I like the trash can call this LAFGO meeting to order.

Recording in progress.

Can we please establish a quorum?

Yes.

Commissioner Moore.

Commissioner Hume.

Here.

Commissioner Jones.

Here.

Commissioner Desmond.

Here.

Commissioner Pratt?

Here.

Commissioner Little.

And Chair Kaplan.

Here.

You have a quorum with all the members present.

Shall we please stare?

We just will be.

Welcome everyone.

My name is Lisa Kaplan.

I have the pleasure of serving as chair for tonight's LAFCO meeting.

I will now turn it over to the clerk to make uh opening statements.

Madam Chair, this meeting of the Sacramento Local Agency Formation Commission is live only on YouTube.com and recorded with closed captioning.

The recording will be cable cast on Metro Cable Channel 14, the local government affairs channel on the Comcast and Direct TV Uverse Cable Systems.

The recording will also be viewed video streamed at Metro 14 Live.

SATCounty.gov.

Today's meeting replays Saturday, September 13th at 3 p.m.

and Monday, September 15th at 2 p.m.

on Metro Cable Channel 14.

Once posted, the recording of this meeting can be viewed on demand at YouTube.com forward slash Metro Cable 14.

The Sacramento Local Agency Formation Commission fosters public engagement during the meeting and encourages public participation, civility, and use of courteous language.

The board does not condone the use of profanity, vulgar language, gestures, or other inappropriate behavior, including personal attacks or threats directed towards any meeting participant.

Each speaker will be given two minutes to make a public comment and are limited to making one comment per agenda or off agenda item.

Please be mindful of the public comment procedures to avoid being interrupted or disconnected while making your comment.

Please fill out a speaker request form and hand it to the clerk staff if you'd like to make a comment in person.

If a speaker is unavailable to make a comment prior to the closing of public comments, the speaker waves their request to speak, and the clerk will file the speaker request form in the record.

The clerk will manage the timer and allow each speaker two minutes to make a comment.

You may send written comments by email to board clerk at SAC County.gov.

Your comment will be routed to the board and filed in the record.

If you need an accommodation pursuant to the Americans with Disabilities Act or for medical or other reasons, please see clerk staff for assistance or contact the clerk's office at 916-874-5451 or by email at Boardclerk at Sat County.gov.

Thank you in advance for your courtesy and understanding of the meeting procedures.

This concludes your announcement.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Can you please read the first agenda item?

The first item is public comment off for I'm sorry to address the commission concerning any matters not on the agenda.

Do we have any public comments?

We do not have any public comments.

Yeah, anybody online?

No on.

Oh, all right.

Well, then clerk, shall we move on to the next item?

Yes.

The next item is consistent.

I'm sorry, consent calendar.

Approve items two through four.

Do we have any public comments for consent?

We do not have any public comments.

Commissioners, any questions, concerns, items?

Madam Chair, I move item.

Commissioner Jones.

Second by Commissioner Little.

You may vote.

Your motion passes unanimously.

The members present.

All right, clerk.

Next item.

The next item is number five.

Presentation of Sacramento Local Agency Formation Commission audit summary for fiscal year 2023-24.

Madam Chair and Commissioners, I'm going to invite uh your auditor uh uh Spencer Blanda to provide you with the report of the audit results, and he is uh coming in uh uh virtually.

Good evening, everybody.

Um I just wanted to confirm.

Can you hear me before I proceed?

We can.

Perfect, and would you like me to share my screen or is it gonna be shared on on your end?

I think so that you have control.

Uh go ahead and share the screen, um, Spencer.

Perfect.

I will go ahead and share right now.

And we do see it, Spencer.

Perfect.

So I will be walking everybody through the results of the um audit for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2024.

And the agenda for tonight is gonna be the deliverables of our audit, which is the independent auditors report itself, the communication with those charged of governance, which is our letter as the auditor to you as the members of the commission, and we will be talking briefly about what happens fiscally at the entity over the fiscal year.

