So we're going to call, first of all, give you a closed session report that we didn't actually
give you yet. We had a closed session at 5.30, and it's a special meeting to review the city
manager and performance review. And we have no report out from that, but I just have to
say that. So now we'll go on to our regular meeting of the city council, City of Arcada.
And would you please stand for flag salute by Sophia Pereira?
Thank you mayor
Patino here vice mayor Ornelas
Here councilmember Pereira here councilmember Wheatley here councilmember Winkler here all present
Thanks, Bridget. Next we go to our ceremonial matters. Our first thing is, oh, I don't have
the proclamations.
Somehow I didn't. Excuse me for a second. I forgot that step. It's
probably sitting on the table.
We could start reading it, maybe.
Let's see, Susan, would you like to do the Arcada High School Career and College Center
Week?
Sure.
And you can go ahead and start reading it now, if you like.
Sure.
I'll do that.
This is the proclamation designating February 1st through 5th, 2016 as Arcada High School
Career and College Center Week, whereas the Arcada High School Career and College
center's mission is to provide students with the information they need to take the critical
steps after high school. The center uses career and college exploration software, career guides
and counseling to help students identify their interests and evaluate options to pursue these
interests after high school. And whereas the center offers unique programs aimed at
the special needs of students with different interests and at various grade levels and
provides information for parents and the community both at the center and through internet tools.
Over 350 students visit the center annually, including half of the senior class.
And whereas the Northern Humboldt Union High School District nor Arcada High School are
able to provide critical financial support for the center, hence the center seeks
support from fundraising events, private donations, and volunteers to continue the
important work.
work. And whereas the annual pancake breakfast fundraiser for the center will be held in memory
of Jackie Foote, who worked with the center from its founding in 1995 and was its coordinator
until her untimely death in March 2008. Now therefore, be it proclaimed that the City
Council of the City of Arcada, in recognition of the Arcada High School career and college
center's preparation of our community youth for college and careers, does hereby declare
of the week of February 1-5, 2016, as Arcada High School Career and College Center Week
in the City of Arcada, and urges the Arcada community to support these efforts by attending
the 9th annual Pancake Breakfast fundraiser at the D Street Community Center on Saturday,
February 6th, from 8 to 11 a.m. Signed January 20th, 2016, by Mayor Paul Petino, and we
I don't know your name. Jim. Jim Ritter. Thank you.
My name is Jim Ritter. Is this on? Yes.
And with Darcy Robbins we coordinate the programs and services that are available to Arcata
and Six Rivers High School students through the Career and College Center. On behalf
of our students, their families, and the faculty and staff of the schools, we'd
I'd like to thank the council and city staff
for your ongoing support of the Career and College Center
and for your proclamation that encourages people
to attend our annual pancake breakfast fundraiser.
This year is our ninth annual pancake breakfast
which honors center founder Jackie Foote
and is sponsored by Arcata Rotary, Sunrise Rotary,
Arcata Suroptimus, Los Coast Rotoract,
Arcata High School Interact,
Tiger's Inc. and numerous businesses throughout our community.
As most of us probably remember from our own experiences,
high school is not an Indian itself,
but hopefully a foundation that can help students move forward with their own goals,
whether those are getting a higher education in college,
finding a job in the workforce,
or pursuing gap year travel, community service, military, or other opportunities.
The Career and College Center exists to help students plan for their next steps after high
school.
Under Darcy's leadership, the Center coordinates one-on-one counseling appointments for students
to talk about college search and applications, scholarships, financial aid, job search, internships,
and summer programs.
We also offer a comprehensive career exploration program, including our Career Speaker Series
that give students the chance to learn firsthand what it is like to work in
different careers, job shadow placements, and new this year our career readiness
workshops with themes including writing a resume, interview skills, tips about
success on the job, and our field trips to local businesses including
Jessica Curl, Coca-Tat, Macaulay Construction, and O&M Industries. As noted
in the Council's proclamation, the Center receives minimal direct financial support
from the school so the success of our pancake breakfast and other fundraising efforts is
crucial to keeping the Center open into the future.
Thank you again for your support, and we look forward to seeing many of you at the
D Street Center on Saturday, February 6th, for the breakfast.
Thanks again.
Thank you.
Next,
we have a proclamation designated in January 2016 as National Mentoring Month,
and Sophia Pereira will read that for us.
A proclamation designated in January 2016 as National Mentoring Month.
Whereas this year, Big Brother's Big Sisters of the North Coast celebrates 47 years of service
to over 4,000 youth in Humboldt County who have needed and wanted mentors.
big brothers, big sisters of the North Coast recognizes that the future of Humboldt County rests on the success of its youth.
And whereas a mentor is a caring, consistent presence who devotes time to help a young person develop personal strength
and achieve their potential through a structured and trusting relationship.
Quality mentoring encourages positive choices, promotes self-esteem, supports academic achievement
and introduces young people to new ideas.
And whereas research shows that young people matched with a caring adult through a quality
mentoring program are 46 percent less likely to use illegal drugs, 27 percent less likely
to start drinking, 52 percent less likely to skip school, and are more trusting of
their parents or guardians.
And whereas youth development experts agree that mentoring is critical to the social,
emotional, and cognitive development of youth, helping them navigate the path to
adulthood more successfully.
And whereas our community has a number of community
volunteers, teachers, and many others who support
the mentoring movement and work selflessly to
improve our children's odds for success.
Currently, a quarter of Big Brother, Big Sisters of
the North Coast participants are Arcada residents.
Now, therefore, be it proclaimed that the City
Council of the City of Arcada hereby designates
January 2016 as National Mentoring Month.
And thanks all of our local heroes who
participate in quality mentoring programs and who equip our youth with the tools to
lead healthy and productive lives.
The City Council also calls on residents to help close the gap between the availability
of mentors and the number of children facing challenging circumstances who would love to
spend time with a big brother or big sister.
Signed today by Mayor Paul Petino, January 20, 2016, and we have some representatives
from Big Brother's Big Sisters.
Hello,
my name is Bonnie Fierro, I am the President of the Board of Directors of Big
Brothers Big Sisters of the North Coast.
Thank you so much for making time on your agenda this evening and also for proclaiming
January 2016 as National Mentoring Month.
National Mentoring Month is an annual campaign that draws attention to the need for more
volunteer mentors.
mentors. Mentors are needed to help youth who are facing adversity, develop confidence, and
learn how to build relationships with an adult they can learn from. Big Brothers Big Sisters
offers a mentoring program in Arcada communities that matches adult volunteer mentors with
children who have similar interests. Many youth in our community can benefit strongly
from spending time with someone who has the same interests, like watching movies, cooking,
or even learning a new hobby, such as photography, horseback riding, or collecting agates.
Sometimes mentoring includes the youth talking about being bullied at school, not being
chosen for a part in a play, or even being excited about winning at a sporting event.
The mentor could offer someone to listen or even share their own experiences which
which in turn would assist the youth in building coping skills or other skills that are beneficial
long term. Mentoring is believing in someone. Mentoring is encouraging someone. Mentoring
is enjoying someone's company. Mentoring is Big Brothers, Big Sisters of the North Coast.
Mentoring is everyone of you. Thank you. And I also have Christine Miller here, who's
Executive Director.
Thank you.
Very quickly, the work that we have been doing for the past 47 years
is funded almost entirely from our fundraisers.
So I just wanted to hit a couple of ones that are coming in the near future.
For National Mentoring Month, our signature event is the Big Chili Cook-Off
that takes place on January 30th at Saturday
in beautiful Blue Lake at the Mad River Tap Room.
It's only $10.
dollars, you get a bowl of chili, all the tasters of everyone participating, a vote
for the popular choice, salad, cornbread, and a cookie for $10. It's a pretty sweet deal.
Also for $10, if you have a great award-winning chili, we're still taking participants, entries
for participants, so I'm sure one of you has an awesome recipe up there. So we encourage
you to come out to that. Not only is there the chili, and we usually have sunshine,
but we also there'll be the undercovers will be playing a very popular local band
and there's some really fabulous silent auction items that'll be there Disneyland
six flags of big bottle of wine that we just got in today so I would encourage
you to come out for that with that in mind to have some fliers I'm just gonna
leave right here for people so you can get more information on that and I
encourage you to pass those around the other fundraiser quickly that'll
tell you about that I know I think all of you are familiar with is bowl for
kids' sake. It makes up over 70% of our annual budget. And this year's theme on March 4th
and 5th is Monster Bowl. So costumes are encouraged. I think it'll bring out the inner monster
in all of us at that time. And the City of Arcada has been an awesome fundraising team
for that. So I'm hoping that's going to happen again. And I'm sure either myself
or my program person is going to be pestering you guys about that. So thank you very
much for your time and it's always fun to come speak here. I do live in Arcada and it
feels like home. So thank you very much.
The next item on our agenda is early oral communications
and this 15-minute time period is provided for people in the rest of the Council on matters
not on the agenda. At the conclusion of all oral communications, the Council may respond
to statements, any requests that requires, uh-oh, I forgot.
Excuse me.
Yeah.
Yeah, the planning commission.
I didn't mean to get around you.
What we did?
I'll stop there and ask for the report from the Planning Commission.
Daniel, report.
Okay.
Well, good evening all.
I'm Rob Flint, Chairman of the Planning Commission.
