh, two filled and two vacant, uh, and the impact would be the workload having to be divided by the remaining staff.

And if there are further council questions, we can uh work with the OPSA team and get you those answers.

And with that, I will uh hand it off to the city attorney's office.

Good afternoon, Mayor McCarty, uh Vice Mayor Talamantes, Mayor Pro Tem Guerra, Council members, and my colleagues, uh City Manager Marakisha Smith, and our city clerk uh Mindy Cuppy.

It's a pleasure to address you from this side of the dais.

Um, we're in the back room providing you legal advice, and uh I get to address you in front.

Um statement in the city attorney's office is to provide the highest uh quality legal services to the city.

Uh per the city charter, the city attorney serves as the exclusive legal counsel to the city, including all offices, departments, boards, and commissions.

Our structure is that we are currently 63 full-time employees.

Unlike other departments, uh, with the single subject focus, the city attorney's office handles assignments and legal services for every department, officer, board, commission, and agency within the city.

Uh because we touch everything in the city from contracts and municipal bonds to land use and public safety.

Our office is the central line of defense and protecting the city from liability.

Uh operational divisions to manage the breath.

Sorry.

Operational divisions to manage this breath.

We have four operational divisions and one management team.

This team supervises 32 attorneys managing diverse portfolios, the supported by a dedicated staff of legal secretaries and paralegals who are essential to our high volume operations.

I have some of my administrative team here today.

They are the backbone of the office, uh, ensuring we handle roughly 10,000 legal assignments annually across every city department.

I'm sure you've seen some of them, so I really appreciate their work in uh working on this budget.

As a service-oriented department, the vast majority of our budget is salaries and benefits.

Uh our primary product is legal expertise and risk management.

To meet the 15% budget reduction, we have identified 1.47 million dollars in uh potential savings.

This would require uh elimination of seven total uh FTEs.

And the breakdown is the breakdown would be level two, two vacant FTEs, and level four, four vacant and one filled FTE.

Uh we strongly advise against these reductions for the following reasons.

Uh a primary component of these cuts involves deleting two senior deputy city attorney positions.

And we cannot simply underfill these positions with junior staff or paralegals or legal secretaries to manage complex legal litigation.

Our outside council fees are significantly more expensive this year.

In 2005, we handled just 26 tort cases were sent to outside council firms, costing the city over $1 million.

We currently have 50 tort cases with outside counsel due to staffing losses and delays in hiring seasoned litigation attorneys.

And this is the visual of what's happening.

By adding two experienced litigators at a cost of approximately $516,000 for them, we could bring in 50 cases in-house and save the city roughly 1.48 million dollars in outside council fees.

For the purpose of saving uh city money.

So I would like to continue our historic practice of bringing cases in-house to a point of about 95 to 99 percent of cases in-house in the future.

Uh our advisory and general counsel divisions.

Last year, 15 attorneys handled 6,443 assignments, roughly 430 assignments per attorney.

These teams also staff 189 city boards and commissions.

Uh losing even one attorney in these divisions will delay advice on critical priorities for this council, including addressing homelessness, land use, water rights, and major projects like the I Street Bridge and the rail yards.

As all of you know, uh we've had an unprecedented immigration workload in this office.

Beyond traditional municipal law, the current federal administration has created an entirely new and complex legal landscape that our office must navigate daily.

The CAO is also a partner in public safety.

Since 2005 25, we have successfully obtained 72 gun violence restraining orders.

This work has directly removed 72 firearms and 56 magazines from the streets.

Police and public works, as you can see, generate the most assignments for our office.

And here's a visual of how the proposed reduction looks to reach the 1.4 million dollars.

As you can see, it not only deletes positions but also reduces senior positions to deputy city attorney ones and twos and the salary potentials, which makes it extremely difficult to uh find uh and recruit seasoned litigators and retain seasoned litigators in in the legal market.

So in closing, our recommendation is to maintain the current level of CAO budget and staff to bring litigation cases in-house for significant cost savings and keep the office fully staffed to address the constant flow of federal government, federal grant conditions and controversial executive orders.

Focus on recruiting and retaining top talent to build a leadership pipeline, uh proactively partner with departments to prevent claims before they become expensive lawsuits, and track measurable savings from reduced outside council reliance.

If you have any questions, uh me and my admin team are available to answer them for you.

Thank you so much.

We will actually take questions by department at this time.

Uh so you want to go first, Mayor Partumagera?

Uh no questions here, just maybe comments.

Uh first of all, one, um, you know, I think uh the the city attorney's proposal here has put forward uh a um I think a recommendation that looks at cost recovery and also uh addressing I think the significant amount of costs with outside council.

Uh and I think move this this uh this focus on putting in um uh a path to developing our own expertise um and managing the litigation, I think is gonna save us in the long run.

Uh particularly I think the number of settlements um uh if we become more effective at litigation in-house are are gonna be uh a much better approach.

So I I appreciate that that uh point there.

Uh the other piece is the you know uh the fact that we have to have a focus now on the federal government for these executive orders and defending ourselves and the money that was already appropriated to us by Congress, I think is critical.

I mean, limiting that defense, we would lose money just by saving by uh trying to uh eliminate that FTE.

So pennywise and pound foolish.

So I think that's an important piece.

And frankly, I think it's disturbing that uh federal government's approach is to try to uh get cities to turn on their residents uh to uh to address their exchange.

So I think one continuing that um uh I want to thank uh uh city attorney your with your staff.

I appreciate Jordan's work on the issue on uh uh that we're doing on homelessness and on CARES court to look at ways we're looking uh at addressing guardianship as well, and also the new rules on gravely disabled uh uh opportunities to make sure that people are are in care uh much faster.

So I'd like to, you know, one uh ensure that as we move forward in this process, we don't jeopardize the work that we've done, uh particularly this the idea of even looking at the probate code and moving forward.

So to me, I think the where we look at our priority, if we can focus on those uh very costly uh issues associated with homelessness that the city attorney's offices do, and I think that's a a priority for me.

So I think for the for the council's point of view when it comes to the budget, the the savings and the ability for us to reduce her liability are are here forward.

So I'll I'll leave it there and say I appreciate the presentation and the thought process and and looking at the evolution of AI and where it has benefited us.

Um I'm interested to see that the test cases on AI.

Uh I'd like to see hey, oh, are there failures in in uh in in how it cites codes, you know?

Um, you know, the issue of the delusional uh AI and see if there are even you know uh making obviously someone has to go back and look at that lit review, but I'd like to see that that uh that benefit cost analysis.

Thank you, Vice Mayor.

Thank you.

Uh quick question.

Uh last year we eliminated or we it was one time uh eliminated two senior deputy positions to be able to fund the fuel network in last year's budget.

Did you add those positions back in to contribute towards this year, or did you just take them out entirely?

No, they were they were what basically were backfilled, uh underfilled.

Yeah.

So they should revert back to senior positions.

So they were underfilled to like DC ones and twos.

Okay.

But now they're gonna for a cost savings, but now they're gonna revert back July 1st.

Uh okay.

So they're back into your budget for this year.

That that would be the proposal, assuming you approve it.

Yeah.

Got it.

That would be that would be the proposal.

Okay.

Councilmember Dickinson.

Does anybody shepardize the case anymore, Gustavo?

Artificial intelligence trust.

AI does it all right or wrong.

Yeah.

I wanted to uh spend a moment on the uh proposal uh to uh engage two more litigators and bring uh the 50 cases that are uh being handled by outside council inside for that uh I'm not looking at the chart, but I think you're at about 1.4 to 1.5 million in savings.

The um the the question I have is uh uh uh one reason that the office goes to outside council as does any governmental office's expertise.

And so uh I just uh uh wonder the extent to which uh those two people if were you to have them as litigators could could handle 50 cases, not in volume necessarily, but in subject subject matter.

Are the have you done any assessment uh to uh think about how many of those cases, if any, you would you would say, gee whiz we need to specialize counsel for the for that purpose, and so I need to take those off the roster of what I really think could could come back in-house.

Yeah, we have that analysis.

And we do have some cases, for example, sequel cases, right, that are complex.

Um we'll farm those out.

This 50 is really the torts that we're talking about.

Oh, those are the slip and falls, the motor vehicle accidents, the ones we can keep in-house.

We don't have to farm those out.

They're not super complex.

Um, although within those 50, there are some that are complex.

There's particularly employment litigation, right?

Sometimes those trials can be two weeks.

Um but we can handle those.

Uh but again, we need those seasoned litigators to be uh junior just can't do that, right?

Okay, so you have looked at subject matter, yeah.

And that that's really was that question.

So then the the follow-on question is maybe this is also a question for Pete as well.

Where does this fit?

Is this uh in the in the mix of considerations for uh budget deliberations uh from the from the Department of Finances point of view with the with the city uh attorney, or is Gustavo making this, and there it is, it lies out there, but yeah, so um you know we haven't reviewed those numbers, but you know, Gustavo has mentioned it, and we're I so first I love when departments come uh forward with ideas that could be potential savings.

We haven't vetted it out yet, but we have um you know committed to working with Gustavo and his team uh to do so.

You know, I I do want to point out that I think a lot of the savings, um, if it's uh real savings would probably come from the risk fund.

And so we would have to also see um you know how how that looks.

Our risk fund is already very underfunded, um, and so how much if any savings could accrue to the general fund in the short to medium term, uh we would need to do that analysis, and we'll do that analysis with the city attorney's office.

So so um uh are you saying that that the council outside council working on cases is uh being paid at least in significant part by the risk fund?

Uh so you know, just hearing what those cases are uh that uh that the city attorney is talking about, to me, a lot of those would be out of the risk fund.

Okay, but again, we need to look and look at the data.

I assume the lawyers are getting paid out of the general fund, but the but the results were getting paid out of the risk fund.

