City Council Meeting — March 4, 2026

Raise your hand. So those of you who are standing in the aisles, you will have to clear the aisles. So if you can find a seat next to anyone who has their hands raised.

The seats are open for everybody in attendance. So if you can just find a seat, that would be great.

Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Okay, good evening everyone. We're going to get the meeting started this evening. If you have an empty seat next to you, could you raise your hand so some of the folks. Yeah, there's a few empty seats in the front here. One, two, three, if anyone wants to come up to the front and grab a seat. So we do have overflow seating in the lobby. The meeting is being broadcast on the TV monitor. Restrooms are also in the lobby area. We have staff available at the back of the chambers if anyone has questions or needs assistance. We have a lot of speakers joining us for the first time this evening, so I want to ensure everyone understands our meeting protocols. If you would like to speak and make public comments, please fill out a yellow speaker card and give it to the city clerk. Please fill out one card per item if you wish to speak on more than one item. We have multiple items regarding the data center tonight, 12A, 12B, and 11B. If you want to speak on each item, fill out a separate card for each item. I will then call speakers by name, indicate it on the speaker card for each agenda item. And you would come up to the podium, speak into the mic. And like previous meetings, I usually call five names. So everyone can line up here in the aisle so that right after the first speaker goes, you guys can go right after to smooth things out. I want to acknowledge that the topics on our agenda tonight carry a lot of weight for our community. We are all here because we all care deeply about the future of this city. To ensure everyone has a chance to speak and be heard, I ask for your cooperation with a few ground rules. first of all please direct all comments to the council not to members of the audience please be respectful of each speaker regardless of what their opinion is everyone gets a chance to be heard we also ask for silence while others are speaking we're using a software called wordly for translation and closed captioning. And the platform using our microphones to capture audio. If the audience is shouting or speaking out of turn, the platform won't be able to capture each speaker's comments. So please remain silent while others are speaking so that Wordly can assist with translation. Please keep your comments focused on the agenda item at hand. we have we're giving the same five minutes for each speaker but depending on how many comment cards when we get to each item I'll let you guys know how many comment cards we have so that you guys can regulate the time amongst yourself that way everyone gets a chance to speak my role as mayor is to ensure this meeting is conducted efficiently and safely for everyone in attendance Thank you all for coming tonight. We will call to order now. And we'll start off with our flag salute with our Monterey Park, with Scout Troop 286, Color Guard. Please rise.

Hold on.

place your right hand over your heart ready begin

right face if if if if if if if if if if

if if

Thank you. you may be seated. We do have a certificate of recognition on behalf of City of Monterey Park for our scouts from Troop 286, and we'd like to present it to Luke Littlefield. And yes, Robert.

So good evening, Mayor, Mayor Potem, City Councilmembers, Robert Aguirre, Director of Recreation and Community Services. And tonight with me, I have Luke Littlefield. Luke recently helped do his Eagle Scout project over at Garvey Ranch Park. So you'll see on the monitors here tonight, Luke's project was actually refurbishing the very old and tattered sign that was over at Garvey Ranch Park. I'm going to allow Luke to speak a little bit about that process. I know he also has some thank yous that he wants to give. And so with that, I'll turn it over to Luke. And I just want to also thank him and his troop for all of their work that they put into beautifying our city. So, Luke.

Thank you, Mr. Robert, and thank you, City Council, for allowing me to be here today.

So my project, as you know, is the first thing of the Garvey Ranch Park sign,

and to get started with that, me and my scouts who volunteered,

we helped make the pathway to the sign right there by clearing out the bushes and leveling the area,

and we placed the pebbles as seen and the stones.

And after that, the park helped us take down the sign and delivered it to my home to work on the sign,

where me and my scout sanded down the sign and repaired the broken wood and painted it.

So I wanted to give a special thank you to Mr. Robert for allowing this to happen,

as my first project idea was to be a flagpole at Garvey Ranch Park, and the plan didn't make it out.

But because of Mr. Robert and his support, I was able to have a new project made, which was the Garvey Ranch Park sign.

and I want to give a special thank you to Ms. Joanne and Mr. Paul

because without them I would have been stressing over the Eagle Scout Project and the flagpole but thanks to them I was able to get through it with the sign

so I want to give a special thank you to the scouts who helped out and my friends

and a special thank you to my mom and dad for encouraging me through my journey

thank you guys applause Thank you so much. We'll bring the certificate to you.

Thank you.

Okay, I'm going to do it now. One, two, three. Oh, wait. Okay, wait. I'm going to take it. Yeah. She's taking selfies.

I have some of you have to step up there. Step up on the... What's up, Erin?

Oh, Jake. Okay, so they put people that I thought I meant.

Yeah.

Look over here real quick.

Oh, you have a good idea.

All right.

No problem.

Thank you.

All right, thank you again to Troop 286.

Madam Clerk, may we get a roll call please. Council Member Goh? Present. Council Member Wong? Present. Council Member Sanchez? Present. Mayor Pro Tem Lowe. Present. Mayor Yang. Present. We have a quorum. Thank you. All right.

Any agenda revisions or additions? Madam Mayor, members of the council, we'd like to request that the council remove item 9A from tonight's agenda. And we'd also like to request item 8A be moved before public communication if the council would like to do so.

All right, and I'd also like to move items 12A, 11B, and 12B up to be heard right after public communications. All good? Yep. All right. So we will go ahead and do...

So just for clarification, item 9A has been removed from the city council agenda for tonight's meeting. Item 9A.

Thank you. So let's start with the presentation for 8A. Then we'll do public communications. And then we'll do items 12A, 11B, and 12B. thank you for the introduction good evening madam here council members and members of the community my name is Michael Cerna I'm an engineer at

Metropolitan Water District and I will be giving a presentation to update you

on our Garvey Reservoir Rehabilitation project here's my agenda I'll provide an overview of Metropolitan who Metropolitan Water District is I'll

provide project background followed with project update and our next steps

Metropolitan Water District was established in 1928.

We serve as a water wholesaler with 26 member agencies.

Ultimately, what that means is through our member agencies,

we're able to deliver drinking water to approximately 19 million people in Southern California.

So this right here shows an aerial view of the city of Monterey Park.

The city boundary is outlined in orange.

Highlighted is Garvey Reservoir and City Hall. So Garvey Reservoir is just southeast of here.

This is, this slide shows the bird's eye view of the reservoir.

You can see the blue highlight lines represent pipelines that are connected to the reservoir.

And I've highlighted the outlet tower and the floating cover and liner,

which are the major components to be rehabilitated. So quick background in this slide, or I'm sorry, quick background.

Garvey Reservoir was constructed in 1954.

Its maximum storage capacity is 1,600 acre feet.

Ultimately, that reservoir provides Metropolitan with operational flexibility to run its water system.

So why is this project needed? Firstly, it's part of who we are. It's in our mission statement. MWD wants to continue to deliver high quality water, high quality drinking water to the community.

And also California Division Drinking Water, DW, the state agency that regulates public drinking water systems,

requires all reservoirs to be covered to protect from contamination.

The reservoir cover that you see here was installed in 1999 with a typical service life of about 20 to 25 years.

This cover is at the end of its useful life. So project goals to summarize.

At a high level, the goal is to improve major facilities.

We want to maintain Garvey Reservoir reliability and improve operations and maintenance.

Here's our project timeline.

This slide really shows the progress of the project as well as MWD's engagement with the city of Monterey Park.

Final design kicked off in 2023, and in 2024 we made two presentations to city council, similar to what I'm doing now.

The first one was performed in January, followed by another one in June.

The EIR for the project was adopted in November of 2024, and we completed design last year, and we awarded a construction contract at the end of 2025.

The picture shown on the slide shows NWD's effort to engage with the city.

I believe on two separate occasions we hosted members of the city council and city management, the mayor, public works director, and city manager.

all visited the reservoir.

This slide shows our anticipated construction schedule.

As mentioned, we issued a contract late last year, in December 2025, and we've been working with our contractor to get the pre-construction administrative documentation completed. Now that our contractor has satisfied some of that front-end documentation,

they're ready to mobilize, and that brings us to where we are today. We anticipate the contract to mobilize later this month with active demolition to occur between April and August of this year, and ultimately construction through 2028.

One thing I want to make clear and stress before we get to the next slide is Metropolitan will have a continued presence on site during construction. Garvey Reservoir is a critical piece of infrastructure for our organization so

it's important for us to have full visibility as construction progresses

we'll have a construction manager on site as well as other engineers and

inspectors and operators to to ensure progress is being made so these are next steps and what to expect firstly there will be no disruption to your water

supply city residents are not connected to the reservoir directly so our

anticipated construction should not affect service to help mitigate and

limit the nuisance noise we've directed the contractor to only perform during

specific working hours as well as to mitigate the additional construction vehicular traffic in the area we've adopted specific truck hauling hours

Again, the goal is to reduce a large truck traffic during morning and after commutes, and we want to keep the roads safe for our neighbors and limit the effect of construction on our daily routines.

At the bottom of the slide, you'll see a map of our construction truck route.

Working with the city, we established this route.

Truck access should be limited to Orange Avenue, Graves Avenue, and Garfield Avenue.

Lastly, before I close, I want to make note that we do plan on circulating a flyer, project information sheet to the community surrounding the reservoir.

We're targeting the week of March 16th, and the flyer will include much of the information

on this slide as well as what I presented to you today. That includes my presentation. Thank you.

May I, Mayor? Yes. Michael, thanks for the presentation. Just a quick question, and if you can clarify again or just say it again, the timeline of the construction Yes, timeline of the construction, again, we are set to mobilize later this month, so our contract is ready to move on site, basically.

Basically, at that point, construction will go through the end of 2028.

Thank you.

Thank you for the presentation of the update. and you're beginning if I missed it I apologize you're beginning construction in a few weeks or months or what yes so again our contractor will mobilize at the end of this month and shovels in the ground likely in April and then through the end of 2020 is construction period that's correct about two years yes and then can you remind if I'd miss it I'm Paul again can you remind us what you're actually doing at the site you're replacing the liner replacing all the pipes yes we're it's called the project we're replacing the liner the cover as

well as striking the outlet tower there's a few other miscellaneous

equipment mechanical electrical furnaces but that information will be part of the fire that we intend to circulate and then we're do we have a webpage already set up for this project towards informing the community we can definitely add it to the city's webpage yeah I think that'd be good especially as a long-term

project whatever can provide us I think we can just upload would be cool and that's a cool rendering and then just to confirm there's there's no after the construction there's you're not changing capacity in terms of how much water is being would be able to store it there anything like that it would be the same essential kind of usage that's correct yes we are not changing capacity we're updating to make sure the equipment's up to date and all that stuff yes thank you

thank you for the update um you know i think it's been about a year since we toured uh i think the facility maybe longer yeah about a year and a half had been in june june 2024 was uh when we had tours yeah and that was my first time actually up at the garvey reservoir and i think one of the things other than the reservoir that's there it's just the amazing views that you have there that I remember anyhow I hope that you will come back as the project progresses and give us updates in terms of where you guys are at and and I think to to reiterate what councilmember Wong said whatever we can do to inform the public in terms of on our part to share information about what's going on with this project it would be appreciated as well yeah duly noted um that will share as much information as we can city officials and we would like to extend that that in white again to for tour as we start to get into the heavy heavy parts of construction if if you guys are up for it you know I'll be more than willing to to twirl toward the second I think it's a beautiful part of Monterey Park in terms of a lot of the the landscape that you can see and just being so high but also that particular area I'm not trying to encourage people go in there and walk, but it is a very nice venue. Thank you.

Michael, thank you very much for your presentation. I know you mentioned that your agency will also be doing outreach to the community. Can you describe more in detail what that entails? Are we talking about mailing letters or building electronics? And how wide of an area are we talking about? So, yes, it is a flyer. It's just a project information sheet, and it does summarize what to expect during construction.

Again, a lot of the information that I already provided today is kind of summarized in the flyer.

I believe we're going to the immediate community surrounding the reservoir, but I can get clarification on that.

I believe we are planning to circulate that the week of March 16th. Okay. I would like to know, I'm sure so would my colleagues, because again, Orange Avenue is a heavily used street, not just for people commuting to work, but also using it as an access way to our shopping centers, not to mention the schools up there. So I think that it's important that, I mean, if it has to be citywide, then again, because of the heavy use of not just Orange, but also Graves Avenue as well.

Thank you. Yes.

Yeah, thank you for that presentation. I'd love to join a future tour since I believe the previous tour was scheduled before I joined council, so I haven't personally toured it myself. But I know the reservoir is much in need of rehabilitation, so thank you for this project. Thank you. Thank you. All right, that's all for 8A. We don't have any public communications for 6 and no staff communications for 7. So we'll jump to the item that most people are here for tonight, 12A. Consideration and possible action to call for a special election on June 2nd, 2026, and adding a proposition to the ballot prohibiting data centers citywide. So let me just tell you guys how many speaker cards I got so you guys can regulate the time and know that more speaker cards come in throughout the night. So 12A, I currently have 55 public comment cards, 12B, 2, and 11B, 27. So it adds up to 85 speakers. So if everyone speaks for the five minutes, that's seven hours. We'll end at 2 in the morning. If everyone speaks for three minutes, that'll be over four hours. We'll end at 11 p.m. So I don't limit folks' time here. I let everyone regulate themselves. I know at one meeting, a lot of people took a lot of time, and over 20 people ended up going home and not getting a chance to speak. So if you've already heard someone say what you want to say, maybe you don't need to repeat yourself, but if you have something worth telling us, then use up all the time. So I'll call five names, and you guys can line up at the aisle. and then when the line gets short then I will call more names. So let's see. Number one, we have Joyce Vega. Two is Carrie. Three is Jeremy. Dave Jones. And Sam.

