City Council meeting. This television broadcast is brought to you by the local cable companies, the County of Kern and the City of Baker's Field. You can watch the rebroadcast of this meeting Saturday at 7 p.m. Sunday at 10 a.m. in the following Wednesday at 7 p.m.
You can download the agenda for this meeting at www.bakersfieldcity.us.
Presiding over this evening's meeting, the Honorable Mayor Karen K. Go.
Good evening. It's my pleasure to call to order the 515 regular City Council meeting of August 26th,
26th. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.
Here.
Council Member Aria.
Here.
Council Member Gonzalez.
Council Member Weer.
Council Member Smith.
I'm here.
Council Member Comin.
Thank you, and welcome to all of you.
Thank you so much for engaging in this civic process.
Tonight we have an interpreter for Spanish speakers,
and at this time I'd like to ask the interpreter to come forward
and very quickly let the audience know that equipment is available in Spanish.
Hola, muy buenas tardes a todos bienvenidos a esta reunión el día de hoy.
El día de hoy vamos a tener interpretación simultánea a través de la reunión.
Para accederale interpretación si tenemos el equipo justo atrás de la sala para que en
aún no ha recibido equipo, cuando usted tenga comentario público, vamos a venir al
frente con usted y acompañarle.
Muchas gracias.
Thank you.
And if you're here to speak during the public statements portion of the meeting, you'll need
to pre-register at the key asks, in the back, staff is there ready to assist you if needed.
And before we begin, I'd like to acknowledge that per staff's recommendation, public
hearing item 8A. That's the vesting tentative track map appeal. We'll be open and continue to
the September 16th, 2026 City Council meeting. While the public can still make comments today,
we encourage you to wait until that item is heard at our September 16th meeting.
Tonight, we have the pleasure of having Father Jimmy Melon, who's vicar at St.
Joseph's
for your service to our community. I know your churches actively involve and food drives and outreach,
and you just recently performed the wedding of our chair of the Keep Baker's Build Beautiful
Committee. That was a beautiful ceremony. Following the invocation, Michelle Antonji Ivani,
who is a senior at Garcis Memorial High School, will lead us in the pledge. Michelle is a forward
She's here with her mentor and advisor Peggy.
Michelle has a 4.8 GPA.
She's national honor society member who has participated in five
varsity sports over the last four years, including
golf, cross country, track, lacrosse, soccer, and tennis.
She's founder and president of the Uncampus Club got the dot.
She's president of CSF, president of helping hands, student council president, and vice president of the best club.
She's a leader of the Healthy Light Committee and the Interact Club,
link her leader, Italian club leader, blood cancer, United Junior Leadership Board.
She'll be asking you for money soon, and the got-to-dot off-campus leadership program.
to show what an incredible person you are, and we're just so proud to have you in our community.
Father, would you all please stand now?
Let us gather for prayer.
Almighty God, we give you thanks for the blessing of this community of Bakersfield,
and for the men and women who have accepted the responsibility of serving its people.
Grant Harris City Council the gift of wisdom and their decisions,
assist them in their service, and bless them as they work for the common good.
Bless the people of Baker's field, especially our families, our children, those who are most struggling at this time.
Mayor City of Baker's field continue to grow in prosperity, peace, and goodwill.
Guide all to participate in this meeting today that their deliberations may bear good fruit for our community.
We ask this to Christ our Lord, amen.
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.
Thank you.
Michelle would you like to officially introduce your advisor and you all may be seated.
Just introduce who that person is with you.
Okay, so to my left is, this is Peggy Rivera, she is the mentor and director of the Ford Dream Builders
and Dimension Program, which I'm very excited to be a part of.
And yeah, I look forward to getting to know her more throughout the course of the year.
Thank you so much. Thank you, Michelle Father. Thank you so much.
Here a few guidelines to help our meeting run smoothly. We request that you turn off your phones.
Please be courteous in the use of cameras and videos for safety reasons and as a courtesy to others,
no signs are loud in the council chamber or in the lobby.
A pause is allowed during the presentation's portion of the meeting only,
but not during other portions of the meeting.
Everyone in attendance in person or by phone is expected to adhere to the rules of decorum.
Establish by Resolution of the City Council. Failure to abide by the city's rules of decorum, including any disruptive
behavior that interferes with our ability to have an orderly and efficient meeting prevents
the city council from conducting the business of the city. Consider this a first warning to everyone
participating that conduct that disrupts this meeting may result in expulsion and or the chambers
being cleared. The favor that disrupts the meeting includes repetitive statements, shouting,
hate speech, interrupting staff or presenters during the meeting, speaking out of turn,
outbursts from the audience. Telephonic participants are expected to adhere to the same rules
today, as those attending here in person. Madam Clerk, next item please.
Please presentations item for a proclamation to Leslie Bloomquist and Mary Stanley of Baby Cafe Monica Delos Santos of Clinical Serivista Wick Marissa Reynoso Ortiz and KT Reynoso of Community Action Partnership of Kern Wick and Terriva Porter of the Kern County breastfeeding coalition declaring national breastfeeding month in Bakersfield during August 2026.
Thank you, strengthening breastfeeding support and resources promotes healthier beginnings for children and families and contributes to the health and well-being of our community.
It's my honor to read this proclamation.
Whereas August is recognized nationally as national breastfeeding month and observance that raises awareness of the importance of breastfeeding and the benefits to infants, mothers, families and communities.
And whereas breastfeeding provides infants with essential nutrition and protection, contributing
to healthy growth and development while also benefiting the health of mothers and whereas
organizations and professionals throughout Bakersfield and Kern County, including baby
cup-baby Bakersfield, clinic SCR this week, community action partnership of Kern WIC and
Kern County breastfeeding coalition worked year round to connect families with breastfeeding
education, support, resources, and services. And whereas the City of Bakersfield is committed
to supporting children and families within our community. Now, therefore, I, Karen Gomez,
the City of Bakersfield, do hereby proclaim August 2026 as National breastfeeding month
in our city and encourage all our residents, community organizations, health care providers, and
families to recognize the importance of breastfeeding education, support, and resources.
It's data, this 26-day of August. It's my honor to be able to present this proclamation.
Good evening, Mayor, council members, and staff. My name is Marissa Reno, so, and I'm the
WIC program administrator with CAPKM. Thank you for recognizing national breastfeeding
and for joining us in celebrating the benefits of breastfeeding for mothers, babies, families, and our community.
National breastfeeding month reminds us of the important role breastfeeding plays in supporting the health
and well-being of both mothers and babies. The American Academy of Pediatric recommends breastfeeding exclusively for the first six months
and continuing breastfeeding alongside solid foods through age two and beyond.
It is also a time to recognize the incredible efforts of mothers who often through sleepless nights and busy days remain committed to nourishing their babies and giving them the healthiest possible start in life.
Their dedication, perseverance and love deserve to be celebrated and supported.
Today, I am honored to stand alongside our partners from Clinica, Sierra Vista, Baby Cafe,
and the Kernan County breastfeeding coalition as we work together to support and power
and advocate for breastfeeding families throughout Baker's field.
Thank you again for your recognition and commitment to the health of our community.
At this time, I would like to invite Reva to share a few remarks.
Thank you, Marissa.
So, my name is Reva.
and IBCLC and the co-chair for the current county breastfeeding coalition. Our coalition brings
together community partners to provide breastfeeding education, lactation support, resources,
outreach events, and advocacy. Through compassionate support and collaboration, we empower
parents to reach their breastfeeding goals while promoting the message that breastfeeding is natural
and important.
This world, this 2026 world breastfeeding month theme is rise, strengthen with works.
Together we're strengthening families, educating and creating healthier beginnings for
all of Kern County, and I'm going to pass it over to Mary.
Good evening, everybody.
My name is Mary Stanley, my name is Mary Stanley, I'm speaking to you on behalf of Baby
We are a non-profit 501C organization providing cost-free professional breastfeeding support to our community and beyond.
It is imperative that we recognize breastfeeding is a biological norm and create an environmental culture that makes it easier for mothers to breastfeed in public, breastfeed their babies in public and have access to breastfeeding support is needed.
Multiple health care organizations, including the American Academy of Pediatrics,
who, which is the World Health Organization, recommend exclusive breastfeeding for six months
and continue breastfeeding for two years as complementary foods are added, and you just heard that.
Increasing breastfeeding rates is a public health issue.
The more babies that are breastfed and the longer they feed at breast, they healthier the community.
is there are many, many health care benefits
to both mothers and babies.
Thank you for your consideration of recognizing August,
2026, this world breastfeeding month,
and improving this proclamation.
And I'm going to introduce, I think it's Monica.
Is that right?
Okay, there we go.
Thank you, man.
You're welcome.
My name is Monica de Los Santos.
I am the breastfeeding coordinator
with Clonica Seravista.
Breastfeeding is one of the first and most powerful gifts the parent can give their child.
In current county breastfeeding support helps families build a healthier future by improving outcomes for babies and parents alike.
When we promote, protect and support breastfeeding, we strengthen not only individual families, but our entire community.
Together, we are investing in the health, well-being and success of future generations.
Thank you.
One, two, three.
Ladies and gentlemen.
Then we'll clear it next item, please.
Presentations item 4B.
Proclamation to Giselle Guerrero, President and Claudia Guerrero, Vice President of Gigi, the warrior, declaring childhood cancer awareness month in Bakersfield during September 2026.
Colleagues childhood cancer is one of the leading causes of death for children in the United States.
Each year nearly 16,000 children between birth and 19 years of age are diagnosed with cancer.
Every three minutes, a family hears the devastating words that their child has been diagnosed with cancer.
It's my honor to read this proclamation.
Whereas cancer knows no boundaries affecting all ethnic and social economic groups.
And whereas increase awareness and research will help educate the public on early diagnosis
and provide readily accessible clinical care to patients in need and whereas dedicated
health professional agencies and organizations have made it their mission to help children
with cancer and provide educational emotional and financial support to their families and
whereas children deserve the chance to dream big, discover new interests and live to their
absolute potential while fighting the disease.
Now, therefore, I Karen Gomez, the City of Bakersfield,
do hereby proclaim September 2026 as childhood cancer awareness
month in our city and urge all residents to join the city
in reaffirming our commitment to fighting childhood cancer
dated this 26 day of August.
Judy, I know you've been through some, sorry,
I mean, you've been through some challenging times with, um, with, G-G-N-O, and so inviting you now to
office them.
Thank you so much for your support.
Good evening Mayor Go, members of the city, community leader, friends, and everyone else who's
here today.
Thank you, Mayor Go, for recognizing September as Childhood Cancer Awareness Month.
This parking lot means so much to our family and to every family who has heard the words
your child has cancer.
For our family childhood cancer isn't just a cause, it's our story.
On February 14th of 2019, our world changed when our daughter Gigi was diagnosed with leukemia.
Gigi spent two and a half years going through intense treatment.
There were difficult days, scary days, and days where we simply had to take things one day at a time.
But through it all, Gigi showed us what strength courage and faith looks like.
Today I am very grateful to say that Gigi is a childhood cancer survivor.
As Fred is saying, to watch her move forward, I also know that her story is only one.
Their children currently fighting cancer, family sitting in a hospital room, and parents praying for the same outcome that we were blessed to receive.
That is why our awareness matters, September gives us an opportunity to make childhood cancer visible, to work gold, to talk about it, to support research, and to support the families and most importantly to make sure these children are never forgotten.
The goal represents childhood cancer awareness that, to me, it also represents hope.
DJ is living proof that there can be a life after childhood diagnosis.
Her journey has inspired our family to turn experience into a purpose and to continue advocating for the children and families affected by cancer.
So this September, I ask everyone to go goals with us, not just for DJ, but for every child fighting, every survivor and every family who has walked the journey.
Thank you.
Thank you so much for using your voice, Fiji's voice, and we're proud of presenting.
We're now moving on to public statements.
In keeping with Council's resolution, the public statements portion is divided into two
periods.
There's a period for items listed on the meeting agenda and items not on the meeting agenda.
Additionally, pursuant to changes in state law, the City Council will now accept public
statements via phone and in person.
Statements for items listed on tonight's agenda are given a two minute time limit 10 minutes for participants by phone and 10 minutes for person in person participants 20 minutes total per agenda item the consent calendar is a whole constitutes one agenda item
Statements regarding items not listed on the agenda are given a two-minute time limit,
ten minutes for participants by phone, and ten minutes for in-person participants,
twenty minutes total.
If you have written comments that are longer than your verbal statement,
give them to the clerk who will give copies to the council.
If you're here to make a public statement,
please register using the kiosk in the back of the chambers where you entered
staff or available to assist if needed.
We ask that you select whether you're here to speak in an item listed on tonight's agenda, or in a matter not on the agenda.
Speakers who do not identify specific agenda item will be presumed speakers for the non-agenda portion, and will be called during the non-agenda portion of the meeting.
If you're here on consent calendar, public hearing item 7A or 7B or public hearing item 8A, that's the diamond farming company on vesting tentative track map appeal.
Now, it's not the time to speak.
You will be given an opportunity to speak when those items are called later in the meeting.
Mental clerk, do we have any public speakers for items not listed on the agenda?
Mayor Go, we have received four requests to speak by phone and 21 requests to speak in person.
We will take the phone speakers first.
There are only two by phone currently connected.
The first speaker will be Alejandra Garcia, and as you can tell by that
At number of speakers, we're going to run out of time, so I would ask that you make your comments
succinctly, and we'll try to get in as many people as possible. Also, this is only our third
time using this new system, and so if we have a few challenges, we're just going to give
each other a great sign, and I hope you'll do that also. Madam Clerk, first speaker, please.
to cost baby sales, including any baby sales to build out here,
save your neighborhood.
We're here to remind you that we want the setting to succeed in creating a general
plan that works for every part of baby sales, not just the field.
We have read with the data
that is in the map show
to 20 years between
the two babies,
the
population, the families, and
the technical stuff in this
office continues to lead
Graclie, I'm sure you will.
Don't worry.
Thank you.
Thank you for your time.
Thank you.
This is García.
Next speaker please.
Let me look.
Diary.
Esther.
Diary.
Yes.
Diary.
at a state and healthy neighborhood committee.
Since then, not committee has been being twice,
but has yet to approach the topic of block.
Meanwhile, we need to address things.
We also the town hall allowed one day and over 50 people showed up
to learn more about this technology
and to share their own concerns.
City Council members may air by fair staff
and the big deal of police department
were notably absent from the student
and informative discussion.
In fact, instead of engaging in direct dialogue with us,
BPD has been busy taking shots that are concerned in the media, and in some cases has given
them information that directly contradicts what they have told us.
BPD allegedly has a call to be requiring officers to include case numbers and false database
queries.
And yet, the long we've received, show many entities that lack supposed to be required information.
According to this kind of fappy, the Department regularly audit database searches, but
We submitted a CPRA request.
We were told that no flood causes it.
The public deserves transparency, accountability, and a voice as to what the biggest
ability police department and the city uses to monitor us.
In our town hall after we freeze like constituents once their voice is heard.
Will you live in?
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Dyer.
Next speaker, please.
Just a reminder.
A pause is not allowed other than during the presentation's portion.
And we know that you're passionate, but we'd just ask that you be respectful.
Thank you.
