I'll hold it down.

There you go.

Okay.

It's two o'clock, and we're going to call today's meeting of the rules and open government committee to order.

Let's start with roll call, please.

Candelas.

Here.

One.

Foley.

Here.

Come in.

Here.

Go in.

Here.

We have a quorum.

Thank you.

Our first item on the agenda is the meeting for Tuesday, March.

The agenda for the council meeting on Tuesday, March 3rd.

Meeting has a 9:30 closed session, 130 regular session, and consent starts on page five and ends on page six.

In section three, we have our sewer rate setting audit report, reasonable accommodation process and personal property impound handling.

And our community oversight committee annual report for measure T.

And in section six, we have our climate adaptation and resilience plan.

And that is it.

Do we have any public comment on this agenda?

No public comment.

Okay, back to the committee.

Okay.

Let's vote.

Motion carries five zero.

And now we are on to our review of the council agenda for March 10th.

9 30 closed session, 1 30 regular session with a recommended cancellation of the evening session.

And consent starts on page five and ends on page six.

Section three, we have our city of San Jose Investment Policy.

We have the City Council Focus Area Status Report.

We have section four ALPR data usage protocol update and police department overtime spending.

And that is it.

Do we have any public comment on this agenda?

No public comment.

Okay, back to the committee.

Move approval.

Second.

With counseling.

Cancellation of the evening session.

All right.

That motion carries five zero as well, and we're on to our consent agenda.

Today we have three items on consent.

Do we have any public comment for consent?

No public comment.

Second.

All right, we have a motion and a second on consent, so let's vote.

Motion carries five zero.

And now we are on to our discussion items section C.

C one.

We have report back from our the memo on respective roles and responsibilities of the city council committees.

And city attorney, I think Kevin, you're going to give us a brief presentation on this.

Yes, thank you, Chair.

Uh Chair Vice Mayor and Council Members uh Kevin Fisher, assistant city attorney.

This is in response to a request from this committee from a few weeks ago to review the respective responsibilities of the rules committee compared to the other standing uh city council committees.

I do have a uh 12-slide PowerPoint.

It's not particularly pretty, but it has all the all the relevant text on that you can follow along.

And uh we will also be uh distributing a memo on kind of summarizing all this to the entire mayor and council.

And I've also been asked to do a flowchart, so you'll have all sorts of visual aids uh to help uh folks will help to navigate through this uh this the path, the different paths.

So I'll go ahead and get started and um essentially the review uh is as I mentioned will explain how council standing committees function under rule nine of the rules of conduct resolution, which is resolution 2023-22 and council policy zero-12.

Council policy zero-twelve is the policy that specifically uh provides the responsibilities of rules when uh referrals come to the rules committee.

And you may recall this committee, this committee and the city council updated in uh uh council policy zero-12, I believe in 2024.

And uh this review will also cover why the rules and open government committee is structurally different than the other council standing committees, and we this will include a discussion when council when committee actions require rules committee and/or full council action.

So just a little uh baseline baseline framework, the next slide, which uh I will, there we go.

The standing committees are created by Rule 9 of the Rules of Conduct Resolution.

The standing committees are advisory bodies to the city council.

The standing committee's actions are recommendations, not final council action, and the standing formal authority remains with the full city council.

So we have uh, I had a heavy finger there.

Subject matter standing committees.

As you know, there are four subject matter standing committees.

There's transportation and environment, neighborhood services and education, community and economic development, and public safety, finance, and strategic support.

The primary role of these committees is policy review and recommendations within their defined subject areas.

The rules and government open government committee has distinct roles per the rules of conduct resolution and council policy 0-12, as I mentioned.

In addition to policy review, rules performs governance functions, such as council and study session agenda review, which obviously you just completed, work plan approvals for the standing committees and modifications to those work plan approvals, deciding whether to drop, defer or request an administrative workload assessment, and then make a recommendation to the city council if the item moves on to city council, and then the rules and open government committee also has open government and ethics responsibilities, such as the PRA appeals that this committee sometimes hears, not very often.

And then let's talk about committee actions versus staff direction.

Not all referral, not all referrals are the same.

Really, the key distinction is policy recommendations from any of the standing committees can go may go directly to the city council if it's on their work plan and the and the committee's been directed to review whatever policy questions coming before the committee.

However, requests involving staff work are governed by council policy zero-12, and that's when the when the when the item needs to go to the rules committee.

Let's talk about policy recommendations.

Policy recommendations, as I mentioned, can go direct to council from the standing committees.

The standing committees may hear items on posted agendas, vote on recommendations on their posted agendas, vote on recommendations in as posted on their agendas, and transmit their recommendation, their report to council.

And no rules committee action is required if no staff work is requested for that policy recommendation.

Requests for involving staff work are a different matter.

If a committee request asks for analysis options or implementation and has workload fiscal or staffing impacts, it is a city council referral under council policy zero-12.

And as such, under 0-12, the rules committee comes into play.

