Hi, good afternoon, everybody, and welcome to the Visalia City Council work session.

We're gonna go ahead and call this meeting to order.

And we would like to go ahead and start out by doing public comments.

So anyone uh citizens are now invited to comment on this issues within the jurisdiction of the Visalia City Council and items listed on the closed session agenda.

The council asks that you keep your comments concise and positive.

Creative criticism presented with appropriate courtesy is welcome.

Each speaker will be allowed three minutes, and a timer will notify you when your time is expired.

Please begin your comments by stating and spelling your name and providing your city of residence.

Anyone from the public wishing to speak.

Good afternoon, Jim Reeves Vicellia.

I've got another little story to tell about dealing with the city.

This one's a good one.

Um a kickball team and practices at Whitendale Park.

Now, a few weeks ago, there was a uh an issue with some holes in the grass area just off of the outfield of the first to second baseline.

And they were pretty deep holes.

They weren't, you know, I don't think they were gopher holes, but they were something, and they were uh very hazardous.

So I went.

My first thought was when my husband told me about them.

There's an app for that, and I could report it on the city's app.

I ended up using the website, and when you you know fill everything out and send it in, it says, Thank you for your submission.

Uh a confirmation email will arrive shortly.

Well, it never arrived.

And I thought, okay, maybe that part just didn't work.

So the next week the holes were still there.

I've sent in another thing through the website.

And uh, you know, they say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

And I tried three times through the website and it didn't work.

So I posted a thing on Facebook and tagged the city and got immediate response through that.

And uh said, you know, either message us or call us or you know, and gave me Jason Glicks uh name to contact.

So I was filling out uh, you know, when I saw that I was sitting out filling out an email to Jason about uh this problem, and my phone rang, and it was Jason calling me directly about it.

And um I told him what the problem was, and he said, Okay, we'll get somebody on that.

And a couple hours later he called me and said, Okay, the crew it's you know, they told me they were out there and they fixed it.

So that afternoon I went out there and lo and behold, the the holes were still there, they weren't filled.

There didn't appear to be anything done.

So I called Jason back and uh told him about it.

He said, Okay, I'll get somebody on it.

He called me later and said, Okay, they went out there and they fixed it.

So I went back out there.

They fixed one, the other one wasn't.

So I called Jason again.

And uh he said, Okay, I'm going out there and looking at it now.

So I went out there with him and you know, showing him exactly what the problem was.

And that afternoon, the team was gonna be practicing again.

So he got it fixed uh completely.

There was another issue on another field that I talked to him about.

He explained what was going on there.

So I just wanted to commend him for his attention to the uh problem, getting it fixed, and following up on it.

That uh I appreciate it a lot.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Anybody else from the public wishing to speak?

All right.

So thank you.

Um, next we're gonna go on to item number one, which is new employee introduction.

Uh Chief Salzar, I believe you're up first.

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

It's my uh privilege this afternoon to introduce six new Viselia PD employees.

We have our two dispatchers coming up too.

So we have two uh new communications operators and four lateral police officers will introduce.

So I'm gonna start with Emily Lavelle, who is raised in Visalia.