The council adopted a permanent memorial for the 2023 Monterey Park shooting and passed an ordinance establishing a moratorium on data‑center development in Saturn Park, while extensive public opposition to the data‑center proposal was recorded.
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Thank you. Yes.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Here we go. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay.
Okay. Good evening, everyone. good evening thank you all for being here sorry we know that there's a lot of interest in public
communications tonight my name is Inez Alvarez I'm the city manager just wanted to take a moment to clarify the order of the items so we understand that there's about 10 speakers who signed up for
regular public communications and so item 5a is going to be heard tonight before
public communications so if you'd like to adjust your speaker card we want to give you a few minutes to come on down and make that adjustment if you're okay leaving it under public communications you can do that but we just wanted to make that clarification so it's clear so item 5a will be heard tonight before public communications.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. There are a few people here. Thank you. All right. Good evening, everyone.
We're going to get this meeting started while the rest are finishing up the public comment cards.
So just some information.
¿ Staff is available at the back of the chambers if you guys have any questions or need assistance since we have a full room tonight. So we're going to start with our Land Acknowledgement Act as we always start our meetings. We would like to acknowledge that the land we inhabit today was once known as Tavangar, the home of the Gabriolino Tavan people. We show our respect to the Gabrielino-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 Gabrielino-Tongva people and invite you to acknowledge the history and join us in caring for this land. so we're going to have our flag salute now with the monterey park police explorers and we're also going to have first graders from rapetto elementary school phoebe tron and veronica de clerc do our pledge of allegiance so everyone please rise
Culler guard, left and left.
Culler guard, forward, forth.
Upward face. Preset colors.
Place your right hand over your heart. I pledge 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 colors. Upward face. Forward march. Both Opposed, colored.
Bow bow, fixed. Dismissed. Thank you so much to our Monarch Park Police Explorers and to our civic superstars.
We have certificates of recognition for Phoebe Tron and Veronica DeClerc.
Thank you. Daddy. Daddy. You want to give me one phone? I'll take one. I'll give you one phone and then you guys can share.
I got my baby. Okay. Everyone's looking right here. And three, one more, one more, three. It's on the picture. One, two. And the last one. One, two, and three. And take the recording. One, two, and three.
Awesome. Have a picture of people coming here. Thank you.
way back to their chairs. We know we have a full house tonight. If you have an open seat in the audience next to you, can you just raise your hand so that individuals that may be looking
for a seat? So there's some seats here where you see raised hands for open available seats.
So thank you, community members, for showing that there's some additional seats there. Also, we just wanted to ask you, please, if you can, try to keep the exit ways as clear as possible just so that there's direct paths in and out of the council chambers.
Thank you.
All right.
If anyone has children who want to be our future civic superstars, you guys can put in a request on our Monterey Park website
or contact Robert as well.
Any of your children can be superstars to do our Pledge of Allegiance.
All right.
Madam Clerk, may we get a roll call, please?
Councilmember Ngo Present Councilmember Wong Present
Councilmember Sanchez
Present
Mayor Pro Tem Lowe
Here Mayor Yang Present We have a quorum Thank you All right, so tonight, everyone, we have a special meeting agenda
running concurrently with our regular agenda. Both agendas are located at the back of the chamber, and there's also a QR code linked to the online agenda. If you scan it, you can go to the agenda on your phones. We are going to be hearing item 5A, the data center moratorium and environmental impact review requirement before public communications.
And item 5B will be added to the end of the consent agenda as item 10E.
Before we begin tonight's agenda, I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge that today marks the third anniversary of the tragic mass shooting in our community. It happened exactly today, January 21st of 2023. I would like to recommend that we move up item 9A first in the agenda to discuss our permanent memorial design after a moment of silence. Counselor, are you in agreement with this?
Yes.
All right, let's have a moment of silence, please.
Thank you, everyone.
This date remains deeply painful for our city, Monterey Park.
We remember the lives that were lost.
We honor the survivors and our first responders, and we hold close to families and loved ones who continue to carry this grief to this day. Monterey Park has shown remarkable strength, compassion, and resilience in the years since. While time has passed, remembrance remains important, not only to honor those we lost, but to reaffirm our commitment to healing, unity, and care for one another. At this time, I would like to invite everyone in the chamber and those watching from home to welcome two individuals who have played an important role in supporting healing and recovery in our community. I would like to invite Abner Ramos, pastor of River of Life, and Peter Ng, CEO of Chinatown Service Center, to offer a few words. Both have been deeply involved in helping our community navigate grief, healing, and support in the aftermath of this tragedy.
Pastor Abner Ramos and Peter Ng, please come to the podium.
Honorable Madam Mayor, Mayor Potem Henry Lo, Councilmember Jose Sanchez, and Councilmember Thomas Wong, and Councilmember Wingo. Today is the third anniversary that many of us remember, and I'm here to speak in favor of this monument to commemorate those who have gone before their time. From a city and community perspective, a memorial reflects who we are and who we choose to be. A memorial ensures that what happens is not forgotten, minimized, or erased in time. It becomes part of the city's collective memory and the visible expression of our core values. Respect for life, compassion for one another, and responsibility to the community. When a city builds a monument, it sends a clear message. it says that every life matters. It says that we are willing to pause, to reflect, and acknowledge the loss with honesty and dignity. And it says that leadership is not only about policy and progress, but about humanity and care. In a diversity like ours, especially within the Asian and Pacific Islander community, remembrance is an act of respect and collective responsibilities. A memorial creates a shared space when people of all backgrounds can come together to reflect, to learn, and to come into peace, safety, and connection. This is why the memorial is so important. they're not only about honoring the past. They shape how the future generations to understand our values and how we respond to it when it matters the most. A memorial stands as a promise that even in the face of tragedy, compassion would guide our path forward. Together, the memorial honors those we lost, support those who remained and reflect the value that define us as a city and as a community. Thank you. Applause Thank you guys for having me.
During our prayer vigil outside of City Hall a few years ago,
I talked about the biblical idea of peace, for those of you who are here, if you remember.
And the Hebrew word for peace is shalom. And shalom is not just the absence of war, the absence of violence. Shalom is flourishing at every level. peace, joy, and eternal love between us with the environment, with God, for those of us who believe in God. And if this were Sunday morning and you were at my church, I'd nerd out and preach, but I won't do that this evening because it looks like we're all going to be here pretty long tonight. I mentioned at our prayer vigil a few years ago that even if you're not a Christian and you don't believe what I do, that there are things that all of us hold dear to us that bring us together as human beings. All of us here believe in a safe place to live. If we have kids, all of us believe in a safe place to raise our kids. All of us believe in seeing this community experience joy. All of us here long and hope for everlasting peace in our lives. If I had more time, I'd have you close your eyes and have you think about your life five to ten years from now. And if I were to ask you to describe what your life would look like in five to ten years, you'd probably be
describing shalom,
flourishing at every level of your life. I'm a firm believer that most of us in this room,
regardless of our faith background, are seeking shalom.
We want to live in such a way
where we are flourishing
and our loved ones are flourishing also. And I also believe that the reason you all serve is because you want shalom in this place. ¿ I pray for shalom in all of our lives regardless of our faith tradition because I believe that that's what we all want. If you feel comfortable, I invite you to bow your heads with me in prayer. Lord, I pray for shalom for those of us and for those people in the city, our friends who have lost loved ones. Would you bring healing to their suffering?
Will you let them know that you are with them?
Lord, would you help them reflect this week on the things they loved about the family members and friends that they lost? Lord, I pray for shalom flourishing for our first responders, Lord, for the police officers, fire department, paramedics, doctors, and nurses, and all those who helped the families in the weeks following the tragedy. Lord, I pray for shalom for our city leaders, Lord, for Inez, for Elizabeth, Lord, for Henry, Thomas, for Vin, for Jose, Lord God. Would you give them wisdom, Lord, so that they could lead in shalom at this place, Lord. I pray for shalom for the families who live here, Lord, for our kids, for the schools, for the hospitals, for our educators. I pray for shalom for the people who are visiting us here tonight. And if you're here tonight for the first time, I just want you to know that Monterey Park is a beautiful place to be, a beautiful place to live. And we would like to invite you when there's nothing newsworthy happening, maybe at one of our events, because it's a cool place to be. I pray shalom over your life also. Lord, would you help us to remember the lives of those we lost during the tragic day three years ago? And again, bless our family and friends. Lastly, help us build a community that lives in peace with one another, a community that strives every day to make Monterey Park a city that is a safe place for future generations. I pray these things all in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
Thank you both, Pastor Ramos and Peter Ng, for your thoughtful words and for the continued work that you do for our community. This evening, we have an item on the agenda, 9A, to consider approval of a permanent memorial concept and to begin the design process. This item reflects a great deal of work by city staff, members of city council, and our community partners, and represents an important step in how we remember, honor, and continue healing as a community. Let's call item 9A. Presentation, please.
Good evening, Madam Mayor and Council. Diana Garcia, Assistant City Manager. As stated this evening, Council is asked to approve the initial concept and award the contract for design of the January 21st, 2023 Memorial. I have with me here this evening landscape architect Michael Madsen, who has been leading the team that has developed the memorial concept in conjunction with staff, the ad hoc council committee members, council members Wong and Lo, family and survivors, and members of the community. I also want to acknowledge the work of our partners at Chinatown Service Center and the MPK Hope Resiliency Center, in particular, Andrea Tseng, Nina Locke, CEO Peter Ng, and Daisy Ma. They've worked hand-in-hand with us during this process and have been indispensable in working together with family and survivors. This evening, I'm going to give a brief background on the process. A full overview can be found in the staff report, and then I'm going to hand it over to Michael to discuss the development of the memorial concept and a timeline for next steps. After that, we'll ask Andrea from Chinatown Service Center to come up and share a few words. Very briefly, the council's been working officially on this item since 2023. The initial staff report went to council in September of 2023. three, we gathered research about memorials and other communities, their budgets, their committees, their processes. In May of 2024, Council established the ad hoc subcommittee with our two council members, members Wong and Lo, to engage with others who've gone through a similar process and determine the best course of action for Monterey Park. On January 20, sorry, January 15th of 2025, we brought back a report on the work and research of that subcommittee and the results of an initial community survey that was done by Chinatown Service Center. In March of 2025, we brought an additional staff report, and Council agreed to dedicate city property to the memorial and directed staff to issue an RFP for designs. And finally, in May, Council approved issuance of an RFP, a community survey, and set the budget at $250,000. So per council's direction, city staff then initiated an additional survey to obtain information on community members' feedback, and staff conducted a request for proposals in June of 2025. The RFP stated that the memorial design must reflect the spirit of the community, embodying themes of hope, serenity, and a forward-looking vision for the future, and that it should be culturally sensitive and reflect the inclusivity of the community, avoiding an exclusive focus on any single group. It also included a summary of community input gathered from the survey and required that proposals would be required to thoroughly consider the provided input and articulate how it had been incorporated into the design. The RFP provided two potential locations in front of City Hall and at the demonstration garden on Orange and Metro. In the first request for proposals, we received one concept that was reviewed and evaluated by the ad hoc subcommittee. That concept was not selected to advance because its tone and approach did not reflect the community's guidance that was provided in the RFP. Staff then conducted a second request for proposals. Three concepts were received, reviewed, and evaluated. One firm withdrew from the process. One design was not moved forward as its tone, scale, and approach did not reflect the community's guidance. And so the top concept is being brought forward for consideration tonight. I'd like to introduce Michael Madsen Landscape architect with Kim Lee Horn and associates to present on his team's work on this concept Michael
Thank You Diana
And good evening council members Thank you to Peter and Pastor Ramos Really grateful to be here as Diana said. My name is Michael Madsen I've been with Kim Lee Horn associates working as a landscape architect for about 22 years now I'm profoundly honored to have the opportunity to speak to you tonight on this memorial. My team and I realize the deep responsibility that we have in creating a space for healing
and remembrance.
So quickly just wanted to share the names on this slide of the different members of the team. There are folks with various backgrounds on various scales and sizes of projects like
this.
Some of them have deep specialties in the technical side of construction. Others really are artists when it comes to storytelling and creating spaces for people. So a quick agenda for this presentation. Just quickly, you've heard a little bit about the project background from Diana. And a little bit about Kinley Horn's background is we have done various memorials across the country for various different events. things are veterans memorials, different scales, partially indoors, partially outdoors, large, small. So we've worked with various communities on different types of memorials. But I'll share an overview of the concept, and then I want to go back and share the process that we went through in the various conversations we've had with the community, the evolution of that concept, and then welcome your feedback. So as Diana shared, there are two sites that were presented in the RFP. There was the city hall site and the demonstration garden site. The demonstration garden is located at 720 Metro Drive for those that may not know where it's at. The team that I'm working with, we really felt that the demonstration garden was a great place for reflection, for kind of escaping everyday busy life, and for providing and meeting the needs and the desires of the RFP that were expressed to us. So we focused on creating a concept in the demonstration garden space. So just to help those that may not be familiar with the local demonstration garden, here's a vicinity map on the left, and then an aerial closer zoom-in view on the right-hand side. here are some photos of what it's like being in the space today so for those that haven't been there this is the current look and feel of the space so being a demonstration garden there are many different types of garden spaces to celebrate many different types of of gardens that that um you all may be able to replicate at your own home so lots of things that can be learned there and some great work that's already been done. So knowing that we have a great foundation to build upon in this garden space, here's the process that we embarked on. On October 8th, we submitted our proposal. On December 6th, we had an opportunity to speak with the victims and the survivors, the victims' families and the survivors. On the 11th, we had an opportunity to speak to the greater community and then here we are today on January 21st. So our initial concept, we, you know, in reading the RFP and reaching out and talking to folks that live here and experience this, we really focused on emotion, public and private spaces, cycles of life, and reflection and renewal. When I say emotion, it was specifically to think about a person that has been through something like this and to create a space that allows for reflection, hope, bringing people together in unity, and to provide some peace and healing opportunity. The public and private spaces to allow folks that want to have some private thoughts, but to also allow people to come together. And then the cycles of life, we believe there's some things that we can introduce that symbolize that in the design, as well as reflection and renewal. so here are some of the concept sketches that came out of the initial phases of the work the sketch to the left is a bubble diagram that kind of looks at the demonstration garden and shows how someone might pass through the space and experience the space knowing that they would also be repurposed at this time to include a memorial then we started to think about the victims and the survivors how could we symbolize some of the folks that lost their life on that day and we thought about a grove of trees about a grove of trees growing um growing older together uh going through the seasons together and so we started to experiment on where that grove of trees might go and how people might experience that grove of trees perhaps by introducing some benches some places to be amongst the trees perhaps those benches could be personalized and engraved to celebrate those individuals and then tried to think about how this memorial fits into the overall garden space so we wanted to create a gateway and we were really drawn to the moon gate the circular design of it really kind of represents that circular cyclical nature in life. And it also provides a very clear definition of you are in a sacred space. So just to give you all an idea of what some of these ideas that we sketched out could look like, here are some images that we felt were very much in line with what we were thinking. Keep in mind though, these are all still very much conceptual and we're working through them, but things, elements like that we might incorporate like seat walls, plant material,
plaques and signage, and night lighting. So then when we take those elements and we drop them down
on this demonstration garden, this is how it looks in the plan view. We really tried to capitalize, first looking at the corner space, knowing that there's a bus stop there and that that's often a place where folks enter the garden. We wanted to set that up on that corner and serve as a greater gateway to the overall garden. Here's a look at how folks might experience that space with that moon gate beyond in the background and the trees and the benches that you can see in the background. So we had the opportunity, as I mentioned earlier, to speak with the victims, families, and survivors, and then the community, and we got some terrific feedback. The overwhelming message that I took away from it was the ask from the community to be sure that we create a space that is joyous and a space that can be uplifting to celebrate those lives that were lost and for people to come together. So some of the things were preference for use of the of an interior garden space so that the memorial wasn't so exposed to the public perhaps looking back in the demonstration garden for a better home for this. Creating opportunities for dance as after all that's what these folks were doing when this tragedy occurred. Encouraging social... Boston
existing views for that quiet reflection. The city also brought in many different guests to
the conversation, and one of them was Ann Seymour from the National Mass Violence Center, and she encouraged us to develop a driving statement to really focus, bring focus for the memorial, and I really love that, and my team, we sat around thinking about this, and the statement that I want to put forward that we came up with was creating a dynamic space that honors those that have passed by inviting movement, reflection, and remembrance through dance. So the updated concept that we'll share on the next slide reflects that movement and having some designated space for dancing, an outdoor dance floor, if you will. And then the remembrance, because this space is further back in the site, there's almost a procession that the walkways create to take you there. And the trees are no longer grouped together, but almost hug this walkway. So there's a procession where you can really remember those that lost their lives and experience that symbol before you get into the space. And then there's some renewal that hopefully folks experience as they pass through the moon gate and enjoy the new plant material. And then protection is really how we wanted folks to feel as they come together, kind of having an engraved or a seat wall, circular space, and some engravings perhaps to celebrate those folks. So here's the updated concept. As I mentioned, you can see those 11 trees along that existing walkway. you can see that you may not be able to see at this scale but the moon gate is incorporated with those seat walls are back there we have a space for signage we have some solar lighting that we are we're proposing along there for the along the walk for nighttime use as there's not electricity at the site today and then of course celebrating the existing landscape to remain and enhancing some new landscape space.
So, of course, this all sounds great, but what could a schedule look like? So our team took a look, and we believe if we are to get going on short notice, then probably mid-March we would be working on the 90% level plans. Middle of April, or the beginning of April, we would have probably 100% plans ready. And we would wrap things up probably in the beginning of May.
So on this last slide, I just want to point out, you all may know, but for those that are here, there's a website at the bottom of this page, and that's a place where the community can reach out with additional questions and catch up on any additional information that the city would like to share out. So I'd be happy to answer any questions or hear your feedback.
Thank you.
Thank you for that presentation.
Madam Mayor, I just want to note,
Andrea Tseng from Chinatown Service Center is going to share a few words.
Thank you.
Hello, Mayor, Mayor Patan, and Council Member, and everyone.
Thank you for allowing me to have this special opportunity to share the reflection from the perspective of service and community care. And I know a lot of people here are for different reasons, but we've been advocating to have a community involved in the past three years. So in many ways, I'm so grateful you're here to give me an opportunity to share what we've been doing to help the family and the survivors.
Thank you.
So I'm Andrea Zen, the director of NPK Hope Resiliency Center. And our center was created in supporting the family of the victims, the survivors, and the community. and in the past year we've been focused with you know case manager counseling support group and there is a community workshop to you know support with the community healing and I'm here to support you know want to share my perspective how memorial is helpful to the family and the survivor for the families you know who lost their loved one a memorial is a deep is deeply personal. It is a public acknowledgement that their family member is remembered. They are not just an incident or a statistic, not just a man on the news. They are a human being whose life matters. It tells family that their grief is seen, respected, and carried by the city and the community. Grief does not follow a timeline. A memorial offers family a place to return to for anniversary, for the birthday, or on quiet days when words are not enough. It allows them to remember with dignity, without the pressure to move on, and with the assurance that their loved ones will not be forgotten. For survivors, a lot of people don't know the difference between the family and the survivors. So for survivors, the meaning of a memorial is very different. Survivors, they will carry the memory that lives on long after the event itself. For them, a memorial is not only about the loss, but also about recognition. It's a recognition for what they have endured, and also for the strength and the resilience it took to continue forward. A soulful design memorial should offer a space of safety, reflection, and choice, supporting healing in their own time and in their own way. And for the community service provider like us, a memorial becomes part of the healing ecosystem. It complement mental health service, community program, and collective care by providing a permanent space of compassion, connection, and remembrance. And I remember Councilmember Jose mentioned about the education component before. You know, a memorial will be a very good example for the younger generation to get involved and then so we can toward the public awareness for anti-violence and community resilience.
Thank you.
Thank you for those comments. We also have one public speaker request card from Pastor Eric Chen.
Before I speak, Francois, did you want to speak or didn't want to? Okay, all right. I just want to make sure because one of the survivors' spouses here. So, good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Temp, City Council Member, City Attorney, City Clerk, City Manager, and the Monterey Park community. I'm glad that we are all still here. And indeed, today marks the third anniversary of the Monterey Park mass shooting. And three years ago, my family almost went to the ballroom. Our original plan that night was to go to the Lunar New Year Carnival every year that the city holds, and then afterwards to go to Star Ballroom for the second Lunar New Year festivity. Luckily, we went to a hot pot in San Gabriel, so we literally dodged a bullet, or multiple bullets. but my family could have been one of the victims and it's very possible that if we had gone to Monterey Park that I would not even be here today so I want to thank you guys and I saw the presentation I thought it was very well done and I talked to many of the survivors and their families they also liked the concept But I want to share with you a letter that I received from President Biden about our relief efforts. So I'm going to read it to us. Dear Reverend Chen, I was honored to meet you during my visit to Monterey Park. The healing process can take a long time after such a profound tragedy. But your guidance and direction to the families and survivors are helping them beyond right now. Scripture tells us that the Lord is near to the brokenhearted, and through your words and action, you are making them feel whole again. Thank you for all you're doing in the community, and Jill and I are keeping you in our prayers. Keep the faith, President Biden. When President Biden came to our community to comfort everybody, I was on the phone with the White House staff as a de facto liaison, calling each family member, each survivor, to invite them to meet President Biden. Now, I know that many of us here, that we all want healing and recovery for all the victims, the families, the survivors. I think many of us, the heart is in the right place. Now, in this specific agenda, this item, Unfortunately, no survivor or family can make it tonight because the support group was scheduled at the exact same time as this meeting. So right before this meeting began, I went over there. I asked them, I know you guys have a meeting. I don't want to disrupt. So what do you want me to say? And I also talked to Francois over here right before. So I think he knows I'm going to speak on everybody's behalf. because when a fact check me afterwards, he's right there. And so, like I said, they really like the concept and the design. It's very touching, but the issue is the location. Now, Kristen Reddy, her father passed away. Valentino passed away. She, during the feedback comments, she said that What is currently designated now is where her and her father would walk every day. So it would be very triggering for her. But of course, she understands if there are budgetary restraints, there's a $250,000 budget. So, you know, she understands. If that's where it needs to be, then, well, I mean, what are you going to do, right? and other people like Francois and Lloyd and many other survivors, they would like it to be at Barnes Park right over here at the corner. And because, you know, because that's number one, that's so far away, the other place. Number two, it's triggering for, and I know Mr. Ma, he also lived over there. So for Maria, that's also triggering, the owner. So they would prefer it to be right over here. Now, I understand there's a budgetary constraint, $250,000, but I really suggest that we listen to the families and the survivors and the victims and what they want. And I think that we should hold off on voting on this. We should do a cost assessment of what, in light of what the families, what they want to see it over here. How much would that cost? And, well, if it's $10 million, I don't think everybody would understand. But let's do an assessment first. And if we need to raise money, I know that after the shooting, San Manuel donated $400,000 to this cause. So I believe that there's more that can be done. And I ask that we do not decide, especially it was scheduled at the exact same time when the survivors are meeting over there at the Resiliency Center. So they don't even have a voice. They cannot even come here to talk about how they feel. only Francois because he's the husband. So I ask that we do not vote on this today. I know that many of the families that are in China, they don't know about what's happening. So I think that's, I'm speaking on Francois' behalf and the survivors and the family, the deceased, the injured, to pause and to give it more time. So I thank you for your time, and God bless everybody. Thank you. All right. Thank you, Pastor Eric. Any comments? Yeah. Yes.
Michael and Diana, thanks for leading this cause. I know this is a long time in the making in terms of giving a presentation. I have been involved in a number of community discussions where we have community input, not only from the families, but members of the family, but also from the community. And I also want to thank CSC as well as Pastor Abner for contributing tonight because I know this is something that has been in the works for a long time. Just honoring and memorializing once a year is not enough. So what we're doing is we're moving forward with the healing. ¿
Family as well as people who were actually there that night they came and they participated and they conceptually Were supportive of what is presented in the location?
Yeah, thank you for that question councilmember go You're right. We've held several community meetings and we have worked in close coordination with chinatown service Center and the mpk hope resiliency center as andrea they mentioned they work with the family members and the survivors They have regular meetings and support for them. So when we received this concept, CSC helped us reach out to the family members and the survivors to inform them. We sent out the initial concept to them so that they were able to review it in advance of the meeting. That was the meeting that was mentioned earlier in the presentation, I believe on December 6th. On a Saturday, we went over to the Resiliency Center. We had about 25 people in attendance, both survivors and victims' family members. We've also been in communication since the shooting with several, Francois being one of them and Kristen being another, because we've invited them to the vigils, to the resiliency day that we just held on Saturday. So as Michael mentioned, at the December 6th meeting, we did receive a lot of really good feedback from the community members. They talked about having a dance floor. They talked about a need for lighting and safety. They talked about wanting to come together in a joyous environment. And the majority of the input they received on the location was overwhelmingly positive. I know that we did have one member that was in preference of having it here at Barnes Park, specifically behind the amphitheater. That is probably, because that's on a hill, we would have to get a geotechnical engineer and build a retaining wall in order to have a memorial there. So that would be something that would be quite cost prohibitive and extensive.