But you're but you're saying it covers the lawyers generally speaking as well.

Uh it can, yes.

Yeah, okay.

Well, I I mean I do think it's it's worth uh assessing this.

It's uh uh it is an interesting uh proposal, and it's probably contrary to the way most governmental lawyers' offices go.

They usually look at more contracting out or or farming out cases than they do bringing them in in-house.

So I I I very much appreciate the the the suggestion and uh I hope we'll take a careful look at it.

Thanks.

Wonderful.

Uh is there anyone else?

All right, I don't see any other questions.

I just want to echo Councilmember Dickinson's comments.

I think that having a robust litigation team is really important to help protect the city of Sacramento.

Otherwise, we just continue getting more lawsuits and more fees, and then that increases our insurance and it has a train effects.

So um I just want to echo his comments.

And there's no other council members.

So your time is done.

Thank you, Gustavo.

All right, and then the next department that we have is city auditor's office.

Welcome, first.

Hello, uh members of the city council.

I'm first city auditor, and I'll be going over my uh office's budget and the cuts that were submitted for my office.

Oh.

All right, the mission of the Office of the City Auditors to provide a catalyst for improvements of city operations, promote credible, efficient, effective, equitable, fair, focused, transparent, and fully accountable city government.

We conduct audits, reviews, and investigations to improve city services, mitigate improper government activities, address inequities, and evaluate internal controls.

So my office is made up of three types of work that we do by the 10 full-time office staff, which includes myself.

Our performance audits is our bread and butter and main focus.

We have seven staff funded out of that division.

Research analysis is where we conduct non-audit work such as analyses, diversity assessments, our community surveys.

We have three staff funded out of this division.

But as I mentioned, you know, given the priority of recent audits requested by the council, the staff of this division have also been instrumental in completing performance audits, such as the recent audit of the City Motel program.

And then we have our whistleblower hotline where we receive and investigate allegations of fraud, waste abuse, and improper activities.

The whistleblower hotline does not have any dedicated funding or staff.

All staff in our office are assigned cases, and they must balance their workload to ensure allegations are received and addressed.

The annual budget for my office is about $2 million.

The office is mostly funded out of the general fund at $1.3 million.

We do receive appropriations from interdepartmental funds through the citywide cost allocation plan.

In addition, we have a dedicated utilities auditor that's funded out of the city's utility funds and a part-time cannabis auditor funded out of cannabis revenue.

In addition, we receive reimbursements from Sacramento Children's Fund for the work that we're mandated to conduct for the annual baseline funding verification and cannabis BOT audits.

Notably, that project project uh requires contributions from all staff in our office.

As I previously mentioned, the whistleblower hotline does not receive dedicated funding or staff.

So the budget is split between our performance audit division and research analysis division.

About 65% of the general fund appropriation is uh for the performance audit division, and the remainder is for research and analysis.

Uh and uh as we mentioned, uh I think Gustavo mentioned the office operates very lean already, and most of our budget is dedicated to staff salaries and benefits.

Um, at 92% of our budget for salaries and benefits, it is one of the highest ones in uh the city departments.

Uh we have services and supplies budget of roughly 163,000.

At 15% reduction of general fund appropriations uh requirement for our office, it's about two 200,000 dollars.

And to meet this requirement, we have submitted three options.

Uh two impacts our services and supplies budget, and one is an FTE cut that is currently filled.

So our office does not bring in revenue for the city.

However, um it is crucial in identifying cost savings and efficiencies for other departments through the work that we do in our audits, uh, which I think we do have a pretty good track record of.

Our first reduction option is to discontinue the biannual national community survey.

The cost of the survey is currently $34,000, and eliminating the survey would not have a large effect on our office, but it would remove one of the city's measures of resident satisfaction and quality of life, which limits our ability to benchmark performance over time and compare ourselves to peer cities.

Without this data, future policy and budget decisions could have less community-informed insight and fewer objective indicators of progress.

We would also lose access to the Polco survey platform, which allows us to launch other surveys to the community as well.

The next reduction option is to reduce our training and computer expenses by 25,000.

This was submitted as a one-time reduction for fiscal year 26-27, but I think it was changed to a budget proposal to be an ongoing cut.

Reducing funding for staff training and computer replacements will limit our ability to maintain essential technical skills and modern audit tools, which may slow audit work and reduce efficiency.

And over time, aging equipment and fewer professional development opportunities could affect quality of audit services.

And then the last reduction strategy, as I mentioned, is an elimination of a senior fiscal policy analyst position.

Eliminating the senior position would reduce our office's capacity to complete complex audit work and provide needed oversight.

Because the position is currently filled, this reduction would result in a layoff.

The loss of the experienced role would significantly limit our ability to meet audit timelines, maintain quality standards, and respond to emerging risks across city operations.

This position is currently working on the audit of the city's EEO complaint investigation and resolution practices.

So that audit would be put on hold again until resources become available to pick it back up.

Right, and then as the slide indicates, $59,000 of the proposed cuts are from our services and supplies budget.

With a budget of 163,000, that does mean it would be cut by 36%.

And at the same time, we have been seeing and absorbing in our budget increases to our software programs that we use in our office.

So, for example, we have our annual mission mark audit software program.

The costs increased from $7,500 a year to 20,000 in 2025.

This was because we had negotiated a 50% discount in our first contract that was for five years that expired last year.

The renewal increased our annual cost to 20,000 a year, which is a big jump, but it was still the most cost effective bid that was submitted when we were renewing.

Has increased from nearly 13,000 in 2020 to 24,000 in 2025.

And we expect that this cost will be even more this current year as we've experienced an increase in the number of cases that we've received.

So in all, we have already absorbed $25,000 in increases in costs in our services and supplies budget.

So this would be an additional hit to that.

And as I mentioned, my office is lean and mostly supports salaries and benefits of the 10 FTE in my office.

As the office is charged with finding efficiencies for the city, it is a central philosophy for me to always try and find savings where I can.

The proposed cut of the senior fiscal policy analyst position is 10% of our office staff.

However, the impact would be more than 10% of our work as two staff are dedicated to non-general fund work, utilities, children's fund, cannabis, which means that we would conduct less performance audits and more of the remaining staff would be spent on non-audit work, such as operating the hotline conducting the charter mandated general children's fund baseline funding verification and administrative tasks.

As we are, I believe the only office in the city that does not have a dedicated administrative staff as well.

So in periods of reduced resources, strong oversight becomes even more important to help the organization manage higher operational pressures.

As departments work to do more with less, the risk of unintentional gaps in processes or internal controls naturally increases, making independent audit work a valuable safeguard to support sound decision making and protect city operations.

Despite the challenges posed by the proposed budget reductions, my office remains firmly committed to delivering independent, objective, and impactful oversight for the city of Sacramento.

Our focus will remain on the work that protects public resources, strengthen city operations, and upholds accountability.

We'll continue to identify operational efficiencies, cost savings, and opportunities to strengthen internal controls across city departments, ensuring we provide meaningful value and actionable insights through our audit work.

This concludes my presentation, and I'll pass it along to the city clerk if there's no questions.

We'll take questions first for you.

Yeah.

Council members, do you guys have any questions for our city auditor before we pass it on?

No?

Okay.

I just want to echo councilmember Maple's uh comments in the city auditor work plan.

If we want our city auditor to finish the work, we need to keep our staff as is, and she just hired a new employee, want to keep that person employed.

So just want to echo support for no cuts to her department.

Okay, thank you.

All right, city clerk.

Welcome, Mindy.

We never see Mindy on that.

You get two minutes.

Thank you.

I would have two minutes.

So good afternoon, Vice Mayor, Council Members, City Attorney, and Assistant City Manager.

Um I'm Mindy Cuppy, your city clerk.

First, I want to thank the city manager for inviting the invitation to present today.

Um I think it's me and one more, and you're done before the budget deliberations.

So the office of the city clerk, as you know, um we are an independent charter office that reports directly to the mayor and council.

The chandel, the charter mandates most of what we do, most is statutory.

But what do we really do?

So I separate what we do into three pillars, but each is integrated with one another.

So legislative management for city council, council standing committees, boards, and commissions.

We publish agendas, we clerk meetings, and we maintain the history for our 29 legislative bodies.

So we do this.

We ensure the council has the data they need to make informed decisions, and we make sure that the public knows what actions are before the council so they can choose how they want to participate.

We're your elections official for candidates for measures.

As you know, we have a community tickets program.

We manage guests in the city suite at the Golden One Center.

Last year we um we welcomed over 3,000 guests in that suite.

We are staffed to the ethics commission, we process complaints.

We create ceremonial resolutions for council members and the mayor to present to our community.

We process fair political practices commission forms, so campaign finance forms, statement of economic interest, and so forth.

We have over 1,000 statement of economic interest form 700 filers.

We maintain the city's municipal code and charter.

We're your city rights records manager.

We process over 5,000 public records requests a year, and we maintain your online data portal.

We process subpoenas, litigation holds, maintain our records retention schedule.

Most of what we do is statutory, but unique to our office as opposed to other city clerk offices in the state, is that we support the mayor and council operations.

We process your payroll, we onboard and off-board staff, we manage your facilities, process bid openings, process citywide contracts, and all financial transactions for the city council.

And I think if I did not state this, Cammy would be remiss.

We um also order your port a podties.

So the budget for the city office of the city clerk is 4.1 million, consists of 23 full-time equivalent staff.

I will be remiss to point out our ethics commission budget.

We were asked to be creative in making recommendations to this body to maintain this to manage this year's budget.

Um the ethics commission is an expense I cannot control.

It's solely based on complaints.

Um, and we have one uh 189,000 allocated to that now.