Madam Clerk, next speaker, please.
Council member Gonzalez.
Thank you, Mayor.
Mr. Cleg, if I can't, I want to make a referral tonight that we reach out to Ms. Dyer
and have a conversation, I believe I made a referral over a year ago regarding the use
of lock systems and the protocol that should be established.
I think it's important that we address this concern with our community members and have
this conversation with them.
I am sorry, I was not aware of this community meeting, and I'm sorry, I missed it.
But would hope that the city manager can have a conversation with these community members.
Thank you, Council Member Gonzalez, Madam City Attorney next speaker, please.
Mayor Go, we're moving on to the in-person speakers next.
The first speaker is Denise Garry Pandel.
Good evening to you, sir.
Denise Garry Pandel, thank you very much.
I appreciate the opportunity to be here.
Thank you.
I want to raise the issue of the rule of law resolution.
I'm asking tonight that it be brought before you on the agenda and there be an up-and-down vote.
What is it concerned?
The resolution, the rule of law resolution for the public who doesn't know, has to do with the issue of sanctuary city status.
I think it's very concerning that you're hiding behind, I believe, political considerations,
as opposed to not putting it on the agenda and having an up and down vote.
I remind all of you that you are elected to be representatives within a Constitutional Republic.
And therefore, have the duty under the rule of law to respect and honor the Constitutional Clause in Article 6 that goes to the Supremacy Clause.
The supremacy clause makes clear that federal law and constitutional law Trump or take precedent under local or state law.
Therefore, since you all took an oath to uphold the Constitution, you're holding a constitutional trust as an office holder.
And that constitutional trust means that you have a responsibility above all else to put the protection and safety of every individual in the community and their property first and foremost.
It's part of our declaration of independence, it's part of what our founding father said in the Declaration of Independence when he wrote
that we are all given in A U in a moment of rights and among these are the right to life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness
which actually refers to the pursuit of virtue.
So this is part of what's woven into our constitution and it's a critical that you put the role of law
Thank you, Mr. President.
Thank you.
Next speaker, please.
Natalie Santa Maria.
Welcome.
Please introduce yourself.
Good afternoon.
My name is Natalie Santa Maria.
I am a promotora.
And I'm here.
I'm a representation of my organization.
I'm here to talk about the general plan and to make a two request.
One is that in support of inviting the city of Acreshow to collaborate with the coalition that's being formed to do community forums.
So that we can allow community members, especially those that are monolingo and Spanish to understand what the general plan is.
The draft was being proposed and have an opportunity to have some input.
Again, we're willing to work with the city.
I know we've been very successful in the past,
so I hope that this leads to that collaboration
and having creating those spaces,
especially in East Bakersville.
With that, I will also like to request
that an environmental justice chapter be allocated.
I know it's included some environmental justice,
it's included in the quality of life.
However, linked to SP,
Senate Bill 1,000, we are asking the environmental justice chapters, standalone be created.
There's a lot of this advantage as you've read between the East and the West and the
expectancy of life.
We have very high asthma rates here, along with Valley Fever, and a lot of that is due to
the infrastructure and historical decisions that have been made.
So again, we look forward to continuing the conversation in that collaboration with the cities
so that we can create this forums.
And we can also look to a way of having an environment
to just this chapter, stand along for this general plan.
Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Santa Maria.
And I'll close next speaker, please.
Abby, power.
Welcome, please introduce yourself.
Thank you.
Good evening, Mayor and City Council members.
My name is Abby Power.
I work with Leadership Council for Justice and Accountability.
And the comments I'm sharing tonight
reflect feedback from community members
and fellow organizations.
I would just like to ask those who are supporting
or comments to please stand so that the City Council can see all of your support.
And so what I wanted to show is a map of disadvantaged communities in Baker's field.
If you look at that map, you'll see that almost all of East Baker's field communities are designated as disadvantaged.
According to Calen virus green, many of these communities also face a pollution burden that is higher than 90% of all census tracks in the state.
You'll also see that there are very few disadvantaged communities on the west side of the city.
This map displays what many of you already know that the city's lower income communities and communities of color face a disproportionate pollution burden in Bakersfield.
But what is the reality of facing a pollution burden this high?
It contributes to worse health outcomes and lower life expectancy.
According to a map in the city's existing conditions report, the majority of residents of East Bakersfield have a life expectancy that's between 57 to 78 years,
which compares to a life expectancy for residents of West Bakersfield that is on average between 78 to 97 years,
which is a huge difference.
SB 1000 requires that the general plan
contain an environmental justice element
or policies integrated throughout all other elements.
The city's current general plan does neither,
it includes a quality of life chapter
which states that it contains many of the plan's EJ policies,
but this is not a dedicated EJ element
and EJ policies are not woven throughout all other chapters.
The general plan also does not take enough meaningful action
to reduce the unique and compounded health risks
faced by disadvantaged communities, which SB 1000 requires.
So we're asking the city to show a commitment to reversing the harm of previous
planning decisions by creating a standalone environmental justice element that
thoroughly addresses all components of SB 1000.
We would also like the city to conduct bilingual community workshops as
participation and feedback is crucial to creating policies that address the needs
of disadvantaged communities, which is a requirement of SB 1000.
Soly publishing a technical document on the website does not do enough to facilitate
President input and it has not been published in any language other than English.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Then, click next speaker, please.
Rod.
Guys.
Welcome.
Oh, thank you.
Good evening, City Council.
After July 15, my name is Rod.
Guys, G-U-I-C-E out of in South West Baker, Seattle, and a resident, so proud to be here.
After July 15, City Council meeting, three Council members made calls for sanctuary city
policy and it's truth act for him. In response at the August 5th meeting, I was proud to submit a resolution by Dr. Angela Fraser to designate Baker's field a rule of law city.
And I urge the council to act on it. Unfortunately, there's been no action and this is a little disappointing.
And I don't know where sanctuary city policies stand or proposals stand, and then they might come back.
So, I'm here today to urge the Council to introduce the rule of law city resolution.
Adopping this resolution is your opportunity to produce something tangible.
It avoids the waste of time money and resources that are truth-act forum would incur.
It mitigates the accelerating cost of sustaining a growing population of foreign nationals.
A rule of law city resolution would also show that we honor our veterans who fought to provide
we have, that we honor everyone who legally became citizens, that we uphold federal law,
and that we align with other California cities who have the courage to oppose sanctuary
city policy, such as Santa Clarita, Corona, Huntington Beach, and more, as well as cities
in Texas, Florida, and Iowa. America is a nation of law and most citizens agree to support,
defend and obey the law. This is your opportunity to show the citizens that you stand with us.
President Harry Truman said progress occurs when courageous,
skillful leaders seize the opportunity to change things for the better.
This is the opportunity. I urge one or more of you to please stand
and champion the rule of law city resolution. We, the people, are not going away.
Thank you for your service to our community. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Guys.
Next speaker, please.
Reverend Dr. Angel Frazier.
Well, thank you.
Thank you, my understanding that you all have a copy of the rule of law.
Mayor City Council members, thank you.
My name is Reverend Angela Frazier.
Thank you, Council members, Zach, for your previous actions regarding the putting
or table in of the sanctuary of policy.
We're the same when I play.
Hey basketball and Germany, it was a good news. And it means enough is enough. Current and former city and state elected officials
have confirmed that a table issue may be reconsidered or resurrected later. Adopting a rule of law resolution can help prevent that sanctuary city proposal from ever returning.
have we moved so far away from the fundamental principles of our Constitution that we
can no longer stomach the idea of the rule of law. The Constitution and your
oath of offers must guide your action anything less undermines them both. I
ask the City Council to place the rule of law on the agenda or and up and down
Thank you for your consideration.
Thank you, Reverend Frazier.
Next speaker, please.
Lytion Andrade Kapilino.
Welcome.
Thank you.
When I started this may your go and city council members.
My name is Lytion Andrade Kapilino.
I'm a resident of Southwest Bakersfield Ward 6.
Volunteer with Leadership Council for Justice and Accountability
among other organizations, social advocate, and proud
daughter, and granddaughter of immigrants.
I'm here tonight to speak to you about the Bakersville
General Plan, something I love about this city
is the joy we have in coming together in community.
The countless events around the city,
the way we show up to support each other,
and the hope we have for a healthier and more
beautiful Bakersfield.
When we think of beautiful cities,
there are a few things that instantly come to mind,
trees, fresh air, walkable areas and places together in community. That is the vision I have for
Baker's field. Clean air is a right, not something earned. The disproportionate rates of pollution
in the disadvantaged areas of Baker's field is the deep concern and to be taken seriously.
Environmental and respiratory concerns are leaders of health issues in Baker's field.
Air pollutants lead to health issues such as pneumonia, asthma, heart disease, lung cancer,
and more.
The general plan must include actions to appropriately zone the city and reduce harmful
pollutants as outlined in SB 1000.
SB 1000 is the law requiring that the general plan in cities with disadvantaged communities
aim to reduce harmful pollutants associated with health risks.
I ask the city to commit to including a standalone environmental justice element in the
general plan that thoroughly and clearly addresses the components of SB 1000 as has been
done by other cities leading the way to reverse the harm in disadvantaged communities.
I was here a few weeks ago with the ask to actively engage with the community. I think you
for extending the date for community comment. However, at this time we are still waiting for
Spanish and Pujombe translations and active community workshops and engagement. It is also a
requirement of the plan to be transparent and include community feedback. I asked the bilingual
workshops are held and the disadvantaged communities around Bakersville so that all residents
can provide feedback and actively participate. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Andrade
Kepelino. Can some Americans else? Thank you, Mayor. Thank you so much for your comments tonight.
And I just want to thank all of the community members who have joined us this evening to talk about
the general plan and to offer up some of your ideas. I need to do some research on some of this.
But I do want to say a couple things, one is there was a map that was presented tonight and we did not get an opportunity to review that map.
So if you will please bring it to the city clerk so that they may make copies.
I think we do have copies perfect because I would like to review that map and respect the fact that you prepared that for us.
And I think the full council should be able to review that. Thank you so much.
The other thing is, I do think that we ought to prepare documents in multiple languages,
including Spanish and Punjabi, and so I hope that we can work towards that goal and ensure
that future outreach meetings are bilingual or, in some cases, trilingual so that we can
reach out and have meaningful conversations with many of our stakeholders, but as somebody
who's been working in East Baker's field and tried to revitalize the east side for 20 years now.
You know, this is a big passion of mine and something that's dear to my heart and would like to see
many more East Baker's old residents and families participate in this process as we look towards
the future of our city. Thank you. Thank you, councilmember. Madam Clerk, next speaker please.
I want to address concerns I had with the Fox cameras that are all over the city.
I'm not necessarily anti-police both my experience growing up in biggest field.
I do not trust information and master railings will be used ethically by our law enforcement
and officials. We're already seeing examples nationwide of law enforcement using information
recorded by flood cameras to track and stock personal contacts. And I don't know how I
control a speaker's field to be any different than the other examples. Those in favor of
the flood cameras claim it to be an extension of their patrolling, but it does so at the expense
of the public's right for privacy. Statements such as you're fine if you're not having
nothing to hide or as long as you aren't doing anything wrong, you'll be fine or not encouraging
when our government is actively changing what is considered wrong and unacceptable.
And in regard to our officials and law enforcement saying,
Float cameras have helped them solve the accumulated crimes.
Hearing this is not encouraging statements like this make our enforcement sound incompetent
and they can't do the job without the use of master valence that are being pushed on us or the use of AI.
Once again, I'm not necessarily anti-police.
I do appreciate seeing if our officials and law enforcement could develop
It's fine against Float cameras moving forward. Thank you.
Thank you Mr. Philanty.
Next speaker, please.
Maria Stalkup.
Welcome, please introduce yourself.
Good evening, my name is Maria Stalkup.
I'm here to talk about Float cameras.
I've lived in Baker's field for almost 20 years as a private citizen,
and I believe that still means something.
I am a private person.
I raised both of my sons here.
Worked here and kept to myself for these 20 years.
This is the first time I've ever been to a city council meeting,
but I felt compelled to be here because of this issue.
I've never been arrested and I have a clean background.
So why must I be surveilled by flawed cameras?
When I drive around, I see endless amounts
of cyber junk cluttering in our street corners and parking lots.
Until recently, I thought that I was the only one
who didn't understand why these were here.
That is until I started reading about flock.
It turns out that people all over the country
are wondering the same things that I am.
Where did these cameras come from and why?
In growing numbers, members of the public
are rejecting this technology.
Some are taking the time to come to City Council meetings like this one.
Some are meeting to discuss with one another and many are discussing it online.
Here are some quotes from people within my own neighborhood of Northwest Bakersfield
from our neighborhood app.
My truck was stolen 41 days ago from the parking lot.
Home Depot and Rose Del Highway.
I failed to report immediately and my truck still has not been located.
Just saying these flat cameras are not all that great.
The flat cameras aren't really going to help normal people.
They're to protect businesses and sell your location data.
these block cameras are BS, these are looking for expired registrations.
I think that the lawsuits will come from this will cost us far more than the benefit from them.
What is block stand for? Makes me think we are a bunch of sheep that need to be hearded.
These are the quotes that I've received from this app.
Over all our community members do not seem to understand what block cameras are for.
Why would they? They were put into place without prior approval and no oversight or voting on the matter.
At the very least, why is the search data not being audited by the city?
How are we to trust our local law enforcement with the information they are collecting when we have one of the most core up and it is documented police forces in the country?
Until this corruption is brought under control, we cannot justify mass surveillance like this.
Thank you.
Madam Clerk.
Next speaker, please.
Brandon Bane.
Welcome, please introduce yourself.
Hello, I'm Brandon Bane.
I'm here to talk about Float Cameras in the city of Biggsville.
Since 2024, 155 cases of misuse of Float Cameras have been noted.
You say countrywide by law enforcement and non law enforcement individuals mainly use
to stock ex-partners, current partners, and just random individuals.
In 2025, Johnson County Sheriff's Department text is used, roughly, to roughly 68,000 cameras
among 6,000 networks, to locate a woman who is trying to get legal health care in an abortion
and another state where health is illegal, but that is legal.
These cameras are invasions of privacy, they are down their harassment, many of us feel like we are being constantly harassed, we feel like we're being surveilled.
In the words of Benjamin Franklin, those who are willing to sell a little bit of their freedom for a little bit of safety deserve neither, and I ask you please to review and honestly end our contract with flock and to remove these cameras as soon as possible.
Please, and thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Paine.
And Madam City Clerk, our final speaker,
Jason Supriano.
Please introduce yourself.
Good evening. My name is Jason Supriano.
Yesterday August 25th at Norse Middle School dismissal,
Officer Chrisman ID 1199 cited me for parking behind
a line of other parents while picking up my son.
Before she even spoke to me,
drivers who saw parking enforcement arrive began erratically accelerating through the parking
full of children and effort to get away from her.
I followed an internal affairs complaint, and I'm contesting the ticket, but that's not what
I'm here about.
I'm asking for a written answer from the city manager and the police chief on whether Bakership
Police Department has a policy governing parking enforcement during active school this
missile while children are walking between vehicles.
Because yesterday, the way that enforcement was being conducted didn't make dismissal any
It caused panic drivers to accelerate through, which should have through an area full of children.
