Culture and Library Commission meeting of February 17th, 2026 to order.

Bill, will you take the roll call?

Yes, Chair Scotland.

Present.

Vice Chair Miller.

Present.

Commissioner Acevedo.

Present.

Commissioner Alvarez.

Commissioner Gillary.

Commissioner Ridsdale.

Present.

Commissioner Smith.

Commissioner Velasquez.

Present.

We have five, so the quorum is met.

Okay.

Thank you.

Item two, announcements.

We have no announcements.

Item three, consent calendar.

Can I get a motion to approve the minutes of January 20th, 2026?

I move to approve.

Thank you.

Is there a second?

I think.

Alright, any discussion?

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

No.

All right.

Motion ferries.

Okay.

On to item four, library services, staff report and announcements.

I have no report or announcements.

Okay.

Moving on to item five, public comments.

At this time we will ask for public comments for items not on the agenda, and comments are limited to three minutes per speaker, please.

My name is Craig Williams.

Basically, um I I heard your organization talk about uh something about artists of the month.

And so I had um a proposal for how you could maybe do that.

Also, a second thing.

Let me just give you this first.

This is just sort of a mock-up of how it could be done.

It could be, you know, just uh, you know, something that said artist of the month, a picture of the artwork that was used for the artist of the month, and just a little sort of a paragraph paragraphs about about the artist.

Um I I have the stand, which I'm willing to give to you guys if you want to do this and use this, but you know, this is something that you could you could put in the uh entrance way, and uh you know it would give more people seeing the art and for the art association, it might get more people coming uh or knowing about the artists association.

The second thing is that I do a lot of art myself, but what I do is I listen to the station, it's called uh it's uh KCSM.

I don't know if people are familiar with that, but they constantly say, you know, all the time that they have the biggest jazz library in the world.

And um, you know, so I was thinking about that, and it might be possible to set the little stand with a radio.

You wouldn't have to put it on that loud, um, and with a poster of KCSM with information about KCSM.

And if people saw that, then you know they could access this library.

They have a free app and uh you know it's a commercial free station, and this is the second thing.

Um but I would be willing to you know give you a little stand along with uh a radio and you know if you kept the volume down, it wouldn't be there are two outlets in the entrance area, and you know, it could be next to those two outlets.

So those are my two ideas, and if you're interested in them, then uh hopefully you can consider them.

Great, thank you so much.

Thank you.

All right, do we have any more public comments at this time?

All right, this concludes public comments.

Moving on to item sixa, presentation on arts, culture, and library commission project planning.

So presentations, no presentations.

Okay, that's it.

Yeah, yeah.

Okay, anyway.

We have action items.

Hooray.

Okay, so we're going to do the commission project planning exercise that we talked about last month, where we all brought in ideas, and these ideas have made it to these sticky boards up on here.

And oh, I just want to call this a you don't need to stay.

Like you're you're free to go.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Um, what we're gonna do.

If I may you also should have received uh this um spreadsheet to summary of the idea that it's alphabetized by commissioner who forwarded the idea.

So edit corresponds to what you see on the um postboard.

So if you want more, did you consider this more information?

Yeah, as a little bit more of a reminder.

So you all have in front of you nine dots.

You may use your nine dots as you'd like.

You can put one dot on each, you can put nine dots on one if you're super duper into it, or some combination thereof.

So take your dots when we're all done.

Go on there, stick your dot where you feel that we should prioritize this as a commission.

And we'll talk about timing later.

Let's we're gonna get them ranked.

But the most important part, in addition to saying what we should do, is putting your not money where your mouth is, like, are you gonna help?

And so if you're willing to help assist this idea come to fruition, like outside of just this meeting, whether it's a subcommittee, whether it's you know doing some other kind of work, put your name under the sign up.

Um, if you don't have a pen, we have some extra pens.

So stick your dots where you want, and hopefully, also stick your name where you're willing to help.

And after we've done our dots, after we've done our names, we'll put the the most popular ones up, and then we'll talk a little more deeply about timing and that kind of stuff, and we'll see if we need to sort of further prioritize.

And I'm kind of thinking this will probably take us the next couple years.

You know, we're not gonna do four things in one year.

Like we just can't.

Maybe we can do two things, maybe we can do three things, maybe we can do one thing, we don't know.

But this is just more where do we want to spend our life force for the next couple years with limited budget?

