[0:01] but there it is

[0:05] calling to order the monday august 9th 2021 regular meeting of the 38th council

[0:12] of the city of berkeley miss harold would you please call the

[0:15] roll council member baker here council member blanchard here

[0:19] councilmember mayor pro tem dean here council member gavin here

[0:24] council member hennan here council member price here

[0:28] mayor turbrack here our first order of business this evening

[0:33] is the approval of tonight's agenda is there a motion to approve

[0:37] so moved your honor support motion made by councilmember baker with support from

[0:41] council member blanchard are there any changes or additions

[0:47] okay seeing none miss harold would you please

[0:50] call the role on tonight's agenda blanchard yes

[0:55] dean yes gavin yes hennen yes price yes baker yes

[1:01] turbric yes at this time please stand for the

[1:05] invocation and remain standing for the pledge of allegiance with us this

[1:09] evening is pastor zach dunlap let's pray

[1:14] good and loving god thank you for the opportunity to live

[1:19] work worship learn pray grow eat shop and

[1:24] make music in this wonderful community of berkeley

[1:27] we come from many different faith traditions and belief systems yet we are

[1:32] united in our pursuit of the common good may we truly look for the good in each

[1:38] person may you grant us and our mayor and city

[1:41] council members wisdom and discernment to lead well

[1:46] and may you empower us to set aside our differences and truly

[1:52] love our neighbors as ourselves

[1:56] in the strong name of jesus i pray

[2:07] of amen united states of america and to the republic for which it stands

[2:13] one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for

[2:18] all

[2:28] all right we will now move to public comments and just as we did last time

[2:33] please bear with me for a few minutes so i can

[2:35] go through the process because we have a number of different folks with us today

[2:39] possibly uh per our normal rules and procedures

[2:44] uh you may comment on specific agenda items while they are being considered

[2:47] and as we have done in the past at normal in-person meetings

[2:53] council members still will not engage you in discussion but if your concern

[2:56] needs to be addressed by a member of city staff please sign your name um on

[3:00] the at the clerk's table there for those attending in person

[3:04] you will have the opportunity to speak in just a moment you can simply come up

[3:08] to the podium state your name and city of residence just as normal

[3:12] for those attending virtually uh participants in the webcast can utilize

[3:16] the raise your hand function by selecting manage participants on the

[3:19] bottom of your dashboard and then select the more button in the bottom right hand

[3:23] corner and our moderator will call your name and unmute you so that you can

[3:26] speak when it is your turn if you have called in

[3:31] please select star 9 or hit star 9 on your

[3:34] phone that will put you in the queue and you will be announced by the last four

[3:37] digits of your phone number when it is your turn to comment

[3:41] again in the virtual environment you will have three minutes to speak and

[3:44] once the three minutes are up you will be muted by the moderators

[3:48] additionally we will read public comments that were emailed to the clerk

[3:52] prior to 5 pm today and we'll make sure that those

[3:56] electronic communications are part of the public record so we're going to do

[3:59] this in in a couple turns here and we're

[4:01] going to follow the same thing throughout the evening when it comes

[4:04] time to comment on events so the first thing we're going to do is i'll open up

[4:07] to anybody here for public comments again items that are not included on

[4:10] tonight's agenda then i will ask the clerk if there are

[4:12] any email communications and thirdly we will go to our folks that are visiting

[4:16] with us virtually make sense hopefully if not i apologize

[4:21] all right uh we will now begin with those folks

[4:23] that are with us today in person

[4:29] man i said all that thank you

[4:32] thank you

[4:35] so i'm uh a berkeley resident my name is jamie

[4:39] stefanian bennett and i am here in support of the small business community

[4:43] here as a resident not a business owner here

[4:47] but specific to if i look at the agenda specifically is resolution number

[4:52] r27-21 and i wanted to state my support representing

[4:57] a great deal of my neighbors colleagues and friends here in town to

[5:02] voice my support of extending the temporary outdoor dining

[5:07] there has been a great deal of pride that we've had even throughout

[5:13] covid by inviting friends and family members to these

[5:17] outdoor spaces bringing people to town and we feel that

[5:21] it will only help the efforts of the dda and other businesses to come into town

[5:26] when they see berkeley act in such a progressive manner with the blood

[5:30] sweat and tears that so many of our small business community have made to

[5:36] stay in business let alone thrive and so we want our small businesses here to

[5:40] thrive and i state my full unequivocal support of our small business community

[5:46] thank you jamie um again we're talking about items that are

[5:50] not covered on the agenda we will certainly get to that and i will make

[5:52] sure that we started off with this one

[5:55] i i appreciate you about this coming up to the microphone thank you thank you

[5:59] any other public comments for any other items that are not covered on tonight's

[6:03] agenda

[6:06] all right miss harold did you receive any email communications to be read into

[6:10] the public record no i did not your honor okay thank you

[6:15] miss mathis i will now switch over to

[6:18] our hybrid version anybody virtually like to comment

[6:22] um i believe so steve if you want to unmute yourself you can go ahead

[6:26] and get some more volume sarah oh can you guys hear me okay that's

[6:32] better it's getting a little bit better okay

[6:36] i'll adjust the volume over here steve if you have anything to say you

[6:40] can go ahead and speak

[6:47] okay thank you very much uh members of council and honorable mayor i'd like to

[6:53] uh correct a little something

[6:56] that had transpired uh

[6:58] prior to myself and paul

[7:03] resigning from the zoning board of appeals

[7:06] we did have a conversation with you on the telephone subsequently it was said

[7:11] in that last pc meeting that that there were discussions ongoing with

[7:17] staff and uh and council people that is

[7:21] absolutely not true i talked to six of the seven

[7:26] that were seated at the time of the resignation they have not heard anything

[7:31] from anyone other than dennis hennan who contacted them and said if you have

[7:36] anything you need information on please feel free to ask i don't know

[7:41] what happened with that but

[7:44] you know i it's it's very frustrating

[7:48] we need to to get this out on the table

[7:52] and we need people to understand what happened this is a

[7:58] learning opportunity if we don't take advantage of it it's really really silly

[8:05] and i know for a fact that a number of members of the planning

[8:09] commission are not very happy about this either what this kind of stuff does is

[8:14] it really degrades the zba and the planning commission

[8:18] and i just wanted to say that and get it out in the public thank you

[8:23] thank you steve

[8:26] miss mathis who's next um chief tim do you have anything to say

[8:33] for

[8:38] today you're gonna have to go ahead and mute yourself there you go yeah there

[8:42] you go um you know my comments as a

[8:46] restaurant owner and seeing the conversations that have happened at

[8:51] different meetings

[8:54] and conversations i've had

[8:58] with business owners so it's really comes down to a decision

[9:03] of whether we want to be together as berkeley businesses

[9:09] or if we want to

[9:13] remain divided and kind of protect our acorns um but i think we need to

[9:20] uh you know it's if this doesn't pass it's

[9:23] really a vote for division

[9:26] um and it's uh

[9:29] it's out of fear if we are able to drive any sort of restaurant or retail

[9:35] business to berkeley everybody wins i i just don't understand um

[9:42] the opposition um we want businesses to succeed

[9:47] and that's really my my two cents

[9:51] is to commit to some growth for berkeley

[9:58] thank you thank you thank you and again we will be

[10:01] commenting on that agenda item later and there will be an opportunity for those

[10:05] with us virtually as well to to be able to comment um while we're discussing

[10:08] that item miss mathis who is next

[10:14] that is all i see at this time mr mayor all right

[10:20] sure

[10:23] cinder 2772 cummings i just wanted to put out the good news that we have

[10:29] our silver medalist kate nye who will be one of our grand marshals at the cruise

[10:35] fest parade we also are honoring

[10:41] our first responders there's a family

[10:45] in particular here in the city and also all of our public safety officers

[10:50] so we're pretty proud about that

[10:53] thank you cindy and thank you for being instrumental i know and making sure that

[10:57] katie was available and here and would be able to participate so thank you so

[11:01] much that's awesome anybody else

[11:05] before we wrap up public comments

[11:09] all right we will move on to our order of business

[11:13] this evening first up is our consent agenda

[11:16] miss harold would you please read the items on tonight's consent agenda

[11:21] one approval of the minutes matter of approving the minutes of the 38th

[11:25] regular city council meeting on monday july 19 2021 two warrant matter of

[11:30] approving warrant number one three six five

[11:34] motion number m-44-21 matter of approving to cast

[11:38] berkeley's official vote for the fouling to serve as a trustee

[11:42] on the board of trustees for the mml workers compensation fund directing the

[11:47] city clerk to send in a marked ballot vote for three incumbent trustees and

[11:53] first and two first-time trustees for a four-year term beginning october 1st

[11:57] 2021. thank you miss harold is there a motion

[12:02] to approve tonight's consent agenda so moved support moved by council member

[12:07] gavin with support from council member price are there any comments or changes

[12:11] from council

[12:15] are there any questions or comments from those that are with us in person

[12:22] miss mathis anybody on the virtual side

[12:28] not at this time sir thank you uh seeing no comments uh miss harold

[12:33] would you please call the role on tonight's consent agenda dean yes gavin

[12:38] yes hennen yes price yes baker yes blanchard yes turbrack yes

[12:45] we now move on to our regular agenda miss harold would you please read item

[12:49] number one recognitions presentations matter of any

[12:54] recognitions or presentations from the consent agenda

[12:58] seeing no recognitions or presentations from the consent agenda we'll move on to

[13:03] item number two motion number m-45-21

[13:09] matter of authorizing the berkeley berkeley orchestra association 2325

[13:14] catalpa drive berkeley michigan to conduct berkeley tag days 2021 in the

[13:18] city of berkeley on friday october 8th from 4 p.m to 9 p.m saturday october 9th

[13:24] from 9 00 a.m to 5 p.m and sunday october 10th from 9 a.m to 5 p.m

[13:29] is there a motion to approve m4521 so moved support

[13:35] motion made by council member hennan with support from council member

[13:38] blanchard mr baumgarten uh that was mayor

[13:42] it's good to see this come back to us this application has been reviewed by

[13:46] each of the appropriate departments as noted in the application packet

[13:50] students will stand outside businesses and sing and play instruments

[13:54] they will have a bucket to collect donations and these funds these will go

[13:58] to the purchase of instruments scholarships music uh support programs

[14:02] and the like the reason this comes before council is because this does take

[14:05] place in the public's right-of-way uh that's it that's owned by the city uh so

[14:10] they come every year and they're they're always very diligent about uh filling

[14:13] out the proper paperwork and it's this item has been recommended by the

[14:17] departments that reviewed it for approval

[14:19] thank you uh comments or questions for mr

[14:23] baumgarten from council

[14:28] recruit all our stuff and everything looks good uh the insurance is up to

[14:31] date and so everything looks fine figured if you were good with a jack

[14:37] we would be okay um other questions any other comments

[14:40] as mr baumgarten as a manager mentioned we are certainly excited to see this

[14:45] able to come back as we've seen some other events slowly

[14:49] but surely beginning to come back we saw last week we've got a few more coming up

[14:52] in the following weeks as long as we can continue to do these

[14:57] things safely it's good to see certainly

[15:01] any comments from anybody here or is anybody representing the

[15:05] orchestra association today either here or virtually

[15:13] no one here virtually nobody here virtually okay

[15:17] well with that and seeing no additional comments uh miss harold then would you

[15:21] please call the roll on m4521

[15:25] gavin yes hennen yes price yes baker yes blanchard yes dean yes turbrack yes

[15:34] we now move on to item number three please

[15:38] motion number m-46-21 matter of authorizing the mayor to

[15:43] execute a contract between smart and the city of berkeley for fiscal year 2022

[15:48] for municipal credit and community credit funds in order to provide public

[15:53] transportation services for the period of july 1st 2021 to june 30th 2022.

[15:59] is there a motion to approve m4621 motion to approve emotion approved

[16:04] by council member baker with support from mayor pro pro-tem dean

[16:09] mr baumgarten thank you mayor this is an annual item

[16:12] that continues our contractual relationship with the with the smart

[16:16] organization as noted in the the application or the

[16:21] memo from your recreation director these these services have been absolutely

[16:25] crucial in the past uh 18 months or so as

[16:29] sometimes our department has been the only ones that have been available to

[16:33] take our most vulnerable populations to the get the groceries go the doctors off

[16:38] appointments that they uh that they depend on regularly so um smart uh

[16:42] annually gets this to us a little bit after our fiscal year so this year is uh

[16:46] is no different there but we've uh had a long history of

[16:50] putting these to good use

[16:53] any questions for city manager

[16:57] mr comment that's mark blanchard i'd like to let people are watching know

[17:01] that this is five 40

[17:03] dollars that we get to provide this service so it's it's quite a significant

[17:06] chunk of money and uh our parks and rec people put it through very good use to

[17:10] ensure that our senior citizens can get where they need to get

[17:14] and doctors appointments that sort of thing so it's

[17:16] great to get the money and it's well used by our city yes incredibly well

[17:20] used and and very important especially as we saw over the past year and a half

[17:25] other councilmember price yes um mr baumgarten could you tell any

[17:30] residents who might be hearing about this program tonight a little bit about

[17:34] what they would need to do to make use of it

[17:37] uh we have a fantastic parks and rec staff i would say that that should be

[17:41] anybody's first call if they're interested making use of these wonderful

[17:43] services dan mcmahon our senior services coordinator

[17:47] would be a fantastic person to reach out to through the rec department

[17:50] anybody there would be able to help them but dan mcmahon does a runnable

[17:53] wonderful job of being our point person for each of these services

[17:57] sometimes even going as far as being the driver of the day even

[18:01] that's how involved he is uh with this program so uh that'd be my first thing

[18:05] if anybody asked me that question i would say reach out to dan mcmahon he'll

[18:08] get you signed up and even if something's not initially available they

[18:12] make every stride possible to to make sure that you get the service that

[18:16] you're looking for thank you absolutely

[18:19] thank you other questions or comments i feel like

[18:22] this is a little early i know smart i think this is earlier than normal i feel

[18:26] like it's like an october thing usually they're october late this time august

[18:29] late yeah okay well let's make it happen earlier

[18:33] um are there any comments or questions from anybody that is with us today in

[18:36] person

[18:40] ms mathis any virtual comments sure yeah we do have um mr mcmahon here

[18:45] if you'd like to hear from wow my apologies mayor oh boy

[18:50] dan welcome

[18:53] good evening uh mr mayor members of city council as mr baumgarten said

[18:58] um this is a contract that comes to you every year um we are i am happy to

[19:04] report that we are running our services in full capacity at this time

[19:08] that means doctors appointments grocery stores uh hair salons you know the works

[19:14] we run monday through friday uh 8 30 till about 4 pm each day

[19:20] you can make an appointment by calling the rec center

[19:23] at two four eight six five eight three four seven zero between the hours

[19:29] of nine and eleven thirty um to make an appointment for those

[19:33] rides uh our boundaries are eight mile to sixteen mile lasser to john r so

[19:39] that's just a little bit more information

[19:42] um to uh

[19:44] miss price's question earlier so again our phone number is

[19:50] seven 248-658-3470 and uh we will do everything that we can to help you out

[19:56] and get you to and from your appointments and

[19:59] um i cannot thank our drivers enough uh

[20:04] james dunlap and tim renaud they've been working throughout this pandemic and