And it also turned, but it should have been a normal pick-up into a police matter.
That's what I'm asking the city to examine.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Piranha.
And so this ends this portion of our meeting.
This is the a lot of time you're welcome for those of you who didn't get a chance to speak
to come back at other meetings to write to us.
but thank you for being here to participate.
Madam Clerk, do we have any public speakers regarding items listed on tonight's agenda?
And if you're here to speak on items listed under consent calendar item six, deferred
business item 10A, that's the Interfund loan or new business item 11A, Clean City Special
Project Funds.
Now is the time to speak and the clerk will call for speech.
It was 11 a and I didn't tell them it was 11 a.
Okay, thank you.
So go ahead and sit down.
We're going to let for those of you who would like to leave at this point.
This would be the right time to leave.
And so we'll just give our guests a moment to leave.
And then just for the city clerk, if you heard Mr.ologists,
it's for 11 a.
Mayor Go, we have received 12 requests to speak on the consent calendar, one by phone and 11 in person, and then we've received four requests to speak.
I apologize five requests to speak on new business item 11A, one by phone and three in person.
The first, it looks like the individual who signed up to speak by phone has not connected.
We will start with the in-person speakers for the consent calendar.
The first speaker is Karina Funes.
Well, please introduce yourself.
Good evening.
Honorable Mayor and members of the Bakersville City Council.
My name is Karina Funes and I am the Policy Manager at Blue Zones Project Bakersfield.
On behalf of Blues on Project Baker SEALS, I want to express our sincere appreciation to the city of Baker SEALS for taking this important step towards creating healthier, safer and more welcoming parks for our community by moving towards smoke free parks.
We are grateful for the city's leadership and for the collaboration with the city manager's office, city attorney's office and our city council members.
Creating smoke free parks is an important investment in the health and well-being of Baker SEALS residents, families and visitors and we are excited to see our city take this step.
In 2024, blue sounds project bakers still began conducting tobacco litter cleanups at Park's
throughout Bakersfield.
Unfortunately, we found tobacco litter at every park we visited and observed adults smoking
in front of children.
There is not a single park across any of the seven wars that was immune to tobacco litter.
We frequently found the most litter around ventures, picnic tables, and parking lots.
Because of what we have seen firsthand through these cleanups, we do have one small recommendation that we believe could help strengthen the policy and ensure its intent is clear.
We respectfully ask that parking lots be explicitly included in the language, or that including be changed to including but not limited to.
This would help ensure that smoke free protections apply consistently throughout our parks and that areas such as parking lots are not unintentionally left open to interpretation.
However, we want to emphasize that this recommendation comes from a place of support for the policy and appreciation for the work the city has already done.
We are very excited about the direction the city is taking and are grateful to see Baker's moving towards healthier smoke free public places.
We look forward to continuing to work alongside the City to make Bakers with a healthier, safer community where we can all live longer better.
Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Punez.
Madam Clerk, next speaker, please.
Crystal Burgess.
Welcome, please introduce yourself.
Good evening, Mayor Go, council members, and city staff.
My name is Crystal Burgess.
I work in tobacco prevention education.
I advise a youth coalition that advocates against tobacco and serve as a member of the tobacco free coalition of Kern County.
I want to be transparent about that connection, but tonight I also want to speak from personal experience as a mom and as a family who spends a lot of time in Bakersfield Parks.
I've been a mom for over 10 years, and our family uses parks for birthdays, tea ball, walks, community events, and just spending time together.
I actually have more than 500 pictures of our family at Bakersfield Parks. I don't smoke, but my children can still encounter secondhand smoke and tobacco product waste when we're enjoying these spaces.
The issue is especially personal to me because a few years ago my daughter stood here in this very room as an underage young person who purchased the vape.
She came here and advocated for a stronger tobacco retail protection protections and we are grateful that the city ultimately passed the tobacco retail license.
She leaves for UC Davis next week and I know she would be proud to see your hometown continue that work by making sidewalks athletic fields playgrounds recreational areas and public buildings within parks smoke free.
I also ask the Council to consider including parking lots and other areas associated with these facilities to not leave the policy open for interpretation.
We see a lot of smoking and tobacco litter in those areas as well.
Please also consider clear signage and cessation resources for residents.
So it residents understand the change and people who notice tobacco products where they can find support.
This isn't about judging people who smoke, it's about making sure families can enjoy public spaces without exposure to smoke.
And to back away, if we can spend hours at a restaurant or sports arena without smoking, I believe we can do the same at our parks.
Thank you for taking this important step towards health and your cleaner parks for Bakersville families and future generations.
Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Berges.
And all the best to you as you go to UC Davis, young lady.
Next speaker, please.
Bernardo Ochoa.
Please introduce yourself.
Good evening, Mariko, city council and city staff.
I'm here tonight as a chair of the Tobacco Freak Coalition of Current County.
On behalf of our coalition, I would like to sincerely thank the Bakerfield City Council
in the City Stafford considering this amendment to Section 125650, which could prohibit smoking
in all areas of public parks. This has surely been a collaborative effort involving our community,
multiple agencies across Current County, and our coalition partners who care deeply about the places
our families gather in play. Some of our first conversations regarding the need for
smoke-free parks take place with council member Eric Arias. As a long-time supporter of
our work, coalition does, there are conversations at the safe and healthy neighborhood
committee. We sincerely thank you. We are, we encourage to see our community voices reflected
today's proposed amendments and reflecting cities ongoing commitment creating a healthier,
safer, and clear bakers field. So our children, seniors, and families are free from exposure
to second-hand smoke. We strongly support this proposed amendments. Education and awareness are essential
to successful implementation and signage can help ensure that these changes are understood and
and a brace by our community.
We are proud to stand alongside the City of Bakersfield
as a longstanding partner in this work.
The tobacco free coalition of current county
is committed to supporting the public education,
social media outreach, and community awareness efforts.
Thank you for your leadership, your partnership,
and your commitment to making biggest field
a healthier, beautiful community.
Thank you for your time.
Thank you, Mr. Chowa.
And I'd love to want to hear for the council.
Thank you, and our City Clerk will get that and get it out to the council.
But a clerk next speaker, please.
Union, the North of the Domingo,
to manage the Lune,
so you can disparate in our team.
My office in the 60s,
Junior Avenue,
Queen Pactado,
the House,
we call it the Police.
The House of the Police,
the House of the Police,
the Vickers, and the V26,
one, six, eight,
seven, six, zero.
We call it the Police
to respond tomorrow.
Mircoles, entre las diez de la mañana, las cinco.
Hoy, eso es a trescientos pies del novescientos uno,
y unio la abenio, el histórica, y unio,
abenio, una ruta noventa y nueve.
Los miembros, los mismos trescientos pies que caminan clientes,
niños, a diario.
No estamos en contra de la ayuda de ayudar,
estamos por para proteger nuestra cuadra.
Solcito,
una tolerancia,
sero tolerancia en unión hábino,
24 horas,
los siete días de la semana,
dos el protocolo de respuesta rápida,
tres,
no a campar,
me rodear,
aquí en tus pies,
cuatro una junta de seguridad
antes aprobada.
Please, here is the expedient that I am the head of yesterday at the 3.48.
Please, I'm going to show you the next expedient that I am the head of yesterday.
Thank you.
And now, in top of your thesis,
you can put it on the phone.
Good
evening, Council.
My name is Leicisa Lovano, and I have a business on 600 June and I have a new item here.
because of the project of the 30 unit shelter that you do have on 901 Union on Sunday evening heading in to Monday.
There were gun fires on our block. Might office at 600 Union Avenue was hit. It was impacted.
And we did call Bakersville Police Department. The case number is 26-168-760.
We did call the police department and they will respond till tomorrow.
Wednesday between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m.
Today,
I am here to say that this was at 300 free from 901, Union Avenue, the Historic Union
Avenue on Route 99, the same 300 feet that customers and children walk every day.
we are not against helping people. We are, we are also wanting to protect our block. I formally
request number one, zero tolerance on Union Avenue 247. 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Two, I asked for rapid response protocol, three note camping or loitering within 500 feet
And for a public safety meeting before approval, please, I do have my file here that I did submit yesterday at 348 PM.
I ask that you also add annex e to the file that I did submit yesterday. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Lafinal.
Tell some of the Americans else.
Thank you, Mayor.
And thank you, Ms. Lamano for coming today and speaking to us.
Thank you for your phone call also a few days ago.
I hope to meet with you in person soon.
And I do want to take up your recommendations.
I think you have a lot of good ideas.
I definitely think there needs to be a zero tolerance
on Union Avenue.
We were heading the right direction.
We had BPD code enforcement and many others out on Union.
and we did some proactive work to address some of those issues.
But I think that was over a year ago,
and I think we need to do some more consistent work
on Union Avenue, is ongoing.
But let's face it, I mean, the reality is
is that Union Avenue, it has been an issue for decades.
It's taking us a long time to get to this state.
It's going to take us a while to get out of it,
but we need to start this work.
And I'm encouraged by some of the investment.
I know it's a little solace to you right now given the immediate issues, but there is some private investment also in the area.
We're working with some private developers to bring new resources and amenities to the area, including a potential supermarket, not going to wood.
I don't want to overstate the possibilities here, but we have been working on things in the background to try to improve the condition of union avenue.
But I 100% agree with you, we ought to get more aggressive in this area.
And I want to make a referral tonight to the city manager that we bring together the
departments who are most responsible for public safety along this corridor, including
BPD and code enforcement and others that may not be obvious, may be even the park
Rangers in some respects, that we bring them together so that we can develop a proactive
and consistent strategy to address these issues on Union Avenue.
And the last thing is there are residents, there are business owners, there are people in the community who really care about Union.
There are families who live in and around Union Avenue who deserve safe neighborhoods.
And it's really unfortunate that there's this perception that Union Avenue is somewhat, you know, second tier to the rest of the city.
We have to reject that notion, and we ought to bring our community members together, business owners, property owners, family members, residents.
Let's come together and have that safety meeting.
That Ms. LaVano has recommended.
And let's have a conversation about what we can do collectively to make this particular corridor much safer for all parties.
So thank you for being here tonight.
Thank you, Madam Clerk next speaker,
please.
Welcome.
Please introduce yourself.
Denise Gary Pandell, just real quick.
The reason why I came up to speak on this issue with respect to the minutes is because
there was a mistake made by the city clerk's office with respect to the minutes.
And it clearly pointed out that I supported a sanctuary city status, and that was
brought to my attention the other day, and I just wanted to make sure that the
was corrected, and I wanted to make it clear to the public, as I stated before, that it is a
via sanctuary city status, is a violation of Title 8, Section 1132 of the Federal Code. It's also
would be a violation of the Supremacy Clause in Article 6 of the Constitution, and basically
in light of the fact that there's been over tens of thousands of murders, just murders alone,
not counting human trafficking, fentanyl, drugs being brought into the country, cartels, fraud,
other crimes, petty and major crimes.
It is really inappropriate for the safety and security of the public to allow illegal immigration
based on the law.
Aside from that, I pointed out for the record during that last meeting we had on August 5th
that the good people in Washington DC had.
And I made an effort to provide everyone who broke the law and entered the country illegally to have $2,500 plus a free ticket back to their country of origin. And I made that clear. And I also made clear the federal grounds by the Department of Justice and the Department of Transportation that those federal grants would be withheld, and that other monies would be withheld from those cities in any state, in the Union, that embraced a saying that,
sure a city. I also made clear that it was just respectful to the people of this country who came here
lawfully. So thank you, Ms. Garrett. You're welcome. Thank you for coming with the record.
The correction has already been made. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.
City Clerk reached out to you and informed you. Thank you very much. Thank you, City Clerk.
Next speaker, please.
Mayor, go. I just want to note that we're allowing the additional 10 minutes
since we had no phone speakers connected?
Yes, go ahead for today.
Natalie Santa Maria.
And just encourage all of you to be as succinct as possible.
Hello, again,
Natalie Santa Maria with visionic compromiso.
And my comment is in regard to your amendment to section 12.56.050.
Thank you for this amendment to prohibits smoking in parks.
I am here also as part of the Tobacco Free Coalition, which you all know that most of
you know that we've been working for many years along with other organizations to pass several
resolutions.
So I'm here to thank you.
I know we present it and also we have the promotoras that went to the last safe and healthy
neighbourhood.
some of them are here. Some of them work connected through phone, but I guess they couldn't just figure out the system.
But again, thinking you in that effort, we're looking forward to looking at how enforcement is going to look.
Some signage to in the parks will be very helpful and some education. We're also including parking lots.
Again, we're looking forward to collaborating on that education, something when something new arises right in our community.
and we want to be as proactive as possible and also want to mention that Hamat here with Grimfield
walking group, which you all know it's also looking forward to collaborating with that
education in the parts that you all know she has a passion for that. So again, thank you
and looking forward to working with you all. Thank you, Ms. Santa Maria.
That'll clerk, do we have additional speakers?
Recordo del Hoyo.
Welcome, please sit and issues yourself.
My name is Recordo del Hoyo, and I'm a proud resident of Ward 1.
Shout out to Councilman Arias.
Good afternoon to Mayor Go and Council members.
Before I get into agenda item 60.2, I'd like to take a moment and
take the City Council for extending the public or
March period for the 245 General Plan Update.
However, after a careful review of the proposal on the general plan update something seems
to be missing, and that's measurable change and action plans.
I too hope all communities can rise together, especially underserved communities.
You see, I grew up in Bakersfield.
I attended local schools.
I graduated from Calcy Bakersfield.
And although much has changed, some areas and some statistics have not changed.
Neighborhoods in Southeast Bakersfield have less than 1% tree canopy shade, areas with severe heat exposure and lackluster infrastructure.
This has been the case since I grew up and continues to be true today.
I applaud the resolution on approving the application for the Climate Bond Grants Fund.
Yes, we need more trees in downtown, but we also need more trees outside the downtown corridor of Ward 2.
I asked to revisit the listed area for this grant application and extend coverage, past California Avenue, past Brunnage Avenue, past 58, past Bill Terrace, to truly amplify and beautify the Chester to South Chester corridor,
with trees, greenery, and green pedestrian corridors.
Thank you for your time.
Thank you, Mr. Delphoyol.
I'm a clerk.
Next speaker, please.
Lawrence, Salceto.
Welcome. Please introduce yourself.
Hi. Hello.
My name is Lawrence Salceto.
Junior.
I am a proud member of the Cholone Indian Nation.
I'm also here representing with tobacco free current
and my place of
I'll can see back at Southern American and Health Project.
We are here in support of the Smoke Free Parks and the ordinance that is going out.
We do, I'm very thankful for customer areas for hearing this at the 16 healthy neighborhoods committee,
especially as a Native American tobacco is a very spiritual and traditional medicine for us.
So we do want to make the distinction between traditional tobacco and commercial tobacco,
virtualized tobacco, which is the heavily processed industrialized version of it versus the traditional
spiritual tobacco, which we use in medicine, which we use as gifts in which we use in prayer.
So please make that consideration when moving forward with these more free parks. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Salcito. Have a quick next speaker, please.
Josie Sarulo?
Welcome, please introduce yourself.
Council members here, our cry.
My name is Josie Sarulo.
My family owns a strip mall at 600 Union Avenue.