But you're right.
After the meeting with the family members, we also had a meeting for the greater community over at Langley Center, where we presented the same presentation that we'd done for the family members and survivors and received feedback there. And I believe council was in attendance at that meeting as well.
Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. I just want to thank the staff
Particularly for the years long effort that this has been already in terms of helping to guide All of us to this point now for the basic concept and I support moving forward on the design So I make sure to the council members point and other comments that were made There is an opportunity I think and if not Can we make sure we do have an opportunity at the 9% design level? to maybe have another consultation with the victims, families, and the survivors, and potentially even the community as well, just before we finalize the design.
I think that would be appropriate.
But I just want to make these additional comments. We'll thank the victims, their families, the survivors, and everyone else who has been part of this year's long process to even getting here. We know that for some this can be part of the healing journey, but we also know that the healing journey for some will take a lifetime. So just this small step I think will help and has helped some folks along the way. So really appreciate that we continue driving this from the city side and the staff side. Appreciate all the effort that went into this. And it's really hard to believe it's been three years now exactly since the shooting. We're at time of celebration, especially as we in the next few weeks and a week or so are going to celebrate Lunar New Year here in the city with our festival on January 30th. That we're coming up on this time again, right? It should be families coming together, celebration, and said three years ago, it turned into this time of extraordinary and deep grief and sadness. But just really grateful that so many have come together in the community and from outside the community to make sure that it wasn't this incident and this tragedy that's defining us. It's really a story, I think, and I'm heartened by the sight of resilience that we're seeing through this process and through so many other community engagements that we've had, and the staff have helped to lead, the Chinatown Service Center and all the Resiliency Center partners that have been helping to pour in resources and love into the community that is looking for opportunities to heal. We really appreciate so many here in the community and outside that have helped in our healing journey as a community. I know this is one small part of that as well so really appreciate us getting to this point look forward to the next few months in terms of finalizing the design I think it would be appropriate to to I know the initial right the staff report indicates and there's an initial kind of estimate for the build out here to be around $250,000 I think that depends on the actual final design I'm curious if we can once we have the final design what will have a better idea of what the actual cost will be but is there any idea of what the timeline is if we're we've got the general concept we're waiting for the actual plans but
construction timeline potentially after we approve a full design what that might
look like I can speak to that so thank you for the feedback we definitely intend to come back to the ad hoc Memorial Committee and to family members once we closer to the final design. After that's complete, that will be put out to RFP for construction. That will probably be open for a few weeks to a month in order for us to get competitive bids. We will come back to City Council at that point with a contract for award for construction. And at that point, we'll have a better idea of how long it will take to build this. initial sort of estimates are probably in the order of a few months so but we will keep council appraised of that and we will be planning a ribbon-cutting ceremony as well when the memorial probably a groundbreaking and a ribbon
cutting when the memorial is done yeah great on a not not requiring but if by
the fourth anniversary of the shooting to have this space ready would be I think
not a too ambitious target.
I think we can definitely do that.
And then just, I don't know when we're ready,
when we might be ready,
but if we might be ready at this point to potentially reach out to state, county, federal government for potential funding as well on this to see if we can make sure that we are fully funded
for this project once it's ready to go to construction. Yes, that's our intention.
If council approves this, I think it's noted in the staff report we'll reach out to some of our local elected officials and see if there is any funds that they're willing to donate. Of course, we would accept any donations from the community as well.
And if there's a way to highlight that we are open to, or there's some sort of a counterweighted for people to donate if they're interested, I don't know if that's through CSC or if we're thinking, if you have some initial thinking on that, I just want to make sure we promote that when ready and obviously let us know, let the council, keep the council apprised on those plans. and I just want to confirm
this land at the
current site that is being proposed that's not land that's actually owned by the city, owned by the Metropolitan Water District we have already confirmed that there will be no issues with utilizing the land for that
yes that is correct great thanks I also wanted to thank
the city staff for all the work that was put into this permanent
memorial. I know it's not an easy task to do a memorial for any city that's gone through this.
And I know that's one of the things that we studied and we looked at. We did, I remember, ask other cities for input in terms of who had been impacted by mass shootings in terms of how they went about creating a permanent memorial. And in every city, it looks very different. So I appreciate all of the feedback and all of the work and effort that was put in by city staff and our consultant as well in terms of reaching out to the survivors, their families, and the community. I know many of us were there when we had a lot of these community meetings and gathered a lot of the input. And so I'm really happy and excited to see that we have a conceptual plan ready to go to memorialize the victims, and their names are up here on the dais, who died and perished that day. And I know this is very personal for a lot of us here, both in the audience, but also for us up here. I know that Henry, my colleague, and I shared the mayorship during that time period when this happened, this tragic event. And it really captured our city in terms of what we were doing. So I really appreciate all of the work and effort that went into this. I also want to thank Peter for being here today. as you came up here I was thinking I couldn't imagine being in the position that we were three years ago without the partnership of the Chinatown Service Center so I really want to thank you for your continued partnership and friendship here through the Chinatown Service Center because that made all the difference for us as a city in terms of being able to go through this process of resiliency and through recovery so I really appreciate all of the work that you've done and all the work that you continue to do through the Chitinthown Service Center, as well as the MPK Hope Resiliency Center. I also wanted to thank Pastor Abner Ramos for being here tonight. I think I met him for the first time just a day or two after the shooting outside of City Hall, and he approached many of us, but he approached me, and we prayed together. And I think one of the things that has captured me about his faith and his church here in Monterey Park has been just how committed he has been to our city, but also to the process of resiliency within our city, but also recovery. And I appreciate that. And I think one of the most powerful things that I saw that I've seen personally and experienced personally was when, along with the many other churches and pastors within the city, you guys did a prayer walk through the city and pray for the city and the victims and just for everyone. And that was a very powerful moment, I think, within our city. And I thank you for leading and heading that and for doing that and for continuing to do that every year. I know I went and joined you guys this year as well. So I appreciate your continued commitment to our city and for being here today.
I really appreciate it. I appreciate the words that you shared with all of us here today.
So shalom, my brother. And then I'm also in support of this project, and I'd love to see move forward. I just had one recommendation as we continue to
move forward with this project
if we could continuously share with the city and the community, especially through
social media if we haven't done so already, where we're at.
So they're also apprising where we're at with the memorial. But I'm very excited that we are
in this process. Thank you. Madam Mayor, thank you. I must say that
It is hard to believe that it has been three years.
As my colleague mentioned, we both shared the transition of the mayorship on that dark moment.
And I know for me it's still very real and very triggering at times, especially when I get a text around 1030 at night, because it was around that time that my phone started alerting me about what had happened. And it was a dark moment for us all, but I think it was a moment in which we also saw the streets of our community by coming together.
And what I will say is that, you know, we showed the world that we wouldn't let this tragedy overwhelm us.
And certainly the path to healing still continues. And I think that this monument is an important path forward.
I have a follow-up question. Again, we didn't reach out to us in cooperation with CSC.
We did reach out to the victims, survivors, right, regarding this effort?
Yes, that's correct. Okay.
I mean, the only thing I would say is that, you know, and again, I realize, you know,
the creation of a monument always has some degree of controversy, which is why in some cases
it takes some communities over 10 years.
Suddenly, I don't think we want to wait
10 years, especially given
that when this shooting
occurred in Monarch Park, we were considered the worst mass shooting incident in an urban area, and since
there's been more, which speaks to the prevalence of gun violence
and why we need to address it, you know, such as, you know, banning assault weapons, my personal opinion. But I want to make sure that, you know, again, we're proving the concept, but as we move forward that we continue to engage even those who never responded for whatever reason, because I just want to make sure that we give them respect. Because, again, you know, when this monument is established, I mean, it's not just a reflection of the community, but also those who are most touched personally. And I want to make sure that we continue to engage with them,
make sure that they are involved in this process in terms of its planning,
its creation, its construction, and also just making sure that, you know,
if there are ways to adjust it, that we do it.
Because, again, we want to make sure that this is reflecting on everyone's experiences.
and also it needs to stand the test of time that when one comes to the monument
that they remember what it stands for
and they come away with something they've learned and hopefully
something that they can take with them.
I wanted to also
thank staff for putting together
this presentation.
¿
staff has taken into consideration the survivors and the family members and kept them in the loop along the way while coming up with this design. And I'd like to continue keeping them in the loop, too, because, you know, this is a permanent memorial to memorialize their families. So with all that's been said by my colleagues, does anyone want to make a motion?
I'll make the motion to approve staff recommendation. All right. Any second? I second. All right. Let's go ahead and place a vote.
Approved unanimously.
All right. Thank you so much. All right.
So that concludes item 9A. So now we move forward to item 5B, which we're putting before public communications. Item 5B is the data center moratorium and environmental impact review requirement. and we have many speakers, most of you guys who are joining us tonight. Some of you guys are joining us for the first time. And right now I believe we have 95 public communications.
That's a lot.
So if everyone speaks for five minutes, if you guys do the math, That's going to be eight hours of speaking.
If you guys... Yeah.
Yeah, so the sooner you guys want us to vote, the quicker you guys have to speak. Because we cannot vote until everyone... Yeah, so you guys know how we're... So, if everyone speaks for three minutes each, that's going to be, let me speak please.
I don't want to have to use the gavel.
So, if everyone speaks for three minutes, that's going to be over four hours, five hours
past midnight.
Even if everyone speaks for one minute, that's going to be over an hour and a half. And this is just the initial cards. A lot of people sometimes straggle in. So, sometimes we get more cards as the night goes on. So everyone who wants to speak can speak tonight, but the longer you guys speak, the later it will be for us to vote. So I'm not putting any time restrictions on anybody. I'll let you guys manage your time and take into consideration your community members so that everyone who wants to speak gets a chance to speak. And if you're just repeating a written communication we already received and we have all read your written communications and we have all been following the social media too. So all that's been seen. So if someone wants to say something significant, important, please do speak. We want to hear all your voices. But looking at the math, looking at the time, just even one minute each is going to be pretty late. And we don't mind staying here late. We've had many late meetings. but I know many of you might want to hear a vote sooner than later.
All right.
So I'm going to be calling speakers five at a time to make the process smoother. So when you hear a name, just come up and line up. And that way, whenever the person in front of you finishes speaking, they can go right after.
All right. So that will smooth the process. Madam Mayor, if I could, before we start, if I can make a statement, and then I also have a question for our city attorney, if that's okay. Yeah. Thank you. and I appreciate everyone being here tonight.
I just want to clarify something. There continues to be a lot of confusion about my role in the proposal to build a data center at 1977 Saturn Avenue. While that project is not on tonight's agenda and there is no information regarding when or if it might be in front of the city council for a decision, I want to make this very clear. I am not involved in that project and I am not helping make any decisions about it because my employer could receive meaningful revenue from the electricity the project would use. The rules for public officials state that if there might be a conflict of interest, or even if it might look like there is one, we must step aside and not take part. That is why I have stayed out of that project, this project, the data center project, from the start and will keep staying out of it. I've been clear and consistent about my continued recusal on this project going back to November when it was first on the agenda. and you can look at special agenda item 5b on tonight's meeting the special meeting agenda for additional context if you're interested in information i want to clarify my past work on the saturn park advisory review committee the spark committee and the rezoning of the saturn park area in 2024 and 2025 was not connected to any specific data center projects including the one at 1977 saturn avenue the rezoning actually added more possible uses for the area including mixed-use buildings and housing, which were not allowed in Saturn Park before voters approved Measure J.J. in 2020. It did not remove other possible uses and did not approve or push forward any data center project. Any claim that this was done to help a particular data center is wrong. Some people are saying that I have been a key decision maker for the 1977 Saturn Avenue data center project. That is not true. I have not, I have said many times in the public, and you go back
to the meeting videos, back to November, and you can
go back to the meeting videos and the minutes. I've said many times in public that I am not taking part, that I'm not taking part in decisions about this project, and I've kept myself out of all talks about it, and will continue to do so. I also want to take a moment,
I also want to take a moment to call this out as well.
Call for some civility, continued civility in our public engagement. I believe in democracy, and I'm really honestly heartened to see so many people here tonight engaging on an issue that you're passionate about and that you care deeply about.
Truly am.
I know the vast majority of folks engaging on this issue are well-meaning. I appreciate your messages, emails, and outreach. And I know the others do as well. But there are a few, and I emphasize very, very few, that have frankly made comments that go well beyond what I think and I think most of us would find acceptable behavior, including calls for veiled and not-so-veiled threats of violence against me specifically. I just want to urge everyone to continue to engage, whatever your position is on the data center issue and any other issues you care about but please please urge us all to be civil and respectful with our engagement with that I just want to ask our city attorney to opine on whether I can engage on this item and the two items that are added tonight
thank you madam mayor members of the council I just reemphasize this is not a project specific item this has to do with all data centers or pending applications future applications for Saturn Park this is a general discussion with regard to what kinds of zoning what kinds of next actions should occur and so there's no project on the agenda I presume to your observations and statements this participation is allowed because there is no specific project that is on the agenda I understand that lots of folks here are expecting a some sort of vote that will affect a specific project it will not if the council eventually decides to vote and adopt a moratorium that moratorium will be in place for 45 days which will allow the city manager myself to provide draft regulations to the city council at a future agenda and the city council will then consider the matter at a public hearing again though those are general zoning regulations and land use decisions has nothing to do with a specific project happy to answer any additional questions so just to be clear
Carl I can engage on this item 5a right you may and I should point out that it's
as mentioned in the staff report that's on a consent calendar now we did ask the FBPC with regard to the individual project that is still pending with regard to 1977 Saturn whether or not you specifically have a conflict with that I will say the same thing that I've said in public before with regard to that project that my assessment is that there is a conflict with regard to 1977 Saturn however again you're allowed to participate in broad decision making with regard to land uses anywhere within
the city and that includes Saturn Park. Community members I definitely want to just make one quick
announcement. We understand you're passionate about the item in front of you tonight. We are using a platform called Wordly. It's live translation services. So the microphones in the council chambers is what Wordly uses to pick up the speaking and it's translating in real time. So we do ask that please, I understand you're passionate. The microphones, that microphone in the middle there is on all the time so when we get speakers speaking over other speakers it's going to be difficult for our translation services to be used at that same time so we can just please be mindful about that we also have line translation happening over here to my right as well so thank you for that and we can get
going with item 5a all right thank you so much and just to reiterate because
tonight's item 5a is for data centers in general not for 1977 Saturn specifically councilmember Wong may be with us tonight all right so I'm gonna start calling these names and again please be considerate of the fellow community members and their times when deciding how much time to take for yourself all right so the first five names are Liziza Lambert and Helica Salazar, Anna Ye, Oscar Uribe, and Luca Uribe. So the five please come up and then take turns speaking.
Hi thank you so much for having me here. My name is Lizisa Lambert and I know I'm
I'm not going to be everyone's favorite person right now, but I am the community engagement person for the developer for 1977 Park Data Center.
I thank you all for taking the time to be here tonight. I know it's not easy.
You all have lives, and I know this is really important to you, as it should be.
I will not take up much time.
I just wanted to introduce myself and say that we're really committed to making sure that this data center is designed with all of your priorities in mind.
We want to bring value. Call to order.
Whoever is speaking at the podium, everyone, please be quiet.
We want to respect everyone who is up here. When you're up here, we won't be interrupting you as well.
we are developing a website that will be answering a lot of your questions there is a flyer in the back that everyone can grab it has an email
it's in the back we just put it on the
it has an email that everyone can reach out to while we develop the website that should be up this week or next week we really really want to have an open dialogue with everyone
answer all your questions and we will also be hosting community meetings in the near future and again we just really want to be good long-term partners to the community and help
open and honest conversations thank you thank you all right who's the next one please line up in Front. Order. Order. All right. Angelica. Good evening, council. My name is Angelica Salazar. I'm here with my son, Nation, my wife, Saira, my daughter, Journey, with the contingent that says no to the data center and yes to the moratorium. We actually live in unincorporated East LA. We shop in Monterey We come to a lot of parks, including the one we recently discovered, which is La Loma Park. Our home is three miles from the site. This is a major environmental issue. There is wildlife there. We live in a part of the world that has persistent drought. It doesn't make sense for us, for our homes. It's a public health issue. It's going to impact our livelihood, our quality of life, our property values. It's also an ethical issue when you think about what the data center represents and the outcomes for learning and education and the economy. It's not a good investment for our community. So I'm here to say, you know, please protect the community, protect our families, protect our health, and no to the data center. Thank you.
Keep going, Anna. Yeah. Anna, is Anna here? Yeah, please come up.
You guys can stand next to the podium, so you guys can go immediately after. It's Anna, Oscar, and Luca.
Good evening.
My name is Anna, and I'm a resident of Monterey Park since I was five. I'm here tonight to express my strong position to the proposed data center in Monterey Park. I don't think that the city has done enough to outreach to inform residents about this development that could significantly impact our community. Many people were unaware of this proposal, which raises serious concerns about transparency and public involvement in the process. And I'm deeply concerned about the large foreign-backed and corporate developers coming to our city to build these... to see these massive data centers. While we rely on the MND to review. And these data centers to know low impact projects. And they consume enormous amounts of energy and water to generate constant noise to infrastructure to impact people's health. And then there's communities across the country to experience these negative impacts firsthand. So we have very, have very right to be concerned about the data center. And I, um, express my
to the science center. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you. In the month since the original meeting, the amount of people calling against the construction of a data center in this city have skyrocketed. Dozens upon dozens, possibly hundreds of people showed up to oppose the project, demanding a full EIR. We're also aware that an IER doesn't guarantee that the project won't be approved, so we're also demanding a structural ban on data centers. While a moratorium does halt the process, you don't put a pause on a tapeworm stealing your nutrients. You kill it.
We'll come back and stand here as many times as we have to until this project is dead. We have evolved to protect our tribes over the course of millions of years, So how dare anyone think we'll subside so quickly? Me, as well as the over 60,000 people living in the city, want to live free of parasites. A data center won't just affect us, but it will also affect the neighboring cities. We don't want our electricity bills to triple. We don't want our air to be filled with more carbon emissions. We don't want our water to be stolen, and we don't want to leave our homes. There are no benefits to this other than stuffing the pockets of corporations and rich men and paraphrasing... And paraphrasing from the original Jurassic Park novel, what you call innovation is actually a rape of the natural world. Thank you. Hello. I don't want to repeat too much about what everyone else is saying, but I do want to bring up about why the data center is being built here instead of a more predominantly white area or rich area. This data center being built here is part of systematic racism. We all know it.
A lot of people don't know that data centers can also cause infertility, and people that live here are mostly Asian and Latina women, So that means that it seems like a small part of trying to move people out of this neighborhood, trying to stop white people, trying to stop people of color from even reproducing. And you guys say you honor Native Americans and that you want to honor the land. But this data center is a huge middle finger to all Native Americans, including myself. This is going to be ruining the land and an insult to Mother Nature. If you love Native Americans, then you would stop this data center from being built. Thank you.
Thank you, Luca. The next five are Cindy Alvarado, Carl Cena Cisneros, Randy and Jelena, Jen and Ronan Rock. Cindy Alvarado.
Yeah, let me repeat it again. Cindy Alvarado, Carl Cina Cisneros, Randy Angelina, Jen, and Roden Rock.
Cindy, is Cindy here?
Okay.
Hello, good evening.
I live in District 2 and I want to ban on data centers in Monterey Park or anywhere near residential communities. I also don't want Monterey Park to change zoning of areas for the prioritized benefits of ultra rich businesses over community members overall well being. If MPK residents want a data center, I want the majority, at least 51% of all MPK residents, to have to come in person and submit a paper ballot to City Hall. just like we were asked to do in order to prevent price hikes on our trash bills. I am upset that Monterey Park, I'm upset that Monterey Park has a system in place to keep residents informed about news events and get us out to participate, monthly city parties, movie nights, Santa's mailbox. But we were kept in the dark about a data center coming to town and and had to find out through word of mouth from concerned neighbors instead of you guys. There should be a full investigation on why a data center was even interested in Monterey Park, who welcomed this against community sentiment and consideration. Something that's just not right with all of this. I live about one and a half miles away from the selected location for the data center. I have a toddler who loves to go with me hiking. She practices in Edison Trails. And at the end of our hikes, we enjoy the playgrounds, which we kept asking for. Thank you guys for having those.
We love those.
I told her I love the sound of my hiking boots hitting the gravel, and she told me she loves the sound of the birds.
I also love the sound of the birds. People will be negatively affected by this, and so will the flora and fauna we live around. Our ancestors will not forgive this.
protect our city, say no to data centers.
Think about the elders in our community who get out to stay healthy, not to breathe pollution,
or those whose lives are put in danger every time there's a blackout, which some of us know, we have a lot of those, as is. And you guys send us reminders to save life,
to save electricity, all that. Like, come on, man. Like, the children,
the children who have almost perfect hearing,
they hear better than we do.
And, you know, and when would be, they get easily irritated by the continuous noise.
That's why we don't bring them here, right? Because they get loud. They get irritated.
Imagine we were cooped up during COVID and then during wildfires. And now you want them back inside because of additional noise pollution.
There's just so many issues with all of this.
We already have sucking water pressure. Now you're trying to steal more water, right?
Busing city lights.
And now you want another, you know, somebody taking that too. sewers and blackouts, we cannot afford to let a data center and all the issues they bring to their neighbors come to our city. Let's fix our current problems instead. All city council representatives, you guys are not going to be here forever, but some of us residents have been here for a long time. I have neighbors who have been here for 30...
And I know there's so many incentives monetarily that these billionaires could help, could provide you guys, and maybe the city cannot pay you as much. We
completely understand that, but think about all the people that are going to stay here and live. I have neighbors right now that cannot be here because they're at home, because they're elders, because they retire, because they have health issues. How come they weren't informed? Some of
them found out today. Like, please, guys, no data centers. Please listen to your community.
listen to us, you know, because this will stay not just in your conscience, but in your reputation.
That's all I... Hello, council. I'm going to try to keep this as fast as possible. It is honestly quite disheartening and frustrating that we have to continue the discussion regarding any data center. I don't know what will make it apparent to the council that the city and its people do not want the data center. I don't understand the constant protection and prioritization of the applicant rather than your own citizens and the blatant ignorance to how this may affect your residents. I come to this council representing myself and those close to me who cannot come to speak for themselves. I would like to repeat the sentiment. Monterey Park residents do not want this data center or any data center. There is no benefits to this idea. The sole fact that the project was originally proposed with an MMD reveals the sheer ignorance in play when coming to its conclusion. I could sit up here all day and explain the difference between an EIR and an MMD, but the short and sweet of it is that while environmental impact is one of the major reasons this project is being criticized, it is also a blatant show of where the care is being placed within this council. This council has prioritized this data center far more than its own citizens, and for some reason, it feels like you don't seem to realize how that reflects on you. I live pretty close to Atlantic Square. I have seen at least four to five shops close and relocate from this plaza in the last year. Rent prices are becoming too much for the businesses in this area. There used to be a GameStop there that had been there since I was able to form memories. My brother was close with the workers, and we were all devastated to learn of its sudden closing. The workers told us rent had doubled and the business was unable to keep their storefront. All of the workers either lost good jobs or had to begin further commutes to different locations. Your citizens are being priced out of business plots, out of their homes, and replaced with large corporations and Airbnbs. Is this not concerning to you? Is this not a priority to you? What is so important about a data center that makes this take a sideline? You are so ready to commercialize our town for hotels and a data center nobody asked for, and yet when your residents' livelihoods are genuinely decreasing in quality, there is utter silence. As a citizen, I am livid. I wake up and there's a news story about a missing father or a kid or a mother stolen or shot by ICE, and the next second I am greeted with the fact that my city council is insisting on a data center where there are so many things that could be created instead. To end off, I was informed the council felt as if my information last time was incorrect or presented wrong. I have brought with me the original script and a full bibliography and highlighted sources connected to the mentioned writing, which I will hand to Miss Michelle. I implore the council to go through and not only reread what I had wrote, but also check each source that was cited. And with that, I will bring my comment to an end. I do recommend pursuing the full EIR, but in short, and to be completely honest, nobody wants this. Even if there is a clean EIR, nobody, I mean nobody who I have talked to wants this data center.
Hello. I'll be very brief since I didn't prepare anything. But I just want you guys to know that we have the power to vote you out. You will be complicit in this if this passes. and I want everyone to remember their names right now. Keep note of their names, who are voting out. Thank you.