So, starting off with the communication with those charge of governance letter.

Um, our scope of the engagement was performing an audit over the financial statements and also looking at internal controls as well.

Our responsibility is to um express an opinion on those financials, and we issued an unmodified opinion on the financials, which means that they are fairly stated and presented in accordance with U.S.

GAAP.

We worked closely with Jose Enriquez and his team for the audit, and we performed the preliminary audit over the internal controls and a year-end audit over the financial statement balances as well.

We had no issues that arose during the audit.

Spencer, it's not if you're clicking, it's not going, uh it's still on the first page.

Spencer, do you mind going full screen?

I apologize.

Let me let me end the slideshow here.

I apologize about that technical difficulty.

Let me go ahead and share that.

I apologize about that.

I'm just uh did it go through.

No, it went through.

It's been through.

Oh, I'm okay, perfect.

I apologize about that, that hiccup there.

Um, just to confirm you can see the screen here that says agenda.

Yes.

Okay, perfect.

You know, I apologize about that.

Um, so quick recap.

We'll talk about the three deliverables that came with our audit report, the governance letter, um, our audit report itself, and talk a little bit about what happened fiscally at the entity over the course of the fiscal year.

And talking about the first letter, um, just to recap, we issued an unmodified opinion or a clean opinion, meaning that the financials are fairly stated and in accordance with US GAAP.

We worked closely with Jose Enriquez and the team, and we encountered no issues, um no disagreements, and we received all of the appropriate audit evidence to make our conclusion.

Um, in your financials, you won't see any significant um estimates, so it's fairly straightforward there.

And this just shows that what we did, so we we don't just look at the financials themselves, but we look at things like internal control, tone at the top, etc.

Basically looking at the data um in a variety of approaches so that we can arrive at our audit opinion.

And as we discussed, um, we didn't have any issues during the course of the audit.

So when we say independent auditors report, it's really gonna be on that big packet of 29 pages.

It's gonna be pages one through two at the beginning.

Um biggest takeaway with this, as I mentioned, unmodified opinion.

Also on pages four through six, you will find the management's discussion and analysis.

And this is really an excellent resource for anybody that wants to see at a high level what occurred at the commission over the course of the fiscal year, and we will talk about that briefly.

So, what you'll see is that toll assets increased around 76,000 from the prior year.

Um, this is going to be mainly driven by things such as revenue going up.

Um, there was some things happening with the market and other factors that we'll talk about in a minute.

Liabilities are down 63,000 from the prior year.

What this is what you're gonna see is because of the lease on the building, there's gonna be amortization year over year.

So those will continue to go down as that um lease amortizations paid off.

It will also fluctuate from year to year depending on the timing of the payable.

So sometimes we have invoices that we pay after the fiscal year, so it will result in a payable as of year end.

So that's really what's causing that fluctuation from prior year.

Looking at the statement of activities side, so revenues are up from the prior year around 193,000.

This is really driven by um we had an increase in interest gained, um, the markets did perform better and the cash is in the county treasury, and that's invested.

So the markets saw improvement over the last year, and that's what kind of drove that a little bit, but mainly we also had projects that were done um for districts that are members, and so that will just fluctuate year over year depending on what projects we are doing, and expenses are up 23,000, which is fairly comparable from the prior year.

And on internal control, um, so what you'll find on the internal control letter is we did have to write one significant deficiency, and this was not anything major or something like that.

We just noted an error on one of the deposit slip items that we were testing, but it was only around the $31 error, so nothing major, and the financials were adjusted because of that.

We just had to list that as a significant deficiency just because we found it.

But again, nothing major there, no material weaknesses were identified on that one.

And so, in overall, um, we had no other issues noted, so strong controls at the at the office there.

And I would like to conclude this presentation by thanking Jose Henriquez and the team for all their support over the audit.