And it is time for the year they report from the Planning Commission,
which you all have in your packets.
I'm sure you've all read and really I'm just here to answer any questions that's
it
You know one thing coming up as I'm really looking forward to our study session
With with you all with the planning commission and next week
And that's kind of been sitting on my head,
you know, making sure that we're ready with
our, yeah, Larry, with his presentation and you and your commission and us to have a good
study session, work together on looking at the big picture.
Right, right. For me, I have a problem with it and that I work for the big developer who
owns the biggest project that's going to be before. And for me, I don't think I can
separate the big picture from the biggest piece of the puzzle. So I don't know that I
can be at that. Sure. You've talked about it with Larry. You might need to refuse
myself. I might need to refuse myself. It would just be hard for me to comment on a
few of those smaller pieces without looking at it as a whole. I'm a big picture guy
in general. It doesn't make sense. Thank you for doing that or thinking about that.
Well, we all play different roles in the same time.
Right.
And Rob and I, what is the connection counter of the specialty connection campaign?
Rob, I just want to thank you and the commission,
because you all have had a pretty heavy workload over the last year,
especially with the turnaround on the MMIZ stuff.
So thank you.
And pass that over to the other commissioners.
So.
Well, it hasn't gone yet.
You know, I think the Commission looks forward to it.
And I guess I'll say that I didn't read it in the report,
but I think it's unfortunate that in a city like Arcada
we have so much trouble staffing commissions.
There are a lot of people who are very aware and active
short-term, you know, they'll be active for a little while and then stop. And to me it's
just sad that we can't, you know, even when you get a vacancy on the planning commission,
it's hard to fill.
So I have a question in the report. It talks about, you know, one of the goals is providing
local trainings for the commissioners. And I'm just wondering, since it looks like,
you know, obviously you have to take the ethics trainings and there's been, you know, historic
preservation webinars. But have there been any other trainings or webinars that the
Planning Commission would think would be beneficial that can be part of that goal for the next
year? Because I know that's something that we've talked about before. And I know resources
obviously are very limited in terms of travel, but I just didn't know if there was anything
else identified that could be useful. Maybe that's more of a staff question, but I
That's probably more of a staff question because they tell us what's available and then we pick and choose and you know back in
the old days when I
When I was first on the planning commission, they were sending people to Monterey. I mean they were like these
What happened
So some of those perks might be nice for some people for me. I'm not interested with that help with retention. Is that what you're saying?
Thank you
I'm sorry. We had
And the council had talked about when we transitioned the historic and design review commission
on to the planning commission that there may be some design training and some historic
preservation and other aspects of training.
And so David and I were going over the, basically we're preparing for the mid-year
budget report and we were looking at our training budget and we do have a little bit
of funds in the training budget and David and I were going to meet and talk about
different training opportunities that we could do for staff and the commission.
but I think definitely the historic preservation and general design, we had also talked about,
you know, kind of how do you make a walkabout community, because the Planning Commission
typically looks at the big picture, as Rob said, but when you get down to the design review,
we're looking more at the micro level, and it's taken a little bit more microscope than
the Planning Commission usually does on the project, but obviously the Planning Commission,
when they take over design review, ultimately if that is the decision,
and then they will make it their own.
Thank you for mentioning that walkable community thing
because I remember when we had a co-meeting
a couple years ago, and we were using terms
because we go to trainings and felt like
this isn't working, because we have to kind of keep up
with the trainings amongst the whole group
or it's sort of meaningless in a sense.
So that's something I had as a note,
so I want to appreciate you bringing that forward.
just because I'm on the board of the local government commission.
And they really do a lot of livable communities training.
And possibly I wasn't even sure that maybe we could bring someone up here
and even cooperate with City of Eureka or something like that
and do some of the planning commission training on that.
I mean, I've also brought forward to the local government commission
that in rural communities we have to use different words
for the way we talk about livable communities and walkable communities
because people oftentimes perceive it as bringing urbanism to a rural situation.
And that's not what we're really trying to do.
I mean, we understand we're interpreting it for our own cells in our own place.
So that's just a little sensitivity I have to that,
that we have to be kind of careful about that,
like we want to bring fortuna in or something like that,
because you use the wrong words and people just feel like you're offending them almost.
So that was something I was just wondering forward.
maybe we could look for, you know, you know, video kind of trainings or maybe bring someone
up and share it with the county or the cities and things like that.
Yeah, besides that, just want to thank you.
You guys do, I always thank you guys really where the river hits the road.
So I think you could do some deep good work for the community.
So thanks.
Thanks, Susan.
Thank you.
Rob, I'm looking forward to Bayview finally getting done.
That's a goal.
You have that as a goal.
Yes, that is a goal for the next year.
you know that's been cooking for a long time yeah if I remember it's got to be
out there for a while you know the Bayview community neighborhood
conservation area so thanks for staying with that being persistent about getting
that done sure sometimes sometimes things take a while yeah there's the
Foster Avenue extension I think people started talking about that like 20 years
ago years yeah so it's nice to see things finally happen and thanks rock
All right.
Thank you.
Okay.
At this time, we'll actually do the early oral communication, and it's a 15-minute
time here provided for people to address the council on matters not on the agenda.
At the conclusion of all the oral communication, the council may respond to statements.
Any request that requires council action will be set by the council for a future
agenda or referred to staff.
Speakers addressing council at this time may be limited to two minutes.
All other oral and written communications will be heard at this meeting under Agenda
Item 11 at the end of the meeting.
So if there's anybody here to speak at early oral communications, it's time.
Good evening, Council and City staff.
I was here a couple weeks ago and I asked if I could do a PowerPoint presentation.
I want to apologize because maybe I didn't give my phone number or something.
So it's 616-1182.
It's very important to do this PowerPoint presentation to let you guys know what we've
grown up to and how we've expanded our business, because we're working with Caltrans on a piece
of property over there off of Jintoli that's going to be given over to you guys.
It gives us a great opportunity to show from start to finish how new direction works.
It gives a great opportunity to see the arcade where I actually created this program
for to actually see how it can benefit communities and stuff.
stuff. So a PowerPoint presentation, and here again I'll take it on me. I did not give
my phone number and I haven't called Karen because I'd just been waiting by that phone
waiting going, okay, they're going to call. So I'm very anxious to get this out, very
anxious to see what we've grown up to and show you what we can do. And then hopefully
that meeting with Caltrans and you guys will work out well and we'll get on the
ground and start cleaning out that area and getting it to you guys. Thank you
very much.
Hi
Maggie Gaynor from Zero Waste Humboldt. I live in Bayside. I'll take a moment to remind
you about an event tomorrow evening that you're invited to. 6 to 8 o'clock at the Humboldt
Bay Aquatic Center. Two very successful businesses that have achieved zero waste data. Sierra
Nevada Brewing Company and Fedser Vineyards are going to be explaining how they did it.
And in October, we're going to have a training here from the U.S. Zero Waste Business Council.
And so they're going to explain what the rigors of the process that they went through.
So I hope you'll come.
There's another event.
Our series is really an important part of our public education program.
There's one in February, in March, and in April.
And they're all different topics that have to do with zero waste solutions.
Thanks.
Can you remind people where it is tomorrow?
John, I'll address what you said.
There's no other early oral communications than nobody else.
John, how long does that PowerPoint take?
And could you make sure that the part that has to do with the Gintwilly Lane,
in Mad River Park area to make sure that that's in there.
Great.
Well, thanks.
We'll see what we can do about getting that on.
And thank you, Maggie.
I'm not gonna get to all five of them
because I already missed one of your events
and I have a meeting tomorrow night,
but I will go to whatever I can get to.
Thank you.
Well, the other meeting should be over by...
Is that four o'clock?
Yeah, I have one in the evening also, a different meeting, yeah, thanks.
Thanks a lot, thanks everyone.
We're on to the meeting of the Successor Agency to the Arcada Community Development Agency.
At this time members of the City Council act as the governing body of the Successor Agency to the Arcada Community Development Agency in accordance with health and safety code section 34173D1
and the City of Arcadia Resolution number 112-10.
All actions taken by the successor agency are authorized by Part 1.85.
Commencing with Section 34170 of Division 24 of the Health
and Safety Code, liability of the successor agency
for any action taken is expressly limited
by the Health and Safety Code 34173E.
So, the first part of that meeting is the successor agency consent calendar.
All the matters on this consent calendar are considered to be retained and are enacted
in one motion.
There is no separate discussion of any of these items.
If discussion is required, that item is removed from the consent calendar and considered
separately.
At the end of the reading of the consent calendar, members of the governing body
for the successor agency or members of the public can request an item be removed for
a separate discussion.
The items are, number one, approved minutes of the regular meeting of September 16, 2015.
Number two, approve a bond proceeds expenditure agreement between the successor agency to
the Arcada Community Development Agency and the City of Arcada for the 2003 tax allocation
bond proceeds and the bond spending plan.
Item 3, adopt the 16-slash-17 recognized obligation payment schedule for the ROPS physical periods
July 1, 2016 through June 30, 2017, and the administrative budget for the physical year
of 2016 and 17.
So anyone that would like to remove an item from the successor agency's consent calendar?
here. I want to remove item number two. Item number two.
Okay. I'll look for the approval
of the successor agency consent calendar minus item two. I'll second. So we have a motion
and a second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye.
