[0:09] To the city session of december 17th at 503. Good evening commissioners. Tonight katie is

[0:18] going to be presenting on the displacement avoidance plan, and they'll go into a little

[0:22] bit more about what that is and what that entails during the presentation. And we'll also be

[0:26] happy to answer any questions that you guys may have at the conclusion of the presentation.

[0:32] thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Good evening, chair and commissioner autauga. It's

[0:52] great to be here. I am christian rodriguez and I am a principal with conecuh design

[1:01] initiative. I'm joined with by corinne odom, one of our planning associates. And we're

[1:07] here, like kendra said, to talk to you about the displacement avoidance plan, which is an

[1:14] initiative that is part of the transformative climate communities. And we're really

[1:18] excited to share more on the program. What we'll be doing for the next few years, the

[1:26] larger tcc program. And then we have a moment to just get your thoughts and collect your

[1:32] feedback as we embark in the next steps for our work. So do we have a clicker? Yes. Oh,

[1:39] great. All right. So like I said, christian, our team here in the eastern coachella valley

[1:49] is also. A part of the bigger team. Martin who's our community coordinator, and

[1:58] edith and they're both here tonight. Gui design initiative, or cdai for short, is a

[2:05] nonprofit design and urban planning firm. We have offices in los angeles, here in the

[2:11] city of coachella, which I lead, and then in other parts of the world, and our work is, you

[2:18] know, goes beyond. But a lot of the work that we've done here has been done since at least

[2:26] 2013, and we've done work from building parks to doing mobility planning to working

[2:34] with the city of coachella, helping you all get some money from the state for various

[2:41] different implementation projects. And our team for the displacement avoidance plan

[2:47] also includes key impact. Who will be our policy technical support, and they will be doing

[2:54] research and ultimately helping us come back to you all with policy recommendations. And

[3:00] we're also partnering with fair housing council of riverside county. They will be doing one

[3:07] on one counseling. They will be doing landlord and tenant mediation during the project

[3:13] timeline, and we'll host a first time homebuyer education workshop, and we'll be going

[3:20] out and promoting some know your rights to tenant in in the city as the project goes on. So

[3:26] today we want to talk to you, give you a project overview, share a little bit more about

[3:32] what displacement is, talk to you about some trends that we'll be looking out for, and

[3:39] then share what the community engagement and community involvement in the displacement

[3:45] avoidance plan is. Then we'd like to, like I said, get your feedback and ask some questions

[3:51] and talk to you about what comes next after this presentation. So the

[3:57] displacement avoidance plan or the dap as we'll refer to it, is part of a larger initiative

[4:02] by the city of coachella that you all are probably aware of. It's part of the transformative

[4:06] climate communities or the tcc. This program was launched in 2017 by the california state

[4:13] legislature, and it's intended to be a neighborhood level transformative plan and to

[4:20] reduce, ultimately reduce, greenhouse gas emissions. Tcc provides an array of local

[4:28] economic, environmental, and health benefits. Some of the types of programs that are

[4:35] included in here in the program are things like affordable housing, shared mobility, green

[4:41] infrastructure, energy efficiency, all of things that are part of the coachella.

[4:46] prospera is the name of the tcc program, and all of those things are part of coachella.

[4:51] prospera. The tcc is part of the cap and trade dollars. So as we know, folks that are

[5:01] doing some things to our environment pay in to be able to do that. And so california

[5:07] uses that funding in order to mitigate, reduce emissions, continue to encourage economic

[5:14] development in communities like ours and protect public health. So like I mentioned, coachella,

[5:22] prospera, the name of the tcc program here in the city, sets out to create a more equitable

[5:29] and climate resilient community. Doing this through neighborhood planning that supports climate

[5:34] change adaptation, the healthy development of children, and the ability of older adults to

[5:40] age in place. Overall, a sense of connectedness and benefit to all of coachella residents as

[5:51] part of the coachella prospera is the displacement avoidance plan or the dap, like I

[5:56] mentioned, and this is really intended to help residents and small businesses stay in place.