Um, some options could be we could return 100,000 to the general fund and treat ethics commission complaints like we do EEO complaints, and that expense would be charged back to the respondent's office.

So since 2019, we've had 67 complaints.

Um, five were referred to our independent evaluator.

Um, eight were returned as no cause reports.

That means that even if the allegation was correct, it would not be a violation of an ethics law.

Um, seven of those complaints went to hearings in front of the Sacramento Ethics Commission and were dismissed.

Um, the cost of each of these complaints is about 14,000, and as I said, it's an expense I cannot manage.

Um, last year, one individual filed six complaints, all dismissed.

Um, and in this past week, I have four new open complaints that have not been reviewed yet.

Um, so rather than having any individual person leave city service, I might recommend we temporarily censate this commission until the budget structure is repaired.

As this is this is an expense that I cannot control.

So in addition to staff time, this would return almost 200,000 to the general fund.

Okay.

So we're proposing to cut 242,000, which is 6% of our budget.

To do this, we will reduce the FTE allocation by one and hold one vacant pending new legislative mandates that I'll share with you on the next slide.

We will also discontinue a $60,000 annual allocation to the office automation fund.

These cuts would impact overtime commission meeting staffing, as you know, we're in this build this room every evening.

We impact our ability to utilize emerging technologies to increase efficiencies.

So in the previous slide, I mentioned new unfunded mandates.

So SB 707, among other things, will require that we remote participation in city council meetings.

So this is going to require additional software and staffing.

We're going to be standing that up quickly.

We are increasing language access in the coming year.

SB 707 requires translation of agendas.

If 20% or more of the population speaks English less than very well.

The cost of this system, as your auditor mentioned, software prices are going up, and that agenda management system cost has increased.

This summer you'll see our new agenda management platform, which will translate those agendas.

It's pretty exciting.

We'll soon be rolling out live translation using YouTube platform.

Our content management system has been upgraded in the past year, and we are contributing 250,000 from our automation fund to the IT department budget to implement that retention module.

I would be remiss if I didn't take this opportunity to thank our ID IT department.

They're constantly partnering with us to look for new technologies, new tools, and to make us more efficient and to make what we do more transparent.

We've made great progress this past year, but there's much more we can do to be more inclusive and increase efficiencies.

Another new mandate per SB 827.

We will soon be rolling out additional mandating training for public officials.

You currently have ethics and harassment training.

We will be adding fiscal and financial training, and this training must be completed by department heads and above.

So department heads, council members, commissioners, and so forth.

We do have an amazing vendor.

I'll shout out to Netfile and Tom.

He's that has made this training easy to comply with.

And so you'll see that rolled out soon.

You have likely seen our digital posting boards.

So to ensure 100% uptime, we have more work and infrastructure to put in place.

And to execute these innovative platforms, we need people to execute and implement.

So thank you for allowing me to present this afternoon, and I'm available for questions.

Thank you, Mindy, appreciate it.

Can you expand?

You said we had one person that had submitted six complaints, and each one costs $14,000 to be able to do investigation for.

That's an average to have the independent evaluator review those, yes.

Is there any way to use FPPC resources that are exist already to be able to investigate these complaints?

So these are ethics laws that are city ethics laws, not FPPC laws.

So if it is a complaint that is something that the FPP is under the FPPC jurisdiction, we deny that claim and then we refer that to the FPPC.

We send them to the appropriate place.

Yeah, and that's where like I'm very supportive of all transparency and accountability with the city of Sacramento.

But if you have individuals that are abusing it, it's just submitting them one after another, it's costing taxpayer dollars.

And so we have to figure out how we work with that and come up with a solution.

So as you move forward in your work plan, see if you can come up with a strategy on that, so it's not so cost-effective on the city of Sacramento.

Okay.

Um, any other people signed up to speak?

No.

All right.

You're good to go, Mindy.

Thank you so much for your presentation.

And welcome back to the dais.

And welcome, Colville, our city treasurer.

Good afternoon.

Last but not least, and I will be the shortest of all of my peers.

Um I'm John Colville, I'm the city treasurer.

I want to acknowledge all the presenters before me, as they have far more difficult tasks in identifying reductions in their departments and minimizing impact to residents.

Whereas my department is a uh revenue center, and for the budget department, we're we're not required to participate in the 15% uh reduction process.

But during my brief report, I'll instead identify CTO actions that have direct impact on the budget, and how things that we did in my office equated to about 10 million dollars in positive cash flow to the budget this coming year.

Let me see.

Per the charter, the mission of the treasurer's office is fundamentally fundamentally just to deposit invest all city funds.

That's what was established way back when.

But that those um responsibilities have evolved in the pat over the years, and we're required for three separate mandates.

Banking operations, debt management, and investment management.

This should include managing 1.6 billion dollars in debt service, one 2.1 billion dollars in investments, and overseeing a banking relationship that executes 4.9 million financial attractions transactions annually.

Uh the current often consists of only nine professionals.

We have up to 13 FDEs.

We only have nine actual folks working.

That's down from 22 when I started in 2004.

These nine individuals have over 200 years of combined city experience with careers averaging 16 years within the the treasurer's office.

The office currently has four unfilled FTEs, and we've been working hard with human services for considerable time to fill these positions.

Unfortunately, the compensation ranges do not are not satisfactory with the experience and education requirement levels, and we're unable to fill them.

And given the fact that the average age of myself and my staff members is 55 years old, we're coming to retirement age, and there's something needs to be done to fill those positions for succession in the office.

As I mentioned, we are uh a revenue uh center.

Uh the treasurer office contributes positively to the general fund.

Our salaries, benefits, expenses equate to 1.5 million allocation support from the general fund.

But in turn, we contribute $5.4 million in revenue generating a net $3.9 million contribution to the fund.

So in lieu of cuts, I would like to share ways in which the department has either directly or facilitated measures, which is positive positively impacted the city's budget.

First of all, talk about revenues.

Professional management of the city's 1.6 billion dollar pool A will at a minimum increase interest revenue by $3.51 million above what Pete has budgeted in his forecast.

I anticipate if interest rates continue where they are, this will be conserved investment and there will be more money.

Additionally, we've increased the management fees assessed to city pool participants to be more in line with cost recovery fees.

We have not re increased these these rates in 15 years, and this should add an additional 700 or 475,000 to our budget.

And finally the 3.9 million dollars that are indicated in the net cash flows for our department.

Additionally, as Pete has spoken before, the team's ability to proactively manage city cash flows allowed the city to recapture 12 million dollars in unrealized losses that result of the federal approach ARPA and CARES money that was invested back in 2020 at or near zero percentage or zero percent rates, and we were able to hold those positions and not have to have to sell them prior to them reaching maturity, and we realize that 12 million dollars back.

And finally, on uh every little bit helps column.

Our office coordinated class action lawsuit that resulted in a hundred forty-six thousand dollar settlement back from visa and master card back to the general fund, and we're awaiting what discoveries settlement's going to be.

And finally, as I said, this is quick.

Um the savings out on the debit side of the tre the ledger, the treasure's office has been directly responsible for over 3.5 million in ongoing general fund savings.

Due to the superior performance of our Stacey and the Scurs portfolio, we are 110% overfunded in that portfolio.

Consequently, the city is not required to make an employer contribution for the coming fiscal year.

This will save the general fund 1.28 million dollars based on the average contributions of the last five years.

Additionally, working with finance, Kim Gladden is as worked to create uh to eliminate the credit card merchant fees that the city currently assumes on transactions done electronically.

This estimate should save the city about $900,000 annually.

And finally, last year we uh refinanced the 2015 refunding bonds without extending their maturities.

We're gonna save the city on an average 1.4 million dollars annually in the general fund.

So to conclude, to borrow a statement from council member Maple.

This is a small and mighty group, it really is.

We are always looking for creative solutions to augment revenue streams and reduce organizational expenses that do not impact include an impact of city services or workforce reductions.

This concludes my presentation, and I think Pete's gonna finish it up if there's any questions.

Um yes, but we'll do questions for you first.

Uh Councilman Right Bull.

Uh no questions, just a quick comment.

Um, I think it's been well established.

I think you do a great job of uh well, great job overall, and I think you do a great job of uh showing just how um efficient your department is and how you make its money, it's really clear.

Um, you know, we're where many other departments are spending because that's what we do here at the city, of course.

We provide services, but um, you do a great job and your team at making the city money, and uh we are outperforming many other places, including the state and others, and so I think that's worth saying and worth investing in personally.

So, as I've said with uh some of our other departments, I think it makes no sense at all for us to make cuts in a place where we are clearly benefiting from your team and having people on it.

So, if anything, um I think we should be investing more.

So thanks.

Thank you.

Councilmember Kaplan.

I too just want to echo what my colleagues said.

I think it should be spelled out with your last um slide.

You're you found a way to save and make the city 3.58 million dollars this year in your small and mighty department, which you have done every year.

Um so I am I am where I believe everybody has to take a haircut um in your department.

Um it doesn't make any fiscal sense whatsoever.

Um, so that's my stance.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Councilmember Jennings.

I just want to pull it on a little bit more while you're sitting up there trying to get off the microphone.

Uh you know I don't like the public speaking.

I I know you don't you don't like the recognition either, but you deserve it.

You you do a great job, and you've done every since I've been here.

I've watched you work and grow that department, grow your people, and take care of the city.

And I just want to let you know how much we appreciate you, and we're not ready for you to retire yet.

So keep doing what you're doing.

We we we deeply appreciate you.

Thank you, sir.

You and your staff.

Wonderful.

Seeing no other council members here, good to go.

Thank you, Mr.

Colville.

And welcome back, Pete.

Thanks, Vice Mayor.

And uh, you know, John brings everybody up, and then I'm here to give the bad news and bring everybody down.