Item number two. So Susan. Okay. This item,
I just found really interesting and I feel like it was a little frustrating for me to
read it because while it's going back, let me see if I can get this here now.
So what this is doing is approving the bond proceeds that since we have sort of finalized
our relationship with paying back the state on redevelopment, we now can re-access
our bond funds. And I think that's great. I'm super excited about it. But then I just
realized that it's a little frustrating because there is no spending plan that's laid out.
I mean, it's referred to, and I even tried to find it online and look back at 2003
and I looked through our economic development plan and I couldn't find, except for, you
have something written in here, and I'm sorry that our council isn't here today, but I want
to have something written in here to bring this back to the council that once the oversight
board has accepted it, for us to actually kind of look at it, look at the projects
we're thinking about. I mean, we're now, it's 13 years later, a completely different
council except for some repeats. And so, you know, I just feel like that's really
important. I mean, we're putting our name on this. We're saying this is what we think
it should go to and we actually have no direction except for vaguely inferred of what the money
is actually going to. And it's a lot of money. So I feel like just to be responsible to
the
It's important for us to kind of look at it and give some direction to staff before staff
goes off with, you know, what should we be doing with this money?
Yeah, I can address a couple of those issues, and I agree it's unfortunate that, you know,
city attorney isn't here tonight because hearing it from her would probably give you a lot more
confidence in hearing it from me. But I can tell you that I'm not going to be
I have studied the issue and Nancy has not had the time to research this very much.
And I looked at the way that other jurisdictions have done their resolutions and their bond
expenditure plans, and we're essentially, we're mirroring what most of the agencies
have done.
I worked with the Department of Finance before I prepared this resolution and the
expenditure plan and made sure that I wasn't missing anything because that was
one of the questions that I had as well. Some agencies prepared a very detailed
bond expenditure plan. Most of those agencies that I saw actually had bonds
issued for a specific purpose, so it was for, you know, downtown bike lanes or
something like that, and so they had detailed expenditure plans. Some had
absolutely nothing, even though it referred to an expenditure plan, there
There was really nothing.
Basically the process allows the agency to assign, instead of project by project, all
of the bond proceeds to the city to continue to do what the bonds were issued for.
In our case, the 2003 bond proceeds, which we're dealing with here, they were just
general issue bonds.
They had to do with anything that's basically redevelopment related, anything that's
in the implementation plan and or the documents that it refers to.
And so the spending plan that's associated with this bond expenditure plan, it really
at this point ties to the Happy Valley project, which will require the majority of the funds
that we have in bond proceeds to get up and running and off the ground as far as we're
estimating at this point.
Once the successor agency transfers those bond proceeds and this enters this agreement and then it is in control of those funds at that point, it can amend the expenditure, the spending plan.
So long as it's consistent with the bond proceeds, redevelopment law, and our implementation plan.
plan. The implementation plan is pretty broad. So I would say that the city council, not the
success rate to see, but the city council can take on study sessions, do public outreach,
whatever they choose to do at that point, if there's a sense that we need to go in
a different direction than the direction that we've been on for the past several
years.
And the reason why I would suggest that we do it this way is because the actions
of the Successor Agency are subject to the Oversight Board and the Department of Finance
review.
The Department of Finance isn't really all that interested in that phase of this process.
Their primary interest was making sure that the agencies expediously wound down their
affairs, paid off all their obligations.
The other key thing that this ties to is that, as you'll notice in Item 3, I'm
You notice that there was a change instead of doing a six-month ROPS.
We're now doing an annual ROPS.
And so you get one chance to get back on the Ferris wheel.
And so this agreement can only be approved in conjunction with a ROPS item
that transfers those bond funds to the city of Arcada.
So we can either do it now or we can wait a year and do it again next year.
The other thing that we're actually going to be – is going to be an option for the
city's success rate agency now that we're essentially down to just paying off bond proceeds
is last and final ROPs.
And so we'll be coming back to you in the near future with this last and final ROPs
as long as we don't have any of these other items hanging out that we need to deal with.
And so, you know, I think that a lot of the concerns that I hear you making,
making the fact that we may want to spend the money in different ways than on the Happy
Valley, which is kind of what I was my impression of what the council direction over the past
couple of years were.
Yeah, we're going to get through this redevelopment process and then we're going to move on to
getting the Happy Valley done.
But we can certainly change direction so long as it's consistent with the plans
when we get to that decision point.
And then the city council is making those decisions, not the successor agency.
Okay. And I appreciate that. I just feel like at this point in time, I mean, I don't think
that this council has had much discussion about that. We've basically been dealing with
the dissolution and stuff. And so, I mean, I'm not – I haven't talked to anyone else
whether we're interested in the Happy Valley. And of course we are, you know. But I just
felt that it was important to bring this back. And I'd like to see if other council
members agree so that we, you know, maybe re-give approval or we thought – and
And it's just so people even get reminded
what it was we were doing because 13 years later,
you're like, well, wait, what were we doing?
And even if we've sort of been talking about this,
we haven't been talking in any positive forward thinking
future way for a while about redevelopment.
We've been kind of slogging through the state process
for the last, what, since 2012.
So I just felt like this is kind of a point in time
That is important, I think, to engage the council, make sure the direction is the way
we really want to be going with it.
And so, I mean, the only thing I kind of wanted to add legally, although we don't have our
legal counsel here, but is that we request some kind of a public meeting or agendized
on a council meeting that we have a discussion about it, and so we can just reassess where
we're at.
Yeah.
Again, I think that the – I'm sorry, but I just wanted to say, when we – we
initially – there were these couple items that were on the agenda.
Initially, what staff wanted to do is we wanted to have this item be on the 17th.
And then basically in our staff meeting with the city attorney and the finance director,
because of what David said about the annual ROPs, it was decided as a group that we needed
to have this agreement approved at the same time as we submit the ROPs.
And then what David was alluding to, we can come back in, you know, a couple weeks
or a month and reassess what we need to do because we need to have the agreement in order
to have a recognized obligation for the Department of Finance to approve.
I understand that and I'm not going to try to hang this up. I just kind of wanted to
look at my other fellow council members and see if they agree that they do want to see it come
back, you know, before it's nine months down and we're half into spending the money
And then we decide if that's what we wished we had done, you know, I think it's important that we kind of
Schedule it say for a month and a half or something like that
And I I think you know, I mean I agree that we should you know we can take a look at it
But I I would I would think our best move is to move forward with this so that we can
Close this part out and finish complete the unwinding of redevelopment
So we don't get caught up with that, and then we're done with the Department of Finance oversight
and approval part of this, and then we can, as a council, revisit this and amend the rubs
later.
So, yeah.
Michael, did you have something?
Yes.
Well, I agree with Mark.
I don't want to hang up the process, but I think it's important that I would follow
the suggestion that you're making, Susan, to be able to review that and have it
be more of an informative session rather than an action session to review where we are?
Well, I don't know if I would make it so that it's not an action session. I mean, I think we should,
I mean, I'm ready to move this forward, so don't worry. I'm not going to hang this up.
But I just, I feel like, let's see, it was in section 4.3, and I'm trying to remember exactly what I was referencing there,
where it says, being as, I mean, I'm paraphrasing here, it was something like,
Like, being as the council knows what the spending plan is, and so I'm like, oh, okay,
I guess we do.
So then I'm looking and trying to find the spending plan.
I can't find it anywhere.
I get the general idea of what the spending plan is.
I mean, I could probably explain it to a citizen, but I realize I don't really know.
And so I thought it would be really nice if we could have a more detailed discussion
about it here.
Susan, yeah, I think that at this point, as I understand it simply, we're getting the
successor agency's funds coming over to the city, and then as a city council, we'll make
the decisions when we have the opportunity, over the next few months or a year or whatever.
Okay. And I just kind of want to acknowledge publicly that other people think we should have this discussion
reasonably in the time. So, just so that we know that we will.
I'll make a motion then that we approve a bond proceeds expenditure agreement between the
Successor Agency to the Community Development Agency and the City of Arcadia for the
2003 tax allocation bond proceeds and the Spond Spending Plan and direct staff to
to come back with some options in terms of how we might amend that plan at future date.
I'll second.
Okay, we have a motion in second. All those in favor?
Aye.
Thank you.
I do want to mention that, you know, the first thing you said regarding the staff report
that it's amazing that we're at this point, I think that, you know, that can't be underscored enough.
I mean, we had our detractors early on.
And so, you know, congratulations to you all.
Yeah.
Well, thank you.
You're the one who slogged through it.
We just cheered you on.
Yeah.
So in the confusion of the consent calendar, you know, I'm not quite sure whether we do
public comment before the consent calendar or after it.
You can take it actually public comment.
I mean, we've already voted on it, but we could have public comment on that.
I understand that.
I just, you know, in the future, if there's like a flag for me that tells me public
public comment before the consent calendar or public comment after we, it's read off.
No, typically you would not take public comment in the consent calendar unless somebody pulled
an item.
Yeah.
Just pull the street like a random.
Okay.
All right.
Thank you.
Public comment like any other new business or old business, I'm correct.
Right.
Okay.
So I understand my confusion.
So if there is any public comment for item two, it's your opportunity now.
If not, we're done with it and we're on to old business, which we have done tonight.
New business, none, and then we're done with the successor agency part of the meeting.