[6:02] what we know and the state knows is that when you do a large investment in communities

[6:09] that haven't had investment capital investment, there are certain things that tend to

[6:17] happen. The value of property goes up, and so that can cause direct and indirect

[6:24] displacement. And I'll leave some of that for my colleague to share more on. But this

[6:29] process is intended to offset those potential negative impacts of a large economic

[6:36] investment in in the community. And in order to even get the funding to do that investment,

[6:47] we needed to do some preliminary work. So we've been working with staff for a few

[6:52] years now. Actually, when we applied for this funding was in 2022. So I want to say three

[6:58] years ago, we first went out and engaged the community through a series of focus

[7:05] groups and stakeholder interviews. We held a focus group with small business

[7:09] owners to learn about what were some of the concerns and the landscape. You know, their

[7:16] experience in the city, and to see if there were any possible. Policies that could be

[7:24] implemented to support their their growth and their ability to stay. And then also, we met

[7:32] with housing advocates and nonprofits in the area to sort of speak on behalf of residents

[7:39] and some of the experiences. We then took all of that information and did a policy

[7:45] workshop with city staff, and ultimately came to a set of policy recommendations that

[7:51] were given to city council for consideration. City council then approved those

[7:59] recommendations, and that's what ultimately was integrated into the application for the

[8:04] tcc. And so we set out to, you know, do some further consideration and

[8:11] implementation of these policies. But we're not held to that. It was something that

[8:19] city council said we can consider. But ultimately, what we really need to do is to

[8:26] implement a total of six anti-displacement policies and three need to be focused on

[8:33] residential policies. Three need to be focused towards small business retention, and

[8:41] six is the minimum. We could do more, but this is all that we're being held to as part of

[8:48] the contract with sgc, the state. So like I said, the displacement avoidance plan

[8:57] requirements are to implement these policies and programs. We need to address displacement

[9:03] vulnerability throughout the cycle of the grant. And we need to focus within the defined

[9:09] project area, which is what you're seeing there. So this doesn't expand to the entire

[9:15] city, the concentration and the resources that are done. Although policies would be

[9:21] citywide, our engagement efforts and all of the work that our partners will be doing

[9:27] will be really focusing within the project area. And like I said, all of this is intended

[9:33] to lead to some robust community engagement. So I'm going to pass it over to my

[9:37] colleague corinne, who's going to share a little bit more about displacement. Thank you,

[9:42] thank you, thank you christian. Thank you all for having us tonight. And yeah, like

[9:48] christian said, I'm going to be talking a little bit more in depth about some of the

[9:52] definitions of displacement and some of the strategies that have been implemented or are

[9:57] part of the suite of tools that can be used to address displacement. So I've never

[10:03] used one of these before. Let's see. Perfect. So displacement happens when people are forced

[10:10] to move against their will. So that could be for any number of reasons eviction, foreclosure

[10:16] of the building in which they're residing, demolition, an increase in rent or

[10:22] negligence from landowners or landlords or building managers. It can ultimately disconnect

[10:29] people from their existing communities, which has really negative impacts on a wide

[10:34] range of things that could be physical, mental and emotional health. Disconnection from

[10:41] buildings and services that people frequent before they are displaced. So schools, family,

[10:47] friends, churches, all of those things are take a hit when people are forced to move out

[10:52] of their neighborhoods. It also affects life chances. So displaced households, if they

[11:00] cannot afford to live in their existing neighborhood, are often forced to move to lower

[11:06] income neighborhoods where outcomes related to health, education and earning power are

[11:12] very different and oftentimes lower or not as positive. And then the graphic on the far

[11:22] right side is supposed to kind of capture how displacement also weakens a community's

[11:27] political power. So when people are first forced to move out of a certain area, there is less

[11:34] influence of that group of the political outcomes in their neighborhoods. So displacement