Uh, but before we conclude, I did want to um just uh raise a few of the pending factors for council to consider when you deliberate over your budget.

The biggest one I mentioned before are the labor negotiations, they will have an impact on the current year and the budget year.

Um, so we do want to account for that.

Uh, as far as the future of the state homelessness resources, uh, this refers to the HAP program.

Uh, the good news is we do not have any HAP funding in our forecast, and we know we have at least one more round appropriated.

So there is some upside there.

Uh, but you know, clearly sit the city and other large cities to maintain these programs need ongoing state funding.

Uh, the last that I want to just highlight right now is you know, everybody sees what's going on in uh the oil industry and in the you know gas prices and and all of those things, and you know, the risk of a recession is higher now than it was a month ago, and it's just something uh for us to keep in mind as we deliberate around the budget.

Um, and then just to close out, again, I again I want to reiterate we're not making any decisions here today.

Um, if you look, we're still in that first portion of uh the upcoming budget schedule, uh, the early budget work sessions.

Uh, we will have a proposed budget to council by the end of April, and then uh council will have its formal budget hearings in May and June uh for a June adoption.

So uh with that, that is staff's presentation, and uh thank you all for your time.

Thank you so much, Pete.

And uh we do have 25 members of the public signed up to speak, so the city clerk will read off names, and everybody gets two minutes to do public comment, and then it's the next person's turn.

Thank you, Vice Mayor.

Um Douglas McDouglas McPherson, Sue Whitworth, Faith Buhay, Sally Callahan, and feel free to line up at the middle aisle.

Douglas.

Ready?

Please proceed.

Thank you, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council members for giving me this time.

My name is Doug McPherson, and I'm a member of the Sacramento Climate Coalition and live in Midtown.

In May of 2023, this council approved a sum of 250,000 to be used for the completion of a viability study of business plan to create a public bank in Sacramento.

I volunteered to be on the treasurer's team, the small and mighty team, and we were responsible for the request for qualification, the RFQ for the process to choose a vendor for this task.

In the interest of saving money, we included language not to exceed 200,000 and had multiple qualified firms bid on the package.

After months of hard work, we were at the end of this process when in December of 2024, it was paused by the city manager.

This was very disappointing.

I won't review the reasons as council was convinced that a public bank in Sacramento was a great idea.

You were already convinced.

I'll only say that due to what has transpired over the last three years, the need for a public bank in Sacramento is even more compelling.

And a public bank aligns perfectly with the city's economic development priorities.

The will of this council in 2023 was to begin the process of establishing a public bank in Sacramento.

I ask that you follow through with that mandate and finish with the approved funds, the RFQ process that was nearly completed 14 months ago.

Thank you very much.

Good afternoon, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council members.

Our public funds from climate destroying Wall Street banks and the funding of fossil fuels, private prisons, and gun manufacturing.

At which over 200 community members were grateful, supportive, and excited to learn about the concept of a public bank in Sacramento.

Please make a motion today to move forward with this extremely important project.

I know that each of you are all very busy, and we live in a multitasking world with our various devices.

Thank you.

Next speaker's Faith, then Sally Good afternoon, Mr.

Mayor, Council members.

I'm Dr.

Faith Boucher, and I want to welcome you to the coolest summer of the rest of our lifetimes.

It's going to be getting hotter throughout our lifetimes.

Public banking will allow the city to take control of the funds that they currently invest through brokerage firms.

Green energy, investment in green energy is competitive with fossil fuels, and we can control that by approving public banking for Sacramento.

Thank you.

You next speaker is Sally Callaghan, then Connie Van Horn, then Jean Lamborn.

Thank you for being on the council.

I'm from Folsom.

And what Sacramento does, the out other outlier cities will do, as the rest of the country.

Please replace the already approved 250,000 for the business plan and viability study on the budget for public banking.

It's fiscally sound to borrow from ourselves.

It makes sense to put the money back in our community to meet our local goals.

Like you were talking about the structure of North Sacramento.

And many more community needs to support.

So please let's look at our capital fiscal deficits that the mayor pointed out.

Also Mr.

Dickinson, thank you for alternatives.

And let's change our future uncertainties with the great untapped resources.

The public banking truly provides for us.

Thank you.

Thanks, speakers.

Connie Van Horn, then Jean Lamborn, then Megan Shumway.

Hello.

This is my first time ever speaking or even attending a city council meeting, so bear with me.

I'm not an expert on banking.

I've been to presentations about public banking, and it sounds like an idea that's too good to be true.

So what I would like to know is is it too good to be true?

I think there's been money allocated to find that out.

I would love to see that go forward.

Listening earlier today to the discussion of the EIFD for North Sacramento, I thought that a public bank would be a much simpler, purer way to fund such a such a study or such a development.

So I think it's a win-win-win.

And it kind of gets the big banks out of the profit making middleman rule.

I also want to point out that it's been a long time, but I was part of a co-housing community that was being developed, and the idea was to have a light footprint on the land, but they couldn't get funding for small houses because the banks wouldn't fund them.

So we had to big build bigger houses and fewer houses in order to get the bank's buy-in.

That's ridiculous, and we should figure out a different system.

It's worked in other states, it's worked in other countries.

Let's see if it can work here.

Thank you.

Jane Lamborn, then Megan Shumway, then Chris Brown.

Okay.

Good afternoon, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and members of the council.

Um my name is Jane Lamborn.

I am a longtime resident of the Sacramento area since 1985.

As an attorney, I have worked for the State Attorney General's office, the State Department of Healthcare Services, and covered California in various programs and positions.

So I'm very familiar with this area, its residents and its needs.

Many of them are not being met, and small businesses, people trying to survive and have a business here in our community.

These are our communities' needs.

Therefore, I stand here today.

That's my ask.

Please, will you restore funding for a public bank?

Will you establish a long-term investment plan that would recycle city funds back into the city coffers where it could be used to meet these community needs?

And possibly it could help with structural deficits in the future if you can get this money back and use it.

Thank you very much.

Mayor McCarty and the council.

And we would use our taxpayer dollars in a more efficient manner than sending it to Wall Street, where the woman percent benefit and the working class people do not.

Good afternoon.

My name is Chris Brown.

I'm with the Sacramento Climate Coalition, and I live in District 5 of the city.

Um, first, before I make any comments, I'm in agreement with previous speakers supporting the reinvestment of this money, which the city joined three other communities in our state taking advantage of a state law that allows public banking here in California.

Sadly, we are in a chaotic period in which the federal government has withdrawn the infrastructure reinvestment act funding that the city could have participated in, and now, as your executive uh finance person has pointed out, we're in a chaotic economy in which a war mongering is driving up the costs of just living in this country.

A public bank would take our resources, bypassing the private middlemen of commercial banks, and those funds following your own vision of supporting economic development could be put back into supporting local initiatives, community identified projects through lending, not spending, or losing public funds to out of state banks.

California public banks can partner with credit unions, local community banks, and CDFIs expanding their lending capacity so it's not just the city's money, it can be combined with other financial institutions to increase the impact.

We can use that money to fund infrastructure projects, public projects, public banks can support initiatives like green infrastructure, affordable housing, public transportation, and small business loans to impacted communities.

Thank you very much.

I hope you reinstate this money and we can get back on the track.

Dr.

Harry Wong, then Mark Sawyer.

Mayor McCarty and Council members.

My name is Dr.

Harry Wong.

I have lived in Sacramento since 1982.

I'm in District 7.

Our individual and community health is extremely important to all of us.

But as you may well know, non-medical factors have a greater impact on our health than having hospitals and clinics, important as they are.

These factors are called the social determinants of health.

Economic policies, social norms, and political systems, they can all impact our health.

An appalling example of this currently would be the impact of current policies on the health of immigrants.

Research shows that the social determinants of health account for 30 to 55% of health outcomes.

And here are the five most important areas, first of all, and everything what you've been talking about afternoon all afternoon, economic stability.

Second, education, health care, neighborhood and built environment, and the social and community context.

A public bank in Sacramento could have impacts in many of these areas by improving income and financial stability, housing, public investment capacity, and equity.

And these are exactly the areas that public health research has identified as the largest drivers of population health.

And that's why I left my office today to be able to speak out on the health of our community.

I urge you to reauthorize the funds for a business plan and viability study for a public bank.

This is a public health and equity issue.

Let's take control of our monies and how they're invested and spent.

Thank you.

Mark Sawyer, then Glayel Glaol Saba.

Good afternoon, Mayor McCarty and City Council members.

My name is Mark Sawyer.

I'm with SAC Act.

Today I come requesting that you restore funding for a viability study for a public bank in Sacramento.

In the face of funding cuts for affordable housing at the federal level, I want to draw attention to the fact that a viable Sacramento public bank could cover hard-to-finance pre-development, preservation, and rapid acquisition costs that commercial banks often avoid.

As a nonprofit bank with direct access to the federal discount window, a Sacramento public bank could significantly lower borrowing costs for projects, expanding the impact of whatever sources of equity we have on hand for affordable housing.

And finally, a viable Sacramento public bank could direct funds to community-based projects with loan repayment recycled not into Wall Street banks, but back directly into new local community lending.

Thank you.

Next speaker is Glale, then Katie McCamman.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council.

My name is Goli Saba, and I'm a family physician and a member of the Sacramento Climate Coalition.

I also represent uh nearly 800 elders in Third Act Sacramento who support a public bank.

We ask you to resume the funding that everyone has been mentioning.

And because it was passed unanimously by the budget and audit committee in 2023.

And because we know that uh the economic development is the council's top priority, and that every year millions of dollars in cities all over California are spent on banking fees and interest on the city's loans.

An example of this is in Oakland, which paid about 60 million in one year for these funds.

Public banks can reroute our tax dollars from Wall Street to the priorities that our community chooses.

