City Council Meeting — July 17, 2024

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How are you going?

Thank you.

All right. Good evening.

Good evening. Welcome to our July 17th City Council meeting. Appreciate everyone joining.

Great packed house. Appreciate it.

We will begin the meeting.

I'll quickly begin with our land acknowledgement. We'd like to acknowledge that the land we inhabit today was once known as the Tovangaar,

the home of the Gabriolino Tongva people. We show our respect to the Gavrilina Tongva people,

as well as all indigenous people, past, present, and future, and honor their labor as original caretakers of this land. We commit to uplifting the Gavrilina Tongva people, invite you to acknowledge the history, and join us in caring for this land. With that, I'll call the meeting to order for July 17th.

We'll start with the flag suit.

I'll invite the police stand as the Monaco Park Police Explorers bring the flags in.

Thank you.

I pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America

and to the republic for which it stands,

one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Order, color. Outward, face. Forward, march.

Hold, color.

Thank you. Please be seated.

And please join me in thanking Grace Wang, our civic superstar today, for leading the Pledge of Allegiance.

If the council can join me in front of the dais to present a certificate for her. Is this?

Grace. Grace.

Grace.

Well, we'll come back together, Mr. Dean, he's perfect.

Thank you, Mr. Dean, congratulations, Mr. Dean, he's great, Mr. Dean, he's great, Mr. Dean,

again thank you to Grace Wang a local student from Repetto Elementary thank you so much

and just a reminder if you're a local student in Monterey Park and you'd like to become a civic superstar our Recreation Community Services Department is open for signups feel free to see Christina or anyone else

to get signed up. We'd love to have more

local students engaged in our city council meetings. We'll go to the city clerk for the roll call.

Council Member Sanchez. Council Member Lo. Here. Council Member Yu. Here. Mayor Pro Tem Ngo. Present.

Mayor Wong. I am here.

We have a quorum. Thank you. Any agenda additions, deletions, changes, adoptions?

Mr. Mayor and members of the City Council, we'd like to request to move up the presentation item 1A, potentially after public communications, and also item 3B.

Are any objections to that? Not so ordered.

And if there are no other changes, we'll open up to public communication.

City Clerk.

First speaker, Angie Chu.

My name is Angie, and I've been in Montreux Park since 1970. A lot of students that I have been with, and especially with the Swim Team Parents Association,

I belong to several nonprofit organizations. Tonight, I would like to address digital safety training in Montreux Park. It's a pilot program I have designed because our crime rate rises so high. I myself was a crime victim a month ago right under Elizabeth Young's law office. And it was horrendous. It was 5 p.m. and a big truck go in to her office lobby and just yang an electric bike out of the office. There are people all around me. 5 p.m. I yell and scream, nobody even come. And nobody even take a picture of the victim. I mean, of the person who attacked us. So from this incidence, I recognize that with camera, I teach a lot of my students, I do emergency room safety.

I just, before I come in I just got the missing girl A 15 year old being Missing and kidnapped July 16th And I'm with the family right now I'm hoping More police Station will be alert But the parents realize There's no Amber Alert anywhere So those are the Critical moments I really want to protect the young generation and also older, senior too. And looking to the future, the Olympic is going to come to this land, you know, in the next one. When I communicate with people who's hosting the Olympic in Paris, the biggest issue is security. So now I'm just hoping we will focus a little bit on that. being the board on Foundation House Charity. We have been around 50 years with a lot of retired medical professionals and also other disciplines. And we are launching an Asian Minds Matter non-profit also in this coming Monday, 29, in NBC, from 5pm to 9.30pm. It would be a way to address Asian minds being highlighted in all aspects, including mental wellness and involvement of community, not being the silent minority. So this is my major two project. I would love any one of you to come and be my guest. We are expecting around 20 tables. But I'm hoping with more Asians willing to serve publicly and willing to stand in adversity, we can move our society in a much better space. Thank you. Mr. Mayor, may I ask a question?

Oh, actually, a question, actually, sorry.

What is the name of your nonprofit? What is it called?

The one that I have been with.

The event on Monday.

Asian Minds Matter.

And are they located in Wani Airport, their office?

Yes, yes.

Well, it's headed by Elizabeth Young, and the location is right under her office.

Oh, I see.

But we are launching a big opening to the community

and invite everyone to join.

I see. Thank you. Yeah.

Thank you. No other speakers. Thank you. We'll move on. I don't know where my agenda is.

We'll move on to item 1A, Monterey Park 12 and under softball all-stars championship. If I can invite the team to maybe join me up in front of the days. I have a lot of certificates.

Thank you. But let me invite up the Monterey Park 12 and Under All-Star Softball Team,

who represented the city of Monterey Park and our community at the USA Softball Northern District Championship.

They went undefeated the entire tournament.

The girls were named. Yeah. Yeah.

the the team the girls were named the northern district champions and receive championship

rings and a championship banner uh this is the first for the league and they will now prepare

or are preparing for the usa softball c-state championship and we want to wish them all the

best and great uh luck uh in that championship and hope to welcome them back for another

presentation and recognition as they hopefully win that but if i can invite the council members to join me up front to present certificates as well thank you

That is it, we're welcome, we're just gonna come, come on, we're just gonna come, we're just gonna come,

we're just gonna come, Thank you.

Do I need to be on the mic?

Do you guys want to move up a little and then we can get behind you? Behind you.

Coaches.

Can you catch your box? No. Get him here.

Do I want to get any? Yeah, coaches should get in.

Everybody set.

All right, if we can get everyone looking right here. Right here. Great.

All right, thank you. Thank you.

Hey, coaches.

Coaches, just stand by me. What are you talking about?

Where's Paulie?

This pen. Art.

And the coaches have just one more announcement they want to make with the team.

So, hey, girls, listen, great season. I couldn't be more proud to be on the same day as you girls and even the coaches here.

So we did, we've gone so long way from January till now.

so you guys should be very proud.

So, hey, listen, we didn't get the last balls out for State,

which you girls deserved this, but the Poway game, it's going to go to Eileen because that kid was just amazing.

You know, we did lose to Pinsonola. I can't even say their name, but I watched the video.

I watched the video over and over.

the center fielder if she didn't catch these fly balls

it probably would have been worse but she's already putting her hand up OT

and our heart game

this kid she doesn't like me but when I tell her Riley

she's always smiling here you go babe yeah applause

This kid, she just works so hard and just keeps working so hard.

And that catch, every time I blink my eyes and I open it up,

I always see Emma running across and catching that fly ball.

And the last one, you know, I call her the horse because she just never gives up, and I'm proud to be her dad, so Berlin.

Congratulations again to the coaches and the team.

We really appreciate you representing Monterey Park very, very, very proudly.

Yes!

Council wants to stay up here. We've got one more presentation.

Let me invite up the

Shetland Baseball All-Star Team. Thank you for joining us. Who achieved runner-up status for

the West Zone Southern California East Region Tournament as well. This is the first time this league baseball division has achieved this honor and as the youngest players in our city, I really appreciate it and we're really proud of you as well. Please, if the team wants to join the city council up here,

let me invite you to come up and join us.

And the coaches.

Thank you for joining us and wishing that or congratulating them and wishing them all the best in their next season as well.

We have a small token of our appreciation from the city council, this certificate. Do you guys want to hold this?

The podium, I mean. Yeah. Ugh.

Yeah.

Big smile.

Right here. Everybody smile.

Thank you.

Good job, guys. One more.

One, two, three.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right, join me again in congratulating the Shetland baseball all-stars. Thank you so much. Congratulations.

Thank you.

All right. All right.

All right. We have one more celebration.

if folks want to take their seat real quick there's actually going to be cake

but shh

we have one more celebration to announce I will stay

you guys you guys will stay

we're going to have cake

alright moving to item 3B a resolution recognizing and proclaiming 2024 as the centennial year of the monterey park fire

department uh i'm going to introduce oh sorry let me hand it over to our city manager good evening

mr mayor members of the council before we recognize the centennial anniversary of the monterey park fire department i'd like to just take a moment and announce that since our last city council meeting

Chris Thompson has been appointed fire chief.

Come on up, Chris.

As you know,

Monterey Park. Council Member. Come on up, Chris. As you know, Chris has been with the fire department for over 24 years and has the knowledge and experience to continue leading and moving the department forward. Over the last several months, Chris has done very well in his, during his tenure as interim fire chief. Chief Thompson is certified as both a chief officer and an executive chief officer with the state of California. And he also has been certified as both a chief officer and an executive chief officer with the state of California. And he also has been certified as a chief officer as a chief officer as a chief officer.

has a bachelor's degree in public administration and a master's degree in emergency management. City Council and the Monterey Park community members, please join me in congratulating

Fire Chief Chris Thompson.

Chief, I don't know if you want to say a few words really quick or if you want to save that.

But we'll go into our item, resolution recognizing and proclaiming 2024 is a centennial year of the Murray Park Fire Department.

We're so proud to be able to celebrate 100 years of fire service and hundreds of service members over those years that have provided essential public service and public safety services for our community, and we look forward to at least 100 more years. Not all of them, maybe under Chief Thompson, but at least a few. I'll open it up to the council for any questions or comments on this item or a motion. Oh, we have a report.

Sorry, there's a slideshow. Hand it over to the chief. So this is a slideshow of some of the pictures that we've had over the 100 years from previous employees that worked for the city of Monterey Park Fire Department.

One of our previous retirees, Captain Tullius, put a lot of these pictures together.

So this kind of shows a lot of the development and growth that the fire department has come to from, you know, 100 years ago to today.

So we wanted to put something together that you guys can see some of the old pictures that we have and some of the remembering of what people in the legacy have done for us in our fire department and what we want to try to continue to do.

You know, I'm extremely humbled by the words and this opportunity.

I'm really proud to lead this group of men and women from fire prevention and code enforcement to the administrative staff to help keep this department running,

but also to all the guys in the back that risk it all day in, day out,

and put their effort and worth on the line to protect the community that we all serve.

So I just want to say thank you to them for this opportunity as well.

Thank you.

during the mass shooting and first responders.

And, you know, oftentimes when I talk to neighbors,

they just talk about how they really are proud of our public safety officers. And I think that's something that you all should be proud of in your department. So, again, congratulations to a century of achievement and leadership.

Thank you.

Congratulations. I know our firefighter team is the champion. And thank you so much for your years of hard work.

And congratulations. We look forward to working closely with you. Thank you.

Congrats, Chief.

It's been a little bit wait, but we got here.

So well deserved.

And again, I am of the perspective that our city, as great as it is, is really defined by our public service and our first responders. So that includes fire and police. we always want to have our city brand of first responders.

So I'm very proud of that.

And congratulations to you and the team and the celebration, the anniversary.

Thank you.