[20:08] they deserve the most praise i can offer they are

[20:13] both in the senior um demographics so they are not only

[20:18] out there doing great work but they're also putting their uh

[20:22] their selves in at risk um we are still uh requiring masks as we are public

[20:28] transportation um so when you're riding you just have to wear a mask and

[20:33] give us a call again if you if you need any assistance

[20:37] well thank you dan if we knew you were uh here which i probably should ask

[20:41] before if you were with us today i wouldn't have made mr baumgarten pretend

[20:43] to say all those nice things about you

[20:48] do you want to give out your personal cell phone too for everybody i heard you

[20:51] give up no i'm just kidding dan i'm i'm just kidding there's a question

[20:55] thank you your honor um how far in advance would someone have to call to

[20:59] reserve a ride absolutely we do suggest at least a two day uh in advance to

[21:07] for us to provide time to get the drivers their schedules uh however we do

[21:11] allow people to call months in advance if you have an appointment in december

[21:15] call now and we can get you on the schedule uh

[21:19] for then we do ask for two days as i said but if you have something further

[21:23] down the line we are more than willing to get those on the books for you at

[21:26] this time thank you

[21:31] any other questions or comments for mr mcminn

[21:36] no all right well dan thank you for being with us this evening to answer

[21:39] some of those questions and to provide some additional context and recognize

[21:43] the drivers we've internally spoken about that so i

[21:47] am very glad that you were able to to mention them and thank them

[21:50] for the work that they've provided any comments from anybody else

[21:58] uh seeing no additional comments uh miss harold would you please call the roll on

[22:03] m4621 hennen yes price yes baker yes blanchard yes dean yes gavin yes turbrac

[22:13] yes we now move on to item number four

[22:18] please miss harold motion number m-47-21

[22:23] matter of authorizing hubble roth and clark for professional design and

[22:27] engineering services related to the kenmore slash cornwall road

[22:30] reconstruction and water main replacement project at a cost not to

[22:35] exceed

[22:38] three 149

[22:39] three dollars and seventy cents funding has

[22:43] been allocated in the road millage and water service accounts

[22:51] 313-938-821-0 and 592-536-821-000

[22:59] is there a motion to approve m 47-21 motion to approve

[23:04] support abortion approved by council member blanchard with support from

[23:07] council member baker mr baumgarten uh legos mayor as we

[23:11] talked about way back in 2018 where we asked voters

[23:15] for their support and putting a substantial investment in our roads

[23:19] they would see both small patches medium patches and large and full

[23:23] reconstructions we have done

[23:26] the first of those two and now we are bringing to you the the scope and tasks

[23:31] involved in doing the third category as well so in this situation it would be

[23:34] the uh kenmore kenwall kenmore and cornwall

[23:39] uh sections as outlined in your in your packets

[23:42] there's also a uh the full scope is including your packet as well as the

[23:46] individual tasks and project thresholds as well so as you can see with us in

[23:51] person is derek schuler and roland alex our dpw director as well as our

[23:55] engineering partner mr schuler mr alex good to see you this evening i will turn

[24:00] it over to you thank you thank you mr baumgard mayor and city council so

[24:03] before you tonight is our recommendation for the next phase i guess what we call

[24:08] year three 2022 which is a

[24:12] road and water main reconstruction project similar to harvard back in 2017

[24:16] a half mile section so and i'm joined by roland alex vice

[24:20] president from hrc uh selecting the next road is

[24:25] took quite a bit of time and what we did is we took the paiser road rankings as

[24:29] well as the water main rankings and working closely with hrc

[24:34] put those together and identified basically our half dozen

[24:38] worst half-mile segments which are shown on the map that we

[24:42] provided to council just to let everybody know what those

[24:45] roads were that's wiltshire west of woodward two sections of bacon

[24:50] cumberland north of 12 mile harvard east of coolidge and then the cornwall

[24:55] kenmore section as well so those were the six that rose to the top

[25:00] and ultimately we selected kenmore and cornwall because it had the most water

[25:04] main breaks over the last five years also consumers energy is going to be

[25:09] replacing the gas main this fall on that street so that's a significant factor as

[25:13] well so we've we've settled on that street

[25:16] that'll be our next half mile segment with your approval

[25:20] design takes several months we're hoping to bid this out during the winter months

[25:24] and then have construction start next spring

[25:27] the estimated construction cost is around 2.5 million dollars so

[25:33] a significant expenditure will be using road millage funds as well as water main

[25:37] funds to fund that so i'm happy to answer any questions you

[25:41] have i'm sure there's a few roland and i can answer those

[25:45] uh mr schuler just to compare the scope as you mentioned 2017 harvard project

[25:49] what is the difference in the cost four years later

[25:53] i think it's really just increased in cost per se it's a very similar segment

[25:58] we're doing the exact same things we do have a little bit more in there

[26:03] for replacing any lead service lines that we

[26:06] encounter so there's a little bit addition there

[26:09] but by and large it's the same scope of work uh it'll be sidewalk new road and

[26:14] new eight-inch water main questions for mr schuler mr alex

[26:19] councilmember baker oh thank you honor thank you guys for bringing this to us

[26:22] tonight and for your diligence in identifying where the the trouble spots

[26:27] are on our city streets and doing the best we can to prioritize and make these

[26:31] tough decisions limited resources i think this was a good deciding uh

[26:35] decision approach that you took um looking ahead obviously you gave us a

[26:40] a rough time frame uh of when you know obviously ground

[26:44] isn't going to be broken anytime soon but

[26:47] looking ahead to when we approach those uh those times could you just share with

[26:53] us a little bit about the communication that will take place with the residents

[26:56] that will be affected either directly or indirectly

[26:59] how we communicate with them and keep them abreast of timing so this

[27:02] communication question and secondly the notion of trees so as i recall on the

[27:06] harvard project which i think was a great success a lot of the um

[27:10] the the wonderful trees along that road were unfortunately taken as part of that

[27:14] uh project do we anticipate any kind of

[27:18] you know similar considerations for trees this time so communication with

[27:21] residents and trees sure thank you i'll go ahead and start with the trees um

[27:26] trees are going to be a big issue for us and and we're going to make every

[27:29] attempt to save trees we're going to follow the same

[27:32] i guess procedure that we used for harvard which was to

[27:36] work with the engineers to identify the locations where we needed to have the

[27:40] arbors look at the trees ultimately the arborist is going to look at all the

[27:43] trees and we're going to make a decision about

[27:46] what can be saved and what has to be removed there are going to be

[27:50] constraints whether it's elevations size of easement those are sort of

[27:54] things that are going to come into play obviously the health of the tree also

[27:58] but we're going to work closely with them to identify what can be saved and

[28:02] what unfortunately cannot and we'll communicate that to everybody

[28:06] i am happy to say that with the harvard project one of uh

[28:10] i guess one of the things that we're proud of is we were able to plant more

[28:12] trees ultimately than were removed we did have to remove some trees with

[28:16] harvard but we were able to plant more we've got a lot of big trees on the

[28:21] north side and we're going to make every attempt to try to save those but we're

[28:24] going to have constraints we're going to have grading constraints

[28:27] this is going to be all new concrete curb and gutter we need to make sure

[28:30] that the right-of-way drains towards the road so we need to

[28:34] hrc looking at elevations to make sure that we've got the proper elevation

[28:38] ultimately but trees are going to be a big story in

[28:42] this and i and i suspect after hrc gets going on design we'll be having several

[28:46] meetings to determine you know where we're going can we shift

[28:49] the road a little bit to save some trees you know i'm perfectly willing to

[28:53] entertain that option obviously there's trees on both sides but you know can we

[28:56] do some things to try to save trees we're more than willing to try to do

[28:59] that communication wise

[29:03] i don't know if many remember but on the harvard project we had a

[29:06] meeting on the street in the fall i'm certainly

[29:10] not opposed to doing that again it was pretty well attended

[29:14] we deliver resident notices working closely with hrc regularly there were

[29:19] several notices delivered with harvard at least a half dozen i suspect we'll be

[29:23] doing the same thing encouraging residents to look at their

[29:27] own utilities beforehand it obviously makes sense to to look at your own lines

[29:31] before we come in and tear up the right-of-way so that'll be one of the

[29:34] key things that we focus on as well so there will be many opportunities for

[29:38] communications getting email addresses having that that meeting on site is if

[29:43] folks want to attend as well as distributing the flyers so a lot more to

[29:47] come and and really that communication plan

[29:50] starts pretty quick so we'll be looking to get that going as soon as possible

[29:54] because some of these things can take some time right

[29:57] thank you thank you

[30:00] councilmember blanton thank you your honor i noticed we're going from a

[30:03] six-inch wire line to an eight-inch water line is this going to tie into the

[30:08] part on the webster where we came off the new coolies line to make that a

[30:11] complete circuit which is something we've been talking about for years it is

[30:14] it is and so we're going to upsize this main which will help us with fire flows

[30:18] we're also going to be doing a little bit of water main work along webster so

[30:21] we're going to pick up where we left off last time and extend that water main to

[30:25] the west and connect in with the new eight inch main

[30:29] thank you i just want to make sure that the residents understand that this is

[30:33] being funded by both the infrastructure bond that we passed and their water

[30:38] bills because some of their water bills go into a fund and the fund is used for

[30:42] fixing water main breaks and hopefully in the long term replacing the water

[30:46] main so we don't have to fix the water main breaks so

[30:51] that's it thank you thank you

[30:54] additional questions councilmember hennan yes uh i have two questions after

[30:59] my treat question was taken the first is you know this is an area

[31:04] that we've had some historic basement flooding so is there anything in this

[31:09] project that will help mitigate that in the future

[31:12] so we'll be um

[31:14] this section does have uh as far as i know all full restricted

[31:18] covers so we'll be maintaining that i will say that

[31:21] um the existence of the curb and gutter

[31:23] section here is pretty well non-existent and we have roads that several roads

[31:28] that have that as well so i think we'll be able to more efficiently store water

[31:33] in the road section without it having to extend

[31:37] into folks front yard so i think that's a positive with that we're going to make

[31:41] sure that the line is structurally lined as we always do and

[31:45] maintain those restricted covers hrc suggested and i think it's a great idea

[31:49] that we explore a green infrastructure alternative here as well

[31:53] so we're excited about that i don't know where that's going to end up for us

[31:57] but we're looking at the triangle there in the middle section to see if we can

[32:00] incorporate some type of green infrastructure again i appreciate hrc

[32:04] suggesting that i think it's a great idea we'll see where it ends up but that

[32:08] might be another way of assisting with the stormwater

[32:12] and the other question i have is

[32:15] it comes to me frequently and there's often a conception that uh concrete

[32:19] lasts longer and you know is more of value so why is it that the city you

[32:24] know uses asphalt on many of our roads sure so we view asphalt

[32:30] for residential applications as the preferred method and and the main thing

[32:34] that comes up for me at least is that you're able to

[32:37] you know mill and overlay that surface after it reaches its life expectancy

[32:41] very easily and cost effectively which concrete you've got to do full depth

[32:45] replacement on that on a very similar life span so

[32:49] we're very happy with how harvard has held up i would encourage anybody to

[32:53] take a look the road has done very well it is an extremely beefy cross section

[32:57] meaning it's very thick there's a deep stone base course with that hrc

[33:03] recommended and it's held up very well so we're very happy with that section i

[33:07] do think it is in the long run the best alternative for

[33:10] berkeley thank you

[33:13] mayor pro tempting thank you i'm i was really happy to see the um

[33:18] green infrastructure the potential for you know the storm water retention so

[33:22] kudos to you roland and your team for bringing that up i do have a question

[33:27] about the lead service lines how do so are you testing every home

[33:32] um to see if there's lead or do you know going into it do you have

[33:36] an idea of which ones might be you know unfortunately we don't have a

[33:40] great idea of this you know we have old water service cards that give us some

[33:44] information on the city side but that's not always the case on the private side

[33:49] so i think what we're going to have to do is do a little bit of exploration

[33:52] at the stop box which is near the curb to determine how many of those that we

[33:56] have and then react from there so it's going

[33:59] to take you know a little bit of exploratory work to determine how many

[34:02] lead services that we have thank you

[34:06] uh mr alex you're with us this evening normally i see you in your basement um

[34:11] thank you for for being with us any anything you'd like to add um on the

[34:15] project um not really i do love coming to berkeley meetings because derek does

[34:19] such a great job of explaining the project and

[34:22] i only get softball so no i think they're did a great job but

[34:26] it is exciting for the community to be investing in your infrastructure

[34:31] you know if you're not putting money towards your roads towards your sewers

[34:34] towards your water mains they're only going to continue to deteriorate and

[34:38] somebody's going to have to pay that bill in the future so kudos to

[34:42] the council for being proactive in the residence recognizing that it's a need

[34:45] that needs to be addressed now and not just kick down the road like so many

[34:48] communities do so i have nothing else though thank you

[34:52] thank you uh for being with us um and i think what mr schuler said a few minutes

[34:56] ago is important if you haven't seen harvard or driven on harvard to to get a

[35:00] sense of what it looks like now there's certainly a stark contrast and

[35:04] in general a lot of that is the curbs and the gutters that are not super

[35:08] existent on many of our roads anymore not at least a lot of them um and that

[35:12] as mr schuler mentioned higher curbs are not going to hold that water there

[35:15] instead of creeping up through front lawns and sidewalks hopefully

[35:20] certainly not on its own going to help but just

[35:23] the contrast and how the road looks and travels

[35:27] certainly is what we want to see every road if in an ideal world we'll be able

[35:31] to do that obviously we can't so we're trying to plan these roads every four to

[35:34] five years when we have the opportunity we have funds we can save

[35:37] to to make a project like this happen but it is very exciting when it does

[35:41] happen and especially once we're able to complete this as was mentioned there

[35:44] will be a lot more conversation as we get closer to what the process

[35:48] actually looks like and the timelines and certainly the trees is going to be

[35:52] an important part of what we do moving forward this is the first step to having

[35:56] hrc get cracking right okay any comments from anybody

[36:02] that is with us in the audience today

[36:08] ms mathis any comments uh with those visiting with us virtually today

[36:16] i'm seeing no hands raised at this time okay

[36:20] well seeing nobody else thank you both for being with us and miss harold would

[36:24] you please call the roll on m4721 price

[36:28] yes baker yes blanchard yes dean yes kevin yes kennen yes turbric yes

[36:38] we now move on to item number five please on tonight's agenda

[36:43] motion number m-48-21 matter of approving the appointments to

[36:48] the zoning board of appeals is there a motion to approve m 48-21

[36:55] so moved support promotion made by councilmember hannah with support

[36:59] council member blanchard mr baumgarten thanks mayor you have four

[37:03] appointments for you before you this evening

[37:05] two alternate members to the zba as well as two regular full members

[37:09] the two alternates this evening are mark reilly

[37:12] for a term would expire next year july 1st 2022

[37:17] and next the other alternate is joanne sir with an appointment expiring uh july

[37:22] 1 of 2024. uh your next two are full members uh

[37:27] kevin wilner as a regular member with the term expiring of 2023 as well as

[37:32] eric mcdonald who previously served as an alternate being promoted if you will