Hello, good evening. My name is Jalina Hatsipancios, and I'm here also on behalf of my husband, Randy Hatsipancios. I grew up in Monterey Park, and I also chose to stay here in Monterey Park to raise my children who are going to school here. My husband is a nurse and I am a teacher. My mother is here and she's a small business owner. We all contribute to this community. I still remember Thomas Wong knocking on my door. He is my neighbor and I am here respectfully speaking to him and to all of you that the promises that you made, please keep them because all of us here, community members are here because we love the city and we hope that you do too. And if this is about raising money for Monterey Park, please support the hardworking residents of Monterey Park who work hard with their small businesses. Small businesses generate a lot of income. And we also help to maintain our neighborhood safe. I'm part of the neighborhood watch in my community. And I know a lot of residents have joined forces because as a city, we have recently struggled with gun violence, an increased amount of crime. and we have senior citizens and children that depend on all of us to be joined together to support our neighborhood and our community. The Monterey Park Police Department has asked for our help and a lot of us here, I recognize our faces, we're a part of this Monterey Park neighborhood watch. We have recently suffered through a lot and I am asking that all of you keep your promises to support No Data Center. the next speakers please line up charles stapleton mark rudom scarlett young and jeremy yes go ahead hello my name is randy and this may come to you as a surprise i work in a data center I know what goes in and out and the workings inside. Guess what? We're just monitoring. Nothing really happens. It's just automation, computers, and maintaining infrastructure. You're not really creating a local business that returns. You're not really creating a community investment where money is circulated within the community. Who are your customers? They're not local. They're all remote. They're from other countries. They could be from Europe, Asia, South America, Australia, wherever. They're not local, so it doesn't really create a cycle of revenue in the city. What else do I say? Also, the people that you hire in a... ¿
more businesses or what many people said a Trader Joe's we would like to see more businesses and or maybe a public space where people can go to and relax thank you
well honorable council mayor others Charles Stapleton I'm a college professor. I've attended a lot of the meetings and basically there's a lot of misunderstanding that takes place. I want to first thank you or hopefully you'll move forward on the full EIR so we can get some more information. But many of us, I think, don't really realize how often we're using the data center. We have the gamers, for instance, and we have my students that are online right now. Buffering happens because of what we see, not enough information, communication going back and forth from the data center to where we are. We're relying on one Wilshire right now. If a data center is going to come in, it's going to go somewhere. And that somewhere, we're going to continue to use the resources that that data center provides. For example, simply online banking. I know some of you do that. When I go out to dinner or lunch, I see people taking photographs of food. Come on, give me a break. That goes into the data center, into the cloud. So I urge you to move forward with the EIR. I urge you to move forward with the EIR and to give us a full account. Thank you very much.
Call to order, please. Call to order. He's asking us to move forward with the EIR. Okay, go ahead.
Honourable Mayor and City Council members, my name is Mark Rudholm and I'm a long-time resident of Monterey Park. I am speaking tonight to support a temporary moratorium and to applaud the developer's decision to undertake a voluntary EIR.
These are positive steps.
The moratorium allows the temperature of this conversation to come down, and the voluntary
EIR demonstrates that the applicant acts in good faith and are willing to put their science
to the test. I urge the Council and the community to use this pause productively. We must use this time to look at the facts that are already in the record, facts that I believe the full EIR will reconfirm. The facility uses an air-cooled system and will not drain our aquifer. The facility connects directly to the regional Mesa substation and pays for its own infrastructure
upgrades rather than burdening ratepayers. It's in Appendix A2. This project represents millions of dollars in potential new utility users tax. This project represents millions
of dollars in new utility users tax and property tax revenue that our city desperately needs without generating traffic or demand for city services.
If we continue having audience members who are not at the microphone yell out,
we're going to take a recess, all right? So this is the last opportunity. And when you guys come up here, we're going to respect your time as well.
Let's allow the developer to prove their case through the EIR, and then let's come back and make a decision based on data, not fear.
Thank you. Next speaker.
Scarlett, Yoon, Jeremy, Caleb.
Scunard.
Go ahead. Hi, my name is Scarlett Orta. I am a resident of Monterey Park. My family and I live in District 3. regarding the proposed data centers within Saturn Park we cannot rely on a summary report or a mitigated negative declaration report it is insufficient and leaves many questions unanswered regarding the environmental effects and the and consequently the human health impacts of the data centers on our community I insist an environmental impact report be completed for public review for a more detailed study.
Hello, Council. I just want to say it's nice seeing you all again. I don't come here often. Apparently the applicant, the developer, is searching for misinformed MPK residents, like they're playing a game of Where's Waldo. Meanwhile, the rest of us are right here showing up, reading the documents, and asking the city questions that still haven't been answered. And I want to ask everyone, who here is for no dentist center in Monterey Park? Raise your hand.
You guys see that? So, my name is Yun. I live in District 5, Vin Nose District. I live about a half mile from the proposed 1977 Saturn data site, and I strongly oppose the data center project. And I urge its withdrawal from this community. Get out of here.
Now, like I said, I don't come here unless in this situation. I expected the Monterey Park City Council to demonstrate stronger advocacy for our community. For example, I trusted Council Member Noe's campaign commitments. lead. Be the voice to people by taking the time to listen to the concerns of the residents. Instead, I've been doing his job. I've been going through my neighborhood door to door and talking to my neighbors. We have elderly Chinese seniors who can only speak Mandarin. Thank God I'm Chinese. Okay?
They understand me, and I let them know that there's a data center in the area near their house on Clover. And they don't want it there. I've talked to young couples who just had a newborn child. next to that data center, next to that line of diesel generators.
So as I was saying, my neighbors are very important to me. I'm here for no other reason than I care about my neighbors. In that vein, I have to ask, what has our council member, my council member, Vin Ngo, been doing? Absolutely not me. Well, I emailed him, and I asked, what have you been doing? And in his email, starting early 2024, he was at the SPARC meeting with Brian Marsh. Then, several council meetings later, he was also meeting with Brian Marsh. Then, in October 2025, there was a nonprofit gala where StratCap bought a $2,000 VIP table, who was also, guess who was there? Vinno and the rest of the council. Now, I only say this because I know that this council cares about this community. And I don't mean to make it hard on everyone that's up there doing their job.
But to see that Vin had all this time to interact with the data center folks and have a community, my neighbors, who I talk with, not even aware and concerned, I have to ask, what have you been doing? Nothing.
So, in conclusion, I believe the MPK community isn't misinformed, they're just under-informed. And so far as VIN, I want to make it clear, don't be knocking on my door or my neighbor's door come November. You can get your damn vote from the applicant. Jeremy, Caleb, Samuel, Teresa, and Carrie.
Hi, I'm Jeremy, District 3, and I'm also with the Amazon Teamsters.
And I know last time I was here, the December 3rd,
we had people from the construction unions that were representing with the business owner. And I think that I've seen a nice turnout of people who are in opposition. They're also union members, so I think there's kind of a balance there. But I want to say, too, that something I've learned through organizing and through working at places that are trying to form a union, there's similar tactics happening right now that it's all about misinformation. It's about showing that people are outsiders, whether it's in a company or whether it's in our community right now.
And we are not outsiders.
I'm District 3 for five years. We are opposed to this for all the reasons that we've read all the same stuff you guys read. We know what we're talking about here. But the same way that union busting happens, they try to spread misinformation.
They try to say that we don't know anything.
but it's just so they can roll us over. And before you know it, our jobs are lower, our health is worse, everything is worse, but we're forming unions,
we're forming connections in the community right now, and you're seeing everything happening
because we are better as a union, as a community. Thank you and say no to this. This is terrible.
Before, sorry, Speaker, just one second.
Can I just want to confirm? Are you Caleb? Yes. Okay, thank you. Okay.
So the speakers, I know we didn't hear the names, so just want to recall the names. So Caleb, Samuel, and sorry, these don't have last names, so we're doing our best here. Samuel, Teresa, and Carrie. Caleb, Samuel, Teresa, Carrie.
Good to go? All right. Thank you.
Honorable Mayor and Council Members, thank you for this time to speak. I live in Monterey Park, District 5, with my wife and three kids.
They're young kids.
And our home is within 500 feet of the project site, on the side where the diesel generators will actually be. And we spend a lot of time at La Loma Park, which is just as close. All three of my kids attend Hillcrest Elementary School, which is in half a mile from the site. And I'm involved in two PTAs, Hillcrest and Monterey Vista. And I do not want this data center here. I appreciate the council taking this crucial step towards getting the environmental impact report. However, I do request that it's conducted ethically and with Monterey Park residents and also the local cities in mind.
Because it's not just going to affect us.
It's going to affect Montebello, unincorporated.
What is it, Alexis? South San Gabriel. Sorry, I'm all over the place.
And basic legal standards are no substitute for our lived experience. And as the lead agency, I would encourage you to take a maximalist approach to any EIR that's done and not simply rely on findings from a company handpicked by the applicant.
There are many reports about the physical health risks associated with the carcinogens
the 24 massive diesel generators will release every time they simply run a test, or God forbid there's a power outage. Also, the constant noise caused by data centers has been reported to cause sleep deprivation, stress, anxiety, depression, increased risk of cardiovascular disease, and that's when everything is running as it should. All these risks are exacerbated every time the backup generators kick on. And keep in mind, we're going to live next to this thing. So my neighbors, there are a lot of elderly families, a lot of young families out here walking around with their kids. We're the ones who are going to suffer the consequences. So I would strongly urge you to simply reject the applicant's proposal for the data center as it is not consistent with our land use element, Measure JJ, which we voted on. And instead, I urge you to revisit the city's original plan as outlined in Ordinance 22-246 to create more affordable housing and mix... ¿
Thank you. So Teresa and then family? That looks like it. He said he was. Okay, you can go after her. Good evening everyone. I'm Teresa and I live extremely close to the proposed data center. Originally, I was going to talk about the ordinance, the proposed moratorium, last-minute urgency moratorium, but I think it's best if I speak about other issues. And one concern that I had that I just thought this is really unprofessional to be coming from the city council, by the way, happy birthday, Michelle, was when I saw that one of our leaders here was saying that the public was misinformed. And I want to let you all know, we're not misinformed. Leadership here is misinformed. because when I asked staff, when I asked electeds, what is the proposal? And this is back in 2024. I was told it was a data processing facility. That's what I was told. And I thought, okay, no big deal. We've had data processing facilities there, which is a completely different animal than a data center. It wasn't until the public started to see the renderings of the Taj Mahal that is proposed that we thought, whoa, wait a minute, this is completely different. So understand, we were not misunderstood. We were misled. Because otherwise, you would have seen these crowds a lot earlier. I also, because I live so close, please do not. It is really getting me annoyed that you guys keep talking about noise. It's not noise. You're not going to hear my voice. You're going to hear that constant vibration. You're going to feel it, the kind that penetrates through your bones. And I have researched it, and it says that it's usually about a two-mile radius. Our city is seven and a half square miles. If you're talking about a two-mile radius, just think of all the lives you're going to affect. Even those people that support it, once they start feeling the pulsations and the vibrations, not during the day, but at night when it's quiet, during the summer when your windows are open, you're going to hear that. You're going to feel all that. And just imagine how bloody mind-boggling, maddening it'll be to hear those vibrations. So I bring this up because I feel that there's a disconnect between the realities of what this data center is bringing. And I'm all for businesses. I think a data center is necessary. Look, I use AI. Monterey Park is not the place for it. It's not. So, and because at the last minute you pulled this bait and switch with the moratorium, I'm going to ask folks here. I want you to stand up. if you think that housing is a better alternative instead of a data center. If you agree with that, please stand up.
And you know what housing's going to do? We all live here because we love this city. I'm not leaving until I am dead, okay? I'm not leaving Monterey Park. This is my home. And I tell people, come visit. It's a really vibrant community. And if you are denying people housing and bringing in a data center, you're being selfish. And you're being selfish because you're denying people the opportunity to live here. And you all preach about how it's important to have housing, how it's important to get people off the streets, how it's important to help young professionals, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Let me be very clear. if you turn your back to me right now, come November, I will turn my back to you. Got it?
Oh, and by the way, by the way, I just want you to know, we're all Monterey Park residents here. District 5, District 2. We're all Monterey Park residents. So this thing about it's outsiders, no, it's not outsiders. We're here. We're here, and this is what we want. You need to listen to us. And by the way, have a wonderful evening and the rest of the week. Thank you.
Hello, my name is Samuel Taylor. I'm a resident of Monterey Park, a longtime resident of Monterey Park. In fact, most of the time in which I've lived in Southern California has been Monterey Park. This is basically my home here. I'm an organizer with the PSL, and I wanted to come here today to advocate against the building of any data centers in Monterey Park. In particular, this day, which I think about the banner behind us commemorating the, I mean, really horrible act of violence on January 21st, 2023. And I think about a maxim that was taught to me by my parents, which is that if you love a community and you care for a community, you have to protect that community.
And when we talk about protecting a community, there's not just explicit violence like what we saw on that day many years ago, but implicit violence. Implicit violence is the targeting of a community of color for a data center and not any other place in Los Angeles County. Implicit violence is using resources and giving them to corporations who want to build AI data centers. Instead of giving those resources to the people to better enrich their lives and the community, I mean, what would Monterey Park be without the community it is today?
I won't take too much time because I want to hear from more people in our community. Our community, these are not people outside of our community. These are people that love this community and want to see it be better than it is today. But I think that everybody sitting here and listening in the city council should adhere and listen to the voices of the community. I mean, it's a really simple choice. Is it the people or is it the billionaires? And I think today the people have spoken in large amounts and they need to be listened to. Thank you.
Good evening, Mayor and city council members. My name is I have a letter. that I would like the clerk to pass out. I'm asking that it be made part of the administrative record for the project.
My name is Carrie. I'm a resident.
I live in District 5 in close proximity to the project. While I'm speaking to you in my personal capacity, I also happen to be a licensed California attorney, and I have prior experience in municipal law as a deputy city attorney for several cities. I want to state, so my arguments will be focused on legal ones. I want to say first of all that I'm fundamentally opposed to the data center as I am seriously concerned about the how the project will affect air quality noise and electricity. I have a few separate items I'd like to comment on. First, I understand the applicant has agreed to voluntarily prepare an EIR for the project. I submitted in my letter, I request that the council direct staff, not the applicant, to retain a new independent CEQA consultant under a city-controlled contract for the EIR.
Kim Lee Horn was the applicant's consultant who prepared the MND documents as shown on the city's website in response to a PRA request received the city has confirmed in writing that it has no agreement with Kim Lee Horn EIRs have a different standard than MNDs under sequel guidelines section 15084 D an EIR must be prepared directly by or under contract to the lead agency which is you. Public Resources Code Section 21082.1A and prevailing case law requires the city to exercise this independent judgment when it comes to an EIR. The city cannot make the required independent judgment finding if the same consultant who prepared the MND under the applicant's direction prepares the EIR under the same arrangement. There's also a built-in conflict of interest. Kim Lee Horn previously concluded the project would have no significant impacts. Asking them to prepare an EIR now would require them to review and potentially contradict their own prior work, which undermines the credibility of the EIR and exposes the city to litigation.
In sum, CEQA makes clear that if the project requires an EIR, it is the city who is responsible for selecting the consultant, directing the consultant's work, controlling the analysis, and exercising its independent judgment. After selecting the consultant, the city shall place them under a city-controlled contract with the consultant reporting to the city, and the applicant can reimburse the city or participate in a three-party reimbursement agreement. So with respect to the ordinance being considered, I have a few comments. If you can pull the ordinance, please.
The last sentence of Section C, which calls on the city manager to direct the applicant to prepare an EIR, that is inconsistent with Section A, which prohibits the city from processing any pending or new application for a data center for 45 days. The point of the moratorium is to stop any forward movement with a data center project, while the moratorium is in effect to give the city time to study what additional regulations may be needed. I already explained above a few minutes ago that it's the city that needs to select the consultant and direct the EIR process. In the end of Section C, the last sentence, you're saying that the city manager or designee is directed to require that the applicant prepare the EIR. That is incorrect, so you should delete that from the end of Section C as being erroneous.
after the city attorney and city manager draft the new regulations we should have a public hearing
so the city can hear from the city's residents obviously as you can see by the attendance tonight our community feels very strongly about the proposed data center after that hearing the city can decide whether to proceed to initiate the EIR process so I'm requesting that the council will strike the last sentence of Section C of the moratorium.
Lastly, I have an unrelated comment regarding transparency on the part of the city. The day before the December 3rd council meeting, applicants' attorneys sent the council a seven-page letter to summarize key environmental, economic, and procedural points from the administrative record, and importantly, quote, provide simple answers for the city council regarding the characteristics of the project in contrast to the misinformation and false rhetoric online. One of the misinformation aspects online was arguably the need for an EIR, which somehow the city and applicant interestingly now agree to. That letter included a fiscal revenue analysis showing that the city will allegedly make between $5 and $8.1 million in recurring annual revenue, and SCE will generate, listen to this, $46 million in electricity costs from the project.
The public was not aware of this letter until it was uploaded onto the city's website in response to a Public Records Act request around December 20, 2025. This letter was written on December 2. The letter provided significant information to the council, summarized the project from the applicant's perspective. It provided key information regarding the applicant's projections and the electricity costs. The public wasn't aware this document existed until the PRA request required it be disclosed. So I'm asking that given that all communications from the applicant to the council are of utmost importance to the community, and in the spirit of transparency, whenever the applicant sends correspondence to the council regarding the project, please immediately upload it to your website.
Thank you.
Deborah Simone, Miranda Sharp, Joan Tu, Christian Duran, and Emily Chu. I'll say it again. Deborah Simone, Miranda Sharp, Joan Tu, Christian Duran, and Emily Chu.
And there's empty seats up here, if anyone standing wants to come and fill in the empty seats. There's a lot of seats in the first, second, third, and fourth rows.
Community members are raising their hands to show other community members where there's seats available. So if you'd like to come down, there's some on your left of the council chambers and middle section in the council chambers, there's seats available.
¿ Is Deborah here? Okay. Hello. I'd like to thank the City Council for hearing my comments. You all know me. You've met me at Meet the Mayor. You've met me at other events. I really appreciate that you're all there at the LGBT Festival that we have here in Barnes Park. I love going to Lunar New Year. I love being here for the July 4 fireworks. They're amazing. This is a great small town feel here. This is a wonderful small city to live in.
But I feel betrayed because I try to engage in an honest way with this council through the SPARK process and before that even sending articles, article after article after article about other municipalities across this country that are now dealing with the scourge of data centers. and I'm just I hate being ignored I hate it nothing personal I just this is such a wonderful city and I want to ask you all what is your vision for this city what is it who do you want to live here what do you want your legacy to be that you sold us out for like $11 million in tax revenue a year for a company that's going to leave in five years when
the technology becomes obsolete? You're going to be left with another empty hulk down there that
no one will want to demolish because it's such a giant boondoggle. Thank you. I got to use that word. Now look, I just, I can't, I'm speaking completely off the cuff here. I made a screed out there about the spark process and i have to point out that 40 people voted at the end of spark for the fate of 58 000 residents of this city are you kidding me how is that even possible that's not democracy i know you guys made an effort but you know a little an ad in the cascades and you know you just didn't do the outreach we did the outreach here it is here we all are
I'm a recent arrival here.
My wife has grown up in the area, been here her whole life. And I just, we were so happy when we got here. I was so happy to do my own lawn work. I was so happy to live in a place that was quiet at night. I was so happy to have a police force that would respond when I called them. After a wonderful experience living in downtown LA. and now I really I just I'm just so betrayed by this and I and you will not have my vote then if this continues and I will not support any of you and I will work against you in absolutely any way I can going forward thank you
Hello. I'm a nearby neighbor in Alhambra, only 10 minutes away. My husband, he couldn't be here today, but less than a year ago, he recovered from mouth cancer. There have been recent reports of data centers causing cancer within their immediate and surrounding communities, such as in Morro County, Oregon. Look it up. Do not bring this cancer-causing data center into Monterey Park for the community's health and safety. Thank you. Thank you.
Hello, council. I was born in Monterey Park, specifically the Garfield Medical Center, right nearby here, and I later grew up in El Mwani or El Monte. I'm here to oppose the data centers for all residential areas as well as nature preservation. In elementary school, I spent summers hanging out with my childhood friend and swimming in the Barnes Park pool. In middle school, I would take the 7D Metro bus with my friends and my neighbors to get to the Atlantic Times Square just to get food, boba, and stroll around the city. With the small but meaningful $20 allowance I got here and there, actually rarely, from my parents. In high school, I found myself back in Monterey Park to practice for tennis seasons at my high school. My point here is to highlight how Monterey Park can be a home not only to its residents but for its neighboring communities. What gets built here doesn't just affect Monterey Park. It affects all of us, including the remaining spaces where animals and wildlife can still survive. People from all over come here to enjoy good food, good air, and to create and reminisce on memories. If history has taught us anything, it's that power should be used for good. And while practicing ethical standards in a capitalistic, corrupt society is difficult, it is still our responsibility. Our duty as human beings is to protect and preserve our communities by being as mindful as we can to survive and thrive together. Let us be the ones to notice that we're headed towards boiling water, stop it, and prevent it before it gets worse. This starts with prioritizing our public health and environment. Health is wealth, and we don't need another pandemic. Thank you.
Hello, Mayor of the Council. My name is Christian Duran. I'm a Monterey Park resident. I've been here since I was eight years old. I took swimming lessons at Georgia Elder Park at the pool over there. I just think it's insane that I found out about all this today while I was at work, and I just had to make my way over here afterwards to come and just talk to you guys about it. I mean, just think about the families that are living here. Obviously, I live in District 5. I live 0.7 miles away from where you're going to be building this thing on Saturn. Obviously, I don't want it there. But also, a lot of people who are further away don't want it there. our neighboring cities probably do not want it there the average citizen does not want this data center here i'm going to get different from the turnout tonight i'm sure there hasn't been a turnout this big in a while if you notice here there's a lot of young people my age mid-20s and maybe even a little younger and just think about it just feels like people my generation are being sold out for this kind of thing something that's going to be staying here i don't like being sold out especially when a lot of times recently in this country and in the socioeconomic state right now we are being sold out we're being priced out over at that place you can build a lot of housing affordable housing for people like me who can honestly maybe cannot really afford it but it would still be nice to have you know thank you everybody um and i just i just think it's a little disrespectful to my time that i find out today and then i'm coming over here kind of last minute i didn't prepare anything had i known that this was happening i would have prepared something more eloquent but i cannot but it's okay because i'm still here and And everybody else is here. And I would just like you to think about just the community, the families, you know, think about the people who are walking their dog early in the morning. I see them when I drive to work every morning. I work in Alhambra, but I live here. And it's just a bit shameful, I feel. And I'm really disappointed that this is how I found out. I found out on Facebook, the Monterey Park Life Facebook group. I'm sure a lot of people probably know it. But it's kind of crazy that I learned from the community and not from my council members. and our city government. And please listen to what we are all saying. I know sometimes it gets a little rowdy, and I know that sometimes we can't hear what you're saying, but also, truly, we are all here because we care about this place, and we all want it to flourish and thrive. And if you put that data center here, the people will not thrive, the community will not thrive. It will siphon everything out of the community, and there will be nothing left. And it's quite honestly... if you want to be more forward thinking think about how this affects the community at large and think about everything that we've built over all these years can just be gone in just a couple years because of one big mistake this data center is nothing but a mistake it is going to take everything away and please i implore you please just just don't build it man you know like just i could say more eloquently if i had more time to prepare but this could all be done this could all be done so fast if you just don't do it think about what all everybody's already said about the environment but also just think on a moral level with what we know ai is being used for it is being used to sell people workers out you know all of us who just trying to make it day by day we're not going to be able to because ai the promise of ai is that oh we'll just go ahead We don't have to hire anybody because AI will do it. Think about what that message that sends to us here. If you're willing to build a place like that and what you're going to be taking away from us. Thank you for having me here. Thank you for expecting my time. Please just take everybody else's time as well. Truly listen to what we have to say because we care. We care. Thank you. Thank you.
There's so Emily Chu, Harad Balian, Ebony Guerrero, Paul Lang, and Steve Scharf. And there's still seats up here. For those of you standing, if you want to have a seat, we still have, we're not even 25% of the way done. There's still like 80 people. So remaining speakers, please be considerate of your community members time tonight. And you guys are welcome to come up and grab a seat.
Go ahead.
Good evening, council members. I am a resident of Monterey Park in District 2. I'm here to express my opposition to the proposed data center at 1977 Saturn and any hypothetical future data center. First, I want to say thank you for listening to the community and calling for an EIR. However, this isn't sufficient. There is clear feedback from the community, as you can see here tonight. We don't want any data centers in Monterey Park. I want to take a moment and remind everyone here that the reason data centers are allowed in Saturn Park at all is because the city made a zoning update based on the SPARC sessions in 2024, where only 40 people voted on ideas, and one of the main activities was participants listening to a presentation on this specific proposed data center. Out of the 40 voters, 19 voted in favor of the data center. 19 people were enough for the city to justify zoning updates to allow data centers. The city is claiming that the SPARC sessions and the resulting ordinance just coincidentally involved data centers and had nothing to do with the ongoing application from HMC. This is very suspicious. If anything, all of this community feedback against data centers should call that 2024 ordinance into question. I've also heard about multiple council members claiming that there is misinformation spreading. To be very clear, there is no misinformation. The community fully understands the very few short-term benefits the project would provide, as well as the many short- and long-term costs and consequences. The community is telling you that the costs to our health, the environment, the community's quality of life, and literal utility costs don't justify the measly benefits. HMC is also alleging that there is a, quote, opposition campaign. There is no campaign. We are regular people, your constituents, concerned about the future of our city.