So one thing I would just want to ask real quick do people understand how you use the dots?

Your options.

Cool.

Any other questions about how this is going to work before we scamper around and do it?

Okay.

Um maybe take a second beforehand, reread the list so you get a little more context, and then we'll maybe take the next however long time it takes.

And then just sit back down when you're done so we know you're done.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I guess I have a question.

Is this like obviously there are like many great ideas here, but we're we're voting not just on the idea, but like feasibility or like kind of what is our criteria other than think that's a cool idea.

I think they're they all seemed relatively feasible.

Okay.

So assuming feasibility, assuming the fact that it seems like we can pull these things off, or at least do enough research to figure out whether or not we can pull it off.

So like if we have a top four and one of the four turns out to be ridiculously not feasible, we still have three.

And I think if I may, one of the um inspirations for this was thinking about having a limited budget because it's dedicated to the grants and to the um comedy event that one of the criteria uh would be low cost or low cost or no cost.

Right.

Yeah.

Um so you know, I mean, I can look at some of these and think that's got more dollars associated with it.

Although it may not look like it on this book.

So part of, you know, part of if you sign up might be trying to figure out how we would get donations for these kinds of things.

So I mean TBD on that, but you know, what what can we accomplish as a commission with limited money?

And do something else than just kind of sit here and read through an agenda and then go our separate ways.

Because I mean, you guys are giving your life force to come here, so why don't we do cool stuff together?

And I would I just add what's exciting to you.

Right, yeah.

What are these ideas?

Yeah, what do you want to do?

Inspire you.

You're coming here for a reason.

Let's do it.

Oh, and I will say one more thing.

If you sign your name up, you aren't necessarily going to have like if you sign up on six things.

We're obviously not going to do six things.

And if we do like the top three things and you've signed up for all of them, you're not writing it in stuff.

Like we'll figure it out.

It's more a I am willing if called upon to help.

So if you're just absolutely not interested in helping with something, don't put your name down.

But if you you were like, yeah, this sounds cool.

Put your name down.

Big sell.

I said I wish there were more of us here to decide this.

I can't even see my dots from here because they're pale yellow.

I'm like, where did my dots go?

You put one on game.

I bet like two.

Two.

I think I can count.

Did you get my email out of that?

Just making sure that's the right thing to do.

Yeah.

All right, have we extended all our dots?

Looking for it a little bit.

What?

I totally said I could count.

I actually can't.

It's cool.

It is the first pancake, you know.

That's true.

Okay.

Four.

So you have to have like a runoff.

Well, we got our toss two.

Yeah, we have we have a top two here.

We wanna just kind of move these around a little bit.

You want to help?

Sure.

Maybe could you move the poetry contest over there to the top?

Okay.

So we have two clear winners.

And then the other ones all kinda have enough people that are interested also that we have three folks there, three folks there, two folks here.

So yeah, I guess those two would be the top two next.

So we could choose four and just kind of be cool with it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I mean, especially because we know this one already worked.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, and I'm just gonna do this one anyway.

So like we know this one has been in some capacity.

Yeah.

Okay, so do we not want to include the other five the the map of art in free little library?

Because there's two volunteers, which is less.

Oh, I see.

I mean, do we wanna do we want to have five total?

Just in terms of our general priorities.

What do you think, Bill?

Well, I think um we can obviously we'll we'll summarize this in a spreadsheet.

We're gonna actually add into the one that already exists.

Um just two additional uh columns with the number of votes and then who uh which commissioners signed up to help.

Um with that in mind, we we have we'll have them all together.

Okay.

And then I think it's just a matter of like you talked about the next step, which is thinking about the timing of these things.

And if the determination is that based on the number of dots and the number of volunteers that these are the top four.

Yeah, they don't have to disappear.

We can do these next time.

Correct.

Yeah, that's what I'm thinking too.

And you know, who knows?

By the time we've done all these, we might have different people of the commission who want to do different stuff.

So let's talk about timing.

Um, Alana, this one was yours.

Tell us more about is there a time period that would work best for this?

Uh I think it's mostly seasonality, right?

Like we want to if it it's biking outside, we don't want to do it today or in February.

Um late springs.

Yeah, like I feel like late spring or late summer.

I think like early fall.

That's like hot.

Um, so yeah, late spring, late summer.

Um I guess like also thinking about if the comedy in the plaza is usually in June, right?