And I also want to make it clear that the proposed 1977 Saturn project isn't on tonight's agenda. So the city council will not and cannot discuss that particular project or any details of that particular project tonight. The item is for a ballot prohibiting data centers. Citywide. So it's a general ballot measure. All right. Joyce, yes. Joyce Vega, good evening. City Council, City Manager. I've been a resident for over 30 years. Let me be clear, I don't want a data center in my community or the greater St. Gabriel Valley. I conditionally support 12A, but demand that the city close two loophole

and also pass an ordinance banning data centers immediately as per the letter from CBM dated February 27, 2026.

I'm fighting this fight for the future of my granddaughters. We are in an upside-down world right now, and I want my granddaughters to know that I fought to make things right.

I'm fighting for our communities to have clean air, clean water, nature, and a world full of productive, creative people, not AI and robots.

Our leaders, our city leaders and planners need to imagine a community that benefits the people of the community

and not greedy billionaire corporations that only care about money and power.

My granddaughter, Noelle, eight years old, says,

I want a world with no data centers here or anywhere where people live.

I want a world with clean air and water to survive.

Thank you.

Sorry, one more thing. I hope that you all make the right decision for your own legacies.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council members. So regarding 12A, I know you already have the letter from Attorney Doug Carstens. I'm sorry, can you please state your name? Carrie. Thank you. I'm very appreciative that he was retained and was able to give you his approach, which, as you know, is a zoning ordinance plus ballot measure. Regarding the zoning ordinance, there's some things I wanted to say to you in favor of that, arguing for that. As you know, zoning ordinances are legislative acts, and courts give wide deference to them. The city only needs a rational basis, which is the lowest legal standard. The city made the decision to adopt ordinance number 2253 to allow data centers in Saturn Park back in November 2024. It's clear now that the majority of residents were unaware of this. Now you're aware of how the majority of our residents feel about allowing data centers. You should not delegate this decision solely to the ballot box. When the city is aware of the aggressive PR campaign, you're well aware of the aggressive PR campaign that HMC has started waging in favor of the data center. From the hiring of multiple PR firms, there may be up to three, to Facebook and Instagram ads, to canvassing the neighborhood. So this is a call that you need to make to fix a problem that you caused.

Also, you now have overwhelming rational bases from the public welfare standpoint to support a zoning amendment to ban data centers. There's a wealth of evidence in the record that you can rely upon to show the detrimental impacts from data centers. You have the MND comment letters from SCAQMD, Advocates for the Environment, Creed and its experts. You have a January 2026 letter from Center for Biological Diversity, and you have a large number of resident letters and public comments from the December through February and including today's meetings. So you have plenty of evidence in the record upon which to base a new zoning ordinance to ban data centers throughout the entire city.

Now, regarding the ballot language and going forward with the ballot in June, obviously, I would wish to have this measure on the ballot as soon as possible. However, I do have several concerns with the language in the ballot measure. I did share some of them with you a few weeks ago when I told you that I felt that the definition of data center is problematic because it's applying only to properties, one or more acres of land. The other thing is that the ordinance only amends the land use element. And I feel that it is very important for all of the zoning amendments to be included in the ballot measure. Just to give you an example of why that's important. So the only definition being addressed is data center, but we have data processing facility, which is actually currently allowed within the office professional zone Monterey Pass Road. And if you look at the definition, a data center could come in under this. It says a building dedicated space within a building, a group of buildings primarily used for the processing, storage, and management of electronic data on less than an acre of land. Although it also says it typically involves data entry, a data center could come in under that definition. Typically involves doesn't mean it has to include data entry. So primarily used for the processing, storage, and management of electronic data. That could be a data center. So if you do this ballot measure that only changes the land use element and you don't go through and identify all of the municipal code sections that need to be changed, I'm concerned that a data center could be allowed in Monterey Pass Road area. So that needs to be fixed.

So I would say a cautious approach is necessary and a comprehensive ordinance that includes all of the municipal code amendments that are necessary to make sure that the council adopts effective regulations to prohibit data centers throughout the whole city. I would also actually suggest deleting the definition of data processing facility. I don't think that adds anything to our code. I think that current uses like office administrative or office professional can encompass the type of ancillary data uses, but any use of data processing facility would most likely almost encompass the data center so there's really no reason to have that definition the code at all thank you

mayor mayor if we could maybe interrupt real quick site think that some many of those concerns that were shared by this speaker right now were emailed I think I think to many of us multiple times. Maybe we could ask our city attorney to address some of those up front, just so perhaps we don't have to repeat all of those in the public comment going forward.

Yes, sir. Madam Mayor, members of the council, we're happy to provide a brief staff report if that's desirable. I think many of these questions have already been addressed within the staff report. certainly comments that have arisen during previous public comment. With regard to the council adopting an ordinance right now, the council has always been able to adopt an ordinance under its own land use authority. It cannot do so tonight. It requires a 20-day notice. It requires it because it's a change to the zoning. And I think my recommendation on that is to wait until the voters have given you direction based upon the ballot proposition, assuming for the sake of my discussion right now that the council were to put something onto the ballot. If the council decides not to, that's certainly something that the council can direct us to bring back zoning regulations and an ordinance. What that would look like is we would draft something, we would notice it, and you would have a public hearing probably sometime in April. The current recommendation, however, is to put something onto the ballot, wait for the voters to decide about that ballot proposition, and then come back after the ballot proposition, again, presumably has been approved by voters, and the council can act under those circumstances. The moratorium, which is not this agenda item, but one of the other agenda items is actually a public hearing, gives the security for not processing any data center applications during the pendency of both a ballot proposition and any decision-making that the city council might make if it decided to, for the sake of this discussion again, if the ballot proposition didn't pass, if the council still wanted to be on its own authority to adopt something, it could certainly do so at a later date. What else was the question? Sorry, I didn't forget anything. One acre. The one acre, the definition that is being proposed is actually a definition that's already on the books twice. It is in the marketplace specific plan and it's also in the Saturn Park innovation and technology zone So there's there's no pride of authorship on that other than the council previously approved that definition For a different area within the city. You can certainly play around with the language At your heart's content Happy to answer any other questions

Thank you, Carl

Dave

Thank you, Mary Yang Honorable Mayor Yang, Mayor Pro Tem Lowe, Council members and dedicated staff. My name is Dave Jones. I have lived in Monterey Park for the last 35 years plus and another 10 plus years before that so 45 or more. Who's counting? Since December, it's been clear the vast majority of Monterey Park residents and business owners are against building a data center in Saturn Park. And as our dedicated citizens have dug deeper into the issue, that sentiment has grown to a full-throated opposition to data centers anywhere in the city. We know the electricity used to power these data centers creates a gigandous amount of CO2. 83,000 million metric tons in the case of 1977 Saturn Street. And as I've noted before, absorbing that much CO2 would require a forest of trees 350 times the size of California. But just this week, I was able to determine the cap-and-trade costs of mitigation. And at California's current rate of $27.94 per ton, that cost would be over $2.3 trillion. That's seven times the entire state budget for 2025. Imagine having two data centers like that or more. Such an environmental impact cannot possibly be mitigated. We need to have no data centers. We also know the cost of electricity will absolutely go up. Goldman Sachs has reported electricity prices jumped 6.9% in 2025, more than double the 2.9% rate of inflation, and that data centers made up 40% of the demand growth. And Bloomberg reported electricity costs in areas near data centers have increased up to 267 percent compared to five years ago. This is so wrong, even President Trump in his State of the Union address said Americans should never pay higher electricity bills because of data centers. Yeah, I know, it blows my mind too. But that's not all. That's not all. The initial study for 1977 Saturn Street tells us the sound generated by the data center's cooling systems and generators will exceed the city's noise limits for residential neighborhoods. This is a consistent trend among data centers. In Great Oak, Virginia, residents complained of a persistent hum from cooling systems and fans that changed the character of their quiet tree-lined neighborhoods. In the Chicagoland suburbs of Aurora, Lyle, and Naperville, residents described the noise from data centers as like there was a helicopter on our roof. HMC's track cap spokespeople say they're going to use dampers and attenuators And they've modeled the noise, and it won't be a problem. But they couldn't say what level attenuators they modeled. And even dampened, based on production specifications, the noise would still exceed the city's limits. So I do support putting a permanent data center ban on the ballot with the following conditions. Remove the loophole that allows data centers less than one acre to be built in the city. No data centers means no data centers. And please change the language of the initiative so that zoning changes are implemented automatically upon passage or failing that, forcing the council to take action in less than one month. Now, most people here are aware HNC StrackCat held two town hall meetings this past Saturday. Meetings that HNC StrackCat couldn't even be bothered to attend. and reinforcing how little regard they have for the people of this city,

their Actum spokesperson said her job was to manage the community. Later,

No. Later, they said the city absolutely does have the discretion to determine whether or not the data center should be built. Yet, HMC StratCap's lawyer is already threatening to sue the city before a decision has even been made. HMC StratCap, by their very own actions, has consistently proven they don't want to be a good neighbor. They don't want to be part of the city. They want to exploit the city. Finally, I'd like to address the good union members here tonight. I grew up in a union home. I live in a union home. To me, being union means standing arm-in-arm with your neighbor against the bosses, not standing arm-in-arm with the bosses against your neighbor. There's a reason for that. Bosses lie. Bosses cheat. HMC StratCap has hired Rodriguez Strategies, which proudly brags about its anti-union work on its website. HMC StratCap doesn't want to help you. They want to exploit you, too.

Don't stand with the bosses. Stand with your neighbors.

No data centers in Monterey Park. No data centers in Monterey Park. No data centers in Monterey Park.

Thank you Dave. Let me call a few more names to get in line. Lorenzo Rodriguez, Angelica, Brian Marsh, Jim Pugh, Caleb. And when you come to the podium, please state your name. Thank you. Good day, good day mate. My name is Jeremy.

I'm on the board of directors for HMC and I just flew out from Australia. Finally showing up for you guys. We heard that Monterey Park is known for your bagels and local mom and pop shop. I signed to hers really good, delicious. When the board members said they wanted to build a data center, I was like, where's Monterey Park? And then I was like, wait, we could build a data center in a park? No, Monterey Park is a city, not a park. Okay, well, anyways, we want to emphasize how much we're looking forward to be your new neighbors, your very noisy, irritating, and extremely toxic neighbors. We'll be doing everything we're legally required to do to get this through. We made you a website. We made you flyers. It matches the color of the official Monterey Park website, so you know it's official. And you may be asking yourself, why Monterey Park? Well, I mean, the celebrities and CEOs won't let us build in Beverly Hills, Silver Lake, or Pasadena. And why 65 feet from the nearby homes? Well, because you didn't stop us. So there's not enough regulations, and it's a brand-new thing, so we're just going to go for it, and you have to catch up. So this is brand-new technology, and we're going to just, you know, it's a gold rush for us. So we had a lot of questions on, you know, what the data center will be used for. You like your iPhone. You use banking software. What about Fortnite? Everyone likes Fortnite. You've used ChatGPT to write an apology to your wife. Those are all the things that we can use it for. Think of the data centers like a black box. We don't ask questions of what AI companies are using it, like ChatGPT, Claude, Grock. They use this black box. We don't ask any questions. They're paying the bills on time. Data centers are like, they outpower school bombings in Iran, teen suicides, and surveillance data for ICE. but I can definitively say we at HMC bear no legal or moral responsibility on what goes on inside that black box or how the data center affects your family, communities, health. I'm going to fly back in Australia soon, so it doesn't matter. So I want to shout out our PR firm, Acton Rodriguez. Thanks for all the work you guys are doing. You're taking the heat for us at that little town hall. Those guys are nonparties and mercenaries, so it's been great. They'll do a wildlife project one day and union busting for lift the next day. It's amazing. And we had a great meet and greet at the IHOP, another great local staple, love the pancakes there. And while I give you guys a little park, so you should be happy, we get a little mini park. Why aren't you thanking us? We're still working on the name, but I'm pushing for the Monterey Park Park.

For the record, this is all parody, so please don't sue me, HMC. One lawsuit against Monterey Park is enough. In all seriousness, letting HMC boss our city around isn't democracy. Having backroom deals for two years isn't democracy.

Don't hide behind your constituents to fix your mistake. Do a moratorium as well as a ballot measure. Listen to people in the community that actually know this stuff better than I do. So I can please stop coming up here and making a fool of myself. Thank you.

Come on, Sam.

All right.

Good evening, Mayor Yang, Mayor Pro Tem Lowe,

council members Sanchez, Wong, and Go.

My name is Sam. I'm a resident here from Monterey Park, District 3,

with you, Jose.

Yeah, I just want to say that with regards to, I know this is for 12A, but real quick on 11B, I do support 11B, but I don't think that's enough.

It's like a Band-Aid. We're bleeding out here, right?

So I do support that for 12A.

I conditionally support 12A, but I do think that the ballot-only approach is too risky.

We need something more, right?

We need an ordinance from the city that bans data centers in the municipal code and in the general plan.

So we need that citywide, and we need it now. Like some other members have said, residents have said, it's not our fault, right?

Like, we were not informed of this. It's been two years this thing has been in the works, and you guys have put us in a real tight spot.

We've got people out here canvassing in the street.

We've got people out here who are spending their money on flyers and everything, their time and money to do this thing. And, you know, we all pay taxes. We all elected you as officials.

It's your job to help protect the health and safety of your residents.

So I hear you, Carl.

It is within the council's powers to be able to pass this ordinance. and that's what I'm here for tonight.

That's what I think a lot of people are here for tonight.

I also want to say that, you know, I know you got the letter

and they have identified that HMC's lawsuit threats are meritless.

There's no bite to them. These guys are all bark.

So I don't know why you guys are scared to go forward with that.

You guys have the police powers to protect the health and safety of your residents

and HMC is not vested.

You guys haven't approved their application. So you can go forward with that.

I also want to point out that, you know, with regards to the one legacy thing that happened here before.

They sued the city. They didn't win. Right.