[37:37] to a full regular board appointment expiring 20 july 1 2024 so that is the

[37:43] slate before you this evening thank you

[37:47] questions or comments from council on our volunteers this evening

[37:54] well certainly we all want to thank them for their service as we've talked about

[37:58] in the past um you know the volunteers in these boards and commissions advisory

[38:03] boards are certainly the backbone of much of what we are able to do up here

[38:06] as council members it's incredibly important and these folks continue to to

[38:10] give their time and talents um to our community and we are incredibly grateful

[38:16] any comments from anybody with us this evening

[38:21] miss mathis you know what's coming

[38:25] not at this time sir not at this time all right well i want to thank all four

[38:30] of them as i mentioned for uh volunteering their time and their

[38:33] talents for our community and i'm sure they're all on pins and

[38:38] needles right now waiting to see if they get approved so miss harold would you

[38:41] please call the roll on m4821 baker yes blanchard yes dean yes

[38:49] gavin yes hennen yes price yes turbric yes

[38:57] we now move on miss harold to item number six please

[39:01] resolution number r-27-21 matter of extending r-20-20

[39:09] for temporary outdoor slash seating and outdoor sales and

[39:13] service areas and to allow temporary enclosures in the outdoor areas in

[39:18] response to covet 19 closures and restrictions

[39:23] is there a motion to approve r2721 so moved

[39:28] support motion made by mayor pro-tem dean i heard council member blanchard as

[39:32] well as three other people mr baumgarten i think mayor

[39:37] coburn still remains uh part of our daily lives here as you can probably

[39:41] tell even if every day when you look at the news or even this evening with those

[39:46] of us um you know still in the situation where there were masks for personal

[39:50] protection that translates into people's

[39:53] apprehension to hurriedly rush back indoors and be close

[39:58] to one another be under the same roof and so what we're suggesting for council

[40:03] this evening is a continuation of the actions that they have taken up to this

[40:07] point which would be restrict the outdoor

[40:10] dining restrictions that we have in our regular ordinance

[40:14] um that would be

[40:16] allowing those people to use parking lots or

[40:19] their own space as well as the north robina north phillips south

[40:24] griffith south thomas east dorothea right of ways owned by the city as well

[40:29] any of those are on the table for restaurants that are potentially

[40:33] interested in taking advantage of that if they find that it would better suit

[40:37] their restaurant or their operations to do so

[40:41] in addition to that uh this particular ordinance now uh with

[40:46] this continuation uh city council or we're also administration is asking the

[40:50] city council permission to study the feasibility

[40:53] of creating a public plaza at griffith on the south side of 12 mile this is an

[40:58] area that has been closed now for quite a while

[41:01] we've gotten high marks people have remarked that they like the outdoor

[41:05] dining they like the visibility they like to see people

[41:09] utilizing the space our own master plan in 2007 called for

[41:14] public plaza to be created downtown it specifically said robina the city as you

[41:19] recall attempted that um it had limited success uh but one of the things that we

[41:24] heard as part of the feedback was that it felt

[41:27] uh rushed and it didn't um didn't really have the public community embrace it

[41:32] like we would have hoped uh so not so learning from from past uh feedback we'd

[41:37] like again the opportunity to study something that could be fully embraced

[41:41] by the community uh the city would be able to use it in

[41:44] any of our departments including recreation

[41:47] local community groups our chamber for various events

[41:51] uh local businesses uh even local groups even

[41:55] people that have like the taste of berkeley could potentially go there i

[41:58] think that's been part of the conversation at one point uh but any so

[42:01] anyway a public gathering place that has high visibility right in our in our

[42:05] downtown are our heaviest trafficked areas this would be open for anyone to

[42:08] use uh it wouldn't be dedicated to any one

[42:11] particular business or use all the time so

[42:14] um again if if not for our master plan calling for something

[42:18] like this to be located downtown we wouldn't be asking for for this to even

[42:22] move forward but it's a culmination of various events

[42:26] that bring this before you this evening so with that uh our community

[42:32] development director erin schlutto is has

[42:35] authored the resolution as well as the memo you find then they see in your

[42:39] packet this evening outlining what a feasibility study for public plaza it

[42:43] would look like as well as has her department is tasked with the

[42:47] administrative functionality of permitting the temporary use permits for

[42:51] the outdoor dining so she is absolutely your content expert

[42:54] here sir director schlutel we'll turn it over to

[42:57] you there anything you'd like to add to give us some additional context well uh

[43:02] thank you uh good evening everyone the city manager outlined it really

[43:05] beautifully um the one thing i wanted to focus on is

[43:09] the extension of this of this relaxation of the temporary outdoor dining

[43:14] enclosures and stuff like that this is the longest one we've ever asked for and

[43:17] the intent of that is to make sure that we have given ourselves enough time not

[43:21] only to conduct the feasibility study and see if it works there not only with

[43:25] the south griffith but um on a dorothy at coolidge as well but also to engage

[43:30] the public we really want to make sure that we have

[43:32] the buy-in and the understanding and we have the input not only from the local

[43:36] businesses that are in that area but the residents who will be impacted by this

[43:40] type of closure as well there are a number of things that we we did and um

[43:45] we really want to make sure that we we bring them to to our table we work with

[43:49] them we talk with them is there something that they have a concern with

[43:51] that we didn't think about well let's let's look at that

[43:54] um so extending this to the end of next year

[43:57] will really give us an opportunity to do an in-depth community engagement

[44:00] engagement strategy now that we're opening things back up and we can do

[44:04] face-to-face engagement we also extended it that long to make

[44:08] sure and build in uh time so that way we don't have to come back for an extension

[44:13] from you so we can maybe we'll get this done in six months and we can come back

[44:18] and say okay we're done this is the recommendation blah blah and then we can

[44:21] shorten this resolution but the intent is to not

[44:24] extend it beyond this this end date of december 31st 2022.

[44:28] additionally it will give us time to explore our ordinances all of our

[44:32] ordinances currently right now with outdoor dining sales and service areas

[44:36] is related is regulated by special land use approval now as i outlined in my

[44:40] review letter uh review memo here it's that's a complex

[44:44] thing and looking at it from a special land

[44:47] use perspective when there's seven members i'm sorry nine members of the

[44:50] planning commission who look at it first and make a recommendation and then city

[44:54] council ultimately adopts it or approves it

[44:57] if we were to make that an administrative function we really need

[44:59] to make sure we look at the parking and the public

[45:03] implications and the neighborhood impacts and those are all things that

[45:06] are discussed in the public meeting so if we were to to look at making that

[45:09] more of an administrative function we want to make sure we don't have any

[45:12] unintended consequences due to that finally the feasibility that i mentioned

[45:18] um so this would really give us the

[45:21] opportunity to study this and and focus and make sure that this is uh this is a

[45:25] beneficial thing for the community in this area at this time

[45:28] okay thank you uh because we've had

[45:34] some very passionate members of our community already uh during our initial

[45:38] public comments i'm going to open it up to the residents that are here first in

[45:42] person um to comment we'll go then to the folks

[45:46] that are visiting with us uh via the hybrid model to talk to us as well and

[45:50] then council will ultimately discuss but i want to give everybody that's here

[45:54] that would like to speak an opportunity to speak first

[45:57] so if you're with us and you'd like to comment on uh the

[46:01] resolution in front of us r2721 now is the perfect time

[46:11] can we do a second time

[46:15] uh mr sabanian bennett did speak during public comments i i feel like if people

[46:19] did not remember that no anybody i mean no no no no anybody that's with us here

[46:23] sorry i didn't mean that okay all right

[46:33] hello mr mayor and city council i'm not i'm

[46:37] not going to go to these meetings so i apologize for the informalness but um

[46:41] i'm april macron and my husband steve and i have been doing business in

[46:43] berkeley in the corner greater than 12 miles since 2000

[46:47] we love the berkeley community and have thoroughly enjoyed growing our business

[46:50] here over the years we also own yellow door art market and

[46:53] manage four apartments above our catching fireflies shop

[46:56] we are glad the city offered unique options for businesses to survive during

[46:59] these unprecedented times and we think berkeley common did a great job

[47:02] transforming the street into an open eating area and have encouraged our

[47:06] guests to dine there however we would like to see griffith reopen again this

[47:10] fall we purchased our catching fireflies

[47:13] building as a highly visible corner location with easy access at an

[47:17] intersection with a traffic light closing griffith diminishes all these

[47:20] advantages and devalues our property investment as we feel because corner

[47:24] corner you know property investments are just more valuable than in the line of

[47:27] street you know businesses um it's inconvenience for our team

[47:31] members customers and tenants not to have easy access to our delighted side

[47:35] street that directly borders our business we feel the many questions from

[47:38] our guests over the past year inquiring when the street would reopen and we

[47:41] expressed it was a temporary sacrifice to help fellow businesses get through

[47:45] crippling capacity limitations um berkeley common also purchased a

[47:49] highly visible corner location with the easy access and intersection with the

[47:52] traffic light this purchase did not include a 2 000 square foot outdoor

[47:56] patio which is roughly the same amount of space of their entire first floor

[48:01] between the wide sidewalk that borders griffith along the front of the building

[48:04] at 12 mile we feel they would have adequate space for outdoor dining

[48:07] options moving forward another concern is catching fireflies is

[48:11] open seven days a week um ten to six month through saturday ten to

[48:15] eight on thursdays and twelve to five on sundays it is frustrating that the

[48:19] street closure is only used five evenings a week and more recently on

[48:23] saturday afternoons and just very recently on sunday afternoons and let's

[48:26] not forget it can't be used when the weather is not cooperative either

[48:30] i'm just curious has a study ever been done with the traffic patterns on

[48:33] griffith i know having a business that borders

[48:36] the intersection for the past 21 years many more patrons would benefit from

[48:40] using that street to get through and easy access to all the stores in the

[48:45] area i understand a recent survey also

[48:48] pitched the street closure as a positive public space

[48:51] um and that extended closure for 15 months would give them time to study

[48:54] this um i just think it's only reasonable for businesses and residents

[48:57] to know more specific actionable plans on what is going to be study before it's

[49:01] passed i mean and and i'm just you know i'm

[49:05] curious about the survey results too i know a big survey was released i would i

[49:09] would be very interested in maybe the public postings of those um so everybody

[49:13] has a better idea where everybody you know falls

[49:16] on the spectrum for their opinion on this

[49:18] and also for berkeley common i would imagine they would want to have that

[49:22] space open for a while it's not public space because it is to their advantage

[49:26] you know having their um you know patio help help them but for example like how

[49:31] would this be advertised as a public space since it's been only used by a

[49:34] private business for the past year um is a birthday common good lend their

[49:37] host set up for you know patrons to enjoy like take out lunches from tlc or

[49:41] cams or cottage injury in the day um how about when brooklyn commons open like

[49:46] what percentage of and if they keep their tables there like what percentage

[49:50] you know would be available for open availability it's just i feel there's

[49:52] like a lot of really unanswered questions before we

[49:56] just like sign off and let's do it you know

[49:58] um these are just a few of the numerous

[50:01] questions to be addressed before a closure extension

[50:04] um and maybe if it's not studied as a public you know place what are the

[50:08] ramifications of one single business benefiting from a permanent closure of a

[50:12] public street that's just even a longer list of

[50:15] questions to be addressed but and on a safety note

[50:18] since griffith has been closed for over a year many vehicles that travel along

[50:22] the alleyway regularly has increased their speed

[50:25] and we've seen them zip right by you know and so that is a safety center for

[50:29] us for our customers across that path to enter or return from our shop um as well

[50:33] as tenants who part directly behind our catching fireflies building

[50:37] and also the louder sounds coming from the outdoor eating area on a special

[50:40] themed music nights um from or from busier weekend crowds you know are

[50:43] definitely a concern for our tenants and future tenants if griffith was to be

[50:47] permanently closed as we did not purchase a building next to a bustling

[50:51] you know outdoor evening crowd so thank you for listening to my

[50:55] concerns and considering my business um because my building is by far the

[50:59] most impacted by the street closure i do have copies of my notes if you have any

[51:03] interest of having them i'm happy to pass them out if not that's fine too so

[51:08] thank you april and i appreciate the email um

[51:14] as we move through um these these comments here i do

[51:20] i have a request i do not want this to

[51:24] get into various namings of businesses and back and forth between anybody that

[51:29] is here um so

[51:31] i asked for your comments about your own personal perspective please and not uh

[51:38] any putting on the other businesses that may be involved in this just because

[51:42] i i just don't want to get into a spot where people feel like they have to then

[51:44] respond to everything or respond to something put anybody in an awkward spot

[51:48] in a public meeting when we want to support all of our businesses here in

[51:51] the community and certainly don't want to put pit anybody against each other so

[51:54] i just want to make that clear and i ask that in all of your comments kind of if

[51:59] you can take that in consideration i would be very appreciative

[52:02] cindy looks like you're coming out come on

[52:06] cinda owner of the lunch cafe first i want to

[52:11] thank our city

[52:14] and our council for making things v you've been very accommodating

[52:20] we had asked because the my building in particular went through a

[52:26] sale during the middle of this pandemic and so there was a there's a new owner

[52:32] and they have

[52:35] a lot of employees and my

[52:38] poor staff myself my old body

[52:42] running around in the back parking lot because we had carryouts

[52:47] we worked through this entire pandemic

[52:51] only because of staff shortage have we had to cut our saturday hours because i

[52:55] think my staff would kill me if i made them off saturday but

[52:59] i do want to thank you for that um it is

[53:06] because you've been very accommodating and you have suggested oh well you can

[53:10] do this you can close the street you can put

[53:14] tables out in front and absolutely we can okay i don't have um

[53:21] uh the accessibility

[53:24] of having to block off the back parking lot i

[53:28] don't have i didn't hear in the reading of this

[53:32] you know the north side of griffith that we can you know put tables out

[53:37] there or anything else i

[53:40] do have a wider portion of my sidewalk and

[53:45] i can use i have two tables out there i need

[53:49] more i guess and we all

[53:55] not naming any we all business owners have had to recreate

[54:00] you either recreate or you lock your doors

[54:05] and that's how it was and it's

[54:09] now i know that covet is not over mr hennen i do realize that firsthand

[54:15] um i'm just responding to that but um

[54:21] we're moving forward we can't look back we're moving forward

[54:25] and moving forward i love what common has done i think it

[54:30] is great i 150 percent

[54:35] support any parklet any any area in the city that will

[54:41] bring people downtown better our business structure

[54:45] do any of it i think it is awesome i think it is great

[54:50] um it definitely

[54:53] it's needed for sure um i know that the master plan states

[54:58] robina um i would love i have had many

[55:03] customers who have said oh could i take on on the nice days because yes people

[55:09] want to eat outside can i take my lunch and can i go across

[55:13] the street i'm sorry you can't you know that's

[55:17] that's not ours okay it's not opened it's not open to

[55:21] the public so i guess what i'm

[55:25] saying for our cafe is that if we can have an open

[55:29] area and make it usable to everyone if you get a coffee down at

[55:35] the the other place that's down the street

[55:40] and you want to go read a book i mean whatever it's to make it not

[55:46] for one particular business you know i love you guys dearly as

[55:52] business owners and a restaurant and it's

[55:57] it is this is not directed to it it's just let's make it let's

[56:04] let's be a family let's put it all together

[56:07] and not

[56:10] push people out thank you thank you cindy

[56:20] hello mr mayor city council um i own vitrine i'm not on 12 mile i do

[56:25] not own a restaurant um the first time i saw this space my name is susan susan