Again, congratulations, Chief, and congratulations to our 100-year-old now fire department. I know we started as a volunteer department, quickly professionalized over the decades, and I think the residents, our community, and the city owe a huge debt of gratitude to our fire service and our fire department and all that have served and continue to serve in those roles. We appreciate all of that and looking forward to continuing to the continued service that you and the fire department

will continue to provide to our community.

So congratulations. Great day for you.

And we look forward to a formal pinning ceremony

to be scheduled.

So keep on the lookout for that. But again, congratulations to the service, the department, and all those that are here to join us in this celebration. If the council can, well, if there's a motion

on the resolution, I'll take that. Move.

I'll second. Move and second. Any further discussion? Hearing none, we'll call the vote.

I approved unanimously.

And I just magically printed this here, so if I can invite

the fire service,

all the staff to please join me with Chief Thompson with the Council we would like to present the certificate or this the copy of the

resolution language we just approved thank you thank you

Thank you.

Let me see if I can hear it.

Oh, thank you for your seat.

I'm going to have this in the foreground.

Well, you got to.

Everyone's looking here.

One, two, three, four. All right, awesome.

We do have cakes and cookies in the back to celebrate for the centennial.

So we will do a short, a very brief recess. I'm going to say five minutes because I know that'll mean ten.

But a five-minute recess. There is cake and refreshments, light refreshments in the atrium area.

Please feel free to grab some on your way out or as you're celebrating. Thank you for joining us to celebrate many happy occasions.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Well, what's the gavel?

Well, what's the gavel Well, what's the gavel Well, what's the gavel Well, what's the gavel Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I don't know.

Thank you.

Good to see you.

Alright we're going to get the meeting back on track.

Council Member Lo. Mayor Pro Tem Go. Council Member U.

All right, we're gonna get the meeting started.

Back again.

All right.

All right. Recess. We're going to end the recess. We're going to move on to staff communications. First up is community development.

Any updates from community development? And just as a note, Mr. Mayor, members of the council,

community development and economic development will be presenting together. Thank you.

Good evening.

Mayor Wong, Mayor Pro Tem, and members of the City Council. My name is Jessica Serrano,

Community Development Director. I'm going to be kicking off the updates from our department, Community Development Department, and I'll go ahead and begin with the Saturn Park Advisory

Committee. You know, as you recall, you first formed this committee on May 22, 2024. Initially,

the SPARK was made up of Mayor Thomas Wong and Mayor Pro Tem Vingau. Since then, additional members have been added to the SPARK, which are shown on this slide. Mayor Wong will serve as the

chairperson for the SPARK. Mayor Pro Tem Vingau will serve as the vice chairperson, and the The additional members include Philip Chang, Johnny Kwok, Paul Lee, Joe Leyva, Tammy Sam, Victoria Chen-Stapleton, and May Xiao Yi. Amongst these individuals, we have three elected officials.

We have three commissioners, two realtors, and one property owner that represents the ownership at Saturn Park.

We would like to thank these individuals for volunteering their time to serve on this committee. Next slide. This next slide shows information about the upcoming SPARC workshops. We invite the community to attend these workshops to share your thoughts about potential land uses for Saturn Park. The first SPARC meeting workshop will be scheduled for July 29th at 6 p.m.

Then the next one is August 12th at 6 p.m., August 19th at 6.30 p.m., and August 29th at 6 p.m. The meetings will be held at the Service Club House at Barnes Park.

And for more information, please visit the website.

We've provided a QR code as well as the website on the slide and the flyer that went out to members of the community.

So please help us spread the word and please help shape the future of Saturn Park by attending these workshops. Next, I'm going to be introducing Janice Wong. She's our economic development specialist who will share additional updates for our department.

Good evening, council members and community members. I would like to invite our community to join us in the economic development strategic plan, also known as EDSP, public input session tomorrow, July 18th, at the Barnes Park Service Club from 6 to 7 p.m.

Our city aims to reshape the economic landscape for the next five years, and our community's input is crucial to ensure the plan reflects our community's diverse aspirations and interests. We are excited to introduce the draft EDSP to our community, which focuses on fostering economic growth while maintaining our residents' high quality of life. The draft incorporates feedbacks from local stakeholders, community members, and the business assessment survey. The draft EDSP is open for public review from July 17th to July 31st. We encourage residents, business owners, and property owners to participate in the public input session or submit their feedback online at Byte.ly slash MPK EDSP. Chinese and Spanish translators will be available for Q&A. To register, please scan the QR code on the PowerPoint slide.

Next slide, please.

I am pleased to update you and our business community about the City of Monterey Park's inaugural Small Business Expo and Networking event. This exciting city-sponsored event, designed to support and strengthen our local community, will take place on Thursday, August 8th from 6 to 7.30 at the new Holiday Inn and Suites in Monterey Park. I encourage all local businesses to attend this free event and seize the opportunity to network with peers,

gain insights from exhibitors representing economic development agencies and city departments, and discover resources to support growth and success.

In addition to networking and information sharing, this event will feature complimentary refreshments and a raffle with exciting prizes. On-site Chinese and Spanish translators will be available as needed. To register, please scan the QR code on the PowerPoint slide. Spaces are limited, so please register today.

We believe this event will be a valuable resource for our business community and look forward to a strong turnout.

In conclusion, I urge community members to participate in these exciting community events. Thank you for your time, and we are happy to answer any questions. Thanks, Janice.

Any questions from Council?

Appreciate it. Looking forward to the workshop.

Any other updates on community economic development?

Appreciate it. Thank you so much. Looking forward to the meetings. We'll move on to library updates.

Good evening, Mayor Wong and members of the Council. Kathleen Boley, I'm Senior Librarian. This evening I'm here to talk about some library programs coming up in the next month.

The first slide highlights our Community Reads Program.

It's our summer program, which runs through July 31st.

Some pictures of some recently offered programs that we had for all ages, including the Family Engineering Club,

which is a program where families work together to construct sculptures using recycled materials, and the Teen Uno Tournament, Mad Science for Kids, and a beaded dragonfly crafter noon for the adults.

next the next is part of the ongoing one book one county book club in which 18 libraries throughout

la county have partnered together around reading and discussing the book la weather by maria

amparo escondon here at monterey park we'll host a book discussion on saturday july 20th upstairs

in the small classroom also this saturday at 2 p.m in the friends room we invite the community to

come and learn more about the birds in your neighborhood. Presented by a representative from the Pasadena Audubon Society, come and explore our local wildlife with fellow nature lovers.

For adults, we're sponsoring a Living Library Workshop and Mixer. It's a program to foster getting to know your fellow community members, and all are invited

on July 23rd to a mixer where participants will work on preparing interesting stories about their lives that they'll share with each other on July 30th.

Both are in the Friends Room at 6 p.m., and refreshments will be served.

The next is part of our summer reading program for kids that encourages children to read

over the summer, and the last one we're having this year is Christopher T. Magician, and

he'll be performing a fun magic show with audience participation and interaction on July 24th at Langley.

For the whole family, join us for a pool party on July 26th from 12 to 2 at George Elder Park Pool. Wrap up your summer with some fun in the sun, bring your swimsuits and towels for a fun get-together, and all ages are welcome. Here we have two interesting programs that are coming up in August in the Friends Room. First is a classic film, Sergeant Rutledge, which will be screened on Saturday the 3rd at 1 p.m. We're very fortunate to welcome the star of the film, Constant Towers. Constant Towers, this film was made in 1960.

And Christopher Hunter is the son of the co-star, Jeffrey Hunter.

A discussion will be led by the film historian, Foster Hirsch. And this is in partnership with the Monterey Park Historical Society.

And second is a conversation with Monterey Park author Justinian Huang. Justinian will be appearing with fellow author Madeline Nakamura to discuss his first novel, The Emperor and the Endless Palace.

This is a romantic thriller that challenges everything we know about true love. And that's August 10th at 2 p.m.

Next, teens can kick off the new school year by designing a book bag. This DIY program is on Friday the 16th at 4.30 in the Friends Room. For the LAMP Literacy Department, we're announcing that the fall semester of the ESL classes begins in August. Please contact the library for more information on registering. The available sessions include tutoring, conversation and book discussion groups, citizenship preparation, and English classes. And finally, I'd like to announce that we're offering two new items for our users. which we obtained through the Empowering Access Grant. First, we have the iFixit repair kits. They're small little tools for electronics repair that can be checked out for use inside the library. And the second one is that we have gotten a few solar charging panels. Right now, we're offering them along with our Parks packs that people can check out for outdoor adventures. The solar chargers could be used for charging electronic devices or hearing aids, for example, during outdoor activities, emergencies, or scheduled outages.

So we're excited about getting that grant.

So that's it. For more information about any of these programs, please visit our website and follow us on social media

or give us a call. Thank you.

Thank you. Any questions or comments?

Mr. Mayor, yes. Again, thank you for the presentation.

and as always, you know, it's wonderful, all the programming that our library offers. For a summer reading program, how many students are currently participating in a summer reading program?

How many students?

That's a good question because our students are of so many ages. But it goes from zero up through 18.

Oh, wow.

Good evening, members of the council. Last I checked, for the children's summer reading program,

we had somewhere in the range of 650 children registered. Wow.

And compared to, like, years past, is that average or is it higher?

It's about on par, I believe, if I'm not mistaken.

Last year it was just over 700.

Oh, wow. Okay. Great.

And we're not finished yet. Oh, wonderful.

Thank you.

I love what we're doing with the library.

I mean, so many events here. I counted 11 and so much that we've actually kind of expanded beyond the library. You've got Elder Park and you've got Langley Center to continue to use the city's resources to plan your event. So kudos to you guys for doing a good job.

And just adding my kudos, appreciate everything the library does in partnership with Recreation and Community Services to provide these services to the community, particularly in early summer as a lot of youth and others in the community are looking for activities to do. I really appreciate that we're engaging them and meeting them where they are. Thank you so much. Looking forward

to all these programs to come. Thank you. Next, we'll move on to Police Department.

Chief Weiss.

Mr. Mayor, members of City Council, Scott Weiss, Chief of Police. Unfortunately, I'm not going to talk to you tonight.

I know that everybody's upset by that.

But I do have two of my staff here. We're going to talk about animal services tonight. I'm going to introduce you to Will Estrada, who's been with our program for many, many years. Most of you know him. And Laura Rodriguez is our new animal services officer. Hiring Laura has alLod us to expand our animal services to seven days a week. She comes with a lot of experience from many other animal services units around the county. So she's a welcome member of the team. They've prepared a PowerPoint, and they're going to introduce you at the end. I'm going to tease it a little bit, is using our new GIS program, we're starting to develop an interactive coyote tracking map that's available to the public. It's up on our website now. They're going to show it to you tonight. Unfortunately, it doesn't load into automatically after the call is created. We have to add it ourselves. but when we get to the new CATRMS program later on in the year, those calls for service will add into that mapping system automatically when the call is placed.