So don't be scared. Show up for for us residents who we elected you.

And that's what that's what we want to see.

A couple of things I want to just highlight here, because I think it is important to to recognize our mistakes, you know, as we've been going through this process.

January 2024, that's when the permit and design review application was submitted for this data center.

That was two years ago.

I've talked to many people in this community who didn't hear about this until December of this year.

That's two years that we didn't get any word from you guys, any outreach.

So let's own that. The SPARC, I wasn't personally a part of that, but I heard that there was probably the highest number I think I heard was 60 residents in attendance at SPARC.

40? Okay.

Hey, I was trying to give them the benefit of the doubt.

Even with that, that's about 0.1% of the population of Monterey Park.

That's hardly representative of the people here of Monterey Park.

And I think, you know, you see a lot of people who are showing up now because the public has been engaged. And I think that's a good thing.

So let's own that.

Let's take advantage of this opportunity.

You see these people out here who don't want this thing built here.

Additionally, I would like to add

and I brought this up before and I passed out some information for you guys

I don't think I've heard any one of you and maybe I missed it in other meetings

mention anything about 1980 standard

and I think that's a huge misstep

if you're going to do any analysis on these properties

you have to consider the cumulative analysis of both properties

and I think it does us a huge disservice if you just completely ignore that

as this property is here, this one is across the street

and there's no way that there can be combined effects of these things.

So let's own that. I think you guys have known about that for a long time,

and that's evident in the documents I gave you.

There's the purchase records.

There's the LLC filings from HMC that were put out.

Interesting enough, the LLC and the purchase of 1980 were done

before the ISM&D for 1977 came out.

In 1977, M&D came out before they even purchased the property.

So it's a really weird timeline. Maybe you guys can help elaborate on that.

But, yeah, so, you know, take a look at that.

I talked to another community member.

She put in a public records ticket with the city, and she never got anything back.

And 1980 was discussed in, I think it was Ordinance 2246, and they didn't send that to her. She had to go digging for that on her own.

And it's clear in HMC's investor documentations that they want to build two here.

So, you know, let's not miss that fact.

And it's on the record here that you guys know that that's their intent, is to build two of those here. So thank you.

My name is Angelica. I'm a resident of South San Gabriel. Oh, hang on a second. Can we maybe Carl can or Inez can we just do a quick reminder again that there's no the topic of our conversation and the items and I are not on specific data center projects or proposals and that the items here correct me if I'm wrong that we're talking about our would deal with data centers uses in the entire city which would include 1980 and any other property for that matter address in the city just want to clarify that so that we're clear that the actions that potentially are going to be taken today have an impact on the entire city we're not talking about one specific practice also why i can't actually engage on this item if if it was specific about a specific data center proposal i would not be able to engage on that item let me know if i'm wrong correct

So the item before Council tonight is it's not in regards to any specific project, property, or applicant. This is general prohibition on data centers citywide, correct.

Sorry, go ahead, Angelica. Okay, hi, my name is Angelica. I'm a resident of South San Gabriel, but I will be minutes away from this data center.

I came out in support of a no data center ballot measure.

of course with clarifications as just as everyone's saying to make sure that we

do not have data centers unfortunately I was not able to attend the so-called

HMC town hall meeting doesn't sound like I missed much because they were not

able to answer the one important question what are you using this data

center for how have they not told us what they're using it for if it was

anything good they would have told us because we have a little pocket park

that we can all enjoy there okay I when I first found out about this meeting was

Actually, the data center project was the night before in December 2024, just like a lot of people here.

Ironically, and just as disturbing, I happened to find out last night that BlackRock has just purchased the electric grid of Indiana, the state of Indiana, and Ohio.

What does that mean for us?

If you do not know who BlackRock is, please look it up. But that means that they are in charge of the electric grid of Indiana and Ohio.

How does that affect us?

Monterey Park, they are willing to build this next to our businesses, next to our parks, next to our schools, next to our elementary school children, Hillcrest Elementary School.

How far is it away from this proposed data center?

And we're willing to build that for our children?

Monterey Park can set a precedent right now, okay? Those private companies can go ahead and buy out whatever they want, but Monterey Park can take control right now and ban data centers, okay?

We take a precedent.

Monterey Park is either going to allow these to be built everywhere.

They are going to see what we are allowing here.

We either set a precedent and say, no, we are not going to have this in Monterey Park, or we are saying that we allow it, okay?

please Monterey Park, please City Council, set a precedent, okay? Do not build data centers.

Please, no data centers in Monterey Park.

My name is Lorenzo. I'm a resident of East L.A. on the border of Monterey Park. I'm here in solidarity with my neighbors and fellow man and woman to speak

And what I consider to be an environmental and class injustice, the air in Monterey Park is not just the air in Monterey Park.

It is the air of the people all over this basin. It is of the commons.

Much like the groundwater that eventually seeps into the water table, what enters this environment will eventually come back to haunt us, our children and our grandchildren. What enters this air will eventually settle back down under its own weight and become part of what we breathe on a daily basis.

And the trapped gases will in turn trap heat and continue giving us hot summer days in February and March.

and after some time there will be no break from what is pumped into our environment.

Living here you may have noticed that we are in somewhat of a bowl surrounded by mountains and hillsides and by the air of the ocean pushing back. That is what gives us our smog.

The air here becomes trapped and all of us in the greater Los Angeles area

are victims of what pollution may come from cars, machinery, industry

and now data centers which are becoming too common.

I think at a town hall there might be some faction, typically of the population, who can say to themselves, I see the benefit of this. I understand why this is necessary. This could make my life better. I don't think that there is some such case today. I would just like to know who it is that is asking for this. If we needed a bridge or a road or a park project or an affordable housing unit, how long would that take? How much pushback would that receive?

And yet here we are, completely blindsided by this initiative to forever alter this community

and the one surrounding it, and if it weren't for the amazing people gathered here today,

the data center would already be an unalterable part of our reality.

This project here is selling your children's rights to clean air and quiet neighborhoods,

and it is selling the right to a secure job to the billionaire class.

They hope you are too ignorant and too placated to notice that the city and the billionaire class

are about to get very rich off of what is rightfully yours, the very air you need to breathe.

also someone who I guarantee was not fighting to get a data center in his backyard,

can continue hoarding wealth and continue chipping away at workers' rights.

I believe we are all very focused on the environmental aspect of this project,

which might be the most immediate, alarming, and visible consequence of the data center.

But what is the purpose of this data center? It is not to use water and make noise and pollute our air.

It has a very clear purpose, which is just as consequential.

It is here to power AI. We know what the intentions of the elite class are.

They have been very clear. They are not shy about this.

We know the endgame of artificial intelligence.

It is not to make our lives more convenient.

I think it is of no surprise to anyone here that the billionaire ruling class is not interested in making your lives easier.

They are not known for their benevolence or their charity.

The advent of AI has been presented as just one more tool.

However, if you are paying attention, you know it to be the last tool.

The intention is to make human labor obsolete and to limit its use as much as possible.

Just recently, Block, the Barrett company of Cash App and Square,

fired 40% of its workforce to be replaced by AI, and their stock rose 25%.

And to me, that was the ruling class's way of saying that was the right move,

and we are headed in the right direction, and that company was rewarded for their inhumanity.

We are heading to an unprecedented future where human labor is no longer necessary,

where human labor is an afterthought, the one thing in a capitalist society, unfortunately,

that can provide a man or woman any real sense of dignity and belonging.

Additionally, we know AI is increasingly being used as a weapon of war.

AI-powered drones, AI-powered missiles, AI-powered decision-making, AI-powered mass surveillance of U.S. citizens.

We are sprinting toward a cliff, and voting yes on data centers is saying, I am okay with that future which I have just described, where future generations are just an inconvenience to the job market, and rather than people, business owners would rather use AI agents which are enabled by the very data centers we are threatened by today.

Where the people in this city are unemployed or underemployed or living in fear of being replaced by AI, where citizens are watched by their own government at all hours on all platforms, where speech and conduct is policed by artificial intelligence, the people on this city council can proclaim with their vote very loudly and very clearly what future they see for this city and the people in it.

Please heed our warning. Nothing good will come from this.

Five years from now, when the rest of the country is suffering from the ramifications of data centers and AI,

when the cities that were too weak to say no to billionaire interests

are watching the consequences of data centers unfold on their citizens,

the city of Monterey Park can proudly state, We stood up to injustice. We represented the interests of our people, and we did not sell them out to the billionaires.

That is a reality worth fighting for. That is a city we can be proud of.

As a final remark, I say to the people of the city council, the citizens of Monterey Park and its surrounding neighborhoods

will not quickly forget what you decide for their future. Thank you.

Well, good evening, Mayor and City Councilmembers. I'm Brian Marsh. I'm with the HMC StratCap.

For several years, we have worked together in good faith with the city processing an application to develop a data center on our property at 1977 Saturn.

During that process, the city provided assurances about the viability of data center development. We acquired the property and proceeded with our application based on those assurances.

We participated in the SPARK process to determine if the data center use was preferred.

The SPARK meetings were sponsored and advertised by the city and open to the public.

The SPARK findings were overwhelmingly supportive of data center use.

We then worked with the city to expand the permitted uses in Saturn Park

and create new zoning regulations for data centers, which the city adopted in November of 2024.

Following the adoption of the data center zoning regulations,

we arranged a tour of a new data center in Vernon for the city council and staff,

and we heard afterwards how the city would welcome a similar investment in Monterey Park.

Based on these actions and representations by the city,

we then closed on the purchase of 1977 Saturn Street in December of 2024.

We continued working with the city on our planning application until it was deemed complete and in conformance with the municipal code.

The city completed its environmental review under CEQA and that found there were no significant environmental impacts.

We negotiated a development agreement with the city that will provide numerous community benefits for the residents.

And the city scheduled our project for a hearing in November 2025, but there was no action.

There was no widespread opposition at that time.

Now for the last few months, we recognize that the city has faced intense public pressure opposed to the data center.

We volunteered to complete a full environmental impact report in response to that opposition.

and to provide more information to help educate the community about our data center.

We also recognize that the city may be interested in pursuing alternative land uses in Saturn Park. I'm here tonight to state that HMC, as the largest property owner in Saturn Park,

is willing to engage in productive, good faith discussions with the city to explore

those alternative uses that the city and the community desire.

The goal would be to reach a mutually acceptable win-win solution for Saturn Park.

Our preferred path is not to litigate.

We must, however, protect our legal rights.

And we believe there may be a common ground solution.

This is your opportunity to create a land use plan that works for the city, the community, and us.

Forcing a ballot proposition with a special election in June 2026 severely degrades our ability to work together.

Therefore, in closing, I ask that you not proceed with item 12A on the agenda and vote to postpone a potential ballot measure until a later date.

That will provide us the time for the city, HMC, and the community to create a mutually acceptable solution for Saturn Park.

And we view this juncture as an opportunity to meet community's desires,

advance the city's priorities, and avoid costly litigation between the parties. Thank you.

Everyone, reminder, please respect everyone who is speaking at the podium, regardless of opinion. That way we can all hear everyone's time. Thank you.

Good evening, City Council members and Madam Mayor. My name's Jim Pugh. I'm with Shepherd Law Firm and we represent the applicant for the Data Scent Project in 1977 Saturn. As you know, my comments will be very brief tonight. We prepared a letter that I have here in my hand that outlines the legal risk associated with items 11B and 12A that are on the agenda tonight. We'll provide it to the city clerk for the administrative record. It demonstrates, in summary, the city's actions on the moratorium and the ballot measure are fraught with legal risk. I expect the city attorney to say there's no risk. I expect the council will continue with its unfettered decision-making. But as the applicant said, I urge you to reconsider your path and work with the applicant to find a mutually acceptable outcome that pleases the community and that pleases the city and works for the applicant. I'll submit this for the record. Thank you.

All right, let me call a few more names while Caleb's coming up. Samuel, Alma, Tilda DeWolf, Kathleen Gomez, and Deborah Simone.

That is going to be a tough act to follow.

I feel like they just gave you an out.

They said they want to build something different, so just ban data centers.

Problem solved.

Honorable Mayor and Council Members. Sorry, I'm going to read it because I'm not a good public speaker.

Oh, and also, if you're watching on YouTube and you want to submit, go to NoDataCenterMPK.

I think this is the camera.

NoDataCenterMPK.org, and you can still write a letter.

There's instructions for how to write a letter to get your voice heard because we appreciate the democratic process. So thank you so much, Mayor and Council members. I'm going to be kind of a broken record here.

I think that's okay.

I live in District 5, and I'm within 500 feet of the proposed site with my wife and three kids. We are not interested in being guinea pigs for a data center.

I also want to point out that across the nation, data centers are popping up, being built by big tech companies who are at the forefront of this technology, and they can't make a safe data center. HMC is an asset manager.

And I'm quite sure that their Dallas and their Kansas facilities were data centers that were bought, that already had renters, which is State Farm.

So they're telling us they can build something that Tesla, Meta, Amazon can't build, which is a safe data center within 65 feet of our homes.

I don't buy that at all. So I'm going to live edit my remarks here because Dave Jones, who I want to be when I grow up, already said most of it.

So we learned about this project December 3rd after two years of sequel reviews.

They could have reached out to us. They could have engaged us.

The SPARK committee was brought up.

I believe only people within 500 feet of Saturn Park were actually notified, and only 19 people voted on the data center.

So that's not... I mean, there's more people here tonight against the data center, and you guys were willing to update the municipal code with 19 people.

Wow. Just ban it.

I also want to talk about the... What do I got? Two and a half. Their town hall.

So it was just Acton and Kim Lee Horn were there,

and I think a representative from Shepard Mullen was there as well.

Then on December 3rd, when Mayor Yang asked the applicant to do a town hall

and they committed to doing that, you said, and I'm not quoting,

but you said, I hope that you bring, where did I write this down? You requested HMC include appropriate agencies.

which I would assume meant Edison, Water District, Gensler, who designed the facility, and HMC.