So we're adjourning as a successor agency and going on to the city council meeting.
So for the City Council, now we go to our Consent Calendar and I'll read this little bit here.
All matters on the Consent Calendar considered to be routine by the City Council are enacted in one motion.
There is no separate discussion of any of these items.
If discussion is required, that item is removed from the Consent Calendar and considered separately.
At the end of the reading of the Consent Calendar, council members or members of public can
request an item be removed for separate discussion and if they do that, we'll have public comment
for that.
So, I'll go ahead and read this to you.
Item A is approve the minutes of February 4, 2015, Regular City Council Meeting.
Item B, approve minutes of December 16, 2015, Regular City Council Meeting.
Item C, by Weekly Report on General Warrants.
Item D, reappoint Daryl Burleson and Maureen Hart to the Economic Development Committee
for firms expiring January 31, 2019.
Item E, approve City Support for the 2016 Godwit Days Festival.
Item F, approve the recycling memorandum of understanding between the Humboldt Waste Management Authority
and certain of its member agencies to participate in a recyclable materials processing contract
to continue to receive recycling services and revenue sharing proceeds.
Item G, adopt resolution number 1536, approving the application for grant funds
from the Division of Boating and Waterways Local Assistance Loan
and grant programs for the South I Street boat launch facility upgrades.
proceeds. Item H, adopt resolution number 15637, adopting the Bonds Proceeds Expenditure
Agreement for the 2003 Tax Allocation Bonds and the Bond Spending Plan.
Item I, approve a letter in support of Assembly Bill 21, Bonita, Bonta, Cooley, Jones, Sawyer,
Lackey and Wood, Medical Marijuana Cultivation Cleanup Legislation. Now, is there any
member of the city council wants to pull an item or first yeah I'd like to pull
item F because I think there may be interest in that okay I want item let me
see it was E and G I'll
make a motion of proof consent calendar minus items E F and
G I'll second okay we have a motion to second all those in favor hi hi okay
Okay, let me go with student item E.
Okay, item E, approved city support
for the 2016 Godward Day Festival.
Well, this is a really difficult one
because of course I love Godward Days
and I love Alex Harris and I mean Alex Stillman,
all those things.
But I'm struggling with this one
because there isn't any justification
in the build-up to it of why are we particularly pulling one non-profit out and supporting them
when, I mean, I know this was born out of the city of Arcadia.
The first one was the Archaeta House. So was Main Street. So how are we differentiating?
We are actually making a gift of public funds of $6,000 to God with Days, nonprofit. How do
we justify that? We don't have it. And I did a little research on this and it's a gift
of public funds. And we have to show the community that somehow this event, or our
support of this event is worth it to put public funds in. So we have to justify some
public benefit. No one says that Godward Days doesn't have public benefit, but it doesn't
have distinct public benefit better than, say, other nonprofits have. And it's like
if I was looking to it and I looked at Godward Days schedule events and I was thinking,
hmm, well, maybe I could justify this if there was a bunch of school days where
kids were able to go on these events, and I'm not trying to give you more work. Don't
get me wrong.
But I'm just trying to figure out, how do we actually justify this? Because we're actually
setting ourselves up to be potentially sued. I mean, why do we charge Main Street to put
the banner across G, and we don't charge God with days? It doesn't actually make sense.
And yet, I understand there's emotional reasons why we do this, possibly. But I just
can't really support it at this point until someone articulates how the expenditure of
these public funds is actually benefiting enough of the broad public that it's worth it. And
we can then turn to any citizen who asks us, why did you put $6,000 towards Godwick
days? Because that's basically what we're giving them. We'll have a good answer for
But right now I don't.
I mean, except for, oh, we love God with days,
and we all love birds.
Could we get staff to...
Sure.
I just have to put that question out there.
And actually, it's kind of worth it.
I want you to almost...
Okay.
I think the history of this item goes back to what
Councilmember Anelis did allude to,
which was at a certain point in time,
the city operated this actual event as a fundraiser
as part of a community event to try to start to bring additional interest to the birding
community, to our Marshall Wildlife Sanctuary, and hope that that turned into additional
tourism dollars.
At some point, that's transitioned through nonprofits, and they ultimately became their
own nonprofit status.
At that point, the municipal code allows the council the option of waiving certain
fees, and the Parks and Rec Committee, historically over time we have sent all the
request through Parks and Rec Committee. And they've told the line pretty tight about trying
to treat everybody equally and basically most deny most requests. And we've sent, historically,
all of them to the Arcada Foundation, which was sort of what the Arcada Foundation was
originally funded for, was to take these requests off of the Council's meetings and
off of the Council's discussions. At that time, I'd have to look back in the history
to see. I know Godwood Days has been discussed at Parks and Rec. I can't recall what
their recommendation was, but as an entity they chose to bring it forward to the city
council as the city manager that is not authorized to waive those fees and only the council is
based on our Muni code and so they came forward to the council and they received that fee
waiver for those and then it's carried through and each year we say we need to bring this
back to the council. We don't have the authorization to waive those fees again.
I would guess that it's been 8 to 10 years. I'd like to say it's only been three
but time goes really fast.
So I'm guessing it's probably been about 10 years
that this has been a practice of the city and the council.
But it is your discretion and it is your discussion
and it needs to be your comfort level to be able
to justify that, you know, that waiver of fees.
We'd be happy to invite them to come and speak to this
and schedule this for another meeting
if that's the will of the council
or render a decision tonight.
I'd like to hear from any of the council member
that might want to speak about it at the moment?
I'd like to hear from staff, too.
But I mean, I think we have a longstanding and as, you know, the city did, you know, create this event.
And I understand that Susan's argument, but I think it's also been one of those events where we,
I think as a city and the community, benefits greatly from, you know,
There's hundreds of people that come into the community and the bed tax and all the other revenue that is generated through this event.
So I think, you know, the cost share and the offsetting is, you know, I think we make that up in other ways throughout the city.
So, yeah.
Sophia, did you have something?
Yeah, for me, I mean, and I, in terms of the question of, you know, what is the rationale?
I mean, for me, the first thing that came to mind is,
well, I don't have the specific numbers, you know,
that it seems like there is this economic development aspect
to it that's really beneficial to our community.
But in terms of bringing up that question,
if that's aligned with what our processes have been,
I mean, I think that's a worthy question to ask.
So, but for me, I definitely see
that there's a public benefit.
But so I'll leave it at that for now, so that.
Michael?
Well, I think that if you contrast it with
Oyster Festival, Oyster Festival is highly profitable
on the main fundraiser for Main Street,
and this is not a particularly profitable event,
but it is something that brings a lot of people
into the area, either from completely outside of the county
or at least from the surrounding areas.
So I think it generates a substantial amount
of positive economic activity,
activity and I think a reasonable cost to the city and so that's why I would like to
continue it.
I think it's a reasonable expenditure for the city for that reason.
I do think it's fair for me to just be clear, it's not that I don't support Godwood Days
at all.
I hope you all understand that and it's also not that I don't, I understand the economic
development aspect of it but as also the Creamery District brings in economic development
as does the Oyster Festival brings in economic development, I do a lot of different efforts
at the one here. And I guess, I mean, if you, what was I looking at today? It was something
where I was just researching as gift to public funds, you know, when do we start to cross
that line? And it was talking about how you really have to have statements in your staff
report or in, you know, of why this particular event deserves a special consideration because
because we're giving it special consideration.
We did give birth to it, you could say,
but as we did arcade house,
yet we charged them to use the annex.
So how are we differentiating these things?
And it's not clear to me.
So if I vote against this,
it's not because I'm voting against the God with Days
at all, and I love the God with Days,
but I just, I personally can't look a citizen in the eye
and tell them why this is different.
It's grown up.
We nurtured it for a while, but it's grown up at this point.
And so I'm not even sure we legally could have nurtured it, because you have to actually
really look at what is a gift of public funds.
But, you know, we've been able to do that, and it's been fine.
And like I said, it was even very difficult for me to have to bring this up, because
this is a heartfelt thing for us all, and Alex Stillman's behind it, and we love
and there's so many reasons that this is not an easy thing to have to sit here and say.
And yet, I feel like we actually have to look at it dispassionately and with a clear understanding
that we have to treat everyone equally, and I feel like I can't back out why we're particularly
supporting this one.
I understand that.
Now, we've all talked except myself, and, you know, when you brought it up, I remember
I remember this coming up, I don't know, ten years ago,
whatever, when I was on the council before,
and I had some of the same reservations.
I thought, you know, why dogwood days?
And then I realized, where does it happen at the marsh mostly?
Who's involved in it is people that come to use the marsh
and build up our city and the birding community
that look at the marshes being the jewel.
It feels to me and it felt like then that
I was convinced that it is different than other activities because it does focus people
and bring them into the marsh, which is not a money-making place.
And it felt like this
This kind of expenditure or subsidy to the Godwit days is a kind of a blended situation
that is not clear like Arcade Main Street or Chamber of Commerce, who get funds from
us time and again separately for other reasons, yeah.
and I just I thought yeah I had some of the same feelings years ago and today
I it's settled in my mind and it feels like God what days is something that is
so married up in our city and does so much for our larger intention that we
should continue to do that so that that's my statement on that up I guess
we're ready yeah I would just I would just point point out to you
I want to say, Julie, help me out, Julie.