I will close with a reminder from the ordinance that council members have, quote,
complete discretion in their decision regarding data centers in Saturn Park. Please listen to your constituents and exercise this discretion to stop the project. I urge you to involve the public in the EIR process, use the EIR results in your decision-making, and not allow data centers in Monterey Park.
Thank you.
Good evening, council members. My name is Hrag Balian. I'm a District 2 resident.
I'm the co-founder, I guess you can call it,
of a group that we're calling
No Data Center in Monterey Park,
among with other people, other Monterey Park residents.
And on January 10th, just like 10, 11 days ago, we launched a petition and set a modest goal of 1,000 signatures. As of yesterday, when I sent you the petition, we had 1,664 signatures. Now, we have over 3,300 signatures.
We have well over 1,000 Monterey Park signatures, 75% from the San Gabriel Valley and 90% from L.A. County. This is a very active petition with a massive surge that we just saw today. And we're seeing how deeply unpopular this data center is. And we're seeing how local it is.
It's not an outsider thing. it's hyper local
it's regional and our neighboring cities are telling us
that they're scared that Monterey Park would be setting a bad precedent
and that Monterey Park would be
a bad neighbor and I agree with that Monterey Park would be a very bad neighbor our residents are united, our neighbors are united
across so many lines
that often divide
but now all saying the same thing
no data center in Monterey Park
Now since we have over a thousand Monterey Park signatures, these numbers are at or near your margins of victory. If this data set of proposal goes through, I think you will
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substantially similar to those previously considered on November 6, 2024, to govern data centers within Saturn Park.
What does that actually mean?
Can someone clarify for me which regulations will be considered during this moratorium that were previously considered? We need clarity and we need transparency. Now more than ever, around this question before we celebrate this moratorium, Ideally, specific wording can be added to this draft before adoption. The EIR has progress, but it's not enough. There is really no place for a data center in Monterey Park. A data center is a heavy industrial facility and should be banned outright according to
the vision of the city outlined in Measure JJ. Thank you. Good evening. My name is Steve Scharf. I live in District 5. I actually live on the street that is directly behind where this data center is going to be. I live on Taylor Drive. I can walk from my house to the data center in under five minutes. If I'm driving my car, I could be there in 30 seconds. What is the idea of putting a data center so close to family suburban homes?
Eight and a half years ago, we were here for another crazy proposal for this property on Saturn. At that time, they were wanting to put in a one legacy hospital, complete with a heliport on the roof right next to a whole street of suburban homes. Fortunately, that proposal was shut down because I think there was already a regulation against that. My question is to each of you, why is there such profound deafness and faulty understanding as to what kind of project you try to put into a facility directly adjacent to suburban community homes? You know, Teresa was up here a little while ago, and she played the sound of what those data centers generate. I don't know where each of you live, but Vin, Thomas, Jose, Henry, Elizabeth, if that data center was generating all that vibration and sound five minutes from your house, how would you feel about this project?
There seems to be profound deafness and misunderstanding in this council as to what is really the best for the people who live in Monterey Park. I urge you, I urge each of you to listen and to have a heart for people who care and who live in Monterey Park. Do what's best for us, the families and the people who live here. Thank you.
Good evening, board members. My name is Ebony Guerrero, and I'm a California Youth Leadership Corps Fellow with Climate Action Campaign, a non-profit climate policy watchdog in California. We urge you to vote yes on item 5A because there is no question that this project will have significant impacts on this community. Doubling the city's energy usage and using polluting fossil fuel generators are both non-starters. These generators would make our air even dirtier and more dangerous. Our region already has the most dangerous air in the U.S., according to American Lung Association. This project would add these very real harms while providing very few long-term jobs and increasing local families' electricity bills, which are already among the highest in the nation, thanks to SoCal Edison, which has increased our rates 106% over the last decade, according to CPUC.
Council Member Wong should rescue himself from this decision, as he is an employee of SoCal Edison and will directly benefit from this project.
Projects like this should improve our communities and be created with their consent. And if the project needs energy, they should buy it from local families and businesses, allowing them to earn extra income. And if local families and businesses do not have extra power to sell, the developers should help them get solar batteries and other technologies that will empower them to do that. This would allow families to share the benefits of our energy system instead of just paying Monopoly at CE. This community, like all communities across California and U.S., are tired of monopoly utilities that continually extract profits for themselves and their shareholders while gaming our community thank you
melissa dora leon vincent chang joshua morales hello i'm paul lang i am a resident of monterey Park in District 3. Council Member Sanchez, I remember when you came to our door to run for this office, and I hope you meant what you said about serving the people of Monterey Park.
And I have heard most of the good points that I've learned about this from my fellow community members, from the people who made me aware, because I was not aware of this issue until
word of mouth brought us here. I thank you to actually our dog groomer who let us know.
But we have a community of residents and small businesses that could be far better served by a project that would add mixed-use space or housing. You've heard this before. I will say to the people who are convinced by the argument that the boom of construction work in the short term would justify the ends of this project. I am a member of two different labor unions,
AGVA and Local 33.
My own fellow members may not agree with me on this, but I do not believe any private institution has their right to come into a residential area and do more harm than good for the sake of its profits.
it is tempting to look at the tax implications for the city coffers it is tempting to look at
the short-term games gains i apologize for those in the construction industry and i am not against building things as that have been mentioned housing the speaker before me had a very creative idea on how you could reduce some of the damage if this were to come to pass, but I hope it never does, just like the vast majority of people who have spoken tonight.
Thank you all for speaking. Thank you all for listening. Thank you. Melissa Dorleon Vincent Chang, Josue Morales, Maximilian Reed. Josue. Hello, my name is Melissa Michelson. I'm representing the San Gabriel Valley Progressive Alliance, a community group in the San Gabriel Valley since 2017. I live in Alhambra, and I'm one of those outsiders. But I come here to Monterey Park to eat, to spend my time, my money. I go to your events in the parks, and now I'm coming here to city council. I come to tell you because I come here because I want to let you know that the whole San Gabriel Valley is watching you. 45 days is not enough. You need to make this a permanent ban on data centers because we are not going away. Thank you. We will be back each and every time this comes up for this data center and all future data centers, whether here or anywhere in our San Gabriel Valley cities. The EIR is the least that the company can do. We are fully expectant of them to try to get away with not spending millions of dollars to create an EIR. But frankly, I'm shocked that you all have let it come to this point, and you didn't mandate an EIR for this project to begin with. Thank you. Also, I just want to point out that this topic of the data center has brought out the community to talk about the real issues facing them and what they really want for their town. They have not been okay here in Monterey Park under your stewardship. So take heed, not just about data centers. This is about putting your people and town first before corporate profits. Thank you.
Vincent? Dora? Is Dora still here? I think she has to go. Okay. Yeah. Good evening, Mayor, members of the City Council. I really want to commend all these folks out here who came out and giving their opinion about the data center.
But by the same token, we also have a lot of folks in the city that lives in the city.
For example, you know, I am one of them. Unfortunately, I'm not as high tech as some of these guys are. So I just really try to learn what's going on. I think they brought up a lot of good points. But as a homeowner, basically a second-generation Monterey Park homeowner, I grew up here, I went to high school, I need to know what's happening with my city in terms of other responsibilities, such as where are we going to get money for our parks? Where are we going to get money for our streets? Now, by the way, the city of Monterey Park, I guess, have been okay on the right track, at least, in terms of going towards being environmentally conscious. For example, we brought up the bike hans in 2006. We also have a complete street policy that we're planning now.
But we also need to think about the future of the city.
How is it going to be funded? I want to know as a homeowner because I have to pay the damn taxes. I'm sorry. But, you know, the thing is, how are we going to pay our police? How are we going to pay our fire? How are we going to do that? So that's something you guys need to think about. I'm very encouraged to hear that the applicant is providing an EIR, I guess as part of the process. But I strongly discourage you from putting any moratorium until you understand and we all have a chance to understand what's going on. Not that I'm disrespecting what they have to say because they all have good points. Like I said, they are very passionate. But I think there's also folks in the city that probably would not come out for whatever reason. But they want to have the best interest of the city, and that's your responsibility. Thank you.
Jose Maximilian Roxana Farahani Felicia Marquez Yosef Gossam.
Hi this is Jose. Thank you council for having me here today. My name is Jose Morales. And I wanted to let you guys know that I am a Native American here and or native of Monterey Park. So I do have family here and my family is present here. My, you know, nephews are here sitting at the front with me and we have continued to stay here in this community at Monterey Park. We've lived here around in District 5 and it's very close to this data center area. So I have grown up and been raised here and I've been here since I was six. I would walk around the Community Community All the Time. Through the whole Community All of Monterey Park. And through this process and planning, you know, of generations, we have all been here. My two sons and my, we're all here, you know, we continue to live here in Monterey Park. So I'm not sure why this data center is here. You know, the community is not in support, as you can see, right? All of us feel like we're here. Like, you know, we all live here, and it's a very beautiful community, and we love being here. So we want to continue to stay here, and we want to keep Monterey Park as beautiful it has been. We want to keep the nature alive. We want our love is here for Monterey Park. So if you know one thing about the data center, you know, in Monterey Park, you know, it's going to cause a huge chain of reaction in this area. so as you can see, look, look, it's going on right now. Look at the effect that it already had, you know, of building that data center here. So, you know, we are against it. Thank you for listening, hearing me out, and have a good night. Thank you so much. Thank you.
Good evening. My name is Roxana Farahani. Thank you for hearing my comment.
I'm a homeowner and resident of Monterey Park District 5. A lot of things have already been said, but here we go. I am opposing the proposed data center at 1977 Saturn Park and any subsequent data centers in Monterey Park full stop. I bought my home in late 2022, having to go way above asking price to purchase it. So you can imagine my dismay at the threat of a data center being built so close by. No property owner wants the value of their home to decrease. Now, other than living in Monterey Park for the past few years, I grew up in the city of San Gabriel. I worked during college for Almani Schools and for the past 12 years have worked for Montebello Unified. As someone who has lived her whole life in the San Gabriel Valley, it is pretty clear to me why Monterey Park was targeted for this project. and it's because of its socioeconomic demographics. Neighboring, more affluent Alhambra, San Gabriel, San Marino, and South Pasadena are currently not having to fight against a data center, although I thank them for being here in solidarity.
And it is absolutely disgusting that our city council allowed it to happen. The idea that different socioeconomic demographics should somehow indicate that residents are apathetic for politics, have lower interest or intelligence, or at worst we are not entitled to receive the same quality of life as others in higher socioeconomic areas
is disdainful. I believe our City Council is complicit in this way of thinking due to the
way the SPARC sessions were handled, given that there was little transparency and rampant misinformation provided to only a handful of residents that were there, which was somehow representative of an entire city. As you now know, as you were emailed the results of the petition, one that is still active and still receiving signatures from Monterey Park residents, the sub park results were not a representative sample. The residents of Monterey Park do not want this data center at all. EIR or not, no data center. Data centers at a state, national, and global level are being asked to halt construction in addition to harmful environmental effects such as air noise and water pollution increased utility cost data centers early to cancer birth defects and miscarriages progressive cities are taking stricter actions against data centers I urge Monterey Park to be a progressive city and lead the SGV in this matter look at what this community built in a matter of months, a few months, and work with us, not the applicant, to build something that actually falls in line with innovation and technology, as Measure JJ is what we passed. That would actually create more and lasting jobs that will benefit the city and its residents in direct ways that we can see and feel daily. Green air, no noise pollution, community spaces, green spaces, healthy food options, affordable housing, sustainable jobs, and better infrastructure. Nowhere in the land use and urban design element in the 113 page document does it state the
word data center.
Just as a little side, sorry to take up so much time, but as you can see we would all stay here the eight hours that's how much it means to us
recently councilman no did meet with a few of us and he mentioned the vacancy
issue for that large size of a building it will be vacant 20 jobs at most and in
five years times as someone said who knows what will be there and it will
probably be vacant yet again in closing I'd like to say that I live on a
a cul-de-sac with neighbors of every ethnicity and age range. We all look out for each other. I walk my dog for an hour or so every day when I get home and I see many people walking. I feel thankful that I live in a diverse community where I can do that safely. I walk by 1977 Saturn often. I know that I will no longer be able to do that if this data center is built. If you have the tiniest pulse on the world right now, you will shut this down. The people are fed up with their
rights being stripped and the quality of life being drained at the hands of
billionaire corporations influencing politics so that only they get richer while we suffer. We are an organized community and we will not be backing down.
Maximilian Reed, Felicia Marquez. I'm Felicia. Oh, sorry.
Yusuf Gossam, Jesse Damon, Joyce Vega. Hello, thank you.
So I'm actually pretty torn. See, I want to make the nice spokesperson and her boss and her boss's boss's boss lots and lots of money. But on the other hand, I don't want to live in the shadow of a cancer belching monster. So rather than see us as obstacles to the world's most boring, wasteful, and expensive toy, imagine us, the people you see gathered here, as human beings. Human beings who just want to live here. Imagine creating something humans want, not some sort of profits and dots on a chart.
Just work with us.
Don't serve us slop and call it a win. Don't give us this data center that no one wants.
You hear all of us.
And if you try to force this data center on us, then you're going to feel our collective disappointment in you personally for letting us down as fellow human beings. If you want to show your respect for your fellow human, show it through your actions. Don't sweat the moratorium and stuff.
Just say no to all of it.
no data centers.
Can everyone hear me okay? Okay, I'm Felicia Marquez. Thank you for seeing us today, City Council.
This is my grandfather, Paul Marquez. This is my grandfather, World War II vet.
This is my father, a Korean War vet, Paul Marquez, Jr.
I'm Felicia Marquez, myself.
And I am a third-generation Monterey Parkin. I have taken over my family's home that was my grandfather's. My family has lived in Monterey Park for more than three generations since 1970 when my grandfather moved from Montebello and firmly settled here in Monterey Park.
I just want to catch my breath.
I proudly took care of my grandfather and my father in my home, which is nearly 90 years old, built in 1930. My patriarchs were hardworking. My grandfather was a teamster, and my father was an MTA bus operator. They were good men to their core and served this country and served this city. A few precious memories I had from my childhood when I was around five is driving down Graves, where I live on Graves Avenue in Lincoln, and my dad pretending it was a roller coaster with butterflies in my stomach. and after picking vegetables in my grandfather's garden which I have an 8,000 square foot property
but it's all garden it's a little house which is the glory of Monterey Park after picking
vegetables we would go to Montebello Bowl for a Shirley Temple and then drive through the dairy on Garfield this is the 1970s with the dairy stand and that stand still exists as a convenience store As an adult, I took over this home, and I have trained as a triathlete, accomplishing many marathons and two full-distance Ironman.
I built these races on the streets of Monterey Park. I've run many, many, many miles. My sweat, blood, and tears are in these streets. I can tell you every curve from Graves to Walmart to the golf course and back. One of my longest runs is the path on Porto Grande along Saturn, where the building is. I'm not the only athlete, as we know, in this city who benefits from the topography and the hills and the streets. I see them every day. Along with the runners, we know families, elders, dog walkers, and a wonderful wildlife that thrive in our ecosystem. I can effortlessly say to you that I love my home and I love Monterey Park and I am adamantly opposed to this data center development. This data center will destroy our city with toxic waste, obviously our healthy resources, using our water and our power. As a community, we know there will be money coming in, but what's the cost? as you know, you will demolish the community, and the impact to our city will be dystopian at best. These data centers must find a better solution instead of parking toxicity in our residential communities. I challenge you, City Council, to do better. Push back on these tech giants. Tell them, no, not on your watch. These tech giants must do better. And I also am in the AI industry, so I use it every day. But they have to find a better solution. We, as the population, cannot be paying for these advancements with our income, our health, and our lives. I implore you to do the right thing. Vote for your granddaughter, three generations away, that loves your home and city now.
This is your legacy.
Think about your generational wealth, and let your granddaughter plant safe gardens to enjoy for their lives.
Please, vote no. Thank you.
Good evening, council. My name is Jesse Damon.
I'm here tonight as a district five resident and as a public health practitioner and researcher and a daily user of La Loma Park. The fact that we are the council's even considering An EIR tonight is due to community advocacy, so thank you, community, for the work you have done.
But also thank you, council, for hearing us. I know this has not been easy for you. You are our neighbors.
We recognize that.
However, this EIR is necessary, but it is not sufficient to determine the true cost of this project to our community. We have to consider the likely obsolescence of the development within the coming decades, but more importantly, the immediate and long-term community health implications of this.
And tonight I want to underscore the mortality and economic costs associated with this project. This is based on figures from the MND as well as research from Columbia University published in 2021. I also cite my sources. The 85,000 metric tons of CO2 that will be produced each year by this project will contribute to 19 premature deaths and cost society upwards of $22 million. These are health economists who have come up with these figures. There is blood on the other side of this project, and there is no way to mitigate that.
in my work I also do a lot of community engagement and tonight is concerning to me
because the path reflects a serious violation of the community's trust many of us are deeply troubled by the negligence and lack of transparency that have contributed to to what you see here and in response to this breach of trust I want to make the following suggestions the city ensure meaningful community input and transparency in the development of regulations governing the site, that any contractor proposing to conduct the EAR be vetted and approved by the community, and that the city require a full health impact assessment that includes substantive Community Participation in, at minimum, the scope, design, implementation, and interpretation of results. Someone tonight used the term lived experience. That health impact needs to reflect our lived experience, not just risk assessment. And I also, I love this community. I've been here for years, and I love it even more after the harrowing last month of trying to organize around this. Please do the moral thing here. No one will remember the council that increased revenue by 5%, but every Everyone will remember the council who sold us out for a glorified server farm.
You're my neighbor.
I want to be neighbors, but your neighbors have to watch.
Thank you.
Yousif Ghazam, Joyce Vega. Joyce Vega, yes. Priscilla Isip, Scarlett Orta,
Dykeland Frumento, and Carlos Navarrete. Priscilla Isip, she's not here, okay.
All right, go ahead. Okay, hi, Joyce Vega, 30 year resident, District 2, Elizabeth Yang. Okay, this is my first time ever coming to a city council meeting. okay because you know it's kind of boring but this my granddaughter eight-year-old granddaughter helped me do i am a hard no on this data center okay i don't want any of my neighbors to suffer and I'm not going to add any more I'm really glad that all these young people are so informed it gives me hope and I know you have kids too so do the right thing no on the data center anywhere not even SGV Hello, my name is Jacqueline Fermento. Hold on, hold on. Scarlet Orta is not here? I don't know, they sent me.
Yeah, hold on, I'm just gonna call five people so they can align.
Scarlet, are you here?
Okay, Carlos Navarrete, not here either. Brandon Solorzano, Virginia Cruz, Domino,
Janice E. John Tran. All right, go ahead.
Okay, so my name is Declan Fermento.
I have lived in Monterey Park for over 25 years.
The home I live in belonged to my husband's grandmother. She waited for that house to be done, be finished, okay?
So we've lived here. I've raised five children in this city. They've gone to schools in this city. That's just personally, that's just for me. One thing I just learned about this whole thing a few hours ago.
So one thing that I would want to ask, the first lady that addressed us was the one that I guess presented this to us, right?
From the first person that showed up, the first person that spoke here.
That is from where this, I don't know because I don't know what company is putting this out.
But I love the fact that they put all these cute little data, this information on here. One of them saying that with all the things that they do, they're going to be spent, they're going to be, Monterey Park will be getting between $5 and $7 million a year. Wow, that's a lot.
For everything that they're going to be doing? That's what she wrote and that's what she's giving out.
That's not me. That's me reading what she wrote. That's insane. The jobs, 300 jobs. They're temporary jobs. They're construction.
As someone else mentioned, they're not going to even be union jobs.
No, we're going to use whoever we can. And then as another person pointed out, a person that actually works in a data center. What do they say? How many people work in there? I don't know. A handful? Not very many. So you guys want to put all that, all this money, all this time and effort to build a piece of crap in our city.
Well, we can definitely do something better with that. You can generate a ton of, that's mixed use. We voted for that in 20, what was it, for JJ?
We voted for that.
That was to be used as mixed use. We want something more Glendale, not ghetto.
That's what we want. We don't want that crap. Okay?
And that's pretty much what, from what, and again, I'm going to have to reiterate how, what the, hey, I read, I'm probably one of the few, like the three people that reads a crappy newspaper that you guys put out every month. I still didn't see the message about this crap going on.
Okay?
And this, last but not least, this is a lady had to leave because she was older and she said she had to leave, she had to go home and take her medicine. But she asked me to hold
this up to you guys. And remember, okay? This is you. This is all of you, okay? This is you. This is you. This is you.
We. It's us. Not you. You might be my neighbor, but you can get voted out.
I got no problem taking this to 2 a.m. I'll order dominoes for everybody here. Speaking about legacy, I know that there was one woman that talked about her family being here since the 70s after her grandfather came down here, right, after World War II. My grandfather came here in the 50s after World War II. My family has been here for three generations, 70 years, right? And my grandpa used to tell me a lot about, first of all, that Atlantic Square. He was just like, there was nothing there. There was like a field there. And he used to talk about how, you know, there wasn't like a lot of homes here. But after a while, you know, when they started building all of these houses, how beautiful the community was here, right? And if he was still alive today, and he was buried here, by the way, with my grandmother. And God willing, I will also have my family here and also be buried here. I know that he would be so disappointed in what the city council is thinking about doing.
Listen, we cannot build this here, right? And, you know, everybody has made good points, but what I really wanted to bring to the city council was the story of my neighbor. And I won't call her by name. She doesn't live here anymore because she can't. my neighbor was elderly. She was here even before my grandfather got here. She is 94 years old. And my mom noticed a couple years ago that her lights are off at night, right? And she always wondered, maybe she went to bed really early, but she's still working. She was a hairdresser. She was a hairdresser all the way until she went to the hospital like a couple months ago, right? And my mom found out that she wasn't turning her lights on because the electricity bill was so goddamn high she couldn't afford to keep her lights on at night. In fact, she didn't turn on the fan. She didn't have an air conditioner. She didn't turn on the fan during the summer. She didn't turn on the heater during the winter. She couldn't afford it. She's 94 years old. She's still working as a hairdresser. Listen, we are already failing our elderly population, right? That is a fact. My mother is also elderly, and she came to me with the electricity bill, and she said, I don't know how I'm going to keep being able to afford this. And I was like, well, we'll figure it out. My family will figure it out. But my neighbor couldn't figure it out. She didn't have any family here. She lived alone. She suffered a fall in the dark at night. She couldn't get up for hours. She's lucky that she was able to get up at all. I can't even imagine what the electricity is going to look like if this data center is ever built. God willing, it will not be, right? But I'm just saying we cannot allow this in our community when we already have community members suffering. Yeah, yeah, no.
Brandon Solorzano. I'm John Tran. John Tran, okay.
Brandon Solorzano, Virginia Cruz, Domino,
Janice E, Christine Harsono, Kerry Ramirez,
Nicole Leung, Irma Grosino.
Go ahead, John. Thank you. I'm really appreciative of everyone's time here. It's not easy to sit and listen and suffer and cry and laugh and clap for this long. So thank you, everyone, for being here. I'm disappointed that we even have to have this conversation. I have friends and neighbors and family in the area, and I'm taking this opportunity to speak for my friends that they're working. They don't have the luxury of being here today like I do. I'll just reiterate what everyone else says. Please don't do this. This is really, really unnecessary. Life is hard enough as it is. It really is. Everything is getting more expensive. Politics, climate change, you have, like, you name it, you know. I'm not terribly politically active. I don't, I'm not terribly well informed. And even this landed on my doorstep. And when it did this morning, and my girlfriend told me about it, I want it to come down and support too, and it's the least that I can do. If we stand silent, if we don't say anything, then these kind of problems are going to keep happening. So please, think about the community. Listen to what everybody's saying. Pay attention to what people want. And just, I just ask you guys to listen. To go home tonight and think about it. And really think about it. You guys have taken the time to sit here today and to listen to all of us. and I'm not asking much. I just want you to keep thinking about it and not forget what everyone said here tonight. Thank you.
Hi, I'm Christine. I was born and raised in Monterey Park, literally born at Garfield Hospital. And my family has been here my entire life. I literally didn't know about this until last night, like at midnight after I got off work. And I don't even have the words to express how angry I am.
the fact that no one really knew what was going on until this past week about this data center is crazy to me, right? Like, as...
We are the people that live in this city, and you are the council members and the mayor and the people that we have elected in our city government to represent our needs and protect us. And with every single person coming up here and all these people showing up and voicing that they don't want this, I just don't even understand how this can be considered. And, like, we can pull up all this information, right? We can look at all the research and the statistics and the studies, but what I'm asking you guys is, does it even matter to you? Do we matter to you? Do our lives matter to you? No. It doesn't really seem like it because they haven't really said anything about no gay, no penning, no sorry, no emotions. Let her finish. Do we need to be another story on a podcast for someone to listen to, like Love Canal or Camp Lejeune? Do we need to have this whole environmental impact report to tell us things that we already know? We already know the negative impacts. And even if we go through with this moratorium and we do this environmental impact report, which apparently the company gets to decide and choose who does this report, how can we even trust that you're going to make the right decision for us? This is a decision that will affect our lives and this community for how many generations? Does it even matter for you guys? Because it matters to us, and we're asking you this entire evening, right, and we will continue to keep showing up at City Hall. We will continue to keep showing up wherever we need to show up to tell you that it matters to us, and we don't want it. That's it. We don't want it. We don't want a moment, this pause. We don't want this report. We just don't want the data center. That's it.