It would be nice if HMC attended their own town hall.

None of those people were there, so they couldn't answer questions like,

have the heat and noise generation from Edison's substation been studied? No.

What about the seven to eight steel high-voltage poles that they'll have to put in residential areas

to connect their substation to the Numark substation? Could they answer that? No.

What happens to the e-waste when HMC has to replace their tens of hundreds of thousands of computers and servers

as the technology continues to change?

That is a lot of e-waste, and we know how fast we have to replace our computers.

If they're going to stay competitive,

they're going to have to replace their equipment very often.

Let's see. I got one more thing I wanted to say.

That's probably it.

I would say yes on the moratorium, outright ban on data centers. They gave us the out. And I would say a ballot measure, but lose the acreage loophole,

because the technology and the facilities that house the technology can get smaller with time.

But that doesn't mean that their resource usage would decrease too. They could still use the same amount of resources.

Okay, that's it for me. Thank you for your time.

G'day, I'm Samuel, and I'm a resident of Monterey Park. Unlike Jeremy, I'm a real Australian. But I don't work for HMC. The first thing I want to draw attention to is how HMC's handlers had to bring in support by convincing union members to attend the last City Council meeting on February 4th in order to satisfy their volunteer hours. The post on Instagram... Read volunteer opportunity for apprentices. It goes on to say apprentices can earn volunteer hours by participating. There is no mention whatsoever of the meetings agenda. They just wanted people to fill the seats and they sure did. Now I think I can speak for the majority of Monterey Park residents. Is this microphone bugging out? I can hear it. Yeah, it's irritating. Now, I think I can speak for the majority of Monterey Park residents when I say we are most definitely not anti-union. Some of us belong to them or wish we could.

You union workers have more in common with the community members across this room than with the corporation that sent you here. you were put in this position but you don't have to stay in it stand with your neighbors build things for the community and stand against things that will exploit it like this data center and any other data center there is no guarantee that the jobs on this proposed site i think it 200 or something like that will be filled by any of the resident union members. Look at how they bus people in from all around the country to build data centres in other cities. Last weekend, over a month of waiting with bated breath, we were finally given two clown halls. Sorry, town halls. In those two sessions, they failed to answer some very important questions regarding city resource usage and there was not a single SC representative present to guarantee that our electricity rates won't increase for a facility that is classified as heavy industry. How can you just power up a 33 megawatt facility without building any new energy supply? Sure, even if they pay for a new distribution, where does the extra power come from? We would need new power stations and you know who is going to have to pay for that? Don't you? Us. And that's not all. They plan on building an even bigger facility across the street at 1980 Saturn, which they declined to talk about by deflecting questions. That would bring the total energy usage to almost four times that of the entire city of Monterey Park. And now we're hearing that other buildings on the street are being looked at for future data centres. When concerned residents wanted to ask questions, we were told to scan a QR code or write them down. We had to raise our voices just to get follow-up questions answered. This after they gave us veiled responses or deferred to an absent HMC or the city. Why wasn't HMC there themselves to answer questions? It's obvious. They don't actually care about engaging with the community. In fact, the PR people running the town hall, and I'm jealous David already mentioned this, said outright that they were there to manage the community. Their words. Where were you, HMC? In the outback, drinking a can of Foster's, throwing another shrimp on the barbie? Or are you back home, avoiding accountability and watching Bluey? Tonight I'm asking the council to vote yes. Yes to extending the moratorium. Yes to a June 2nd special election for a citywide ban on data centres. Yes to a city ordinance that permanently bans data centres from being built in the city. And on that ballot, we're also asking to close two loopholes, prevent data centres occupying less than one acre from slipping through and commit to a one-month turnaround between the ballot and any amendments to the municipal code and general plan. Which brings me to something worth reflecting on. All of us here should take Mr James Pugh, HMC's lawyer, and his use of the word mob as a compliment. He represents an Australian company, but he failed to realise that he was using a word that First Nations Australians used to describe themselves and their people. In Aboriginal English, mob means more than just a crowd. It refers to your extended family, your clan and the community you come from. It's a word of connection and identity of kinship. To my fellow Monterey Park community members, that is us. We are the Monterey Park mob. Thank you for your time.

Good evening, Mayor Yang, council members. My name is Kathleen. I'm part of District 3.

I'm going to keep this pretty short. Definitely an introvert. I don't really like to public speak, but I think at this point...

Sorry. Okay. My name is Kathleen, District 3.

I definitely consider myself more of an introvert.

I'm not a public speaker, but I feel at this point if we do not say something we're complicit with everything going on around us

I

Attended the town hall that was hosted by HMC two things that stood out to me

Their number one talking point is this little pocket park. It's not the red part here

It's not the yellow part of this little tiny pocket park last time. I checked

No one wants to take a leisurely stroll around a data center Thing number two that stood out to me is they were trying to justify the diesel generators

in comparison to a hospital and fire station.

In the event of a big power outage, what do we want to support, a hospital or a data center?

I think it's pretty clear. So I'll just end this by saying that I support 12A conditionally, of course, as long as we

adopt a citywide ordinance that prohibits data centers. Thank you.

Good evening. My name is Tilda DeWolf, and I've lived here over 50 years, and I consider this the most destructive proposal I have heard in these 50-plus years.

I live very close to where it would be and they will be and I would very much consider moving. Thank you. Hi, good evening.

All of you, it's great to see you.

I'm Alma Marquez, and I live here in Monterey Park.

I have lived here for the last 13 years.

And when I was in college at East L.A. College, I dreamt of moving to Monterey Park. So it was a real different kind of community than where I grew up in. I grew up in Huntington Park.

I'm a proud product of Huntington Park.

And during that time, when I was in high school and transitioning to college,

there was a toxic waste incinerator that they were trying to build 500 feet away from our high school.

And we organized and we stopped it.

And never in a million years would I or could I imagine that something similar would happen in my dream city.

And I own a business in Monterey Park.

We are a communications and community engagement firm. So we know we are experts in community engagement.

What has happened here is not community engagement.

So I want to say yes to the ballot measure.

We want to make sure that we add a moratorium.

We also are very clear that language matters.

Please do whatever you can to change the language because it is very confusing.

So yes means yes, no means no.

Now, as a communications expert, and I've talked about this with our team, we're offering our communication services pro bono to the city to help support the efforts of keeping our community clear and safe from any and every data center that is even thinking about coming to our community.

I also just want to say that the present industrial complex is the same complex that is the technology complex that we're dealing with.

The tech bros are absolutely the Epstein class. They are not the working class.

Let me say a few more names. Bosco, Bosco, Ben, Lance Williams, Elijah Lim, Antonio Martinez.

Mayor Yang, Mayor Pro Tem Lowe, members of the City Council, it's great to be up here again talking with you about the concept of data centers in our wonderful town. I'm going to go back to what I talked about at the first meeting last year, and that's vision for this city. And I'm asking you again, what's your vision for this city? I'm here to support 12A. I'm here to close the loopholes and support what everybody else has said in our letter from Doug Carstens.

I would like you to think for a minute, 10 years down the road, when Monterey Park is the city that said no to data centers, when Monterey Park is the city that has pride in its past, faith in its future, and it's a place for people to come live. and you know we have supported I am not against development down there in Saturn Park I'm not against using union work to do it they can wire up some mixed-use residential they can plumb mixed-use residential they can do all those things they comply all their trades I am a member of a trade union for over 30 years I was vested in October of 1994 and I gotta say I and And that work has allowed me to finally buy a home here in Monterey Park at the wonderful young age of 52.

And part of what's wrong with this country right now is the average age of the home buyer now, do you know that, is 50. 50, Gen X for crying out loud. Give me a break. I mean, I love it. But anyway. So, you know, I just want you all to think about that, because you have all these wonderful people who are so media savvy and so civically minded. One of the wonderful things about going out and canvassing with these people is I have met neighbors who speak Cantonese, neighbors who speak Mandarin, neighbors who speak Espanol, and everybody. And we have gone out and met the people that actually live there. Who are the people in your neighborhood? If you're Gen X, you know that song, and now it's in your head. I mean, I think let's make this town a place where people want to come live, where people want to do real things, where they're not relying on a robot or a program or an app to run their lives. Let's put our faith in the future. Thank you.

Good evening, Mayor, City Council. My name is Bosco from District 5. We all hear how the world's wealthiest corporations like NVIDIA, Meta, X, Amazon, and OpenAI are pushing their agenda that AI is necessary. The AI race is resulting in a rush for constructing more and more data centers around the country. These massive buildings are packed with GPUs consuming huge amounts of fossil fuels to power and cool them. Journalists are reporting on how data centers are being rapidly constructed next to residential areas without a responsible level of concern for the health and welfare of those living nearby. A quick Google search provides resources for anyone to learn about the negative impacts that data centers have on nearby residents. I attended HMC's town hall last Saturday at the Barnes Park Clubhouse. HMC's hired publicists and consultants were there to provide information about their project. When I shared my concerns, my questions were not answered. I asked if HMC had taken into consideration public health disorders related to constant noise exposure to low-frequency noise and infrasound. The representatives answered no. However, researchers at UC Davis highlight how chronic exposure to noise can cause increased stress, hypertension, sleep disturbances, anxiety, depression, as well as behavioral and emotional disorders in children. A study from Harvard has shown an association between long-term noise exposure and an increased risk of cardiovascular mortality. Researchers at Caltech and UC Riverside reported that data center health impacts have tripled in only four years. The number of cases could rise by another 72% by 2028 if mitigations are not enacted. On another note, we discovered that HMC purchased both 1977 and 1980 Saturn Street properties at the same time in 2024, with 1980 being 25% larger. At HMC's town hall, many residents, myself included, asked what their intentions were for the 1980 property. Obviously, some sort of plan must have been in place when they...

The ordinance must ban data centers in Saturn Park, Marketplace, Monterey Pass Road, and Corporate Center Drive. Once an ordinance is passed, the ballot language must remove acreage as a factor. The ballot results must directly enact changes and bypass council as a middleman. Rushing incomplete ballot language without full community protections just to meet a June deadline is not acceptable. I am in support of the 10-month and 15-day extension of the moratorium, which would expire in January 2027. All eyes are on Monterey Park right now. Neighboring cities, including Montebello, City of Industry, Hacienda Heights, Roland Heights, are watching. Amazon's recent purchase of a property in Eaton Canyon with a probable plan for a future data center may very well be affected. So big money interests are waiting to see our outcome. We can either be another victim of corporate abuse or the leader with a plan for other cities in California to follow. We, the residents, have rallied together to ban data centers in our city. It's up to you, the city council members, to join us in support of the health and well-being of our community. Thank you very much.

Hello, members of the Monterey Park City Council. My name is Lance Williams.

I'm a resident in District 2 here in Monterey Park.

I've been able to call Monterey Park my home here for the last five years, and I'm here in support of the ballot measure.

I'm originally from a little town some of you might have heard of called Memphis, Tennessee,

where facilities like this have become all too clear in the public eye how much of a problem it can become for the community. I'm proud to call both of these communities my home, especially on days like this where today we're proud to be out here making our voices heard. As a city and as a country, we're currently at a crossroads.

We're facing an unprecedented moment in politics where people are emboldened, engaged, and

the opportunity for community organization, like what we see today, reflects that.

Every day, we witness the wishes of corporations pursuing profits over people manifesting both

here and abroad. At times the ability to change these things may seem hopeless, but in defiance we stand

here today hopeful for a future for our community. Members of the City Council, I hope the biggest takeaway for you all today is that the wishes of the residents are clear.

We want to ensure a future where the wishes of the people are honored above those of corporate interest. The future of developing technologies, there's a conceivable future where a facility like

this will require no human operators, but we will still be here.

I leave you all with a quote from a song I listened to on the walk over here from my

house today, Gotta Serve Somebody by Bob Dylan. But you're gonna have to serve somebody.

Yes, you're gonna have to serve somebody.

Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord, but you're gonna have to serve somebody and the question today is who do you all serve?

Thank you

Hello, good evening Hello council members mayor. My name is Antonio Martinez resident of MPK for 20 years

For the record, I am against the data center installation. I wrote my following words just moments ago and as some of my neighbors just found out about these plans so this is only a minimal opposition on my part.

From what I'm hearing it is evident there was a lack of communication. I am

not a contractor, cannot read blueprints, but I do believe in building strong

relationships and following principles for everyday good life living.

Having a data center does not provide that. A leader must be the chief servant and practice proper use of power.

I highly encourage you all to be good servants for all residents of this beautiful community.

Life is a gift to be enjoyed. How can a data center provide this for these residents?

It cannot, and it will not, and it must not. Every individual plays a critical role in advancing the larger mission of the world by contributing their own part to do right by the residents of Monterey Park.

And let's ban the data centers.

I would like to hear next steps on what the council will do to stop the data center machine for being constructed.

Yes, on the ballot measure.

Thank you.

Let me say a few more names. Andy Wu, Robert Castro, Karen, Luke Skywalker, and George Boonegram.

Good evening, honorable mayor, council members. My name is Ben Steckler.

I'm here as a planning professional to remind you of one thing a data center is

an industrial use it does not belong anywhere near a residential use and

right now the proposed data center the proposed data center and the one that is

presumed to go across the street will be too close to residential uses do not

reenact the industrial revolution do not allow for an industrial use to

contaminate the lives of the people of your city. It is not something that

belongs here. Monterey Park is a mostly residential community. It does not belong

here. The uses should be restricted outside of residential areas. I would encourage you to continue with your path in order to enact legislation within

your city and stop the construction of this and all data centers in the future

and I would encourage you to do so post haste so that you don't have to worry

about lawsuits coming down that will occupy your time mostly and a funnel of

muddle the waters I would also encourage you to bring back the data center for

consideration at 1977 Saturn and to deny it outright.