So it will literally update every minute with everything that we do. So the public has clear transparency with everything we do. They can look up just about every call. They're going to show you that link. And we broke it down into council districts, so you can kind of see how it's affecting the different council districts. So I'm going to introduce Will and Laura, and they're going to take it from here.

Good evening, Council.

We're going to-

Coyotes are native to California. They can be seen in diverse habitats. They can thrive in urban environments as we see in our city.

Coyotes provide very many, excuse me.

Coyotes are the benefit of our ecosystem in the sense that they keep the rodent population

down. They eat small mammals, things that can be problematic. Populations can explode without something that's going to keep that population under control. Next slide.

Understanding the coyote is important. They drive on, they have a diet that is consistent

of small mammals, rodents, birds, fruit, eggs, vegetables,

plants, pet food and human food.

So if you have a food source out there, they're probably going to be visiting your property.

Coyotes have various calls, yips, barks

They make a lot of sounds Natives called them song dogs

So we get a lot of calls about people talking about hearing coyotes So coyotes communicate in a lot of different ways

Generally some of them sound like barks and some of them sound kind of interesting

But hearing a coyote is different than actually seeing a coyote

The coyote mating season, coyotes breed during January and March.

Coyotes breed once a year. Coyote females don't breed until they're about two years old.

They can breed at a younger age, but that's typical.

A pair of coyotes will stick together for several years and be one breeding pair.

The just-in-pitation period is 63 days approximately two months the pups are born in April and May

The litter size can vary from four to seven pups They're born underground in a den the mother will stay with the pups for about 12 days before coming out and exploring so

Like I was saying predictable is preventable so we know when they're going to be more active

We know that they're going to be more active in June, July, and August because the mother has kind of let them go out and thrive.

So we got some safety tips. Some of them are kind of obvious. Don't leave small children and pets outside unattended. Walk your dogs on a leash.

That's just safe in general.

Make sure you walk your dog on a leash. Bring your pets inside at night. Don't leave food outside. If you see a dog, if you see a coyote and you're walking a small dog, pick it up.

It just makes sense to do that.

It should be on a leash anyways, but you don't want to have a small animal kind of roaming around.

If you see a coyote, it doesn't mean anything is going to happen. It's just being preventative.

Remove food sources. Keep fruit trees pruned. Cover compost piles.

Cover garbage.

They have a great sense of smell. If you leave a food source out, you're going to see them on your property.

Eliminate water during dry climates. Bird bath.

If you're leaving large bowls out of water just for stray cats,

or if you just have puddling water, make sure you dump it and remove it,

because now that we're in summer, There's not a lot of water sources.

During puppy-rearing season, well, to prevent coyotes from coming out of your property,

make sure that you prune trees, cut grass, low-hanging trees.

Make sure they're trimmed up high. Anything that is low-hanging, they'll hide under.

And we want to keep them off of our property.

We want to keep them wild so we got to make sure that we prune our hillsides.

We have a lot of vast hillsides in Monterey Park and a lot of a lot of trees that are just kind of overgrown, which is kind of an ideal environment.

Don't feed coyotes which seems pretty obvious. But that's a problem. If you feed coyotes, they become comfortable with human activity.

they kind of that gap

that natural fear goes away and then that gap comes together and bridges

so don't feed coyotes, don't leave food out for

animals that are just wild animals or stray animals

if you're confronted by a coyote haze it make loud noise, be big that's huge hazing coyotes is really important

And if you see a coyote and you make noise and you're big and loud, most likely it's going to run away. We're instilling fear in that animal, natural fear of humans.

These animals are, like I explained, they can thrive in urban environments.

So they come across people and they become comfortable with them.

So if you scare them and haze them, they're going to stay away from us. Although it's extremely rare, if a coyote attacks a human being, dial 911.

Coyote data and mapping.

Monterey Park's Animal Services Bureau aims to collect more accurate data on the coyote population and activity in the city of Monterey Park.

To do this, we need the participation of Monterey Park residents.

So to be able to understand this, they're in your backyards, they're in your neighborhoods.

We need you to call in when you have a coyote.

And we're looking for specific types of activity.

Going back to that, what should we do if we see a coyote? We report it. We're looking for, like I said, specific types of activity. We're looking for coyote versus human encounters, encounters versus encounters with domestic pets resulting in injury or death, coyotes on school campuses during school hours, coyotes refusing to leave private properties after the being hazed if coyotes just hanging out and it's not going away you're making noise and it's just staying there we want to know that we want to know if you have a sick or injured coyote in the area because a sick or injured coyote can be a little more problematic a little more

opportunist maybe looking for pet food or vegetables in a garden easily accessible food

because they don't have the strength to go out and look for the rodents and squirrels and gophers and things that they typically survive on.

Reporting coyotes. To report a coyote, it's really simple. You can call our police dispatch. They take your information. They'll ask you a couple of questions. If you have any kind of specific information, you can provide it. If you see 2, 3, 1, just let us know. You can also report it directly to Animal Services. We'll take that information and we'll enter it into our system. And as the chief mentioned, we are working on a map that will be updated as sightings are made or reports are made. Like I said, we want specific types of activity reported. If you see a coyote running up a hillside and it's, you know, in an industrial area or if it's on Monterey Pass, that's just a coyote behaving like a normal coyote. It's not really invading your property. It's not really causing a problem. That's actually beneficial because it's keeping our rodent population down, keeping our hillside safe from erosion by eating rats and mice and burrowing animals. So the coyote map that was developed, it has various colors that will describe different types of activity that is reported. we're looking at activity like if animals been attacked those would be highlighted in a certain color if a coyote has been sighted if you have a

negative coyote interaction if the coyotes following you if a coyote approaches you while you're walking your dog all these activities are

categorized and blotted onto our map and we have we used the the previous fiscal year

from 2023 to 2024 and we I believe the map is not active but I believe we had about you know

we had about 100 sightings out of those sightings the majority of them were just people seeing coyotes in our neighborhoods. We didn't have any coyote attacks against a human being.

Like I said, that's extremely rare, but we want to prevent that. So that's why we are tracking this

data. The map link is active right now and the numbers are updated and we will continue to update them as the calls come in. But again, it's done by a human being. It's updated by a human on the map. It's not done automated automated yet, but the map is current and it is active on the website So you can use that link to get to the map

Yeah, so with this information, you know with this new system that's developed it's going to be It's going to be Really great to be able to see the population how many people are reporting it The types of you know interactions that we're having You know just in this short period of time that we tracked we could see that it right now. It's it's minimal. We're not seeing

Some of the horror stories that you know that that we get that

Typically or you know

People are terrified of coyotes, but it's just a lack of an understanding They're important to the ecosystem But that kind of ends our presentation on coyotes If anybody has any questions

I do have a question I just want to make sure I understand this so I'm looking at that my eyes

are giving me trouble because it's so far away but there's probably 60 to 75 dots that doesn't

net the green dots that doesn't necessarily mean we have 75 coyotes that just means we had calls

at that point in time at a particular point in time exactly okay so that activity can be

a single coyote kind of bouncing around a neighborhood 75 times and you know you know

in a rural area a coyote can cover like eight square miles in an urban setting they only need

anywhere from a mile to two square miles of territory and most of our coyotes are vagabond

coyotes where typically you see like one coyote by itself during this time of year we may see two or three because their puppies are kind of leaving them and that's when we see more activity it's

interesting because I'm looking at the bulk of them actually is right by ELAC and I that's all

flat land there's really no hills there or that's when people call in and says you know we got a

standing coyote in the middle of the street here yeah that that would be a couple of miles from

the 710 freeway a lot of open area the Monterey Pass road which is also a lot of

hillsides. So, you know, them trickling

that way, it kind of makes sense to us where we're following them. And what we want to do is kind of follow them back to where they're coming from. And if there's a problem we can address it, right?

And just

a point of clarification for the map.

Are we

refreshing, like if we don't want a coyote sighting from a year ago to be on there, that's not particularly

helpful what's the so so right now we have the previous fiscal year and now that we're in the current fiscal year starting in july starting july 1st uh it will be updated to show the current fiscal year uh as the chief was explaining we're still developing it and we want this we're trying to determine what is going to be the best information to provide is it going to be on a monthly basis? Should we provide a quarterly basis, a yearly basis? This information helps us, my partner, Officer Rodriguez and myself, to be able to go out and explore and see what's going on, see if there's an issue, see if it needs to be addressed, if the animal's just behaving naturally, if it's creating a problem, if there's a safety concern. So right now, we do have the previous fiscal year. Moving forward, I believe we're probably going to be focusing from the

current year moving forward. The new mapping system will be interactive. In other words, you can go into it and ask it to pick a date of beginning and a date of end, and it will show you the data for that time period. It's generated by the person that's looking at the map. Right now, it's static, and we're giving it for a one-year period of time. But the future map, when it's tied into CAT or MS, you're the one that will decide what the time period is. You could look at it for a 24-hour period, or you could look at it for a year period. It's up to you. Very helpful. Thank you.

And it's difficult to see because, like you said, it's really far away, but it is broken up in districts. District 1 is like in a kind of a yellowish color. District 2 is purple. District 3 is blue. District 4 is green. And District 5 is pink.

And are these just from the GO MPK signings or this includes calls?

These are from all calls received by the police department regarding coyotes.

GO Monterey parks are forwarded. They automatically go to animal services.

We can. I think it would be...

She does have a voice. Oh, okay. I know she talks. William is like me. He likes to talk.

Thank you. I want him to know who you are.

Good evening, Council and Mayor. I'm sorry, you can continue.

No, just a question and suggestion that, you know, if it hasn't been, perhaps we should be making sure it's posted on the Cascades so that people, you know, are aware of these tips and also the interactive map.

So Laura's going to be with us in August. She will have been with us for a year. So previously, yes, we have posted in the Cascades,

so that's something that she will probably be doing for us as well.

Now, currently, we do post warnings and information,

predominantly on social media, because that seems to be the way that the community

or most people get information now. So we do post it on our socials for the police department

And just just to echo what councilman Rolo was saying I think it would be it would make sense to Make sure we continue to post or have the tips and the safety tips and Tips on encountering coyotes in the cascades and we'll we'll add it to cascades and all the other

Platforms we use absolutely and if we can translate that to right to Chinese and Spanish Yes

And then if we I know there's a link now in go mpk for reporting coyotes may be helpful to link to the map or other resources there too.

At Go Monterey Park? Yeah. Okay, we'll look at that. I'm not sure how the app works. I know it tells me a lot of things, but we'll see if we can make that happen.

If it makes sense, yeah.

Sure.

But the more we can do to communicate, especially these tips in terms of keeping food away, right? I think people, it's also good mosquito tips. I don't know if Joe's here, but water out and all that stuff. I think would be helpful because I think people don't know. People are literally in my neighborhood, people are feeding stray cats on the sidewalk,

which they shouldn't be doing anyway,

but that also attracts coyotes and keeps them in the neighborhood.

I agree.

Any other questions, comments?