They can also decrease the cost of infrastructure building significantly by almost a half.

Also, public bank uh could truly help with small and minority business lending.

Uh, I want to share a story.

A Latina friend told me that when she tried to get a hairdressing business started in Sacramento, she had a very difficult time.

Uh, this was recent, um, accessing business loans and felt that being a female minority made things particularly challenging.

According to a University of Michigan 2025 report, she was right.

Today in California, this is a quote small businesses navigate challenging uh challenges, keeping their doors open, hiring workers, and expanding their operations.

In particular, predatory lenders offer loan uh offer loans with excessively high interest rates, and they often have huge lump sum payments.

This is what what my friend experienced.

An opportunity fund study found that these loans carried an average annual percentage rate.

I want to this is not an error of 94% interest, and with one loan was even at 358%, uh, with black and Latinx owned businesses being disappointed.

Thank you for your comments.

Your time is complete.

Our next speaker is Katie McCamin and Kolika.

Thank you very much.

Supporting this uh good afternoon, Mayor and Council members.

I'm Katie McCamin.

I'm the executive director for 350 Sacramento.

Uh, I'm here to ask that you restore funding for a public bank feasibility study per AB 857, asking both as a representative of 350 SAC and a local younger constituent who wants to see this beautiful city do great things in the future.

Currently, our tax dollars are being used to engage in wars, foreign deals, and deadly immigration enforcement that benefits no one.

A public bank would help us focus and prioritize money from our local economy, our own work back into projects that prioritize our community health and long-term well-being.

North Dakota shows success in a public banking system.

It currently supports residents to go to college, fund small businesses, fund local agriculture, infrastructure, and more.

On a personal note, I live in District 2 and would love to see improvements in the neighborhood I've grown to love.

I thank Council Member Dickinson and supporters for speaking up to fund these much-needed improvements earlier today.

I want to highlight that public banking could help neglected communities like my own and others.

Let's stop supporting unnecessary spending of our money on things we never asked for.

Let's restore the AB 857 funding for a public bank feasibility study in our city and empower ourselves to be resilient, empowered, and somewhat sovereign into our future.

Thank you.

Next speaker is Kalika, then Diana Cassidy, then Diamond Lula.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council members.

My name is Kalika Siegel.

I'm proudly in District 2, and I rise today to push for your renewed commitment to move to more, move toward a more just and more equitable Sacramento.

This body previously approved the funding and a viability study and business plan per the AB 857 requirements, and Sacramento needs you to continue that support.

I rise to speak today on the impact on people of color and why it's important to divest from Wall Street and business as usual and reinvest the power back into the community through a public bank.

Banking as usual funds private prisons and ice that directly harm my community.

Black and other people of color are disproportionately harmed through overincarceration in these facilities, as these poor for-profit institutions have higher rates of violence and push for longer and more punitive sentences.

To maximize their profits, these companies cut corners on medical care and then lobby for stricter laws that accelerate mass incarceration.

We're literally paying them to destroy us systemically.

We have an opportunity to reinvest back into the people, change the frame, and rewrite the narrative.

A public bank would set the trajectory towards economic growth by keeping the money local and providing loans to small and minority businesses.

Due to the longstanding historic systemic discrimination and predatory lending in our community, a public bank could be transformational because it's government, governance is community-based.

We know long-term investment is necessary for real change.

And this is also an opportunity to tackle some of the real issues like affordable housing, food deserts within the city, restoration of our parks, and basic infrastructure.

This is a multi-layered issue, and this vote is just one step in the process.

I urge your I vote today and to follow San Francisco and Los Angeles and getting this done.

And I want to remind you all that your vote.

Thank you for your comments.

Our next speaker is Diana Cassidy, then Diamond Lula.

I have 12 more speakers.

So Diana Cassidy and Diamond.

Thank you.

So Diana, then James Valleo.

Then Nancy Hernandez.

Hello and good afternoon, City Council, Mayor, and Vice Mayor.

My name is Diamond Lulo, and I am so grateful to have the privilege to speak before you.

The reason I am up here before you is my concern of the budget cuts on the police department, Magnet Academy.

First of all, I'd like to say that I was never this confident.

My freshman year self would have never came up before you to speak about what I believe in.

I would have stayed in the background, blending with everyone.

But now I come before you with confidence and my courage of conviction.

I come before you with my head held high and making eye contact with all you at this moment.

I stand with resolve.

That is all because of this academy's doing.

I went from a shy and timid girl to someone that beams with confidence.

This program has shaped me in so many ways.

I am now taking pride in what I do, and I learned to be a leader, no longer following anyone else's steps.

Now, at this moment, let me be frank.

Before joining law, I was all over the place, failing classes, not on the track to graduating.

No one really cared for me at that moment.

But now that I've joined this, it's like a second family.

I am on track to graduating, and I've made so many more friends along the way.

This all happened because of a conversation I had with one officer.

He told me that I had so much potential and I could do so much good in my life, and then everyone's around me.

That changed my course of my success at that moment.

So tell me, are you willing to take that person that changed my life and that could change so many more intelligent scholars at my school?

Thank you.

James Filaleo, then Nancy Hernandez.

Hello, everybody.

My name is James Vallejo.

I've been in Hiram Johnson's Law Academy for three years, and I remember my freshman year, I was very shy, soft-spoken, and never really got out of my comfort zone.

Sophomore year, I decided I wanted to join law and see what all the hype was about.

Over the year I got to talk to people, make connections with people I never thought I would personally ever talk to.

And by the end of the year, I realized we were more than just a class, we felt more like a team.

My junior year, I started to really find myself and find who I considered to be my people.

I started stepping up for not just myself, but for my class or my team.

By my senior year, these people around me felt more like family, not just classmates.

I was also able to take that.

I was also able to take that leadership step without feeling nervous.

A couple ways I've been able to do that is by helping lead our class through different physical and mental challenges throughout the year and also helping out during community service events such as our football games.

Law has changed me as a person and brought me out of my comfort zone in the best possible way.

I believe Law Academy has done the same for many others, not just myself.

This academy isn't just about being.

Sorry.

This academy isn't just about law, it's about being able to find yourself and your people.

So without an officer, I believe most won't get the same push or have the same success I and many others have.

Thank you.

Nancy and then Brianna.

Hi, my name is Nancy Hernandez, and I like to share my journey of growth and confidence.

My freshman year, I struggled a lot, and I wasn't very confident.

And often felt nervous trying a new thing.

However, everything began to change when I joined the wrestling team at Hiram Johnson.

At first, I was scared every time I stepped onto the mat and felt butterflies in my stomach.

I doubted myself and I wasn't sure I belonged there.

Still, I kept practicing, and slowly those nerves started to turn into more into fierce determination.

Later during my sophomore year, I joined the law academy, which pushed me even further through both wrestling and the academy.

I learned how to become more confident in myself.

Wrestling taught me discipline, resilience, and how to push through fear.

Law Academy taught me leadership, organization, and how to work together in a team.

Over time, I started winning matches and even earned championships.

Each one wasn't just about a medal.

It was poop that hard work and belief in yourself really does pay off.

Now when I step onto the map or face a challenge, I no longer feel the same fear.

Ever since I joined the law academy, my confidence in myself began to grow.

And every time I win a championship or a medal, the first thing I do is tell my officer, because he also made me believe in myself even more.

Thank you.

Brianna Wells, then Garrett Kirkland.

Good afternoon, Council members and mayor.

Our students need stability.

Our students need mentorship, and our students need programs that work.

My name's Brianna Wells, and I'm an assistant principal at Hiram Johnson High School.

I'm here again because the future of our Magnet Police Academy still remains uncertain.

When funding decisions are made, they should be intentional.

They should reflect what we know is making a difference, especially for our students.

And they should protect the programs that are working.

This program is working.

We have a hundred percent graduation rate at our Magnet Police Academy at Hiram Johnson High School.

That's not typical, and it's not easy, and it certainly is not accidental.

It happens because students have structure, they have accountability, and they have consistent adults who show up for them every single day.

At Hiram Johnson, we serve students with incredible potential and real challenges.

What they need is not fewer opportunities.

They need more.

They need adults who know them.

They need programs that give them direction, and they need spaces where they feel seen, supported, and capable of success.

And that's exactly what this academy provides.

Our officers are not just teaching curriculum to these students.

They are building relationships with them.

They are mentoring them, the very students who need steady adults in their lives.

And we're seeing the impact in engagement in confidence and in graduation.

So I want to ask you something directly.

If we are not protecting programs that are clearly improving outcomes for our students of Sacramento, then what exactly are we prioritizing?

We know what doesn't work, but we also know what does, and this works.

So today I'm asking that you lead with intention.

Protect the programs that are making a measurable difference in the lives of these students.

Because when we protect programs like this, we're not just funding an academy.

We're investing in the future of our students and in the future of this great city of Sacramento.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

Sorry, member Garrett's missing this for uh our area.

Do you want to call Nancy qualified for states going back?

We hope she wins next year as a senior.

Good afternoon.

My name is Garrett Kirk, and I'm the principal of Hiram Johnson High School, but I'm not speaking to you today as a principal.

I'm speaking to you as someone who grew up in this city, in the neighborhoods around Hiram Johnson.

This community helped shape me and who I am.

And for nearly 30 years, I have worked in the schools across this city, the same neighborhoods that raised me.

Over the three decades, I have seen many programs come and go.

I have seen initiatives that sounded promising, but never truly changed outcomes for students.

And I have seen the programs that do change.

The Magnet Academies, including the police academy at Hiram Johnson, and many other schools are one of the programs that does change.

I know this because I have watched what happens when students walk into these programs.

Students who were unsure of themselves begin to find purpose.

Students who felt disconnected begin to find belonging.