It is your right as it is a basically civic duty that this council has to

protect its residents within the city.

And I'm trying to abridge my original comment,

so forgive me for stuttering just a little bit, but I'll keep it short.

you do not want an industrial use in any sort of adjacency or proximity to residential uses

because it will encourage more and more stronger industrial uses to do the same thing.

And all you're doing is putting your citizens at risk if you allow them to move forward

with any sort of an EIR or any other sort of a process.

You have the right. It is a discretionary approval.

And all you have to do is call them back into a forum with proper notice and deny their request.

Thank you very much.

Have a nice evening.

Hey, everyone. My name is Eli, and I live in Monterey Park.

I grew up here, and it's a pretty awesome place. I want to call for a permanent citywide ban on data centers and to speak out against AI as a whole.

While it has potential benefits, the way that it's been developed and employed is anti-human and extremely destructive. It is a means for billionaires to extract more wealth from people like us,

as well as exert more influence through disinformation powered by AI.

It is pushed by evil leeches like Peter Thiel, who says things like,

freedom and democracy are not compatible. Technocrats want to pursue freedom, and democracy is a barrier.

AI is being forced on us with our consent,

being integrated into search engines and our devices by default.

It's eroding our critical thinking skills, teaching us not to question where our information is coming from.

In dark times like this, our day-to-day interactions with each other

within our community are a guiding light and drivers for real change.

algorithms fueled by AI push controversial content and divide us intentionally.

They want to poison our interactions with each other.

And to allow this beautiful city to be pushed over by these billionaires

is to stomp out the potential for real change. It starts in places like Monterey Park.

Thank you.

Good evening, City Council. My name is Andy.

I grew up in Monterey Park. I went to Markeppel, and I may or may not be skipping studying for midterms at USC to be here.

And I support Measure 12A, banning data centers throughout our city.

And on that note, I'd like to address some of the proposed economic benefits of building a data center

and comparing them against the economic benefits of building your average McDonald's.

So the average data center has around 20 to 30 permanent workers in it.

This one has 26, while the average McDonald's franchise employs around 50 people.

It takes around three years to build a normal data center.

Well, in comparison, the normal McDonald's takes around six to 10 months to build.

As for taxability, data centers do not provide any tangible service to local residents,

while a McDonald's sells burgers and fries, which can be taxed and generate revenue. Long term, 20 years from now, people are still going to be eating burgers and fries at McDonald's. Not even three years from now, the economists predict that the AI bubble is about to burst like the dot-com bubble did.

And then as for energy use, one McDonald's consumes roughly 81 kilowatt hours a year,

while this data center would consume about 434 million kilowatt hours a year.

So overall wrapping it up, to build a McDonald's compared to a data center,

a McDonald's would bring twice the jobs built in a quarter of the time with more taxable economic output with longer industry stability

in much less land area while also using 0.0000002% the amount of energy.

And lastly, I would like to send a message to union workers.

Monterey Park absolutely loves you guys, and we would be willing to welcome you all here

to develop Saturn Park into something

that is actually beneficial to Monterey Park residents.

For example, walkable mixed-use zoning that may or may not include McDonald's. Thank you.

I'll call a few more names. Teddy Yoon, Madeline Ocampo, Stephen Kuhn, and Yolanda.

Good evening, Madam Mayor, honorable council members and city staff. Thank you for allowing me this chance to speak. I would like to thank you, first of all, for listening to the Monterey Park residents and to coming up with solutions to address our concerns. What was your name? I go by Luke Skywalker tonight.

Please continue to be patient and listen to what we have to say as we move forward on this matter together. For the record, I support all three items being discussed tonight. Not much to say, but I want to use my time to share with you why I don't support this project. besides the environmental concerns that has been spoken about quite a lot. The implication this has on how we live is at stake. Data centers are nothing but support infrastructure for tech companies to continue to collect our data, monitor our behavior, and influence our thoughts and actions. At the core are opaque algorithms that serve content based on the user's data. They customize these content based on past behavior. Some have said that, oh, these are very convenient. They're good for us. But it might seem convenient. But taken to the extreme, it can decide what we read online, what we think, what we buy, and for how much. Already, there are evidence that even the price we pay for food and services are customized to us. You and I might not even pay the same price on eggs or milk. There's a study done by Consumer Reports using Instacart that shows that the prices that each person pays for the exact same items are completely different, even though they're in the exact same location and purchasing the items at the exact same time. You and I might not even be paid the same wage for the exact same job because of our level of desperation for money. An example is ShiftKey. It's a gig-based app for nurses. from data purchase to data brokers that's collected illegally. These nurses... The money they pay is determined by how much money they have in their bank account and how much debt they owe. The lower the money they have in the bank account and the more debt they owe, the lower their pay actually is determined. That's very criminal. You and I might not even own the things we pay money for. Examples are HPU printers. These printers don't really work for us even though we pay money for them. If we want to use cheaper ink, we cannot. will not allow us to use them without buying ink from HP. These are just a few examples of things that are being poisoned in our daily life. All of this is possible because of the data being collected on us, data we give away for free in the name of convenience, data being hosted in data centers, data that is not being protected, data that is leaked every month, my email, phone number, address, and social security numbers, as are all of yours, were leaked, is leaking, and will continue to leak, they are sitting in some database in a data center somewhere waiting for cyber criminals to exploit. I don't stand here with a mask because I enjoy wearing one. I wear it because I have to protect my privacy. I don't turn off my phone and put it in a Faraday bag because it's cool. I do it to protect my privacy because these companies won't. So no, I don't support my data being used without my consent to enrich the capitalists. I don't support the means to continue to enable them. I don't support data centers, period. Thank you.

Good evening, council members. My name is George Bocanegra, and my brothers and sisters are here tonight, and believe it or not, we do live in the community and the surrounding communities around here. I did want to share some information and speak on this, on the proposing a ballot initiate to ban all data centers citywide. Data centers are an important part of the California economy and provide many high quality union jobs throughout the state. By banning data centers citywide, the city is precluding the opportunities for union workers that live in this area a good paying wage. Our union members, along with our brothers and sisters in the other trades, are voting members in the city of Monterey Park as well. If the city puts a data center proposition on the ballot in June, then we will mobilize the full strength of our voting base to ensure the ballot measure fails. It is also important context that even proposed laws at the state level do not ban data centers. Those laws are more about balancing economic growth and environmental protection. The city's proposed data center ban is over the top and will result in depressed economic conditions in the city and the lack of good paying union jobs.

We urge you to propose a citywide data center ban and vote tonight to not advance a ballot initiative.

Thank you very much.

Honorable Mayor Yang, Mayor Pro Tem, Henry, City Council.

We're a small town, and I look at all of you, and I see you guys as friends.

You're part of my community. You're my neighbors.

I was at China Bistro about a couple weeks ago. I was staring at you, handing low, like a creepy guy.

But I wanted to say hello, but I knew he was with family. And that's my point, is that Monterey Park, we know each other. We have relationships with each other.

We're friends. We're neighbors.

So when HMC, StratCap, their lobbyists come into our town,

they don't belong here, and we don't want them here,

and they're going to lose. They're going to lose badly.

so i have a speech and it started with going to the town hall and i wanted to ask some questions

and all i got met with was a lobbyist game plan to control

the audience. So here's my question.

If Monterey Park's five-year forecast shows no deficit,

health-free reserves, and stable revenue growth, what exactly are we being asked to sacrifice our infrastructure,

air quality, and long-term planning for? A data center that adds less than

9, 8,

7, 6, 5% to the budget.

Why should residents accept environmental risk and increased utility strain for a project the city does not fiscally need?

So the fiscal case for this data center falls apart the moment you examine its numbers.

The city is being told to expect $5 to $7 million annually.

How many of you folks have seen this flyer that's been going around $5 to $7 million annually?

Yet $2 million of that is attributed to sales and use tax.

According to the report itself, it's collected once every four years.

Calling that annual, quote, annual revenue is not analysis. It is misrepresentation.

Another way to say it is a revenue stream collected every four years cannot, under any definition, be called annual.

The report further inflates property tax projections by treating servers, racks, and IT equipment

as real property, despite California law clearly classifying them as tangible personal property.

As a result, much of the recurring revenue being advertised does not legally exist.

You are being asked to approve a 24-7 industrial facility based on projections that do not

withstand the basic scrutiny. Monter Park

deserves transparency and honesty, not accounting tricks.

And I don't know if I mentioned, but I'm 412A. I see

this as a figurative headshot. They got about three months to at least try

to convince the community. They're probably on their heels right now. They have no idea what they're doing. I went to IHOP. I saw their Actum.

They're Rodriguez lobbyists. They're green. They don't know what's

going on. I went to the town hall. They're also, they quote unquote said, we're managing the

community. Okay. That's, you guys are going to lose. So please just go home.

Hi, good evening. My name is Madeline Ocampo. I'm a Monterey Park resident. I've lived here

for over 25 years, and I'm in support of 12A, but I want to mention if you could remove ballot language loopholes that would allow for data center development and approve the ballot and adopt the citywide ordinance that prohibits data centers of any size or type. Finally, please ignore HMC's lawsuit threats as they are meritless. You know, this is the third time I've come to these city council meetings, and I'm just tired.

I'm tired of fighting our own government and trying to convince you to care about people

instead of corporations.

It's just like...

You want to hear something sad? You know, many people don't even want to have kids anymore because, one, it's too expensive. Two, they don't see a future for them. They don't see a future for them, and could you blame them? Look how many billions are being poured into mass surveillance, prisons, ICE, ICE detention centers, wars, defense contracts, fossil fuels, weapons, and AI, which is growing faster than it could be properly regulated. And guess what's behind all this? What's going to be fueling all this? Data centers. More and more data centers to feed into this egregious obsession of the billionaire and ruling class to control and subjugate people. And what's funny, they don't even see us as people. To them, we are products. We are cogs in their machine. Do you really want to form part of this bleak future? Do you want to accelerate the exploitation of our already dwindling natural resources? Did you know the UN announced that we're in a global water bankruptcy, meaning we're using water faster than it's being replenished? Do you want to give in to this endless destruction and construction? just to make a quick buck? I thought educated people like you would know better.

Please be on the right side of history. Please do the right thing. Do not neglect the wellbeing of our community and planet. I mean, say no to data centers. Come on, abolish ICE, free Palestine.

Good evening. Xin chào, ne ou. My name is Theodore Chow. I am a proud resident of Monterey Park, District 5.

I'm also a professor of mathematics education at Cal State Fullerton, and I'm also a union member.

I'm pro-union.

So as a professor, I focus often on knowledge and long-term movements. The way history doesn't always repeat, but it rhymes. For instance, I just taught my students this week about the Chevron refinery fire in Richmond, California,

that targeted a Southeast Asian population.

The Phyllis refinery here in Los Angeles.

Asthma, cancer, sickness, death, targeted at communities of color.

History doesn't repeat, it rhymes.

I'm very proud to live in Monterey Park. I'm also very proud of my ancestry that comes from Hong Kong.

And the history of Hong Kong is one that involves very similar ways of powerful groups coming into communities of color and exploiting their resources.

Slake promises, spin, exploitation.

The British used opium to destroy the mental will of the people to allow takeover of their sovereignty. Similarly, we see companies like HMC that see us a proud community of color and working class community as similarly easy pickings. They don't need opium in 2026.

2026, these lawyers, Instagram ads, bogus surveys, performative town hall meetings, and the threat of litigation to manipulate and gaslight us, giving us easy answers and feel-good solutions to ease our pain. But what happened in Hong Kong? Our people lost their country. And if we allow these data centers, we'll lose our community.

Communities of color and working-class communities are continually targeted by predators like HMC, using the same colonizer playbook we've seen for centuries, to sell short-term solutions that end up destroying us all and stealing our natural resources.

Data centers and companies like AGMC are going to keep coming, and they're going to keep coming because they think we don't know.

They call it what they say, yeah, right?

I'm here tonight to ask for three things, a three-pronged approach. The moratorium, a ballot measure being clear to close any loopholes about acreage,

data center definitions, and location of any future data centers or data processing units,

and adopting a permanent ordinance banning data centers in our city to show the world that we in Monterey Park are not going to be colonized.

Thank you.

Buenos tardes. Good evening, honorable mayor and council members. My family has been living in Monterey Park for four generations.

What's your name? Yolanda.

My parents moved here in 1969.

I am 74 years old, a retired MUSD teacher, and a longtime resident.

I am impressed at the turnout of community at these council meetings that are focused on the data center.

I wasn't aware of this project until I read it on Instagram.

It's obvious that these cities' citizens do not want this data center in the neighborhood.

I certainly don't want it in my backyard.

The data center will have ill effect on all human and animal life with its low frequency noise and pollution.

The cost of homes will go down as utility costs go up. No es bueno.

At the first meeting, I saw the HMC representatives stay mostly silent and observing angry citizens.

Yes, we are angry.

This seems to be a David and Goliath situation, and the community is David.

This Goliath is calculating, restrained, and professionally trained for opposition.

At the second meeting, HMC had union workers join and speak for them.

This is the oldest strategy of corporate 101.

The strategy of get the working class people against each other until one tires out the other.

This is meant to divide us while corporate sits back and waits.

It's about their money.

They will threaten us, they will sue, and call us narrow-minded and rude as we fight for the well-being of our families. We are not trained in manipulative-

angry. But if you don't think a small being like me can make a difference, then you've never been in bed with a mosquito. Call us unruly and misinformed, shame.

We are not against working class people because we are trying to make a living to feed our families.

We are against the HMC data center in our community.

This is not a fight against union workers.

Skilled labor is to be appreciated and honored.

This center will provide temporary employment. We are not against progress and education.

Data centers are necessary and aren't going away.

Artificial intelligence is here, and as part of our lives, we are involved with AI daily.

If you have a computer or a cell phone, what we are against is putting our families' health and well-being at risk with this data center so close to our homes. Put this center away from our neighborhoods, not our family-friendly city, Monterey Park.