Thank you for the update. Appreciate it. And let's get these tips out to the community. Thank you.

Thank you for your time.

All right. We'll move on to recreation and community services.

Good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, Council Members.

I'm Christina Alatorre, Recreation Manager for the Recreation and Community Services

Department.

And tonight, I have a few highlights of what we've been doing and what we have going on in our city.

So first, I'd like to thank all the community members who made it out to our Independence Day event. It was a really great time to be had. We had the band 4x4, and we ended the night in a fireworks celebration of our nation's independence.

I'd also like to thank our fire police and public works departments who helped us this evening kick off this event for our community members.

As you can see from the photos, the community had a great time. And again, our fireworks show were spectacular. and as Mayor Pro Tem said, it was the only firework show of the night on that night.

Next slide, please. We've recently kicked off our summer movies in the park.

We had the Super Mario Brothers movie where we gave out masks to kids,

and then we had our Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles night

where the Ninja Turtles came out to take photos with Monterey Park residents and community members. And we also gave out Ninja Turtle masks for the night. Upcoming on July 25th is Kung Fu Panda 4. And then we end our movies in the park on August 8th with the Barbie movie.

Next slide, please.

Over at the Langley Center, we have monthly health screenings. The next health screening is on the 22nd of this month. And then we have our health seminars. The next one is about beating the heat and staying safe during these times where the weather is very, very hot. And that will take place tomorrow at the Langley Center.

On the 23rd, we have our country line dance.

Anyone 55 and over can join us and register for this event.

Typically our line dances are very, very popular at the Langley Center.

Next slide.

So tomorrow at the Vincent Price Art Museum, we are going to be having a reception.

And the art piece is called Life Culture Art Project, Painting Generations of Our Community.

So what we've done is we've worked with the Boys and Girls Club of the West San Gabriel Valley in Eastside and the seniors at the Langley Center. And the seniors have done a self-portrait.

This has been led by one of the Boys and Girls Club staff members, Lalo, and he has graciously taught our seniors different painting techniques and skills.

and then with those art pieces, those have been turned over to some of the youth in the community and what you're going to be seeing is some self-portraits and then some youth, I'm going to say, artistic expressions on those same canvases and we welcome everyone in the community to join us

for this free event. It kicks off at five o'clock. Along with that, we've been working really hard in

the Recreation Department with City Fabric for our open house event. As you know, we are working

on the park system master plan. We've been inviting all the community members to take part in our survey. Surveys are still open. They can be accessed through our website and by just searching parks plan. Actually, at this open house, which will take place on Sunday, July 28th from 9 to noon. Anyone can drop in at any time between those hours. And the initial survey results will be released. And we're all actually going to be having an interactive activity with the community members

to kind of see where they would like to put their dollar as far as enhancing and updating our parks

throughout the city. Next slide, please.

That is all I have for you, Mayor Wong,

council member, or pro tem go, and council members. If you have any questions or comments,

I'd be more than happy to answer them.

All right, council.

I do.

I'm looking forward to next Thursday, I want to meet Pao, as in Kung Fu Panda, and then three weeks from now, it's Barbie.

I want to see who's dressing Barbie when we're out in the movie.

As a matter of fact, we have a few Barbie outfits in our recreation closet.

I know of a Ken.

And I forgot to tell you, so we have a special treat.

So for our Barbie movie, we are actually going to be having nail painting. So if any council members would like to have their nails painted, join us for our movie.

Looking forward to that. Any other comments, questions?

If not, looking forward to these events. Thanks so much for everything that the Recreation Community Services Department does. And I appreciate the great job putting together the fireworks show.

So the self-portrait painting will be displayed tomorrow at VPAM?

Yes. Okay, fine. All right. Thank you.

All right. Thank you so much. Thank you.

All right. That is it for staff communications. We're done with our presentation item.

We'll move on to our consent calendar. Are there any items council members want to pull from consent?

If not, I'm going to pull item 3C just for a quick discussion

and 3H to highlight something very quickly.

If there's no other changes, if there's a motion,

we'll take that for the remaining items.

Sure.

Mr. Mayor, motion to move the un-pulled items and the rest of the consent.

Move and second. Any further discussion?

Hearing none, call for the vote.

Approved unanimously.

Thank you. All right.

We'll move on to item 3C.

If there's a very, very, very quick staff report.

Mr. Mayor, members of the city council, Scott Wiesch, Chief of Police. With me is Corporal Dave Cassiano.

He is our traffic investigator and the second in charge of our traffic bureau.

He's the one that authored the cannabis grant, and he can answer any questions you may have about it. Thank you.

Any quick questions from Council? Just really quick, thank you, Chief,

and thank you for being here to talk about this item. I'm just curious, well, one, fully support applying for this grant and appreciate being able to receive this money from the state.

Can you just talk a little about what activities we plan to fund out of this grant for the police department and for the city?

Good evening, Mayor and City Councilmembers. The money we get from the CHP grant is through the cannabis, the state tax. And so that money, we do have it earmarked for DUI suppression. And then we've also gotten it for two motorcycles to be used for DUI enforcement. It's also money given for us for education. So it'll be used for the center officers to training to what we call SFSD, standard field sobriety test, to help them so when they go out they can see impaired driving. and also we also getting what's called a pedal cart it's a two-person cart and what you do is you have one person in a driving and then with the pedals you have the other person standing by and what you do is you put we have these goggles we call them DUI goggles so it's supposed to show what it's like to be impaired and so we have a little course and so that's something we're going to have for them. That's interesting.

No, I appreciate the note on that. I think I'm sure there are some people that would be interested in checking the, it sounds like a bicycle that you would drive under.

When we have our city events, we'll have a booth and we'll have these things out as part of the education program. The genesis of this was that the CHP began to see that impaired driving was not just alcohol. Throughout the nation, impaired driving also includes drugs and marijuana, and this program is designed with the legalization of marijuana in California. It was designed to train officers and to educate the public on the potential for disaster for driving impaired under the influence of marijuana. Basically, the rules are the same.

if you can't drink a beer in a car you can't smoke a joint in a car if you feel

impaired after drinking the same thing goes for marijuana but it's a different kind of it's a different kind of investigation and CHP has dumped quite a bit of money into trying to educate the public on how to avoid the disasters of

under the influence driving right now I appreciate this and appreciate that we're

looking at opportunities and in ways that we can resource further education in the community. If there's more that we can do and resource permitting to partner with schools and other organizations that are doing outreach to youth and others in the community around impaired driving and drug use prevention, any of those activities we can support through some of this grant funding, either sub-grant or just providing resources like the things that we're procuring for this, I think that'd be great. And if there are opportunities for us to partner with others that are trusted voices and sources of information in the community to further

these efforts.

I think that would be great to explore.

We can't sub out the money, but we can go to those organizations and provide them with

training and outreach services. That's part of the purpose.

We'll be in all the schools.

We'll be talking to public groups.

We'll be at all the city events. So it's pretty robust outreach.

basically we don't turn anybody down who wants the education.

Thank you. That's all I have on this. I don't know if there's

a motion. We'll open up to a motion on the item.

I'll make the motion. Second by Councilor Lo.

Yes, second. Any further discussion? Hearing none, we'll call a vote.

Approved unanimously. Thank you.

I'll move to item 3H, Notice of Completion for Various Capital Improvement Projects. If we can do a very brief staff report.

Good evening, Honorable Mayor, Mayor Pro Temp and City Council. Sean Igel, Public Works Director.

Tonight you have before you several items for Notice of Completion. As you know, Public Works has been working hard to get our CIP program to a good place. We've, like I said a while back, we've completed over 30 projects last year. We have another over 30 this year. This just goes to show the level of dedication that we have within our team. So you have before you, you have our library facility improvements.

diligence on this and appreciate the efforts to be on top of our contractors on this work and making sure we're delivering infrastructure like this but also make sure we're delivering value in terms of

the budget and our our expenses thank you yeah thank you but also wanted to see if we can do

more to right I think it's fair to toot our horn a little bit and it's important to remind and let our community members know that these projects are happening. A lot of these things, I think a lot of public works projects are taken for granted by our community, and I think it would be helpful to have before or after kind of stories and pictures and reminders to the community that this work is happening and that we are repairing potholes and streets and doing all this work in our community. I think we need to do a better job of telling that story to the community, and if we can find ways to write these things up for the Cascades and get this out in the newsletters and find other opportunities to showcase the amazing work that the public works department all our departments are doing in the community I think that'd be very very ideal and helpful. Thank you appreciate that yeah

just one thing to highlight real quick is we do have on our website we do have our CIP list so you actually go on there and you can interact with our GIS map and see what products we currently have going on what projects we completed the ones that we have completed we typically have before and after pictures especially when it comes to our paving projects we try to show the exact location of the before and after so we try to highlight that stuff within our website you have to get there but yes definitely heard understood you we do we will work on putting a cascades item together and we can put a QR code that goes directly to that web page to where the can the community can see all the different

things that we are doing and have done great and I would love to see because

or I imagine the other council members as well get questions from neighbors about these projects that are happening and the inconveniences when we have to SHUT DOWN STREETS AND WHEN IS THIS GOING TO GET FIXED, WHEN IS THAT GOING TO GET FIXED, BE GREAT TO SHOWCASE THIS PROACTIVELY IN THE COMMUNITY. AND EVEN IF THEY DON'T READ THE CASCADES OR SOME PEOPLE EVEN SAY THAT THEY DO READ THE CASCADES, THEY MISS CERTAIN PORTIONS AND I CAN POINT BACK TO, HEY, WE JUST PUT THAT IN THE CASCADES AND TAKE A LOOK ABOUT ALL THE PRODUCTS THAT WE'RE DOING AND EVERYTHING

WE'RE GETTING DONE. ABSOLUTELY. GREAT. THANK YOU. Thank you.

With that, if there's a motion to adopt

staff recommendation on the item.

Move for approval.

I'll second.

Move and second. Any further discussion?

Hearing none, call for the vote.

Approved, you're not absolutely.

Thank you.

All right, moving on to public hearing. Item 4A, a consideration of costs resulting from evading weed nuisances and authorizing collection via special assessment.

Is there a staff report?

Thank you.

Fire Marshal Jessica Estrella will be making the presentation.

Thank you very much.

Hello, Mayor and members of the City Council.

I am Jessica Estrella. I am the Fire Marshal here in Monterey Park.

so this is the final step in city's weed abatement process for council to consider approving the county's costs related to abatement and directing that these costs be collected via special assignment sorry assessment for the 2023 to 2024 weed abatement cycle 1569 parcels were identified as public nuisances five parcels required county abatement totaling $13,316. The remainder of the 1,564 parcels will be assessed as a flat fee of the $5,159. Grand total is $94,000. I do want to point out that we contract with the county of LA, and this is no fiscal impacts for the city of Monterey Park. All nuisance costs are collected and are the responsibility of the property owners themselves.