Yes.

So have it like a month or two after that, so it's not competing.

Um I think contingencies or like dependencies would be I saw this as like a collaboration with the bicycle and pedestrian uh commission, so I would need to reach out to them and see if they'd even be interested in collaborating or not.

Um and perhaps the another potential partner would be the rec department.

Oh yeah, you know, yeah.

So and yeah, kind of dependent on like what their priorities are.

So I mean, this could be a this summer thing or next summer, you know.

We're already planning, yeah.

So I would just from the perspective of trying to collaborate in this way, which I think is fantastic, and we're trying to do more and more in this city in this way, cross-department department collaboration.

Um I would say 2027, just to be realistic.

And this is great idea.

It is a lot of moving pieces to this.

Yeah, yeah, it has more external dependencies.

Yes.

Okay.

Also, um, Ava Energy or Ava Energy, they um are learning that bike e-bike um like promotion giveaway.

The giveaway um on the third round I won.

So we got a new e-bike.

Um not because I'm writing it, but for mostly for my kids.

Dad already wrote it eight test running, it was it.

Um it's a really good program to get people out.

Cool, you know, and on the on the bikes.

Is it an ongoing?

Sorry.

Yes, it's I think it's still ongoing from what I saw.

Yeah.

So perhaps it would still be doing it in 2023.

Yeah, and we can yeah, I think their whole point is to um to push, you know, uh green friendly type of um transportation.

Yeah, so then that might line up with the yeah, like maybe sponsor of a lot of things in San Diego.

Okay, yeah.

Great.

Yeah, and and we mentioned um like a bike shop too.

Oh, yes.

Okay, there's also bike east bay.

So, like, I feel like there's a lot of potential yeah, collaborators.

Um very green friendly area, yeah.

Okay, so cool.

Oh so we have a path forward for that one.

Let's talk about the poetry contest.

Whose idea was this?

Sweet.

Oh, yes, do you have many ideas?

Yeah, we're still uh tell me more about your thoughts about like timing and what would need to what would need to happen for this to exist.

I think this is a little bit like the um like the grants program a little bit where we we would have to just come up with an infrastructure of how do we call for entries, how do we I don't know if it's a contest per se, like somebody like wins, but like how do we determine what to do with the poetry that we get, like how do we merchandise it back to the public, right?

Like whether it's on library receipts or you know, putting it in the public somewhere.

So I think it's to me it's more about um probably a like a subcommittee figuring working through some of these things.

I don't know that we need sponsorships per se, and we can think through if there's people we want to partner with to help get the poetry out there, but I don't think there would be a whole lot of cost involved either.

Okay, so it's basically call for entries, get some entries, do something with the entries.

That's about as far as I got.

Great.

Risdale mentioned was the idea of you know creative things, because I think there's a lot of creative possibilities now.

Uh for example putting like the winning poems on like the checkout receipts.

I think we could totally do.

And with social media it's so much easier to kind of get those things out there.

Yeah.

And there was um I don't know if you guys take part but there just was a thing that popped up that's like a poetry machine.

Cool.

Like there's one at the airport too.

Yeah.

So I mean and I don't know that we could like program our own I don't think that might be a little ambitious but we could figure out I don't know just like a cool way to let people interact with what people in San Landro have created.

Where's the poetry machine part?

Um like right where you used to pay for fairs but now you have to use your clipper anyway but yeah.

Right.

Maybe we could even get sponsors to put a poem on ad space instead of an ad, like one viewer ad and one more poem like at a bar uh a bus stop or what have you cool so that can that one can kind of happen like it's not it does not have a seasonality to it.

It's just more of a process.

Okay.

Makes it more flexible to support that um I think every year around Martin Luther King there's something in um the school district that sponsors like submit your um your poetry for the Martin Luther King contest um kind of like a an opportunity for like empowerment you know to use poetry in that way um this the school district I think given even Silent Joe High I think has one of their academies I think SLAM has that um part as part of its academy for the high school students so I don't know if you want to target just like the adult audiences or if you want to if we want to open it up to like high schoolers um that might be a good target of people that might want to get involved because a lot of kids might be into into that yeah maybe two different age groups yeah we can have you know celebrity judges like a lot of didn't you do the MLK day probably it was like the oratorical so is more speeches but yeah um it's very cool.