As you know, the rules committee screens referrals, referrals from council members, as you if you receive a memo from one or more council members with some sort of initiative that would require staff work or you receive it from one of the standing committees, and this committee determines whether to assign defer or drop the item.

And this committee, as you know, and frequently does requests workload assessments.

In any event, unless we have a drop in this committee or a deferral, or unless the city manager greenlights an item, the full city council affirms or modifies whatever recommendation comes from from the rules committee.

So we have a two-lane process overview.

Just kind of summarize.

Lane one, policy recommendations.

Standing committee can go straight to council if it's if it's if it's strictly policy with no no staff workload.

Lane two, staff work request, the standing committee, uh standing committee can hear that item, but it would need to go to the rules committee because it includes staff work, and then the rules committee, as noted on the previous slide, can assign, defer, drop the item, request a workload analysis, and then the item would go to the full city council.

So what can committees do without rules?

Uh the standing committees can request existing information, the standing committees can ask clarifying questions, they can operate with an appropriate approved work plans, and they can shape recommendations for council consideration.

Again, those are policy recommendations.

Standing standing committees other than rules may not independently assign substantial new staff work, direct implementation of policy, or commit city resources.

These actions require the policy zero-12 compliance, which again is being routed through the rules committee.

So last slide.

Key takeaways standing committees are advisory, rules as a gateway, not a substitute for council.

And when in doubt, we should treat staff work as a zero-12 referral that needs to go to the rules committee.

Of course, the city manager, you know, is the best feedback as to whether something is substantial staff work or not.

And kind of to sum this up, this process preserves transparency, workload control, and council authority.

And that's the end of my presentation.

I'm of course, all right.

Well, thank you for the report.

Do we have any public comment on this item?

Okay, so back to the committee.

I'll start with the vice perfoli.

Just whoops.

Just a comment.

Thank you.

That was really a good presentation.

So, your plan to distribute this to the full council is how?

Thank you, Vice Mayor.

Yes.

I will next prepare our office.

Me, uh, will next prepare a memo summarizing all this.

I was holding off preparing the memo in case I got any feedback.

I gave this presentation to the city manager's senior staff last week, and now I'm giving it to you.

So the next step will be to prepare the memo summarizing this in a little more detail, but not a novel length by any means.

And then also, as I mentioned, there's been a uh clamor for a flowchart.

So uh I will we will include a flow chart as well.

I'm I'm not a big flowchart guy, but um some folks are so we'll go ahead and include that.

Yeah, I'm not a big flow chart person either.

I like to bypass the flow chart, but I thought this presentation was really easy to understand and uh I got it.

If there's uh policy, it's okay.

If it needs staff time, which most things need staff time, it comes through rules.

That was I I thank you so much for the presentation.

I'll move approval.

Second.

Okay.

Um, don't know that we need a motion on this item, it's really just a report.

But but I guess we'll accept the report, so that's fine.

We'll take a vote to accept the report.

Any other comments, questions?

Okay, councilman.

I just wanted to express my appreciation.

I'll see it's it's broken.

Now I see why we're stumbling, but uh I just wanted to express my appreciation to uh Kevin for for his presentation and a succinctness, so thank you.

Uh attorney Fisher.

Yes, uh succinct and clear will be would be great for the memo too because we don't have time to read a lot, as you know.

Thank you.

All right, um, let's vote on this item.

All right.

Motion carries five zero, and that brings us to the second item, which is the return of the Coyote Valley's corridor study.

I'm gonna turn to Lee to just give us a quick overview of the workload analysis and then we'll go to public comment.

Sure.

Thank you, Chair.

It is broken.

Uh attached to the agenda is staff's workload analysis, uh, bringing the report forward for council approval.

We have deemed a yellow light as we had referenced last week.

So the workload analysis does include a yellow light, given that the resources to work on this um were eliminated.

However, to ensure the community is aware of the progress that was made and has information for what's been included in very draft forms, I would say staff is going to, if the rules committee approves, produce uh a brief info memo uh highlighting that work and pointing it to the city's website where that work is currently housed.

And Director Burton is here for any questions that the rules committee may have.

Thank you.

We'll go to public comment.

I have four speaker cards.

Uh please go ahead and make your way to the podium.

Allie, Alice and Jean.

Ready?

Hi, hello.

My name's Allie Victorine.

I'm a resident of D7 and an avid user of the Coyote Creek Park Chain.

I have concerns about the draft Coyote Valley corridor study as it stands now.

I'm concerned about the proposed reduction of the riparian setback from 100 feet to 20 feet, the inadequate analysis of the effects on wildlife, and the unique uh hydrology of the Coyote Valley and the effects that uh this report might have on that.

So I'm asking that the draft report not be assigned to a council agenda until errors are fixed, key analyses are finished, as pointed out in the joint letter from Green Footh Hills and other respected environmental groups.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

I'm Jean Dresden, and I acknowledge that uh the council members and mayor were concerned that the community was not aware of the status of the report and sought to solve that communication problem.

I believe that staff's recommendation for an information memo that acknowledges the work that's been done and the work that is yet to be done to address uh community concerns and additional outreach that's needed in areas that have identified difficulties, would be important to do and come forward with.