Not here.

If you do your research, see that these large data centers are in working-class neighborhoods,

not where the affluent live.

So who is profiting? Not us.

Este es nuestra casa. Este data center no se pasa.

This is our house. This shall not pass.

Let me say a few more names. Jesse Damon, Emily Chu, Harag Balian, Alan Rosso, and Eleanor Lee.

Hi, I'm Stephen J. Kang, Mayor Yang, council members and staff. . HMC has behaved very poorly and proven themselves to be dishonest, unreliable and a vindictive partner serving you a smorgasbord of reasons to reject their projects under your discretionary powers. They acted in bad faith from the jump when they submitted their application as a data processing center, then submitted a sloppy MND rife with inaccuracies. They threw a sham town hall where they would only take written questions, delay follow-up questions, and gaslight us. They've threatened legal action against the city for their own failures to cheat the system. And spoiler alert, they're going to sue us anyway. They've recruited unions to intimidate us. And I want to take a second to talk about these unions. There are two types. There are unions that fight for labor and unions in the corporate pocket. I know because I'm ashamed to be a member of the Directors Guild of America, which cuts backroom deals with the studios, but I'm also proud to be a member of the Writers Guild of America.

The WGA was at the vanguard of the hot labor summer of 23, a sweeping nationwide labor movement that includes SAG, Teamsters, Lifeguards, sanitation workers, the United Auto Workers, traffic officers, nurses, fast food employees, but you know who I didn't see out there? You guys? You may co-opt our rhetoric, but your alliance with Rodriguez's strategies betrays your corporate end game. Rodriguez led the successful campaign for Prop 22, which prevents Lyft and Uber drivers from unionizing. This was opposed by the service employees International Union, United Food and Commercial Workers, and the Teamsters. So your siding with a union-busting lobby exposes your hypocrisy and indicts your credibility. Now we, the residents of Monterey Park, will show you what true union cred looks like. Note the entire coalition of union members here who are anti-data center. We come from the Screen Actors Guild, the Writers Guild, the Animation Guild, and a panoply of IATSE locals. We also have the Teamsters, the nurses, and the teachers. Even our lawn signs are printed by Mitchell Publishing, a union house. We are endorsed by the DSA. We have more unions represented and more union residents. And we work here. A lot of us out of our home offices, which would be threatened by the presence of a data center, We are protesting, and you have crossed our picket line to take our seats in this chamber and jeopardize our labor. You lack solidarity. You're scabs.

And we do not tolerate scabs in Monterey Park, and we do not tolerate corporations that bring them to our city. So tonight is payback. And it's time for the City Council to step up to the plate. We have called upon you to close two loopholes in the ballot measure, loopholes so gaping the residents of Monterey Park arrived at them independently of each other. Let's make this ballot measure airtight. Let's also draft an ordinance banning all data centers. It would provide immediate and maximum protection for us and send an unequivocal and official message from both the people and the government. An ordinance is the most common and effective means of banning data centers, as shown in Gordon, Atlanta, Peculiar, Lordstown, Big Rapids Township, Warrantown, and Palmetto. Literally the only places where residents have resorted to a ballot measure are towns where the city council doesn't listen. You cannot distance yourself from this fight. You're in it because HMC has dragged you into it. And as our elected officials, you need to own this messaging with an ordinance. You have every reason to do it and no downsides. Not only is this the right thing to do, it would be the ultimate clapback and karmic justice for an applicant who has acted in bad faith. HMC, Actum, and Rodriguez know that with only a ballot measure, they still have a path forward because they can outspend us. We can shut that down tonight. Remember the night of...

Remember the night of January 21st when y'all passed the temporary moratorium? How great that felt. I loved watching James Pugh storm out of this hall. And I loved the look on Liziza Lambert's face when she called her boss and told him that everything had gone sideways. Let's show these parasites that we are done playing. After all the threats, misinformation, and disrespect to the people and council of this great city, let's deliver what they've got coming to them. Find your voice, stand strong, and pass an ordinance. They've fucked around, and now they're going to find out.

Robert Castro, resident, District 5. I don't know that I get more weight.

You know, it's going to affect the whole San Gabriel Valley if they build a data center.

You know, a new topic, the inherent danger of electricity, a lot of heat. you know I don't see the UA here the other union was here last time and I wondered plumbers plumbers well no it's fire suppression and there's a lot of talk about the Edison power and the generators but they're also going to require battery backup you know there's that UPS system so they're talking about water, heat, electricity yeah I want a job like that to be done by union labor but not here and I support that ballot with amendments here talking about five generations here in Monterey

Park.

And I don't know, that gives me more weight. I worry about all the people that live in the community. So please do the right thing, and I can have faith in the future. Thank you. Thank you.

Good evening, council. My name is Jesse Damon. First, shout out to Bob Castro. Thank you for not making me go after Steven. Hey, HMC StratCap. Unlike anyone from your company, we attended your sham of a town hall last Saturday. Your strategists and technical experts interpreted community engagement as refusing to answer verbal questions. You could probably talk to Alma back here. She would help. You heard about managing the community every time one of us has to listen to that nonsense, a new activist is born. Thank you to the city staff who did stop by our booths. Your intimidation campaign seems to have lost some steam. Your baseless threats of litigation are overpriced posturing. Your last-minute letters are hilarious and pathetic. This mob is quite informed.

We won't be threatened by the unions you're exploiting and we will welcome unions back when we have a project worth fighting for. I hear you. You need the work. We all need the work. Look at the world right now. Your work cannot happen on our backs, and you deserve work with dignity. Hypersteel AI is not it. Council, the community has found its courage,

and it's time for you to find yours.

we can have your back on this with a ballot measure it is very clear that you care about this community but we also need leaders with values and vision and those have both been thin on the ground the last few months i understand and appreciate the need for caution but it is not readily apparent what this council believes in or what values drive your leadership in fact it's hard to know how informed our leadership even is. At least two city staff and electeds have attempted to absolve themselves of responsibility by saying, I'm new, I wasn't here when this started, but you are here now. You submitted the mitigated negative declaration for approval. You have the gavel in front of you, so you have the power and the responsibility. Our attorney has asserted that an ordinance and ballot measure carry the same minimal level of legal exposure because the applicant has no vested rights. If you're ready to start rebuilding trust with the community, initiate a ban through an ordinance, put this on the ballot, and start engaging with us meaningfully.

I've spent the last decade of my life as one of the leads of the California Reducing Disparities Project, a statewide initiative to address mental health disparities. Locating data centers in communities like ours are prime examples of why these disparities exist. My work is about ensuring that communities have a voice in the systems that exist to serve them because there is no about us without us. And let me tell you about this community. The depth of the talent in Monterey Park is staggering. Within a 10-minute walk from my house, there are dozens of geniuses at research, communications, visual storytelling, organizing, legal strategy, rhetoric, environmental justice, engineering, and art. These folks have put in hundreds of hours of work to protect this community while raising families, going to school, paying mortgages, working full-time, caregiving. These people here tonight are the leaders this community deserves, and your courage and integrity are now part of the history of Monterey Park. To all the neighbors who are nervous about public speaking, to all the introverts like me, we see you, we love you, we need to hear you. people have found their voice because we cannot look away from this fight, because we are fighting for our neighborhood, our health, and our livelihoods. This jewel of a community is worth protecting, which is why it behooves us to do everything we can to keep data centers out of Monterey Park. Council, it is time for you to take the wheel, adopt an ordinance banning data centers like dozens of cities before us, then close the loopholes, make sure the ballot language is airtight, and ignore the threat of frivolous lawsuits. Like it or not, Monterey Park is leading the fight for the entire San Gabriel Valley.

Montebello passed a data center moratorium because we passed one first. Our fight inspired Sasha Renee Perez to take the data center fight to the state level, and our families in City of Industry, La Puente, Hacienda Heights, Roland Heights are looking to us for help. I know we will win with a ballot but relying on it alone is craven and irresponsible. It is time to lead. Pass an ordinance now.

! Applause!

Good evening, Council Members. My name is Emily. I'm a resident of Monterey Park in District 2 and a co-founder of No Data Center MPK. I am here tonight to conditionally support item 12A. The city's approach right now seems to be pushing the ballot forward and hoping for the best. The reality is that there is too much risk to rely on a ballot alone, and the community deserves stronger protections. A ballot should be one part of a two-part plan to provide the maximum level of protection for the community. Before I go further, I want to assure everyone that this two-part plan is designed by an expert. No data center MPK has retained Doug Carstens, an attorney who specializes in environmental, municipal, and land use law to make sure the community is fighting for the highest levels of protection possible and that we don't leave any loopholes for future data centers. Here's what Doug proposes. In addition to the ballot, the council should also adopt an ordinance immediately to ban data centers citywide. This is what is referred to as a belt and suspenders legal strategy, which mitigates risk. The way it works is that the city would first pass an ordinance to provide a permanent baseline level of protection. This is the belt. Then the ballot measure acts as the suspenders that reinforce the ordinance if it passes. And most importantly, if the ballot fails, we will still have the belt and suspenders in place, which means that we have the protection of the ordinance. This is about mitigating risk. With the city's current approach, we don't have this fallback protection. In fact, there are cascading negative effects if the ballot doesn't pass. I want to paint a picture for everyone and just bear with me because this is not pleasant. But imagine we move forward with what the city wants today. We have a ballot in June and a temporary moratorium. And imagine this isn't hard that HMC starts aggressively campaigning. And we know they have tons of money to essentially buy the ballot. And despite our best efforts, the ballot fails. So what happens at that point? We only have a temporary moratorium to protect us, which needs to be renewed in January 2027. And we have two council seats opening up in November this year. So it's in HMC's best interest to back pro-data center candidates and try to influence our November city elections. Now the community is fighting HMC for two elections back-to-back. And if they win, they end the moratorium in January 2027, and they restart their application.

So coming back to the belt and suspenders, an ordinance would take effect right away. It would provide durable protections if the ballot fails. And very importantly, it would demonstrate the council's commitment to protecting its constituents. As a community, we are not feeling the council's commitment right now. And we are seeing a lack of accountability to fix this situation and earn back public trust. The ordinance is an opportunity to do that. And to be clear, as other folks have said before me, there is nothing legally blocking the city from passing an ordinance. The council just doesn't want to do it.

Before I wrap up, I want to touch on the ballot language. There are two loopholes in the current language that leave the door open for data centers in the future. They need to be closed now. First, allowing data centers under one acre. and second, not specifying timing for zoning update implementation. Campaigning for ballot is not a casual thing. It requires a lot of time, energy, and money from the community, and it is not worth doing for a ballot that isn't as strong as it can be. These loopholes need to be addressed now, and I strongly urge the council to please listen to your constituents and adopt an ordinance immediately to ban data centers citywide. The council's current plan is to gamble on the future of this city, and that is not acceptable. Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor, Councilmembers. My name is Hrag Balian. I'm a resident of Monterey Park in District 2 and also one of the founders of No Data Center MPK. I support a ballot measure to ban data centers citywide, but with the changes that others have been asking about. In addition to a ballot, I also think that you should ban data centers citywide by ordinance. A month ago, you all said that you were going to consider all options to ban data centers. Over the past several weeks, it became clear that you all became singularly fixated on a ballot. You really don't seem to want to ban data centers by ordinance. And I've noticed a troubling shift in how this council has been talking about its option to enact an ordinance. Specifically, I've heard several claims. A, that you don't have the power to ban data centers by ordinance, and that doing so would be undemocratic. B, that if you do ban by ordinance, it will expose the city to devastating litigation. C, that even if you pass an ordinance, a future council can simply undo it. So why bother? D, that you're very confident that a ballot will pass, so an ordinance would be a waste of time. And from these four claims, a conclusion. E, that a valid measure is the only way to ban data centers. Now, no data center MPK has retained Doug Carstens, as you've heard, to fact-check every single one of these claims. His assessment is unequivocal. None of them are accurate. And frankly, he is deeply puzzled and concerned that the city appears to believe otherwise. So let me take these claims one at a time. A, you don't have the power. This is very clearly false. The California Constitution grants you the authority to enact ordinances. That is not some extraordinary measure. It is a core function of your office. This is called representative democracy. We've elected you to represent us, the people. So land use, zoning, public safety, these are your domain. A. Passing ordinances isn't exceeding your authority. It is your authority. B. You'll get sued, and it will be devastating. Also false. Our attorney has confirmed that since HMC has not secured the vested rights to proceed with their project, any lawsuit they file would lack legal merit. HMC-threatening litigation is nothing more than intimidation, and they're free to make these threats under their First Amendment rights. That threat will exist regardless of whether the ban comes by ordinance, by ballot, or both. A ballot measure does not make the city lawsuit-proof, so don't let the threat of meritless lawsuit paralyze you from doing your job.

C. A future council can just undo it. This argument is defeatist and puts into question why you'd pass any ordinance on any topic or why you have a job at all. It also misunderstands the law. Yes, a future counsel could attempt to repeal an ordinance, but doing so would trigger CEQA review and an EIR, creating significant legal, financial, and procedural hurdles. It would also require public process, public hearings, and public scrutiny. And as you can see, we are here. We are engaged. We are paying attention now. An ordinance repeal would neither happen quickly nor quietly, especially with an engaged and organized electorate. D, it would be a waste of time. Also false. Even if you're extremely confident that a ballot will pass, passing an ordinance would mean taking HMC's deep pockets seriously. It would mean building a second line of defense against a well-funded PR campaign. And it would mean showing your constituents that you hear them and that you take some responsibility for the decisions that got us into this mess to begin with. Are you going to get behind this community, or are you going to hide behind a ballot? And E, a ballot is the only way. Also false. I refer you back to points A, B, C, and D. This conclusion does not follow from the facts. At this point, many of you have publicly voiced support for data center regulation. Every single one of you have signed the letters backing state-level data center rules. You have the legal authority. You have the public mandate. The only question is, do you have the will? Thank you.