Hey.
My name is Nicole. I'm almost 25, and I'm a resident of Monterey Park, and I live two miles away from the proposed data center. This is where my sister and I were born. we went to Alpha Shen Kindergarten, moved to Temple City and moved back here in the original house my parents bought when they first immigrated from China. State Department. The day before Christmas, my neighbor's unit directly across from mine caught on fire. All families nearby, including mine, had to be evacuated. Thankfully, it was contained within the day and no one got hurt. Shout out to the Monterey Park Fire Department. This incidence gave me flashbacks of the wildfires that destroyed Altadena and the Palisades in 2025. I really fear that Monterey Park could face a similar kind of devastation where we can't put out a fire because a damn data center stole our water during an ongoing water crisis in California. I have a Bachelor's of Science in Environmental Science from UCLA, so this project is very personal to me, and I would say I'm not misinformed about the environmental consequences. Data centers will only have leads to being in.
Though it should not take a college degree to recognize that people have the right to clean air and water, transparency from our elected government officials, and this project will threaten the well-being of our community and contribute to our ongoing global climate crisis. By even entertaining the idea of building a data center, you have betrayed the trust of so many people in this community, the same people that tasked you with the power and moral responsibility to make our lives better, but we're also the same people that can take your power away. It is so patronizing and disrespectful that you could even think about sneaking this past us. I have an elderly Asian neighbor... I have an elderly Asian neighbor who diligently tends to her garden every single day. I think it makes her really happy to wake up every day to tend to it. She doesn't speak any English, and she takes care of her disabled grandson full-time. She grows young leaves and scallions and sugar cane, and she gives some of her hard-earned harvest to me. I'm also speaking for her, who relies on fresh water to grow her vegetables. I do not buy any of the reasons listed by the city officials on that piece of paper. That closed-loop water cooling system is a misnomer. It takes two loops of water for this to work. The inner loop is closed. The outer loop is connected to water towers, where water is constantly being evaporated. and must be refilled constantly. I don't care that this project will build this new park while you bleed this community dry. We probably can't even maintain the park and that beautiful grove of trees that's supposed to honor the victims of January 21st that was initially proposed today because we won't have any water anymore. Like everyone else, I call for a ban on data centers being built. If this gets built however many years down the line, your legacy will be nothing more than a Superfund site where Monterey Park once was. Thank you.
Carrie Ramirez. I think she left. Irma? Yeah, come on.
And with Miss Benitez.
Jessica Ju. Christine Rady.
Sabrina Pham.
Agatha Rodriguez.
Catherine Wilson. Wyatt Stiles.
David Hanson, Rico Rivera, Valerie Lizarraga. All right, just go ahead. Good evening, Madam Mayor and fellow members of the council and city staff. I'm joined this evening alongside my Nana, my grandma. Nana, can you share with the community how many years you've lived in this beautiful city? I've lived in my house in District 2 for 61 years.
And in our home, we're caregivers to my father for over 15 years, a victim of cancer. He has a severe bone cancer and has lived with his bone cancer for over 15 years. And when we look at countless data and studies and research, whether it's been the University of Tulsa, ClimateGen, NPR, the University of Alabama, we recognize that there's intense water consumption with the development of data centers. There's high energy demand, there's fossil fuel reliance, and increased electric rates and air pollution and health risks. We don't need a data center in this community. Please do the right thing and align with community. We can't emphasize that enough. If it comes down to economic development reform that is needed in the city, why not invest in the US Summit Investment Summit or continue attending these proposed economic development forums that we attend as a city to bring in economic development reform to the city. We don't need this data center. Thank you so much. Oh let me say something. Another thing that the city could do is please do something with the Atlantic Square. It's a sore eye. I mean, it's just gone down, down, down. And over there at 1977, you could build affording houses too. That's what the city really needs.
Thank you.
Sorry, we want to make sure that we're not missing any speakers, so I'm going to go through the names that were called just previously. Jessica Jew, Kristen Greedy, Sabrina Pham, Agatha Rodriguez,
Catherine Wilson, Valerie Leziraga.
So I know David Hansen is next and next will be Steven Coom, Madeline Ocampo,
Aurora Morales Eric Morales and Caleb Shim key Hi, David. Thank you My name is David Hansen. I'm with you a local 398 plumbers and steam fitters We do piping systems we We are in favor of the moratorium. We are in favor of pausing and Getting transparency from the developer we are absolutely in
in favor of the environmental review and and if third party if that's what the
law says then we're in favor of that we want to hold the developer accountable this is our community we we but it should be said that the closed loop
system is a closed loop system with refrigerant on the cooling side not
old-fashioned water cooling towers this is a California where our carbon
footprint on the energy that we develop here in California is some of the
greenest in the country right the so the the carbon footprint of a data center in Texas is not the carbon footprint of a data center that we build in California so the developer has Come to agreements with labor unions. This will be a skilled and trained job This will have apprenticeship requirements and local hire requirements for the development the contractor
Is being held accountable. I saw signs out there that I really like that said
People over profit and that's what they're doing in the development side for this project. And so we applaud the developer for those efforts, and we want them to be held accountable for all of those promises that they've committed to. So we thank you.
Good evening. My name is Christina Cisneros. I was actually in the first round, but you misquote my name, so I didn't come up. So now I'm coming up. So good evening, Council members and community members. Again, my name is Christina Cisneros. I'm an MPK resident, and I've lived here for almost 20 years. My home is within a mile and a half of the proposed Saturn site. I'm a neighbor to Teresa, so yes, this development will absolutely impact me and my family directly. I want to start by reminding the council members that they have a duty to their constituents, many who showed up tonight to oppose this data center. So as a reminder, here is the MPK mission statement. The mission of the city of Monterey Park is to provide excellent service, foster growth and opportunity, and create a joyous and collaborative environment. MPK Council members have not fulfilled their duties to their constituents to create a collaborative environment. Rather, they have been working what appears to be in the shadows to put a 250,000 square foot data center in a residential area. And you are correct. I have been misinformed. I was under the impression that there were going to be 14 diesel engines. And tonight I learned that there's going to be 24 diesel engines. So, yes, absolutely misinformed. Where I can do a script, but I'm so aghast right now at the city council. where where was this for the public why did you not approach your constituents the people that you work for not 40 people if we have five board districts that's eight representatives per board district for 60,000 people is that representative absolutely not. Okay, so let's keep going. Misinformed. Okay. This data center is not growth or opportunity for the residents of Monterey Park, who will bear the burdens of the effects of the first data center. And why do I say first? Because the fact of the matter is, if you let this one come on, we will be bullied into two, three, four of them in Monterey Park, because they will have gotten the first one. And when they get the first one, that will be on every single one of you on the city council. And I think it's interesting. I've never been to a city council. Actually, that's not true. I have been to a city council member, but I've never spoken in front of my city council. I have committed each of your names to my memory after sitting here for three hours tonight. And trust me, I will work my hardest if this data center comes in to ensure that none of you are elected again. I will do that. I am not a political person.
But the fact of the matter is, is that you guys are, we are a city of grieving. We are a city of grieving. And you know what you're going to turn us into? a city of anger and dissatisfaction. We live in a beautiful city. From where I live, I can hear the traffic on the freeway. I can hear them shooting clay pucks at Whittier Narrows. I can hear the kids playing basketball, I'm sorry, baseball from La Loma and the people cheering them on from my home. Do you know what that means? That means that if this data center makes noise, I will hear that too. So with that, I just want to remind you that you have a duty to us, your constituents, to not put this data center here in Monterey Park. Period. Full stop. no data center. Woo! EIR. Awesome. But no, nothing. This should not be here. No to data centers. No to data centers.
Good evening, Mayor Yang, council members and staff. I'm Stephen J. Kung, and I live in District five right by La Loma Park. When I got the news about a meeting to approve the EIR, Jesse and I were euphoric. Finally, we can get back to our lives and leave the drama behind, but then we took a closer look and realized that the moratorium merely kicks the can down the road and only for 45 days, and the fundamental problem remains for a prospective data center. I'm here to request three things. First, the community should oversee the EIR process, including selection of contractor
and establishment of environmental thresholds. Two, the city needs to commission a comprehensive
health impact assessment reflecting the health priorities and lived experience of residents. If you need more guidance on this, just ask my husband, Jesse Damon. This is literally what he does for a living, and he holds an MPH in community health sciences.
And three, during this moratorium, the community should have significant input into the development of data center regulations. we do not trust Inez Alvarez and Tim Ho to fix the very problem they caused, and they should be removed from the process. Inez Alvarez, you and Tim Ho need to be held accountable for your complicity. Your non-information campaign that has been on brazen display today favors the applicant. Even today, people are just finding out about the data center. There hasn't been a single mention of the data center in Cascades. The SPARC committee was a sham. The way you cozied up to Brian Marsh at the December 3rd council meeting, all on tape, belies your inability to read a room and exposes your true allegiance. We do not want you drafting any EIR or data center regulations. It needs to be drafted by a disinterested third party with significant community impact. ¿ to mention the value of my home while shrouded in secrecy, you need to understand it doesn't get more personal than that.
Inez Alvarez, Ninde Shalai, Alvarez, Alvarez, Tim Ho, Tim Ho, Brian Marsh, Brian Marsh Data Center Data Center
As you can tell, the Data Center is an albatross and deeply unpopular among your electorate. The longer this drags on, the more bitter we get.
The more you will lose us.
But you, the City Council, have the power to end it all right here. persuade Brian Marsh to withdraw his application or just outright reject the application and emerge the hero?
Do you have the courage to not just be a politician, but a leader? We all hope to have your answer soon. Thank you.
Good evening. I am an owner of a mom pop shop that has been in Monterey Park for 30 years. I am a daughter of parents that live here, granddaughter of my grandmother that lives here, friends of friends that live here, two blocks away from the space chosen for the data center. Monterey Park has a huge Asian community that are survivors of the Vietnam War. They fled Vietnam in boats to travel to LA, than was told that Monterey Park is their new home. They love this place, that they chose to make this place their permanent home. I know because my dad is one of those survivors. He and people I serve in my family restaurant. English is not their first language, and the majority of them are about 50-plus years old. Knowing that, are you taking advantage of these particular citizens of Monterey Park that don't understand what's going on? Are you looking to make them move again? Are you looking to make them? Are you here for the citizens of Monterey Park, or are you here for the money? That's all I'm asking. Monterey Park has much culture and history that a data center will not add to. As a citizen here, no to the data center. Thank you.
Hi, good evening. My name is Eric Morales and I'm a permanent resident over in District 4. I've been here since birth and my family's next generation is being raised here. I'm only interested in the protection and development of Monterey Park's economy. I would like to feel like my interests are being represented moving forward and I want an indefinite moratorium. Thank you for your time, Council Members and Monterey Park. Hello, my name is Madeline.
I've lived in Monterey Park for over 25 years. I'm a utilities engineer, and on the side, I volunteer for a plant-based treaty, which fights climate change to the food system and makes healthy food accessible to all. So I obviously care about climate change and public health. I'm speaking to demand that the city council vote yes on item 5A and adopt the urgency ordinance to help data center activity i demand that the city council ban data center activity completely data centers could increase energy and water demands raising bills for residents given the planned diesel generators they pose risks to air quality noise pollution and public health it would mean loss of land and very few permanent jobs as people have mentioned this would hurt monterey park's reputation of a calm peaceful environment and community filled with green spaces, and as a result, people may think twice about visiting or living here. This would benefit an overseas firm and not Monterey Park residents. The slogan up there says, faith in the future. I won't have faith in the future if this data center goes through. We're going to destroy the environment and public health for what? For more AI swap? For the greedy tech bros? Is this what you want your legacy to be? be on the right side of history and reject data centers.
Put people over profit. Thank you.
I'm going to call a few more names. Aurora Mireles. Yes. Okay.
Caleb Shimke. Alex Leon. Richard Kame.
Yoko. Alice Lee.
and Sam Kahan.
Good evening, council members.
That was my daughter.
She's chosen to make this her home.
My name is Aurora Mireles.
I'm a lifelong resident of Monterey Park. I'm also a teacher, a UTLA member, and organizer. My kids, like I said, have chosen to make this beautiful city their home. My family and I walked our neighborhood in District 3 to inform them about this monstrosity. AI is a tool nobody needed to solve problems that didn't exist. I agree with previous speakers. We were misled by you. Our representatives and data centers will ruin our quality of life. We are organizing. We will not let fear, uncertainty, and doubt stop us from organizing to put a stop to this here and in neighboring cities. Use the land to address the need for affordable housing. We are all watching to see if you stand with the people or with corporate interests.
Thank you.
Hello, my name is Caleb. I'm a resident in Monterey Park, and I wanted to support the moratorium and maybe even have it extended, not just 40 days, but like 400. or 4,000 days. I just finished, I have my certificate here of the homeless count that was just performed tonight. And I, you know, to highlight what the previous speaker said, it would be great if we instead devoted more land towards affordable housing. And so that's my comment.
Hi, my name is Alice. I'm here to ask that the City Council vote yes on item 5a to immediately halt data center activity in Saturn Park And additionally, I ask that City Council take steps to ban data centers outright I was born and raised in Monterey Park and I have lived in the city all my life Right now, I am a resident in Council District 1 I come from a really big family of working-class immigrants and most of my family members also live in Monterey Park I am deeply concerned about the impact that any data center would have on our access to essential resources and on our health One of my aunts is retired. She's on SSI and she's on food stamps. Her family lives in a second-floor apartment that gets really, really hot in the summer. And so during heat waves, will they be able to afford to turn on their air conditioner if a data center hikes up electricity prices? Will they have clean water to drink if runoff from a data center enters the water supply? Another one of my aunts is a server at a Chinese restaurant. She has asthma, and during the wildfires last year, she had trouble breathing even indoors with her windows closed. So what will happen to her if a data center is regularly releasing large amounts of toxic particles into the air? What about my little nieces and nephews? Will they have to risk respiratory illness every time they try to go to the park to play? My oldest aunt had a stroke two years ago, and she's no longer mobile. So what happens to her if the power keeps going out, or if it stays out? In all of my time living here, the people that I have known and interacted with have almost all been from, or they've all been from immigrant working class families like mine. And so many of the residents of the city, as I think a lot of people here tonight have pointed out, do not have the same kind of access to come to these meetings and to address all of you. But they will also be the folks who are hit the hardest by the consequences of building any data center. And so to the members of City Council, I really hope that you will do the right thing and ban data centers outright. Thank you.
Hey, my name is Sam.
Mayor, thank you guys for all having this.
I don't know.
It was really kind of apparent to me. I think I could probably count on one hand how many people were for this thing. And this room was pretty full tonight. It was pretty full on December 3rd. And, yeah, I think that just kind of speaks volumes to the way that the community feels about this. I live in District 3, Jose. Yeah, and I had some talking points that I wrote out, but I actually like this little thing that they put out here from the applicant. So I'll use this for my talking points because it's better than my handwriting.
Monterey Park Data Center. It's not plural.
I believe I read in their investment documentation that they have an LAX1 and an LAX2. And I've also read about 1980 Saturn Street that they've also acquired. So, and tonight I heard that we were going to have this moratorium for data centers in general, not specifically. I don't know if that's what you meant, but it appears to me that there might be two of these things, you know, one coming up right behind this. So with that in mind, you know, a few things with the, you know, things that were brought up. But I think this project's been known about for some time now, right, like two years or one year when the MND came out. but something that I don't think has been talked about is that the environmental impacts have just been discussed with regards to one building, 1977 Saturn.
Not two buildings.
They're right across the street from each other. And there was some hand-wavy kind of explanation in the initial study about the operational diesel generator use that we can't predict some kind of event that we will use these generators, right? I'm surprised that even flew by the South Coast
air quality board.
They're just saying we're not going to analyze this because we can't predict it. If you can't predict it, why would you have the diesel generators there in the first place? And I don't think it's hard to develop a scenario, maybe 24 hours, 48 hours of grid outage. How long are we going to allow these things to run? I think South Coast knows they have thresholds in their documents here. It says stringent regulatory thresholds required by CEQA or South Coast, they know how long
it should be run.
and I think these people have a right to know. And with regards to rates, I mean, you're putting two times the amount of the city of Monterey Park's load right here. With another building, that would be four times the amount of demand just in one spot. And, you know, for all of, you know, SoCal Edison customers, if they look at their bill and they look at the time of use rates, we know that these things are influenced by supply and demand. So you're heavily increasing the demand of electricity here. and I heard on December 3rd and right here it says, you know, there's really no impact to rates, but I don't necessarily buy that and I think that SoCal Edison should put out their analysis as to how they came to that conclusion and what impact that's going to have on the rate payer for the next five to ten years. I heard a lot of people that are concerned about that and that's happened in other communities. Let's see what else we got here. Yeah, the transparency and stuff, you know, I think a lot of people have talked about that. Like this project you know, they say environmental and zoning review for over a two-year period. So this thing's been ongoing for two years. The MND was out in October 2024. I heard about this last month. A lot of people heard about it tonight. So the community outreach has been very poor.
I'll, you know, try to be nice about that. You guys have gotten a lot of heat on that.
Yeah, and I think that's it.
I'm going to hang it up. So, yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Let me read us some more names. Are you Richard? No, I'm Alex. What's your name? Alex Leon. Alex, okay.
So Yoko is not here.
Richard Kame.
I have another one from Vincent Chang, who already spoke.
Grace Young.
Mimi Lee. Hallie.
Jenny Talia Dow, Nancy Nguyen, Mitchell Del Rio, and Aaron Revellis.
All right, Alex. Good evening.
My name is Alex, and I live in Monterey Parks District 1.
Tom, I'll be seeing you in November. I want to speak for the people who wake up, raise families, and who build lives in this city,
because what was being proposed here is not for us. It is for corporations that will never live with the consequences of what they leave behind.
Data centers are not community development.
They are industrial infrastructure. They consume enormous public resources, they lock up land permanently, and they turn living neighborhoods into service zones for someone else's profit. That is not progress for residents, that is extraction. Our city is dense, our land is scarce, and our families are already struggling with housing costs, traffic, pollution, and an overburdened infrastructure. And now we are being asked to give up even more. Not for parks, not for homes, not for schools. ¿ because if this is allowed, it will not be the last proposal. One becomes the justification for the next, and suddenly the future of our city is being shaped by whoever shows up with the biggest industrial project and the best lawyers.
A moratorium is not hesitation.
It is resistance.
It is a city saying our neighborhoods are not commodities. Our land is not for sale, and our future will not be decided by corporate demand. Monterey Park should be built for people, not machines. For families, not server racks. For community life, not industrial infrastructure.
This is our home.
And it's worth defending.
Hello. I'll keep things brief and stick to the facts. My name is Mitchell Del Rio, and I'm here to voice my opposition to the proposed data center at 1977 Saturn. The city council must adopt a moratorium halting the development of the data center until a proper environmental study has been conducted. In addition to the increased water and electricity usage in the valley without any clear economic benefits, the construction would be a source of air, noise, and water pollution. The potential long-term health issues caused by the construction far away the dubious potential gains of the proposed data center. and the data center will not bring any long-term jobs to the city and any potential profits generated by this AI driven bubble will only benefit on Australian corporation that has zero interest in a long-term future of Bonnary Park the City Council has a responsibility to its constituency a constituency that is here today shown an overwhelming opposition to becoming the next victim of the damage caused by short-term side of corporations chasing short-term profits. Speaking of facts, I wish to remind the council that you serve us. We elected you and if you don't reject the data center come November we will eject you. Remember that you are our neighbors and the negative consequences of the data center will also be felt by you. Am I boring you? Thank you.
Yes. Hi, my name is Nancy, and this is the first time I come here because I have this situation that the city council changed my zone to a commercial. Now I came into the meeting and I found out because of the data center, they changed my residential zone to a commercial zone without my permission approved. And that's why this is really make me upset. I'm building the house because I like to live in the city of Monterey Park. And during the project that I pay so much for the city permit, everything, and now they say that I cannot build anymore. and now they changed back to the commercial zone. And now they say that I have to change it back. It's going to cost me $100,000. And the zone has been residential zone for 40 years. So why are you guys doing this to me? And this is not fair for me, you know. And I spent so much money, and I want to live in the city of Monterey Park. And now I found out the data center. Because of the data center, they converted my residential zone to a commercial zone. And without informing, I did not receive any letter or anything.
I'm really upset. and I really hope that the city council and the mayor, you know, change it back to my residential zone because my lot is very small and my zone is next to the residential people leave, not a commercial. I don't want to build any office commercial zone there. I need a house to leave. and I hope all the people here that helped me you know to bring my residential zone back because I don't have money to pay a hundred thousand dollars to switch it back that's what the city the planning department told me to do and this is not fair and they could you know the project that I'm doing, it's been two years, and it's almost ready to build, and now they say that I cannot build anymore. And this is the one on Vegabon. Thank you. I think the city staff are going to follow up with that one. I'm not sure where. Okay. Okay.
Okay.
Council, earlier you were asking us to respect the data center supporters' times, but it's clear that they aren't respecting us, period. I've been watching all of you now on your phones texting. You don't even seem to give us the time of day with side conversations. you've misled the public multiple times the last meeting on December 3rd. You had lied to us that the public cannot comment if they were to be heard that day of December 3rd, that they couldn't comment today on January 21st. So if you want to talk about respect, then you don't tell us what we have to... This is our business. You have to hear us and you will respect our time. If you have the nerve to tell us to keep it short so we can all go home early, we are all already having sleepless nights.
Last meeting, I was listening to residents having to beg for you to fix the pool that's falling apart. But it takes just some random investor who isn't even from here. It's arrogant. As a member of the community, it's clear that with the overwhelming amount of people here tonight, we all collectively believe in one thing. there is no benefit from the proposed data center.
The colleagues alongside us tonight have already done the work to collect and present immense empirical data and scientific findings and present clear, compelling evidence, and you still choose to ignore us, and it leads us as a community to come to the conclusion that you take us as stupid. Even with the 45-day moratorium emerging, it is not a permanent solution, and it is not enough. We want a complete end to the data center entirely.
The amount of people here that have already tried to remind you that all of you are serving on the boards, public servants, while there's no public benefit from this project, we will see no job creation. We will be subjected to deafening noise pollution, and it would be constant and unending. You wouldn't like it if protesters showed up with megaphones outside your house every night, but from what I understand, that is well within their constitutional right. How are we expected to foot the bill for the water and electricity usage and we don't even get a cut of the share Monterey Park's property value is going to plummet from this project while our energy bills will skyrocket and what will happen is people will begin to leave and it's going to tear this community apart. Not only will we have be condemned to tripled health risks that include cancer and reproductive birth defects. We're going to have to watch ourselves or our loved ones suffer slow, agonizing, and preventable deaths. These scenarios have full scientific weight behind them to better illustrate what's at stake for our community and what our future is going to look like. But what about right now? You're listening to people who are telling you they can't even pay their bills and it doesn't matter to you because ice is flooding our streets and there was no rush to stop any of this. We as the public are telling you that this is our city. Our families live here. Generations have called this home. This is not up to five council members to auction it off. Monterey Park is not for sale.
How hypocritical of the board to even present a land acknowledgement when this very same land they're looking to pollute and exploit. I am not going to thank the council for an IER or moratorium. You only agreed to this moratorium because you got scared when we put on pressure. I'm going to thank everyone behind me who fought for this moratorium, and they're fighting to the end until we see an end to the project, and they deserve the credit, not you. I'm not going to attempt people that just attempted to poison us and pretend that it didn't happen. You keep disgracing yourselves. You want money. There's money right here. You can invest in your community, and you need to all resign. So many people are reminding you to do their jobs. It's obvious you can't. Every resident here tonight, they're doing your jobs for you. We deserve to be free of you. We do not deserve to be embarrassed by you.
All right, let me call some more names. Are you Mimi? Yes.
Okay, Logan Bell. Godfrey Wachira, Dave Jones, Brian Merck, Vivian Romero, Heling Lee, and Angelica.
All right, go ahead.
Hi, good evening, council members. My name is Mimi Lee. I'm a resident of Monterey Park here with my two elderly parents and two little sisters and Like many others. I just found out about this data center project within the past two weeks or so I missed the first meeting because I didn't know about it And I just want to say that I oppose the data centers Now or ever with or without an EIR report We already know what happens to communities that allow these type of things. We will not be another Flint, Michigan, or another city that has become a wasteland or polluted. Please make the right decision. Protect our environment, protect our communities and our families.
Thank you.
Hello, Brian Merkey. I live in District 3, about half a mile, less than half a mile from the data center. I think it's clear people don't want this, so I assume, I hope you all are going to vote yes on the 45-day moratorium.