We did a presentation at the International Watchable Wildlife Conference.
And your point is exactly right, Paul.
You know, it's difficult to charge revenue or to generate revenue
or to charge to go out and watch wildlife.
And that's what it kind of comes down to as part of,
and that's why we hosted and sponsored this event.
And but I think Susan's question is a good question
and maybe we should take a look at those kinds of issues.
I would not want to pull the rug out from under them
right here at the 11th hour for their event for this year,
but maybe taking a look at the bigger picture
and other events, because I agree.
There's other events that go on.
You have a soccer tournament.
They always ask for a waiver, a reduced fee.
So there's other things, too.
So stuff it.
Just to clarify, for a change, I got the staff report in a few months ahead of time, so it's not the 11th hour if you wanted more information from the sponsors of the event.
They could come in and talk to you, but it's in April, so we're pretty early in getting this.
And, you know, I appreciate the...
You know, I actually want to say that the Mayor just said something that kind of changed my mind a little bit.
It's like we actually do have budget items for the Chamber, for Main Street, and we don't
for, you know, I mean, and it's, I mean, I'm not sure it quite still fits the category
of being fundable compared to other nonprofits, but that helps ease me a little bit of like,
oh, okay, that's true.
We do kind of support those other organizations.
I just didn't think that through.
So just to add a little bit, they do offer certain programs for free to anyone in the
community who wants to come to them.
And I don't know if that would help, but they've done that traditionally.
They offer programs for children both at the Marsh and at the community center during the
Godwood Day events as well as some other ones that are open to the public in general.
Right.
Yeah.
I did notice that when I looked at the registration, but there was like room for 10 people here,
10 people there.
And I was kind of like, it's not really the community, exactly, you know.
But I just feel like what you said kind of helped.
Thank you.
Can we have any public comment that would like to, I need someone from the public
I'd like to talk about Godwit Days or this item.
Seeing no one, we'll go ahead.
I'll make a motion that we approve the city support
for the 2016 Godwit Days Festival.
Second?
We have a motion in the second.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed?
Well, I guess I'll say no,
just since I was having questions about it.
And maybe what I would like to just request
for next time, if you're looking to this next time,
have some community data, some thoughts about it,
how the money is used, help us defend this decision.
I see the name for both the findings in this document.
Thank you.
OK, that was item E. And I'd like to look at item G also,
Susan, at this point, because I'd like to pull F after.
Oh, so go through G.
If you don't mind.
Yeah, I just wanted to bring this forward
that I was at Foam.
And they were really confused about this idea.
They didn't understand at all.
They were talking about, they thought that the new sort of,
what am I trying to say, if I'm the right word here,
the boat launch facility was actually at the end of I Street,
not like on the side where it is now.
They thought it was at the end, like behind the rock
or something, they were trying to figure out how,
and they thought it went like,
they were saying that they heard it went 50 feet out.
And they were going, huh?
Does this make sense?
And it was a whole like spirited discussion
with a lot of maybe misinformed information.
So I didn't know anything about it,
so I had nothing to offer actually.
So anyway, I just wanted to kind of let you be aware of that,
that there would seem to be some misunderstandings.
Good to know about that.
And first, I want to take the opportunity to introduce
Emily Benvy, our environmental programs manager
who started a couple weeks ago with the city.
And she's joining us here at the staff table.
We're glad to have her working in environmental services.
Thank you and I tasked her with this project. Just a little bit of background. There is
a water trails concept for Humboldt Bay. This was one of the nodes on that water trails
route. There were two concepts for improving the current boating, launching or dock situation
at South I Street and
The one that I think you're mentioning, Councilmember Ornelas, is the short one straight to the south,
to the channel. We discovered how much work the Harbor Conservation District and Recreation
District have done on CEQA towards the other option, which is basically extending the
floating boat dock. I'll turn this over to Emily in a minute. But one thing I need
to do is get this on the capital improvement program list. There's some grant funding
opportunities. We're just trying to move this along and have our partners, the Harvard
District and RCAA, kind of help move this along because there's been a lot of public
comments about improving the – or extending the time when you can't access the channel
and not just have our boat dock, which sits on the mud for hours when you could
actually get out to the the channel into the bay so um but I'll turn this over to
Emily right now she's she's been spearheading this effort and this is a
grant just a grant application to kind of get the process moving but I think
there's two options both could be standalone and viable in their own
right but once we realized how much work have been done engineering wise on
extending the existing law. So there was a discussion of far the one out okay
That's probably a lot, if everyone was confused.
Good evening, council members. Can you hear me all right?
This is my first time dealing with the mic over here.
So, yes, as Mark mentioned, I think you did a really good job
of kind of explaining the two options,
and there was a little bit of a lack of communication at the outset
as to which option we were going to pursue.
Based on Mark's explanation, it sounds like extending the dock
makes the most sense considering all the work that has already been undertaken in that option.
And so I have been in coordination with Gretchen over at the Interpretive Center who has been
relaying my comments to Foam. She made me aware of the concerns and so we went back and forth
and clarified that, spoke to a couple of their other concerns. So it sounds like that confusion
confusion should be cleared up for the deadline that they want to submit their letter of support
under. What else can I say about this? We're meeting with the Harbor District tomorrow to
solidify our plan. So really, we're early in the concept and preliminary design and
there was that last-minute lack of communication to add to a little bit of confusion. But
does that answer your question? Yeah, just the historical context. There were the
two sites. So one is exactly where you said going straight out I Street, out the
parking lot and basically going straightforward. And there is a nice deep channel there. Going
through the sequel process, or the second option is off of our existing boat ramp and
extending it out. Going through the sequel process, we ran into a significant impact
potential to the aesthetic historical natural resource of the war that runs right along
kind of parallel to where that southern option was going to go. And that's really
what at that point steered us to the existing boat ramp area that we were
in. I mean one thing some of the phone members brought up was it seemed like it
would be good to connect to a deep water but you know like maybe where is it
James Creek that comes out there or what does that what creek is that that
comes out right? It's actually butchers lute kind of winds around there or
tributary kind of yeah. Okay well I mean I don't have any problem with that I
just wanted to wanted to share that people didn't know exactly what was
being referenced, and they were talking about something going off the edge, and it was like,
isn't that a big sequel issue?
It's surprising we're not talking about that, or, you know, just things like that.
So, anyway, I'll make a motion to approve consent.
And then we have a public, I'll try to do that first, before.
Okay, sure.
Yeah.
So is there anybody from the public that would like to talk about the voting facility,
the grant program for the I Street boat launch.
That's on our consent calendar.
No?
Okay, go ahead.
Okay, I'm the commotion to approve consent calendar item G.
Okay, we have a motion in second.
All those in favor?
Aye.
The next item that we have pulled is item F
and Sophia has pulled that, so go ahead.
Oh, well, I'm pulling it
because I imagine that there's some great public interest
in this discussion.
So actually, can we just start with a staff report
and kind of go from there?
Sure, okay.
Yeah, we were recommending that the city council
prove a recycling memorandum of understanding
between Humboldt Waste Management Authority
and certain member agencies to participate
in a recycling materials processing contract
and to continue receiving recycling services and revenue-sharing proceeds.
Currently, as the Council knows, the HWMA receives the material from our curbside program
where it is transferred to the solid waste of willots for processing.
And Arcada is the only agency that's not a signatory to that contract
that binds that material to the processing facility in willots,
although we've enjoyed the benefits of being part of it and do receive the proceeds from
the recyclable side.
The past year or two we've been pursuing the avenue of putting out an RFP for a long-term
recyclable processing contract.
And due to certain circumstances, one would be the markets for recyclables are low.
So to enter into a long-term and or 20-year agreement may be not the best option right now.
And the member agencies, you know, and through HWMA have been discussing this.
We brought this to you because basically the HWMA requested on November 12th at their board meeting
to extend the HWMA agreement with solid waste of will.
it's an additional two years so we can get organized on the RFP process so it's not pushing
the timeline too tightly for a respondent to secure a facility because the local facility
is still, I think, the desire for most everybody, local jobs, local facility. But to gain
two more years and at that meeting they requested the City of Arcada enter into the MOU,
which we currently haven't signed on to for that two-year period.
So, you know, I know we did receive some comment, and you'll hear tonight,
an offer to operate and to receive our recycled material.
Some pros and cons, I guess, it would be just to consider.
It's pretty low overhead for us right now to have HWMA run this agreement and in terms
of our administration of a contract and an agreement with solid ways to will it.
So that's pretty smooth.
Keeping materials kind of bound together as much as possible I think achieves that
economy of scale we're looking for in a long-term arrangement and hopefully that
arrangement is going to end up in Humboldt County.
Actually, I'll just, I'll wait on the
other issue of the comment letter you got today and I think you'll get some comments
and maybe I can answer or clarify some things. But I just wanted to say this was, you know,
your choices are you could not act on this and we could still, you know, probably
keep going with HWMA, but a member on prayer
might want to clarify too, this was brought
to you at the request of HWMA Board for us
to formally sign on as they extend their
current arrangement for two more years, so.
Can we take this?
And on that revenue sharing, I should say,
the current revenue sharing is $8 a ton
for the mixed recyclables and $55 a ton
for Cardboard.
That's what the Revenue Sharing Agreement is.