And Laticia has run a successful business there
for over seven years.
She pays taxes, employers locals,
and wants to stay.
But the constant business interaction
From the chronic offenders is forcing her at other tenants to close their doors.
The plans for this project offers an onsite fence, but a fence does nothing for the neighborhood businesses within a four-block radius.
Our area is already hurting from high crime, open drug use, vandalism, fights, threats to store workers, open sex, threats to customers,
lowering constant storefront trouble. The list goes on and on. The city cannot just fix housing
for one group of people, while causing financial burden for the local businesses that pay taxes
and provide local jobs or they will leave and this will cause more empty buildings in the area where half
the stores are already shut down.
True compassion requires balance.
If you move a high risk group here, you must protect us.
We demand that the conditional use permit
legally forced the developer to do eight things
for the life of this project.
First, pay for 24-7 security guard,
Looping our streets and alleys within a four block radius.
Second, install high definition cameras
that link right to the police.
Third, gifts security and police immediate power
to remove trouble bankers.
Fourth, give businesses owners fast, trespass for them.
We'll get you time to set.
Please bring your comments to a close.
Do one more sentence.
Do not approve this project without securing
in our businesses first. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Swivel. Next speaker, please
Madam Clerk.
Guadalupe, Sylva.
Ms. Sova, Guadalupe,
doesn't look like she's here.
Would you just go on to the next person, please?
Magnus, Lightborn.
Welcome, please introduce yourself.
Thank you.
Good evening, I'm Mayor Go, City Council members.
My name is Magnus, Lightborn.
Representing Ripple, Fibre, California.
I'm here with our chief legal officer, Joshua Ornion.
I just wanted to let you guys know we look forward
working with you to bring this high speed fiber optic internet service to the
underserved areas of the city. And we'd like to do it in the most
invasive manner as most non-invasive manner as possible. And I look forward to
working with you guys and thank you for your cooperation.
Thank you Mr. Viper.
Mental click next speaker please.
Mayors and next four speakers are in person regarding item 11A. The first speaker is
So this is on the Clean Cities Special Project Fires.
It was possible.
So sorry.
I would like to give my time to the residents who are here to speak on this.
I was just supporting.
So I'd like to go to the residents first.
Then, of course, please call the next speaker.
Thank you.
Nures Torres.
Well, thank you.
My name is Nures Torres.
Adra desco al consejal eerix harías por escuchar nuestras inquietudes y tomar en cuenta las necesidades de nuestra comunidad.
valoramos su atención y esperamos seguir trabajando juntos para mejorar nuestra ciudad.
También queremos solicitar su apoyo para que los ayude a realizar una investigación sobre unas personas que están inquietando nuestro vecindario.
I want to thank you for
listening to our concerns, we want to talk about an issue that we have been having in the community.
We've greatly valued your attention in our efforts to be what a better our community.
We also want to ask for your support to be able to do an investigation regarding some
people who are concerning our communities.
There is a man who lives in a lot that has been abandoned by the community who has a
weapon.
And I would like to establish a meeting so that we can go over the details.
Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Torres, and Councilmember Ares.
Thank you, Mayor.
I just want to say thank you to Ms. Torres.
Thank you, Nudies, for everything that you do for your community.
I was a pleasure just a little more than a week ago.
Being out there in your neck of the woods, getting to walk the community
and see all of the many challenges that you all are navigating.
So my heart goes out to and I just want you to know that we certainly hear you.
And we want to do right by the community, but we couldn't do that without you.
So thank you for your advocacy.
And I want to like to ask, actually, our city attorney,
if I could get your help to reconvene our,
I'll call it a task force addressing some of the neighborhood level challenges
and some of these bakers filled that we get a bigger police department
and the city attorney's office together to meet with no reason
to talk about some of the safety challenges there.
Thank you.
Thank you, Councillor Biber, R.E.S.
And then I'll clear next speaker, please.
Johnny, a log is.
Welcome, please introduce yourself.
Hello, my name is Johnny Ologas.
Take the timer.
I was here for something else.
I actually flock and 11A.
One of the issues with the dump site that was out in,
I believe it's word one if I'm correct, is I heard that they were trying to put cameras out there to find these individuals that were dumping the trash.
I am now trying to be solution-based and one of my proposals is instead of finding these individuals that dumped the trash.
How about we open the wood site for accepting trash?
So the wood site, I believe it's Tuesday through Saturday from 8 a.m. to 330.
My brother actually called me on Monday, he was going to take some wood from his house,
some tree trimmings or whatever, and he couldn't get to the wood.
He's like on Monday. He says, is the wood side open? I said, no, it's not. And so he's like, I don't want to go to
Bina, the line fill, right? Which you guys, I don't know if you know where Bina is. And so what ended up happening was my brother turned around when back home, right?
And he wasted his gas. And as we know, gas is really expensive right now. So my account, you know, I'm going to ask Zach, if you can please look into this, because we have a lot of trees in our area, a ton of trees.
We're about to go into that season where I will probably take two trailers full of trees
of just my art is just a ton.
So I will ask Zach to look into that.
But I will ask, you know, I will tell Eric, you know, as far as the camera suggests, I think
that's just a terrible idea.
I think we should provide solutions and look at why people can't take the trash or their
tree trimmings.
Let's be more proactive about it and ask the community members.
I work in the trash industry, so that's how, you know, so anyway, the other thing is
Sanctuary city. Let's do it. You guys suck.
Thank you Mr. Ologos and next speaker please
go. That was our final speaker. Thank you next item, please
Yeah, yeah
We need a break at this point to think. So let's take a break for 10 minutes and
And we'll be back for more city business.
Start gathering together and if we could have staff in the back to close the doors, please.
It's close enough to 10 minutes.
Council Member Coleman, we're ready to start.
Let's all sit down, please, so we can continue the meeting at 647.
Madam Clerk, would you please read the next item?
The staff member was provided transmitting corrective minutes for item 6A1, item 6F3,
transmitting correspondence, item 6F15, correcting the item title, and also please note
that item 6E1 contains a staff recommendation to adopt resolutions, approving salaries
and benefits for specified units.
Thank you, and we've had a request by Councilmember Smith to poll 6C4, and is that just a number two Councilmember?
That is correct.
Okay, thank you.
And I don't see any other requests for item to be poll, Councilmember Gonzalez?
Motion to approve consent calendar with the exception of 6C4.
Okay, thank you.
The motion please catch your votes.
The item is approved with the Council Member, we are voting no and Vice Mayor Corps absent.
Thank you. And Council Member Smith has six C4.
Thank you, Mayor. This is the item that addresses the smoking in public parks.
And I think that's a good thing to move away from smoking in public parks, but reading the original ordinance.
I also noticed that it also prohibits bicycles and unicycles, and I think that all of our
children have ridden bicycles in parks, and that we should, since we are kind of cleaning
this ordinance up that we can go ahead and allow bicycles and unicycles in parks, so I
would make that change to this cleanup ordinance.
Thank you.
You have a motion?
Please catch it.
Oh, Council Member Arias.
Thanks, Mayor, really quickly.
I just wanted to thank the advocates for their work on this item.
They brought it back to safe and healthy neighborhoods.
Not too long ago, I made a wonderful presentation,
and I just think this signifies the continued work
to make sure that we're creating these community spaces
that are smoke free for our children.
Thank you so much for the work on this.
I also want to take the recommendation that we explicitly
call out that our parks are also smoke free zones.
I have not had a chance to look through the entire document itself, but I would like to
make that ask that we make that explicit.
Thank you.
It's so you have a motion to approve six C4.
You have a motion to discuss your votes.
The motion is approved with Council Member Weere Voting No and Vice-Mere Corps absent.
Thank you.
Next item, please.
Consent calendar public hearings, item 7A, public hearing to consider the planning
Commission's approval of General Plan Amendment and zone change number 23-0560 and it's proposed
mitigated negative declaration.
Item 7B, public hearing to consider planning commissions approval of General Plan Amendment,
zone change number 25-008 and it's proposed mitigated negative declaration.
Thank you. It's time for the consent calendar public hearings as the clerk said. The purpose of this section is to
Out on all the items listed under consent calendar hearings in one motion without further comment. If anyone would like to speak on any of the hearing items listed, the item must be removed from the portion of this agenda. If an item is removed, it will be placed at the end of the regular public hearing portion of the agenda.
So, at this time, I will open consent calendar public hearing item seven A, B. Is there any one of the
audience who would like to request that a hearing item be removed from the consent calendar?
If so, please come forward. This isn't the time to take testimony. Only remove the matter from the consent calendar hearing.
Mayor, go. We did receive a request to remove item 7A from the consent calendar public hearings.
Thank you. And then does any council member wish to remove any other item?
Right. So at this time consent calendar public hearing item 7B is now closed.
And do we have a motion on that?
Mayor, I'll make a motion to adopt consent calendar public hearing items 7B.
You have a motion? Please, test your votes.
The item is approved with Council Member Core Absent.
Thank you, next item, please.
Hearing's item 8A, public hearing, public appeal hearing of planning commissions approval,
investing tentative track map number 7451 phased.
Macintosh and Associates representing Diamond Farming Company is proposing to submit sub-devide
40.77 acres into 313 single-family residential lots. One multi-use trail lot and one
parklot and the R2 small lot single unit dwelling zone located generally southeast of all of
Drive and Santa Fe Way. Sierra Club appealed the planning commission decision,
developer Tom D from RFG properties ink requested the public appeal hearing be opened and
continue to September 16th, 2026 since they are negotiating a settlement with the appellate
Sierra Club. I'm sorry did we skip seven A? We'll come back to that at the end of the hearings.
Okay.
So for the public hearings each side will be allowed 20 minutes. It's 20 minutes for all
speakers per site 10 minutes for in-person speakers 10 minutes for speakers by phone. It's
important that you identify yourself, make your statements distinctly so others may speak.
If there's testimony on both sites, each side will be allowed a 10 minute rebuttal. There's
clock on the TV screens behind me, which indicates 20 minutes when you're called on,
please identify yourself. You may ask questions during your statement, but they won't be addressed
until the public hearing is closed. If you've written comments that are longer than your
statement given to the clerk and shall provide copies to the council. Please be courteous to
others who wish to speak.
So at this time, public hearing item 8A is open. Before we begin,
I'd like to acknowledge that staff recommends that we open and continue this public hearing
to the September 16th, 2026 City Council meeting pending negotiations of the settlement. While
the public can still make public comments today, we encourage you to wait until the item is heard
on September 16th.
Madam Clerk, do we have any speakers in opposition or in favor of this item?
Mayor, go.
We have not received any requests to speak in opposition or in favor of this item either by
phone or in person.
Thank you.
Next item, please.
Don't we need a motion to continue?
Yes.
We do need a motion to continue.
I would like to make that move.
Councilmember Smith made a motion to continue this item.
You have a motion, please cast your votes.
The item is approved with Vice-Mere Corps absent.
Thank you.
Man, a clerk next item, please.
Item 7A.
Public hearing to consider the planning commissions.
Approval of General Plan Amendment and zone change number 23-0560.
And as proposed, mitigated negative declaration.
and click what about 8B.
Somebody made this mistake.
All right, there is no 8B.
All right, we're on to 7A Council Member Smith.
Are you the one who pulled it initially?
No, somebody else did.
City manager, click.
Mayor and Council are a developer.
Our developer can just give a quick summary of this.
Pending any questions and response to those that wanted
to have this item discussed separately.
Even Council members, what we have in front of us is
Jerome Plano Amendment, 230560,
property owner, ATG, and investment LLC.
Projectscription and the Jerome Plano Amendment
has owned change for 24.8, eight, six acres,
the project intends to develop 6.36 acres commercial land
on northern person the property,
and the project intends to develop 18.5 acres
as a multifamily residential
on the southern person the parcel.
Conceptual development plans have been submitted for a commercial person, but no
development plans have been submitted for the residential portion at this time.
Located in the southwest corner of Tafht Highway, Ash Road, in Ward 7.
Seco-Doculate is an M&D.
Plank Commissioner proved this project until I 16th, no speakers in favor or opposition
at that hearing.
Stack recommends the project has been found consistent with general plan policies and
city zoning ordinances requirements for these reasons, city staff recommends
Approval of the Journal of Plan and Amendment and Zone Change for Project 23, 0.560.
Thank you.
Copy.
So at this time, public item 7A is open.
Then we have a request to speak on this item.
Mayor Go, we've received one request to speak in opposition to staff's recommendation.
and go ahead and call that speaker.
Use the draw, Osby,
is that person in person,
or was that specific on the phone?
There go the request was for in person.
Thank you.
And I don't see that she is present here.
My assumption, Mary, you know, if I may,
is that it may have been another item besides this item
that was made perhaps mislabeled.
OK.
Thank you.
And so, does anybody want to make a motion on this item?
Councilmember Smith.
I'll make the motion to approve.
You have a motion on seven A, please catch your votes.
Out, the curing is closed.
Now, you have a motion.
There's some interesting music coming from somewhere.
Staff, so if you want to attend to that,
did you already vote?
The item is approved with Vice-Mare Corps absent.
Thank you.
Next item, please.
Item 10 A. Interfund loan to complete the acquisition of 1430 and 1440 trucks in Avenue
pursuant to Council approved purchase agreement.
Thank you.
Sorry, Margot. There was a blue memo prepared for this item. Transmitting an updated resolution.
Thank you, Madam City Clerk. Mr. Cleg.
Thank you, Marron Council. As we jump into this item, I will remind your council that this
This was before you in March of this year earlier.
Your city council approved a purchase and a lease and purchase and sale agreement contingent
on a due diligence period for this site.
We'll walk through the background again on this because it is a large decision and large item.
But in quick summary, this project really was initiated out of an effort to save our operating
dollars to gain efficiencies and to focus on a long-term solution to a need that we had
that was costing us more dollars than made sense for our operations.
to
be clerk, I'm having a hard time making this advance.
Thank you, Mr. Marcus.
So again, this goes all the way back to 2021.
We were in a mode where we were in the process of hiring
100 police officers as well as some support staff in the police department.
We had significant space challenges.
We did a space planning study.
I identified future space needs,
but also we did not have the capacity at the time to address those with the expense of new
build projects. And so we were in a position where we needed to lease office space to house
our growing police department. And we also did citywide office space assessments in 23 and 24,
but we have been leasing space in a building that is outside of our downtown core since 2021,
And those lease payments have been escalating up towards last year.
It was $900,000 and next year we anticipated to be over a million dollars for those lease payments.
At the time, there was limited suitable office space in the downtown core,
but the council all the time approved that move out of the urgency that we had,
but gave direction to try and look for long-term space back in the downtown core at some point in the future.
So, there were multiple properties that were assessed in 2024 and 2025 to think about those
long term needs.
We found that the trucks in tower became a realistic option in 2025 and started the process
of doing the analysis and approaching the property owners.
And again, there's a unique opportunity that this move will offer a significant savings while
addressing that long-term space needs into the future.
Just in summary, there is an immediate savings of $350,000 a year of our operating
dollars and after the payment for our internal fund loan that would represent a savings
of more than a million dollars a year after the 12-year term of that loan.
This is just an oriented, again, council and community to where this location is.
It is the taller tower portion, as well as that orange color, they're labeled 11 and the parking garage behind it.