What you should do next, this was put on the agenda, very short notice. This council today could put on the agenda for the next meeting for a permanent moratorium.
They can do that right now. They can put on a permanent moratorium.
If this council is afraid that the talented lawyers from the data center are going to sue the council for putting on a moratorium, then the council can put it to the voters to decide clearly, do we want this? Do we not want this? The voters can decide if you're afraid we have a pending application.
We can't kill it right away. maybe they're going to sue us, I don't know. You can put it to the voters. We can vote no.
You can take the decision out of your hands because you've clearly bungled it so far.
You really have.
Councilmember Wong, you were at the SPARK meetings. You helped do the SPARK meetings, and you worked for Edison at the time. And you had the developer of the data center do presentations, do meet and greets and everything. I mean, this is how serious this SPARK meeting was. Do you know what they ranked parks as a priority? Dead last, okay?
Parks, not only dead last, a red frowny face, okay?
That's what they ranked parks. ¿
applications, okay? Do you know, I'm an attorney. I'm an attorney for the county of LA. Do you know how hard it is to get your law license suspended? You can show up drunk to a murder trial and still
keep your license, but you sold it overseas for how much money? $1,500 retainer to submit thousands
of fraudulent applications. And now we have a half a billion dollar developer coming to our town. We have a man who has financial interest in Edison, and we have a council member who's already had her license suspended for kickbacks and fraud. We have a big project coming to town. And you know what the council did?
They pushed it through quietly.
They did it so quietly, snuck through the night until the people caught wind of it. And now you can put on last-minute moratoriums just like that,
but you could have done that six months ago, and you didn't.
So for the next meeting, permanent moratorium.
Thank you. Thank you.
Good evening, Mayor Yang, honorable council members, dedicated staff. My name is Dave Jones, and I am not angry.
I am not disappointed. I am overjoyed at the citizen advocacy that we are seeing here tonight.
I am proud of my fellow Monterey Park citizens, and I am so glad to hear the elderly being so well represented. But I'm going to represent myself tonight. I grew up in Monterey Park. I went to school in Monterey Park. My family moved to Alhambra, and then I moved back to Monterey Park to raise my family, and I've been here for 35 years since then. Not only that, I worked at 1977 Saturn Street, and I worked at 1980 Saturn Street. I moved Union Bank into 1980 Saturn Street when they opened that building up. So I'm bringing all of that up because I want to make sure everyone understands I am not an outsider. Also, people seem to be concerned about misinformation.
So let me be perfectly clear.
The numbers I'm going to use in just a few minutes come directly from the initial study and mitigated negative declaration released to the public on behalf of the applicant. I'm here tonight to speak on the proposed 45-day moratorium on the new data centers in Monterey Park and to say I support the moratorium. A moratorium is a good idea. Yes, it should be permanent.
Data centers of the type proposed do not belong in Monterey Park. Yes, there may be a need for them.
Not here. This isn't NIMBYism.
This is they are a bad fit. When I reviewed the initial study, I found it had 892 references to CO2, 1,071 references to noise, and 1,361 references to hazardous waste.
And the completely ludicrous finding that all of this added up to a less than significant environmental impact. Ludicrous. Completely. Ludicrous.
The study says the data center, when operational, this is their numbers, the data center, when operational, will use enough electricity over 400 million kilowatt hours per year
to generate 83,000 million metric tons of CO2. 83,000 million tons.
That's a big number to contemplate. You could not count to that number in your lifetime.
It's 227 million tons per day.
9.5 million tons of CO2 per hour. 9.5 million tons of CO2 every single hour. But that's not significant.
Oh, wait, wait, wait. That's less than significant.
I don't want to be accused of spreading this information. Sorry, there's no test, but we're going to have to do some math right now. Talking about mitigation, one acre of trees can absorb two and a half tons of CO2 per year. That means we need to plant over 4 million acres of trees per hour of CO2, over 100 million acres of trees per day, and 36 billion acres per year. That's 57 million square miles. It's more than 57 million square miles. That's 349 times the size of the entire state of California.
It's physically impossible to mitigate the CO2 generated from the electricity used by these data centers.
There is no way anyone can say in good conscience the environmental impact of this data center is less than significant. I see my time will expire, so I will skip the rest of the stuff that I had on noise, water, hazardous waste. I will say tier four generators, they're just as loud.
Okay?
So don't buy the stuff that they're talking about that.
Listen to the people. Listen to the people, city council. You can see they're here. You can hear their voice. It's saying you don't have to listen. You don't have to listen hard. It's very obvious.
No data centers in Monterey Park.
Good evening, council members. My name is Godfrey Washira, and I'm with Creed LA.
We actually support the Saturn Data Center project because we work to uplift working families.
Let him speak!
One of the benefits of the project is that it will create a pathway for those who want to start a union career in construction. That means a lot, and will open doors for a brighter future for many, including at-risk youth and people in need of a second chance. As an organization we've done over the years, we've worked on providing pathways for so many people, and we've seen how families' lives have been changed, the economic mobility that has taken place, the economic stability. And we truly believe that economic prosperity and economic freedom is the foundation of all other justices that take place. So we are proud to work on behalf of working families.
We have always... I mean, like...
what we've seen, the impact that it has had on them, just seeing people's lives change, seeing guys who needed a second chance, who came out of prison and got a union career, and now they're taking care of themselves and living up to their families.
That means a lot. That really does mean a lot.
And so opening opportunities for working families is a noble ideal and one that is worth your consideration moving forward.
Thank you. Hello, my name is Angelica.
I want to say that I am in support of the environmental impact report that you all are suggesting, but I want to make it 100% clear I am against this data center in Monterey Park. I did not grow up in Monterey Park, but Monterey Park has helped raise me. I went to the community college here.
I've shopped here.
And now I'm so very fortunate that I live in South San Gabriel, which is minutes away from this data center.
Okay, minutes.
Okay, I can name you a million reasons of what makes Monterey Park amazing. And I'm sure everybody here can agree with me and give me a million more reasons.
But what put Monterey Park on the map? This tragedy.
this tragedy that happened the loss of life january 21st 2023 is what put monterey park on the map okay now all of you in support of this data center want to you're going to one-up that tragedy and put built this data center like really is that what you want to monterey park to be
remembered as henry i see you walking your dog okay i see you walking your dog you want to destroy that piece that we have? Like how ridiculous. Do not trash Monterey Park.
Good evening, Mayor, Council Members. Hi, Henry. Haven't seen you in a while. My name is Vivian Romero. It's been a long time since I've been in this chamber. I have a lot of family that lived for decades in Monterey Park on Windover Way. I was a resident at one point over on De La Fuente for a brief time, and I currently live one mile away from this zone. My partner Shannon and I ride bikes there on Potrero, on Saturn. We walk there. We've endured decades of environmental injustice. and severe negative health impacts. Four members already diagnosed with cancer. My mom is terminal right now. And I really attribute it to a lot of the hazardous cancer clusters, including the Monterey Park Superfund site, including the Monterey Park SoCal Edison Mesa substation, which he works for, the Pomona 60 Freeway Cap and Trade Corridor, and the towering Tehachapi Power Transmission Lines. You add to this toxic mix Los Angeles Airport jetliners, which are sometimes just a few hundred feet above my home, flying because of the FAA flight path. And I remember Teresa was also in opposition to that as I was going to the LAX roundtable meetings. This is all creating a lot of noise, a lot of vibration, super fun toxins, methane gas, fumes. And the zoning that was indicated earlier by the city attorney has a huge influence. Zoning is the gatekeeper. If you allow this data center, those emissions, the constant noise from those fans and the generator exhaust and the power-hungry servers will create an unacceptable, totally unacceptable toxic triangle. worsening respiratory disease, cancer, asthma, heart disease, and children's health. Construction near those Tehachapi lines risks more electromagnetic interference, arc flashes, power outages during peak loads, compounded by Superfund toxins in the soil, the air, and the water, things that we breathe and drink. Our emergency responses would probably also be strained if there was any kind of a catastrophic event. We're by the Superfund site, a busy highway. Hundreds of thousands of cars on a daily basis are queuing on the Pomona Freeway. They're stopped, going both directions, east and west. And then you've got the Edison substation. Those emergency responses will suffer delays. And any data center incident or fire or spill or breach would heighten the disaster potential. I'd like you to all consider that when you vote. The nighttime noise is already at a very high decibel level. 24-7 operations would compound traffic rumble and vibration and the hum, driving up people's stress, their sleep disruption, mental health issues for families that are already overburdened. Please take a minute when you can to watch the YouTube video exposing the dark side of America's AI data center explosion. Don't turn that zone into an industrial hellscape, please. I urge you, we already have enough pollution and toxins. There's enough unbearable health burdens there already. The quality of life issues in our community, a community of color. I look around the room, we're all people of color. Boston
here today to voice our support for the proposed moratorium. I want to thank everyone who came here prepared statements personal stories and research but I don't have anything prepared so my statement will be brief and it will be simple. We believe that requiring a full environmental impact report is the bare minimum for any data center project but we stand in opposition to the 1977 Saturn data center project. Councilmember Sanchez we We are constituents of your district, and we are especially looking for your support on this agenda item. Thank you for your time.
All right, give me a second.
Let me read off some more names.
Are you Helen?
Yes. Okay. We have Theresa, no last name.
Amy, Amy L, Lily Huang,
Emily, I think it's Leanne, Emily Leanne, Dolores Rogue, Michelle E., Aaliyah Fang, and Ismail.
All right, go ahead. Hi, my name is Helen. First time I speak in public, sorry. I live here for 35 years. My kids grow up here, and I have many families and friends in the city. I just heard of this project about three days ago. So I Googled what is AI Data Center, and the picture shows up. It's all just a building with these computer standing things. There's no human inside, so there won't be any jobs besides the construction for a year or two. and I'm amazed of the size. 250,000 square feet. I've never seen anything that big in my lifetime. But I can't imagine. I mean, I feel like microwave, how radioactive. I try to avoid it as much as I can. Imagine a 250,000 square foot full of engine electrical. Even if I had the money, would I want to buy somewhere in the city? I mean, luckily, I've lived here for 35 years and a homeowner. But as of now with the price, if I had the money, would I choose Monterey Park? I'm just saying. Thank you a lot. I mean, I'm at awe of the presence of the people who show up today. And I just urge you all to serve the people, the community that you campaign to do so when you campaign. So please, no data center in San Gabriel. I mean, you don't see it proposed in San Marino, South Pass, Pasadena. Why do they pick us? maybe because they see our city as weak city council members or, you know, we have or us. Thank you.
Hello, community members of Monterey Park. My name is Lily, and I work as a nurse. I have grave news. ICE is here. They are here in our communities. They are masked. They are armed. They wear no badges, show no identification. They are trigger happy and drunk on power. It makes sense why they may feel that when it seems that they and everyone in D.C. these days have absolute immunity. No repercussions when 30-plus people have died in ICE holdings. No repercussions when they shoot a bystander in the face. when they stop cars, pull people out of cars, throw weapons at nonviolent protesters, beat up people, and even pepper spray an entire family, including their baby. It doesn't matter if any of the people they abduct daily have actually committed any crime or not. They don't care. At this point, really, anyone who thinks that what ICE is doing is okay need to take a good look at the mirror, really look at yourself, and ask yourself why you are as racist and money-worshipping as you are. everywhere we look the wealth divide could not be more clear ice is just one of the many weapons that the wealthy elites of this country used to control the masses any protest at all against these blatant human abuses are labeled as against the law who makes the laws in the first place that's right the porters of power and money gotten usually by being born into it or by being oppressors even this data center who doesn't benefit but the ultra wealthy and the ultra greedy Maybe it will generate the city some funds some people have said to do what so they can funnel more money than the already near 40% expected expected general fund expenditure to the Monterey Park police so that the police can continue to stand by as ice attacks or worse support ice themselves. so that the city can continue to not build low-income housing for modern parkers who are already being swallowed and pushed out by this skyrocketing real estate market, which it seems is what anyone here cares about these days. Not the fact that their neighbors are starving and living paycheck to paycheck, afraid to leave their home because of the color of their skin and where they were born, which, by the way, are things that people cannot control. No, people here are more interested in the property values of the city going up, the optics of good schools and good families. Nothing this comfortable and this good is earned without human suffering as a price. The U.S. is built on top of Native Americans and African American slaves. Our taxes continue to fund the military-industrial complex, which goes to kill people far, far away so we can take their oil or their mines, but we never get to see it, so we get to sleep soundly at night. Now, this is shameful. This is not right. So what can we do to fight back? The answer is showing up and protesting like we are doing today. But to keep showing up, even when it's not right in your backyard, the answer is to boycott, divest, and sanction. It works, but we all have to work together. Any big brand name that you recognize is probably too big already. Boycott Amazon, Walmart, places that are owned by billionaires are a good start. There are no ethical billionaires. It is impossible to make that much money on your own labor. And I hate to hear it, but yes, boycott Dodgers, because when every ticket you buy, you enrich the billionaire CEO who oversees something like $12 million in investments in ICE detention centers and is connected with Palantir. Under the current system, we are all complicit, but there are more of us than there are of them. If we all use the Boycat and the No Thanks app, we can each start saying no to fascism, no to a police state. If we start caring about those less fortunate than us, whether they are very close or far, far away, if we each make the individual choice to stop supporting the businesses of these mega wealthy assholes, if we put the money and then the time in where our values truly are, if we do mutual aid, and then we might just be able to have a world worth living for before we die. I have Teresa, Amy L., Emily Leon, Dolores, Roque, and then Meishao Yi. Right, so Emily? Emily, okay. Council members, I'm going to keep this short and sweet. My name is Emily Leon, and I'm a longtime resident of Monterey Park. I'm actually part of Henry Lo's district. Folks, there's been some really good journalism surrounding data centers and all of them have come to the same conclusion, the same contestants. Data centers poison supplies of fresh water, use up exorbitant amounts of electricity and then force residents to pay for their consumption. The message I got is clear. Building the data center would mean rendering the lives of Monterey Park residents disposable. The people who actually reside in Monterey Park deserve prioritization over the interest and profit of a foreign developer. I defer my time to other speakers. Thank you.
All right. Mayshele E. Aliyah Fang. Ismael. Angela Hong. Samuel Taylor. I want to
I thank the city and everyone for reconsidering the environmental impacts. As we can see, there's a lot of concern, and so it's good that we're taking this step back and considering those conditions again that I had spoke about before to safeguard the community from any impacts. And so what I wanted to add is I took a look at the conditions, and I think we can do more. I know we said LEED.
There's other. There's ENERGY STAR.
There's ISO 50001. standards so that we can make sure that their power usage effectiveness is as as efficient as possible. There's a lot of other considerations as you can hear from the audience. There's a lot of concerns with power use and so I highly recommend that you remove any requirements for public EV charging because EV charging requires a great deal of power, a lot more power and so as you hear there's a great demand on this property and so requiring EV charging at this location would make it even worse. And so I recommend instead that we consider requiring self-generation, solar battery storage to mitigate that energy consumption,
get them as lean as possible,
and then if necessary we could add that self-generation to help reduce that consumption. Also after that, with the battery storage,
if they could work with the utility,
they can become an asset to the grid.
They can become a microgrid.
And so when the city and the community is in need of power, they can draw down power from the battery storage from the facility. Also, as you can hear, there's a lot of concern with the fuel, the generators and the diesel fuel. And so one recommendation I did make is considering hydro-treated vegetable oil, and so that it's a lot more safe for the environment.
so that's something to consider.
Hey, guys. You know, every single week I come to the... Every meeting I come here and I fight very, very hard for your right to speak. I have been berated, belittled, reprimanded, written up by this council because of me fighting for your right to speak and to have time to speak. I'm asking you, please, it's okay if we disagree. it's okay if people don't want a data setter or want a data setter. This is America. This is a democratic process. We should all allow everyone to speak and hear what they have to say without everybody yelling, without people being scared. People shouldn't feel terrified to speak up and say how they feel. I shouldn't feel like I'm going to get beat up or have my car scratched or my tires slashed. people should feel comfortable to say what they're thinking. Just as much as I've protected your right to speak and I continue to do so, I do so for everybody even people that I disagree with. So please have that same respect for each other because we're neighbors and we're supposed to love each other whether we get along or agree or not. So please everybody do that favor and I'm going to I'm going to defend the SPARC committee. I'm going to defend Thomas Wong. And if you all know me here, I am not one for this council, okay? I am one who has fought with this council so many times. But I'm going to tell you, he is telling the truth. The SPARC committee, Thomas Wong,
did not support this data center.
None of them have. And all of that information that you see out there, it's a lie. And it's not fair that he's being bullied and harassed based on a lie. If you want to fight something and you disagree, it's okay. But do it based on facts. Hurting people based on a lie, it's not right. That's not right. Bullying anybody is not right. So please. Please.
Mayor. Excuse me.
It's 11 o'clock. You want to make a motion to extend the meeting?
Ms. Mayor, maybe we can take a quick break.
I think we've been going for close to,
council's been going over five yards straight now.
Does anyone want to make a motion to extend the meeting?
I'll make a motion to extend the meeting for at least another hour.
Okay.
And actually, we're at the last few speakers, so we can finish this agenda item before taking a break.
A second extension for an hour.
Yeah.
Yeah, so we'll vote on the motion to extend the meeting time.
Motion approved. Thank you.
All right, let me just call these last few. Did anyone put in a speaker card and not speak yet?
Oh, there's still people. Then you can- ¿
George. Jory. It looks like J-O-R-G or Q. Sorry if I... Gorea. Jorge. Jorge. Yeah. Last name is C-O-R-R-E-A. Yeah. Thomas Fernandez. Tomas. Katie looks like Cole. Felicia Sandoval, Catherine Torres, Shada, Jack Chen, Ann, and Robert Lopez.
I'll come down and if you're speaking on item 5A, we'll just change the speaker card quickly.
Hello, good evening. What's your name? My name is Sam Mao. I'm a resident for the
Are you speaking on 5A?
Yeah.
So we'll change your speaker's card.
Okay, yeah.
This says public communications right now.
Okay. Sorry, I make a mistake. But actually, I'll be here for at least five hours for here. But actually, as the previous speaker already told them this is the data center. I have a twice. I remember the investigation, this is twice of the whole Montreux part, the cities, the electricity usage, but there's annual years. But how do you think that this is one spot, but the electricity, the usage of twice of the whole city? So how do you think that this is like a microwave, if you're thinking this is just a data center, but you're thinking this is one spot, then twice of the usage of the whole city, the Monterey City. So how do you think that this is like a microwave in the civilian area, just like a neighborhood. And other things is you're thinking my house is just only near this, just within one mile, and other the Hillcrest, the school, just only we think this is nearby, this is a data center. I think in this report, I didn't see some radiations and investigation or something. But at least, as I know that, this is a high usage of this electricity electricity in this small spot. So that will be radiation, will be higher, and then make the public pollution or public a healthy issue. So that's my concern then. And I'm living here and moving here in Montreal part at least 10 years. at least 10 years. And my family and my child, two child, three child living here, so how come this is a race from here because these are data centers. So I in this, we don't want to the data center. This is what I want to try to say. Thank you. Thank you.
Good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, City Attorney, City Manager, and Council Members. My name is Katie Cole, and I am opposed to a data center being allowed in the city of Monterey Park. I oppose it not only for myself, but for the family and friends I have who are working and raising families in the SGV area, both around and within Monterey Park. I don't want any harm to come to my loved ones. I don't want people to come knocking on their door one day telling them to move out for a data center to take their place. I don't want them and their children to develop wear cancers or have to drink dirty contaminated water. I think it's wrong that hardworking members of our community should have to suffer due to a data center being allowed into their backyards. If you're hoping that this moratorium alone will dispel the public outrage at the prospect of an AI data center, you are dead wrong. There should be a complete ban on these AI dentist centers altogether. Data centers pose not only an environmental hazard, but a health risk as well. Children, elderly, and immunocompromised people will all feel the effects of a data center if one were to be allowed within this city. There are numerous examples of entire communities and cities that are destroyed by data centers, either due to the noise, the health of the community members, lack of water and resources, or just from being bought out by companies looking to expand into their backyards. I want to know just what is so good about an AI data center that you feel it's okay to ignore these risks. Why do you protect these data centers from scrutiny while turning a blind eye to all these concerns? What will it take for you to listen? It's wrong that we should have to fight so hard in order to stop this from happening. I really hope that you all consider and take into account just how many people today turned up to attend today's council meeting and give their opinions to you. This board full of people is this community's only way to make a difference and protect what we believe is right. The 45-day moratorium is not enough, nor is an EIR. Please listen to what we have to say and ban AI data centers from being built altogether. Thank you very much.
Good evening, Mayor Elizabeth Yang, Henry, Jose, Thomas, and Vin.
I know you all. You know me. I wasn't going to speak tonight, but about two weeks, maybe about a month ago, my son
started talking to me about the data center. I didn't know anything about it. I'm not really that informed. So I can't talk like some of these lawyers and inspectors or whatever. I don't have that kind of information. What I do know, I'm a mother. I'm a grandmother. I've just had a great-granddaughter born, and they live at my house. I don't hear anything safe about it. Now, we had a meeting last Wednesday for the Monterey Park Women's Club. As you know, I'm the president. There was a couple of ladies that came to speak on the data center. I had to stop them because we're not political, and I didn't have the pros and cons. but what I did notice that day is that not one person at our meeting there was about 40 ladies that usually attend and a couple of men didn't know anything about the Dana Center only one person, Carol
she knew
nobody else had ever heard of it
and I'm wondering
after I hear everybody I heard it from my son he heard it from my son because my son grooms his dog but you come to my house
but why
are so many people
not just uninformed but just don't know they just don't know and you know
what made me
stand up today
is that I went to a Democratic meeting the other day Vin, correct me if I'm wrong, you spoke about the data center. The first thing
you said was you were for it. Now, wait, wait. Have you all already made up your mind? Have you
already made up your mind? Because the first thing you said is I'm for it. You said that. And I said, wait a minute. Where's the con? If you're pro, where's the con? I mean, I want to know. I want to hit both sides so I can decide. Also, I'm a real estate agent. I'm not promoting that, but the real estate, the real estate, I believe, two people last week, because I'm also on Zillow, I do, I get Zillow leads, they told me that if there's a data center in Monterey Park, they won't even consider moving to Monterey Park. Now that, and I'm just talking last week, so I'm thinking, well, that's my retirement. It's like a 401k that maybe the 401k went down,
but I don't have a 401k. That's all I have. So, and I give back to this community. I like this, I love this community.
I've been here since 1986, and I know you all,
so I don't want to be your enemy. I have a dinner with you. I go to your house for parties.
But have you guys made up your mind?
I want to know.
Vin has, because he told me.
But have you made up your mind? If you made up your mind, then what are we doing here? what are we doing and that moratorium i agree is not the answer because i didn't know that's what i was coming here for tonight and i also asked vin at that same meeting do we get to vote and he said no you guys get to decide for us for 60 000 people no i don't i and my son he told me that if that comes to this city, he's moving. He's moving out. My granddaughter said the same thing, because she has a baby. So I guess I'm selling my house. You know, you guys, I hope you haven't made up your mind.
I hope tonight maybe there's another side that you see,
because these are the people. These are the people that we have. Do you all live in Monterey Park? Do you all have children who go to school in Monterey Park? Okay. I did. My son went to Macy Hillcrest. You know, you guys, I just want to say that when I go back to the Monterey Park Women's Cup, I can't talk politics. but I swear I'm going to spread the word about the data center because they need to know they need to know and I want to know why why did I not know when I have dinner with you guys and I have I go to your events why didn't I know why didn't I know how come my son had to tell me and then tell me all the reasons that he's against it. Couldn't you guys have mentioned it even lightly? Okay, but like I said, I'm your friend. I'm not your enemy. But you live here too, and your children live here too, and your school teacher, and your, you know, everybody has a position here.
So you guys make the right decision for all of us.
Or we will move. And when a lot of people move from an area, what happens? The real estate goes down. And our children will not want to go to school here. I mean, I wouldn't want to do it. I wouldn't want to go here either.
Thank you, though, for your time.
Hi, everyone. My name is Shada. I've lived in Monterey Park District 1 my entire life. Monterey Park means so much to me. It's where I grew up. It's where I met my husband at Mark Keppel High School. And it's where I plan to raise a family. I wasn't planning to speak, but then a professor spoke earlier supporting the data center, and I was disgusted. I am also a professor. I'm a professor that serves the San Gabriel Valley community at Pasadena City College. I want to make it clear that I do not support the data center. One of the classes I teach is research methods, which is a class I think you should all take. Spring semester at PCC starts February 18th. Because there seems to be a lack of skill when it comes to reading empirical evidence. I am not going to restate the evidence that was presented because I think my community did a wonderful job highlighting the negative impacts from the data center. center, I am going to talk about something that I noticed hasn't been talked about. I want to talk about how research on data centers is conducted. So if you were to take my class, something that you would learn is that research is conducted in different ways. There's typically some sort of ethic boards that monitors research studies, but when private companies conduct research using private money, so money that is not from the federal, state, or local government, there are no ethical guidelines that need to be followed. That means that private companies can misreport numbers to make sure that their company looks good. There is no oversight, and because there is no oversight, they get away with it. Why am I bringing this up? I truly believe that the negative impacts of the data center are worse than we think. And the last thing that I want to add is that when you're looking at For
Good evening, everyone. Thank you very much for extending the time so that we can all continue to speak and voice our concerns about the AI Data Center. For the moratorium, I do hope that you vote yes so that there is an extension. But like all of my fellow residents here, that's not enough. It needs to be a no on all AI Data Centers, period.