Students who lacked direction begin to find a future.

Why?

It's because these academies give young people something incredibly powerful.

Structure, mentorship, accountability, and adults who refuse to give up on them.

Schools like Hiram Johnson that have magnet academies have long served as anchors in their community.

For generations, families in Sacramento have trusted schools like Hiram Johnson to educate their children, guide them and prepare them for their future.

When we invest in programs inside these schools, we are not simply funding a class.

We are investing in the stability of our neighborhoods and the future of our city.

After 30 years, I can say this with confidence.

We know which programs work for youth.

And the magnet academies work.

Please keep this funding so our kids have this program.

Thank you very much.

Appreciate the brief.

Kim Hickman is our next speaker, then Robert Copeland, then L.R.

Roberts.

I have six more speakers.

Good afternoon, Mayor and members of City Council.

My name is Kimberly Hickman.

I'm a longtime Sacramento resident.

I'm here to so to show my support for the restoration of the funding for the public banking in Sacramento.

I'm also here to list for the record a number of different organizations that will also support from their support towards this worthy cause as well.

The Sacramento Area Congregations Together, which is comprised of 57 congregations, Sacramento Climate Coalition of has 37 organizations, the public health advocates, Sacramento Area move to amend, Sierra Club of Sacramento, Community Land Trust, the Environmental Council of Sacramento, 350 Sacramento, Third Act Sacramento, which I'm a proud member of Social Justice Politicor, Community Lead Advocacy Group, Poor People Campaign, Poor People's Campaign, Sacramento, and the Friends of Capital Mansion Neighborhood Association.

So I can't improve upon the wonderful comments that my um fellow activists have given.

But again, I want to thank you for your time this afternoon so I could um list these organizations and throw in my support for the restoration of funding as well.

Thank you very much.

Robert Copeland, then L.R.

Roberts, then Lamaya Coleman.

Mr.

Copeland.

I remember a poor people's campaign here in Sacramento.

Who benefits from a public bank?

The people in Sacramento.

I agree with the people that support a public bank, small business with benefit.

A whole entire community like District 2, my district, District 4, District 8.

Thank you.

LR Roberts, then Lamaya Coleman, then Dr.

Flo Kofer and Keon Bliss.

Um I'm LR Roberts.

I'm a member of Third Act, and I'm also a member of the Peace and Freedom Party.

And we support a public bank.

Um and all the reasons are out there.

Certainly, we need money to spend on the right things.

For instance, when the um the Roseville Road housing was in uh trailers, people complained to me.

They said it was awful and that it was managed very poorly.

Uh, twice that I know of in the last couple of months, they've taken somebody's RV away with two.

We're spending money on this stuff with 20 minutes' notice.

We're wasting funds on eight cops giving one person a ticket.

Um six cops giving one person a ticket for lying down.

Um this is this is ridiculous.

You are now having the cops go out and demanding that people have a food permit to feed people.

This is not a good use of money, and all this counts as homeless services.

So we need to spend the money on the right thing.

We need to have a public um bank, and we need to stop spending money on hassling homeless people.

Lamaya following Lamaya is Dr.

Phil Koferman.

My name is Lamaya Coleman, and I live in district LSC, district four.

Um I also support uh moving forward the previously approved funding for the the for public bank.

I think public banking provides an opportunity once it's going to be more proactive.

Um there's been a lot of conversation today around trying to rectify like long-term past wrongs.

Um, and when we're paying debt service and things like that, it makes it more difficult, or when we're like having to like you know really take what we can get in terms of of financing it, makes it more difficult.

If we have control of our own funds, we can be more strategic.

So, and we can we can finance things that are may not be as desirable to get finance in the commercial sector.

So please please move forward at 250,000.

I have two more speakers.

Dr.

Flo Kopher, then Keon Bliss.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council members.

My name is Dr.

Flo Kofer, and I'm here this afternoon to urge you to move forward with the previously approved $250,000 allocation for a business plan and viability study under AB 857.

Sacramento is currently facing a 66.2 million dollar budget deficit.

And as discussed earlier from the presenters and speakers here, we understand that some really difficult decisions are going to be made.

And in that context, it's even more important that we evaluate tools that can help us better leverage public dollars, reduce long-term costs, and generate community level returns on our investments.

A public bank is a very practical tool that would allow Sacramento to better align our public dollars with public values.

Right now, the city banks with institutions like JP Morgan Chase, the largest funder of fossil fuels globally.

That means that our public resources are reinforcing systems that run counter to our climate, housing, and economic goals.

And as someone who sits that on the mayor's climate commission, that's something that we actively encourage the city not to do.

A viability study is the responsible next step.

It would provide transparent data-driven answers about costs, risks, and benefits.

So resident staff and policymakers can make informed decisions.

And the potential upside is significant, as we heard from some of the previous speakers, that expanding access to capital can help us with small businesses that are routinely locked out of traditional lending markets, deeply affordable and supportive housing, clean energy, and preparing, especially for extreme heat and flooding as we're experiencing these 90 degree days in March.

A public bank is one of the few tools that can give local governments greater control over how we invest in our own community.

And at a time when residents are rightly concerned about how public dollars are spent, especially amid a significant deficit, the answer is not less transparency or fewer options, it's more.

Sacramento has an opportunity to lead here.

So the first step is to simply follow through on what was already approved and let the public see the analysis.

And so that is my urge for you today.

Thank you.

Keon Bliss is the final speaker on this agenda item.

I fully support a public banking system and think it is long overdue here in this city for genuine innovative uh economic uh changes that we can actually use that could benefit majority of the city.

Unfortunately, I am more pessimistic uh than my fellow community members as I've learned uh over many years of watching these council decisions that and the most recent budget cycles that most of y'all have learned exactly nothing uh when it comes to actual participatory budgeting.

Uh give like just take this these meetings, these early budget workshops happening uh in the middle of the afternoon when most of us are either working or at school, and only a uh handful of us out of the 535,000 people in the city can actually participate meaningfully within that, uh, as well as a budgeting survey that goes on uh that does that reaches fewer and fewer people year after year.

Um I wanted to can and I also noticed that we continue to place the burden of balancing the budget uh from these cuts on the most underdefunded apartments uh while sparing the single largest departments uh from any serious cuts.

Take the ones that you just heard uh presented today, uh which represent less than three percent of our general fund, um, and departments like the youth um parks and actually are rich our community being up less than one percent, yet combined they appear to represent over seven percent of the proposed budget cuts before you today.

Meanwhile, the police department uh, even though it offers up to 36 million from up to 196 FTE cuts, only 69 of these positions are vacant despite more than 150 vacancies left on the table from last year's budget cycle.

And out of these vacant positions, 69 or 67 of them are considered high impact that will scare most of you from even considering touching them.

Meanwhile, uh parks and like the Yipsey department, uh, which has over 121 cuts on the table.

Uh, only 38 positions are vacant, and the eight to two filled positions, 76 of those positions are considered major impacts.

But I don't expect a majority of you to actually thank you for your comments, Mayor.

This concludes the public comment on agenda item number 17.

Thank you for your comments.

I dare you all.

Mayor, this concludes the coup public comment on agenda item 17.

Okay, thank you.

Uh now it's time for council member comments.

Um start with Council Member Maple.

Uh yeah, thank you very much.

I just wanted to um well, one, thank you.

Let's start out with the presentations.

Um wanted to thank everyone for coming and presenting.

I know a point well taken that this does happen during the day, but we also, you know, want to make sure that we have time to have presentations about what each department does, what's important, um, and that we can fit that into our schedule, and then these recordings are online.

Uh, I want to thank especially um our finance team, Pete Coletto, our city manager for recently coming to a town hall that I had in my district um that was specifically budget focused, and they found information that you provided very helpful, uh, especially in the way that you framed it.

And so um I think that in those types of activities in combination with uh the discussions that happen here in more depth and the detail that comes out of that is so helpful.

Um and so I really hope that the public can um come back and view these uh videos, take a look, understand what's happening in the department and understand the process that's going through this.

And um, so just want to appreciate that.

Um, I know we talked about each of the individual um presentations and ask questions.

I did want to make a note.

Um, I wanted to thank everyone who showed up today uh for attending this meeting.

I know it's uh hard to break away sometimes in the middle of the day, so thank you for taking the time to come here, speak to us, share your perspective.

I also want to thank um the coalition members for meeting with my office, and I know that you've met with, I'm sure other council offices too about the public bank.

I appreciated some of the historical context.

Um so a lot a lot of that happened prior to my time here on the council.

Um, but I've been uh long been a supporter of a public bank in concept, both when it was making its way through uh the state legislature.

I know our mayor, when he was in the the state assembly was a supporter of the concept of a public bank as well.

Um, and then I have been a supporter locally as well.

And so I think that uh it's one of those things where yes, it's really challenging.

We do have to figure out how we're gonna pay for this because um you gotta spend money to make money, and this is one of those things where the investment that we make now to look into what this could look like in Sacramento could literally pay dividends into the future and create a better system for us.

And so I do support that.

I would love to see this get agendized or I guess re-agendized at a budget and audit committee meeting.

I know it was voted on uh several years ago prior to my time here and was passed through the committee, but did not move forward um for funding reasons.

I think it's worth another discussion, another look for us as a council to figure out if that's something that we can prioritize, what that could look like and uh figure out you know, hear from the the advocates and from people who are experts in this space.

I'm also particularly interested in other jurisdictions that have now done their own studies and started implementation about how that has worked in other places.

And so I just wanted to hope that we can maybe agendize that discussion while we're in our budget conversations.

So thank you.

Thank you, Councilmore Vang.

Thanks, Mayor.

Um, just want to take this moment to thank Pete and his team and all the departments um in all the offices and charter offices that uh present today and want to thank all of the residents that came to speak.