Any questions?

Thank you. We'll open up the public hearing.

Are there any public comments?

No public comments.

All right.

We'll close the public hearing.

Any comments from council members?

If not, is there a motion?

I'll make the motion.

I'll second.

Any further discussion? Hearing none, I'll call for the vote.

Approved unanimously.

Thank you.

All right, we'll move on to item 4B, public hearing,

to consider extension of the ordinance 2245 preparing permits for land use

entitlements within the Becaslin Business Park

aka Saturn Park for an additional 10 months and 15 days. We'll open it up to staff report.

Staff report on this item will be given by Jessica Jessica Serrano.

Yes. Community following director.

Good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, members of the City Council. This item is a public hearing to consider the extension of urgency ordinance number 2245, prohibiting permits for land use entitlements within McCaslin Park, also known as Saturn Park, for an additional 10 months and 15 days.

On June 18, 2024, the City Council adopted this urgency ordinance instituting a moratorium which prohibits the acceptance and approval of new permits for development within Saturn Park for at least 45 days, which ends on August 2, 2024. This will allow additional time for the Saturn Park Advisory Review Committee to receive

public input regarding future uses or potential uses at Saturn Park as part of the drafting

of a Saturn Park specific plan.

Now, what the item before you is an extension of the moratorium to extend the period to 10 months and 15 days.

At this point, I'm available to answer any questions. Thank you.

We will open up the public hearing, and I believe there are some speakers.

First speaker, Jim Pugh.

Hello.

Good evening, honorable mayor, mayor pro tem, and city council members. I'm Jim Pugh from Shepard Mullen, representing the applicant for the data center project located at 1977 Saturn.

Good to see you again.

It's been about a month, as you know. Tonight, we're really here to offer you and the city a solution of what we see as a way to have the data center project continue, along with the specific planning effort in Saturn Park. our solution is really made up of two prongs and I'll go through those in a

minute but what I think it allows the city to do is obtain an immediate

economic development opportunity that provides tangible benefits both for the city and the residents and the community then it also facilitates the long-term planning that you're going to embark on with the spark committee in the Saturn

Park area. So the first, we submitted a letter. If you've read it, excellent. If not, I'll summarize

it briefly. But the first component of our solution that we offer to you tonight is the applicant's willingness to enter into a development agreement with the city. You may or may not know a development agreement is not required per the current code, but the applicant wants to work with the city and is willing to voluntarily enter into that development agreement to provide additional benefits to the community and the city. That development agreement is the mechanism that would provide those rights legally and in a binding way for the city and also vest the interest

of the applicant. But we can only do that if we actually have a live project. And as we mentioned

last time, you know that extending the moratorium for another 10 months would essentially kill the project. So what we've done is provided in that solution and also in our letter, what is the second prong of the solution? That's a provision. You add one provision, which would be new section 4B in your ordinance, fits nicely right under 4A, and that would allow for exempted activities

during the term of the moratorium,

but it's very tightly constrained, and it allows the city to retain power over exempted activities. Those exempted activities would only apply for certain applications filed before April 2024 and would only allow projects to be approved if at the same time or before a development agreement was also approved. So it provides a lot of discretionary control over the projects that are considered exempt activities. We think that this request is a win-win solution, so what we're specifically asking of you tonight is to amend the draft ordinance by providing that one provision in our letter, 4B, before you adopt the ordinance tonight. And we think this is a safe and smart decision with the city. As you may know, there's no other data center projects proposed in Santa Ana Park at this time. And, in fact, I think since the last time we've spoken, even interest in other data centers has minimized, to put it lightly.

So, ultimately, we think the city will have the tangible developments of redevelopment in the Saturn Park area.

It can be a seed for economic activity. that also allows tangible community benefits beyond just the data centers benefits that's the beauty of the development agreement allows you to negotiate other benefits that may be important to the city and that's up to your discretion as well as we move through this process so we respectfully ask that you do amend the ordinance tonight and for the reasons in our letter we believe it's a win for you the city for the residents and for the applicant and presents the community with a very nice long-term vision for Saturn Park we also as we pointed out in our letter and I'll note for the record there's certain legal risk of not doing that we don't want to emphasize those here what we really want to ask is that we work together to improve the city create a revitalized saturn park and allow the project to proceed under the ordinance as amended so we're here for any

additional questions those are my requests for your honorable consideration thank you very much

thank you next speaker next speaker brian marsh of strat cap data centers

Good evening, Mayor and City Councilors. Brian Marsh, CEO of StratCap Data Centers.

We are the applicant for 1977 Saturn.

Obviously, I was here about a month ago when the original moratorium came up.

Kind of as we said then, we didn't think it was really needed with the discretionary approvals that the city has.

You still have that.

and certainly what we propose.

We don't think 10 and a half months is needed either.

Hopefully we can work through this process quickly.

We've been working with the city for 16 months now to try to get this project approved,

trying to follow all the rules and regulations that you have. The only variance we asked for was a reduction in parking,

which we thought was a good thing.

We're kind of at the goal line.

I think we hope to have the environmental report ready for public comment here shortly.

And then we can go through this review process.

And we're looking forward to working with SPARC and the committee there to talk about data centers,

educate the public, educate yourselves more about data centers and the benefits that they bring to the community. We think it's a great fit.

It's a fantastic project for Monterey Park, and we think it can coexist with other mix of uses if that's what the city's looking for.

Having been in commercial real estate my entire career and spending a lot more time walking around your city and seeing what you have here,

I certainly understand the need for more housing, and I think that can work practically on any site, no matter where you put it.

Some of the other uses that have been mentioned, such as retail, I think may struggle.

I've noticed you've got a fairly high vacancy rate of retail right now today in the city.

Certainly, if it's mixed in with affordable housing, that may not be the type of demographics

that's going to attract more retailers into a mixed-use environment.

We know that office isn't dead.

Department. I don't think there's really a lot of support for industrial warehouses in that neighborhood. So, you know, it entertainment, who knows, maybe with the right project, if you can attract them there. But really, this is Saturn Park, at least on the eastern end of the property where 1977 is and 1980. Those two sites in particular are ideal for for data center development and the close proximity to the SCE Mesa substation.

It's a great opportunity for the city to attract a very significant investment into the city

that will generate jobs and a lot of tax revenues and very safe, secure facilities.

So we're looking forward to working with you, and hopefully you'll go along with our suggested changes and modifications. really gives us that path forward, that's something that could happen in the next 90 to 120 days. I mentioned last time we're under a deadline to close on 1977 Saturn, so we may be able to buy a little bit more time, but we don't think we can go much longer. We've also got a method of service study from Southern Cal Edison on the power for 50 megawatts,

and we have gotten a commitment from them that they can serve us,

but there is a short window of only six months from when we receive the report

in which we have to accept it and move forward.

Otherwise, we lose that right. We would have to completely start over, go back through the whole method of service study,

pay another $100,000, $150,000 fee. by the time they get to us on the next go-round, that power may be gone and no longer available.

So we really do need to act quickly if we want to go forward.

And just like Jim said, you know, the last action on the moratorium has had a negative impact with 1980.

There was another buyer on that site, was interested in data centers. We understand they have dropped their contract.

so just don't want to see the city damaged anymore that would prevent these type of projects from happening

so thank you very much

thank you any other speakers last speaker is me

good evening this is Misha I just wanted to say that I'm speaking as a resident tonight. I just wanted to reiterate what I said and concur with the two gentlemen before me that the land use element and the current zoning are in line. This moratorium really is not necessary especially the duration of it. The 10 months is a bit excessive being that the SPARK meetings are completed August 29th. So everything should be completed within within a few months. So extending the moratorium for so long after we've already lost potential developer, it just doesn't make sense. The entire point of this process is to bring back business and development in this area. And so discouraging it by further extending this moratorium is not very smart. so hopefully we can maybe revise that as requested and shorten it to a more reasonable duration if you're going to approve it. Also considering that you can extend it later if necessary.

So I think it's a good compromise.

I'd like to speak to my neighbors now.

Good evening, neighbors.

You see what's going on here. This is really important that you all listen and participate, whether you live in this area or not,

because after this area, they're coming for you.

You see, we have existing zoning.

You see, you approved Measure JJ,

which established the land use element.

And despite all of that, they're still circumventing whatever we thought was agreed upon

or what we thought was law.

They're still looking for ways to go around what the current zoning requirements are.

They're still trying to do whatever they want, not what you voted for.

So if you don't want this happening in your neighborhood, please, please pay attention.

Participate.

Because when you don't speak up, this is what happens. They take advantage of the situation. They take advantage of the fact that we're too busy. They take advantage of the fact that we don't know the laws like they do, and they manipulate it to get whatever they want. So if you don't want that happening at your home, in your neighborhood, please pay attention because only through your voice and your vote can you make this right.

Thank you.

Any other speakers?

No other speakers.

Thank you. We'll close the public hearing.

We'll open it up to questions or comments from Council.

Yes, Mr. Mayor.

Yes, a question, Mr. Marsh. So help me understand what is, if you can elaborate again, what is it, since the ordinance is asking for a 10-month moratorium as proposed, What is how how is this presenting a challenge to your project may I ask?

Well, I don't know if maybe we can ask staff to answer that question and that might be first place to direct that.

Can you explain?

Mr. Carlberger can take a stab at this one.

Mr. Mayor, members of the council, the way I understand the applicant's situation is they have an option on purchasing the property. And Mr. Pugh, you can correct me if I have it wrong.

I'm just summarizing.

They have an option on purchasing the property, which is dependent in part on obtaining somewhat discretionary approvals from the city. One of the challenges that they face is that if the processing is halted or if there is no opportunity to have a definitive date for considering the discretionary permitting, their option will fall through or they will have to extend it, which will cost them additional money because presumably there will be a fee involved with that.

Am I summarizing this generally correctly?

SO IF I'M GUESSING WITHOUT KNOWING AND I'M INTERRUPTING MR.

PUGH'S INTENT ON SPEAKING BUT I'M GUESSING THEY'RE LOOKING FOR

SOMETHING LIKE A 90-DAY EXTENSION ON THE MORATORIUM AS OPPOSED TO A 10-MONTH EXTENSION ON THE MORATORIUM. FROM THE STANDPOINT OF THE SPARK COMMITTEES OF THE SPARK'S CURRENT SCHEDULE IT WOULD SEEM THAT A 90-DAY MORATORIUM WOULD BE SUFFICIENT FOR THE SPARK TO HOLD ITS MEETINGS AND COME BACK TO THE City Council with some recommendations. And in addition to that, if you added the proposed subsection B as proposed by Mr. Pugh and his client, that that would give them some breathing space and at least assure the property owners and their shareholders that the City's intent on negotiating with them with regard to a development agreement and they could put some goodies on the table for the City Council to consider with regard to the development agreement in the form of

public benefits.