We greatly appreciate them taking the time out of their busy schedules to get us what we needed.

And with that, I would like to open the floor to any questions that any of you might have.

Commissioners, questions?

I am seeing none.

Uh thank you, Mr.

Blanda.

Uh, congratulations, staff on getting the highest note for auditing and internal controls.

Um, and with that, that is just a presentation.

So no action is required.

That is correct, madam chair.

This is a receiving file, and thank you very much, uh, Spencer and your and your team as well, uh, for uh all of your assistance and and uh and advice during the entire process.

All right.

Now moving on, clerk.

Can we move on to the next item?

Madam Chair, item number six is consider the nominations for the Cal LAFCO Board of Directors and designate the voting delegate at the Calavco conference.

So, madam chair and commissioners, um, this item is um uh brought to you by um the California Association of LAFCOs at the conference.

There's going to be uh an election for new members of the board.

Um as you saw from your packet um for the central region, we have um uh we have seats that are open for city members and for the public member.

Um, those seats are currently open.

I believe the uh the city member seat is open.

The public member uh position, I believe the incumbent is plan is planning on on running again for for her seat.

Um, but uh with this, um, there's also going to be considerations of changes to the Cal AFCO bylaws.

This is part of the ongoing effort of CalAfco to reform itself to be more inclusive and also more responsive to its membership.

Um, basically modernize it a little bit.

Uh, and I'm happy to to um provide you with with some more background than what's in your packet, but by designating a a um a voting delegate, you're allowing that individual to be able to vote on both the elections and also on the bylaw changes, and if you wanted to provide a recommendation to the voting delegate, um you may do so as well.

I recommend that uh Commissioner Jones, she's going to be the the voting delegate, and uh you need an alternate so um you can pick between Ms.

Grabo or me in terms of who's gonna be.

So I think we'll flip for it.

Well, uh Mr.

Enriquez, may it probably make sense that Ms.

Graybo is the alternative since you might have another role you were playing during the conference.

Yes, and it makes absolute sense uh madam chair, and I fully support that.

Then uh I uh say that there's a motion that our voting member be Commissioner Jones and our alternate Miss Gray Bowl second, second by Commissioner Little.

Uh shall we vote?

Maybe your motion passes unanimously with the members present.

Thank you.

Um, and now item seven, as you started talking about.

Actually, no, we're still in item six.

Um because uh this is also an opportunity in case a commissioner wanted to run for the board of directors, either a city member or a public member uh to run.

You can also nominate someone from this commission to uh be on the ballot for the Cal AFC.

Commissioner Jones, do you have interest?

She's not her position is not a free element.

No, I would have to yeah, it would have to be a city member, uh, which either be you, madam chair, or commissioner Pratt.

And then for the public member seat, it would be Commissioner Little.

Too soon.

My last committee, I got on something I didn't need to get out to.

So I'm full right now.

Yes, your fault.

Yeah, I already have another project going on for next year, so I'll uh I'll bypass.

Okay.

And then I don't know if Commissioner Little was interested.

No.

Okay.

Um, and then the last piece for item number six is on the bylaw changes.

If you wanted to provide any guidance to um to Commissioner Jones in terms of how to vote on the bylaw changes.

Staff recommendation is to fully support it.

Again, these are bylaws to make the the organization more responsive, more nimble.

Um, it and it actually sets up additional, uh, if they pass, it sets up additional reforms that will be occurring in February um uh to fully implement the reformation of the association.

And uh am I correct, Mr.

Enriquez in assuming that you had a hand in drafting all of these?

I did not, Madam Chair.

Okay.

Um I'm in my role as the intra media, I'm I'm basically concentrate more on operations and making sure that um that uh certain things that Cal Afco puts on, like the conference, uh, are actually placed.

These are the work of Pamela Miller, who's the previous executive director for CalAfco, and she the she led um regional panels.