Um again, uh we are still in the early uh stages of the budget, and we haven't decided on what we're reducing yet.

And so uh really appreciate the city manager bringing uh this item actually a little bit earlier, usually uh compared to previous years when we've had conversation about the budget.

And so um, but it's really great that you're here because you're providing your insight on what your priorities are, and so I really wanted to say thank you to all of you.

Um before I talk about the public bank, I actually do have a question for Pete really quick, just about budget, because last week I had asked for this, and and maybe it's gonna come at the next budget presentation.

But I know that each um charter officer office and department um is presenting uh um their proposal based on a baseline.

I know it's not 50 percent across 15 percent across the board.

I know that me and my colleagues don't agree with that, but I I actually do want to see what the proposed line is, uh, what the what the percentages basically.

Um we do have that as an SBI it will be in the uh packet, and we're getting it up online as well so that the public can see.

Okay, great.

That's just really I just wanted to just check in on that and make sure, because I yeah, thank you so much for that.

So looking forward to seeing that.

Um, so earlier today we heard from Dr.

Harry Wang, uh, who actually talked about how a public bank uh um is a public health issue, and I just really wanted to center uh what he he brought up.

You know, I think oftentimes bank do control access to credit and capital.

Um, and if residents or small businesses can't get loans, they struggle to afford health care, housing, um, bringing grocery stores into the cities, um, and really just the lack of access to loans uh for small businesses.

And so um I just want to put on record that I am in support uh for continuing the viability study for a public bank.

And I also want to take a moment to acknowledge former council member Katie Malice Willa, who actually uh started this work in the city uh with the city treasurer's office.

And I know that um our mayor, our former mayor and council was supportive of this.

Um, and uh I continue to be a supporter of this too because we know that public banks are a financial institution owned by the people, owned by us at the government, and they're designed to operate for the public interest rather than for private profit, right?

And especially in these times, uh, we should be exploring and trying to implement innovative uh financial tools.

And I actually see this um as part of our three priorities.

Last year we did a uh a workshop about uh what are what what will be our priority as a mayor and council, and it was economic development, public safety, housing and homelessness.

I actually think this addresses two of it, or actually all of it.

Um, and so really just wanted to echo my support for this as well.

And again, um, especially in these moments when we know we're facing a budget deficit, it's really important that we explore approaches that uh could help us um address the long-term economic stability of our city.

And so uh just wanted to put my support for that as um our city manager is listening to our residents and to mayor and council and bring forth the proposal um in the upcoming months.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Dickinson.

Thanks, Mayor.

Um Pete, I um just had a couple of small things uh with regard to uh some of the supplemental information you've given us, which I don't know if I made it through through all of it, but um last year when you you gave us the uh listing of vacancies, you also listed how long they they've been vacant.

And what I saw in the supplementals didn't show that it have you done that already, and I just didn't see it.

Uh I believe so, but let me uh double we definitely have the information because I was looking at it the other day.

I thought it was with our supplemental budget information item.

I'll double check and I'll send out we'll update it if it's on the list of vacancies and I saw a list of updated vacancies uh the the vacancies but didn't list the length of uh and the the cost, but but didn't list the length of vacancies now.

Maybe I didn't got you.

I'll make sure that it's in there and we'll send it out.

Okay, the other the other thing I wanted to touch on uh is um the the funding uh out of vacancies for non-budgeted positions.

And um perhaps we need to have a little longer discussion about this because uh it it uh seems uh inconsistent to me.

We we've talked a little bit about this in the past to have money that we're holding to pay for positions that aren't in the budget and yet get filled.

Uh and so it seems to me that that's that that's uh uh confusing at the least and not uh transparent to the public uh either.

I won't say it the worst, I'll just say either.

So maybe we can uh somewhere in the course of conversation, and maybe it's offline, frankly, is talk a little bit more about how um uh how we discuss that aspect that which is I don't it's hundred, hundred something thousand dollars.

Um correct, yeah.

And we um you know, generally what we try to do is work with the departments to correct them because they're I can definitely see during the year, you know, maybe you need a different classification, and so um this is the solution kind of while we're waiting for the budget to come um or do the budget process.

But we you know our desire is definitely to work with the departments to uh reflect reality in our budget and not hold a position vacant just to fill a different classification.

And so we are trying to correct that during the budget process, but I agree with you.

We can have more discussion.

Okay, I appreciate that.

The the other comment I I want I wanted to make was that I I I appreciate actually all those who spoke today, including those who are advocating for uh a public bank, and uh the it is something that that uh the council directed funding for exploration of a few years ago.

It it went by the wayside with with other budget um uh pressures.

Uh maybe it may it makes sense at least to have that discussion, and uh I'm happy to uh have a conversation with the with the mayor about that as the chair of the of the budget committee uh uh to see what what if anything might make sense.

So um thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, Vice Mayor Talamantes.

Um so just want to put it on record our city treasurer John Cobell did do a lot of work on this, and just some background the RF key, let's see, in January 2024, the RFQ closed with only one statement of qualifications, received over budget, then a task force was explored based on lack of response, then um, and then it was canceled uh per Council Member Anzuela due to budget constraints and lack of response.

Um and then I know community-based organizations continue to outreach to identify more applicants for a future second release of RFQ.

And uh that's currently in the process, and then John received three statements of qualifications uh that received that you received in September 2024.

John, would you be able to tell us what the quotes were for that on average?

Uh thank you.

I've been actually texting with Kim Cladden who worked.

I my recollections they're all right around 200,000.

Um in principle uh a public bank is something that I would I would advocate for, but can I just interject real quick?

Yeah, yeah, and I know it's not a guest.

This is this is our budget hearing, and the the public rightfully brought up an issue they'd like to us to focus in the budget.

Now I was gonna say it's near W.

Let me just interject right here.

Um it's not before us today, but I I was gonna say at some point that I do think it is an intriguing topic.

Some of us weren't on the council when this conversation started.

So what I would ask you as a minimum is can you re report back to us what the work has been done so far, your perspective, and then we can decide whether or not we want to continue looking at through the budget and audit committee or or the for full council, but it's not notice tonight, so that will we'll continue the the regular budget conversations.

I can do that.

I've already forwarded information to Councilmember Maple and Councilmember Telamars of a timeline of what transpired the RFPs and things like that.

I mean, so yeah, I'm happy to do that.

Perfect.

Thank you.

Yeah, and like yeah, and I and I understand this is not agenda, so we shouldn't be having a conversation about a specific thing.

Um, but I just wanted to put it on record the the work that has been done.

So um happy to continue the conversations on another committee.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Councilmember Kaplan.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, I really want to thank our city attorney clerk.

Um, I know we got background information with Oops, our auditor and our treasurer.

Um, you know, it bears reminding we're facing a 66.2 million dollar deficit.

We uh yet don't fully know the exact extent of what salary negotiations will do to, but it's going to add to our deficit.

And every time we look at potential cuts uh that we don't want to take, other cuts have to be made.

Um, and it's right.

I mean, you you look at it, um, approximately 70 individuals in our parks and maintenance are up to lose our their job, uh, who are the least paid among us.

So we have to really look at how are we going to balance if we don't want to cut one department um another one is is going to have to accept um those cuts.

So I appreciate where the treasurer showed how they're bringing money in.

Um I am thankful that the city attorney said if we look at things differently with outside attorneys, it's actually going to save us.

Um but I also think we have to look at, you know, our clerk OPSA auditor, others will have to uh accept some cuts, and we just need to be very clear.

It may take longer.

All the audits on the table are really important.

But if we all have to tighten our belts, then it means that maybe the audits take a little longer.

Things don't clean get cleaned as quickly.

And then I know the legal field, unfortunately, it's hard, but we can always put in extensions and requests for extended time when when you do litigation.

Um if we are if we are short staff, but everybody needs to to tighten their belt.

And I just want my colleagues to remind everybody, nobody wants to take these cuts, but every time we say we're not going to take something, a cut is going to happen somewhere else, and so we need to have that comprehensive conversation.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Councilmember Guerra.

Uh you know, I made my comments earlier, but it just, you know, it I think uh a little bit of memory lane.

I I remember uh being the capital director for assembly member David Chu, um, you know, and a co-author, uh joint author, Miguel Santiago, who's now my seat mate on the California Air Resources Board.

And I think um, you know, we had both uh um I think both of you might have been on the in the assembly at some point of the at some version of this legislation as well, um, in uh when it was going through.

So it's uh either way, both of them were seat mates at that time.

Um I do want to say that uh you know I want to thank our our city treasurer because our our well we already have a successful version of public financing that is under construction on Stockton Boulevard, and so it's a great housing project that's already moving forward, and we're gonna be uh uh opening up soon on both between district five and district six.

So uh more work to do on that.

Uh exciting um I did want to um you know also um you know I uh thank the city uh uh treasurer's team uh with their great work.

They're a small and mighty team who have returned a lot of revenue back to the city.

Uh and uh you know they they operate uh I think uh probably um uh in the normal shift uh the the city uh treasurers team, the courtyard and the uh the the police department's um um uh 6 a.m.

roll call are probably the earliest people at uh working at city hall every day because they're on East Coast time, uh making sure that we're beating the market.

So I just want to thank you guys' team because you've uh returned a lot for the city, and I think it's been innovative.

So thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

I I know the big picture here was our our budget discussion and those four important officers that report directly to us.

And one, we want to acknowledge the the work that you do and do more work uh with less people in the past few years.

And uh we have this exercise where we have a deficit, and whether or not we're gonna do it or not, uh, we put everybody on the table so we can see the good, the bad, and the ugly, like they said two months ago about this budget process, and rightfully we see that some things aren't you know um very viable as far as our decisions as far as saving money and the impact to our constituents, so but we need to hear them all, and you know, we appreciate the work you do, but it's a process, and we're trying to be fair to every to all departments and the public to show um the this impact.