Have I summarized everything accurately?

yes carl that's generally accurate again jim pew from shepherd mullen representing the applicant i think you've um give it the right context um i'll only add that you know there's a bright line

right which is under the contract to buy the property there is a date of which if you don't

perform meaning close on the land then the contract is no more right unless it's extended so

So if you couple that bright line with a moratorium for 10 months or longer, there's no light at the end of the tunnel, right, from a deal perspective.

And so that's the real risk here.

What we've tried to propose in the solution, and thanks for raising it, I focused on adding one provision to the ordinance, which is that Section 4B, because that basically allows the pathway for the project to continue, get approved if you so desire,

and really remove the risk from the project, at least of imploding from the contractual perspective.

But it also allows the SPARC to do its job as long as you want, right?

You could go 10 months and 15 days. You could go another year.

the SPARK process can play out. So long as you have the new Section 4B, those things become independent.

The 90-day request that we also put in our letter was almost a stopgap,

meaning if we live to fight another day, like I said last time,

the 90-day extension puts a little more time on the clock, but it's a Band-Aid.

It's not the fix that we would all want in order for these things to proceed together without unduly risking the project.

So that's why our primary request was to amend the ordinance so we don't have to keep revisiting this.

Secondary request was, you know, the 90-day instead of the 10-month day, which becomes mostly irrelevant if you add the provision we asked for.

And again, what is this bright line? I mean, in other words, is there a hard deadline?

What is this bright line deadline you're referring to?

In the contract, it's by a certain date you have to either close on the land or the contract expires.

And I don't know if you'd like to tell me.

You're asking him what that date is.

What the date is?

It's August 30th. Oh, I see. August 30th. Oh, I see. Okay.

Right. So if you look at that, we literally can't finish.

Now that we've kind of delayed to the extent we have, when you circulate the environmental review document under CEQA, there's a statutory review period. Then it needs to come to you for consideration, et cetera.

The time runs out on that.

So we need to make sure that, one, we have an exempt activities pathway to even get the project approved in the first place. And if that happens, there's more impetus for us to negotiate an extension of the contract.

I see.

And again, remind me again, when did you start this process? I mean, yeah, when did you start?

At 1977, Saturn.

Yeah, informally, we talked with staff about a year ago, 16 months ago.

That was not, you know, filing an application or anything like that. that was we're interested in developing a data center in this city is that something you're interested what does the code look like do the diligence and then the application for this project was formally filed earlier this year i believe in january january this year yeah

okay thank you if i may mr mayor members of the council just to follow up uh if it's if the 4b subsection is something that the city council would like to entertain I will tell you that mr. Pugh and I discussed it yesterday I'm fine with the language if that's something that the city council would like to entertain so we don't have to have any tinkering here at the dais if that's something that you would like to do I'd also point out that the if the council want to entertain the 90 day extension rather than a 10 month 15 day extension there's nothing that prevents the city from continuing on the moratorium beyond 90 days but I imagine that if the request made by the applicant under these circumstances was something that the city council was willing to entertain, that in the next 30 days certainly we could craft a development agreement that would be acceptable for consideration by the city council. That would also require some amendment. I assume the CEQA document hasn't gone out for review, has it?

Not yet.

Okay, so we would need to amend the project description for the CEQA document, but that doesn't substantially alter the analysis of the CEQA document.

In other words, this is purely a policy call on your behalf, and all of the delivery systems are ready to be triggered if that's something that you would like to do.

Thank you for clarification.

Councilman, are you?

Thank you. We know that the data center is related to data, to cloud storage, data backup, which is the backbone of our technology, especially with the AI taking off. And knowing that your business can provide like maybe fiber optics to nearby businesses. So it is like locating right next to a freeway entrance and getting a fast access to freeway. So my question is, what kind of business will be attracted to data center so that to take advantage to the fast and reliable Internet access?

Yeah, thank you, Council Member Yu. Brian Marsh.

Data centers, I like to use the analogy, they're a little bit like fast food restaurants. They like to cluster together because users and customers have different tastes. and one customer may want to use Amazon Web Service.

Another one may want to use Microsoft Azure. Another one may use IBM Cloud or Google Cloud, just to give you an example.

So they like to congregate together because they can also talk to each other via the Internet, through fiber optics.

And so they really are more of a magnet for other data centers,

And that's why there's such a unique opportunity here with Saturn Park and its location. But there are ancillary businesses that will also be attracted to them.

Mainly, I think of suppliers and technicians and maintenance.

Those types of companies will sometimes locate next to them,

and it may be in an office environment or office warehouse or something of that nature.

if they're storing parts, they're doing assembly, you know, light.

comparables that you can give us a ballpark of how much more tax that you can give to the city?

Yeah, we've commissioned Ask the Ryan Company, who's one of the largest property tax and sales

tax consultants in the country, to help us on this question. I'm going to give you a very

ballpark back of the napkin.

So we did an estimate for roughly a $400 million property tax assessed value

and roughly 30 megawatts of electricity per hour is what we're looking at.

And the city collects a tax on the sale of that electricity. We also look at personal property tax.

Roughly, we're using right now roughly $400 million,

which is the same as the real property, if you will. I think that number will be a lot higher. This would be all of the server, computer servers, networking gear, all that that goes into the data center that by those customers I was describing,

by those users.

And just on sort of the real property, the electricity, the personal property, we're coming up with a number somewhere between $6 million to $10 million a year to the city.

Now, that's, again, hasn't been completely verified.

It's dependent on a lot of factors. And that would be really upon stabilization once we get it built, get it fully occupied. we got customers in there using it so but we definitely want to take a closer look at that and I think you know I'll make a commitment to you by the first

spark meeting we'll have a slide that we will be happy to present kind of share

those calculations and and fine-tune them to make sure we're capturing

everything correctly thank you thank you I have a follow-up question Brian

Mr. Marsh. So going back to Councilmember Hughes, you mentioned $400 million. $400 million is the total project cost. Is that where you're deriving your, I guess, the imputed value?

That's for our part of the project.

That's to buy the property, demolish the building, construct a new shell, bring in the power,

and deliver what we would consider to be a turnkey, move-in ready data center space. And then the business personal property is really all the computers that the customers,

the tenants bring to the to the table right and then the tax base would be based on the 400 million

the infrastructure the base and that would be your property tax assessment is that yeah and

in our analysis we actually took 90 of that just to say it wasn't the full construction cost we

used a made an assumption of 90 of that cost would go towards the assessed value so so it

would be a very successful project if you come in within 90 of that budget because usually it's 110 10% of that budget. So thank you so much. I'm going to actually ask Jessica for a couple of questions. So let me let me kind of take a step back and go back to why we're doing spark. Why do we have a committee put together with spark? Why are we doing this staff report? Sure. So back in May,

we presented to city council the issue related to Saturn Park in that area is set vacant for many years.

Many of the properties have been sitting there vacant. Over 70% of the properties there are empty right now. There's a lot of for lease, for sale signs.

And there was also an evaluation of the zoning, the existing zoning, in comparison to the general plan.

And when we took a hard look at those two, we found that there are some inconsistencies. And that's the real basis for instituting a moratorium so that a specific plan can be drafted to create consistency between general plan and zoning. Okay.

And then my next question is, who consists of, I saw earlier, remind me again who the players are.

There's nine members.

Yes.

If you can just kind of go briefly to the bio. I want to make sure we clarify this. So folks who are not here today, they're watching us. They understand why we're doing this and who's involved.

Sure. We have our mayor, Thomas Wong, as the chairperson. You're the vice chair.

Philip Chang, he's a member of the community.

Johnny Kwok, he's a planning commissioner.

Paul Lee, he's also a parks and rec commissioner.

Joe Leyva, he's a property owner representing a property owner from Saturn Park.

Tammy Sam, she's a planning commissioner.

Victoria Chen Stapleton, she's a community member, also a realtor. And our city clerk, May Xiaoyi, she's the ninth member.

So if I can summarize this, I know we have some folks interning from a company who's actually looking at a project, so I'll give you guys a shout-out from CBRE.

Thanks for coming.

first time city council meeting. Thanks for coming here. So I'll talk to you guys. So we're doing this because you guys are in real estate. Just think about a project that is 70% vacant for the last 10-15 years. In your mind you're thinking what is going on? That's the reason why we're doing this and who the players are. If you look at the players involved, there's three elected officials. You've got some real estate agents who are in the community. You have commissioners who actually volunteer to help the city. And you also have property owners who are involved and planning commissioners, people who are actually involved with the city in planning development. So this is why we're doing this as part of your learning process.

And one more question for Jessica.

Going back to the timing, I understand what Mr. Peary and Mr. Marsh is asking for

in terms of the timing of their project in a in a I guess one to ten from

starting from scratch to kind of getting the final permit to do what they need to do where are they at how close are they from being done and from from the

approval process because it it really it was a 16 18 month process but we only got the paperwork early this year that's correct they filed their application of

January of this year and they have been working together with our team to review plans review their sequel document At this point we haven't released the sequel document, but that alone will take about 20 30 days

for public review and comment and then after that that'll Open the way for us to be able to schedule a public hearing before Planning Commission. I mean I would say if I had to guess we're at least two months away from a public hearing for Planning Commission. And then after Planning Commission, then they would have, if they receive an approval, then they would be able to submit plans to building and safety for construction.

If I could just tag team on Ms. Serrano's comments. Were the council to move forward with the request from the applicant and we were to add in the development agreement as part of the project description, the consideration of the development agreement and the entire project would go to the city council under the municipal code so there would be no need for planning commission review at that point the city council itself acts as the planning agency for development agreements and other types of legislative decisions so that would bypass the

planning commission and go directly to the city council for consideration we actually had one of

those a couple of meetings ago and we actually went back because of public comments uh jessica

how many, Mr. Rondo, how many projects do we have in line here at Saturn Park that's actually done the same processing that we have in front of us? How many developments are pending?

This is the only one.

Okay.

Yeah, I haven't finished asking the question. And so just going back to the $400 million potential tax.

And for the vacant building itself, I know that we had appraisal done for the same building.

And this, in September 9, 2021, the value concluded to be about $38 million. So a vacant building is about $38 million. And then so you can add 10 times more of the value and provide the tax to the city, I mean to the state of the city. So I think that would be a value added.

But I'm very greedy. I wanted to ask for more. So let's say, can we explore about the data center? For example, you're renting the space to Google, Amazon.

and so you're taking the rent for storage their data and is it possible that we can get some kind

of sales tax or any other tax in addition to property tax from your business as well

yes council member you I think do you think there's a possibility for the city

collecting more sales tax.

And again, I'm not a sales tax expert or a property tax expert,

but I do think there's nuances as to point of sale

and where it's delivered and that sort of thing.

So again, we will ask for advice,

but certainly a lot of equipment,

a lot of material that's going into this.

And so that was something that we did not include in my earlier remark about what our estimate was,

was any of those sales taxes other than unless you want to characterize the tax on the electricity as one.