She did an online survey, which you may remember that I sent one of those um out, and um she conducted interviews uh with folks, um, she conducted also a forum at the staff workshops.

She compiled I forgot how many sheets of notes and postcards, but it's pretty s substantive.

And so um so the end result that you see here.

Um I only had a little bit of uh of an input, and it had to do with the uh regional officers being voting members on the board, but everything else it's it's the work of of Ms.

Miller and she deserves full full credit for that.

So what I hear is it wasn't done in a vacuum and it was done with a lot of input.

Correct.

And uh Commissioner Jones, uh, are you good with staff recommendation to giving you authority to support it?

Yes, ma'am, I am.

Would you like to make a motion?

I so move staff's recommendation, second, motion by Jones, second by Hume.

You may vote.

And this is a vote to support the amendments to the bylaw amendments at the annual voting meeting and give Commissioner Jones that authority.

Correct.

And that was uh item seven.

Uh for the record, uh Madam Chair, there were no public comments for item number five nor item number six.

Or seven.

Or seven.

You know, we're free wheeling tonight.

Yeah.

Item number eight is consider and approve a contract with RSG Inc.

for the preparation of a municipal service review and sphere of influence study of Omachumne Hartnell Water District.

I hope that's it.

Madam Chair, uh your policy analyst Grabo will be providing the staff report on this item.

Great, good evening, Commissioners.

My name is Christy Grabo.

Before you go, Miss Graybo, can we just confirm that item seven uh we voted on uh Madam Clerk, and that was yes from everybody because the voting is still up on our screen.

Yes.

Thank you.

No, go ahead.

Ms.

Graybo.

Um so as mentioned, I'm one of your policy analysts.

I'm here tonight to present to you two different contracts.

The first one that we're gonna discuss is um a contract uh to get approval for the EO to sign before we move forward on the work, and that will be um that LAFCO has received an application from Umnochimini Hartnell Water District for um a MS, I'm sorry, for a sphere of influence and annexation for unincorporated um aglands.

And uh this water district has not had an MSR done, so before we move forward with the application, we need to get that um moving um and as such with staff.

We did an RFP to hire a consultant.

RSG um submitted a proposal, and um RSG is actually a firm that we are working with with uh Florin County Water District, so they know Sacramento Sacramento County Water Districts and our staff as well, um, and we have for full confidence in their expertise in this um project.

Uh staff also sent the proposal to the water district for their um approval on the work and as well as the price, because they'll be paying for it as part of the application.

Um we have a purchasing policy um that requires URIS' approval before um our EO signs um the anything above 10,000.

So staff is recommending that the commission approve the contract with RSG not to exceed 43,505 on this contract and this work.

That concludes staff's presentation.

Uh any public comments?

We do not have any public comments.

Commissioners, questions, Ms.

Graybo, can you just please describe for anybody who may be watching later on where the omnichumini Hartnell water district is located?

I'm gonna I'm gonna kick that to our EO if we can.

The uh the district uh actually is south of Grant Line Road to the um Casumas River.

Um not basin, but the to the Consumers River area.

Um but it stops uh just shy of of Elk Grove.

The area that they're looking to expand is actually south of Elk Grove.

Uh so it's contiguous, but as Ms.

Graybo indicated, uh, is never had uh an MSR done.

So the law requires that a mu MSR be conducted before a consideration of a sphere of influence can be done and uh hence this item.

Okay.

Commissioners, uh Commissioner Hume.

Um thank you, Chair.

Very familiar with where uh OHWD is located, uh and also that uh the annexation area uh is um is an area that's already represented by the lower Casumus Resource Conservation District, uh completely different purview.

Um but I believe uh I'm just curious, uh OHWD is not a municipal water purveyor, and yet is that the fact that the in LAFCO policy there is no catch-all, or why are we going through an MSR for uh sphere of influence?