Yeah is it is it along those lines uh I don't know so they're I think they're reading speeches that other people had written like famous speaking I'm remembering correctly and then they were judged on like their performance and oh projection and okay okay yeah I just remember that and I see it a lot with the high school newsletters yeah I don't think there's like seasonality that there are like there could but there could be either like I'm sure there's a poetry month or other things we could tap into for like oh if we wanted a time look yeah that what you're saying.

Yeah okay yeah it's good to look at any last poetical thoughts yeah maybe it could be like an event like um we get the entries they're adjudicated like maybe the top ten or top five there's like a live poetry thing at some point that people come to yeah that'll be and then one more idea maybe if we did do it as an ongoing like seasonal thing it could be different topics per season interesting think about it the more like write this down too great yeah just then I would give people like write a poem about spring.

So just for uh context I just sort of looked at the National Poetry Month in the United States is celebrated every April so if we wanted to try to connect it to that we'd be looking April 2027.

Alright that's good enough maybe if we you know run it now run it again and then whatever great thoughts all right okay um writing workshops mine um seasonality I know right um so I think what I was um what I expressed I'm trying to what I envisioned that being his because I I'm connected a little bit with um the grant recipient who um is currently running out of the library every Wednesday the um cultural writing workshop for Latinx middle school girls um she's exploring possibly expanding that to high schoolers but um the cool part is that my daughter says that she's met at least one or two Latinx authors so I know that um you know Doctor Aviane has connections

Um so I think what I was um what I expressed, I'm trying to what I envision that being his because I I'm connected a little bit with um the grant recipient who um is currently running out of the library every Wednesday the um cultural writing workshop for Latinx middle school girls.

Um she's exploring, possibly expanding that to high schoolers, but um the cool part is that my daughter says that she's met at least one or two Latinx authors.

So I know that um you know, Doctor Aviane has connections, and then I had a Latinx professor, English professor at Cal State East Bay who also exposed me to other Latinx authors.

And then I'm also connected to uh the Chicana Latina Foundation um scholarship company and organization, and they have a lot of connections to other types of Latinx authors.

Um I think that it would be cool to offer something like that through the library, um, even as a trial, like a test run to see if you know if we were to put that out there, would we have interest from the public?

But of course we would need a lot of these um writers and authors or artists to volunteer their time.

And that would be out of you know, their own good heart to to demonstrate that and expose the kids of Salie Angel to that, whether it's high schoolers or middle schoolers or younger kids, which might be harder.

But um that's what I'm thinking about um providing that type of positive exposure.

Okay.

So then what we as a committee would need to do is do the initial outreach, like see who you can get, right?

Like, and then based on who says yes, that would kind of depend on timing, that would depend on content.

Right.

And it would probably be be better, I wanna say, in the summer when there's not a lot already going on for these students.

Um that's what I think because even like Yanni won't be doing this in the summer.

And she's right now my kids in her program from September to May.

Um, and then there's nothing in the summer.

Be besides the wonderful like summer reading program that the library offers, but I notice that not, you know, it's probably not as I don't know, extensive as it is like expensive as it could be, maybe because there's not a specific target audience and like other authors getting involved with it.

I d I don't know how how that's turned out.

Yeah, we don't usually have um authors during the summer.

Uh it's such an enormous undertaking to just run the basic program.

Right.

Um and the whole theory behind it for the younger kids is there's a uh educational kind of reading fall off.

The breaks.

Yeah, so that they lose some skills and part of the impetus years back for summer reading program was to make sure that those skills did not decline.

Right.

So we you know, that's the emphasis, and then trying to make sure we incentivize it.

Yes, yes, yeah.

That's so much of what it is like thinking every s every time it's reinventing it to make it more sophisticated in terms of just appealing to their interests.

So I mean, this could totally be done any time of the year.

I think I love the idea of appealing to authors to give their time, especially if you you know somebody who's you know up there in terms of maybe main recognition or even if not, but but um you know you might think about it as just depends on how responsive the authors are, how many are in the pool.

I would think in the Bay Area probably have decent pool to draw from and you know you could structure it so that you have an author on some you know time frame, some sort of set schedule and then have the you know the writing workshops, if you will, happen in between.

So the authors are kind of like inspiration, and then and then the kids are reading and writing, you know, based on what they're all working on in their own personalized, but then they're being inspired by these various authority.

So and that that you might want to have a time limited because at some point there'll be a fall off, right?

Like, oh another author.