Thank you.

So maybe hopefully we'll provide a little bit more research and detailed reports, you know, when we get started with our committee.

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you. Thank you so much.

Thank you.

I appreciate Mr. Marsh, both of you being here.

And just in the interest of disclosure,

we did have a conversation with Mr. Marsh earlier this week

around this project as well. I appreciate you making the time

and helping to present a little bit more detail around this proposal.

I will say up front, I would not want this process

to take 10 months and 15 days either. I would be amenable to a shorter period, and we always have the option to extend. And my concern is around the proposed language around allowing this proposal to continue to go through the process and be exempted from the moratorium, however long that lasts. I also don't want to shortchange the SPARK process where we will and we the hope of and the Intention of even creating the Saturn Park Advisory Review committee I forgot what our stands for Is to help and bring in the entire right community to vision and re-envision What we want to see in the Saturn Park the cows and park area

and

And while there are vacancies, the last thing I want, obviously, is continued vacancies in that area. But the hope is to leverage those vacancies for an opportunity for the community to provide as much feedback as we can gather about what they want to see there for that whole neighborhood. So in that sense, I know that timing, this might work out okay, where even if we adopt the proposed language for 4B on this, timing-wise, probably might be okay. But my concern is I don't know if doing a 90-day extension, and I'm looking to Carl and Jessica for some guidance on this, how do we kind of make sure that this doesn't impinge on what our hope is out of Spark while offering some flexibility? I would hate for this deal to fall through as it currently stands. But how do we, if there's a way to balance kind of all these competing interests and needs on this, in my mind it's right now shortening to maybe a 90 to 120 day period. I don't know how long if out of the spark comes a recommendation from the committee to do a specific plan for the Saturn Park area, how long that might take to implement or finalize and how that might play with a potential timeline for a moratorium too.

Mr. Mayor, members of the council, I'll jump in. It seems to me based upon the schedule that we've seen from the SPARC that there are going to be four meetings that will be wrapping up sometime in September, which means that the 90-day schedule will be – I'm wrong. It wraps up August 29th. So the 90-day period would, you could shorten it even to 60 days based upon this schedule from the standpoint of you will know at the end of August and be presented with the results of the SPARK consideration of the Saturn Park in September. And you can make a determination at that point whether, one, you want to make any changes to the zoning. Two, if you do want to make changes to the zoning, what those changes look like. and along those lines whether or not a data center is included with the overall perspective of that specific plan. I think that satisfies the applicant. Monterey Park. And, also, we have a 2-5-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9-9 So assuming for the sake of this discussion that you were to adopt the ordinance and have a 90-day moratorium in September, if you decided that you don't want to do anything, you just extinguish the moratorium at that point, and the existing zoning remains, and this project keeps going the way it is. So there are many options on the table for you. I wouldn't tie yourselves into a knot from the standpoint of giving yourself too little time. I would simply say if this is something that you want to do is to give yourself the 90-day moratorium and add in 4B because that would allow Mr. Pugh and myself to start horse trading with regard to a development agreement so that there's something for you to consider. Hopefully in September, that is, because by that time the CEQA document will have been circulated and then you can have a public hearing with regard to the DA if that's something that you want to do. But it gives you the flexibility to take a number of different options rather than closing off.

those opportunities. So Carl I hear the mayor's comments and I fully support that because we don't want to shortchange ourselves for the city but we also want to support development from Mr. Marsh. I actually think we will get through a solution that will actually be beneficiary for both parties but timing is everything and right now we're kind of debating it's three months six months may i ask if there's something that from a legal standpoint where you know you can like like you said we can do the three months and then you can build in automatically another three months so then uh the applicant can kind of decide how they want to position their option with the land seller because at the end of the day, it's an opportunity cost for them to figure this out. But for us to kind of keep someone in tow, because they started this process in January,

we'll continue to honor that.

We're giving them by way of a grandfather for them to continue this process while we continue to look at sparks and figure out what we want to do that's best for our community, best for the city. Obviously, it's going to help the tax revenue for the city. And again, we want this, we want McCaslin Park to be vibrant.

That's the end of the day.

70% vacancy is going to drive a lot of no good stuff.

It's blighted in a sense.

So, Mr. Mayor, members of the council, council member, I think to answer your question from the standpoint of can we add in an automatic extension, off the top of my head, the government code sections that govern the way moratorium works doesn't allow that. You need a public hearing each time that you seek to extend a moratorium because you have to make specific findings with regard to that moratorium. So really the question tonight is, well, do you think you're going to be able to take care of the problem within this amount of time and then reconsider at the end of that amount of time whether or not you need to extend it? There's no provision in the government code requiring you to go through a public hearing process to extinguish a moratorium. So if you were finished earlier, you could just simply rescind or repeal the ordinance, and the moratorium would be gone at that point. There's no requirement for anything else.

You don't have to make findings for it.

But to answer your question, there's no way to trigger an automatic extension like you might with a lease, for example. If, you know, on the anniversary date it renews itself, that's not the same type of process for a moratorium.

Can I add one point for you guys to consider?

Please.

Thank you. Jim Pugh with the applicant.

So I just want to make sure we don't have the tail wagging the dog on my letter.

We did make two important requests. One was about the 90 days.

That's the tail.

The exempt activity is by far 99% of the request because to be completely transparent,

that deal is hanging on by a thread so if we don't get some pathway to negotiate a development

agreement and have exempted activities your ordinance the way it's drafted and carl can speak to it it allows you to process we talked about that before it does not allow you to approve so if you're a landowner and you see an ordinance come in that says oh great 30 excuse me three more months or 90 days later the city council can then extend again if you so wish that does nothing to the pathway it basically says the moratoriums continue to live on why would we ever extend that string evaporates the deal ends to me brian can comment more if he wants but i i truly believe tonight is the last opportunity to be able to save this particular project the other one kind of already fell out based on what happened last time so that's why we propose both the 90-day if

you want to entertain that but most importantly the exemption of the provision that doesn't allow

anyone to just come in it allows a very narrow subset of activities that we've coordinated on

making sure protects the city so carl i can't in my good conscience play favoritism just because

someone's here but what I want to do and what I'd like to do is make a proposal where it helps people who want to do business in the community as well as making sure that it helps protect our city in growing vibrantly. Let me throw something at you and then you can tweak it in the legal sense. What I what I like to do is allow us to continue to process the paperwork in the project that's already been presented in January, continue to run parallel traps on that while putting the moratorium for 90 days. And then you can craft a development agreement with the puritan who is here to continue to structure that law so that they don't lose time and they don't get stuck. And then they can depend and determine based on their investment strategy, whether it's

a go or no go.

We're not going to stop that.

That is a personal business decision. what we can do is continue on and redevelopment this facility or this area while keeping in mind that we're going to support businesses who have started the process and then continue to have a group to review what's best for the city going forward, not in the next five years, 10 years, but in the next 50 years, that really benefits our community.

A quick question for the applicant.

I think you mentioned earlier your current deal deadline is the end of August.

So even at this timeline, you probably, I don't know, I assume you have had some initial talks with the property owner about potential short-term extensions for the deal.

Yes, and thank you, Mayor.

We've had those initial talks.

We're optimistic we can buy a couple more months.

if we know there's a pathway to approval, not processing.

That's helpful. That's the key.

Because we're not going to close on and buy that property unless we know we're approved

and without any appeal or anything else.

We appreciate that.

I'm amenable to a much shorter timeline for the moratorium. I I would like to see our work done on the spark on the timeline currently laid out and if feedback and a recommendation out of the spark Comes to the council for some sort of action I would love to see that happen expediently right before the end of the year if I don't know what that is right. I don't want to Get ahead of whatever conversations might happen at the spark and what feedback we might get from the community so in that sense I'm hesitant to commit to any sort of action to shortchange what process might come out of the spark but to

Pro Tem Go's point I don't see why we can't

continue this process in parallel I'm amenable to the proposed changes and Carl will make sure that the language doesn't commit us to a decision before the SPARC process has been completed. But I'm a meal that at least in parallel start negotiating a potential development agreement in terms on that. If the council after the SPARC process decides to move forward on this I don't want to lose time on getting to a point

where we can approve some sort of agreement expeditiously. And I'll look to

to suggest what that specific action should be.

So I think the only real question for the council is the time on the moratorium. Is it 60 days, 90 days, is it 120 days, is it 180 days? To Mr. Pugh's point, if you want to open negotiations with this applicant and give them an opportunity to tell the property owner that, yes, there's a path forward for the city council to consider a deal within the next two months, THEN ADD IN THE SECTION 4B THAT WAS PROPOSED IN MR. PUGH'S LETTER. I'VE ALREADY VETTED THAT LANGUAGE. IT'S ACCEPTABLE AS PRESENTED IN MR. PUGH'S LETTER THAT YOU RECEIVED. SO REALLY THOSE ARE THE TWO ISSUES. WHAT'S THE TIMING ON THE MORNING FOR?

I'M I'M AMMULA. IT SOUNDS LIKE WE'RE GOOD ON THE LANGUAGE. I'M AMMULA TO THAT.

I WOULD SUGGEST 90 DAYS.

I THINK THAT GIVES THE SPARK GREAT TIME AND THEN TIME FOR THE COUNCIL to take at least some initial action if necessitated out of the spark. And we can always extend that if we need with another public hearing. I'd also say to the applicant, I know we had this conversation earlier this week as well, but if there are opportunities to revisit the design for the site, well, one, as you're thinking through community benefits, I think we talked about some of those, right, potential public space and open space for the community, whether that's off-site or on-site. EV charging amenities for the community that we need desperately not just us but everyone a whole host of issues i'm sure we can start to identify as well in terms of other community benefits

and i think out of the spark process and i encouraged you in our meeting and encourage you

now to attend those to see what else the community might be interested in terms of amenities and potential benefits to think through those but also if there's an opportunity to revisit the site design to allow for physically other potential opportunities to potentially coexist or exist on the current site that would be I think appreciated and to enable and allow for flexibility of uses of that current site which is a very large site but I think there's potential opportunity there to have a win-win-win for the community, for everyone, and for the applicant as well, and the property owner, and everyone involved, if we're willing to do some work. With that said, I'm happy to make a motion, but if there's someone else that wants to make this move.

So let me ask you. So right now then, what I'm hearing is that, which I would support is that,

So we're amending Item 5B to, number one, specify that the moratorium will only be for 90 days

and that we are also going to adopt what has been recommended by Mr. Marshall's legal counsel,

what they call Section 4B as an exemption to allow them to proceed with a development agreement. Is that correct?

And, Mr. Mayor, members of the council, maybe I should just read into the record because I know it's part of the record, but we keep on talking about 4B.

Well, I was actually about to say, should I read it word for word? Yeah, well, you can read it if you want to. Oh, my gosh. I'm happy to. All right, sure. As you make the motion, feel free to do that.