Significant parking space to the advantage of the tenants of the building, the city, and ultimately our parking enterprise that will make that parking available in the evenings to customers downtown and to expand our enterprise beyond
are current parking garage.
This is mostly for the public record to just reflect the space and where we're going to
initially occupy space for the police department, so we're moving the police department
into three floors of office space and one floor, the ground floor for some training space.
And that is already subject to the lease agreement as approved by Council, but as we move
with purchase, then we would still occupy that space, but it is 122,000 square foot building
that allows us to have many other tenants that help to pay for the net operating cost of that building.
And that gets us to the rationale. Again, it gives us the opportunity to
manage our timing and our costs and our space needs while getting a long-term solution.
We don't need to occupy the entire space.
We can slowly over time as our community grows, and we have additional needs to serve our community.
Community to potentially occupy additional space, but we don't have to. And having those lease revenues
come in to help again with our operating costs as a huge advantage. And in particular, it was the
a very expensive, least payments that we're able to eliminate and consolidate staff and it also
improve our operational efficiencies. Again, note the number of parking spaces is significant
and it is in the heart of downtown and positioned very close to City Hall that allows us to
continue to move forward and work in closely together as City Team. And we just note
lastly that we were able to have a favorable purchase price given some of our market timing.
and that the value, which we're purchasing,
this is significantly below the appraised value,
and again has multiple long-term tenants.
We completed our due diligence period at the end of July.
We saw no red flags, there are not any facility issues
that aren't beyond what we would consider regular maintenance.
We did through the process identify some of those maintenance needs
that are going to come up in the next five to 10 years,
and that's important and valuable. There are a couple of smaller issues that we're agreed
to be addressed before a close on the property as well as some consideration for our maintenance
costs in the first year because we do anticipate needing to do some maintenance in year one.
We already had a $425,000 deposit on this property that would go towards the purchase price.
And we are underway in the planning process to move the police department in as we had made the choice that we would either lease or purchase moving forward just to get out of the other lease costs that we're facing at the other location.
So again in short summary after our due diligence staff is recommending that we move forward because there are new issues that suggest that we shouldn't acquire the building.
A
few more, I think just valuable reflections on why we feel this is such a move for the city.
The existing tenants have a very stable rental income stream.
You see that there on the screen.
There are a variety of different tenants and varying lease agreements,
but several of those are also long-term tenants.
We do have about 21% vacancy.
the average vacancy for office space in downtown is closer to 6%
citywide, it's closer to 8% and so we think there's work we can go
due to acquire additional tenants that would help us continue to offset our operating costs.
The performer that's before your council does not include assumptions of additional revenues
from those leases. We took a conservative approach and it's based on current plus one
that's based on a notable letter of interest that has been issued to occupy that space.
And so any additional space that gets least only helps improve our net operating, which
already, again, achieves that $350,000 savings per year.
But also very importantly, the preserve is a very important building in the core corridor
for trucks and preserves our economic activity downtown and again that phased city expansion
as needed. These are numbers that were provided in the administrative report and these
are the numbers where I'm giving you, again, our lease payments were going to be over a
million dollars a year in this coming year. Our total payments for debt service against
this Interfund loan would be $636,000, which is why I'm saying that the million minus the
$366, that's your $350 I rounded down, $350,000 in savings every year, and those payments
that we're making from our capital improvement program each year, free up the operating dollars
on the police side and they go towards the acquisition of this long-term asset.
So instead of growing money away to a lease that didn't result in any long-term asset,
this now does put us in a position to have acquired this long-term asset.
Lastly, I noted earlier that we had a space that we could continue to lease.
These are just some square foot estimates and some conservative estimated lease revenues that could come from those additional spaces.
And as you'll note, that would significantly again increase that revenue and notably decrease the amount of capital dollars that would need to go towards debt service each year.
And we feel that several years into this payback of our
inner fund loan that we're likely to be in a position
or the full debt service is being paid by the net operating revenues from the building.
There are actually still two options in front of us.
There is the option to move with purpose and to close by the end of this month.
And that would represent a significant savings.
say $100,000, and I don't see any reason not to move now, if we chose to exercise our
purchase option at a later date, the price would change notably, and our deposit, again,
has already, where past our due diligence period, the deposit has gone hard and we would not
get that deposit back if we don't move forward. And again, significant savings with the early exercise
option that would recommend in front of you. This is a lot of numbers but we wanted to be
transparent and demonstrate what our debt service payments look like. Again, this is a 2.5%
interest loan over 12 years. At the same time, we're using some of our capital facility reserve
about $2.5 million in total and we're going to pay that back over the next five years to make
that that is restored as a and I probably should have done this at the outset I apologize
it did not. As a recommendation to use an Interfund loan what this means what we're doing
is we have reserves in our equipment fund that we're going to borrow against or borrowing
against our own reserve dollars. But it's at a 2.5% interest rate because we don't want to
lose a value that our reserves would have gained had they been invested in the market. And so
we always invest our reserves and this represents a five-year average of what our reserve interest
income has been, and that 2.5% is a fair way to make sure that we're not losing money in our
reserves by making this interfund loan. Some might question why do we choose this particular way
financing. It's far more cost-effective than going out and trying to loan or bond in the
private markets because you have to pay higher interest rates. You also have to pay transactional
costs. And it's in the scope at $12 million. It's in the scope that our interfund reserves
can handle. We can't do larger projects that might be tens of millions or a hundred million
But we have a reserve that is over $100 million in our equipment fund and we have a
54 million dollar unrestricted reserve in the equipment fund.
And so this is about the right size for us to do a very meaningful project that's going to
save us a lot of money and a short time frame still make that equipment fund whole again.
So, that is our recommendation from you, the City Council, a 12.1 million dollar
fund loan, that we would appropriate those to our capital outlifund and appropriate
the remaining 2 million from the capital facility reserve to our capital outlifund.
It's a total of 2.5 towards this project from the capital outlifund.
The other 425 is the deposit that we already made, and without them, I'm happy to answer
any questions.
Thank you, Mr. Klig.
Council member Gonzales.
Thank you, Mayor, thank you, Mr. Collect, for the presentation. We've had a lot of conversation about this. I just want to for the sake of over the benefit of the public
Ask a few questions, and then I wanted to ask a couple of questions for my
Benefit number one is you know, we talk a lot about inner funds, but that that may that may be jargon for
You know, my constituents people in the community
What I think what we're doing is correct me from wrong, but we're borrowing from ourselves in the sense
that, you know, we have a general fund, which most people refer to as the city budget and
most folks when they come to council and they talk about their priorities for the city,
will be typically referencing the general fund. This is where most of our sales tax,
property tax revenue goes into is where we earn and how we spend money. But we also have additional
funds, additional separate funds that are not co-mingled,
that are, in fact, separate.
And these funds include the City Equipment Internal Service Fund, the Capital Outlave Fund,
and what we're doing is we're borrowing from those particular funds that can only be used
for certain purposes. Am I right so far?
Yes, that's correct, Councilmember.
And I would just reflect really quickly.
You are correct.
We're borrowing from ourselves.
The equipment fund is a dedicated fund that is separate from the general fund,
and the dollars that go into that equipment fund actually come from the general fund,
and several of our other funds.
But they have to be protected only for the use of purchase of equipment.
But again, as a healthy reserve sits over there,
it's an opportunity to borrow against that from ourselves, but because it is dedicated to
specific purpose, it does have to be paid back with interest. So when we say that we're saving money,
we are saving money because today, we are spending money on a current lease agreement for space
that we need for big, so police department, and we pay a million dollars annually. And where do
those funds come from? Thank you, Gunsmart, that is coming out of the general fund, the savings that we're
achieving is going to be to the general fund.
So we will, because we have to pay ourselves back
within these additional, these other funds,
we will be saving $350,000 a year,
and then in the 13th year, then we will be saving $1,000,000 at least.
Because these lease agreements, they don't get cheaper
over time, just like my rent.
It's only gotten more expensive.
of, you know, the lease agreement will likely be even more expensive in the future. Is that right?
That is correct. It's a conservative savings of a million dollars a year. It will only increase
over the life of this loan payback. So over the next 12 years, we'll be paying 12 million dollars
if we choose not to pursue this. That is correct. The other thing is, the thing I really like about this project
is that it, you know, it occupies a building that currently has a 21% vacancy rate.
You mentioned there's a current 21% vacancy rate.
Is that including the anticipated use from Baxle Police Department in the city?
When police occupies it, there will still be 21% vacancy.
Got it.
but we are already having conversations with potential tenants in anticipation of the city's
purchase.
Absolutely, and it has been actively marketed, I think it's fair to know that, but also
we feel that as the city enters the building, as the owner, and as an attendant, there
may be some tenants who look at that and make some considerations, but we also think some
potential tenants would see that as an attractive relationship.
We'll leverage all of our relationships that we have as well to make sure that we can fill
that space as much as possible.
Great.
The second to the last point, parking is a huge benefit because parking is limited in
downtown.
It is one of the most controversial issues in downtown Bakes, given its scarcity.
How much does it cost to build a parking structure?
I think you can count some member, and I'm hearing count some of it to build a parking
structure depends a little bit on the size of course, but a parking structure that would
be 300 plus stalls as a 323 stall parking garage could be easily $50 million dollars.
It built.
50 million dollars to build a new structure.
Correct.
Yeah.
That's not going to happen any time soon.
At least with the city of Vegas, we'll give an hour current in this way.
So I think this is a good move even for that.
And then my last point is, tonight we're also considering an item related to a vacant property
that has seen many code violations, and we know all too well in this city.
What happens when buildings remain underutilized or even vacant?
It becomes a huge liability to the city because we have to expend resources by way of
code enforcement, police department, fire department,
and else becomes just a nuisance to the surrounding
community. There are a lot of negative externalities
related to some of these buildings that unfortunately
are in the urban court. There's just a higher concentration.
And the thing that I've always worried about is to see
this building fall into disrepair and to see many of the
and it's leave as a result, and then whoever the future owner is seeing them not really caring for this property.
And it becoming the major liability for all of us in this community. And so I think this is a really big win for not only the city of Bakersville, from a business perspective, but also for downtown and for the future of downtown Bakersville. So I'm going to make a motion tonight that we approve this. Thanks.
Thank you.
Councilmember Bessier-Tosh.
I don't.
We have to borrow.
We have to be interested in money that we borrow from money count, Randy.
That's like a, that's a mandatory thing.
Good evening.
Councilmember.
That is really a best practice.
So what we did is we built this interfund loan policy based on other comparable cities.
And it really is, because it's an enterprise fund,
it really is the proper approach.
Those funds are really belonging to the Equipment Fund.
And so we want to really return those dollars
with what they would have earned if they would have
been made in an investment fund.
So that's really best practice.
Thank you.
That's, I promise you right now,
I want to ask you any more question.
That was the only one.
So the freezing and vocabulary behind the conversation that I just listened to was a little
bit bothersome to me because it's not our money, it's taxpayer money, we're going to pay
interest on tax, we're going to pay interest with taxpayer money on tax payer money for
something, I just, I mean that makes me sick to my stomach, we're going to pay interest
on taxpayer money, because we're not making money by investing it, that just sounds so
backwards to me. We're going to take more money from the people to pay for the money we already
took from the people. That doesn't make sense to me. This is going to be so much more costly.
It's a 1974 building every year that goes by in my life, and I'm not even a building. I break down
and cost more. I can only imagine what the floor space to this, that parking structure looks like.
I think it would be very cheap to have parking if we tore it all down and had a gravel
lot with striped lines, the current kind of fair, it would cost maybe half a million dollars,
but this is going to cost so much money and in a time when we're listening to people that
have businesses on union that are getting shot up and we can't do anything to help with that
or we're trying to create gel bed space but we're moving real slow, I don't understand
And how we can allocate money to anything outside of fixing the problem that is plugging business owners that are coming here on a Wednesday night to speak and begging for help.
I just, I don't support this.
I think it's going to cost so much more money.
I don't understand how we're going to pay interest on taxpayer money by taking more money from the taxpayers.
But, you know, that's those are my comments.
Council
Member Coleman.
Thank you, Mayor.
So I wanted to address two things.
I wanted to first address this interfund transfer
because there's people been out there talking about
how it's some kind of accounting trick
or we're doing something shady.
The interfund, first of all,
That air fund that we're going to borrow the money for,
that's the Equipment Fund.
Can you please tell me where that money in the Equipment Fund comes from?
Yeah, I think it comes from a moment.
The Equipment Fund, by the way, is principally vehicles,
although there are a few other large value pieces of equipment
that we include in the Equipment Fund,
but we're not talking about equipment like shovels and rakes.
This is high dollar value equipment, and so that equipment fund is funded by almost all of our funds.
So some of it comes from the general fund, some of it comes from our other enterprise funds.
But because they're coming from other enterprise funds, let's say it comes from the water fund.
Those are protected dollars, right payers, paid those dollars, and so that's why we feel
it is appropriate to pay back the interest on that loan because it is a best accounting
practice to account for each of these funds distinctly and openly, and I think I'll read
a little bit into your question as well, Council Member Comin, which I think is a good question.
In our annual financial reporting documents, we report on each of these funds independently.
They are accounted for separately independently, and those dollars are collected from each
of the other funds to buy all the equipment we need across all of the funds.
But again, that is one of our funds that, of course, it represents the value of all of
that equipment.
And so if we had multiple large pieces of equipment that went out, and we had to replace those,
That's where our reserves come in, but we have a fairly healthy reserve by comparison there.
And so it is available for the Interfund loan, but it needs to all be
a documented and accounted for very clearly these are separate dollars.
Okay. So first of all, this is not new to the city of Baker's field.
That is.
All right. We've done it before.
That is correct. We have.
Because I remember in the redevelopment days, we did that from time to time to make some
of the middle-creek projects and that kind of thing work.
As all that has been, many have been repaid, you know.
It has, I think, as it relates to the redevelopment fund, of course, there's, you know, when
state shut that down, there were lots of complications, but of the city's
interfund loans, yes, all that has been repaid back.
So this is something that's a recognized, and I
deal a little bit of my own research on this.
I just kind of wanted to make a comment about this, because there
have been people out there saying that this is a county
districts and this is recognized by the California state controllers office and they have
a very strict rules on on this.
It's is common for municipalities to use in her fund borrowing.
That is correct. It is very common and also the government finance officers association has a set of
guidelines that govern this as well as the state of California.
Okay, and can you tell me what the balance is in the equipment fund right now?
The equipment fund balance, let me pull that up.
I'm plus from minus the.
It's it's about a hundred and twenty million dollars and unrestricted is about fifty four million dollars.
So we're going to be taking the unrestricted amount correct.
Correct.
And so what will the balance be after we borrow the money?
Sorry, Council member.
I have to put on my head.
If Mr. McKee can you have it off the top of your head,
you're free?
I do have it.
Well, it's 50, you say it's 54 million.
We're going to bar 12.
So, 40 points.
It's a simple matter.
I could have done that.
I can look at my notes.
I guess my question then becomes,
we're still going to have 40 million dollars in a cow.
Are we going to need this?
We do not believe we do. In fact, we did some analysis and we have a very high level of confidence that we'll be able to back any equipment purchases that we need to over the full 12 years of this loan repayment with the
I think I made my point about the Interfund loan, Interfund borrowing.