[11:40] really touches a wide range of those aspects of people's lives. Investment induced displacement

[11:50] is kind of what the dap in this project is really focused on. It's defined as being triggered

[11:56] by economic and speculative impacts of transformative infrastructure development. So

[12:02] that can be things like sustainability and resiliency features, improvements to

[12:08] mobility, as well as enhancements of parks and open space. And that is a statement

[12:13] from a dap displacement avoidance plan that was prepared for the city of fresno

[12:18] as part of this same tcc program. So the image on the right shows some of the

[12:25] projects that are part of the coachella prospera project and things like increasing

[12:31] equitable housing and affordable housing, shared mobility, energy efficiency and

[12:36] solar, increasing solar access. All of those things are improvements that as part of

[12:43] coachella, prospero will improve quality of life here in the city. And so this

[12:49] displacement is really unique to to large amounts of investment in a community. So

[12:55] the dap will really hone in on preventing those things so that people who currently live here

[13:00] can enjoy the benefits of of these projects. Some of the anti-displacement strategies

[13:11] generally fall into four different categories. So these policies, programs, and

[13:16] financing tools are often classified as renter protections that might include

[13:20] rental assistance, cash assistance, providing education or counseling to tenants, and

[13:28] other things like just cause for evictions and then rent stabilization as well. Housing

[13:33] production is another category of anti-displacement strategy, so ensuring that there is

[13:39] enough housing to house people and increasing the housing stock is is considered another

[13:47] method for combating displacement, stock preservation and upgrades.

[13:52] basically just means holding on to the housing that does exist and making sure that it remains

[13:56] in good condition for people to continue living in. Some of the strategies that fall under that

[14:02] category include community land trusts. So like shared ownership of land, as well as

[14:09] restricting the ability of buildings to be converted from rental properties to to

[14:16] condominiums. And then finally, the fourth category is asset building, which focuses less on

[14:23] housing stock, increasing it, preserving it, protecting renters, and more on increasing

[14:29] like the financial power of residents. So that could be coaching around like financial

[14:35] decision making, lending or loans to to help first time homebuyers purchase and other

[14:43] things like lease to purchase programs, things of that nature. So those are the four kind of

[14:48] major buckets of anti-displacement strategies that will be looking into as we

[14:54] develop the displacement avoidance plan. As part of this project. Okay. And now that

[15:01] I've talked a little bit about what displacement is, we also wanted to share how it's

[15:06] currently showing up in this part of the state. And so we have some information from a

[15:15] report that was published by the california housing partnership that focuses on

[15:19] riverside county, this during this current year. And these following slides, pull graphs

[15:25] from this affordable housing needs report. But some of the key data points here are that

[15:33] 54,000 about low income renter households in riverside county do not have access to an

[15:38] affordable home state, and federal funding for housing production and preservation in

[15:44] riverside county is down by half from 2024, which is pretty shocking. 78% of extremely low

[15:53] income households in riverside county are paying more than half of their income on housing

[15:58] costs. That's traditionally referred to as housing burden. When people are paying a really

[16:04] significant portion of their income on rent. And we have some more graphics about that

[16:09] later in the presentation. There are also some figures here about homelessness and the

[16:15] ability to accommodate people who are dealing with that experience. And then there's

[16:21] also some information here about minimum wage. So renters in the county have to earn at

[16:27] least $38.33 per hour, which is greater than the minimum age, minimum wage. Excuse me? In

[16:35] order to afford the average monthly rent in the county. This slide talks a little bit

[16:43] about the gaps in affordable housing access for renters. So I think this is again the same

[16:50] stat from the previous slide. But it shows that low income renter households really do not

[16:56] have good access to affordable homes. So on the left hand side, you can see the number of very

[17:04] low income individuals and extremely low income individuals who are renters.