No I I just have seen this happen, it's not very yeah.

It's just one of those odd things that happens.

It's like people sort of take it for granted and they're not as enthusiastic.

So you might have a three or six month kind of program.

Yes.

And and you're right about that.

Like my daughter says that because they're all seventh and eighth graders, six, seventh in a careers, and she says there's days where she's like the only one interested, and she wants to be on, like she wants to impress the author that's coming to visit.

Yeah.

But like 60, 75% of the girls are just not into it.

And she notices and she's like, oh, so and so is goofing around, and I felt embarrassed in front of the author that came to see us.

And you know, it's hard to keep these kids engaged, is the point, and it's so normal, obviously.

That's just part of youth.

Um but yeah, the the motivation behind this is for us to have a specific targeted audiences with some of the resources I might be able to pull.

Yeah and then at the same time, you know, provide something positive for for our youth and use the library space at the same time.

Right.

And this is something where you have specific access that believe I do and haven't done it yet, but yeah, yeah, and so having pulled those things, yeah, but I think I could.

Yeah, and so you're helping the library get access to that in a way that benefits this audience.

I think so.

Yeah.

And did you have um uh you're thinking continuing the the like the grant targeted the Latin uh Latinos, uh let Latinas were you thinking of keeping it to that or expanding it so that it's both girls and boys.

Oh, um, I I think that it would not have to be one gender, like both, yeah.

Yeah, just I mean uh basically Latinx, not Latina or Latino, yeah.

Okay.

That's what it thinks.

Yeah, okay.

Any other thoughts that I want to say on this one?

And this is good because it can like expand and contract, right?

Like you want, or you could do 50 depending on how it goes.

Yeah.

Um yeah, I was just thinking in terms of when you initially proposed this much like shorter term workshops, like so maybe it's like targeted in terms of audience and then time as well, or it's like, okay, it's gonna be a month of like four four sessions, and I don't know what how much time is needed to have an impact, but something like that might be more approachable, and especially during the if it's during the summer, kind of like be like, okay, you're out of school, here's this thing, but you know in reality, people are gonna like go to vacation or have some more jobs and stuff.

So like balancing that, and so not feeling like we have to be locked into it.

Oh, it's gonna be a three-month or a six month program.

Right.

It might be more yeah, it was actually to get buy-in from that's exactly what what happened with Yannae.

I guess it went so well for her those three months that she actually was able to expand it for months.

I was surprised that she went from some like the whole school year.

Um but again, a good a good kid amount of kids have devoted their every Wednesday to being here in the library for for two hours.

Um so I feel like or maybe even smaller breaks like spring break or the one the ski week, you know, the one that is we're on right now.

Yeah, yeah.

Just like being creative with thinking about the duration or whatever.

Um very important.

And it could also be the same day too.

You know, there could be an author talk, and then the author could kind of stick around.

It's like, okay, brainstorm short stories with acclaimed short story authored so-and-so.

You know, and if they're willing to stay for two hours, you know, whatever a kid attention span might be.

Like it doesn't have to be a comeback, it can be uh, okay, now we're all fired up because this author just told us tons of cool stuff, right?

Start on it here and then you know, maybe come back, maybe not, but you know, they can get momentum that day, right?

And you know, we something we've done very successfully, we haven't done for one for a while, but is where we have you know group of authors, it's usually some organized around uh a genre, like you know, mystery authors or something like that.

And you know, you've got three or four on a panel and they talk about their experience, how they got to do what they're doing, they get a living from it, uh their unique voice, what or what's common among mystery writers, you know.

So I could see something like that too, very you could organize it in such a way that it's focused on one day, and then the writing workshops come after that, you know, because you know, all these hopefully get these kids there.

They're inspired again by these authors, and then they want to go forward and actually put in the work.

And we could even start off small by just inviting um organizing the authors to have that space for the students, and then proposing a follow-up to the program with okay.

Now we're not only gonna meet and learn about the books that these authors wrote and about their how they're got how they got into their careers, but also um practice, practice and engage in that type of writing style and storytelling, etc.

Great cool.

Yeah, very flexible.

I like I like that we're not necessarily locking ourselves into date limited things.

She says like a date limited thing.

Uh any last thoughts about this before we talk about game shrooms.

Okay.

Oh, yeah, the woman's been.

That was like someone's now satin up going off.

Yeah.