My name is Meredith Lepe. I'm a longtime Monterey Park resident. I currently reside in District 3. I grew up in District 2. I have family in Districts 1, 2, 3, 4, and friends in 5. I respectfully request that all council members vote no in building any data center in our beloved city. And while the reasons are numerous and compelling, as you have all heard this evening, I specifically ask that you recognize the absurdity and the irresponsibility of having a data center here. Sorry, I need my glasses. as it would directly be counter to the city's already in place conservation efforts and measures for water. Per the Monterey Park official government website, there are permanent, mandatory water restrictions citywide for all residents. We are restricted in our water usage. irrigation is limited to specific days, certain hours, and to be used only for specific purposes. In 2021, the city passed an ordinance, number 2214, which outlines fines to residents who overuse their water consumption, $100 for their first offense, $200 for their second, $500 for their third and possible misdemeanor for their fourth, as well as $25 fines for infractions such as water runoff within the first year. These show our city's commitment to water conservation, the true seriousness of it, and its impact on our community, the city's expectation that we as citizens will do our part. The Monterey Park City website water also reports that our entire community uses about 7.3 million gallons of water in February and can fluctuate up to about 12 million gallons of water per day in August that's currently an average of about 10 million per day roughly or 100 to 110 gallons per person per resident per day. However, an AI data center like the one that's being proposed, 250,000 square feet is considered a large slash hyperscale facility, would generate between, excuse me, not generate, it would be using between one and five million gallons per day and more in hot climates like California and since obviously Monterey Park is in California and we all know our record highs that we've had it is logical to assume that this water usage would be on higher end in a state that is greatly impacted by drought building an AI data center does not make sense and though I read that as of December 30th. 2025 was the first year in 25 years that California was not in a drought. That's two and a half decades that we have been in a very severe drought. Two and a half decades.
The threat of a future drought is ongoing. It is imperative that we protect this resource. In light of the permanent water restriction in Monterey Park, in our community, and in its efforts to protect our community and this precious resource, building a data center that strains our water supply makes absolutely no sense. It would be detrimental to our community and threaten our water supply during future droughts. Please put a permanent moratorium on any AI data center. Thank you. Hi, do I have to wait for this thing to go down or can I just speak? Oh, there you go. I'm not really good at public speaking. This is the first time I've been here because I never felt like I had to be here. Because I have you, Henry. You know, you're my neighbor. You know, when you came to me, I asked for senators. I said, no problem. Do you want my parents to sign as well? because I feel like you're the right guy for the job. And then it turns out this year I had to find out about a data center over a TikTok video of a Caucasian woman waving a flag. And I thought to myself, this has got to be a joke. It's a data center. No, actually I Googled it and actually it was coming. And I had no idea what's going on. And then a lot of slander has been said about all of you on TikTok. You guys are TikTok famous, actually. You know, especially Council Member Thomas Wong. And then actually, I would like to think that no way, that's not possible. I don't believe it. You know, I don't believe anybody that's sitting in the council in Monterey Park could do something like this. So, you know, we're here. We're voicing our concern. We're giving you all a chance to fight for us, to say no to this thing. Everybody here believes you guys got paid. We're just wondering how much that is. You know, prove it to us that none of you are for the big billionaires and for the people. We all have elderly people, parents, family members that's at home that cannot be here right now. Imagine when they have to take their morning walks. Now the ring won't stop in their years. I will I'm not sure if you guys ever spend time at a data center or even like take a walkabout or like a tour or something. You know, how about this? You know, go find a data center, sleep there for a week. And if you guys have no problems, then, you know, like maybe we will reconsider it. Right. And then happy birthday, Michelle. So, you know, we do I want to say, like, we do need to respect everybody's time. Of course, we have different opinions and, you know, we we shouldn't be so biased on this thing. And what she said is actually pretty right. But however, it's like I think you're seeing as one perspective, meaning that, yeah, like build it with clean energy and all that stuff. How much is that going to cost? And then when things could be cheaper, corporations would like to cut corners, for sure. They're not going to give you the safest route. They're going to be like, okay, how much can we save on this? And then what you would propose is very valid, and we do understand. However, there's people that live literally 500 feet away from the Dere Center. 65 feet! Oh, 65 feet. I'm sorry. 65 feet. And then I heard like now is 24 generators instead of 12. You know, so then that that's a little bit concerning very concerning and then so I would like to see that the council is for the people I still believe in you guys I believe that you guys will do the right thing in the end and then you know next time when you come over I will fight for you. I will go around collect signatures for you, you know But however if you vote against this but against everybody's right that's here 11 o'clock 1130 we're tired my head hurts, but I'm still here, you know fighting for everybody anybody just not have this bill, please consider your constituents. Thank you.
What's up everybody, mi gente, mi people, all around. My name is Rob. I have turned my back on these people because they have turned our back on us. And if there is one thing clear, if there is one thing clear, that community and the rest of us we got us okay even this tragedy did a cop stop it no a citizen had to disarm the suspect so when i tell you we got us that's right am i even from here no i'm not i'm from east lowe's a neighboring city and you bet your ass i'd show up to another city to say no data centers and they want to talk about misinformation and they want to talk about outside actors what about brian marsh what about that dude that just came in here who the fuck are you bro the one chick at co-data center sitting right here bold-faced as fuck listening to all of us say no okay and then you got michelle yee trying to just grease it up real good what if we did this what if we did that we are living in an age of fascism we don't have time for this today's a data center next week it's going to be the other data center a detention center where the ICE facilities get to park we've old one time that's it it's over so yeah if a data center pops up in Montebello I'm going to move my ass to Montebello if it shows up in El Monte I'm going to be in El Monte today it was in Monterey Park so I showed up in Monterey Park because I care about the people.
These people don't deserve our vote. As far as I'm concerned, all of you are done by November. All right? But what we need to do more than this is beyond just a moratorium. It's beyond just, oh, hey, no data centers here. We have to stand up for what's going on here. This is a techno autocratic state that we live in. Whoever has the most money gets to call the shots. These people cucked out to them. It's awful. And to the rest of you who live here amongst these people who serve you, who are your neighbors, who go to the schools as your kids do. I've watched you snicker. I've watched all of you exchange glances like you don't give a shit. And guess what? Come November, you're all done. And guess what else? We will all remember your face. We will all see you walk your dog. We will all see you wherever you go. Do you understand? We're pissed. So this goes beyond disagreement, sis. We're not talking about baseball teams. We're talking about our community. alright oh y'all are done and I'll tell you what else oh you're laughing you think it's funny you think it's funny a big joke ask for kindness please guys don't disagree right that was you and now you think it's funny tell you what else watch your back okay just watch out we're all pissed Hi, my name is Jessica. I don't know who is my council member, but I know Vin. Vin, I don't know if you recognize me. It's been like a while. I'm a little bit disappointed to hear. Not a little. I'm really disappointed to hear you for the data center. My mom and I, we live about a mile away. I want to give you some updates. I don't know the last time you talked to my mom. Her cancer came back. She has stage four, and she's going to be going to City of Hope soon. And, like, the chemical, like, the CO2, the noise, like, I just don't think that that would be very conducive to her health. And that's why I came here. I want to plead to you and to everyone here. It's going to affect a lot of people. and so like I care so much about my mom and I want her to get better and I want her to live as long as she can and so if you're if you're gonna allow a corporation that will pollute our environment with the noise with the co2 with everything I don't know all the all the facts they're gonna see it's insignificant but how do they know the long-term effects like do they really know how long has have AI data centers been around you know like we don't know the long-term effects of how it will impact our health. But also, and I know that they're saying, oh, we're going to do all these things so that the noise won't be bad, that the CO2 won't be bad, that this, this, this, this. They're going to make all of these promises. But in all disasters, those corporations did not want to cause those disasters. They happened. So when the water is getting polluted because of a corporation, that corporation didn't want that to happen, but it happens. And then the people that live there are the ones that have to deal with the consequences. And then so please think of us as a community. Please think of my mom. Please think about our health and everyone around us. It's not just impacting Monterey Park. It's impacting people like the other neighboring cities. So please be mindful of that. Normally data centers are built far away because they don't want to impact the community. Why are we going to allow this to happen to us?
Thank you. So please vote like please be against the data centers. I don't know what the right word is because I just found out about this as well. But yeah. ¿
who put in a speaker?
Yes.
Is it Ann Kageyama?
Okay. Come on. And other than Ann,
is there anyone who put in a speaker card but hasn't spoken yet? All right, so Ann, you'll be the last speaker.
Oh, awesome.
Well, I'm going to come from a different place from everyone else that has spoken here, the majority. Hi, Carl. How are you?
I just wanted to say hi because I noticed that you haven't really looked at anyone.
No, no, no. Don't clap. Please don't clap.
No, I just want to make sure that he sees me because he's the only one. I wasn't going to speak up today. I was just going to sit here for a little bit and probably be home because it's past my bedtime. I know I want to be in bed right now.
I just want to say that
if you guys are really thinking about going through with this, please reconsider. And I just found out that you were saying that, you know, or they're saying that you voted yes for this. How would you like it if you live right next to a data center? Hearing all the bad things that come about it, yes, it's going to temporarily create jobs.
but what happens after that? Yeah, and at what cost? And, you know, I know all of you probably just tuned majority of the people out today
because they have been attacking all of you.
I've been listening. And I don't think that's right because, you know, threats, it makes you defensive,
so you're not going to listen to everyone's opinion.
and I just hope that you guys reconsider
and really hear my voice if you haven't listened to anyone else's because I'm not as eloquent as some of the other people
that spoke up today, obviously
but I'm looking at each and every one of you guys sitting up here today I have never spoken up about anything until today I found out about
no, no, no, don't clap, don't clap, don't clap, don't clap, please.
I have never felt
this pit in my gut
until I heard about this mid-December.
And if I would have known about this, about the December 3rd meeting,
I would have been here. I grew up here. I don't live here anymore. I live in Alhambra. But Alhambra's not my home. Monterey Park is my home.
The library was one story back in the 80s when I used to go there. Boys and Girls Club right next door.
I used to go there all the time, especially when I was a teenager. That only had one story.
The lot across that's now the senior citizen's home, that was dirt. Land across right there. From there, it was a parking lot for a very long time. The CVS down the street used to be Chano's back in the 90s and 31 Flavors. And I used to go there all the time
where the guy from 31 Flavors knew me. And he's like, oh, well, I can make this for you in five minutes can you wait hell yeah i want my oscar the grouch cup i've seen monterey park change
i remember when atlantic square when a lot of people probably don't even know this there used
to be a woolworths there see some people do remember this is my home my parents still live
in the same home that they bought in the 70s they live about a mile away down the street from Coral View.
I used to ride my bike down the hill to Macy with no helmet,
but, you know, we don't care about safety back in the 80s, 90s.
Damn, time's almost already up.
This is what happens when you just kind of go off the top of your head and not writing anything down, not really wanting to speak, but I just want you guys to hear my voice.
please reconsider if anything please
don't have this data center made
it's going to impact a lot of people's lives especially the people that live here and if you don't live here would you want to live here once it's built and I'm coming with compassion
I'm not here to yell at you guys bully you guys because that's not right and you guys have maintained composure and I commend you for that
because it must be hard on your end
to listen to all the hate that's spewing to you
all night but I also want you to know that you guys are supposed to represent us, the community. So please, please, if you say yes, just please reconsider. That's all. Thank you. Thank you.
All right, comments? Yes.
Well, first, let me thank everyone for being here. And I want to especially thank Ann for wrapping this up. I think the EQ in you is off the charts. Thank you for that very calm ending to a night of lots of, I would say, some hostility. but at the end of the day we're here to help run the city and make decisions there were a couple of accusations but i will tell you uh you know i met brian two times one that's well three times when at sparks meeting which he was part of the community to be involved in the second time was at one of our council meetings and then he showed up in our library gala which i think majority of staff and council members attend every year for the library. I think he was there two years ago. So, John, that's where I told you I met him, and thank you for sharing that. But you painted a different light. I just want to clarify that. And in terms of speaking to the community, community engagement, may I speak, please? In terms of community engagement, I went and spoke to the Democratic Club a few weeks ago, and I shared the pros and cons as was asked of me to do, and I stated my position at the time. Catherine, I just wanted to share that. And I also spent some time with constituents.
Is it okay to use your name? Thumbs up?
Stephen and Jesse's home among 25-plus community members. And when I walked in the house, I shared the information about the background,
how we got here.
and when I left the house, what did I tell you guys? That I was going to come forth with an EIR and that's something I had pitched to council and we added a moratorium to that. This is a process that we have to go through. This is about risk-reward equation for the city and we would have to be fair, just like we're listening to everyone else, we also have to listen to business owners who want to come into our city and do business in the city. I know a lot of us, a lot of you, are against the data center, and I am actually rethinking that process through because I'm hearing the audience.
I'm hearing the constituents.
But you also have to understand we have to go through a process. We just ask you to understand that part. And this is why we have these lively discussions and debates. Yelling and screaming does not make this easier. And again, I want to thank Ann for pointing that out. It's this involvement, community engagement. Now, we wouldn't have gotten here if 10% of you guys showed up at the Sparks meeting.
We didn't know. Again. Again. So that's part of the process.
That's part of the understanding.
Then you're failing us for the process. Mayor. Mayor.
If everyone, we listen very patiently. I did not look at my phone a single time this entire evening. We listened to every single one of your voices. So please give your same respect when your council members are speaking.
So we're listening to you guys and we're making informed decisions. So I'm just going to conclude that and let the rest of the council make their statements.
Thank you.
Well, I'll reiterate, I already, I made my statement about the data center. I know most of the, all of the comments were about the specific 1977 Avenue data center
proposal.
I reiterate that I have recused myself from consideration this project. That is not what is on the agenda. I will just note that what is on the agenda, I support moratorium that can be extended starting at 45 days, can be extended if we needed, and would support city staff at least coming back to promulgate additional regulations that are called for by staff recommendation. I would support that and would be very open to other additional measures if they come
on the agenda.
But I can't comment specifically on the 1977 data center project. But broadly, given our city attorney's council, I can engage on this issue that's on the agenda and I will state my support for it.
Okay.
I wanted to thank everyone who came out tonight. I know a lot of people left already.
It's already pretty late.
I'm a civics teacher, so seeing so much civic activity happening inspires me as a civics teacher. It gives me inspiration and hope that people still care about issues and are willing to come out and take the time to organize and to do all the work that you've done. So I really appreciate that. I have stated my concerns in the past about data centers in this community and just data centers in general. And so I share a lot of the same concerns that you guys have regarding data centers. And so earlier I saw one of my students sitting in the audience
and she left. She had to go because she said she had class.
But I had her as a student three years ago, and she reminded me that she was in my academic decathlon team,
and I coach academic decathlon,
and she reminded me that the year that she was on the decathlon team, the theme for that year was water, a valuable resource. And she wanted to remind me of everything that I had taught her that year about water and about the importance and value of water and I thanked her for the reminder and many of my other students one of my other students reminded me that in that same packet and unit that I taught them that year that one of the major sections of that study was how a lot of our environmental concerns can be easily resolved through policy and he said to me you you know, Mr. Sanchez, you could easily just pass measures in the city and do other stuff and resolve all of our environmental concerns because they're all policy measures. And I thought in my head, like, if it were just that easy, right? But I was inspired by what he said. And so, his name's Kevin. And so I really appreciate that he reminded me of that.
I am concerned
like you guys are and a lot of you guys mentioned the electrical use in the city just by the data center I think a lot of the concerns that you have are the same concerns I have because we're seeing what's happening throughout the country and all we have to do is google it online or turn on the TV and see what is happening throughout the country
I don't know
that electric rates will go up if a data center comes in What I do know is that we'll be competing for the same electricity that everyone else is. And I know that there's currently two bills in the Senate that are addressing those issues or trying to address those issues
and trying to create a separate way to measure data centers in terms of their electrical use.
But that might not be resolved this year. And so I have and share those same concerns. And I think about, I don't live near 1977 Saturn. I live on the other side of Monterey Park near East L.A. College, and I live close by East L.A. And so, but I can imagine that if I lived in that area, that when I purchased my home, I don't think I purchased it thinking that there would be a data center built next to it. I don't think that I would be happy. I don't think, I think I would be genuinely scared, knowing that almost the freeway is being built next to my home, potentially. But there's still a lot of unknowns. I know there's 24 generators are being built there, and potentially the... ¿ of near freeways in Monterey Park. We have the 10 freeway that goes by. We have the 60 freeway. We have the 710 freeway, right? So we're all genuinely concerned with those things.
My wife, well, first I want to say that I want to think, I saw a lot of District 3 people out,
so I really appreciate it, but all of you guys who came out, but I live with four constituents in my own home, my wife being one of them. And she texted me today saying, what time is the council meeting? And I thought she was going to say, I'll drop by some coffee or boba for you. But she said she wanted to come and speak on the issue. And so I asked her what she would say. And she said, well, I spoke to my students about it. My wife and I are both classroom teachers in this community. And so she sent me a couple of items that she thought she would say. And I told her, if you come here, let me know so I can meet you in the parking lot,
because there's a lot of people here.
And she was planning to bring our daughters.
We have three of them.
And then she said, and I'm going to read her message. She said, I'm not going to be able to make it. She said, the girls are falling asleep, and they're hungry, but they're asking about you. but I wanted to tell you how incredibly proud I am that you're standing up for what is right tonight standing up for our family I want to say that I am against the data center
I also want to say that I don't think a data center is a right fit for Monterey Park it is
not a right fit for the San Gabriel Valley. And I feel that if we open the doors in Monterey Park for a data center, there's the second data center that we built in 1980. And the number of data centers will just continue to grow throughout the San Gabriel Valley. I did not choose to raise my family in Monterey Park so that later in the future, they have health conditions and health
problems and then how will I answer my kids the students that I teach that and
I know there's the one in here how I would look them in the face okay and I can't do that I can't sell them out that way so tonight I'm voting on behalf of my fellow residents I'm also voting on behalf of my family who I love and care very much about and I thank you for reminding me of that
because I think we all need to be reminded every once in a while about what truly matters.
So I am in favor of the moratorium but I'm in favor of an indefinite moratorium.
I would like to encourage
our staff, city staff to and I know that I think for the most part from what I'm hearing most people most of accounts or another council member the fate or two more councilors are favor moratorium but would like to encourage city staff to look at how bringing back an indefinite moratorium within our city
Someone spoke earlier, and I didn't catch their name.
Actually, there's two people, and I jotted down what they said. One person said, Monterey Park should be built for people, not machines.
This is my home, and it's worth defending. And I truly believe that. Another person said Monterey Park is not for sale.
Not for data centers, at least.
So that's all I have to say. Thank you for coming out tonight.
Okay. All right. Before I share my comment on the horse, was there another speaker request card that came in before if not then I mean I'm sure I looked up from speaking and I'll show my remarks I mean is it Eric Chen okay are you speaking for this
agenda or for public communication okay so we'll wait until after this agenda item then do you want to speak for item 5a okay go ahead okay I don't think good
Good evening again, everybody, mayor and mayor pro temp and city council and community. I think it's all the arguments have been repeated ad nauseum. I don't need to repeat that. But the only thing I want to talk about is, so where do we go from here? Because as city council, all of you guys have the power. We need three votes. Okay? Right now, you guys can decide right now. We're not going to have a data center. Or we can say, okay, it's not on the item. we're gonna on the next on the next City Council meeting we are gonna vote to ban data centers in monitoring Park you have that option so I invite you this is forget about the memory I know the moratorium or all this other stuff it's just a delay tactic okay all you have to do is right now say I propose at the next City Council meeting we're gonna ban data centers and let's see where everybody stands we don't need an environmental study we already know what's gonna happen we don't need that we've already seen the consequences all around this country okay the same thing that's happened in everywhere else is gonna happen here okay now unless you know somehow magically we can we have you know infinite amount of nuclear energy already okay that doesn't affect anybody but yeah okay we already have whatever the latest fusion nuclear technology and nothing's going to be, you know, nobody's going to be affected. Yeah, right? I think it's a no-brainer, but we're not at that point. So I say right now, we just, you know, all the comments, you know, are meaningless. The only thing that matters is, are you going to ban it or are you not? So right now, everything now is because it's going to, 45 days, all this is going to calm down and then we're going to forget and then why don't I know they want you to forget but you know and then basically what's gonna happen is gonna wait for the elections to see what happens so let's not get to that point I think we should just you know making an item ban ban data centers in Monterey Park yes or no the next city council meeting it's as simple it's as simple as that. Anything else is a distraction, is a delay, is a deflection. So, you guys can do it right now. You have the power to say, okay, I want to ban, I make a motion, the next item, we're going to ban it. So, what you say now, you can say about all your feelings, and you know, there's all these different concerns. You can do it tonight, and we can all go home, and everybody will be happy. Okay? They can do it right now. Right now after my speech, they can do it. And then we all can be done. Okay? So let's see. So let's see what they're going to do. Right? Because, I mean, earlier I came up here and I said the victims, right, the victims who was here, they don't agree with the plan. And they voted against what the victims want. I was up here earlier. They voted against what the victims want. It was right there. They even scheduled the support group at the same exact time precisely so that those victims cannot speak up for themselves here.
Not them, but, you know, not them. They didn't do it. The Chinatown Service Center, you know. So, I mean, speak of conflict of interest. I mean, Mr. No, I mean, you are on the board of Chinatown Service Center, so that's a conflict of interest. So why don't you do the same thing as Thomas and say, hey, anything related to the Chinatown Service Center? You know, I recuse myself. But, I mean, so that's what I'm saying is that right now, just no more deliberation, no more comments. Just say, I will make a motion right now to make our next item, and let's see where you stand. Because I don't think we need to, all these studies are unnecessary. They're already out there. Vote to ban now or else it's just a delay. That's all.
Okay. Well, thank you very much. Oh, I'm really hoarse. Thank you very much for everyone who came out tonight. And certainly thank you everyone who has been sharing emails and comments with all of us these past few weeks. Certainly, it's been very helpful and useful for all of us.
I know that perhaps some have been asking with my position, and certainly if I've been rather reticent, it's because, again, as policymakers, you know, we have to be unbiased because we are supposed to be listening to all sides and, you know, make an informed decision. Having said that, you know, I have, you know, like probably many of us, you know, we've seen the articles, the news about the impact of data centers, especially in states that have been, you know, they were built because probably because these states had less regulations than in California, you know, which, I mean, to our credit, we have actually very strong regulations that comes to energy. water resources, conservation, etc. And yes, we are aware of the body of work that has been reported about places like
Lewden County, Virginia.
In fact, I was at a conference in Washington, D.C. in December and I was hoping, unfortunately the schedule didn't work out to help meet actually with some local officials in Lewden County
because it seems to be the epicenter of the data center industry
in the United States.
I mean, unfortunately, it didn't happen.
But nonetheless, you know, I mean, this is how I look at it.
So as my colleague, Councillor Sanchez said, I mean, there have been some bills making its way through the legislature.
Actually, there was a series of bills that went through last session last year in the legislature to address a lot of concerns that have been brought up today.
And, you know, fortunately, a lot of those bills got vetoed. I mean, I think the only bill that got signed to law this past session was a bill to study the impacts on the, I guess, the energy grid of the state when it's a data center.
And again, maybe we do need to have these studies because, again, as policymakers at any level, you know, we rely on data information.
and again I know from the authors of the bills making its way through the legislature this session, they're going to try again and certainly, you know, again I would say pay attention to also the legislation and also ask your legislators how they're going to vote as well as writing letters to the governors because he did veto a bunch of bills last year Having said that
because in the absence of
any real state legislation and federal legislation, you know, it has now been left to the responsibility of local government
to deal with this. And
in some ways, it's a little unfair because, you know, we are... You know what? I listen to you all night. You will listen to me speak, okay? Okay? Because I have sat here for many hours. I have respectfully listened to all of you. And again, you are the right to say comments. Again, you're right. Hey, we're elected for that purpose. But again, when I'm speaking, you will listen to me, all right? Yes, sir. Thank you. Thank you, ma'am. So anyway, so as I was saying, so, you know, as a consequence, local governments are now, they have to do with the burden on what to do. And again, you know, all of us have to do,
All of us are faced with the challenge of, on one hand, how do we continue to provide services that all of you wish, and at the same time, pay for it.