[56:31] rogel sorry um the first time i saw this space we

[56:36] were doing an interview for a ladies night out a long time ago

[56:39] i had a business in ann arbor for years the second i laid eyes on it i said we

[56:45] need this permanently it's dynamic it makes us competitive

[56:49] it's a outdoor space it's we should need more than one not just one

[56:54] i saw it as such a forward thinking space not in answer to the kovid um the

[57:00] code has taught us a lot and this is one of the many things that's taught us that

[57:03] this is engaging and it's compelling and it makes the city very dynamic and

[57:08] instead of driving right through you're stopping and enjoying it i love this

[57:13] space the second i saw it i think we could do more you know with

[57:18] it um who's using it and all those things are all those moving parts um i

[57:23] think it affects the city as a whole it makes us

[57:27] extremely competitive and i i can't say enough about keeping

[57:32] this space and adding more i'm doing more not less

[57:36] figuring out what our dear friends and and peers and these hard-working

[57:41] well-meaning people find wrong with it and

[57:45] reacting if it's a speed issue how do other towns

[57:48] that have done this well um

[57:52] you know react to slowing people down um if it's something about you know the

[57:58] time it is and the noise i will tell you in ann arbor um

[58:02] that noise just makes it hip and happening and people really love that

[58:06] you know what i mean it's it gets people out um

[58:10] but so reacting to rather than fight or flight you know finding out what's wrong

[58:14] with it and and fixing it and not only having just one but more than one

[58:19] so i just heard it was on the ballot and i thought i'd come and share thank you

[58:22] thank you all

[58:26] uh mr superintendent bennett i i do not want to make you feel like you can't

[58:29] come back up again if you wanted to comment again yes this time if you would

[58:33] like to we're on it's the right time again i will double down on uh what our

[58:39] friend from vitrine said um a lot of families in the neighborhood

[58:44] directly behind get a kick out of coming down there

[58:47] so i'm not just representing my personal opinion i said i would come on behalf of

[58:50] a lot of the neighbors in the community obviously there's differing opinions on

[58:55] different things but i'm coming in support of

[58:59] this specific extension while we do our due diligence to find do our research do

[59:04] what we're supposed to um but again we hope to extend these types of things be

[59:09] progressive not be afraid to be left behind let's make berkeley

[59:14] unique and cool in a place where people want to move into and continue to deepen

[59:19] our city thank you thanks

[59:26] [Music] hi

[59:29] i'm katie cutcher owner one of the three owners of berkeley common and um

[59:34] i'm here to speak about the extension tonight as well as i i

[59:40] didn't really realize the other piece of this was on the agenda today i thought

[59:43] we were just talking about the extension not making this a permanent fixture

[59:47] right now but i will touch on both subjects i first and foremost want to

[59:51] thank council for being progressive saying yes when you could have said no

[59:55] it kept us in business this has been a challenging year for all

[1:00:00] my retailers and restaurants and personally mentally

[1:00:05] everybody here sitting here together we are an inclusive business always have

[1:00:10] been always well we invested here for many reasons

[1:00:14] because we are a community business never did i want anybody not to have

[1:00:17] lunch in our space actually if anybody asks us i say hop

[1:00:21] the fence and i will continue to do so

[1:00:25] that going forward outdoor dining is imperative for

[1:00:30] restaurants right now we are not moving uh the covet button

[1:00:35] for it's going to a different place a different phase we are masked up as of

[1:00:39] tomorrow again we are not using our

[1:00:43] indoor private dining uh event room because of coven it is just too

[1:00:48] dangerous we are operating an outdoor dining room

[1:00:52] right now and i don't think it's a bad thing and i'm not ashamed of it and i

[1:00:56] think it's only brought business to the city

[1:00:59] every time somebody comes in and they can't get in whether it's restrictions

[1:01:02] or anything like that we tell them to go shopping and discover berkeley

[1:01:06] and the feedback has i have never gone to this store before and we're coming

[1:01:10] back so i hope that continues the other big part of this is the

[1:01:16] relationships and partnerships we're developing with the other businesses in

[1:01:19] town we're sharing ideas we're inviting progress together and we're promoting a

[1:01:24] thriving downtown something that would be a shame to squash

[1:01:29] it is code is open pandora's box the community support behind this project

[1:01:33] has been overwhelming positive can it be tweaked absolutely do we want to tweak

[1:01:38] it with you one hundred percent uh do we want this community space one

[1:01:43] hundred percent it has never been our idea just to benefit financially from

[1:01:47] this space to be our own we serve on boards my sister and i

[1:01:51] we live breathe eat berkeley and that's why we're here

[1:01:56] we want to see other things like this exist is this number one initiative

[1:02:00] possibly could there be others i hope so we'll work very hard for that

[1:02:06] why we realize this is not everybody's shared vision we're asking for extension

[1:02:10] on these areas tonight and we invite an open discussion for anything more

[1:02:14] permanently in the future this is just one step of many

[1:02:18] so this doesn't have to be definite or permanent or has to be so negative we

[1:02:22] want to continue to be a good business in this area we want to be good

[1:02:26] neighbors to all of our businesses um

[1:02:30] and time of is of the essence so we ask you to approve this tonight for just the

[1:02:34] extension the bigger discussion can exist at a later date thank you

[1:02:38] thank you

[1:02:47] hello good evening i am chris gross

[1:02:50] one of the three partners at berkeley common

[1:02:53] my sister spoke to most of the things i wanted to say

[1:02:57] i guess i just wanted to add that first again i'll echo our appreciation

[1:03:03] um our business was saved by having this outdoor space

[1:03:06] um and second

[1:03:09] it's been our intention and it will continue to be to to work as a team in

[1:03:13] berkeley um and lit in the way we live and the way

[1:03:18] we run our business i think are the same we we want to project positivity and

[1:03:22] inclusion um we want to invite people in this

[1:03:26] having this outdoor space and this visibility has brought people

[1:03:30] from outside berkeley i have all of the data because i have a

[1:03:34] system now to track that and there are people coming from 45 minutes and away

[1:03:40] to dying outdoors

[1:03:43] because we had that available last winter when not many people did

[1:03:47] and i i don't know if it'll be true but it i it very

[1:03:50] well might be true that this winter is the same thing people will still want to

[1:03:54] eat outside and we are aiming to provide that um

[1:03:59] and i i i've heard um some of the concerns tonight and i'm i'm

[1:04:05] sorry i haven't heard those before but i think if we prove that's the whole

[1:04:10] reason to approve this extension is to be able to hear those concerns and

[1:04:14] address them we want to be good partners we want to be good neighbors

[1:04:19] and that's why we volunteer here work here live here

[1:04:25] we're all in um and we are happy to partner up in any way

[1:04:31] and move forward as a city and bring people here

[1:04:35] thanks thank you chris

[1:04:44] good evening mike mcginnis interim executive director for berkeley's

[1:04:47] downtown development authority and to the esteemed honorable local elected

[1:04:54] officials and public servants thank you for your leadership i wanted to you know

[1:04:58] these do the your honor thing so i just want to lay it on thick

[1:05:02] on behalf of the entire mile stretch of 12 mile and

[1:05:07] the entire mile stretch of coolidge that falls within

[1:05:10] the downtown district authority footprint i want to encourage for the

[1:05:15] sake of allowing downtown berkeley to have that competitive advantage

[1:05:20] regionally speaking and to not lose that i would hate for the multiple

[1:05:25] restaurants to have that competitive disadvantage

[1:05:28] if it were to expire or lapse in just a matter of weeks so

[1:05:32] i think that this has been a very instructive and helpful deliberation

[1:05:36] this evening and that can continue beyond this evening and beyond this

[1:05:39] chamber where we can make it as maximum benefit for all entities not solely

[1:05:45] restaurants and i look forward to the dda being at that table and being a part

[1:05:50] of those conversations to make any decision

[1:05:53] with temporary or long term to make it the best bang for the buck and the best

[1:05:59] residual impact for our downtown and residents

[1:06:02] i think the empirical and anecdotal evidence speaks to this temporary

[1:06:07] measure benefiting both the community overall but specifically our downtown

[1:06:12] corridors with that extension and so i just want to offer that perspective from

[1:06:16] what's been shared through the dda to you this evening thank you very much

[1:06:21] thank you mike

[1:06:29] good evening everybody uh dan mccourt at 30 63 12 mile just a

[1:06:34] couple buildings down from the griffith that we're discussing but

[1:06:39] derek got out of here tonight before i got a chance to give him some major

[1:06:42] props on uh dpw's handling of

[1:06:46] the incredibly disgusting dumpster situation that we've got going on in the

[1:06:50] back of that parking lot um tried for years and years and years and

[1:06:53] the only reason i bring it up tonight is because many of us here tonight are part

[1:06:57] of that guilty party and i just want to now that we've got everybody in the same

[1:07:00] room that we all get on the same page it's

[1:07:03] literally a rat not even a rat trap it's a rat haven

[1:07:06] uh it got to the point where there was in several inches of rotting garbage

[1:07:11] along below the dumpsters themselves there's

[1:07:13] three dumpsters in there we talked about maybe removing the brown one hopefully

[1:07:17] leaving more room we can't keep people from dumping

[1:07:20] you know uh old restaurant supplies and things like that

[1:07:24] in the middle of the night but we can put our own garbage in our own bags put

[1:07:28] those bags into the dumpster the way that it's supposed to happen

[1:07:31] derek um has been instrumental in

[1:07:36] his feedback and then getting that place cleaned out just uh this last week

[1:07:40] but i challenge everybody that has a business here that uses that dumpster to

[1:07:44] take your own garbage out on once in a while pick up the stuff with your

[1:07:47] address on it and put it in the dumpster so

[1:07:50] that said um in talking about the outdoor dining

[1:07:54] in the space that we're looking at i've eaten everywhere as you can tell this

[1:07:58] doesn't happen by mistake um wonderful restaurants love berkeley live just a

[1:08:02] mile away and

[1:08:05] i'm all for eating outside i like eating i like eating outside

[1:08:08] i wasn't super aware of the understanding as to what

[1:08:13] this meant i i was thinking that this would be an open space where someone

[1:08:17] could get something from a restaurant a cocktail and some dinner and walk over

[1:08:22] to the space and enjoy that space that to me seems like a city space that would

[1:08:26] be something that during the coke this was a great idea at the time it was the

[1:08:29] right idea at the time my concern is two things first of all

[1:08:33] safety right now

[1:08:36] are the outdoor spaces being observed with inspections like our buildings

[1:08:42] do they get looked at there right now there are extension

[1:08:45] cores running through puddles there are various things that would not pass if

[1:08:50] the inspectors came into my building so safety first right we want to make

[1:08:55] sure that everybody is safe in doing this and enjoying themselves

[1:08:58] while dining outdoors and the second is inclusion you know to

[1:09:02] me if it's a city space it's a city street if you guys are going to make

[1:09:06] this decision and i don't envy your decision tonight

[1:09:10] the street i can see maybe a sidewalk being able to encompass that as your own

[1:09:15] city street not so much if it's going to be a city street like that it should be

[1:09:19] open we shouldn't have to hop offense to enjoy something

[1:09:23] on a city street that we all pay taxes for so we pay taxes based on the square

[1:09:27] footage of our building that's where we should own our business

[1:09:30] if we want to have the ability to do this we did this during covid it was

[1:09:34] great but i urge you to reconsider and and not

[1:09:38] extend the outdoor dining for the end of griffith anyway if you're

[1:09:42] looking for an option moving forward my building will

[1:09:45] be available you can raise that

[1:09:49] create a nice green space and not have to worry about a street so

[1:09:53] that's all thank you thank you we're not raising your building though

[1:09:58] sorry

[1:10:02] any additional comments from folks that are here before i go to our folks that

[1:10:05] are with us virtually can i have some clarification

[1:10:11] what aaron presented okay what you're voting on is

[1:10:17] the continued closure of griffith avenue

[1:10:22] south of 12 mile for

[1:10:27] only no no no no we're voting on the temporary restrictions that are in

[1:10:32] multiple places right now that anybody has access to that happens to be one of

[1:10:36] those locations griffith that is under this ordinance right or this resolution

[1:10:40] right now that's why it's come up it's it's not really what the conversation is

[1:10:44] about it's a part of it the conversation's about extending the

[1:10:47] restrictions extending for all businesses across berkeley under the

[1:10:51] ordinance correct okay earn the resolution yes

[1:10:56] okay so we'll look we will

[1:10:59] we will council has a lot of questions and i think it's going to clarify a lot

[1:11:02] of what you you are asking right now again i want to give everybody an

[1:11:06] opportunity to comment first based on the feedback that we've heard um and

[1:11:10] then we will obviously deliberate and we have certainly questions of our own uh

[1:11:14] that i think are going to go a long way to helping to maybe clarify some of the

[1:11:18] questions that have come up recently is that fair if not you can come back up

[1:11:21] don't worry i'm not going to not going to say you can't come up anymore

[1:11:30] i do know because i am a resident of the city

[1:11:33] um the traffic on beverly

[1:11:39] people know that griffith is closed

[1:11:42] and it is a four-way stop um

[1:11:47] no it's not it's not

[1:11:51] people blow that stop sign

[1:11:56] multiple times a day night doesn't matter so it's that's a concern

[1:12:01] for me there's been accidents there i know that i appreciate that feedback's

[1:12:06] in you that's not something that necessarily we hear about all the time

[1:12:08] but i can promise you that we do know a department um right there across the

[1:12:12] street that would love to monitor that area if it does in fact

[1:12:17] what's happening what you mentioned okay miss mathis let's go to the folks that

[1:12:21] are with us virtually here so we can allow them to to get their comments on

[1:12:28] i know we had one already he's certainly welcome to come back again

[1:12:34] tim you're welcome to speak yep yeah i think i you know although i said

[1:12:38] it at the wrong time because i thought i was uh late so um i'm not gonna repeat

[1:12:43] myself i think we've been yapping

[1:12:46] long enough um just um

[1:12:50] that's it thank you for the opportunity certainly

[1:12:55] miss mathis who else who's next there's no one else at this time

[1:13:01] all right so mr baumgarten and director salute i'm

[1:13:05] going to throw it back over to you just for a minute um we're going to again

[1:13:08] clarify exactly what we're doing today what what this ordinance r27 and our 28

[1:13:14] i believe i think it's our 28 right right after yes okay what those

[1:13:18] ordinances do and why it seems that we're having two conversations at once

[1:13:22] here okay yes i'd be happy to address so the

[1:13:26] resolution before you this evening is a continuation of the resolution that has

[1:13:30] been effect in effect since june of last year

[1:13:33] with the inclusion of the temporary enclosures which we brought about i want

[1:13:37] to say october november of 2020 for the winter months so really

[1:13:42] the context of the feasibility study was just to give context of why we're going

[1:13:46] this late but it is an extension of the resolution

[1:13:49] that would allow outdoor dining in private parking areas where special land

[1:13:53] use approval has not been granted yet in municipal parking areas

[1:13:58] in on the residential side streets where um and it's the four of them are listed