It's been done. We've just cities of Pickersfield has done it frequently in the past.
Other communities, California and outside of California use this practice to finance deals.
It's a good way to do it because you don't have to go out in the market.
And you mentioned that you would have to pay broker fees for somebody to put a bond out and that kind of thing and then you would probably have a higher interest rate
So I like the interfund borrowing as a as a tool. I like the fact that we're not talking putting it out there for 30 years
We're going to pay it back in 12 years and frankly if you're going to have some operating
games, then you might be able to pay that down sooner, but I didn't want to talk about the
deal itself because in my history of things I've done, I've done these kind of real estate
analysis for investment groups and we've gone and assessed the property to make a buyer,
to buy or no buy recommendation.
And so, to me, this is not a spectacular real-state deal.
You know, yeah, we'd like to be buying it for less.
But it's a solid deal.
And it's a defendable deal.
And it pencils,
even without making any assumptions
about being able to knock that 21% vaccine factor down to 6% that's just going to be money in the bank.
And we have an appraisal that supports a value above the purchase price. Correct?
That is correct. Okay.
There was some concern about the the high cost of utilities,
but there's been some progress in that correct. Yeah, I think you can't remember this
question that is also correct that there have been some energy efficiency measures to switch
to LED lights throughout the building, but there are a couple additional energy efficiency
projects that we think we could invest in to further lower the energy costs.
I guess I want to make a point we're not buying a vacant building for us to use all the space.
So, it has some pre-set income coming in from these rentals.
That's correct.
One point for a million dollars in annual lease income.
That's significant.
Which is not, is that included the money worth spending for the lease or not?
It does not.
So, this repayment can be largely paid out of either the
at least savings or the money we earn from the building.
It can count some member for just for a sake of clarity and transparency.
There's other building operating expenses you noted, the utilities and some of the maintenance
and the management, but the total net operating costs plus the savings from our lease elimination
at the other building is that $350,000 that savings that does come to the city and that
net operating savings helps to pay down our debt service.
All right.
Thank you.
The other point I wanted to make about is that a lot has made about the cost of the building,
but municipalities typically hold these things for 50 years or more.
And when you start to do, you know, time, value of money and calculations, it was for a brand
you could probably figure out.
It's a little beyond me, but it makes that those investments a lot more reasonable.
But then we get down to, so for me, when I analyze it, I analyze first, does it make financial
sense. And to me, the purchase price, the money money we're going to save from least payments
that we're currently paying other people, the money that we're going to potentially earn
from rents and parking and whatever else is there to take advantage of makes that a good deal
for me.
It's a pencil.
It's a good financial deal.
Then the question becomes why should you buy it.
And then there's some other strategic, intrinsic issues that I think are real important.
And that is the location of this property being in the, I mean, that's the key one there.
It's on a very critical corner in our downtown.
It's across from the Superior Court.
It's a county corner from a city hall.
It's in a strategic excellent location.
It gives the city control down to that corner,
but it also gives us control 300 and some parking spaces,
which we desperately need them downtown.
It gives us a little bit of flexibility for the city.
I don't think it's our intention to
take it all for us, but it gives us the ability to scale up and down as we have other needs.
This building we're in right now is getting pretty close to the end of this useful life.
At some point it's going to need to be remodeled or rebuilt or something and it would give us an opportunity to relocate
functions that we do here during that period of time.
something for future city councils to worry about,
but it'll be a resource that they can use at that time.
And the other thing I was encouraged by was that, in my research, I learned that other governmental and public entities
that have been purchasing property downtown, and these downtown building, rather than leasing them.
And that's a critical distinction. Is that businesses just being in the downtown is great, but are they leasing or are they owning these buildings?
and these government agencies, the current county subterranean schools, has 1675,
Chester Avenue, 1200 trucks to an avenue, which is the old church, and the county
occurring in Cape K have 1318th Street. So that's encouraging to me when these agencies
are buying property downtown. It signals a faith in those neighborhoods.
So anyway, I'll get back to my point because I think it's a fair financial deal and it's a good overall purchase for the city.
Thank you.
I'm a little confused here.
On page nine that you have here, it shows that
on page nine, can you explain to me what
In the world, leave savings from California Avenue's base, a million dollars.
That's a savings that we're achieving by not leasing the other space where the police department
has had office based on California Avenue.
Okay, so that you're seeing we're getting more money now.
We're not having that million dollar expense any longer.
But those folks have to go somewhere.
We're going to have an expense.
I mean, that billings going to cost money.
If I may count somewhere, we're just to clarify that is not the training academy.
I'm not a training academy.
I'm just trying to figure out if a million dollars in here is money a one-time deal.
We're not we're not going to get that every every 12 months. We're not going to get savings from from
California County space. So, Council Mayor, where the police department is leasing on an annual basis, numerous office spaces and an office building on California Avenue. So that is an annual expense that we're going to get that savings every year going forward.
But I thought you were stopping that.
Correct.
By stopping that lease and moving them instead into this building, we've moved that million
dollars to those lease payments that are just gone each year and into the value of acquiring
this building, the Bank of America building, because those same dollars were paying into
the repayment of that loan essentially to acquire that building.
Okay, but the way this reads is, you know, it's projected net offering income is the minus
260,000, right?
Correct.
Then there's the savings of, so we don't have to pay, then lease any more, so it's made
dollars there.
Correct.
Okay.
and then it comes down. And then the next year, we're not going to have savings from that.
We will.
How will we? Because it's an annual payment to the other building. We'll have to pay
a million every year, every year, it's another million dollars to the other building.
We'll make, okay, maybe I'm confused.
We're buying a building and we already have a building.
We don't, we don't own the other building. We're just leasing it.
I know, and that's what's confusing me.
We're releasing it.
Boom, the lease is over.
Now we're on our own. It's a million dollars.
Okay? Okay.
So we have that savings, but that doesn't continue on.
We don't get a million dollars for 12 years
Well, this tries to pay itself out.
I suppose if I could put it a different way,
Councilman, we're if we stayed at the other building,
we would pay a million dollars a year.
One of them trying to say is, for one, the first year,
you're going to get a million dollars
because you're not paying that.
You're not paying that, oh, correct.
The next year, you're going to say that you're
going to pay that, and you're not going to pay it again,
or you're going to pay it again.
We're not going to pay it.
Okay, so we're not going to have we have a million dollars in here's income, we're not going to have that the next year.
I'm doing my best council member, but I would just reiterate that is an ongoing savings every year.
It's ongoing savings.
That doesn't make any sense. Does it make any sense whatsoever?
We're going to pay this off in fan mail inbox. We're not going to we're not going to get that money a million dollars every year
So and then we're going to take that money and we're going to do it wherever we want to but it's not going to be a savings of of a million dollars every year
It's a one-shot deal one-year deal
again. I feel like I've answered this question best. I can it isn't an annual savings
Okay. Well, maybe in yours, but in in the real world, you get one million dollars, the next year, you don't get a million dollars.
You have to pay it. And the whole thing is just ridiculous.
That's an over-spit.
Thank you, Mayor.
I think the City of Vegas field has been fiscally responsible over the years with various
City Council's and I think that this purchase is very similar to what past City Council's have done are existing planning building department are in a building that we purchased.
that was already built. City Hall North is a building that we purchased that was already built and
it's been 20 some years since we bought that building. I know you weren't here, but do you know any
details on that? Mr. Helen has done some of that homework, believe it was purchased in 1993 for
$13 million?
I thought it was early $2,000.
It was okay.
How that compared?
I did some research so in 2005, it was purchased for $13 million.
So, 21 years ago.
21 years ago, it's half the size.
You're right.
And we paid $13 million.
Correct.
And so we're getting 21 years later.
We're getting twice the building.
For the same amount of money.
Greg. Seems like a good deal to me.
Ownership to me is always better than leasing. I mean leasing
as was stated, goes on forever. In 12 years from now, we would continue to pay that million,
probably million, two million, three by then. And instead of paying that out as lease payments,
We now own the building and that May and 2 May and 3 can go to higher and more police.
So I think it's a great deal and I appreciate staff working on it and I'm in favour of it.
Thank you.
Thank you Mayor.
Thank you to staff for all the work that they've done on this item.
I think it's a great opportunity.
I just have a couple of comments but I would like to ask whoever was a part of the team.
who kind of did the walkthroughs and did the due diligence work, taking the tours, taking a look at
all of the deferred maintenance. If I could ask you to come to the mic, we'd love to learn
more about what that deferred maintenance investigation looked like, what were the findings.
looks like it's just me. So we actually received direction and closed session to have external
vendors come in and look at all of everything. And we did, we used several vendors to look
elevators, roof windows, all of our systems, plumbing, electrical. I believe we had 11 different
vendors come through and look through the building between end of March all the way up until July.
There were some concerns that we saw coming through the building because as was stated, it's a
50 year old building, right?
So there's going to be some things that do need to be fixed,
but nothing that wasn't, that was a red flag
as City Manager clerks had.
Nothing that couldn't be fixed over the next five years,
10 years that we could schedule in regular CIPs over time.
So some of the things that we said, hey, these are really big fixes.
we did go back to the seller during that period of time between July and coming back to
Council. And we had some more negotiations to say, hey, these are some very large items.
We would like you to come down on price because those are going to be heavy costs for us
that we need to consider over the next five years, 10 years. And so we did get a deduct and
we showed that in the presentation today.
So, partly we feel that those ongoing maintenance things
we can solve over the next five years.
We have an excellent property manager.
So, the property manager is Mel Aconsons, MD Aconsons Group.
They have been property manager there for, I don't know,
as long as anyone can remember, they know that building really well
and we've already started to work with them
just try to address some of the immediate things
that we can get done before we move in.
So, I'll put an answer to your question.
I was just at two quick items as Mr. Helen pointed out,
it's been professionally managed over the years,
and so they've had a robust maintenance schedule.
They've kept up on the regular maintenance,
they have about a half a million dollars a year
in just maintenance costs that's typically
We expanded, you know, keeping up on things, and when we talk about things that, you know,
repairs we know will need to happen in the next five to ten years.
There aren't deferred things that have fallen behind.
They're just the useful life of the elevators.
We know is going to be, you know, up at a certain point.
But that's the price of owning a building as you're going to have to,
every once in a while, replace it roof, every once in a while, replace it in elevator.
And nothing is beyond its regular life cycle.
We just know in the next five to 10,
we're going to have some of those replacements to make.
And I'll just point out that it was just last summer
that we had to replace several elevators in City,
all north as a standard practice for owning any asset
or building.
So I appreciate that.
I know that there was some out in the community
that had questions about due diligence and the deferred maintenance.
So I appreciate you stepping in, Gary, to share that with us.
I would just like to make a comment that, you know, we have a responsibility to a certain degree to make sure that we are
ensuring that these properties, especially these larger buildings do not lay vacant for very long.
In 2009, I'm reminded that it was a previous council that stepped up when the Padre Hotel fell short by almost $2 million during their construction and renovation project, a multi-million dollar project, the tapped out all other financing mechanisms, and they had nobody to look to other than the city of Bakerstil.
And the city of Bakersfield in the council at that time stepped up and borrowed money from the federal government to actually make good on that shortfall for the property owner.
And so I shared that because this is not something new to this council.
This is not something new to this administration for the city of Bakersfield.
This is something that, you know, previous councils have done to get creative to innovate and to continue to fight for downtown Bakersfield.
So, with that, I'm happy to join my colleagues in supporting this item tonight.
Thank you.
I don't see any additional requests to speak.
So you have a motion by Council Member Gonzalez to support staff's recommendation. Please catch your votes.
The motion is approved with Council Members Weir and Bashir Tashvoting No and Vice-Mercor absent.
Thank you. Next item, please.
New Business Item 11A, contingency funds for clean city special project, $500,000 for clean up of a major illegal dumping site, consisting of 50 acres located in the southeast,
South of Brook Street, East of Hale Street, and adjacent to East Plans Avenue.
Mr. Clark.
Thank you, Mayor.
Council.
Mr. Gary Howell and we'll present this item.
All right.
So Council members all talk briefly about this.
There are several very large chronic nuisance properties in the city.
We have a clean city's team that focuses on many of those chronic nuisance properties.
basically sees not only focuses on properties that are of major issue, but also, you know, in
our right way in other areas, but this has been one that they are codenforcement or rapid
response. All of the teams have been focusing on over the last several years. In fact, today
I don't know the exact number, but I know we've had multiple rounds of cleanup from our codenforcement
team of this site, and as you will see through the presentation, it's just bandades over a
whole. They're making small dents in trying to do some cleanup here, but the scale and the
condition of the site is getting to a point where it's becoming a real help and safety risk.
So that's what we're before you tonight. The other thing I want to add is their images you're
are because of our excellent drones.
There's been some talk about cameras and drones.
I mean, I'm a believer in technology, so I believe,
but let's use it if we have it.
Our water department has some incredible drones
because they need them to monitor and manage our water facilities.
So they've helped us out taking some still shots
of some of the most difficult areas.
I will say the majority of this debris
is probably construction debris, is what I would call it, whether it's, I don't think we'd
have, we have too much wood debris, there was a comment about, there's a lot of wood debris
out there, there's some wood debris out there, but mostly construction. You'll see chunks,
massive chunks of asphalt, massive chunks of concrete, so instead of going to the dump,
They use the Si, you'll see palettes, you'll see drywall,
you'll see a boat, you'll see abandoned cars,
you'll see abandoned trailers.
So it's, again, one of our, one of our largest efforts.
And it's been difficult for the private property to defend it.
And we'll talk a little bit more about our work with the private property owner.
And he's here tonight, the representatives are here tonight as well.
I think another major issue on this site is there are a large number of people living there.
This is where they call home some of these drone images.
You'll see where they've created these tents and shanties and villages,
which that's a very unsafe place to call your place of home there.
So part of this cleanup is a coordinated effort
with making sure that homeless resources are brought out there.
So these people can be moved off on the appropriate way.
Just a little bit on clean cities.
There's probably seven departments that are hands-on in this effort.
So I think it's probably the largest multi-department effort
that we've got in the city.
I'm proud of those teams and we did a larger presentation to council previously on what's going on there, but that image to the right is
is really probably the most inhabited part of that area and it's right in the heart of some of the parcels and we'll zoom out to some of the maps, but these teams work very well together.
I will say the coordination is excellent, impact team or BPD team is working well with rapid
response.
They have co-response teams that work hand in hand and solid waste is right there with
them.
Again, we've got a river, water department that helps us park rangers or helping.
And then we've got our outside partners with other vendors that come and help on private
jobs.
and then obviously, uh, property owners. So this is the effort that we're asking to undertake
with some of these funds that we're asking to come out of contingencies. Obviously, we need
to remove the debris and help remove the homeless. We need to make sure that we're continuing
to take appropriate steps and appropriate measures. Obviously, this is going to happen over time.
this is not going to happen tomorrow. We're not going to run out there and do this if approved,
but it'll take some time to tease some of this stuff up. And then lastly,
the biggest problem is people can just drive in here and we'll I'll show you some of the
the sections of the maps where this is why construction debris is on this site, it's because
people just drive their trucks in and unload here. And so we've got to pinch those off and put
areas there in some of these locations, and we've got kind of a plan and a map that outlines.