Staff is so busy dealing with SB 79 and the general plan review and all sorts of other gifts from the state legislature that this project really needs to be put aside, but the materials are there, the thoughts are there, they need to be memorialized.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, council members.

Alice Kaufman, uh policy and advocacy director for Greenfooth Hills.

Um, I guess Jean kind of pretty much said it all already.

Um I definitely agree uh with staff's assessment that um the reports uh not even reports but sort of the preliminary assessments and the draft uh documents that were created were in draft form, in some cases uh fairly rough and um as in the as noted in the letter that that we uh attached um now attached that we emailed to uh to the city.

Uh there definitely was a lot of work to be done on those documents.

So I'm glad to hear that they're not going to be memorialized as any kind of final report.

Um looking forward to that informational memo um to be posted to the website.

So thanks very much.

Hi, um I'm Larry Ames, a longtime Creek Trail and Park Advocate, and I'm echoing the thing.

Please do not put the draft on the consent calendar right now.

And um the park is important to us, it's repairing a corridor, the trails, the habitat.

The public wants to weigh in on it before it's adopted.

Thank you.

Back to the committee.

Okay, all right.

Sorry, Vice Mayor Foley.

Okay, we have technology problems.

Uh thank you for the members of the public who came and spoke, and thank you for the workload analysis.

Actually, this, as one of the authors of the memo, this is exactly what we were hoping for, is just an info memo to really memorialize the work that's already been done and not requesting that the staff uh proceed with any other work.

We already voted as a council last year to halt indefinitely any future work.

So this really is all we were looking for last week, and I move approval of this item.

Okay, any other comments?

I don't see any other lights, so let's oh, go ahead.

Sorry about that.

So um by by having the info memo, uh, this just prolongs uh the time frame in which anything would ever be done.

I don't the info memo, I think will simply highlight the work that was done and what work hasn't been done, and it'll point to all of those draft reports.

In no way does it speak to the finality or the resources that may be needed to complete that work that would need to be directed by the full council.

Okay, thank you.

And presumably we we voted to suspend the work, so the council would have to vote to re to begin the work again, but it's important for the work that was done before to be written down somewhere so that at some time in the future there's a record of it.

That is correct.

I mean, through this year's budget process, in addition to allocating funding, there will be a lot of conversations about just staff capacity in general outside of money, and what are those things that uh the council would like staff to focus on?

Obviously, the council focus areas will be a big part of that.

Big part of it is gonna be there's a host of policy work within kind of the planning building code enforcement world, um, housing department world, which you know Jean spoke to um where council can ask us to re-engage in this work, but it'll need to be to be prioritized in addition to the policy work around general plan housing element sp79, which I just say has some um aggressive timelines uh that we're supposed to meet in addition to a host of other things.

So council will get the opportunity to chat about that again through the budget process.

Yes, when when things get easier for the planning department and the decade from now, maybe.

All right, let's um vote on this item.

All right, that motion carries five zero.

Thank you all, and we are on to open forum.

Lillian, please.

I don't know, I can't turn the mic off.

No, sorry, okay.

Good afternoon.

Um, my name's Lillian Koenig, and I'm a D3 uh representative that sits on the senior commission.

Um I'm here today to uh basically hold a grievance, and it is uh specifically on municipal code 2.08.120.

Um it specifically states and the senior commission is not a standing committee from what I understand, it's a commission.

So when you talk about open rules, open government, I'm here today because I believe that open government and your your um representation here actually uh does refer to your um stippens in your municipal codes and the city um this recently uh when I applied for the stipend, which is 200 um when you appear on the commission, you should be eligible for that.

And I was told that there was no funding available.

So I would like to know per attorney and city manager why on your books you still have that.

Hello, oh I'm still speaking.

Okay, why you specifically have that municipal code on the books if we are not eligible for that stipend?

And when I looked at 806, which lists all of the uh potential city council people, et cetera, et cetera, who do receive stiffness from 100 to 350 dollars?

They may or may not be um under this particular code, and that's what I am concerned about.

I would like to appeal that decision that I am not eligible due to the fact that there is no funding available.

I simply don't understand why open government has it on the books if we are not eligible, and therefore other standing committees or other commissions uh are eligible.

I I was told by Mr.

Cohen, we met earlier in the in the parking lot that it's under a different kind of funding.

But nevertheless, nevertheless, take it off the books.

If we are not eligible and there's no funding, why is it on?

Thank you.

Go ahead.

And and ma'am, as soon as we're done here, I'm happy to come off the dice and chat.

Uh, luckily, uh that chair and I were able to speak to the Parks and Rec department about this.

I think there's a uh bad miscommunication back to you.

All stipends are recognized and funded.

So they will be moving forward with the stipend for anyone who applies for the senior commission, including yours.

City manager, thank you so much for that.

But is that also um refundable back like in December when we were sitting there?

They'll be looking at that.

We'll adjust.

We'll let Lee will come out and talk to you afterwards.

All right, we are adjourned at two twenty three PM.

Thank you.