[1:14:03] in um in the ordinance but it's uh south griffith north

[1:14:07] sorry apologize north robin at 12 mile north

[1:14:10] phillips at 12 mile south griffith at 12 mile south thomas at 12 mile and

[1:14:15] eastworthia at coolidge now we put these in the resolution after careful

[1:14:19] consideration with uh with the city manager as well as with the former dda

[1:14:23] director and those were the areas that we thought might be

[1:14:27] more utilized because there's a congregation of either restaurants or a

[1:14:32] large swath of retail businesses that could use it for their outdoor sales or

[1:14:36] service areas so it wasn't just intended for this one this one location

[1:14:40] however this one location is the only one that has been utilized we haven't

[1:14:44] received any any real interest from from any of the other

[1:14:48] ones now if someone were interested and wanted to

[1:14:50] pursue that by all means we're more than happy to look at this or if there's

[1:14:54] another intersection that that might work we can talk about that as well

[1:14:57] there has been some interest at eastworthia coolidge but it just never

[1:15:01] kind of came to fruition so the the resolution before you is just

[1:15:06] that extension to allow that which has been happening for the past year to

[1:15:09] continue and like i said we we put the

[1:15:13] as we've gone along we've put an end date on them um sometimes it was for six

[1:15:17] months sometimes it was for three months this one is the longest one only in the

[1:15:21] sense that um hopefully by the end of 2022

[1:15:24] most of or all restrictions will be over and done with and we'll be into a

[1:15:28] new phase but also to really look at this space

[1:15:32] and and see if that's something that we would want to do east cool or the

[1:15:36] coolidge space griffith but the resolution before you is just to

[1:15:40] extend that which is already in place right we are not voting on

[1:15:45] potentially griffith permanently closing that is not what we are talking about

[1:15:48] today we are we do want to study which is what director schlutel mentioned give

[1:15:52] us some time to actually study if that would make sense as a public plaza

[1:15:57] but this is not a vote on up or down on griffith that is not what we're trying

[1:16:01] to accomplish today we're trying to we're discussing

[1:16:04] potentially using those restrictions that director mentioned that apply to

[1:16:08] various places in the community a number of different businesses are taking

[1:16:12] advantage of some of the uh relaxed

[1:16:15] guidelines right now where normally a special land use would have been

[1:16:19] the typical process to try to make it easier for folks to continue operating

[1:16:23] especially not knowing when this covet is going to

[1:16:28] allow us to to resume eating inside comfortably in

[1:16:31] close quarters with some other folks that is the primary concern i did not

[1:16:34] want this to get into a specifically griffith conversation

[1:16:38] although i also am not stifling anybody's comments or

[1:16:43] communication because i think it is important especially as we do talk about

[1:16:46] this in the future and what is a public plaza there what does that public plaza

[1:16:50] look like how would folks have access to it i

[1:16:53] guess i kind of in speaking with the city manager earlier we kind of envision

[1:16:56] it maybe something similar to what we have

[1:16:58] for park right now if somebody wants to run out of park for something they can

[1:17:01] sign up we have a you know sign up at some point and there are probably some

[1:17:06] fees associated with renting and for a small time period that space but it

[1:17:11] would also just be open city space so if somebody does grab some food somewhere

[1:17:14] and wants to go and eat they could certainly do that

[1:17:17] at any time but again that's a further down the road kind of conversation

[1:17:23] that fair clear ish maybe council i'm going to open it up to us

[1:17:28] because i know there are a lot of questions as well that we have

[1:17:31] and i want to give everybody the opportunity to

[1:17:34] discuss those right now council member price

[1:17:39] yes director chaluto i wanted to thank you and your team for all the

[1:17:43] information around this proposed extension

[1:17:47] i wanted you to speak too if you could a little bit about the

[1:17:51] survey that you put out to area residents and how they felt like they've

[1:17:55] been impacted by this

[1:17:59] closure so far yes that's a great question thank you so

[1:18:03] um let me go back in time just a little bit

[1:18:06] so when we were going to do the first the first closure and the first

[1:18:10] temporary relaxation of our ordinances for

[1:18:14] outdoor dining we did put out one survey and it was for those business property

[1:18:19] owners that were on griffith one block south of that intersection so it just

[1:18:23] went down to beverly and then east and west of griffith so it was a very small

[1:18:28] survey pool now overwhelming people liked it blah blah

[1:18:31] this time given that we are looking at the possible well first of

[1:18:35] all i wanted to ask how things have been impacting them in the past year

[1:18:39] would they like this to continue would they like it to be a public plaza we

[1:18:42] opened it a little bit more broadly and so that area went out much broader so we

[1:18:47] went one block north of of 12 mile

[1:18:52] two blocks south of no i'm sorry two blocks north of 12 mile two blocks south

[1:18:56] of of 12 mile and then gardner to robina so we had a much much larger swath of of

[1:19:02] residents who who could participate mailed it out to 448 business owners

[1:19:08] property owners residents occupants etc and we received 365 responses in that

[1:19:14] survey so overwhelmingly we had people say that

[1:19:18] they've reacted felt very positively about the closure over the past year

[1:19:23] 49.86 percent 182 responses felt that the the griffith closure has impacted

[1:19:30] them very positively there were about 10 questions here we

[1:19:34] were trying to keep it as broad as possible again this was just the first

[1:19:37] of many community engagement efforts and if this had skewed wildly the other way

[1:19:42] we would be having a different conversation right now but

[1:19:45] we had a lot of people say that they would be interested in um discussing how

[1:19:51] this could be extended either seasonally or permanently um most people that

[1:19:56] responded did not want to see it returned to the former configuration of

[1:19:59] the two-way stop uh immediately they the numbers

[1:20:04] kind of speak from sorry yes oh i just could you clarify you said um

[1:20:09] 49 said it impacted them very positively what were the other options like

[1:20:15] very negatively negatively neutral hadn't really noticed positively or very

[1:20:19] positively okay so it was on a scale of one yeah okay so it wasn't just very

[1:20:23] positively or negatively just right we tried we tried to yeah try to give them

[1:20:26] a little bit more and then you said 49 very positively and then how many about

[1:20:31] positively neutral yeah positively was 11.51 percent so about 42 people neutral

[1:20:38] uh 25.48 93 people negatively 4.93 18 persons

[1:20:45] very negatively 8.22 which is about 30 persons thank you so much for clarifying

[1:20:50] that okay um

[1:20:52] so in addition to some of these questions of you know would you like to

[1:20:56] see it as a temporary seasonal um and or permanent

[1:21:01] like i said things were very positive we even

[1:21:04] included a question of how many times you visited berkeley common in the last

[1:21:07] year just to kind of get a gauges of the people who did respond were they

[1:21:11] frequent visitors here or not just to give a little bit more context and then

[1:21:15] we did open it up for any additional thoughts comments concerns questions or

[1:21:19] anything and the number of responses we've received was

[1:21:25] well over 240 not to mention we also noted that if you wanted to include your

[1:21:29] email address on this to receive updates excuse me please do so and we'll make

[1:21:35] sure to keep you updated on how things progress in the future and this will be

[1:21:38] a really good email blast list for when we start doing

[1:21:41] the community engagement uh component of this if if we continue moving forward so

[1:21:46] um this has been a really good gauge as to how people have been feeling over the

[1:21:50] past year and also where they want to go in the future

[1:21:53] that's fantastic thank you for being proactive with communicating with the

[1:21:56] residents um before we have to make this decision

[1:22:01] additional comments still looking this way so i'll stay over

[1:22:04] here in case there's already if not i'll turn the other way okay all right i

[1:22:08] guess i'll come over to this side councilmember henning

[1:22:12] yeah and just to

[1:22:14] do some summation there that was 86 percent of people thought were neutral

[1:22:19] or some form of positive with the change with a

[1:22:23] pretty large sample size so i mean

[1:22:27] that number speaks a lot to me so

[1:22:31] so i do support the extension i have two modifications that i want to see um

[1:22:37] and the first is i do think we need to be charging rent at this point this is

[1:22:43] any place that we have um not just griffith any place we have

[1:22:48] uh private use of public property uh we're past the acute phase of covid um

[1:22:54] and there's uh but there are still issues and so i do think um

[1:23:01] that it does let's say even the playing field uh if

[1:23:04] we start to charge rent and the second place second item is

[1:23:10] where we do close publicly close close public roads i do think we should carve

[1:23:16] out a part that is clearly public access that

[1:23:22] anyone can use it's it's clearly marked as such uh so we can start to see

[1:23:27] um the public plaza aspect of it so we're

[1:23:31] we're experimenting you know we're getting data on the

[1:23:35] experimentation on that part as well you know while we have these other things

[1:23:40] so those are the two things that i'd like to see

[1:23:43] added to this

[1:23:51] okay

[1:23:54] anything we're here no okay any other comments or as we make our way back here

[1:23:59] mr m may i address the second point um so yeah the part of

[1:24:03] the community engagement strategy and the reason for this extension is to

[1:24:07] really look at the programming of that space so if we were to to look at that

[1:24:11] area as a public plaza how can we ensure that this is done

[1:24:16] correctly that brings everybody here that they they now know that this has

[1:24:20] transitioned from that which it was to what it will be in the future and making

[1:24:24] sure that that is done where there's not any any ambiguity in

[1:24:28] it whatsoever so while it'd still be a place where people could you know go get

[1:24:32] a sandwich and come over here making sure that they understand that there's a

[1:24:36] clear demarcation from from a private use to a public use and

[1:24:41] that'll all be part of the the feasibility study the design of it the

[1:24:44] programming of it these were things that we noted that weren't done at the robina

[1:24:48] plaza and that's why maybe reasons why it

[1:24:51] didn't didn't flourish is we want to make sure that we we correct those

[1:24:55] mistakes if we do this going forward okay

[1:25:01] councilman baker oh thank your honor thank you

[1:25:03] for this information for bringing this back

[1:25:06] to us and i want to thank everybody for their comments and thoughts uh tonight i

[1:25:09] know this specifically for before us now is just

[1:25:12] the extension but it's it's easy to get into the dialogue about the broader what

[1:25:17] ifs and could be especially into your point about the

[1:25:19] robina issue some of the comments we've received here

[1:25:22] in the short term looking at the barricades and everything it feels like

[1:25:26] a disaster zone if you're going by there and there's all sorts of great safety

[1:25:30] reasons why we have those barriers and all the kind of protective things

[1:25:34] because folks you know if they haven't been in town in a while they might just

[1:25:38] hit turn signal and try to pop in there so not to not to get into the the

[1:25:43] closure conversation but just to help paint the picture

[1:25:47] if if any of these properties or other spots were

[1:25:51] eventually deemed to be to be closed it would actually be

[1:25:55] closed at the street you'd have like on street parking so it would just be an

[1:25:59] extension of whether it's coolage or 12 mile

[1:26:02] and it would be there would be no way to turn in

[1:26:05] because it would actually be sealed off and it would actually just continue the

[1:26:08] street there'd be additional parking we'd gain parking in those kind of

[1:26:11] scenarios and and then to your point there'd be

[1:26:14] proper signage we'd we'd amend the wayfinding that's been put in place uh

[1:26:18] to indicate that this is a public facility and then to the comment that

[1:26:22] was made earlier it would just be rented out as needed for specific events just

[1:26:26] like you could rent out jc park or anything like that now

[1:26:29] now back to the the the temporary extension

[1:26:33] a lot of it does hinge first on the the kovid right

[1:26:37] because cove is right in the middle of this

[1:26:39] title even of of what we're doing here so certainly since the delta thing is

[1:26:44] going crazy right now uh i think we need to to keep that bigger picture in mind

[1:26:48] and i'm glad that we were reminded again that this is more than just one

[1:26:52] one intersection uh and secondly um the notion of so i'm going to come back to

[1:26:56] you with the timing question again uh when do we imagine um there's additional

[1:27:00] conversations and studies continuing and i uh like my colleague i applaud the

[1:27:06] proactive work that's already been done with the with the studies that have been

[1:27:10] put in place can you describe not even to pin you down to specific

[1:27:13] dates or anything but the general sequence or the kinds of conversations

[1:27:17] that we'll have to get a better feel for how this space

[1:27:20] could be used to benefit the entire community

[1:27:23] yeah so i've i've started unofficially putting out some feelers with a couple

[1:27:27] planning firms that that i know just to get an idea of what a

[1:27:30] feasibility study would cost for for those two spaces that i mentioned um

[1:27:35] have started to brainstorm a little bit with our communications uh guru mr

[1:27:40] mathis on ways that we can bring people together and talk about it

[1:27:44] as you know we had a really robust community engagement strategy planned

[1:27:48] for our master plan which didn't come to fruition so now maybe we can use some of

[1:27:51] those ideas to do this but it would involve

[1:27:55] meetings with the residents it would involve meetings with the business

[1:27:58] owners because there concerns and their viewpoints are very very different so we

[1:28:02] need to make sure that we've we've looked at everything

[1:28:06] secularly but then you know comprehensively together

[1:28:09] so those are the kinds of things we want to do the survey was a good a good start

[1:28:13] and i imagine we'll probably do another one of those because it gives people the

[1:28:17] opportunity to do it from the comfort of their own home they don't have to leave

[1:28:20] they don't have to go out and they can also maybe be a little more honest about

[1:28:24] what they're feeling rather than a face-to-face conversation but certainly

[1:28:27] this is not the only like i said it's not the only way we're going to be doing

[1:28:31] this there's going to be a lot more face-to-face conversations

[1:28:33] once we get into a little bit more of the

[1:28:36] what would you like to see component design component and if we have a

[1:28:39] conceptual then and i'm just brainstorming here but um you know then

[1:28:43] there's opportunities for bringing people into that space and showing them

[1:28:46] renderings and say which one do you like better do you like this better what

[1:28:49] about this um and really making it so that the community is is more or less

[1:28:54] designing this they're helping us design and telling us what they want to see so

[1:28:58] that's that's really kind of where i my thought process is coming from

[1:29:03] great thank you that makes a lot of sense and uh and i'll just wrap up my

[1:29:06] bit here again to kind of reinforce some of the comments that we heard from folks

[1:29:09] uh to ensure that the here and now is is safe certainly we don't want to you know

[1:29:14] trip hazards uh and i too you guys know i'm a big fan

[1:29:17] of speed limits right there's a reason we have those things and they are

[1:29:20] important and stop signs even more so uh so whatever um so this is my request

[1:29:26] whatever we can do to ask our friends across the street uh to help keep an eye

[1:29:29] on that and find some ways to instrument that just to um to let folks know that

[1:29:33] it's not a thoroughfare right it's meant to stop signs of there for all the right

[1:29:37] reasons and we want to make sure people stay safe and and obey those so

[1:29:41] so thanks again for folks for bringing those up to our attention so we can

[1:29:44] address those councilmember blanchard thank you your

[1:29:47] honor i'd just like to say that i think that what berkeley commons has done it's

[1:29:50] been very good for the city brought us a lot of business both to the restaurant

[1:29:54] and for the retail i think it's a good thing i think we need to need to move

[1:29:58] forward i think our feasibility study would be a good thing there is one other

[1:30:02] thing that we have thrown out feelers about but not had any response and that