So this is that, some of those maps, so to share a little bit of where this is.
So this is, we're calling it our East Plan site because it's basically as far east as you can go on plans,
before we get to the treatment plant, too.
It's right next to Hale, Hill Street, and Brook Street.
It's just east of Cottonwood or South MLK.
And some of these barriers that we've been able to track down
is actually through our public worship apartment
as then a killer job of finding about 100 sticks of K-Rail,
which is about 2,000 feet.
We would need to procure that with some of this money that we're asking to be set aside.
We've worked with the property owner and they have agreed to put in some gates.
At some of these difficult points, there's already some berms there.
So if you're saying, why don't we just put in the whole thing, you know, with electrified fence and K rail.
We just don't have that much money, but some of the berms provide a barrier.
There, the other site that's just south of this isn't really not saying this is an area
that needs to be cleaned up, but it's an access, almost like a highway to get to this
dumping site.
And so this is a little further south, it's south of Brook, white lane, you can see it goes
dead ends right into the middle of this site.
But we've identified K-ray on barriers and gates.
Part of having gates there, you may be asking that question,
because fire does need to get into this site,
and so they'll have noxboxes on it.
So fires only one can access it if they need to put out fires
or in the middle of the site.
They'll be able to access it.
Again, fire was a part of this team to help us identify
appropriate locations.
So, this is the funding and the plan.
We're asking for $500,000 of CAP contingency funds
to make a really big dent in this health and safety area.
This is a referral from Council Member Arias to set aside
some money and contingency funds.
And really to partner with the property owner.
The key point, as part of this, is whatever resources we're spending, we are going to
lean the property owner.
We've told property owner this, this is part of what we do, is ultimately if there's
a transaction in a cell, those lanes are paid off.
So we do recuper money when there's a transaction that's a part of this.
So there's one piece of property that's an outside area owner and then the rest of the property is owned by Mr. Serra.
So some of these lanes, you know, if transacted on, could be repaid, which is a good thing for us to recoup some of this investment.
Obviously, there needs to be ongoing enforcement after this and so that again is a part of the plan for this major site.
We have to answer any questions.
Thank you, Mr. Hallan.
Mr. Clerk, do you have any further comments?
Thank you, Mayor.
I do not.
Thank you.
Madam City Clerk for the record.
Council member.
Weir has left.
He left it.
Eight.
P.M.
Council member.
Thank you, Mayor.
Thank you, Gary, for the presentation and thanks for what we call Gary our quarterback or
our head coach for all of the major master planning and development that's happening
out in MLK Boulevard and you've just been amazing with every punch that is thrown
our way.
Gary's Gary's ready for it, so definitely appreciate you, Gary.
Last Tuesday, I was out at this property, went there around 7.30.
Noris, who was here earlier today, made comment about some other issues that were having in the neighborhood.
Walked it with me and actually organized a good group of about 12 different residents.
And imagine this, you walk behind your property into what should be your backyard.
And you've got mountains of debris, concrete, just spread everywhere.
You've got homeless encampments all around.
In fact, there was about six or so dogs that were trying to chase this off the property.
And as we walked deeper into this dump, essentially dump site,
we were actually getting yelled at by some of the individuals who were homeless.
and requesting that we get off of their property.
Can you imagine that?
As a property owner, if your house is just a rocks throw away from where you're at?
That was the reality.
For so many of these individuals later that evening,
there was actually a vehicle that drove up right beside us,
They waived right past us, and I thought that they were going to pull into their backyard.
Instead, they pulled into one of the homeless and came in.
So there are vehicles in use, there are vehicles that are out of use that have been dumped on this site.
It's out of control.
And there are certainly other hotspots in Ward 1 and in Southeast Bakersfield.
Nothing quite like this.
And so I would just ask that this Council will take this into serious consideration that this is not just an investment on this particular property,
but actually I see this as an opportunity for us to procure some of the materials and equipment that we're going to be able to need to prevent future dumping,
because we know that as soon as we block off,
this particular 40 acres, folks are gonna go somewhere else.
And so I hope that we have our team
as ready as soon as we bait this,
we're gonna have to prepare for where folks are going
to go next in order to dump.
I might also add that also towards the end of last Tuesday
as we were getting ready to finish the conversation,
there was a clearly a company vehicle who had just gotten done dumping just a few moments
before we were able to actually see them do get caught in the act. So it's an ongoing problem.
I think that there are certainly some things that we could do better on the enforcement side
of the problem. I'm grateful to Chief Stratton who we had a great conversation about some of the ways
that we can tackle from an enforcement standpoint,
but certainly in order to move projects forward
and to see growth and not these bakers feel
that this is going to be one of the essential steps
in order to make that happen.
So with that, I would like to move approval
of this item and looking forward to any questions
or comments from my colleague.
Thank you.
City property, or is this owned by a private person slash company?
It is private property.
And why is the city spending the rest of the taxpayer money to help one person and his property?
Council member, I think that's a good question.
Typically, when we have large abatements like this that pose a public health and safety risk,
will do code enforcement action,
debate the property, and then assess the costs
to that property that we're tax payer costs
to later be recovered.
So I have 10 acres down my Cal State LA,
just vacant land.
As soon as the grass gets over like a certain height,
I get a letter in the mail threatening thousands of dollars
that they're gonna cut,
put a lean on my property and take my property away.
If I just think of all the mom and pops that are closing doors,
just got notice of a grocery store closed into my ward,
because of this I don't understand why we're spending we're going to spend a half a million dollars a clean
With all the respect, I mean, if you buy a piece of property, you should take care of it. I would hate to call the city if someone's dog group to my front yard and made the city come pick it up. Am I missing something? Was this, was this, what are we doing? Why are we on the hook for this? I don't understand. Again, council member, three different thoughts. One, this is at the council discretion, whether or not to allocate additional dollars to go and.
to pursue this abatement.
We don't have the money in our budget to do an abatement
of this size proactively to then assess it against the property.
And so this would front load that,
but that's going to subject to the purview of the council.
Number two, we have a two to some of your points.
We've done much of the same things you mentioned.
We've sent letters.
We've done code enforcement, actions on this property.
But, at a certain point, there is a public good need to do some of these large
statements to ensure that these type of conditions don't continue.
But, and I've sort of already mentioned it, but lastly, ultimately, it is the
property owners' responsibility, we're stepping in for the public good to make that happen
more quickly.
And, again, try to recover those costs later.
So, this is 100% the owners responsibility to do, that is correct.
Might I just add, I think, there is an enforcement aspect that I think that is appropriate
for us to aid in and assist in, but it is the property under responsibility.
I mean, I definitely feel because, you know, we deal with, I mean, they go out, and if they arrest
every homeless person there, they're going to be in and out of Loretto the same day,
and we're going to be dealing with the same problem.
But that's despite that's besides the point because every other business owner that gets terrorized by these people that we seem to not be able to deal with
Because we don't have the money to deal with them.
They have to pay to fix their businesses. That lady who got her business window shot out probably had to pay for her window to be repaired?
This this this that's such a dangerous
Presidents as a council for the rest of the city. I mean, that's this scares me. I mean, I could only imagine what would come down the tube when any other business
I mean, I spent $360,000 a year on private security to deal with this kind of stuff.
I have nothing else to say, I mean, I'm just, I'm kind of shocked.
Councilmember Smith.
Thank you, Mayor.
So I want to explore the lean idea a little bit.
So you said there will be a lean on the property.
This burns can probably speak to it.
Code enforcement on a regular basis brings their
leans to council and I think one thing.
That's what I was going to say.
Yeah, my every time we've got them 40.
That's right.
This would be counseling.
So it's very similar situation.
We do it all the time.
We go out and we clean up property and we put a lean on.
That's correct.
But I mean, this obviously is much more substantial.
So, this is future development property. Yes. And so if they come in with a final map, I mean, I'm trying to visualize how this lean is paid back is it as you sell a house, as you record maps, is it all one shot, but how do we really visualize how it's getting paid off.
Councilman Smith, it, the leans get placed on the tax roll, how it would roll to some
subdivision. I'm not sure how that would play out.
This is kind of a typical process
of a good enforcement case. If you think about like our demo on just traveling, same thing,
very, very sizable way exceeds our budget funds to do an action. So, I guess I see this
similar to to others, large cleanups that we have, not exactly sure how a track map would
impact funding or if that would, it had to have a title person how that would work out.
Well I mean do we, the question is, do we expect it to be paid back all the once or as
because it's parceled out, we typically, our leans are not payback all at once, and often
they're part of a payback pool that just gets, you know, that comes in in smaller increments
over time.
Well, I mean, typically it's, yeah, random lots here, they're everywhere, but if this
is one, so then, and we food stop, as it gets subdivided, how are we going to work through
that. But the point is, is it will get paid back?
It's developed and it's got a lot better
chance of being developed if it's cleaned up. The access you mentioned there's berms, I mean
it looks like from the picture. Yeah, I could just drive my dump truck on plans road, but
there is, I didn't see a picture. Yeah, we didn't show pictures. So there are berms all along
those other access?
Yes, so you, I think there's significant
burns on the very east side.
You can see that there's that road.
So adjacent, if we zoomed out a little bit,
you'll see that we have our farm, one of our farm.
Right to the east, so you see that road,
there's a berm there that's on that side.
And then on plans, there's also a berm.
Okay, so the K-Rail is so that all-long plans is difficult to access because of the burn.
Yeah, just the roads that go through that we need to.
The section that's in that northwest corner is where people are entering now.
You can drive along the very western edge down and then loop down or you can just get in immediately
and then head over on the east side.
So, is there existing signage, I mean,
that is part of, because what's going to be added to it?
It is part of its education.
If it looks like a dump, it must be a dump,
and I think I could take my stuff there.
You know, if there's no signage saying,
the real dump is at this other location.
We can certainly add that to the project that's easy to post signs.
We did just a few weeks ago got the no trespassing.
And so we'll be installing those no trespassing signs with this project as well.
I think it's a good investment.
We're going to get paid back and we clean up the neighborhood and move it forward.
And just like we do, all the other property
events that we see is just a different scale.
So good work.
Thank you.
Thank you, Council Member Smith, and City Clerk,
Council Member, where has returned, and he returned it
809.
Council Member Gonzalez.
Thank you, Mayor.
OK, so I appreciate in the presentation.
You said that cleanup alone will not solve the problem,
because that had been on my mind for a few days now.
The last thing I want us to do is try to bait the property only to see this problem continue and
Have us, you know, back here again trying to resolve this issue.
I just need to clarify. I thought I heard there's two properties that are problematic or
Between this map and so there's actually five parcels that are in between these two maps.
So there's two parcels on this map.
There's the northern parcel that is adjacent to East Plans.
And then if Brook kept going, you'd see that there's
that parcel that's just above Brook.
And then as we go to this, so this is just south of that.
Brook Street, so between Brook and White and between White and
it's the end of that map.
Those are there are three more process in that section there. Okay, so with all those five parcels. How many unique different property owners are there?
I believe there's two owners. Yeah, two unique owners. Okay, and and one owner has been responsive or have they both been responsive one owner is here tonight at this meeting and a one owner is been very difficult to engage with.
And so this 500,000 is to address all parcels, all five parcels.
It's to address all five parcels related to being able to get into the site, to make it impenetrable.
And then the majority of the cleanup is here on these two parcels.
That's where the majority of where the homeless living were most of the dumping has occurred.
There is some dumping on these two arson's,
but the lion's share of what the team has assessed
and some of the bids that we're starting not bids,
but evaluation that we've gotten from some of the teams,
it's in these two arson's,
where it most of the dumping's been occurring.
Okay, got it, okay.
Because typically when we have chronic nuisance properties,
There are reason why their chronic nuisance properties is because the property owner has been
unresponsive for extended period of time.
Code enforcement has done a great job trying to address the issue trying to cite the property
owner much to Mr. Bessertosh's point with his experience in properties in NLA.
Code enforcement does that, but still the property owner remains unresponsive does not do anything
with the property and so it leaves the city with no other choice but to take some sort of
action. Because without that action there's such a negative impact to the surrounding
neighborhood to the poor residents like Mr. Arya's constituent and they end up having to pay
that negative externality by being impacted by all of these things that happen on this property.
So ultimately, the city has to respond through code enforcement.
The issue here is that the cost to mitigate to address this problem, far exceeds the
code enforcement's budget to address these issues, and that's why this item is coming
today.
This is not unique to the city.
I mean, the city does this stuff all the time, but what is unique is the dollar amount
for this particular property and I think that's the challenge that I'm trying to
wrap around in my head because I'm not sure,
just as a policy matter,
I'm not quite sure
as a policy matter given the fact that we have a responsive property owner how we should
best proceed. One of the ideas that we've initiated a few years ago that I think is one
of the best ideas for the city of Bakerfield is this receivership program, is allowing
for us to bring in the courts to help us take, make some action on these properties. And we've
done some good work in my ward and actually throughout the city now because of that tool to address
some of these chronic nuisance properties, but here,
that's not the case.
Let me ask you a couple more questions
before I throw out some ideas.
One is, have we spent some time observing the rate
at which the construction debris has accumulated the property?
I think code monitors this property, and they would
the best person to answer that.
I know in the last four years that we've been talking about this property,
it has evident flow of because of code has taken certain actions to reduce
some of that construction debris, and then it just comes right back.
And I don't know how fast it comes back and the frequency,
and when are the peaks and valleys of that, I'm not sure,
but we can we can research that it would be helpful to know because I mean the pretty nasty photos
it's awful looking but you know is that after a year is that after a week is that after a
month it would be helpful to know really the severity of the issue because you know there are some
other steps that have weren't listed here that I think we ought to take number one is you know we
Invested significantly, this council has invested in bulky waste cleanups in doing mobile cleanups and mobile pick are what do we call it mobile pick up mobile location drop off drop off. Thank you. Thank you, but you know again part of our clean city initiative. We have more services now available to residents than I think ever.
We need to, I like, you know, Mr. Lagi's comment. We need to be more proactive in our effort
to do outreach to these construction companies. And also, I would like us to, and perhaps
has already been done, but I would like us to spit.
And some more time on-site, either through private security, existing private security contract, or by-staff, to monitor
those bad actors, and to, in real time, provide them some education of what the appropriate process is.
That this, in fact, is not dumping site to Mr. Smith's comment earlier.
But the last thing I think is that this really is about economic development.
This is really ultimately what we want to do here is not just clean up the site.
If we zoom out from a city council perspective but we really want to see and we really
want to see with all of these chronic news properties is a better and higher use of that
property.
What we want to see on this particular property, all these parcels, are new construction,
you know, new homes, housing development, we want to see, you know, families living on
these properties.
Ultimately, that is the solution.
So the question now, my mind is, how do we get there?
How do we get to that development?
Obviously, this particular problem is a real burden barrier to to see that property developed.
And so from my lens, I don't see this as a response to a nuisance in the way of code enforcement.
I really see this as an economic development tool.
So similar to what we do with tax increment financing, for example,
Where, again, there is a president set where we may offer a certain incentive to a developer because we know that over the course of the project that the revenue generated by a better use through property tax increases will allow the city to actually recoup those funds in the future.
That's the way I kind of take a look at this project.