Um I'm gonna stick this up here temporarily so you have something for my black following.

Okay.

So happened last year.

It was fun, it was fantastic.

It took zero dollars, some staff time, um, but not a huge amount of staff time, right?

And there were so last year the library decided to do some talks around mushroom themed stuff, like they just totally ran with it, which was fantastic.

Like a couple staffers organized uh like a medicinal mushroom talk.

And so this like really fancy doctor lady came out and made this intense presentation about medicina mushrooms.

It was really cool.

And then afterwards there were little things there where you could decorate some mushroom art to then hide for game of shrooms.

So this year, um, as far as what I know would happen is Game of Shrooms, the worldwide art hide and seek event is happening again this year.

Day is June something.

It's on it's in June.

Saturday and mid-June.

I think it's June 13th.

Thank you.

That would make sense.

Saturday, June 13th.

And uh what I would be proposing again is that artists are allowed to hide art within the library.

So what happened last year is artists we we kind of let people know that they could hide art in the library with the intent that the morning of Saturday the 13th, people who came seeking free art would be able to kind of rampage through the library and look for it.

And I think Bill, you made a list of like mushroom themed dewy decimal places where people one might might find mushrooms, but we did stuff kind of all around the library, and there were six or seven or eight artists, including Alana, who came and hit art in the library Friday night right as we were closing.

And then there was a crowd of about 25 people outside the library just like and yeah, just run around finding art, which was then theirs for free.

Um this also happens on social media, and we wanted to get people an option who didn't necessarily have social media to just come to the library and do it.

And I have introduced this idea to the San Leandro Art Association.

You can imagine with their average age of like 70 or whatever, like not many of them have Instagram, so they're hype to make some mushroom art and hide it in the library this year.

It would be cool if we could get it out more to our artist lists and just generally have more people in San Leandro participating in this because it's fun and it's cool and it's free and the world needs more whimsy because I'm also gonna try and get the person who started Game of Shrooms to come to the library on that Saturday morning.

Um he lives in Richmond, I think.

His name is Attaboy.

He goes by anyway, something is Daniel.

And he was like stoked that the library was so willing to help last year.

So maybe I can lure him down here.

Maybe in 2027, we can have people write mushroom poems and then hide them.

Yeah.

Smart.

It's art.

Yeah.

We could start this year.

So one thing that I was gonna just based on our experience last year, uh I was thinking exactly what you were what you already started doing, which is that we let people know this is happening.

A lot of people aren't aware of it.

Yeah.

And um and I've got the artists in mind, as you said, to inspire them to you know create art specifically for this event.

And I would love to see more art that would appeal to children specifically.

Um just in terms of its style.

And because I I don't know if anybody hid any art in the children's library class.

Or the children's sections.

Um so I'd love to see some of that.

You know, people are people appreciate what they create, but I just think it'd be fun to challenge people.

Like here's here's an art, you know, that would have, you know, like I said appeal to a child.

Was there was there workshops?

Was there a workshop where the library had people make mushroom art or am I imagining that?

Yes.

So yeah, the what we did was the the medicinal mushroom presentation.

I was just wondering if you could have like more kid focused one where it's like, oh, there's like a children's book about a mouse that lives in a mushroom and like there's like a story reading and then everybody makes mushrooms out of paper plates or something, and then the kids could even hide.

Yeah, we've got more time this year than I think last year, so we could totally do that.

Yeah.

Um so aside from that, I mean, does anyone does this bring any ideas to mind with anyone?

Like anything that you should add.

I mean, it's kind of been the Brody and Bill show because I brought it in the first place and was like, do thing, please.

And I'm making our foot anyway.

So I'll make some plus mushrooms.

I think it's a great idea.

It sounds like it was successful.

I didn't get to be involved on the last one, but I would like to be on the next one.

Yeah, yeah.

It's very fun.

And it has enough momentum because it is worldwide at this point.

And there are way more people who know about it in San Leandro who want to come find free art than there are artists.

I kind of want to change that, you know, because I make pottery for it and then I go hide it around San Leandro in addition to the library.

Dude, people snuff that stuff up within like ten minutes.

It's wild how quickly they're just like, how did you get are you just waiting in the middle of San Leandro to see it pop up on my Instagram?

That's crazy.

Anyway, so this one is very time-bound.

It is June 13th.

So that's a that's assumed.

Um that's that's that.

All right.