Um uh council can probably uh give you a little more in-depth uh legal response, but the the reality is that there is no caveat within uh within the um the law that get that that allows you to say, well, this isn't really a municipal service, and so then you therefore you can you can um you can disregard um it just basically says that if for the setting of a sphere of influence or the update of a sphere of influence, you need to conduct an MSR beforehand, uh and that's basically what the law says and and um it you know it sounds like it's we're we're getting into a little bit more um expense than it needs to, but the reality is that um since the district has never been studied before, um it's good for the public to have that background information that an MSR provides um I would also like to add that the application is to expand their service area for south of Elkro but only for groundwater management so they're not expanding uh or the providing water um to that area it's it's it's merely for the um for GSA purposes and um they would be taking over from I believe El Dorada County or sorry Sacramento County.

Okay.

Oh actually you have the general manager for uh OHWD here I could probably answer more technical questions than I can yeah uh Mike Wakeman general manager uh Chumney Hart now water district um we're actually taking over for Sacramento Central Groundwater Authority which has the authority over that area um we've been working closely with them on this uh the area we're annexing is outside of El Grove SOI it's all agriculture and the idea is that um uh it'll be a OHWD is an ag district so it'd be one ag district and represent all those people within that area uh SCGA within won't have as much agriculture in it and it would become more of an urban uh focused uh right now it was a request by a lot of the growers out in that area because oh d is an elected uh water district so we're a land order elected district so and it for specifically where it's at it's south of Grant Line Road currently our current district south of Grant Line Road um west of Jackson Highway basically follows Dillard and Green Road down and then highway 99 is the um western boundary and then we'll expand from 99 all the way to I5 and then take uh on the north side of the Casumas River our district on the um our current district is partially south side of Casumas River so we're in both groundwater sustainability agencies um both in the South American subbasin and in the Casumus basin so any other questions thank you Commissioner Hume you're good all right do I hear do I have a motion sure I'd make it second move by Commissioner Hume second by Commissioner Desmond uh in favor of the contract vote the item passes unanimously thank you madam clerk next item please the next item is item number nine consider and approve an agreement with CyTech solutions for document management services madam chair your uh policy analyst Grabo will also take it uh this item great thank you um so this next contract that we have is that staff is preparing uh for a potential move uh of location of our office um potentially next summer um and in preparation of that move and also just to update our office operations in general um we need to um implement an electronic document management and retrieval system so basically just update our office currently our lafco office has a file room that has project files agenda packets resolutions um a whole bunch of files from city and corporations that date back to 1963 um and so it'd just be great to have something a little bit more updated on that so staff coordinated and we reached out to five different um companies uh locally to get a quote and uh proposal from what they would do in this effort um based on cost and project tasks uh staff decided that citech solutions was the company uh that had the best competitive pricing and had a timeline that we could definitely work with um additionally cytach uh this is their main bread and butter for their their company that they work with public agencies um and again based on our public I'm sorry on our purchasing policy we can need your approval before moving forward this contract um shall not exceed more than 56,521 dollars and so staff is recommending approval on this request clerk madam clerk do we have any public comments?

We do not have any public comments.

Do you have commissioner comments?

I'll take a motion.

Madam chair.

I still move.

Move by commissioner jones second second by commissioner Little.

All vote, please.

Your item passes unanimously.

The fire marshal away.

Yeah.

Uh-huh and uh executive director, next item.

Uh it the next item is the executive officer commission counsel comments.

Uh, before we get to the astro sheet, I wanted to just uh highlight a couple uh a couple of things.

Um number one uh staff is considering canceling the October meeting.

Uh we will provide you with an update with about a week or two weeks from now, uh, just so you know.

Uh so you may have your first Wednesday of October free.

Um the second uh thing I wanted to bring up to speed on is um there is uh request for um uh monterey lafco um uh is on a uh is uh had one of their decisions overturned by a trial court they're appealing it and they sent out a request for amicus briefs uh and discussing it with some of my colleagues um instead of providing separate um amicus briefs we um we decided that uh it might be better for Cal LAFCO to contract with an with an attorney to prepare a single one and another LAFCOS can come in on a cost sharing basis, and so um uh counsel and I discussed it.