And so I understand there may not be, you know,
I know that there may not be a TIFF mechanism for this particular
development, this particular use.
I know that the, what is it?
The EIFDs typically are related to public infrastructure
investments and specifically for affordable housing.
So, I'm not sure there's a good mechanism yet that the state has provided for cities, but I think that through that lens I can see us pursuing this strategy, you know, again for the purposes of economic development.
So, yeah, I'll support it. Thanks.
Thank you, consumer with Gonzales, consumer with Coleman.
Thank you, Mayor.
So, I have similar policy matter concerns about this.
First of all, this is the same property that the more partners were here about last meeting
where they had spent money and then you know what I'm talking about?
Yeah, let me go there.
That's the property of the.
Okay, so they already spent money cleaning this up, and then the offenders went and dumped more stuff on there.
All right, so is there a breakdown?
I don't, maybe you showed it to me, maybe I missed it.
Is there a breakdown of how this $500,000 is going to be spent?
Did I see that in there?
Did I miss that?
No.
I think there's a kind of multi-pronged approach.
We don't have a line item budget in this presentation,
but based on the teams recommendation,
obviously barriers will be of a cost.
We have an access of 200 trucks,
truckloads of how many trucks have to go to the dump
to put this where it belonged.
So, that's really the majority of the cost, I mean, the barriers or some cost getting the heavy machinery out there to move, you know, the massive piles around, but it's equipment, trucks, and manpower to get stuff done.
So one of the things I struggle with here is that, and I appreciate the more partners
in their diligence on this parcel and the things they're doing on the East Side Town,
but at the time when I get beat up every time I see Richard Chapman from economic development
corporation because he's on me about the call-cut buildings that it burnt over there
and just piles of rubble and we can't seem to get those cleaned up. We don't have
money in our budget for us to do it and so you know but now we're looking for half
a million dollars to clean up you know some other place and so that's where I get into
that policy question. If we do it once, we have to do it everywhere. Where do we draw
a lot? How do we make that case? So I'm struggling a little bit with this one. Any
you can talk about prevention, be size these barriers like you're going to start having
Please helicopter fly over it, you know, whenever they're around or whatever, I don't know.
To start trying to do some affordable.
So in our secure column there, we talk about bringing in some,
but before this develops bringing in some temp lighting, obviously,
we'll just talk about it was maybe some on-site surveillance, having some extra security out there.
We would not be using any of our dollars to do this.
This would be private property owner would need to do some of these things.
We would just want to make sure there's, it's impenetrable from a barrier standpoint and then they would need to do some investment of lighting on site private surveillance.
I think the one thing I would add to what Gary had shared was that we have discussed
the, you know, as the concept of changing a little bit how we do legal dumping enforcement
has come up, can we put some cameras up, can we do some additional illegal dumping
enforcement that has been contemplated for this site and just, you know, I know you're
and talking to Chief Council member, but I have to clarify for the public record, we do not have a police helicopter.
So, yeah, so, you know, I see the need, but I'm hesitant to support this.
Not that I don't want us to do this, but I'd like to have a more comprehensive understanding of what our policy is going to be about to.
And I know it's not just the call cut, there's other ones around too, and we could dump a couple million bucks in these things pretty quickly.
And so two things, one is things like K-Rail and those kind of things we ought to have.
If we need to have it, is there some other means by which we can buy those and have them to where we use them in different projects.
But I'd like to have, I think I think maybe more of a bus conversation about what we're
going to do about all these sites around, and there's several of them.
We can all think of two or three off top of our head.
I know what the city's approach is going to be to those.
Because I don't want to dump a $500,000 lean on it, guys, property, that we may, we may
see it. But you know, if you have an other town investor that owns the land that you
know, he is father bought it before him. I don't know the case exactly, but you know, he
might not care. So we might be, you know, 10, 20 years before that, problems ever developed.
So I don't know. I just, I'm just, I'm struggling with this right now, so no.
If I may Council Member, just as we developed our economic development strategic plan, this council
asks us to also develop a rubric set of criteria for making decisions about economic development
incentives, there could be an opportunity to also, we have a chronic nuisance program that
the staff actually spends a lot of time ranking properties that our chronic nuisance is under
of certain sort of criteria. Another potential, you know, thought from the council going forward
is to first have to develop a set of criteria that could be used as a framework for making
decisions about these very unique large chronic nuisance properties. It would be, in my mind, it would
actually be fairly similar to the economic development, you know, incentive criteria. And we have a
few different tools in the tool belt, you know, we do have the abatement process, we're working
on a lean forgiveness policy that would be available in instances where it's creating, you've
got a new ownership and you're going to generate new economic activity. Do you look at those
leans and so just food for thought for the council that it could be a future action for staff
as to develop a certain criteria that council could use in making these kind of decisions because
There are a rare number of times where we would suggest,
let's use additional dollars to address a significant issue.
But to some of the points that have been noted tonight,
there are times where you're going to create opportunities
and address problems that come to the good of the community
ultimately.
And there are ways that we could measure that
in a reasonable framework.
One other idea just to add to the C major click is also in kind of the economic development
mindset, having the property owner have some sort of commitment.
What I'm hearing you say is maybe we want to see this developed in five to ten years.
maybe they have some sort of, well, if we invest 500,000 that there needs to be some sort of additional
commitment out of them that we see this property develop, you know, in some sort of criteria that
aligns to what CMander was talking about with the economic government framework.
Yeah, I don't know if I know the answers to those questions. I think I'm posing the question right
were the answer to them. So, you know, for my money, I'd like to see us have a further discussion
about that. In support of it, I will make one comment that the council took a very, very
conservative approach to preparing this year's budget. And we purposely didn't act on some
We decided to pool that and wait till mid-year to see how our numbers are going to work out
before we committed any of that.
So we had made some reservations,
some contingency money set aside for these kind of projects.
I just like to know how the better understanding of what our policy is.
So we don't have to have these to conversations when these things come up that we know what we're going to do.
We know what we're capable of doing, we're not going to do.
So I guess I'm going to have to think about if I would make a motion or anything.
I don't know.
That's all the questions I have.
Thank you.
Thank you Mayor.
I just want to share that I appreciate the honest thinking and scrutiny of this allocation.
And I too share some of those concerns because I agree,
particularly in Council Member Gonzalez's district
in mind, we have numerous of these properties.
And so I know that I can't come back for a second time
when there's another 40-acre lot with the similar problem.
And so I think this is a unique opportunity.
But I also want to make sure that we're
also not losing sight of the fact that this is a compounding problem, not just for future economic
development, but it's an immediate public safety issue, that the trash that's not on the
screen anymore, but the debris stretches all the way back to our spreading fields and connects
and abuts immediately, you know, an entire section of R1 residential homes.
So there are many community members,
newaries, along with her neighbors who are very concerned
that when not if, but when another fire breaks out,
that fire may actually pose an immediate threat
in harm to their property.
And so, as Council Member Gonzalez mentioned,
we just don't have the funds in the budget today
to debate this project.
And so we need an additional allocation,
like the one tonight in order to be able to, uh, a bait, uh,
I'll share that just a couple of weeks ago from my count, it was the fourth fire in the span of
about three months that fourth fire was the largest that I've seen on the property, but it actually
The larger part of it in chunk was on the property of the property owner who we cannot get in contact with.
And so even if we were to ask the investor to bait their side, they're still more than 50% that we could not get under control.
So just wanted to share that and share that I appreciate the concern and actually would like to ask what the appropriate committee would be for us to make a referral
that committee take a look at, you know, what is that threshold for council to consider
a level of investment and attention, frankly, like this?
Councillor Morarius,
at first blush, but we could also always come back and revisit that,
but I actually think probably safe and healthy neighborhoods makes the most sense.
Okay, then with that, I'll make that referral tonight.
Thank you.
Councilmember Smith.
Thank you, Mayor.
The referral does not apply to this.
That's a separate referral that I'm hearing.
I'm just thinking that I am correct in the developer.
The one of the landowners is here.
is that correct? And that we've talked about how I guess payback or if I guess payback over time
or how we work through that and perhaps it would be a good idea to continue and have conversations
with a developer and come back in another meeting.
So I'm not going to make that motion because
just in more than one, and so I'll let him think about that, but that would be something
that I think perhaps we could address some of the concerns that other council members
are having and find solutions.
If I may, council members Smith, in the spirit of trying to help address some of the questions
concerns as well. I think if if we were to take just a little bit more time we could potentially
refine numbers for what are the costs of the securing versus the abatement and what is
and the signage versus the abatement and also what would be the costs for the abatement of
the northern portion. So just for just for some additional clarity what you see on the page
on screen right now. There's a northern portion that is the separate property owner and the southern
portion that has, you know, is I maybe slightly off on this, either in the process of acquisition
or has been acquired by other property owners. They have it. Okay, has been acquired by other
We could potentially try and also separate out what the costs may be for a
abatement of the non-responsive versus the responsive that might help look at
those dollars more specifically.
And then I think it's also worth noting I'll just take a moment to clarify this
that the ownership of the larger section to the south, that's fairly recent
ownership.
They've come into that ownership in more recent years and cleaned it up.
And then the ownership, but if you go back together, one, Gary, thank you.
The southern portion of this property, very recently acquired, and so, you know, I think
it's worth noting that we're not talking about the same actors over multiple years.
This is a new owner who's trying to be responsible and in a spirit of the long-term solution,
And we're looking at ways to help secure the site and force the site, but then also address
the abatement costs to the cost of the property if that helps.
But there may be ways for us to, again, in summary, refine the numbers that would help give
clarity and potentially options for how to spend those dollars and maybe work on some
of the other questions that have been raised at the same time.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mayor. I just wanted to make a referral that we pursue the
receivership process for those parcels under the ownership of the
unresponsive owner, because even if we do see development on these sites,
those existing parcels remain a nuisance and a problem for the community
moving forward. So if it, if it makes sense, I would like us to at least consider or explore
that option for that property. Thank you, Council member. We can sell this, Council member.
Are yes. Thank you, Mayor. Given the feedback from some of my colleagues and also given that we
are approaching 9pm, I would like to withdraw my motion. I mean, introduce a new motion to bring this
item back at the next council meeting. Thank you. Thank you. Any other request to speak? Seeing none. You have a motion. Please catch your votes.
The motion is approved with Council Member Bashir Tashvori no and vice mayor core absent.
Thank you and now. Next item please. Council and mayor statements.
Here's the screen so I can see with our any council member Bashir Tash.
Can we get a presentation on municipal code and the standards that we are supposed to?
I heard Councilman Gonzalez talking about some of the things that we can do.
I'd like a presentation and then some thoughts on how we can put more teeth in it to
hold people accountable and taking properties that are just kind of destroying.
And not just commercial residential.
I mean we need to just something.
I want to know what our policy is and some ideas on how we can actually hold people accountable
So that we're not wasting tax payer money for clarity counts of merit, nuisance product chronic nuisance properties.
Yeah, I would even chronic nuisance properties.
I don't know what our standards are for even front yards if there's grass levels and cars parked in.
I'm sure there's just I get considered.
We need something that's got teeth, real teeth.
That's that for first or for a second.
Can we begin to look at the adoption of the best practices, best practices,
tool kit for homelessness and addiction for treatment. First policy that just came out was published.
I think I received the copy of it, Carlos, the director of the mission. It's just fantastic. It's
what all sides used to work on to actually get in front of this issue that we've gone away from
the last two decades that it's really created this, this homeless problem. And so I think that that
would be incredible to get done. We need to figure out how we can start rolling out the adoption
and that instead of continuing the waste millions of dollars on what's not working.
That's it.
Thank you, Council Member Gonzalez.
Thank you, Mayor.
You know, after the recent events over the weekend and the tragedy, there has been a
lot of questions about youth violence and gain related shootings and homicides, and I think
It would be worthwhile for this council to within a council meeting to have a workshop related
to some of our violence intervention work so that the community can have a fuller understanding
as some of the work that we're already engaged in because there's a lot of ideas out there,
a lot of great conversations, but I think it would be helpful for us to at least establish a baseline
of what's already taking place within the city of Bakersville, along with many other community partners.
Thank you, Councillor Mibbon. It's all this. Councillor Mibbon, are you?
Thank you, Mayor. I'll just share that that's a wonderful idea given all of the
interest in this topic, but also just the communities outpouring of support and concern rather about
say safety in our community, I also just would love to add on some of the investments this
council has made into the partnerships between BPD and our school resource officers and
placing those at particular sites of interest. There's so many different things that we have
done to make our community safer but also in partnership with some of our key partners like
school districts and so we'd love to make sure that we're taking full stock of all of that.
All of that worked. Mr. Clay, did you have something? Thank you, Mayor. I just
would appreciate the opportunities, reflect very briefly a couple of overarching thoughts on this topic
because it is a large conversation that's going on in the community right now.
I would first say that any act of violence, any tragedy, loss of life is so unfortunate.
And we are very saddened by the incident that occurred last week.
I think it's also important to reflect that Bakersfield, from a gun violence perspective,
has not been as safe as it has been the last two years in more than a decade.
The efforts that have been underway have made incredible progress.
Every incident matters, and we want to make sure that we stop every incident we can,
and that we respond to every incident.
But because of the efforts of the Bakersville Police Department,
our Office of Violence and Prevention and Prevention, our community-based organizations,
we saw more than a 70% reduction in homicides and shootings from 2021 through 2024.
We saw a very slight plateauing and uptick of last year.
If you reflect in 2021, we had 60 homicides.
17 of those were gang violence related.
And in 2025, we had 33 homicides.
Three of those were gang violence related.
In 2026, we had only 10 homicides.
One, the one last week was gang violence related.
It is remarkable, the reduction in gain violence.
I would argue that our community
will make gun violence standpoint
has become very safe.
And again, every incident that concerns our community
that is different than that is important to us.
But the gains have been significant,
and we're going to continue to make those gains
and work hard on this topic,
but there's lots of work that's been happening.
and I will express just some concern that as we were rallying partners in 2021 to do this work for
many of the young people in our disadvantaged neighborhoods who are experiencing these incidents
at a too high of a rate. We didn't have the same community impetus at the time. We will welcome
any energy that is created from these type of incidents.
But we've rolled up our sleeves and been doing this work for a long time.
I've seen really big results.
And we'll take the opportunity to make that even bigger.
I would note our overall crime also significantly down.
But we're very frustrated about the chronic low-level quality of life crimes
that can be played in our community.
That is issue number one for your council.
You've made that issue number one for staff to address.
but our gun violence issues have been dramatically different, and it's fortunate that these are isolated instances today.
Thank you, Mr. Kleg. Council member Coleman.
Thank you, Mayor.
I wanted to reach out to Angela Frazier.
I'm sitting here, Dr. Angela Frazier.
I've been sitting here all night, and I appreciate that.
Unfortunately, Johnny Elogas made some remarks as the exited, which were, you know, for those
people that don't know Mr. Elogas, that can be offensive of some of his comments.
So I apologize that we didn't react, I know you wanted to be able to respond to him and
we didn't give him an opportunity to do that, and so I apologize for not understanding
what you were telling me at that time.
So thank you for sitting through this whole thing.
I hope you learned something and that's all I have to say about that.
So thank you.
I don't see any other requests, so we stand at adjourn at 8.51.