And I know that the three of you are the four of you heard tonight were less than three percent of the city budget, so that's not lost on us.

I did want to note specifically there was all this talk tonight about the treasurer's office, so I don't want to uh diminish the city attorney's office, their clerk or oops that but three things uh to you to the treasure, real quick.

One, thank you for making us money.

Uh, we appreciate that.

Uh number two, uh, we look forward to the further opportunity to discuss as we wind down scurs and opportunity to do the same thing, like the public bank type option, reinvest our resources in a community with maybe ideas for a revolving loan fund or something like that.

I know it's been thrown out there.

And then lastly, I know there was all this talk on the public bank.

I I did uh make make a mention earlier, and yeah, I I was I looked it up in 2019.

I was a co-author of that, in large part because cities across the state were saying, can we do this?

And the banks were saying, No, you can't, you need state uh authorization.

So at the minimum, at that time, there is an effort to authorize cities to evaluate and study it.

And um, to my knowledge, no city has done it yet.

But LA and San Francisco are still in the evaluation phases, and the city of Sacramento did put some money forward, and we did spend a little bit of money, I guess, and we had some other amount of reserve, which has been pulled back from the budget, so we have to decide about that.

But I guess to get us all up to speed, if we could ask the treasurer to to just send us a memo as far as what's been done so far with the evaluation, and then we can decide what we want to do going forward.

Um but uh yeah, thank you for that and appreciate the robust um public conversation, the interest of the council.

So this item was no action, but just provide direction, which we certainly did.

So with that, that concludes this item.

Uh next is public comment for items not on the agenda.

Thank you, Mayor.

And I believe we can probably skip council comments, ideas, and questions and save those for this evening.

Does the city manager have a report?

No.

Thank you.

I have five speakers for public comment.

It's not on the agenda.

Robert Copeland, Gary Fleshman, Michael Milton, Twyconda Strain, then Teresa Oliver.

I'd like to know one thing.

One of the city council going to get serious about preventing people propellant, becoming homeless.

I've been coming here since Kevin Johnson was that mayor, and things have gotten worse in Sacramento.

Get on the ball.

If you can't do your job, we can replace you.

I'm gonna vote for my bank for uh Congress.

I'm not bumper at Guerrero.

He's been on the city council the longest.

He had not done jack shit.

We don't I don't agree with a lot of the uh policies.

He voted no on rent control, he voted no on.

Uh cow care, Medicare for all.

Also, I agree as well, uh city council on one thing.

Uh Sacramento safe streets, but you need a lot of help if you're gonna pass it by a ballot measure.

Thank you.

Gary Fleshman.

Thank you, Mayor.

So council people.

Um, my name is Gary Fleshman.

I'm a long-term resident of Thomas.

And um I have been trying to work with Brian to help coordinate and set the policies on the small home communities, not just in the Thomas, but the rest of the city.

Um, a couple of things that have come up, and I was fortunate enough that uh Brian actually sent me a revised copy of the new policy referrals.

Uh, I just want to say thank you.

Um I also want to say he's been very helpful.

He's been he's been positive.

He's been when I asked to meet with him, he took two hours and and talk and met with me and talked about my concerns and trying to get these things worked out.

I think that's a positive here.

Um specifically with uh with the excuse me.

Specifically with the um the old central and site.

Um is this going to be a 55 female only site?

Um in the up in the uh updated policies that really wasn't made clear.

Um the reason why I asked this is because an awful lot of people in the community are have brought up the issue of sex offenders.

And I was thinking about this, and I said if we keep this as a totally female site, chances are proportion and statistically there are less female sex offenders than male sex offenders.

And if we do that, that might help, that might actually help the uh the community and address some of that problem.

Um second, um, I also noticed that there was some talking about a community-free shuttle.

Didn't exactly say where exactly that was going to be coming from and how that was going to be arranged.

It would be nice to see some more of that information.

One of the one of the uh suggestions I had recently was to designate all of these small home communities as a weapons-free zone.

I don't think that's being unreasonable.

Um the other thing is I noticed that there's really not a system for neighborhood for the neighbors in the community to resolve issues that pop up with the micro home residents.

Who would they reach out to in order to solve some of these problems?

You know, and uh once thank you for your comments.

Your time is complete.

Our next speaker is Michael Melton in Toyconda.

Then Teresa.

Only a fool will go along with Mr.

Pizarro's shenanigans.

Okay.

It costs $9,000 a year for a person to stay in a tiny home with no toilet and no shower, and only cost 8,700 a year to stay in the hotel.

Why would you go for something that costs more?

Well, I would go for why we pay more, and then half the time somebody's not even staying in the place.

Make it make sense.

It's just an abandoned room.

It's like having a hotel voucher and and not giving the hotel voucher to nobody.

Or matter of fact, give it to somebody and them just not using it.

Just wasting money.

You're just throwing it in the air instead of building apartments.

I know you're not looking at me because you're a part of the embellishment.

Kevin, I don't, I hate to say it, man.

But you, you and you, them three right there, they got it going on.

It's you, it's you.

You was a part of SHRA, you nodded for Pedro, like he was like he's some good guy.

The other guy is a crook.

He that he's trying to set it up for him to try to work it out for him, but he's even seeing this holes in the plan.

You guys want to go ahead and go along with something that's not gonna work, that's not gonna help the community, something that's that that that's a temporary thing, but not an apartment at the end of the day.

You guys are what what what are you guys doing with the money?

Why are you trying to keep five million dollars to do bull?

No toilets, 55 and up, then you're excluding me.

I'm 44, so I'm definitely gonna have a complaint because I'm I'm 11 years away for the help.

So I'm gonna keep on complaining about when it's 55 and up and you're not doing anything for the youth.

Or I had to be 25.

Okay, I got kids.

I got a divorce, I got child support, I got problems, and I need help.

I come to you for years for help, nobody's saying nothing for help.

I come to Mr.

Pedro, Mr.

Pidro wouldn't give me no hotel vouchers.

You gotta talk about hotel vouchers.

He's talking about we're gonna get, I'm doing this.

He's not doing none of that.

Dude is coming here lying in your face.

He lied in my face last week and told me, hey, I'll get your RV out tomorrow.

Thank you for your comments.

Taekwondo and Teresa.

Hello, I came here tonight.

Um, well, actually, I made this meeting on the flute, but um first let me start off by um saying that I called District 2 numerous of times about apartment complex that has black toxic mo, roaches, infestation of roaches, rats, and so on and so forth.

Now, this apartment complex had many code violations, years for years, and the same problem keep on persisting.

And nobody, nobody cares.

We got carbon monoxide, you got kids with cerebral palsy, you got kids with autism, you got premature babies that that's been in and out of the hospital just within the last month.

You know, there's no air quality, there's no air quality, there's nothing habitable about the apartment complex.

My refrigerator's still sitting outside on the porch because of the rats, and I mean because of the roaches, and my art is always getting infestated.

It's nothing, and nobody does nothing about it.

You know, I keep calling, I call and I call and I call.

Okay, and um now, and then what I caught on a fluke with everything that you guys were talking about.

Now, with this homeless thing and its funding and the budget and now everything like that, nothing, nothing that you guys are doing with the tiny homes are benefiting for anybody that's going to it because people get kicked out and put right back on the streets.

You know, there's no help, there's no there's no success stories, and then you got apartment complex that are uninhabitable that are infested with roaches, and it's not good for people's health, you know.

So there's like numerous problems going on that nobody like seems to care about, you know, and you guys are here to help, but where's your heart?

budget and all everything like that nothing nothing that you guys are doing with the tiny homes are benefiting for anybody that's going to it because people get kicked out and put right back on the streets you know there's no help there's no there's no success stories and then you got apartment complex that are uninhabitable that are infested with roaches and it's not good for people's health you know so there's like numerous problems going on that nobody like seems to care about you know and you guys are here to help but where's your heart you know saying y'all going off y'all mindsets and everything looks good on paper but you guys gotta go by your heart and we'll being led by God by the spirit you know saying because right is right in the longest wrong and what you're doing is wrong you know I'm saying so I just asked for righteousness and justice remediate Teresa Oliver is our final speaker at the two o'clock meeting hello how are you doing my name is Trisa Oliver um I also live at the same apartment complex as Mr at 595 Santiago Avenue which is roach infested rats mice and I experienced myself where they also shut down my PGE because of the corrosion of the rat's pee and do do and all that and it's like causing really bad health conditions I'm disabled as well I'm trying to move my landlord time um I've made complaints also I've been abated by SHRA so they're not paying him so now he wants to evict me because of the problem he wants to no payment from me or anything else and his name is Mr.

Asada I'm I'm correct yes uh he does he's been doing a lot of things he's never he'd never I've been there for a year he's never ever you know worked on anything or tried to help me or any situation I spent over a hundred dollars on bait and all this other stuff for the for this stuff and it's like I was so bad I had to throw all my stuff away I barely have clothes now it's one sitting here pants I have no shorts and no winter clothes nothing summer clothes at all because of the fact that I had to throw all my stuff out of the dresser and everything because it's all infesting it was nasty I throw my couch away I throw my book furniture away half my clothes away everything and it just it doesn't make sense why do I have to throw my stuff away and then still pay rent for something I didn't even I didn't expect I have nothing to do I am I mean it's it's sad how would you feel if you if you lost all your belongings I mean come on now what can we do how are we gonna make it better if I can meet the last two speakers over here in the corner so I can get your your information and get some additional information please ma'am thank you so Mayor that concludes the business of our 2 p.m council meeting um I recommend we take a 10 minute break and we start our 5 p.m council meeting at 537 perfect thank you thank you