I think I'd like to take the public at this point on this item. So if there's anybody
in the public that wants to speak on this item about the recyclables and the MOU, tell
me who you are. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, members of the council. My name is Rick Powell
and I represent Eel River Resource Recovery. As staff mentioned, we sent a letter to
to all of you. Yesterday, hopefully, you all got it and had a minute to read it. I won't
go through the entire letter, but as you know, we own and operate the Samoa Processing Facility,
formerly ACRC. Since we bought the facility, we have made changes to the facility to convert
it from a dual stream to a single stream. We've also turned it into a permitted it
as a medium volume transfer station. We had hoped that the RFP that was mentioned,
then the RP process would go forward and we would have an opportunity to submit a proposal
to process all the recyclables in Humboldt County with the exception of some that are
currently contractually obligated otherwise. Unfortunately, that process unraveled.
We would like to see the City of Arcadia table this MOU at this time and explore the
opportunity to have their recyclables delivered and processed at the Samoa Transfers Station
rather than trucking them 140 miles away to another county, which takes along with those
recyclables in that truck, local jobs, tax dollars, additional revenue to the city.
As staff said, you currently receive $8 a ton.
We've offered $10 a ton, and we'll also match the $55 a ton for cardboard.
And we will not deduct an admin fee.
You don't receive $8.
You receive $7.20.
sense. We understand that the city would probably like to participate in future RFPs and we have
no issue with entering into an agreement that expires at the end of the two-year extension
that was just granted, which then two-year extension starts in November. It doesn't
start now.
Local jobs, tax dollars, parts, services sourced locally. You're supporting
supporting all of the community. You're supporting your businesses in town. We use several businesses
in this town. And with increased tonnage at the facility, all of those will increase.
We currently employ four employees full-time out there. One-cent facility is fully operational,
which we fully expect it will be. We'll have a staff of approximately 24 people.
Unfortunately, processing facility is very expensive to operate and maintain. So there's
a lot of additional services and parts that are sourced locally, not in Mendocino County
to support that facility.
So once again, we ask that you please table this, explore the option of entering into an
agreement with our company, and keep that material local, generate more jobs, tax dollars,
and support the local community.
Thank you very much.
Thanks, Rick.
Hi.
Mayor, Councilman Peoples.
Chuck Scharder with the River Resource Recovery.
One of the components in the RFP was outreach, and one of the things that Il River does do
is outreach.
We do it for businesses.
We do it for community business or any community committees, anything like that, schools.
I've done outreach for Ferndale Village Club, Redwood Prep Elementary School, Royal
the Conservation Crew Corp, each new member crews that come through each year.
I do a series, so each crew member knows what not only at their facility, which is recyclable,
but when they go out in the field, they also know how to separate the garbage from the
recyclable.
Fortson Middle School, St. Joseph's Hospital, Zane Middle School, I'm not sure where
it was burning.
Letty was here or not, but we've been working with them to get to zero waste.
He calls me up occasionally and says,
we have this item, what can we do with it?
How do we recycle it?
One of the latest things they called up
and says we have our plastic utensils.
And I says, you bet we can recycle those.
And so we came down, we did a tour,
and he brought me 120 pounds of plastic forks and spoons,
and the kids were really excited.
So Zane Middle School is one of the great success stories there.
Humboldt County Fair,
Two years ago they asked me to come on over there and start working with their recycling
at the fair because their garbage rates were so high and we were discounting it, but we
felt they really needed to get in a recycling program.
Working with the fair people, one of the people we called in also to help up was John
Shelter, who's here tonight.
Our first year we made 25 percent diversion.
Last year we made 40 percent diversion.
John was one of the people that, when his crew were on the floor of that, and I got to give him mostly credit for it, because his crew, when they do their presentation, they're fantastic.
They really helped out. They were going through. He helped me set up where the recycling center should be, what kind of materials were being diverted, which was being thrown away.
They were working with the benders at the fair.
I'm working also with the Fair Committee to make sure that the benders bikes more material that is recyclable.
So we do do outreach and it's one of the big things that we're proud of at Il River Resource Recovery.
And I just want to let you know that that's one thing that is available.
There's anybody out there, whatever if you're a school or if you have a committee that you want to clean up an area, give us a call.
with
We'll be happy to work with them. Thank you.
Thank you.
Good evening. John Shelter again. I'm here to speak in support of the Ill River Disposal.
We worked with them at Humboldt County Fair and two years ago he was right. He brought
us in also. We worked hand in hand with them, very understanding people and want to do
the best for the community. They asked, they did exactly what I asked them to do.
We
was escaping me, but that's a great mark. As we keep moving forward, these are the specialists
that we want in place. Besides that, it does keep our jobs local. And if you understand
what I do for a living, I get the homeless back to work. This is one of the places that
they thrive at. This is a good opportunity to kind of change the way we do things and
bring back the money here local. Thank you guys very much.
Thanks, John. Anyone else? Maggie?
I'm Maggie Gaynor, and I'm a board member of Zero Waste Humboldt.
This is the only way I can be brief.
Given the high public interest in both the loss of the ACRC contract
and Humboldt Waste Management Authority's proposed regional recycling RFP,
which placed an emphasis on finding a local processor at a competitive price,
I'd like to request that this item be removed from the consent agenda and rescheduled as
a business item at a future meeting.
This will allow for a presentation from ill-rivered disposal and a full public discussion by council
members and the public could be in a better position to provide informed comment.
With solid waste of will, it's, when solid waste of will, it's asked at Humboldt
Voice Management Authorities meeting last week for a subsidy.
It really triggered for us that the next logical step is to return to looking for local opportunities
for local businesses to bring back those jobs and also something we haven't considered
very much until really of late the carbon footprint of our recycling services.
Bigger picture for us, our emphasis is not on managing waste, it is on preventing it.
It's really nice to have local businesses that you can connect with quick and fast and
easy and eyeball to eyeball when you're working on prevention.
And then the goal, the long-term goal for recycling should be to incorporate those
locally collected process materials into our own local regional economy with our own local manufacturers.
So that would make it easier also.
So I hope that you'll pull it from the agenda.
Thanks, Megan.
Maureen.
Hi, Maureen Hart. I live in Arcada.
Five years ago, some of us were all here,
year, and we lost 50 jobs, 50 jobs. And we were given the, we accepted that, okay, at
a certain point in time, we have five years to bring it back. Now, I see over and over
again in cities, they spend millions of dollars trying to create jobs in their economic
development departments. And then I saw in this situation where another department destroyed
50 jobs. Now, it costs a lot of money to create jobs locally, and we all know that. So when
I see that there was some money coming back in, 149,000, and we spend millions of dollars
creating jobs that doesn't sound like a very good deal and I just want us to look
at returning a few of them have been four jobs over there whatever but we need
to return those jobs as soon as possible so I support the point and the full
discussion of that contract. Thank you. Thanks Marie.
Anyone else from the
public like to speak on this item. Okay. There is. Come on up. Thank you. Tell us your name.
Good evening. My name is Juliette Bond. I live in Arcata and I've been involved in
waste and recycling, mostly diversion here for the last, gosh, nine years or so. So
So, I've definitely, you know, when I first moved here, I got my little bins from Arcada
Garbage Company and I separated everything out.
And then I remember when we got curbside and I remember when the economic downturn
hit and ACRC and, you know, was ceased to be in operation.
I was working at H-1 Way at the time.
I've seen all of this happening throughout time, including the strategic plan and
And including the last five years,
you know, has gone by so quickly.
And here we are again, looking at what are we going to do with the same truthfully, relatively
small bundle of recyclables that Arcada is responsible for.
And when we sit here and say that we want the local jobs and we want this local firm,
I just want to say there's one right over there.
We have it today, tomorrow.
You could decide tomorrow to enter into a contract if you wanted to for just the two years that gives you more money
Does give the local firm a chance to prove its capabilities and serving the city of Arcada?
Arcada does not have to keep the tons bundled together. We are very small and rural up here. We are tonnage
it is important, but
And as much as it is important
It's you know how they say vote with your dollars sort of vote with your recyclables
If you want to see a local facility, but with your recyclables, send them to the local facility,
see if they serve you well over the next two years.
If you don't want to have hassles with contract management, make that a term of the agreement.
You know, these things are resolvable.
So I would agree with Zero Waste Humboldt and others in the room that this item should be pulled.
The, everyone involved should have a chance to look at the full range of, you know,
to compare the offers on the table and make a really informed decision that's going to
benefit our community.
So thank you for your time.
Thanks Juliet.
Okay, again anybody else?
So I'd like to turn it back over to Council and hear your opinion after the discussion.
Well, I think, you know, overwhelmingly, you know, I think that's the right course
of action right now is to table this item, especially in light of we've had a lot
a lot of change in circumstances here locally very recently and in addition we also have
a study session coming up with zero waste humbled just next week so I think this item
would benefit from a more rigorous discussion so I would make a motion to table this item.
I'll second that motion because I agree and I think we do want to look at jobs. It
is a deeper issue than just recyclables. I'd almost like to hear from Council Member
prayer if this was discussed at HWMA in any way or if you want to put you on the spot
if it's not.
No, the thing that I actually wanted to bring up when we were at HWMA talking about the
RFP process and kind of part of what also played into not having all the member agencies
wanting to sign on is because some of the member agencies, my understanding is actually
have contracts with Eel River and that would extend, you know, basically there was an overlap.