Let me call a few more names.

Chris Dolly, Jessica Ju, Felicia Marquez, John N, Mike Romero.

Good evening, everyone. First of all, I apologize if I can't talk,

but I'm very nervous.

To me, first of all, I am a resident of El Monte, where there is also a data center being proposed across the street from my mom's store.

her pride and joy um so this is i mean all these folks are given fantastic facts uh i can't top any

of anything that's been said but this is going to be personal so i'll try to keep it short and sweet

to me anyone who in any way supports funds or builds data centers is no better than street

thugs that kill with guns. At least with them, death is quick and you can see the

face of your killer. You are not constantly bombarded with chemicals and noise by a company on another continent until your body can no longer take it.

A vote for a data center is a vote for poisoning people and the environment.

I just found out, I mean, I'm not as informed as half the people here, but I I just learned today that since 2024, nobody had known about this.

That's a huge red flag. Another huge red flag for me.

Who will be providing power to the data center?

One name would be Edison. Correct me if I'm wrong, and I may be wrong, and I apologize if I am wrong,

but I believe Council Member Thomas Wong works for Edison.

That is a huge, huge red flag for me.

Huge red flag.

And I wouldn't be surprised to find other red flags sitting in front of me right now.

Like I said, I would keep this short and sweet.

This is all just food for thought. Thank you.

Mayor, if we could interrupt again, maybe I could call on the city attorney to do another reminder of what item we're actually talking about,

what items we're talking about tonight. Just to be clear. Excuse me. Just to explain why I can't engage on this item, what my conflict of interest was on the specific proposal on the data center, which is why we were accused, and what we're actually talking about tonight, and the reason why I can engage. Thank you, Madam Mayor, members of the Council.

The FPPC decision with regard to that is posted on the data center website, so anyone can read that. This is 12A has to do with all data centers. It is a policy decision that is on a citywide basis made by the city council. It does not involve any particular project. I realize that many of the commentators are talking about a particular project. That project has not made it to the city council. This decision tonight or this consideration of a decision has to do with a ballot proposition and any associated direction from the city council to the city manager myself with regard to city-wide prohibition on data centers. It is not specific to any particular data center. Happy to answer any additional questions. Hi, I'm Eleanor Lee, resident of Monterey Park from 1966 until I got

married, moved out,

and I'm back in my mom and dad's house. So

I've watched Monterey Park

grow from this little town into a thriving community.

And I found out about

the data center back in December. My daughter says, you know, we're putting

a data center in. I'm like, really?

I was a little

surprised. And

I don't want to repeat what everybody else has said here because I got an email

I sent the email and forwarded all of you council members here

and I hope you read it because

actually the attorney

who was hired did his research

and has pretty much shown us what we need to do

so I'm just asking you to take that seriously and take a look at what

has been said and

also

I've gone to three of these council meetings and this is the first time I got to speak

all the other

Director of times there been so many people, but I went home, and because my daughter had to go to work the next day, so I was looking at some of the things that pride in our past, faith in our future, I hope you have faith in our future. I don't have grandchildren, I have granddogs, but I want to see Monterey parc be even better, that we are going to be showing the world what we stand for, and being set of precedent

that we are not going to stand for having a data center being put in.

And that's all I have to say. Thank you.

Jess Jew, Jessica Jew, City Council. I'm a lifelong resident of Monterey Park, District 4. I'm also representing multiple family, friends, and community members that couldn't be here in person tonight. I stand with my fellow residents and neighboring communities in support of a June ballot measure that would prohibit data centers citywide with the caveat that, one, language is modified to remove any loopholes regarding size exemption and definition, and two, to make explicit the time frame to ensure the measure takes effect immediately upon voter approval. Mayor Yang, you said at the top of this item that we don't have to repeat what other people have spoken about or to reiterate points. But to you and the rest of the city council, it seems like we do. Because every time you kick the can down the road or you put the buck back on the residents to ban data centers, you erode the trust of this city council and of the government democratic process. I just want to make it clear for me there is no quote mutually pleasing solution, unquote, that we can come to that does not include an outright prohibition on data centers citywide by both ballot and ordinance.

A ballot would be one very necessary important step of a level of protection. I do want to speak for the many residents who may not be able to vote, such as my 98-year-old grandmother, who is a resident but not a voting citizen, or my dear friend's one-month-old baby, who obviously also cannot vote, especially as our voting rights seem to be threatened more and more each year. Illegal ICE kidnappings on citizens and legal residents alike, policies like the SAVE Act and other voter intimidation tactics coming down the pipeline, including early reports from the Washington Post of all places about a draft executive order possibly circulating that would, quote, unlock extraordinary presidential powers over voting. So I believe in voting. I believe it's an important step in our democracy to voice our community, but we also have to consider the residents who may not have that privilege, that right, and I believe they deserve to have their voices and their rights protected still.

And that's why, in addition to this ballot, I also support at least a two-pronged approach to band data centers, again, by ballot and ordinance. And I urge you once again, I will keep coming to every single council meeting on this item until I don't have to, to remember your oath. Remember who you serve. Not AI, not corporations, but the people of this community. Thank you for your time.

I have a lot of stuff, sorry. Lots of junk.

Thank you. Hi, City Council. Hi, Mayor. Hi, Mayor Pro Tem. Nice to see everyone today. As you know, my family has been in Monterey Park for over 60 years. I ask you tonight, City Council, to vote yes on the moratorium to expand to January 2027, to vote yes on the June 2nd special election for the city ban, and yes to the city ordinance ban for forever building in Monterey Park. No data centers. And to also close the two loops that we've all been discussing tonight. As you know, I'm very passionate, as we all are, about our power, water, health, and home values. We don't want this data center. You know it. Mayor Yang, as relentless as you were to get my vote, and we've talked several times at my home, we will be a trillion times more relentless to put this data center in a cement grave. We don't want it. I want to point out that if we want a strategic approach as a democratic process here, you must do better. Spark was not democratic. We all want you to lead by example and not by knowing your best friends and who you're going to dinner with. We want you to lead by example. I challenge you again to be the change we need. Be the change we need. Don't be the reason we have to change. Also, to HMC and all your PR firms, don't waste your time. I've already been to where you're going, and no business owner believes your bullshit. it. Also, while I appreciate the small headline and the cascade paper today that I saw when I came home from work, we can do better. Don't just provide a link. We don't want some, we would want you to take a good space out to explain what the hell is going on in our city. Last, I want to say you are all not benefiting our lives. You're not helping us. I felt guilty this weekend to fight Idaho for my niece's wedding versus going to the town hall. What a terrible position you are putting us in. No data centers.

Thank you.

Thank you. Good evening. Let me call some more names. Yvonne Juan, Adalie Marlin, Mary Marcos. Good evening, Mayor Yang, Mayor Pro Tem, and council members. My name is Crystal Lee.

My family has lived in Monterey Park since 1966 when my grandparents purchased their first and only home here.

I've been coming to these council meetings, like it's my third time.

So I am going to be quick and just kind of reinforce what we've been hearing.

I am asking the council to pass a citywide ordinance

that prohibits data centers in all forms and sizes

and applies citywide, not just to a specific area,

and also address the ballot language to make direct changes

to the municipal code and general plan by number and section rather than directing the

council to promptly implement changes later, whatever that looks like. And then close existing loopholes in the current language that could allow smaller data centers

under one acre to proceed.

And I'd just like to close my comment with this.

Notice how everyone who's for this project has a moneyed interest if it gets approved.

But everyone against it has a wide range of nuanced reasons.

There's nothing ethically wrong with builders wanting to build in general, so don't mind the unions being here, but building where or what the community doesn't want to build shouldn't be okay.

You are violating our trust and neglecting your responsibility to serve the community by allowing this to drag on and on.

No means no for our neighborhoods.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Mayors, members of City Council, City Manager and City Attorney,

thank you for listening to your community and working with us towards the Band on Data Center. What's your name? My name is John.

I actually, I appreciate Mayor Yang's openness and availability to us, your constituents and council members for their serious consideration of our concerns.

I recognize the involvement of city council and staff in our community, not even realizing some dine at my family's restaurant right off of Garvey Avenue.

But today I'm here because I want to bring awareness to you about, unfortunately they're no longer here, but paid agitators here working against us, specifically by weaponization of union association or membership.

I want to pretty much emphasize what Stephen Cone was saying in the sense that these paid or accredited union members,

guilt trip city council and the community claiming that we are anti-union when the outcry or our outcry is due to, without exaggeration,

concerns with city residents living very close to the data center sites, plural.

If anything, it's anti-human for these union members to focus on their own desire for cash when plenty of construction work exists in the county, and we'll speak on this later.

Even as I speak now, I can feel the resentment towards my words.

I'm actually a Unite Here Local 11 member, a union representing hospitality and entertainment workers throughout L.A. County.

We recently demonstrated at Universal Studios because of ice presence in various areas surrounding the park.

We are also not getting fair wages while bringing a record profit year after year for Universal.

Our protest is for our own livelihoods,

specifically the lack of scheduling due to the lack of tourism due to ICE presence,

and the members of the community affected by ICE raids.

Not greed and drive for contracts to make money at the expense of other humans just trying to live.

These so-called union members don't deserve our collective respect because their presence alone is their admission that profit is more important than our people.

Not to mention their additional motivation to be here and get credit towards their apprenticeship or simply be paid, though they claim otherwise. Residents must be forced to listen to the repetitive pleading for a data center that will provide nothing to the community,

tax revenue against increased electricity and utility costs, and nothing to these contractors after they complete this project.

And what's worse, they'll move on to other data centers in other communities, like the City of Industry, Puente Hills Mall,

and do the same thing again, selfishly and without any acknowledgement of the humanity of the residents affected.

To conclude, City Council is actually doing a great job right now in advocating for our community.

I really believe that all council members here actually make themselves available and want to hear what the community has to say, and I really appreciate that.

I also want to say I actually really appreciate the city attorney's personability and willingness to sympathize with us residents.

Lastly, I had a great experience meeting the city manager at my family restaurant the other day.

I really, it brings me hope to see that people in council, people at the city are supporting businesses in the community,

and that really means a lot to me.

It gives me hope in the midst of this chaos to see that council is working with this

and dealing with the frustration that HMC continues to fuel.

Thank you so much.

John, what's your family's restaurant? It's going to be the Yat-Trang on Garvey, right off of New and Garvey, the main intersection. But if you're coming off of Newmark and you go up Orange,

it's going to be the restaurant right over there on Garvey.

What's it called? Yat-Trang.

Mayor Yang, Council Members, I am Yvonne Wong. Let me reiterate the following before I state my position. The proposed massive hyperscale data center is the size of more than four football fields and is as close as 65 feet from the nearest residences. It belongs in a heavy industrial zone, not an innovation technology zone like Saturn Park. The air, water, noise, and light pollution from this project will be detrimental to the health of residents. Killer diesel exhaust from 24 backup generators is proven to cause cancer, respiratory, and many other diseases. PFAS, known as forever toxic chemicals, are used in closed-loop cooling systems to control corrosion and bacteria growth. Any leakage will contaminate our soil and groundwater. Barriers and wars are not effective to buffer the 24-7 nonstop humming noises and vibrations from the chillers. Data centers strain vital resources like electricity and water for our daily survival. Their presence will invariably lead to rate heights as shown in other communities. municipalities across the country are stopping data center projects, including our neighboring city Montebello. We are being watched closely, locally, nationally, and internationally. The Monterey Park Sustainability Plan adopted in April 2024 to mitigate climate change will be completely undermined and negated by the proposed data center, which is neither green nor sustainable. Monterey Park is in a seismic zone, sitting on top of the La Ponte Forest Fort and close to the St. Andreas Fort. Data centers will pose unnecessary...

State tax exemption for certified data center will reduce any optimistic projected revenue. There will be barely 26 permanent jobs created by this project. Regardless whether the two-day certain street properties sit idle, property tax will still be paid to the city. Vacancies in certain parts have not posed serious financial burden for the city since 2019. The city has a $1.23 million surplus per its latest mid-year financial report. I applaud our city for responsible fiscal management. We are not in dire need of revenue for services, programs, or improvements. improvements. Monterey Park belongs to all the residents. It is totally undemocratic for merely 19 people in Spark to decide on the future of Southern Park for the entire city population of 66,000. We should take our time to plan better use and development like housing and retail, which will do us no harm but bring vibrancy to the city. Residents are blessed with 17 parks in Monterey Park. We do not need a pocket park from the data centre requiring city maintenance to enjoy our city. We do not need a foreign conglomerate to sway and dictate how we should run business here and force-fed us with data center. Data center will definitely dissuade potential homebuyers, residents and businesses from relocating here. In conclusion, this project is a total misfit for Monterey Park. We, the residents, have the absolute right to determine our own destiny. So I urge our city council to go ahead with the ballot measure and tighten up the loophole and also have the ordinance to ban city center in the city. Thank you. Thank you.

Good evening. My name is Hosung Mary. And I thought I would forego the speech because.

Did you submit a comment card? Wonderful job.

Hosung, did you submit a comment card?

Yes.

I don't have it.

Yeah. Okay. I think you said Mary. Yeah.

Oh, you put it under Mary. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

but after hearing HMC

Representative and their lawyer I decided to come up here and

Speak to you folks on

February 4th council for HMC

referred to concern

residents of Monterey Park as an uninformed

Mob to pressure City Council's decision making

He repeated those same words at the meeting that night.

That language alone shows how little regard HMC and its representative have for the people who actually live here.

In the same breath, he has threatened legal action in order to get counsel to render a decision in his client's favor. If they truly intended to listen to the community, they would have held open, well-organized town halls long before now. Instead, some of us only found out about last Saturday's so-called town hall.

And even then, no time was provided.

it took me many hours to figure out where to go.

