The Santa Rosa City Council met on March 28, 2023, in a regular session that began at 4:00 p.m. following a closed session (3:00 p.m. to 4:02 p.m.) on litigation. The meeting was attended by Mayor Natalie Rogers, Vice Mayor Dianna MacDonald, Council Members Eddie Alvarez, Jeff Okrepkie, and Mark Stapp. Council Members Victoria Fleming and Chris Rogers were absent. Key actions included approval of the consent calendar, a vote to oppose Sonoma Water’s proposed 10.56% wholesale water rate increase, approval of a rezoning ordinance, authorization for up to $30 million in bonds for affordable housing, and approval of a sanitary sewer easement vacation.
I'm kind of liking it out here. I'd like to ask the interpreter currently on the Spanish channel to commence translation of the meeting. Once you join the Spanish channel, we recommend you shut off the main audio so you only hear the Spanish translation. Welcome back, everyone. We will now reconvene our meeting, seeing a quorum. Madam City Clerk, may you please call the roll? Certainly, Mayor. Councilmember Stapp. Here. Councilmember Rogers is absent. Councilmember O'Krepki? Here. Councilmember Fleming is also absent. Councilmember Alvarez. Present. Vice Mayor McDonald? Here. And Mayor Rogers. Present. Rogers and Fleming. We have no study sessions today, so we will move on to item five, which will be our report on our closed session. Madam City Attorney. Moving to item six point one, our proclamation that we have for today. Thank you, Madam Mayor. I have uh the honor of doing this proclamation for American Red Cross Month, which the uh Red Cross has a special place in my heart. Having been a recipient of some of their services after the fires, uh this organization has done a great job locally and nationally, of course, and and further. So with that being said, whereas during American Red Cross month in March, we celebrate the humanitarian spirit of Santa Rosa and reaffirm our commitment to help ensure no one faces a crisis alone. Whereas caring for one another is at the heart of our community and exemplified by the people of the City of Santa Rosa, whose simple acts of kindness through the Red Cross provide help and hope in people's most difficult moments, thereby continuing the life-saving legacy of Claire Barton, who founded the organization more than 140 years ago to prevent and alleviate human suffering. Whereas every day, these ordinary individuals lend a helping hand to make an extraordinary difference for neighbors in need, whether by providing emergency shelter, food, and comfort for families displaced by home fires and other disasters, donating life-saving blood for cancer patients, accident victims, and people with sickle cell disease and other life-threatening conditions, supporting military members and veterans along with their families and caregivers using and teaching vital skills like first aid and CPR to help others survive medical emergencies or delivering international humanitarian aid and reconnecting loved ones separated by crises around the world. Whereas their support, volunteerism, and generous donations are critical to our community's resilience. We hereby recognize this month of March in honor of all those who fulfill Claire Barton's noble words. You must never think of anything except the need and how to meet it, and ask everyone to join in this commitment. And now therefore be it resolved that I, Natalie Rogers, Mayor of the City of Santa Rosa, on behalf of the entire City Council to hereby proclaim March 2023 as Red Cross Month. I encourage all citizens of Santa Rosa to reach out and support the humanitarian mission of the American Red Cross. Thank you, Councilmember O Krepke. I would like to call up the representatives that will be receiving this proclamation to the podium to make a comment. And following their comment, Madam City Clerk, can you please conduct public comment? And thank you to the council for the work that you do. We know that you're not technically volunteers, but the amount of hours that you work at your job, you might as well be. I've been uh evacuated once with uh Kincaid. Um and so I'm just grateful to the Red Cross for the opportunity to be a part of such a wonderful organization. And if anyone can donate their time, their blood or their services, um I please briefly uh accept any opportunities to be able to work with you. Yeah, we're in the process of trying to establish a good working relationship with the Santa Rosa Fire Department. One of our largest activities is called Sound the Alarm. And this past weekend, well, two weekends ago actually, uh we put alarms in the homes of 30 uh residents at uh the Rancho Cabeza Mobile Home Park out on Calistoga Road. So we made uh the lives of 30 people safer than they were because they were homes that did not have uh smoke alarms. So we're working with the fire department to find neighborhoods that uh could really use this kind of program uh to the extent that the fire department wants to put them in themselves, we can provide them with the alarms, or if they can give us the addresses and the names, we'll contact those people and put those alarms in. So again, thanks for the partnership with the city of Santa Rosa and and the fire department. Thank you, Madam City Clerk. Thank you.