And so there are currently other member agencies that are sending their recyclables to Eel
River.
So I'm supportive of tapering this item.
I don't think it's at this point urgent.
I don't think it's drastically going to change anything.
I think it's an important conversation for us to have.
So I'll just say that.
Well, I was the HWMA representative at the time that all this was happening as far as the contract.
And there was very strong community sentiment here in Arcada and from the majority of the council
that we did not want to go with woe.
And so we wanted to keep it local.
And I don't see that as changing.
We never signed a contract to be part of this.
And now that this whole RFP process is being extended for two years,
I see no reason why we should be signing this and agreeing to this.
And so I agree with the other council members that, I mean,
I would have voted against this, but I think tabling it is a very reasonable thing to do.
As part of the tabling this, then we'll have an agenda item that will come back
and give us kind of two sides of this or not?
Yeah.
If you table it, you can table it to a time specified,
or you could table it to sort of a general period of time,
something that obviously we're going to wait.
I mean, next week we have the zero waste,
the study session was zero waste humbled,
but it seems like you might decide at that meeting
sort of some course of action that you want to take out
and we could determine an agenda that would fit
within that timeframe.
It also direct staff if you want them to be looking at whatever your entire range of options is for recycling.
I mean, there are alternatives of just signing on to this contract.
There would be the alternative of the City of Arcada doing its own RFP City of Arcada going back to HWMA and saying, you know,
the council is not interested in waiting.
We're going to move forward.
Are any of you interested as other member agencies?
I mean, they could lay out other options if that was of interest to the council.
So we could do that within a month, you think?
Have it back on the agenda?
Have it back on the agenda.
Second meeting in February?
Is it going to be crowded or is it October?
It's going to be crowded.
I mean, the March.
Wherever that is.
It's going to be crowded.
But you never know how things roll.
Okay.
It seems like it has a little bit of a time pressure
because it's kind of a two years to the end of the MOU.
I think sooner we make it.
We don't need too much more data, and I think we can make a decision in a month.
Thank you.
So I guess we need a motion on that.
We're already going to motion that again.
Motion second.
So all those in favor of tabling this and bringing it back at another time.
Aye.
We could have actually done it tonight.
If we could schedule this.
Because, you know, in the thing I also was thinking too is, you know, because HWMA had
been, you know, doing this without officially being on the MOU, I mean, I think it is good
to also give them a heads up, you know, hey, you know, we're wanting to have this conversation.
So I think it is good that we were able to table it so it wasn't just a total blind
side.
Yeah, and I think it's necessary to kind of clear the air, make a decision and then
move on and it feels like we have a lot of options or at least a couple.
So thanks.
Our next item is old business and we don't have any of that tonight.
We have new business that's item A, adopt a resolution number 15633 authorizing a grant
application for the 2015 housing related parks program grant to fund improvements
of up to $300,000 to improve up to four Arcada parks.
The State Housing and Community Development Department,
HCD 2015 Housing-Related Parks Program awards
prorated grants based on construction of low-income housing
that satisfies the housing element goals.
Eligibility is based on having a compliant housing element,
reporting annually on the housing element,
and demonstrating that building permits were issued
to units restricted to occupancy by low-income residents.
City staff is preparing an application by the February 4th, 2016 date, oh, it says 2106.
It means 2016, okay, due date.
The Housing Development or Housing Community Development Department also requires a governing
body resolution authorizing the submission.
And so we have a recommendation that the City Council 1 adopt Resolution 1563 and direct
staff to submit all necessary documentation to state to finalize the application.
So do we have a staff report on this?
Good evening, Council.
Can you hear me?
I'm really excited to be able to provide a staff report on this.
So we've been working, the Environmental Services and the Community Development Department have
been working together on this.
And this is funding that's available because of the city's really great track record in
terms of trying to provide affordable housing.
And what we're applying for is up to $300,000.
So what we've determined is we think we're eligible for a little over $200,000.
So last year, there was more money available, and so when we were speaking with the grant
funders, they said you should apply for and make your resolution be for more in case there's
additional funding available.
So based on kind of the different metrics that the state uses, we get additional funds
if we make sure that we're allocating all of the money to certain parks that are
considered to be in underserved neighborhoods. And the state has a metric for that, which
is an area and a community where the amount of reusable park space for every thousand
residents living within a half mile radius of that park space is less than three acres.
So based on the state's metrics, the four parks that we have that are eligible are
Mountain View, Green View, Cahill and James Creek Meadows. Mountain View Park and Green
Park are also
In our five-year capital improvement program to be, you know, have an upgrade. And we have
some photos of those as well to let you know. So what's really exciting, so that's Greenview
Park right there. And what's exciting about Greenview Park is that we have a very active
neighborhood effort to create the first all-inclusive park in not just Arcada, but really all
of Humboldt County.
And this community group has met.
They've met with Parks and Recreation.
We have kind of a concept plan of what they'd like,
which includes a playground, a gazebo,
and then a multi-use sports court
that would be really for individuals of all abilities.
They've been working actively,
and they have support from Cypress Grove Shev
has given them money.
Wild Berries has pledged funds as well.
They've opened up an account with Humboldt
foundation and they're actively doing fundraising.
So this grant will really help support those efforts.
And then what's wonderful as well is that the other park
in the same neighborhood is eligible as well.
All of the neighborhood is already aware of this one.
And so the idea now is to look at whatever we have in this
park.
The plans for Mountain View would really be ones to
complement this park as well.
And the Greenview neighborhood group is really interested
and going around and getting the neighborhood back together to talk about Mountain View and
what the possibility is. So that's really a great opportunity and really wonderful.
We added the other two parks. So this is Mountain View Park. So you can see there's very little
there. I'm sorry, the lighting isn't so good, but there is a swing set there.
That's right. There's something. So the opportunity to really look at this park
and really add a lot of different recreational elements that's really exciting.
I like the logic of making an all-inclusive park that may have a lot of equipment that
is more specific for all-inclusive and then this park to have stuff that you wouldn't necessarily
have in the other park. I mean, is that what you're saying?
Well, I think we will have a neighborhood meeting and really talk about that, but there's a lot
of opportunities. There's a lot of different options in terms of play equipment for, you
know, TOTS as well as older children. And then really looking at how do we provide recreational
opportunities for our teens as well as adults. So really looking at all of those different
users. Another park that is eligible for funding is Cahill Park. So this is what
this playground looks like. And there's also green space around there as well.
And what we put into the grant application is looking at how we could add to the existing
elements that are here.
So looking at opportunities for older, you know, for adults and our older children to
have some opportunities in these two parks.
If funds allow, I mean, we really don't know.
If we get our 200,000, we'll be really thrilled.
If we get 300,000, there might be some opportunity for some funding at these other two parks
as well.
And the other one is Chains Creek Meadows.
Okay.
And the metric that you talked about is population, immediate vicinity population versus acre of park.
Is that what you're talking about?
Yes.
So their metric again is usable park space for every thousand residents living within a half mile radius of that park is less than three acres.
Well, there's an income component too, isn't there?
No.
Actually, it's defined as a park-deficient community.
So what this is is this is really an incentive.
The state is providing this as an incentive to communities to provide affordable housing.
So it's one way to really try to get communities to work towards that.
And so this is kind of a bonus that they give to those communities that actually meet those requirements.
But then there's an additional bonus that goes towards taking all the funds they are for you
and putting it towards park-deficient communities, which means it gives us an extra $40,000 roughly
by saying, okay, we're going to direct all of our funds to the parks that they've identified
as being the ones that are in neighborhoods that are considered park-deficient.
Great. Thanks, Julie. Anything else you have?
Oh, great.
I have a question.
Go ahead.
James Creek Metals Park, didn't we just renovate that?
I thought that was, like, really newly renovated.
It's, yeah.
It has a lot of wonderful amenities already, yes.
What we did was we put every park in that the state designated,
because we wanted to keep our options as open as we could.
I guess I think I can bring this up,
because I think I'm 500 feet away from it.
But I think about Sunnybrae Park and, you know, Councilmember Pereira and I have worked
together a little.
We've had a few getting rid of invasives.
But it's, you know, I mean, was, did that not fit the criteria?
It did not fit the criteria.
Because it's big.
But there's no real recreation.
Well, I'm happy to meet with you on other options that we could pursue to add.
I think that actually, because there are people who have been wondering, like, how come
and we can't seem to drum up something around that park.
And so it would be nice, I'll meet with you.
Absolutely.
Thanks, Susan.
Anybody else that had a comment on this?
I think the application looks good
and you put us in the most competitive light.
You know, there's other parks around town too
that I kind of wanted to, you know,
Innis is one that kind of, you know,
it seems like it would be right on the edge,
but I know we have the proposed expansion too,
so that might have taken out of the running.
And even though we have done some recent upgrades, both at James Creek and Cahill, I think keeping
them to make it the application competitive is a good idea, so I support it.
So did the state actually – pardon me – did the state actually give you the list?
Yes, we had to go to a state website and then they showed you which ones were eligible.
Oh, okay.
Interesting.
I'd like to make a motion.
Right.
I move that we adopt Resolution Number 156-33, authorizing a grant application for the 2015
Housing-Related Parks Program grant to fund improvements of up to $300,000 to improve up
to four arcaded parks.
Second.
Okay.
We have a motion in the second.