And I texted my neighbors with the information.

And unfortunately, because it was a short notice, they couldn't attend.

The meeting itself was demeaning, dismissive, uninformative.

Panel members spent more time shushing the residents than answering the questions.

And no HMC representative was present.

It was not a forum for transparency.

It was an attempt to control the narrative.

Meanwhile, HMC stated an unmitigated electricity demand of 434 million kilowatts per year,

the equivalent of 40,000 households, which significantly differs from industry standards.

However, even with their stated usage, Monterey Park only has 22,000 households.

This data center would consume nearly twice the electricity used by every household in the city of Manoy Park combined.

In order to meet the demand required, requires major grid upgrades and those costs fall on rate payers. Residents will face higher build with greater grid instability and increased vulnerability during heat waves and shortages. And while the industry research also shows that facility of this size can use up to 110 million gallons of water per year, HMC claimed it will only use 12 million, a number that raises a real question about accuracy and transparency.

But even at their stated figure, this project adds additional pressure to already stressed water system in our city. Also, Monterey Park is home to some of the region's strongest public schools. Monterey Highland, Monterey Vista, Brightwood, and others.

Our teachers, staff, family work very hard to give our children the very best possible future. So when HMC Council calls educators and unions opposing this project as mob, it's not only disrespectful, it is disconnected from who we are as a community. Can a data center improve our children's education while exposing them to increased heat, noise, and environmental factors?

why would we place our children under such circumstances and at risk has the

data center okay all right has the data center meaningfully addressed these

concerns with the community if they have most of the residents are excluded from

those conversations their actions make one thing very clear they have not earned this community's

trust nor nor do they appear to have any intent of doing so and that was clear by the last weekend's

Town Hall meeting which led to my going even with my back injury

I went to house to house in my neighborhood with the help of one of my one of my neighbors and

ascertain signatures as

asking what MP

No Data Center MPK has proposed

I sent you an email, but some of the residents who are elderly, they have no access to computer or know how to use it.

Therefore, I printed the email and had them sign. And it's...

So, lastly, I just want to say we expect projects that will strengthen our community, not the ones that danger our infrastructure, raise our utility costs, and dismiss our voice. Our message is straightforward. We deserve better, and our children deserve better, and so does ourselves. Thank you. Good evening, comrades.

My name is Marcos.

I do not live in Monterey Park, but I'm from Alhambra.

I come here to remind everyone that this issue is not limited to Monterey Park, but every community around it.

If you don't believe me, ask the eastsiders how bad the cleanup is at the Exide Battery Plant. If you still don't believe me, ask the northeastsiders how bad the cleanup is at Shoal Canyon. These are environmental disasters close to home and allowed by greedy capitalist politicians.

I am here to address the masses in Monterey Park.

You aren't alone. You have friends all around you. We laud your work.

We uplift your struggle.

We support the People's Agenda Item 12A.

We support a vote, and we support a full citywide ban.

We stand here with you at the United Front because these politicians maintain the system of colonialism by taking the land and using it for capitalist gain.

When they could actually give the land back or listen to the endless list of possibilities the residents have put up. So I stand here not to beg or plead with the council, but to demand them listen to the community. We need to organize against the capitalist land exploitation and the business owners who are looking to divide us.

So now I ask the council, Berger, Alvarez, Yang, Lowe, Sanchez, Wong, and Noh.

who do you represent because the residents of monterey park have spoken in defiance

they have even suggested what they want housing and food and yet you push this slop

this is the cycle of colonization you don't need to be a white person to uphold white supremacy and all of you up there who are all people of color you reveal who your masters are

So I am here to remind you that you have nothing to lose but your chains.

It's clear now more than ever, entertaining this idea of a data center here in Monterey Park

is highlighting the fact that Democrats continue to fuel capitalist endeavors.

Instead of using the space for community resources,

it's for private exploitation of people, land, and resources for years to come.

these politicians work to secure themselves instead of those they swore to protect

they work to protect the lining of their pockets and get their names on plaques instead of the

lives of their neighbors they are literally putting a price tag on our lives so this is

what separates us socialists from capitalists we are defiant we defy capitalism we defy white supremacy, we defy patriarchy, we defy colonialism, and we will defy it to the very end. We organize every possible way and exhaust every approach, and if these statements linger with you,

then answer the call. Denounce the politicians who play fast and loose with our lives for their

personal gain, who sit themselves higher than us. Join a socialist organization like the Peace and

Freedom Party and vote these politicians out or join a socialist organization that defends the

community and the land because that's what we're doing up in Alhambra. We are putting the capitalist politicians in the hot seat for selling us out to the colonizers just like this council wants to

sell you out. Our heat runs hot and it mounts even the thickest block of ice and if you want to remove

these people seek us out seek the peace and freedom party out on instagram we have candidates running everywhere and we will front you don't settle for the crumbs these politicians push on

you you have revealed the power you possess put the council the mayor the city manager and the

city attorney in the hot seat because it's no

Do we still have people outside? Maybe let them know there's a lot of empty seats in here if they want to come inside. Thank you, Robert. And while people are coming in, I wanted to see if my fellow council members wanted to make any comments or share any thoughts or let them finish. No, no, we're about halfway through.

Let's keep going. Yeah, keep going. Okay, all right, then let me call some more names. Dominic Jaramillo, KCW,

Andrea Vega, Tom Salones,

Okay. And Cameron Rush.

Do we have to go this way or can we come straight up? Depending on names. Yeah, you can go. And also, these are names that I called earlier but didn't come, so I just wanted to call them again. Teddy, Karen, Mike Romero, and Adeline Marlin. All right, go ahead. Hello, council. My name is Domino Caramillo.

This is actually the first time I've come to one of these meetings, and I have been meaning to for a while.

I think like many of us we are afraid and worried and it seems like we are not being listened to

I know people have brought up before but these companies are coming

for land and it's a big issue that all of us are dealing with

I as a college student fear that every day

that while trying to build something in Monterey Park it will be cut short

so please listen to us all and thank you for giving time to us today. Thank you.

Good evening, council members. Good to see you again.

Sad that we have to be here again on this issue. My name is Casey Wong. I am a

Los Angeles City community member.

I did grow up in this district. I lived here for over

five years, and now I work in this district very fortunately.

Not to repeat what other folks have said, I want to point out that hundreds

and thousands of people have been activated by this issue. It's purely through the grassroots efforts of concerned community members who are doing this on their own free time. Imagine if the people who are paid to do community engagement on this program, on this project, were actually trying to do community engagement, what they could achieve. With all the capital behind them, if they really wanted to, I'm sure they could outreach every single resident in Monterey Park. And yet, they only managed to turn out 40 people and only 19 people in support of this project. So it doesn't seem like they were trying to actually engage with the community, despite all of the funding they have to propose suing the city. I'm sure that's a lot of billable hours that our friend here has sat through.

The city and the people elected to represent this community to engage with the residents, you all know how to win elections. That's all you got here. You know how to engage the community. You know how to garner votes. You know how to win support. And yet, only 19 people supported this project when you all were doing the community engagement, when you created the SPARC. If you really wanted to engage the community, I believe that you would have. And yet somehow most folks here didn't find out about this project until December of last year, just a few months ago. You're all somewhat successful politicians, but you have gained these seats. and I'm curious how you're gauging all of this community support. If I were a politician, I would see that this is a really salient issue. This is an issue people are really excited about, that we're really passionate about, that hundreds of people have shown up here, given the time and the notice, that when they know there is a platform to engage on, they will show up. And I'm sure there are many people who wanted to be here tonight that could not be here as well. So if this HMC capital really wanted to engage the community, they could have. There are plenty of ways, and the people would have turned out to voice their opinion and learn and engage on this program, on this project. I'm going to end on this to expand on my comrades' words earlier. In the words of Ashada Shakur, it is our duty to fight for our freedom. It is our duty to win, which we will. we must love and support each other, and we have nothing to lose but our chains.

Hi, my name is Tom, Tom Salonga. First time doing this here, but a little background on me.

I worked as a graphic designer for the film industry, and I finally achieved my dream job for about a year and a half.

That is until the strikes of 2023, which were spurred by the proliferation of AI and image generators like Mid Journey, Stable, Diffusion, and the like. So just to cut it short, I support any sort of ordinance that would ban the construction of data centers around the city just because I'm aware of the massive health effects that affect people that live right near them.

And I just want to also point out, I mean, we here in Los Angeles have lived under nearly a decade of drought. Like, we were in the orange level, and we were told to be water-wise about how much water we consume.

What was it called?

Like, be conscious of how much power we also use, like flex hours.

Yeah, our flex hours from, like, 4 to 9.

These data centers, they run 24-7.

I mean, think of an array of, I mean, I'm a PC gamer, so think of an array of thousands of PC games rendering 120 frames of just information, like, nonstop.

These machines get really hot, so they require a lot of water to stay cool.

Not only that, but then just last year, we had that huge fire that happened back in the Palisades as well as Altadena.

So what sense does it make to construct several of these water-hungry centers?

I mean, the whole fire department was at a strain in trying to deal with, like,

just these massive fires that had broken out in our neighborhoods.

So I think if we were able to – I mean, if we go back to just building these data centers, we would just fall back into the orange level, and it would just put many –

many homes at risk.

Not only that, but these diesel generators emit a lot of pollutants,

which would affect the health of many citizens.

It could cause cancer and then also COPD. So, yeah.

There were a lot of good arguments that were put out here and were really well formulated, but I feel I have spoken my piece, and I really hope that you act with your conscience.

Look out for all these people.

I know a lot of, I have so many friends here,

so many friends that live around Monterey Park, and it's been a big part of my life as well.

I attended Cal State LA.

My wife, her family lives here,

and we want a future.

We just want a peaceful future.

And that's, yeah, that's it.

That's all I have to say.

Cindy Alvarado, Heng Ha,

Mimi Lee, Alex Leon, Luca Urebe.

Good evening, Honorable Mayor and Council Members.

My name is Andrea Vega,

and I'm here representing the organization Food and Water Watch.

Yesterday, we sent you a letter signed by over 20 climate organizations throughout California

urging you to reject HMC Capital's data center project

and enact a permanent citywide ban on data centers.

The expansion of data centers poses major environmental and economic threats due to rapidly increasing demands for energy, driving more fossil fuel pollution, straining our water resources, and rising electricity prices.

56% of the electricity used to power data centers is fueled by fossil fuels, and the HMC project alone specifically would require 24 diesel generators.

the project is estimated to almost triple Monterey Park's electricity use to about 434 million kilowatts per year,

which would lead to skyrocketing electricity costs for residents. At a time when electricity rates nationally have increased 21.3% from 2021 to 2024,

drastically outpacing inflation and driven in large part by the rapid build-out of data centers,

a project like this would have a negative impact on already burdened rate payers.

And it's clearly not just environmental organizations that are identifying the dangers that data centers pose to communities.

I mean, this room has been packed with residents who are very clear in demands.

No data centers in Monterey Park.

And honestly, let's be clear, the promised economic benefits of this project are highly misleading.

Food and Water Watch's analysis recently found that when it comes to data centers, there's a limited amount of long-term employment opportunities.

And this research, which was based on the historic data center hotbed of Virginia, found that investment needed to create one permanent data center job is 100 times greater than what was required to create a job outside of that industry. These data centers, they benefit developers and utility companies, not residents. So pass an ordinance banning all data centers.

All right, tough act to follow.

Good evening, Honorable Mayor and Councilmembers. Much has been said tonight about the environmental impact, the community impact of these data centers.

I wanted to talk a little bit about something else.

I wanted to talk about what we're getting in exchange for all of that sacrifice and all of that cost if this data center were to be built.

I wanted to talk about what they're actually going to use this data center for, because data centers have been around for a while and are used for lots of different things.

But this data center is specifically being constructed here because AI is big right now.

There is a big boom, a big demand for data centers all over the country. That's why they're having to try to get these in like residential areas and places where they shouldn't be in the first place.

And I want to talk a little bit about what AI actually is because to put it bluntly,

AI companies think we are stupid and are engaged in active disinformation campaigns to keep us from understanding what it actually is.

So what is AI? So you know that little like row at the top of your phone keyboard that tells you like the next word you're going to say?

you're going to say, what that is is a language model.

It is built on like a bunch of words and phrases and sentences that are basically, it's just a database

that it pulls from and it gives you the statistically most

likely next word you're going to say.

And as you use your phone, as you type more, it starts incorporating your language

into its training data.

It's a small language model that just predicts the next word you're going to say. And sometimes it even gets it right.

What big LLM, LLM stands for large language model,

what those are is that on a massive scale, It is trained on the entire internet.

So basically what it does is it gives you the statistically next most likely word after the one it has just said.

It thinks one word at a time, and it gives you the most generic, soulless thing, version of what you asked for.

So the point I'm trying to get at is that AI does not think.

It is a statistics machine, and it is being marketed to you as something that thinks. It is being marketed as the path to superintelligence.

It is not at all.

It is a statistics machine, and due to the very nature of it, you can throw more training data at it, which actually you can't really.

It's already trained on the whole Internet.

But you can throw more training data at it theoretically.

You can throw more compute power at it in the form of these data centers.

The fundamental problem of these AIs, that they have no concept of truth or correctness or morals, and we'll just... That lie to you without even knowing about it. That cannot be fixed by more compute and by more training data. AI is a statistics engine that tells you what is the most likely thing to say, not what is true. It has no concept of what is true because it does not think and it never will. We will never have super intelligence. So, and when more people realize this, we will realize that AI...one moment. Thanks.

Once we realize this, we will realize that AI is a bubble that will soon pop.

It is a technology whose returns are already beginning to diminish.

We are destroying environments all around the country, all around the world, and AI is only getting marginally better, marginally better.

OpenAI actually had to write into its code that there are three Rs in the word strawberry

because it kept telling you that there were two because that's how we discuss it on the internet.