[1:30:06] are social districts uh royal oak is institute social

[1:30:10] districts and that's something that we could think about but

[1:30:13] we need businesses to come to us with some ideas to help out so if some of the

[1:30:18] businesses think that they have a good case or a good

[1:30:21] idea on what we could do to implement a

[1:30:24] social district in addition to what we're doing now

[1:30:27] that could be an improvement so i think the feasibility study is good we

[1:30:32] need to get more public access space but

[1:30:36] what berkeley commons is doing right now i think is helping us out a lot and

[1:30:39] getting people into the city and getting them

[1:30:41] through there safely so thank you for what you've done and let's think about

[1:30:45] the other part of it as a social district maybe later on if we can find a

[1:30:48] way to do that successfully in our city thank you

[1:30:52] thank you um aaron i could read this or you can read it either way i just again

[1:30:57] try to keep this on the the resolution that we're talking

[1:31:00] about i know there's there's a larger thing that continues to come up uh

[1:31:04] potentially for the future in our community but again there are one two

[1:31:07] three four five six seven eight nine plus the five that you mentioned there

[1:31:11] are a number of different things that this

[1:31:13] resolution continues to provide um you know if allowing the use of

[1:31:19] private parking spaces you know up to fifty percent of their current lawful

[1:31:22] usable space or by thirty percent of the existing parking area temporarily adding

[1:31:26] or expanding outdoor dining or seating sales and service areas not encroaching

[1:31:30] or obstructing fire lanes you know obviously being respectful of the noise

[1:31:34] and then if there's a municipal lot you know up to 25 percent of the municipal

[1:31:37] parking area may be used available there are a number of other businesses that

[1:31:41] are taking advantage of these things and have been taking advantage of them

[1:31:44] the conversation today has seemed to center around just one particular

[1:31:49] instance but there are far more that we are talking about

[1:31:53] and in speaking with colleagues in other communities especially after the past

[1:31:57] year outdoor dining outdoor dining access

[1:32:02] i don't see that going away even if

[1:32:06] hopefully soon covet is something that is behind us i don't see a need or a

[1:32:10] desire for outdoor dining to just vanish that's not happening actually we're

[1:32:14] seeing a number of communities close to us going

[1:32:18] in the opposite direction which is something that i think we need to

[1:32:20] certainly be available and open to as well

[1:32:24] because that's what people want and that's what businesses are going to need

[1:32:27] to be able to offer to continue to be competitive is to have some of those

[1:32:30] spaces to me that is the most important part of

[1:32:34] continuing the temporary ease of these restrictions

[1:32:38] today that is what is most important for me

[1:32:41] the griffith opportunity

[1:32:44] i think as a public space in a public plaza and maybe its own little social

[1:32:48] district where you know anybody who's out and about can

[1:32:51] enjoy that spot certainly private businesses can also enjoy that

[1:32:55] spot or rent it out by perming or however we're going to figure that out

[1:32:59] if we decide to go that way in the future permanently

[1:33:01] those are going to be ongoing conversations

[1:33:05] but under this that intersection is one of the five

[1:33:09] where anybody else again could have applied and hadn't yet to utilize one of

[1:33:13] those spaces that would be able to continue now my question for you miss

[1:33:16] luto is if we do approve this and it's continued up through december of 2022

[1:33:22] when does it become our public plaza for us to program and

[1:33:27] try out and really study and feasibility and all of those things versus where

[1:33:32] it's kind of seen right now as it's only for one particular space

[1:33:39] well a lot of that comes down to the once the feasibility study is done and

[1:33:42] we've engaged the public and and if there's buy-in we'll bring those results

[1:33:47] and we'll bring all that feedback back to you and how we want to do this

[1:33:51] it wouldn't be a start and stop on a saturday and then this is now a public

[1:33:54] plaza there would be a transitional component

[1:33:58] i'm assuming i haven't quite gotten that far as to how to roll that out but there

[1:34:01] would be a point of the use can continue as a private

[1:34:05] outdoor dining space until this day and then the programming in the plaza would

[1:34:09] be ready to go um you know shortly thereafter

[1:34:13] but leading them up so that way the the business can

[1:34:18] acclimate can get their their last um the last hurrah i guess you want to

[1:34:23] call it um so that way they can um make their arrangements on all of the

[1:34:28] the investments they've done on their on their side all right so then i have a

[1:34:31] legal question for the attorney if that is the case

[1:34:34] and the resolution as written i mean it just says you can apply at

[1:34:40] this space and now it basically says this through december of 2022 do we have

[1:34:44] to add any language

[1:34:48] in here to

[1:34:50] you know be again as transparent as possible with everybody involved and not

[1:34:53] to just call one day and say hey you were on let's use somebody else you were

[1:34:57] at east north ian coolidge well guess what we're taking this over now and they

[1:35:02] say no you approve this to december of 2022 you don't have any access to it

[1:35:07] would we have to change the language or put anything in here to give us that

[1:35:10] ability other than we take the resolution out i think you already have

[1:35:14] i mean they're right right uh uh further down in that resolution it says

[1:35:20] it is further resolved that the city council

[1:35:23] reserves the authority to modify shorten or lengthen the duration terms and

[1:35:29] conditions of this resolution as the council deems reasonable and

[1:35:34] appropriate under the circumstances that is something we've carried over from the

[1:35:38] prior resolutions recognizing that

[1:35:43] facts and circumstances do change and the council is making this as a

[1:35:50] temporary accommodation but as we become

[1:35:54] more informed as i said circumstances change

[1:35:57] council wants that to have that ability to either

[1:36:01] backtrack or move in a different direction so

[1:36:04] um it's a long answer to your simple

[1:36:07] question i i i just feel like we seem to have found

[1:36:11] ourselves in a lot of uh a lot of places where there's some gray area let's see

[1:36:15] and we end up having people in robes having to tell us i can't say that

[1:36:19] people i can't say people won't either applaud

[1:36:22] or or complain if council goes in a different direction

[1:36:26] but you are reserving the authority to do that and that is a very general

[1:36:29] question it's certainly not it was it was directed at the people at east or

[1:36:32] thea and coolidge first of all uh just to make sure that if something changed

[1:36:36] because my goal is to make that a public plaza

[1:36:39] yes as soon as expediently as soon as possible and feasibly possible given

[1:36:44] what we want to have um just because i think it would be such

[1:36:49] a good benefit for the entire community and then look at potential other places

[1:36:52] back to dorothea again that's my goal yes i am in favor of

[1:36:57] expending these restrictions or easing of these restrictions right now for

[1:37:00] everybody else especially with what's going on and delta coming back and

[1:37:04] hitting more waves but also keeping our eye on what the future could look like

[1:37:09] and at least having a timeline i'm not big on

[1:37:12] approving things

[1:37:16] there with a lot of ambiguity because

[1:37:19] if i if we don't know when the next steps are happening i feel like that's

[1:37:22] what can create a lot of consternation and

[1:37:25] anger and questions in our community and i don't want that to happen here what's

[1:37:29] that make sense councilman baker oh thank you honor just to kind of build on

[1:37:32] that and kind of get right back to just kind of the the obvious point that i

[1:37:36] think we drive by often and you've pointed out here uh if someone at one of

[1:37:40] these other locations or somewhere else in the city was interested in

[1:37:44] uh taking advantage of of this and leveraging it to to

[1:37:48] bolster their business especially as we get into this thing

[1:37:52] at risk of just being completely obvious about it what would how would they go

[1:37:55] about contacting you uh and what would you um ask of them to bring

[1:38:00] in terms of uh like if they did want to do the you know something on coolidge or

[1:38:04] something like that how would they get a hold of you and and

[1:38:07] what kind of materials might you suggest that they bring again just to kind of

[1:38:11] ensure that we're broadening the conversation here tonight

[1:38:13] yeah certainly so uh you can call me here at city hall 248 658 3329 um you

[1:38:19] can email me but we have an application a permit application available online

[1:38:24] it's for the temporary outdoor dining closures and it very specifically says

[1:38:28] where you're looking to do your outdoor dining sales service areas whether it's

[1:38:32] on a sidewalk cafe whether it's in a municipal private lot or if it's on one

[1:38:36] of those intersections you know we haven't had any one except

[1:38:39] for this one here but

[1:38:42] you know we would need a site plan showing exactly where everything is

[1:38:44] going to be what type of barricades you're going to do we have to work with

[1:38:48] uh the road commission of oakland county if it's on 12 mile because that's a

[1:38:51] county road work with them and get a traffic control

[1:38:55] order from the department of public safety so there are a number of things

[1:38:58] that need to go into it but if certainly if anyone is interested take a look at

[1:39:02] our our website for the application and feel free to reach out to me

[1:39:05] at city hall and my email address and we can walk through all the steps

[1:39:09] thank you and just to kind of put folks minds at ease when you you mentioned a

[1:39:12] lot of very important requirements there that are all um completely valid and

[1:39:15] understandable uh it almost sounds arduous is it actually as daunting as it

[1:39:19] sounds or like when you say site plan could they just come in with like a

[1:39:21] sketch and a kind of a thing or does it have to be an official

[1:39:25] no it doesn't have to be signed and sealed by an architect or anything but

[1:39:27] just showing where the building is where the spaces are what type of um uh

[1:39:33] barricades you're planning on using to separate especially if it's on the

[1:39:37] one of these residential streets we want to make sure that there is a clear

[1:39:41] and very identifiable blockade from from the

[1:39:46] traffic area to to the pedestrian area and where the

[1:39:49] patrons will be sitting so we want to make sure that that is very very clear

[1:39:52] for everybody so making sure that that is um

[1:39:56] is understood and there last year there were a couple of people who submitted

[1:39:59] this and was like no that that's that that doesn't quite work that's not safe

[1:40:03] enough we you know try doing this over here oh yeah sure we'll we'll do that

[1:40:06] we'll use those materials cool no problem but just making sure that

[1:40:09] something is safe and not just having a velvet rope um across it wasn't you know

[1:40:13] didn't wasn't enough so we want to make sure

[1:40:16] that there is something that that is very clear and and

[1:40:19] not permanent but a little bit more permanent than a velvet rope right so

[1:40:22] yeah any of those questions can be directed to me and we can walk through

[1:40:26] all of those steps together certainly if it's a a private parking area or

[1:40:29] municipal parking area or sidewalk those are a little bit easier to to do

[1:40:33] when you get into the side streets with the traffic control orders and rcoc and

[1:40:37] all the signage that needs to be done there's a lot more to it

[1:40:40] so i would encourage anyone who's interested to contact me and we can walk

[1:40:43] through all those steps together thank you

[1:40:47] thank you erin you mentioned the programming component

[1:40:52] do you envision that happening during that

[1:40:56] feasibility study period if we approve this

[1:40:59] extending the closure do you envision that programming being part of that

[1:41:05] time frame yes i do okay you know we would be working with parks and rec we'd

[1:41:08] be working with um the dda we'd be working with the school

[1:41:12] district we'd be working with any other local organizations to make sure that

[1:41:15] really this is program within within an inch of its life to make sure that we

[1:41:19] have a lot of engaging activities and things

[1:41:22] to bring the public to this space um so that way they they do know that it is a

[1:41:27] public a public area that that's a big component to make sure

[1:41:32] it's done and and the maintenance and and the the routine cleaning and all

[1:41:36] that stuff that that goes in hand in hand with all of this perfect um because

[1:41:39] that really was i think a

[1:41:43] a a ball drop if you will on robina i think that to your point earlier that um

[1:41:48] those things weren't as robust as they as they could have

[1:41:53] been so i'm glad to hear that that's the thinking now so thank you

[1:41:58] councilmember hammond um

[1:42:01] before we approve tonight i would just like to get the pulse of the rest of

[1:42:06] council if you know if we approve tonight

[1:42:09] is there interest at the next meeting considering

[1:42:13] modifications that require rent and considering some clearly identifiable

[1:42:19] public space where we have these closures

[1:42:23] i think first i want to ask director saluto

[1:42:27] how long would it take for us to i mean i i assume on the rent or fee structure

[1:42:32] we probably would default to what we are using maybe in some other places in the

[1:42:36] city but in terms of the the additional steps

[1:42:40] granted we don't have another meeting for a little while is that enough time

[1:42:44] to come back and talk a little bit more about what

[1:42:47] this next step with what the next phases are going to look like in terms of the

[1:42:51] timeline of the overall yes yes yes

[1:42:55] uh i mean is that okay with council to come back and want to take a quick yes

[1:42:59] if we do that i apologize but you're still looking to approve this

[1:43:03] extension this evening and then just okay just wanted some clarification on

[1:43:06] my nts yes we're looking to make sure that we have um some next steps and we

[1:43:11] know what those next steps are potentially going to look like so that

[1:43:13] we can continue these conversations as it relates to the other item

[1:43:18] that is not that's a part of what we're talking about right now yes and that's

[1:43:21] the sole point of what we're talking about right now you will be you'll be

[1:43:24] annoyed by how many emails you're going to get from me on timelines and and

[1:43:26] materials and things to go over any other comments from council

[1:43:34] final thoughts from folks that are with us

[1:43:37] today before we vote

[1:43:43] okay it is a gray area

[1:43:52] the master plan states robina would it be

[1:43:56] more feasible and just a suggestion i don't know

[1:44:00] just me sitting here thinking um

[1:44:05] the closure is already to september 30th correct

[1:44:11] for berkeley commons well it's under the under the resolution for

[1:44:15] everything yes okay would it be

[1:44:19] clearer to

[1:44:22] open that back up

[1:44:25] take this feasibility study take it and do this study in the survey

[1:44:31] and everything else on robino

[1:44:37] start with that makes it a public area

[1:44:42] you're not affecting tenants in the upstairs

[1:44:46] that april owns okay you're not a fa because there's no

[1:44:51] tenants there i know that i it's

[1:44:55] just a thought so either way

[1:44:59] if this gets approved that is a part of it obviously

[1:45:03] because that's one of the areas that was identified in one of the places where

[1:45:06] somebody applied and used and we have north rubin at 12

[1:45:10] mile which had not been it was one of the areas that was

[1:45:14] targeted as is a good potential for this nobody took advantage of that yet so

[1:45:18] for us to either way if this gets approved that is allowed to continue

[1:45:22] regardless while we're studying the feasibility so we wouldn't be closing

[1:45:26] one down to move one either because that's already an area that they could

[1:45:30] be in permitted by this so which you're talking about then

[1:45:34] shifting what we have in here i'm personally

[1:45:39] not going to recommend that we shift it now

[1:45:42] just because this is how it's been and they've used it at this point

[1:45:46] had it not been one of the initial places i think that's

[1:45:49] a different conversation maybe we would have had that before

[1:45:52] but i think we're kind of here now i'm personally loved to change that

[1:45:57] um any other comments i would just like to follow up i mean

[1:46:01] it's just the only reason why grip this is not considered to be a public space

[1:46:05] is because berkeley common is only one that you

[1:46:08] know one of the main restaurants that chose to take advantage of that which i

[1:46:11] think is great i think they did a great job i mean i don't know if a public

[1:46:13] space is awesome for them either because you're

[1:46:17] going to lose your dining i mean part of the i mean i will say privatized you

[1:46:21] know you know gusto goes a long way and they

[1:46:24] are clear you know they're clearly showing that because they do they have a