So the motion is to amend the mortals between nine days

and to also add the following language, which we would dub 4B,

Exemptive Activities.

During the effectiveness.

Into the mic.

Oh, sorry. Exemptive Activities.

During the effectiveness, this ordinance or any extension, the city may issue any permit or land use entitlement to any person or entity for constructing, placing, or operating within the McCaslin Business Park, i.e. Saturn Park.

Only if the criteria in this section 4 are satisfied, the city manager or designee must review any application for a permit or land use entitlement to determine compliance with the provisions of this ordinance.

The employees, city boards, and commissioners, and the city council are permitted to accept, process, and approve certain applications for land use entitlements, including without limitation, use permits, variances, building permits, licenses, and certificates of occupancy necessary for constructing, placing, or operating within the Saturn Park area. only for development applications that one, were filled with the city before April 15, 2024.

Two, include or are amended to include a development agreement per chapter 21.44 of the Monterey Park Municipal Code.

And three, obtain city council approval of the development agreement before or concurrent with approval of the project entitlements proposed in the timely filled application. This exemption will remain effective for the term of this ordinance and any extensions.

I WOULD LIKE TO ALSO ASK CARL TO ADD ANY INPUT YOU NEED, GIVING YOU THE FLEXIBILITY TO ADD ANY ADDITIONAL COMMENT FROM A LEGAL STANDPOINT.

I WILL ADMIT THAT I HAVE ALREADY VETTED THE LANGUAGE AND REDLINED THE PORTIONS THAT I THOUGHT WERE IMPORTANT TO BE ADDED IN IF THIS WAS SOMETHING THAT THE COUNCIL WANTED TO DO. SO WHAT'S BEEN READ INTO THE RECORD HAS BEEN VETTED BY ME. I'LL PUT MY BLESSING.

We'll call for the vote.

Approved unanimously.

Thank you.

Look forward to seeing you at the SPARC meetings.

Thank you. Or a representative. I know you live in Texas.

Thank you.

Moving on to item 4C, public hearing and approval.

I don't know if I closed the public hearing, but I did that. 4C, public hearing and approval 2425 annual action plan as required by the CDBG and Home Investment Partnerships Program.

GO TO THE STAFF REPORT. THE STAFF REPORT WILL BE GIVEN BY MARTHA GARCIA, OUR FINANCE DIRECTOR.

GOOD EVENING, MAYOR, MAYOR PROTEMP, AND COUNCIL MEMBERS. MARTHA GARCIA, FINANCE DIRECTOR. THE CITY IS A FEDERAL ENTITLEMENT GRANT RECIPIENT OF CDBG AND HOME FUNDS FROM THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT, KNOWN AS HUD. In order to receive the fiscal year 2425 CDBG and home allocation, the city must comply with the following requirements. We must fulfill participation requirements by conducting a public hearing, which is today, publish a draft annual action plan for a 30-day comment period in order to receive citizen input regarding the final document,

and adopt the final annual action plan at today's meeting.

As a recipient of CDBG and home funds, the city is required to prepare and submit a five-year consolidated plan that serves as the federal planning document for receiving CDBG and home program funds.

The city completed its 2024 consolidated plan in 2020.

Every year the city is also required to prepare and submit an annual action plan to HUD, which serves to update and delineate efforts in the fiscal year ahead toward meeting the priority established by the city in its consolidated plan. The annual action plan operates on a single program year established by the city, which is going to be this fiscal year, 24-25, whereas the consolidated plan covers a five-year planning period,

which is July 1, 2020 to July, June 30, 2025.

The proposed fiscal year 24-25 one-year plan activities and funding for the CDBG funds are as follows. For administration, it's $106,000. For fair housing, it'll be $20,000. Business improvement project, $200,000. Street improvement projects, $250,000. For a total allocation of $576,000. The proposed 24-25 one-year plan for home funds, administration is $27,000. Home rental rehabilitation is $208,000. CHDO project is $41,000. And total allocation is $278,235. The public notice for this hearing was published on June 3, 2024, and the Monterey Park Progress newspaper documents associated with this hearing were available for public review from June 30, 2024, through July 2017 through today, 2024.

And at this time, at the time of preparing the staff report,

staff had not received any written comments concerning the annual action report. This concludes my presentation, and I also have Priscilla Davila, our CDBG Home Consultant, on Zoom if we have any questions.

Thank you. Council, if there are any questions, comments?

Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair. Martha, thank you for the presentation. I see on page 136 in terms of the proposed activities, 200,000 would be business improvement projects. Can you go into more detail what that means?

So that has been set aside for economic development to prepare a program that will support our local businesses that qualify for these funds. If we have Jessica, I'm not sure if the program has been identified specifically and outlined, but we do know that it's going to be for businesses.

I see. So like a thought improvement or?

That's definitely a possibility, yes.

I see. And again, I know it's from this part of the front, but have we ever done a survey of our local businesses, especially those in shopping centers that are rather a few decades old? What is the need? I mean, I imagine $200,000 will probably be spread out very quickly, very fast. I'm just curious, especially when we're talking about attracting businesses, have we ever done an assessment of how much we would really need to do if we were to provide an extensive, comprehensive program?

Mr. Mayor and members of the council, Council Member Loll, I'll try to answer this question. Definitely we understand that $200,000 set aside for, this would be a new program that would help businesses correct.

We have talked about, based on feedback from our council members to try to support our local business,

facade improvements has been one of the items because we definitely understand that some businesses might just need a simple paying job, might need updated signage. We understand that there could be businesses that need new furniture or something like that. So development of that program is still being considered. The other thing that I wanted to bring up is definitely we envision that this program would be developed along with our economic development strategic plan. That's currently the economic development team discussed that earlier today. So as part of that plan, additional program considerations can be discussed, but that is in general what is being planned for this fund.

Okay, I mean definitely I think if we can you know Provide a little larger you know pot of funding. I think that'd be great for businesses

Any other council comments questions Just

Dovetail off of what councilman low was saying I appreciate staff Listening to the council and and initiating this program I'd say it's a very good start and councilman below's point I probably the community and the businesses in the community probably need more assistance than that. But I think this is a great way to start to essentially pilot this project. And I appreciate the flexibility that's built into this annual report to enable us to be able to experiment, do some of this outreach to the businesses to see what might make sense. Knowing we can't do everything for businesses, and we can't do everything and fulfill all the needs that probably exist. but this is a great way to one, start to figure out how our team, our economic development team and our staff here can provide some direct assistance to businesses that need it. I can imagine also some equipment changes and other things that some small businesses and restaurants

and people that have limited resources or are available to borrow even

just need maybe a few thousand dollars to upgrade some equipment to bring in more business or a different type of business and really start to flourish. and I would love for us to be able to utilize this fund and leverage it for those kind of opportunities to help our businesses do better and that helps the city do better as well as they pay more taxes and all that stuff and bring more people to the city

to spend money in other places.

So I really can't emphasize how excited I am

for us to kick this off.

I look forward to the implementation details.

My question on this will be, do we have or have we thought through or how are we going to

manage and implement a program like this? Are we thinking about bringing a consultant? Is this something our economic team would manage directly?

Have we given any thought to that? Economic development and their

team will be managing it and they'll be getting assistance

from finance for the administration part of it. Great. And would love

to make sure, I know, I'm sure we're already planning this, but would love to to make sure that as this fund is spent

to support businesses, I think the rest of the council

will be very interested in how those funds are being doled out to businesses, which ones, and what's being done and what other assistance we can provide as well in terms of counseling,

checkable assistance, and we can connect them to

through LADC or other PACE and other CSC that all provide support for businesses in the community and how we can connect resources and appreciate that we're already building some of these tools and putting these resources together for businesses in our community. And to also harp on Council Member Lo's point,

if we can find additional, or after we leverage this initial kind of $200,000 fund

over this next fiscal year, if we can, as we're going along the way, evaluate what the needs are with the community and if there are opportunities or a need for looking for additional funding to supplement this, either this year or into next year or in future years. Let's make sure we're working that into future budgets as well. And if there are funds we can leverage

out of the state, federal government, county, anything else like that to do this,

and even I know county, the Department of Economic Opportunity, and others are doing similar programs to this, maybe not exactly the same, but have resources like this where we can help leverage our limited funds with potentially other resources for our businesses, let's definitely look out for those opportunities.

On the home funds for housing,

I know part of this budget goes to fund

the Housing Rights Center to do tenant and landlord workshops and outreach.

It says here that we contract with HRC

to do landlord-tenant disputes and handle complaints around housing situations.

Do we know how many complaints HRC handled

kind of on the landlord-tenant side over the last year

or just ballpark? I'm just curious.

That is my consultant that handled it.

Priscilla, do you have a count?

I don't have that number right in front of me, but I do know that we will be going to council in September with a caper,

and that'll detail exactly how many people they assisted this past program year.

Okay, cool. No, I appreciate that. Look forward to that report.

I'd also say, I mean, we're not paying, from what I can read, if I'm reading this right, we're not paying or we're not providing that much funding to the Housing Rights Center to do this kind of work, especially as statewide rent control exists and there are more and more new tenant protections that the state is passing that probably go unenforced, mostly because even landlords don't know, small landlords don't even know about some of these regulations. The more we can do, and if we need to start looking at how we do more here in terms of education for landlords and tenants around their rights and responsibilities for landlords, let's look at, I would encourage us to look at how we resource that more if we need to provide additional funding to the Housing Rights Center or other nonprofits that provide that kind of education and outreach to our landlord community and our tenants, let's give that a good hard look.

Also on the home fund front, I know we've set aside a portion of this funding to do house home retrofits to make sure that they're in livable conditions. I echo what I've said in the past when this report has come up and our spending for home and CDBG funding has come up. I would still think I think we get a lot more bang for the buck when we look at rental housing versus owner-occupied housing for where to direct these funds and particularly low-income, senior, both rental and senior-owned housing, to do even appliance replacements and retrofits. I know that there are still housing units in the city that don't have air conditioning, as we're experiencing heat waves and more and more extreme heat during the summer, but also throughout the year, and other impacts that we know through our sustainability plan, which we adopted a few months ago, that we will experience more and more climate impacts in our community like extreme heat. How do we, can we marry our plans for utilizing and leveraging home funds for home retrofits, housing retrofits, and housing upgrades to make sure that these units continue to be affordable but also livable, connect that and make sure it intersects with our goals in the same early plan to make sure we're doing what we can to resource the community and community members to adapt to climate conditions that we expect in the future. And so one of my ideas would be, like, how do we look at maybe a rebate or some sort of direct install or retrofit program for housing, existing affordable housing or low-income housing to replace in order to install efficient air conditioning systems or other more efficient, energy efficient, water efficient appliances in some of these homes. I think that can go a long way along with other kind of retrofits that we're looking at for homes. I think this is more directed at our consultant

who oversees this program.

I would love to expand this beyond, right, just I know trying to remember back to the last few reports,

I think we...