Uh we think that it's it's good for for Sacramento LAFCO to join.

And so uh I signed the contract to to the for the cost sharing this um um just this week.

And the contract itself uh we have essentially eight parties that are joining in joining in.

Um it's Calavco plus seven other LAFCOs.

About three of them are LAFCOs that are no longer in the association, but they still want to join in on on the effort.

So it ends up being about a cost uh whopping total of 937 dollars so far.

I believe Orange County took it up on their meeting this morning as to whether or not they also want to join in the effort, which means the cost will be even less at that point because we have a not to exceed contract of 7500, which is absolutely bonkers um from a cost standpoint, but it's the the attorney said they could do it, and they have a statewide reputation for um uh uh for preparing these kinds of things, and they're very familiar with LAFCOs.

Um if you want to know the the details of what the amicus brief would would factor in on.

When the trial judge overturned Monterey LAFCO's decision, uh the the judge used the standard called um rational connection, which is above and beyond what the standard is under Cortesian Knox Hertzburg.

Um the law itself has uh uh indicates to judges that they're supposed to be using a substantial evidence rationale for weighing LAFCO decisions, and so the courts give LAFCOs uh a lot of discretion uh in in this and making their decisions, and so that's uh and that's because of that of that substantial evidence um clause that's in the in the law.

The uh the judge used uh a higher standard that's that's out of um that's outside of what the law indicates.

What standard was what standard it is?

The uh it was called rational connection.

And I this is my speculation as a non-attorney, and I'm sure um your counsel is probably gonna be um chastising me later on, but what I think it is is that the judge got confused in terms of what LAFCOs do.

LAFCOs are quasi-legislative bodies, which means that you operate similar to the legislature.

Cities and counties are quad judge quasi-judicial, and so they in when they make decisions, they have to connect the decision that they've made to the facts that are on the ground.

LAFCOs don't have that burden.

And so uh, and so I think the judge, in my opinion, as a as a layperson, the judge applied a quasi-judicial standard instead of a quasi-legislative standard, which is what the law says that it should be.

Um and so we're we're not commenting on the Monterey decision, or whether or not it should be overturned.

We're commenting that the rationale should be overturned because that's not what the standard of Cortesian Knox Hertzburg says.

So the the the amicus is is very, very um uh narrow and it's very much targeted um towards uh requesting that the appeals uh appeals judges overturn that um overturn that logic for the decision.

Okay.

Uh any comments, commissioners, questions?

That's interesting.

It's very interesting.

Feel free to send on the brief uh when it's finalized.

At least I would like to read it.

Sure.

Uh and then uh Ms.

Grabo will cover the uh astro sheet.

Great.

So I uh I just wanted to highlight three projects that are moving forward.

Um, Florence County Water District.

As mentioned, we're partnering with RSG to do that, the draft.

Um we have reviewed the draft review of the MSR.

Um it is now in staff at the district's hands, um, and they are reviewing out their legal team.

Um and we should be getting back soon.

Our plan is um probably November time frame of h of hosting a community meeting to uh let the community know some of the findings that we found um in as a result of that document.

Um Metro Fire District, we just had a meeting uh yesterday, actually, um for a kickoff of that project.

So that is in movement, and then um Florin Resource Conservation District Detachment.

Um we have a draft MSR for that, and we're reviewing that in-house.

So pretty busy on some things.

Commissioners, questions, comments?

All right, next item.

Item number eleven is commissioner and commissioners' comments.

Commissioners, anything?

Anything new?

All right, you guys have been busy.

Thank you.

Let's keep it short and sweet.

We can get on with the rest of our evening, and so I'll call this meeting adjourned at 6.03.