[1:46:27] dynamic situation i almost rather personally i would rather have them have

[1:46:32] a robust awesome restaurant open for lunch

[1:46:36] you know you know lunches saturdays and sundays as opposed to public space

[1:46:40] personally i mean it's a fellow business oh no no no i'm saying like long term it

[1:46:45] could set up instead of a public space that's used periodically here and there

[1:46:48] the loitering and i mean i know i don't want to be negative but i'm just like

[1:46:51] i'm looking through my eyes my manager and i can hear it already as i say that

[1:46:55] i would rather have a robust you know restaurant that's open you know

[1:46:59] six days a week for lunches i mean personally i'm just saying i believe

[1:47:04] or not is because of the dynamics correct well right oh yeah i know saying

[1:47:07] long term i guess i would rather have i mean well the reality is

[1:47:11] i mean if you guys could close it regardless i would rather have these

[1:47:13] guys buy it and do what they do because they do a great job i mean if it's going

[1:47:16] to be close that's just my opinion okay it is a public road we i mean that's the

[1:47:20] issue you guys can sell stuff i don't know you guys make things happen right i

[1:47:23] don't know rent things okay i'm just saying preferably if it's going to be

[1:47:26] closed regardless i have i would rather have these guys to do what they're doing

[1:47:29] because i i would like it for that more so than just a in a public space but

[1:47:33] that's my two cents all right so thank you april appreciate that

[1:47:37] any final comments before i call for the vote

[1:47:40] mike and then ms mathis i'm going to be

[1:47:43] coming to you so if anybody is in the queue please we'll get them ready i just

[1:47:47] want to say thank you to the berkeley residents who have been so resoundingly

[1:47:51] supportive of the the small businesses in our downtown footprint i know that's

[1:47:55] true beyond just the downtown borders but

[1:47:58] centering that in this conversation as this is a temporary measure that will be

[1:48:02] temporarily extended a little bit longer i want to thank the residents because

[1:48:06] we're going to need you even more so to continue

[1:48:09] that local support i think that's distinctly true for berkeley even more

[1:48:13] than other communities that's already been helpful and just

[1:48:16] want to celebrate that and thank the community's leaders because our downtown

[1:48:20] businesses and the entire communities small businesses really need that

[1:48:24] continued rallying as we meander and navigate all the obstacles that continue

[1:48:29] to rise for our small enterprises thank you

[1:48:33] miss mathis

[1:48:39] okay there is no one in the queue at this time

[1:48:42] okay any last minute comments from council

[1:48:45] members or clarifications or questions seeing none

[1:48:50] miss herald um

[1:48:52] go back to my numbers here please would you please call the role on r

[1:48:57] 2721 to get any temporary

[1:49:00] easing of restrictions for outdoor dining in our community

[1:49:04] blanchard yes dean yes gavin yes hennen yes price yes baker yes terbrak

[1:49:13] yes

[1:49:16] we now move to item number seven please resolution number r-28-21

[1:49:24] matter of extending r-21-20 for temporary signage in

[1:49:28] response to covet 19 coba 19 restrictions

[1:49:35] anybody wants to see the end of the party here

[1:49:38] this is part two we're going gonna have communications

[1:49:42] sometimes those are entertaining sometimes not okay all right emotional

[1:49:46] proof support

[1:49:50] uh is there a motion to prove our 2821 motion by council member baker support

[1:49:54] for mayor pro tem dean mr barman garden ms schluteau i'll let

[1:49:59] you guys take it away this is the second part you are now talking to our uh

[1:50:03] interim director of the dda as well as anybody that is with us virtually

[1:50:08] here mr mayor along with the relaxation of outdoor dining across the community

[1:50:14] we have also uh been relaxing some of the

[1:50:17] signage requirements that go along with this in order to allow those that are

[1:50:21] driving through a community or walking through any potential customer

[1:50:25] can be alerted to businesses being open closed having different hours

[1:50:30] having a sale any fantastic opportunity there is to dine shop or enjoy berkeley

[1:50:36] we have allowed our our businesses to take advantage of uh some relaxed

[1:50:41] ordinances it has not been uh largely used uh but it is uh something that we

[1:50:46] would like to continue to offer um certainly as items change this would run

[1:50:51] along parallel to the timeline that we've indicated for uh outdoor dining as

[1:50:56] well right there's a follow-up to the item that we just spoke with in terms of

[1:50:59] the timelines those are the same this is obviously focused on signs whereas the

[1:51:02] first one was focused on outdoor dining and easing some of those restrictions

[1:51:07] erin anything you'd like to add no uh this really just comes to you it

[1:51:13] it it has gone in tandem with the outdoor dining so it only seemed right

[1:51:16] that if we were going to extend one to extend the other so it comes before you

[1:51:19] there hasn't been any issues problems concerns complaints from any residents

[1:51:24] that i've heard or business owners so um you know if it continues to attract

[1:51:28] people and bring people in and show people that we are open and we are a

[1:51:31] vibrant community that's why it's before you this evening

[1:51:34] okay miss mathis i'm going to come over to

[1:51:37] you first do we have any folks um that would like to comment on this

[1:51:44] not at this time sir not at this time okay mr mcginnis uh you don't have to

[1:51:50] believe me you're just the only person outside of

[1:51:53] that that is with us in person so you'll know

[1:51:56] you're not compelled by any stretch but i do know that you also do like downtown

[1:52:00] love signs all right thank you that was that was mike

[1:52:04] mcginnis in case anybody could not see him he chose not to step up to the

[1:52:07] microphone but he does project well enough

[1:52:10] downtown loves signs council councilmember thank you your

[1:52:14] honor and uh thank you again it is i just wonder how the conversation would

[1:52:17] have been if we put this one first instead of

[1:52:20] at least they would have been aware that this opportunity so i think i have a

[1:52:23] question and a request the question and you may have hinted at this

[1:52:27] um how what's the uptake on on the extended

[1:52:30] uh sign

[1:52:33] um ability and permissions do is there can you give us any kind of

[1:52:37] sense as the degree to which um

[1:52:40] the extension or the the relaxation of the of the ordinances have been utilized

[1:52:46] thus far yeah they're really i'm sorry

[1:52:49] only to say it's been slight so slight yes that's yeah there hasn't been nearly

[1:52:53] as many um this was just more as a method to for people to do grand

[1:52:57] openings and you know we are open or just yeah know that you're open and just

[1:53:01] to let us know that we're open now that things have been open for quite some

[1:53:04] time there really hasn't been a whole lot of um continued uh

[1:53:08] need that's not the right word there hasn't

[1:53:10] been a whole lot of people who have continued to do that so

[1:53:14] it really was the the very beginning but given that things are

[1:53:18] trending in another way we want to make sure that we continue to offer this as a

[1:53:22] relaxed incentive for people to to advertise their businesses here in our

[1:53:26] community in case that does happen in case it does hopefully not thank you

[1:53:30] then my uh my request might be given our dynamic dda director here and and many

[1:53:36] other fantastic folks that are here to help promote the city maybe there's a

[1:53:40] way that we can provide some additional information or some

[1:53:44] reminders or some ways to help let people know that this

[1:53:48] is an option available to them they may

[1:53:51] choose to make it covid related or just general hey we're here we're around and

[1:53:57] get the word out it seems to me i am not a business owner in the city

[1:54:02] but it seems to me that this kind of an opportunity to have the ability to put

[1:54:05] additional signage out can only help right to raise awareness

[1:54:09] to draw more folks into the city and so i guess i'm wondering if there's some

[1:54:13] kind of way that we could put together just even a pamphlet or some kind of

[1:54:17] resources so that

[1:54:20] mr mcginnis and others can can help let folks know that this resource is

[1:54:24] available to them don't count on it forever because it's a temporary

[1:54:27] extension of the relaxation of the ordinances but

[1:54:31] while it's here let's at least see if there is any long-term benefit to uh

[1:54:36] to re-evaluating those ordinances uh down the road as well so i think that's

[1:54:39] my request that really long and verbose but between mr mcginnis and the dda and

[1:54:43] councilmember blanchard liaisoning to the chamber i think let's make sure that

[1:54:48] we are reinforcing this message so that so that folks know so that all

[1:54:52] of our businesses know is that fair can you handle that

[1:54:55] i thought you could thank you also it is nice too that

[1:54:59] there's no fees associated because i know if you have a sandwich

[1:55:03] board and you want to put it outside it's

[1:55:06] i don't know i'm not going to say a number because i don't know what the fee

[1:55:08] is now but there's a fee for that so it has it is nice that that's been taken

[1:55:13] away and i think probably to council member baker's point

[1:55:16] many businesses may not know um that this has been relaxed that they can put

[1:55:21] the signage out there aren't additional fees i mean you can't put it where

[1:55:25] people are going to walk but you know all the information's there but

[1:55:29] to your point getting the word out i think would be really helpful um because

[1:55:32] people may not know especially if we had like some kind of i

[1:55:36] don't know like a parade or something going down 12 mile

[1:55:40] businesses could potentially just if they needed to i mean it seems like that

[1:55:43] would be an art festival right street art fest that we just had and uh uh an

[1:55:47] art bash that we're basically coming as well and there's certainly some

[1:55:50] opportunities to raise um visibility with this yeah if folks do decide to do

[1:55:56] that and i think that's our way of trying to get more folks to

[1:55:59] take advantage of this if it's something that is makes sense to them

[1:56:03] any other questions from council members on that this one is a little bit more

[1:56:06] straightforward we're not talking about a potential road closure in the future

[1:56:12] um okay well seeing no additional questions or comments

[1:56:16] miss harold would you please call the role on our 28-21

[1:56:21] dean yes gavin yes hennen yes price yes baker yes blanchard yes turbrac yes

[1:56:31] uh would we now move on to item number eight please miss harold

[1:56:35] matter of authorizing the city manager to sign the application for additional

[1:56:39] service credit purchase for gina harold approving two years of additional

[1:56:42] service credit this service credit purchase is allowed by the city of

[1:56:45] berkeley merit system of human resource management section

[1:56:49] 1001.08

[1:56:52] and meets all the requirements of the mers plan document

[1:56:57] i feel like you will have to abstain on this

[1:57:00] is there a motion to approve i'm 49 21. so moved support

[1:57:05] motion made by councilmember price with support from council member gavin mr

[1:57:09] baumgarten thank you mayor this is a pretty robust motion it does explain

[1:57:14] sort of uh the internal logic behind this coming before you this evening

[1:57:18] the merit system is uh it covers basically any of our employees that

[1:57:24] aren't tied to a a different bargaining unit such as our maple dpw or

[1:57:30] the police unions

[1:57:33] so gina does fall under the merit system being an administrative

[1:57:37] personnel this is adopted by council so this

[1:57:41] benefit is not something that is just developed internally it is actually it

[1:57:45] carries the weight of an action by council and gina is fully qualified

[1:57:50] under those provisions to take advantage of this benefit that we offer

[1:57:55] this does not come without some calculations the numbers

[1:57:58] that you see within the memorandum attached are developed by our finance

[1:58:03] director who works with mers on coming up with these per their calculations

[1:58:08] and these costs are shared by both the employee as

[1:58:12] well as the city itself we do find this benefit to be mutually

[1:58:15] beneficial to both the employee and our overall financial health when it

[1:58:20] comes to our retirement system so uh we like to see people take advantage of

[1:58:23] this uh thankfully uh gina as far as i know plans to uh stick around for what

[1:58:29] 30 40 more years uh and we're lucky to have her uh

[1:58:35] and hope that she has a long and fruitful career right here in berkeley i

[1:58:38] do want to point out that in the memo from our finance director mark pollock

[1:58:41] he does clearly say in here since gina is a long way from her

[1:58:47] i retirement that was to you know push off us telling her not to leave any

[1:58:51] earlier and i haven't even messed up yet i haven't called you miss mitchell as

[1:58:54] far as i know at least once tonight so that also bodes well for us in the

[1:58:58] future additional questions uh from council

[1:59:02] we've seen a number of these obviously recently and

[1:59:05] there are certain mutual benefits uh certainly we do not want to see anybody

[1:59:10] leave our community who does a tremendous job but there are benefits on

[1:59:13] both sides and and the contracts are structured in a way to allow this it's

[1:59:17] our role as the final governing body to approve them which we have done in the

[1:59:21] past

[1:59:24] seeing no additional questions or comments

[1:59:28] almost messed up on purpose that time miss harold would you please call the

[1:59:32] roll on m4921 gavin yes hennen yes price yes faker yes

[1:59:39] blanchard yes dean yes turbrack yes we have now reached

[1:59:45] communications and i believe it is council member hannah's turn to go first

[1:59:49] but i am going to start with council member gavin anyway so we can work right

[1:59:52] around thank you your honor uh so planning

[1:59:55] commission the main topic of discussion uh was proposed ordinance amendments on

[1:59:59] a permitted locations for exterior appliance there were also

[2:00:02] elections for chair vice chair and secretary and liaison appointments to

[2:00:06] various boards as well so the next meeting will be tuesday the

[2:00:10] 24th at 7 pm and as i indicated last time the eac does not meet this month

[2:00:15] but a reminder about the bike corral that the

[2:00:18] eac will host for the art bash that was already mentioned earlier on september

[2:00:22] 11th and a reminder if you'd like to

[2:00:24] volunteer uh to staff the bike crowd you can contact me at ourgavin at

[2:00:29] berkeleymich.net and we'll get you signed up and so the

[2:00:32] next meeting of the eac will be on september 16th at 6 30. and that's all i

[2:00:36] have thank you thank you and councilmember

[2:00:39] hannah that was not a slight to you by starting there i just wanted to keep it

[2:00:43] this way go ahead all right uh first with the zba i just

[2:00:47] wanted to welcome our new members uh their next meeting is tomorrow august

[2:00:52] 10th 7 7pm and it'll be the continuation of

[2:00:55] the case they already started hearing on a home edition

[2:00:59] the tree board hasn't met since our next last meeting and but their next meeting

[2:01:03] is scheduled for september 13th however i'm happy to report the city has

[2:01:08] been awarded a four thousand dollar matching grant

[2:01:12] from the michigan department of natural resources and this is going to allow us

[2:01:16] to plant at least 25 additional trees this year in addition to the roughly 200

[2:01:22] that were already scheduled to be added so and then finally i just wanted to

[2:01:27] thank the members of the berkeley gardeners who put together the inaugural

[2:01:31] garden walk on saturday it was well organized my wife and i we learned a lot

[2:01:37] talking to the people looking at their gardens and got to see some really

[2:01:41] beautiful things you know some hidden gems inside berkeley

[2:01:45] thank you excellent thank you mayor pro tem thank you

[2:01:49] um i have some fun parks and rec updates summerfest 2021 continues with an

[2:01:54] outdoor movie in the park tomorrow tuesday august 10th at 7 p.m

[2:01:59] this will take place at oxford park and our featured film is mighty ducks

[2:02:04] ducks fly together gordon bombay who doesn't like a good triple d

[2:02:08] um please bring blankets chairs or your and your picnic basket if you choose

[2:02:13] uh cruise fest and dream cruise are august 20th and 21st respectively and we

[2:02:18] have lots of fun in store the cruise fest parade begins at 6 30 p.m on the

[2:02:23] 20th bring your chairs and get a spot on 12 mile to watch the classic car parade