And yes, unfortunately, because of a lot of history of policies at the state level, a lot of line-use decisions have been fiscalized. And again, I'm just saying this because, again, this drives a lot of line-use decision-making.
and it's not just Monterey Park
because in the news, probably in Pasadena I think Amazon has bought something in the state of industry they are looking at rezoning in downtown LA, apparently my office building
is next to the biggest data center in LA
one motion which you wouldn't tell because it's an office building
and again, I'm not saying this to bore everyone
because I know everyone will realize oh, it's almost midnight but again, this is the reality for a lot of local government. And I think that, you know, and again, I want to thank my colleagues, you know, also like those who have done Spark Committee because they were trying to do something that was with the best intent, and that is quality of life issues.
And as Council Member Wong said, I mean, the Spark Committee did look at other uses as well, housing, mixed use, and by the way, you know, I mean, you know, some of the people who showed up at that SPARK meeting was like saying, I don't want housing there either.
You know, again, that's some of the nimbyism. And here's the reality. It is an office building that's been empty for 15 years.
And it's not doing anyone any service because there's no jobs being generated.
There's no economic activity. And frankly, you know, it's not helping the community either. And that was really the purpose of the SPARK committee, to look at how our other uses of what is now... ¿ Why haven't we done other uses? I assure you that if there was a housing project before us, we would support it in a heartbeat. But a company did buy it, and a company has someone out in the audience today. And yes, they bought the land, but absolutely, I agree that we also have the authority to determine whether or not its uses are the best use.
And I will say right now, I'm not sure because based on, again, just what I've seen in the news I've read, I know the impact. And also, again, the absence of any state regulations, then I do worry about, you know, what does it mean for Monterey Park?
Mayor Pro Tem, my apologies.
We have to extend the meeting.
I'll make the motion. You want to make a motion? I'll make the motion for an hour. All right. A second? All right.
We're moving to extend the meeting further because it's midnight.
So let's vote.
Approved unanimously.
All right, all right, all right. I know it's, oh, actually it's now, oh, it's actually now Thursday. Well, good morning, everyone. You know, for HMC or STRAT CAP, you know, I have to also say that I'm a little disappointed that although I know you said representatives,
but I think you yourself have also
should have done a better job of outreach to this
community, and maybe you thought that
if you just pushed us fast enough that it would somehow pass, but again, I think you did yourself no favors
either, and so I think you also were a responsibility to
what is the situation we're in now. Again, everyone knows Serena's Council. I often... No, I am not. You know what? Again.
No, no. I said the company. I said, okay, yes, I said the company has responsibilities as well for not doing outreach. Is that clear? Can I continue speaking, please?
All right. Thank you. Thank you. As I was saying, you know, and if I get interrupted, I'll keep talking and we can extend another hour until 4 in the morning. Would you like that?
Okay, thank you. Okay. Anyway, so again, I don't know if this is a right fit for this community. At this point, I have doubts. and frankly you know I mean if and I know some staff you know I mean I know this is put in moratorium and certainly you know if staff is going to look at other regulations whether or not we do a data center you know I will tell you right now I have doubts I have doubts because and again as our clerk said and these were good suggestions is that and again in the absence of any state regulations yeah we should be perhaps we should be requiring And if there was a data center, yeah, you know, why don't you, you know, pay for the majority of your energy usage so that it doesn't impact the community? Why don't you pay for self-generation and let it all be green energy? And if, yeah, in a few years, if by chance it's empty, then you should be required to vacate the facility so that it does not become blight. And again, you know, I mean, if at this point, again, I have high doubts about the viability of this data center. But if for what reason it should come to that, then I say we adopt some of the strictest regulations. And frankly, maybe it would be an example to the state who has also not given us any guidance.
So again, I hope that made my position clear that I have doubts about this project. And frankly, if we revisit the moratorium, I would be in favor of extending it.
And at this point, again, I just have doubts about the viability of this project and the company behind it. So, thank you. And, no, no, I'm sorry, but again, again, I know all of you are here and you're all passionate about the issue. But again, you know, some of the attacks against my colleagues is unfair and unwarranted. Again, you are entitled. You are entitled to say what you have, but so am I.
And I will say right now that everyone who serves here, they have the best interest in serving your community.
Look, no one runs for office and says, let's see, how do I screw people over? No. Every day someone wakes up as an elected official and says, how long, how can we serve our community? How can we make life better? I have been an elected official for now almost 25 years. Not just a council member, but a school board member. People mention Hillcrest. I know Hillcrest very well. I was on the Garvey school board for 17 years. And absolutely, I am very much, you know, children always come first to me when it comes to policy issues. And so, again, I just have to say that, you know, everyone here and every action they have done,
it is with the best interest in improving the quality of life.
Now, yes, you know, obviously this project has brought up a lot of concerns, and rightly so, because, you know what, this is an issue that unfortunately many people are still waking up to.
And again, I think it's very interesting that even in red states, people are now starting to wake up to the issue.
And like I said, even California, you know, California, we're behind. I mean, again, there's absolutely no regulation at the state level on this. And so, again, it falls on us, you know. And again, even if we don't vote for a data center, guess what? They'll try and go to industry. They'll try to go to any city that has a warehouse or an Inland Empire. And so I say that, you know, on the one hand, yeah, we all rely on AI and data centers because of its convenience. But at the same time, as an infrastructure, yeah, how do we make it so that it doesn't hurt the environment, it doesn't hurt people, and only benefit a few?
And I think that's probably a broader policy question and one that probably we won't solve tonight.
But certainly, I think that a policy issue that we need to also have more robust conversations, you know, with our state and federal representatives and county as well. So anyway, my two cents. And I apologize if I've been rambling on. I mean, I know it's now half past 12, but thank you for listening to me. I listened to you all night. Thank you, Henry. Thank you.
Thank you Mayor Pro Tem and thanks to all my council for their feedback and thanks to each and every one of you guys for staying past midnight. You know we have these meetings twice a month and typically we don't have this many people show up so it's great that an issue like this unified the whole community and brought you guys all out tonight. So thank you all for being here.
So you guys elected us to represent you.
Your concerns are our concerns. I've said that many times. So when you guys bring your concerns to me, it becomes my concerns, and they are my concerns. My own mother, who's in her 70s, and my stepfather, who is also in his 70s, both live within a mile from the 1977 Saturn site. So, of course, I'm not going to vote for something that's going to hurt my own family. and you elected all of us here to make decisions after hearing all of the facts, right? You don't want us to just hear one side and then just make a decision. So we're here to hear all the facts. On December 3rd, when this first came before us, we immediately took it off the agenda when we realized there was a lot more opinions. A lot of you guys are saying you didn't even hear about it until three days ago,
today, a week ago.
You guys weren't even here on December 3rd. So even without you guys being present, we already took it off the agenda because we knew there was going to be community concerns. After we took it off the agenda, the applicant told us at that day that they were going to host town hall meetings to give us the facts from their side. And I do applaud the applicant for sending a representative here tonight because I actually didn't think they were going to send anybody. But we were hoping that they would give us more information. That was December 3rd. It's now January 21st. Yes, the holidays was an excuse, but I'm very personally disappointed that we did not get more information at all from the applicants.
This paper that someone just showed on the stand, they didn't even give it to us. I had to go and request it to get a copy of this paper. So this could have easily been emailed to us and we didn't get that information. So, you know, I've sat as a temporary judge in court before, and I've heard plaintiff's side and defense side.
I made a decision.
At this point, one side is giving all the information. The other side is giving zero information. So how am I going to side? Of course I'm going to side with the side that's giving me all the information.
Right?
So at this point, because of all of you feeding us good information, I'm siding with no data center.
All right, get down, get down.
And I do want to applaud Vin for bringing tonight's agenda item into, you know, This wasn't even on the agenda tonight because we weren't going to hear it until we get some town hall meetings to hear all the facts. But then, Council Member Ngo, he's the one who brought this moratorium idea up, and that's how it got onto the agenda as 5A tonight. So thank you, Council Member Ngo, for even putting it on the agenda.
So since 5A is on the agenda, does anyone want to make any more comments tonight?
I know everyone's— Actually, I do want to... Yeah, go ahead. I'll be brief. I know, I know. I can prefer both. I'll just say this. Again, you know, I appreciate everyone making public comment. It is your right. However, let's also be civil. And I will just say that I didn't appreciate that someone said, watch your back. Because that can be a threat to my safety. And, yes, I do walk my dog every morning. And I don't appreciate being told, watch your back.
And if that person is still here, I'm going to tell any law enforcement, I want to make sure that you are aware that I have just been threatened, all of us, for doing our duty. Because, again, that is not public discourse.
And I don't appreciate and will tolerate any threats to my person or my family or my dog, especially my dog. No, my dog is a rescue. My dog is a pit bull rescue.
So, therefore, anyway, that's another story.
My point is that threats are not tolerated. and again to whoever said it I don't appreciate it and again if law enforcement is here I want to make a report that I just got threatened tonight thank you. Henry we have your back. Thank you.
Madam Mayor if I could just say one thing there's there's one item I forgot to mention the council also received a communication and I want to make sure that it's here for the public record from the Montebello Teachers Association. The Montebello Teachers Association, which is a union, a teacher union, passed a resolution regarding the data center here in Monterey Park. And I want to read the resolution very quickly. It's pretty short. It says, resolution regarding proposed data center in Monterey Park. And they said, whereas the Montebello Teachers Association, a local chapter of the California Teachers Association, exists to protect and promote the health and well-being of its members and all the students enrolled in the schools of the Montebello Unified School District, whereas the Montebello Teachers Association represents certificated employees working within three miles of the proposed Saturn Street data center that is requesting a permit to open a data center in Monterey Park, and these staff members serve thousands of students in schools within the Montebello Unified School District that are located in proximity to the proposed data center, whereas the proposed Saturn Street data center has not submitted an environmental impact report to the city of Monterey Park and a mitigated negative declaration was filed by the city of Monterey Park in lieu of an environmental impact report. Whereas the effect of data centers on human health, including increases in cancer rates, is not fully known and has not been addressed in the mitigated negative declaration, therefore be it resolved that the Montebello Teachers Association encourages the city of Monterey Park to require that the proposed Saturn Street data center submit a comprehensive environmental impact report, which includes information on the potential harm to humans who spend a significant amount of time in proximity to data centers prior to granting a permit for the data center. Therefore, be it resolved that the Montebello Teachers Association opposes the development of any data center within the close proximity of the schools of the Montebello Unified School
district without extensive research that affirms the health and safety of the students and staff
of these schools will not be compromised by the proposed data center. And my district, District 3, and some of you guys are from District 3, has schools from the Montaiglian Unified School District, including Bella Vista, where my wife went to school. So I want to make sure that I mention that because it takes a lot of courage for teachers union to step up and do what's right. And I've been a teacher for 25 years now and a member of the Elhambra Teachers Association. And so I'm very proud of the work that they're doing and for passing this resolution and sharing it with us and sharing their thoughts. Because it's not just residents of Monterey Park that are impacted. It's also the people who work here as well and our students who are our future.
Thank you.
Any other comments? Anyone want to make a motion?
¿
jurisdiction so those would be my two recommended amendments to that I should note just so people understand that the 45 days is required by the government code and that gives the ability for the city to provide noticing to the property owners that are affected by any zone change that might occur the interim ordinance is specifically designed not to have noticed and adopted only on an interim basis so that's a requirement of California law there's nothing that I I can do about that.
And that was brought up by one of the attorneys who spoke, right?
Carrie. No, I brought up something else. I brought up the last question. I should be deleted because we...
Do you want to come up to the podium? Because everything's recorded in here, so when you speak from the back, we can't hear you.
It's in my letter, but... The last sentence of sentence C because you're telling the applicant to prepare an EIR and that's the city's responsibility So I don't I think you should just delete that
Madam Mayor because you're gonna take this moratorium and this time to determine if you want to do the outright ban So why are you letting them go forward with an EIR? The point of the moratorium is to freeze things as they are right now So directing them to prepare an EIR is contradictory to that
Plus, you're the one who's supposed to be preparing the EIR, not the developer.
That's the problem with the MND.
It was totally biased. Carl, do you want to respond?
Madam Mayor, members of the council, two things. One is the recommended action is to take out the sentence, so if that's what the city council would like to do. Second is the city did have independent review pursuant to a third-party consultant that the city was under contract with. So to the extent that that's relevant to the discussion about an overall moratorium on all data centers, I offer that for the record but happy to answer any other questions so your
proposal is to remove that sentence from yes see got it okay thank you
well I'm gonna look to my seat attorney because the language change and this is where we need to protect the city for a lot of reasons based upon the
conversation that the City Council has has provided it's my understanding that you wish to entertain a complete prohibition on all data centers within the city so the direction
so I've I've my recommended changes to the draft ordinance would reflect that
intent I want to just make clear I can engage on this issue if that's the
proposal that's correct I'll make the motion to adopt the changes to what was
recommended for the ordinance we have it sounds like we have to start with the 45-day moratorium and give direction for staff to begin promulgating regulations along to potentially prohibit or for the council looking to consider prohibiting data center uses in the city going forward that's what's on the agenda I'll approve that I'd also like to ask in my comments if the if we if the city does before on that if I can ask the city staff to also begin looking at again approaching the zoning in the Saturn Park area to around the housing and to make sure that's promulgated in the zoning code as well going forward and potentially other changes so the zoning there and make sure we have robust community engagement around that process and I hope that others will be part of that process going forward.
I want to confirm.
Carl's going to stop me if I can't engage on this.
It sounds like it's part of the motion.
I'll second that. All right.
So including housing and all data centers.
Let's vote.
All right. Thank you all for coming out. We're going to take a recess. Can I ask a point of clarification?
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. ¿
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, no, too early. All right.
Let's conclude the recess and get back to our meeting since it's 1242 now.
Do we want to make...
Madam Mayor, members of the council, I understand from the city manager that perhaps some clarification would be in order. The council adopted on four-fifths, well, actually unanimous vote, the moratorium for 45 days. I think a question arose about what happens in those 45 days. So by law, the ordinance will expire on March 7th. So before that date, we will go through a noticing process because we have to notice any changes to the zoning code. The proposal that was memorialized within the ordinance that was adopted states that there will be a complete prohibition on data centers within the city's jurisdiction. So we have to draft those regulations, and then we also have to notice all the property owners that is affected by that zoning code in order to have a public hearing for the city council to consider those changes to the zoning regulations. All that is required by state law. There is nothing tonight that they could do to completely take care of it tonight.
So that's a process.
I think that was discussed earlier in terms of there is a process that we have to go through. So the noticing will take – it requires at least 20 days noticing for a public hearing. So even if we had the regulations drafted tomorrow and we put notices in the mail Friday, it would still be 20 days out. Now, we will calculate out when that occurs based upon the meeting schedule. But it will likely, the public hearing will be scheduled before March 7th. I imagine it will be the second meeting in February.
Does that help?
Data is not set, but we have to have a hearing before March 7th in order to even extend the moratorium, even if they take no actions with regard to the zoning regulations. So I'm just, I went to law school, not math school, so I'm just basing the calculations on March 7th, 20-day noticing and the amount of time it takes for us to actually draft something for consideration.
and if I may so if it helps for the public we have two meetings every month as the mayor mentioned so the next meeting would be February 4th and the meeting after that would be February 18th so and madam mayor if I can say
something or city manager when those dates become available if we can publicize those on social media so the public is made aware of when those
meeting will occur absolutely we can definitely do that councilmember Sanchez in addition just for the public there is a web page that is up on the city's website right now specific to the 1977 project it has all publicly available documents on that web page on it has letters that we received from the applicant it has written communication links to written communications so that That is all on the city's webpage. We will definitely ensure to post additional information there as it becomes available.
And if I could, Madam Mayor, on this item, if we can maybe draft a press statement as well, I imagine, I know there was a lot of media here covering tonight, maybe just for clarity's sake and for those who could not stay for the whole meeting, maybe I think some clarity would, in terms of what action the council has taken tonight, would be helpful to make sure that it is disseminated widely. And I think it would be helpful for me and others to potentially amplify as well. Noted. Definitely. We can definitely
start working on drafting a news release about the action that way it is clear we could also post that press release on the city's webpage it's posted all news releases on the public you can sign up you can subscribe to get our agendas you could subscribe to get our news releases all on the city's webpage but we'll post in both of those locations on the webpage for the for the data center item and also on the news release page as well I just want to make sure to get lost
that start working with staff on but bringing back the zoning there and the prefer potential changes to that for the existing zoning now the spits I can't remember what we called it back for accounts consideration and potential
changes well when ready so just for clarification City Council members I just want to make sure the council majority of the council wants to bring that back for the Saturn Park zone area to look at additional uses is that what I'm hearing
yeah okay okay thank you all right thank you for that clarification so we're
done with five new business um six is there any public communications not related to 5a there are
yes and i don't know if these individuals are still here but we will call them just in case
all right i don't know if these are for 5a because some people wrote for public not for 5a when they meant for 5A. Jory Correa, last name is C-O-R-R-E-A. Thomas Fernandez and Felicia Sandoval or Sardoval. All right, so I guess they must have been for 5A or left already. Okay, so no more public
communications there's four different staff communications but since it's late
are there any staff communications that might be more urgent and need to be heard before or next meeting on February 4th or can we table maybe we can table these
for the next meeting madam mayor if I may we can table all the updates there it There was a few that are timely from the standpoint that these events will occur before the next council meeting. So if I may, I can make a brief, quick presentation just on those items. So we wanted to make sure that the community knows that we have our Lunar New Year Festival that will be held on Garvey Avenue. So definitely we have street closures. That information is also posted on the city's webpage and also on the city's social media. So the dates for that weekend are January 31st, Saturday, 10 a.m. to 9 p.m., and February 1st, which is Sunday, from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. So we invite the community members to definitely come out. Very well-attended events. If you haven't been to it, we encourage you to join us. We have a community cleanup event this Saturday, January 24th, at Sierra Vista from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. And this event is to accept bulky items that the residents want to discard. You can go ahead and bring them by Sierra Vista. You can furniture, mattresses, appliances, e-waste. We'll collect those items. Again, Sierra Vista this Saturday.
Is that right?
Yeah, this Saturday from 8 to 12. And then the last one that we wanted to make sure, I know we didn't get the speakers tonight on the item, but we have had many speakers on this item the Barnes Park pool revitalization community engagement meeting the based on the community survey and the concepts results that community engagement meeting will be held on Monday February 2nd at 6 p.m. at Langley Center so we encourage individuals that are interested in hearing about that whole project to please engage and come and give us your feedback on the concepts that our consultant prepared. Available for questions.
All right, thank you.
And everyone's good with moving the rest of the staff communications to our next meeting? All right, do we need a motion or no?
No. Okay. All right, eight, no presentation.
We've covered nine already.
Ten, consent calendar. I'll move consent. All right, council member Wong moves.
I'll second with a note that I was not here on the November 9th meeting.
All right. Let's vote.
Approved unanimously.
Thank you. All right.
Then 11, public hearing, and 12, new business. So 12A, let's talk about the resolution appointing city council members to specific organizations.
Is there a staff report? Do you need a staff report? I don't need that. Okay.
I just want to be mindful we have 10 minutes before the next hour.
Yes.
May I suggest that we've been appointed to these from prior year past, and if someone to change position maybe just speak up now otherwise just maintain the status
I'm interested in the economic one I don't know if I think Councilmember Wong's currently doing that one I could be a second if you want to continue
doing that one just to go to the meetings anyway and I'm gonna be the
chair in the summer for the board okay but if you want to be the alternate
Who's the alternate?
Vin is the alternate right now, but if you want to switch that.
Oh, okay. She can be the alternate. That's fine. She's interested in that. Okay. Maybe that one change.
Then I can go when you're not available.
You're the alternate.
You can go even when he goes.
Oh, okay. But you're the alternate. Then I can go when you go, too. All right.
Anyone else want to try any other organizations?
No? All right.
Then just one change, I'll be the alternate.
Okay.
So just for clarification, this is for the San Gabriel Valley Economic Partnership?
Yes. Okay.
So Thomas is going to be the representative and Elizabeth is going to be the alternate. That's the only change to the previous year's list.
I'll make the motion to adopt the resolution reflecting that.
I will second. All right, let's vote. Approved unanimously. Thank you.
and 12b consideration and possible introduction and first reading of an ordinance amending the Monterey Park municipal code chapters listed
honorable mayor and City Council I'm Tim Hound director of community development this item is to introduce an ordinance amending the municipal code to designate the Planning Commission as the Board of Appeals to consider appeals arising from application of the California Building Standards Code. This ordinance is proposed in response to a new case law, Temple of 1001 Buddhas v. City of Fremont. Through the ordinance, the city council would delegate the appeal body authority to the planning commission for such California Building Standards Codes matters. This concludes staff's presentation. I can answer any questions if you'd like.
Thank you. Questions?
So just to confirm, this change we're adopting, what we would adopt tonight is just to make sure we're aligned with state law.
That is correct. All right. I'm happy to make a motion. All right. Council Member Wong moves. I'll second. All right.
Council Member Sanchez seconds.
Let's vote. Approved unanimously. All right.
That's all for a new business. Then moving on to 13, city communications.
I will start, and I will keep it simple. The 17th, this past Saturday, we held our Resiliency Day, which really is the reflection and focus on healing with our loving memory of the names listed above in the incident that happened three years ago. So today's the actual day, but we actually did a memorial reflection on that day. I just wanted to say that our prayers are with the family, and the city, the community continues to heal. On the 15th last week, we had a ribbon cutting at Los Dioses de los Moles. Councilmember Wong and I were there
Councilmember Lowe and I was there
Pro Tem Mayor Lowe was there so we had a ribbon cutting for them, they've been in the community for about a year now but they had the grand opening then on the 13th
there was a City of Rosemead
mayoral installation and Councilmember Lowe and I was there to congratulate
the new mayor
Mayor Sandra Armenta and Mayor Pro Tem Polly Lowe
and also
just the last couple of weeks I've held a couple of town hall meetings with the folks in District 5, giving them background and having discussions with the data center decisioning.
So that's my report.
Echo that. Went to a lot of same events. Really appreciate being able to get back in the community on the new year. Just wish everyone a Happy New Year. This is our first meeting since the new year. and also wanted to join in wishing our city clerk a happy birthday yesterday thanks for spending your day with us your night and just looking forward to another fruitful and productive year with my council colleagues and looking forward to our amazing lunar new year festival encourage everyone to join us there please tell your friends largest lunar year festival in the region and we're kicking off kind of we always kick off the lunar new year festivities for Southern California with our festival coming up on January 31st and February 1st right here on Garvey. I look forward to everyone being there and
shopping local.
It's always great when we have the Lunar New Year Festival. I feel like we kick off in Monterey Park, the Lunar New Year festivities, but it ushers in a whole month of Lunar New Year dinners and festivals. So very excited about that. My daughters always love coming to to that um i i just wanted to bring one item up um city manager i know that uh well currently um if we're watching the news uh there's been a lot of ice activity especially in the southeast la neighboring cities including montebello which is right next door um i just i know that in the past
this council had
approved and asked to put monies aside, I think in the amount of $50,000 it was, right,
to help
in whatever capacity that we can.
I don't know that we
have done any of that. I know that we helped support the food drive that was done by LA County
which was bordering
and within our city boundaries as well. But given the increase in ice raids and activity in our communities just wanted to reiterate the importance that Monterey Park be prepared in case of any type of ice activity that happens in our city I mean it's happening in our neighboring cities but it could potentially happen here in Monterey Park as well want to make sure that we're ready to protect our residents or we have a large immigrant community in Monterey Park but you know this this last year in in 2025 was the deadliest year in terms of people dying in ICE custody as well we had over 32 people that died and when I read the list of the people who who died I mean it's just such a diverse group of people from different parts of Latin America and Asia and many other parts of the country that shouldn't have died and died while in ICE custody. So I just want to make sure that we are prepared as a city. It's very scary for residents. I teach, and I see it in my students' faces. I see it in the stories that they share. A lot of them not going out as much as they used to, not shopping, going out. because of a lot of the ice activity happening. So that said, I'm very hopeful that we're starting a new year and we're starting our first council meeting. Very excited that we were able to listen to the community in terms of the data center concerns that were happening and that the council took action on that. So I think that's an amazing way to start the year
and to start our first council meeting.
So thank you for that. and then see to Council Member Love.
Sure. I went to a lot of events that my colleagues mentioned,
and again, also excited for the upcoming Lunar New Year event
and also future council meetings because certainly we have a lot of things to tackle this year, and I'm looking forward to work with my colleagues, city staff, and the community. Thank you.
I'm going to do it in one minute so that we can adjourn before 1 o'clock.
So just really quick,
The Chamber of Commerce is hosting an evening with me on January 29th. So if anyone wants to. ¿ Sacramento, she's going to have a resolution at the Senate to recognize our resiliency day. So I'm catching a flight at 6.55 a.m., so going straight to the airport from here.
And if nothing else?
Really quick, one other potential future agenda item. I know L.A. County is working to adopt ice-free zones on government-owned property. I'm curious to see what that ordinance language is going to look like. I know staff, I think, is already monitoring that. If once LA County actually comes out with the final ordinance language might be something for us to consider
potentially as inspiration
Thank you. Adjourned at 1 o'clock. Thank you everyone
Thank you. Thank you.