Um time bound, time ish bound things, two things that can kind of happen whenever.

Two things that are kind of cordian, bigger or smaller, depending on energy, etc.

bandwidth of various humans.

Yes.

Great.

Next steps question.

We have to decide um the the the thing that work has worked for the grants program, for example, is to have a subcommittee of people who you know are really dedicated three commissioners two are here, um, and uh Commissioner Gillary that you know have take the time to meet uh separate, you know, obviously apart from the regular monthly meeting, to plan and work through all the details.

So I think that's a model that fits within the commission structure that would work.

Now we can't have more than four commissioners because we can't have a quorum.

We can't have five, because now you have an official meeting uh like this meeting.

Um and so it would have to be four or less uh for uh committee and you know we could stand up committee.

There's nothing to say we could have subcommittees for each one of these, yeah.

That therefore you could focus on the because you know, each one of these the game of shrooms, because we've done it in the past, I think it requires a little less.

Yeah, it's not as much of a we're designing this from scratch.

So the other three there's fair amount of details that need to be worked out.

So I think and some two we've established we're talking about probably a year from now.

Yeah.

But there's nothing to say you shouldn't get started.

Right.

Um feasibility stuff.

Yeah, because it's all initially it's just figuring out who wants to partner and what they're gonna bring to the table and what does it really look like.

So I mean the library's got a lot of experience program planning, so we can help with all of this as far as how to bring a program about.

Um I just think that the subcommittee route is the way to go.

And they can be stood up and then you know, we've had subcommittees come and go.

So I'm I'm looking at this list, and it's it's actually kind of nice because there's like three people for each of these, and one person is not on all three.

So it's actually kind of cool.

So if we were to pretend we had subcommittees made up of approximately three people, because let's not do four necessarily for all these because we have a new commissioner who's getting sworn in probably right the second, and she's cool and wants to do stuff too.

Um and then we have other people too who just aren't here tonight.

But like Rosa shouldn't have to do all four, right?

I mean well, oh yeah, Rosa, you're in all three.

Yeah, I would say like two subcommittees max per person.

Including our the grants committee subcommittees.

Oh, well, yeah.

That's kind of how much work are you up for?

Yeah, I mean, I meant for like these got it, okay.

Because I don't think we need one for game of shrooms.

Like we can just kind of ad hoc on that one tell.

So Rosa the overachiever.

Which one is it?

You have to choose one of these to not be on, which would you choose?

Well, I think you don't need me for the shrooms one.

Right, no, like these three.

Those three.

Um, you sign with four.

Jeez.

And I just reminded on everything to see whatever landed.

Um I mean, obviously you need to work on this one, sorry.

Um, I have such cool such cool uh details.

I guess the four two one.

Okay.

So um so then are we cool?

Like let's keep off there.

Are we cool with these being just you two for now?

And then three, like official subcommittee-wise.

Oh yeah, plus we're getting a new commissioner.

Yes.

Yeah, yeah, we can add her, and then we can add other folks like up to four.

Here, we're at two here, we're at three years, and we can wiggle it around like, but like as a start, just to kind of maybe chat amongst yourselves and get a plan moving a little bit.

Just have like an email chain.

Yeah, have an email thing.

I'm not making an official motion, but like no one like shake your head at me if you think okay.

Um then let's consider these the official subcommittees.

Should we um I'm just thinking it before we we should probably vote.

Okay, I think it'd be worthwhile because it's an action item.

Um, but give uh member of the public if you're interested in it we just like to give the uh public a chance to comment if you wish.

You don't have to.

I was at the the shrooms event.

Uh-huh.

It was great.

Oh, thank you.

Um my family and I, my my wife is who's also here.

We got five shrooms.

And uh it was exciting.

I think four shrooms.

And one was in the children's session as well.

So it wasn't as children's session, but I love that you got.

These are great as well.

I love the bike one.

Uh that's very exciting as well.

So uh this is great.

I'm glad I came.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

So I'm just thinking how to it's not a bad idea, just to you know, formalize it.

Um I'm just thinking what the motion would be.

I guess it would be us to establish.

Were you proposing it's a little hard for me to hear because there's some noise outside?

Chair Scott, were you proposing three subcommittees?

I am proposing four priorities with three subcommittees.

Yes.

Okay.

And the subcommittees would be um made up of the members that are on these.

And they would be labeled basically the the event the uh projects themselves.