[2:02:27] which goes from woodward to greenfield along 12 mile

[2:02:30] then post parade activities we have musical entertainment you know because

[2:02:34] the street's blocked off so why not take advantage of that musical entertainment

[2:02:38] food vendors street dance party bouncers and new this year

[2:02:42] parks and recreation is hosting another outdoor movie night in front of the

[2:02:46] neighbor shop following the parade so 7 30 8

[2:02:49] o'clock-ish they'll be showing grease so again just

[2:02:53] pick up your chair and move it in front of the neighbor shop and enjoy another

[2:02:56] um classic movie and then finally parks and recreation is

[2:03:00] hosting an ice cream social in community park on

[2:03:04] tuesday august 25th at 5 30 p.m pre-registration is not required to show

[2:03:10] up and what a sweet way to end the summer thank you

[2:03:15] thank you councilmember baker yes thank you your honor a couple quick updates as

[2:03:18] well the downtown development authority dda board

[2:03:21] meets this week's wednesday in two days time

[2:03:24] uh and i'd certainly like to help congratulate all of the volunteers and

[2:03:28] businesses and and residents and artists that came out this past weekend for the

[2:03:32] uh the berkeley street art fest it was a fantastic time the weather ended up

[2:03:36] working out pretty well for us and uh and i saw folks young and old having a

[2:03:40] terrific time as i walked up and down and had a great time talking with

[2:03:43] everyone and admiring the tremendous skill of what they brought to uh to the

[2:03:47] city here with just little pieces of chalk it's

[2:03:49] absolutely amazing uh and please visit downtownberkeley.org

[2:03:54] to to learn more about what's going on in our beautiful in our beautiful city

[2:03:58] here and upcoming events

[2:04:01] historical committee meets tomorrow august 10th

[2:04:05] in the conference room around the corner and they want to thank all the all the

[2:04:09] folks residents that have been lining up to come in and visit the museum since it

[2:04:13] reopened uh and uh you know because whether it

[2:04:16] was your first time or a repeat visitor a splendid time was had by all

[2:04:21] i know they're still trying to uh to be able to receive credit card payments i'm

[2:04:26] not sure where that is in the process it's been a couple of months now

[2:04:30] uh but hopefully they'll be able to expedite um the ability to make an

[2:04:35] exchange of your money for items from that commemorate the city's history i

[2:04:40] think it'd be a great exchange the technology committee meets next

[2:04:44] week's wednesday august 18th and again just a friendly reminder that

[2:04:49] although the city's website remains unsecure it's been several months as

[2:04:52] well any financial transactions are conducted

[2:04:56] through a third party so any financial information

[2:04:59] like the upcoming ability to pay taxes online is done through a third party so

[2:05:03] your information will not be at risk with the unsecured website

[2:05:08] and finally it a quote from david cothrell here who

[2:05:12] said doing the right thing isn't always easy

[2:05:16] in fact sometimes it's real hard but just remembering that doing the

[2:05:21] right but just remember that doing the right thing

[2:05:23] is the right thing and i want to keep this quick

[2:05:28] i want to thank all of the residents and folks here in

[2:05:31] the city that have done the right thing and gotten the covet vaccine

[2:05:35] we lead many of the cities in the state at a exceptionally high vaccination rate

[2:05:40] which is fantastic it goes to

[2:05:43] the care with which we have for ourselves and our families and our

[2:05:47] neighbors and and our fellow residents here

[2:05:50] uh and um for those who choose not to um i just

[2:05:54] hope that it's not based on all the false information and and

[2:05:58] misconceptions that are out there if anybody has any questions about um about

[2:06:02] the vaccine it's its um ability to help protect uh

[2:06:07] especially given the the new delta thing that's ripping its way through the

[2:06:10] country uh it's it's on its way here and it's already been detected so whatever

[2:06:16] we can do to help put your mind at ease and let you know

[2:06:20] that to take care not only of yourself

[2:06:22] but also again for your family for your loved ones for your neighbors for your

[2:06:27] co-workers for the places that you go to uh here in the city and beyond uh please

[2:06:32] do the right thing and help um because unlike many

[2:06:35] decisions this isn't just an individual decision because your decision affects

[2:06:39] everybody around you uh so thank you uh and let's continue to

[2:06:42] do the right thing and and have berkeley lead by example with the tremendous

[2:06:46] vaccination rate thanks thank you councilmember baker

[2:06:50] councilmember price yes thank you mayor turbrack um like

[2:06:55] councilmember baker i'd like to offer big thanks to everyone the berkeley

[2:07:00] chamber city staff and all the volunteers who pulled off yet another

[2:07:04] amazing street art fest on saturday my kids and i had a blast doing crafts

[2:07:10] admiring the chalk art chatting with davidson their very

[2:07:15] favorite artists in the whole world and reconnecting with so many members of

[2:07:20] our community in the festive and fun environment

[2:07:23] what a great way to showcase our coolidge businesses and the creative

[2:07:28] spirit that drives berkeley forward bravo

[2:07:32] and finally with covet cases on the rise and schools preparing to reopen i also

[2:07:37] wanted to urge everyone who is eligible to receive the vaccine to get one

[2:07:42] coveted vaccines are safe and effective and they will protect you your family

[2:07:46] and our community thank you

[2:07:50] thank you councilmember blanchard thank you honor i have a bunch i saw you run

[2:07:54] down that thing last minute too i almost got you too soon uh

[2:07:58] the daily tribute had the best of the best readers choice awards and a number

[2:08:02] of our businesses were selected and i'd like to read them off

[2:08:05] they were rated as one two or three berkeley or the best coney island was

[2:08:09] berkeley a w best family restaurant number one was alex's berkeley best ice

[2:08:15] cream number two clark's ice cream best lunch place

[2:08:19] three third place was the lunch cafe best middle eastern lebanese restaurant

[2:08:24] number one the original mr kebab in berkeley

[2:08:27] best collision shop number two was berkeley collision best dentist dr

[2:08:32] dr sarah ruddy best dry cleaners number two was janet

[2:08:37] davis best eye doctor berkeley eyewear and

[2:08:40] local sunglass company best tattoo parlor number three was

[2:08:43] american pride tattoo and they were out at the

[2:08:47] chalk fest giving tattoos to kids that was very interesting

[2:08:51] [Laughter] our best veterinary clinic number three

[2:08:57] was berkeley animal clinic best bike store number third place was d bicycles

[2:09:03] best bridal store number one the wedding shop and number

[2:09:07] two jenna and white so we got the wedding business pretty well taken up

[2:09:10] here uh best candy store number two was

[2:09:13] sydney bog suite essentials best gift shop and boutique two was

[2:09:17] catching fireflies and three was yellow door art market

[2:09:20] best jeweler number three was matt gross jeweler studio best resale shop was some

[2:09:27] girl boutique that was every third place and the best

[2:09:30] unique store three was the twisted shamrock

[2:09:34] so we had a number of great businesses that showed up on that list and i'm

[2:09:37] proud of all of them on my last minute notes we're making a

[2:09:41] note that one thing nobody's talking about yet that i almost forgot is on

[2:09:44] saturday we had the grand opening of pinspiration down on cartwheels a new uh

[2:09:50] arts and crafts store so i take 20 years away mr mayor no that's

[2:09:55] fine i i'm glad and i also like to thank the berkeley

[2:09:59] chamber for their great efforts at the street rfs they did a great job

[2:10:02] and i'd also like to thank berkeley american legion post 374 for honoring

[2:10:06] public safety officer brian gather saturday in what we hope will be an

[2:10:11] annual event honoring the public safety officer of the year

[2:10:15] and my quote successful emergency management relies

[2:10:18] upon experience and expertise leo bonzer

[2:10:23] will you bring both thank you council member blanchard mr

[2:10:28] baumgarten uh thank you samaras i want to remind everybody that our newsletter

[2:10:32] comes out every month it is chock full of great information a couple of

[2:10:36] highlights this month outside of my bad jokes are the clerk's office represented

[2:10:40] by ms harold this evening did note that av ballot applications uh are being

[2:10:45] mailed out to the permanent list this week

[2:10:48] that is not to say the ballots themselves but if that's uh what you

[2:10:52] would like to do if you'd like to vote in that way

[2:10:55] that application makes you return that application in time so that you can get

[2:10:58] that mailed to you as well very convenient uh

[2:11:02] do it's uh fun to talk about election season until it actually gets here but

[2:11:06] we're still in that fun phase right now before the the work associated that

[2:11:10] really starts to ramp up next up our community development

[2:11:14] department has boxes all throughout the city each

[2:11:18] of our public buildings city hall the library the recreation department as

[2:11:22] well as public works all soliciting feedback and information on our

[2:11:27] draft master plan that's out for a 63 day period right now we only ask that

[2:11:31] you get those comments back to us by september 23rd

[2:11:35] but certainly take a chance read the documents understand the vision of the

[2:11:41] collective vision of the community as told by you the the residents that

[2:11:44] live here and that's how that's how we got to this point and that's how we will

[2:11:48] proceed as well so there's still not plenty of opportunity

[2:11:51] to to have your voice heard on that item and then uh last but not least the uh

[2:11:57] not just us but other depa apartments or uh community groups

[2:12:01] facilitates or uh the content that goes into that this document so you can read

[2:12:06] wonderful information from the chamber as well as the dda

[2:12:10] all sorts of fun fun information and the very last page gives a full listing of

[2:12:15] all of the different meetings and stuff that come are coming up in the month of

[2:12:18] august so keep in mind these are all public and

[2:12:21] in-person meetings once again so we'd love to see you come by and see what's

[2:12:25] happening not just at the council meeting but also the individual groups

[2:12:28] that make this city wonderful so that's my only item mr mayor thank you mr

[2:12:33] attorney uh mr mayor thank you uh nothing new to report this evening all

[2:12:39] is well when you say that that is a good thing i

[2:12:42] i appreciate that um

[2:12:45] i have a number of things but you're going to sense a common theme because i

[2:12:48] think just about all of them have been mentioned i do want to congratulate

[2:12:51] brian gothard as the public safety officer of the year and i want to thank

[2:12:56] the legion for putting that event together

[2:12:59] um ike and and the crew just a tremendous

[2:13:02] night for brian something that i think is going to continue in the future um

[2:13:06] but recognizing the public uh public safety officers in our community for

[2:13:10] what they do on a daily basis again these are true community police officers

[2:13:14] many of the things um that the the chief was speaking about in his introduction

[2:13:19] who has worse jokes than you might i add um

[2:13:23] you know was was not just about the life saving and and the typical things that

[2:13:27] we think about with public safety officers it was the times when brian

[2:13:30] stopped and played basketball with some kids or just interacted with people

[2:13:34] those are the things that really that people remember and that's that's how

[2:13:37] they form their perception of our community it's not just if you do

[2:13:40] something wrong they're here when you're doing things

[2:13:43] that are right as well and they want to be here and are part of the community so

[2:13:45] that was a great night certainly want to congratulate the

[2:13:48] chamber it was the first real city-wide event we've had in about a year and a

[2:13:52] half and it was

[2:13:54] tremendous it went off without a hitch to have the event but also the

[2:13:58] additional spacing this year i think also made other made folks feel more

[2:14:01] comfortable and being able to walk around

[2:14:04] you know hit hit some of the different booths and vendors there but also see

[2:14:07] the chalk art and do it in a way that allowed folks to remain socially distant

[2:14:11] and feel safe and comfortable out there um and as was mentioned pinspiration um

[2:14:17] also with the ribbon cutting uh that day as well where community meets creativity

[2:14:21] that is that is what inspiration is all about um and it's i imagine a place that

[2:14:25] my children are going to want to visit quite frequently

[2:14:28] um on the subject of

[2:14:31] cutting ribbons vibe credit union on july 21st actually officially cut their

[2:14:36] ribbon on their new branch it's not new but it if you have

[2:14:41] driven past it certainly looks brand new and if you've been inside it is

[2:14:43] definitely brand new a place that has not been changed in the 41 years that

[2:14:48] i've been around this community has seen a significant change

[2:14:52] and they they were able to cut the ribbon on the 21st it was relatively

[2:14:55] small um there had some executives there and their board

[2:14:59] of directors was there as well but on this wednesday they are doing an event

[2:15:02] for the members um in the afternoon on wednesday and i've been told that there

[2:15:08] is supposed to be ice cream there and if not

[2:15:10] please go inside and ask to see tamara she will certainly

[2:15:14] help you out um if there is not um also as mentioned cruise fest is

[2:15:20] coming up the art bash is coming up before our next meeting as well has been

[2:15:24] mentioned and hopefully another public safety golf

[2:15:26] outing for the one that was unfortunately cancelled rather last

[2:15:31] minute i mean and also again please remain

[2:15:34] vigilant there are new cdc guidelines now even if you are fully

[2:15:38] vaccinated recommending in public indoor settings when there's a lot of people

[2:15:43] packed in a substantial or high transmission risk to please they

[2:15:47] recommend wearing a mask also fully vaccinated people might

[2:15:50] choose to wear a mask if they live with folks who are

[2:15:54] immunocompromised or potentially at higher risk again this is coming back to

[2:15:57] recommending now even vaccinated folks if they want to to continue to be as

[2:16:02] safe as possible recommending that they continue to wear masks in those in those

[2:16:06] settings and for schools

[2:16:09] cdc recommends universal indoor masking for all teachers staff and students and

[2:16:14] visitors to schools regardless of vaccination status and i say that as

[2:16:18] well because school will be back before our next meeting and our district is

[2:16:24] following those same rules that were announced just last week

[2:16:27] that teacher staff students visitors everybody has to be masked regardless of

[2:16:32] vaccination status and i think that is the correct decision uh superintendent

[2:16:37] scott francis really his first you know big decisions getting really thrown into

[2:16:40] the fire here but i do certainly support that decision

[2:16:44] i don't know that he really could have made any other decision on him and the

[2:16:47] school board and i do support that and i think it is the the correct decision for

[2:16:52] all of our kids so they can safely return to school and actually have a

[2:16:55] school year that is at least more in person and more like you know

[2:17:01] school should be i think for all of the

[2:17:03] students and to the teachers

[2:17:07] another school year is already here summer flew by

[2:17:09] thank you for your service and what you do

[2:17:12] for all of our kids and and last year was especially difficult on educators um

[2:17:17] a former educator sure but my wife is an educator still and i cannot imagine how

[2:17:22] difficult it was for teachers to be making multiple sets of plans where

[2:17:25] virtually are we in person and still trying to

[2:17:28] educate the children to the absolute best of their ability in just absolutely

[2:17:34] unforeseen and unbearable circumstances hopefully the school year certainly goes

[2:17:38] better for them as well

[2:17:40] and with that i will ask for a motion to adjourn

[2:17:45] motion adjourn support motion to adjourn by council member baker with support

[2:17:49] from council member hennen are there any questions no there are not perfect miss

[2:17:53] harold would you please call the roll price

[2:17:57] yes baker yes blanchard yes dean yes gavin yes hennen yes turbrac yes

[2:18:04] the august 9th 2021 meeting of the 38th council of the

[2:18:08] city of berkeley is adjourned

[2:18:23] [Music]

[2:18:50] you

Berkley City Council Meeting - August 9, 2021

Transcript