Do you need the other part of the recommendation in terms of directing staff to submit all
necessary documentation to the state to finalize the application.
Okay.
Here you go.
And if there's any member of the public that would like to talk on this item, the park's
related grant.
Okay.
If you're going to, they're telling me that you have to be up here because the people,
they don't, they don't hear you.
Yeah.
Yeah, no.
Thanks, Megan.
It's probably an item from the Parks and Rec Committee.
Thanks.
So we have a motion, and do we have a second?
So a motion, a second.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Thank you for this.
This looks like a good project.
Great.
We're very excited.
Okay.
At this point, we have oral and written communications.
So anybody that wants to talk about something not on the agenda at this point, it's another
opportunity to do that.
So you can come on up.
Seeing no one.
Okay, we're done with that.
Council and staff reports, would you, would someone like to start?
Sure.
I'll start.
report. Just a few things to report. Well, obviously, I think all of us attended Bull
Beans, and it was a great event, as always, and also attended a seismic safety commission
meeting this past week and sort of been decked on with that since Senator Cooley is also
on the commission with me. I had lunch with him and discussed our experience with
to MMIC and I'm glad to see that we, on our consent calendar, did the support letter for
Assembly Bill 21.
So I had the chance to explain to him some of the challenges that we had faced in Fracata
with regard to the MMIC area and why we were supportive of this, you know, all the cleanup
legislation.
And then, let's see, we had a couple of things moving forward.
was mentioned earlier the Greenview Park project and went through Parks and Rec and then also
the Futsal project is moving forward through Parks and Rec also, so that was great to hear
and that looks very promising. And then Mayor Patino and I attended the fundraiser for
Greenview Park at the D Street Center. I showed Selma the movie Selma the night before
for Martin Luther King Day, so it was great.
That's all I have to report.
Sophia?
Just a couple things.
On Monday, we had the Arcada House Partnership Board meeting
where the new executive director, she was present,
her name is Darlene Spore,
and she recently moved to the area,
and she actually has over 20 years of experience
in nonprofit management,
has worked in affordable housing and development,
And most recently, she was a college administrator.
So she has interesting diverse background.
And so, yeah, I'm sure you all get to meet her at some point.
I think they're working on putting together some sort of event where, you know,
it's a fundraiser and also an opportunity for the community to meet her.
So that's going on.
And then just another thing with Humboldt Waste Management Authority.
already. We've been talking lots of trash.
So I just wanted to talk, you know, it was
kind of alluded to by someone in public comment about solid waste of billets and a request
that they had made for their solid waste contract with HWMA. And basically, this contract
is a 10-year contract where a year and a half into it there was an RFP process
but solid waste of bullets got the contract and basically a year and a half
in they've requested for whereas the current contract doesn't require HW may
paying anything they were asking for about a six-month period for us to pay
nearly $60,000 because they felt like they did not receive the amount of
profits that they had initially anticipated because they were relying
heavily on kind of this backhaul concept of we already have trucks going down south
and so we can just add to it.
So there was obviously a lot of discussion about that and the concern about the precedent
that that would set, especially since we had received other bids a year and a half ago.
So we did not take action on their request to make any changes to the contract.
So I just thought you should know about that because I would have obviously an impact
on our ratepayers. And then, also, we did vote to extend the solid waste of
Willett's recycling contract for that additional two years, which obviously
kind of came up tonight. So those were kind of the two big items at HWMA last
week. That's all my report.
Yeah, I don't have too much. I just wanted to let
the public know that the Redwood Coast Energy Authority, we're moving along on still exploring,
but moving farther into exploring the community choice aggregation idea.
And so there is an information period. There's information time for people to come to it
at the Arcata Community Center next Wednesday night, January 27th, from 5.30 to 7.30.
People can come there and people from RCEA will be there to help discuss and, you know,
clarify and help people understand how Community Choice Accordation works.
So that's a D-Straight?
No, it's at the Arcata Community Center.
Arcata Community Center.
Yeah, 530 to 730, Wednesday, a week from today, January 27th.
Yeah, that's it.
In the top case, Community Choice Accordation.
Yes, it's basically kind of an explanation, question and answer.
Is there any indication of the proposals coming in?
You know, we didn't really talk about it because they hadn't come in yet when we had our meeting,
because we had our meeting a week early because of Martin Luther King.
Well, speaking of Martin Luther King Day, I attended the event at the community center.
It's always great, the interfaith gospel choir is always excellent, and the storyteller
and the children, and just thinking about Dr. King, and all he did, even though he had
a short life, he certainly did a tremendous amount and is very rightly honored by all of
us.
And as I mentioned before, I had the opportunity to hear and speak in Chicago in 1964,
which is certainly a wonderful opportunity.
So today was an HDA board meeting, and we approved a new contract with the existing company
that does ads on the buses, and I think that, you know, we're happy with them,
We don't want to drop them, and so we approved, essentially,
continuation of the existing contract, but at a higher price
because there was competition last time.
So that's more revenue for HTA.
Still no labor agreement.
This is taking a very long time.
Let's see. And then also that we approved funding requests for an electric bus and a charging
station, which is going to go before HCOG tomorrow night.
That's exciting.
The Labor thing you were talking about is with HTA employees.
HTA employees, right.
Thanks.
Anything else, Michael?
No, nothing.
Mark, did you have something additional?
I just wanted to add, because I just wanted to thank city staff, because with all the
local flooding that we had here recently, I know city staff did an incredible job to
alleviate and keep the streets open where they could, and minimize the damage we had.
And I know they were out there, they were all over working around the clock, so thank
you, thank them.
For myself, I went to Bola Beans'
hazmat.
We have our quarterly meeting on hazmat, and I continued to go on Friday at 1 o'clock
to clean the plaza with the Community Pride Project, and hopefully we continue to have
people come out because a few people can do a great job at an hour.
And I'd say that's probably it for me.
Anything else from staff?
Just a couple of quick things.
The first one is we've had a commitment to staff training this year
and one of the big emphasis is on customer service training.
We are bringing a woman by the name of Jean Steele,
who does work really nationally and internationally in customer service,
up to work with our staff.
We've opened it up to some staff from other local government agencies as well to do really
an all-day training with all of our frontline staff, which is going to be on February 4th.
We have, she's a very dynamic speaker.
We have asked her to spend the night and do a half-day session that we're going to
take our management to be part of our management team day, but we've also opened it up
to the public and they're advertising in partnership with the Chamber of Commerce.
So we do have reserve spaces for any of the council that is interested in attending
meeting that half-day session as well.
And we're fifth?
It's February 5th, so we'll send that out to you.
It's from 9 to 12 on February 5th
at D Street Neighborhood Center.
We do also still have spaces that we're selling for $50 each
in the community, and they can register through
the Chamber of Commerce's website for that.
So I don't know if we'll completely fill,
but we might get close.
When you were talking about training,
this is a model that we're working on a little bit
to see if we can bring some higher-level capacity
training, share it with the local area because we have some great facilities.
We're hoping to get our money back via this model and we'll see how it works.
It should be a good training.
That's worth the money.
The other thing, just quickly, I wanted to pass out for you, actually,
Director Andres here and could answer questions.
But at the study session with the Open Space and Ag Committee,
a question came up about hunting on the property along South G Street.
And we researched that through our municipal code,
and although the title is Sectioned Upland Game Hunting,
it does allow for both upland game and migratory waterfowl.
So Director Andre also looked at what the fishing game code was
in terms of safety zone from various buildings,
and it really requires 150-yard safety zone.
So he actually went ahead and mapped that,
and we'll just pass it out so you have it.
You guys haven't requested this as an agenda item
since it came up.
We thought at least you'd have the knowledge
of how, you know, where is it legal to hunt on that particular property does seem to be
the only property within the city limits that we're seeing hunting on actively.
So I'll pass that out right before we leave and I think that's it.
Great.
Karen?
I'm a little confused that training on February 5th, what's the title of that?
What am I going to learn there?
Learn to run wild.
Happy people win.
And it's customer service training.
I think it's called customer service training.
She's got a fancier title.
But the title of her book is Happy People Win.
And her concept really is about what makes us happy,
what makes other people happy.
Why on earth would we not go the extra mile
to make everybody feel good?
I mean, that's, you know, a nutshell,
but she does it much more eloquently than I do.
Well, thanks.
I'm excited to put that in my calendar.
anything else from anyone there's a vetted wing inflatable fun that's kind of
that's for the public so for the public it's kind of a press event but it is the
council has all been invited and it's Friday I believe it's at 12 30 I'm
actually gonna not I'm gonna miss that event that opening I'm gonna be leaving
actually tonight to head down to the annual ring of board meeting in
Sonoma County so I appreciate we're getting out kind of early as noon rather
than 12 o'clock at noon okay okay at 12 o'clock that's a really exciting huge
you know yeah yeah and we did close on that loan as you all know you receive
emails and although I have to say the email at first said like wing inflatable
close.
I had a heart attack for a minute, Mitch.
So in order to get you out and on the road, well let's look at dates of future meetings
and at this point we have a joint study session Tuesday, January 26th, 6 p.m.,
Council chamber and then we have a study session with zero waste Humboldt Thursday the 28th at
the council at 6 p.m. in the council chambers, so
those two will be
next week and
Have a good time at remit. Thank you for representing us safe drive work here