Yes.

Do I need to read them all out?

No, no.

Just well, I guess it would be a bad idea.

But so four priorities.

Three subcommittees.

Okay.

Do I need to make the motion?

I'm not allowed to make function.

I'll make the motion.

Uh I move that we have four priorities for the next two years that we focus on.

The Douglas list them all.

The library bike tour, the poetry contest, the series of writing workshops for Latinx Youth, and the 2026 Game of Shrooms.

And in addition to that, there'll be three subcommittees supporting the library bike tour, the poetry contest, and the series of writing workshops for Latinx youth.

Can I get a uh a motion to approve?

Oh yeah, a second.

Okay.

All right.

And if you agree, say hi.

I posed.

All right, motion carries.

Thank you, Alana.

That's always a uh that's always an exercise in free writing, is it not?

Yeah.

We could make that a poem.

Yeah.

Okay.

Sweet.

Excellent.

Now we know what we're doing.

And those who weren't here tonight, now they know what we're doing.

They will find out what they're doing.

They will find out what we're doing.

They and us are all doing.

And then we should be seeing it.

So we are moving on to item eight commission reports and announcements.

Item 8A grants committee.

Shall we have a report from the grant committee?

I'm happy to give a report as staff.

Yeah, what do you got?

Yeah, so um the uh similar to last time.

We we've gotten the final reports for the 2025 grant um uh program, and it's up to me to pull it all together to get it to the grants committee so we can review those and then bring back a uh presentation to the full commission as to the outcome of those grants.

So that's in process um and in process in part because a lot of the focus uh in my effort has been to support the grants committee and in the 26 Arts of Culture Grant program.

So all the publicity is out.

We've had a lot of inquiries.

Um I had one today, a phone call that just was asking some really specific questions like that.

Ah, I have confidence you'll actually put it in an application, but I haven't received any applications yet.

I think this is very typical for people on the last minute, and the application deadline is effectively two weeks.

It's Friday the 27th of February at 5 p.m.

So you know, you should have received all that promotional material, so if you haven't, you know, please please share it.

And uh we'd love to get a nice diverse group of applicant applicants in.

So that's sort of where that's the report.

Has it gone up to our artist list?

Yes.

Okay, great.

Cool.

And we had a wonderful uh QA slash mingling session, networking, mingling, question asking.

Um Bill ran that, Alana and I were there for that.

It was well attended, I'd say like 15, 20 people.

Yeah, that's what kind of came you went.

And people had questions.

Yeah, it was it was good.

One person found out that it was only for people on San Leandro and turn around and left.

Oh my goodness.

You know, somebody else had the city funding.

They got their question answered.

So uh yeah, it was good.

I'm hoping for an interesting crop of folks this year.

Do you have anything to add, Alana?

No, because they speaking to everyone and hearing about their ideas for projects, so I hope that they they apply.

And I will say to feed you back on that, I thank you for out of sight out of mind.

You're on to the next is all in the past, but um for this QA uh set session uh because this will be the third one that we've done, I believe.

Uh I didn't recognize basically anybody, which is a good thing.

So I mean I it'd be I'd been happy if you know the folks who would come before did attend, but I'm just saying that we reached a different group of people.

And uh we're always trying to you know make sure that uh you know we we particularly reach people who aren't aware of the program.

uh session um because this will be the third one that we've done i believe uh i didn't recognize basically anybody which is a good thing so i mean i'd be I'd been happy if you know the folks who had come before did attend but I'm just saying that we reached a different group of people and uh we're always trying to you know make sure that uh you know we we particularly reach people who aren't aware of the program so I think we at least the initial publicity accomplished that so uh and I will follow up with our comms team to make sure that they are boosting this because they created a great video which I shared with the commissioners uh and it's on our website and make sure that they're continuing to to boost that uh through the means that they use that I don't understand but something algorithms algorithms algorithms so that's that's my report on that and your and the thank you uh do any commissioners have questions or comments about that report all right uh moving on to commissioner comments uh do commissioners have any comments or reports things that weren't otherwise on the agenda exciting things to announce Terry's not here so there's no upcoming shows to talk about okay well then we are on to item nine adjournment do I have a motion to adjourn the meeting of February 17th 2026 motion move is there a second to adjourn second any discussion all right all those in favor aye any opposed all right this concludes the meeting of February 17 2026 as of 749 p.m