[17:09] and the gap in the availability of rental homes is quite massive. On the right hand side,

[17:16] it's just showing those cost burdened households. So 70%, 78% of extremely low income

[17:23] households in the county are paying more than half of their income on housing costs. So

[17:27] just a visual representation of the information from that previous slide. This talks a

[17:36] little bit about rent costs. And so asking rents in riverside county have increased

[17:41] by almost 30% between the end of 2019 and the end of 2024. I think this is not unique to

[17:51] riverside county, but globally or I guess nationwide rents are going up and it is hard to

[17:58] account for that as people's wages aren't really reflected of that increase. I think this

[18:04] is our second to last graph, but again, this shows that minimum wage amount that people

[18:09] would need to make in order to pay for the average rental price in in riverside county.

[18:16] so it also compares it to the state minimum wage. And like the average amount of money

[18:24] that people in certain industries make. So you can see on the fourth line that people

[18:29] who work in the home health and personal care industry make about $16.64 on the hour, which

[18:36] is more than half the amount needed in order to make that average asking rent payment.

[18:48] and then this map is not from the riverside county affordable housing needs report, but it's

[18:55] from the columbia screen database, which shows a number of different factors that

[19:03] affect disadvantaged communities across the state. And one of the things that it

[19:08] focuses on is housing burden. So this is zoomed in, actually, to take a closer look at the

[19:14] city of coachella and its surrounding area. And this again is showing that housing

[19:20] burden indicator. So it's the percentage of households that are low income and are paying

[19:26] more than 50% of their income on rent. So you can see that within the city of coachella,

[19:35] housing burden is pretty significant. The darker colors obviously show that that the

[19:43] percentage is higher in those areas, and we don't have it exactly called out. Is this a

[19:48] laser? Oh no, it's not a laser. It doesn't I don't need I don't need it to be a laser. But we

[19:55] don't have the exact boundary of the project area here. But you can imagine that the

[20:00] project area boundary is sort of where that small circle is and kind of goes out from there.

[20:05] so there is a great amount of housing burden within the project area. And then this

[20:12] last map shares affordable housing projects that are currently in the pipeline. And

[20:17] it also includes the project status of those developments. It's not interactive here

[20:23] because it's on a powerpoint slide, but this is a map, a portal that was created by an

[20:28] organization called lift to rise. And they have a good system of tracking affordable

[20:33] housing that's coming on and also identifying potential opportunities for future

[20:38] affordable housing development. Okay, so that was a lot of information about the sort of

[20:45] residential landscape. And we also wanted to share some insights about what

[20:51] displacement pressures are that are being experienced by small businesses in coachella. And so

[20:58] these insights came out of the conversations that christian mentioned at the beginning of

[21:03] the presentation that were had in order to develop the application for the grant. This

[21:09] came out of like a stakeholder conversation with a number of business owners in the area. So

[21:15] some of the challenges and concerns that people identified were that new code and

[21:21] compliance requirements could be expensive, that the processes of getting businesses

[21:27] set up and sometimes remodeled often was delayed, that there's a lot of competition between

[21:33] smaller businesses and larger operations that are hard to keep up with. That security has

[21:39] posed a challenge for small business owners as well, and the impact that the unhoused

[21:46] population has been or has had on business operations was also a point that that business

[21:53] owners discussed in that focus group two years ago. As far as areas for improvements and

[21:59] opportunities for support, business owners discussed the accessibility and

[22:05] responsiveness of city officials, improving security measures for businesses, which

[22:11] is reflected in that previous slide about challenges, streamlining and accelerating

[22:17] the process for business extensions and business plans. Investment in security

[22:23] infrastructure. I think a number of the people who participated in this focus

[22:27] group were didn't necessarily own the the space in which their business was, and so

[22:34] there was discussion of how important it is for actual property owners to maintain

[22:39] those spaces and beautify them as well. And then there was also discussion of insurance.

[22:46] and then this last kind of category of insights that came out of these conversations were

[22:51] around potential policies and programs that business owners felt would be helpful in, in

[22:59] lessening the risk of displacement for them. So there was discussion of financial

[23:04] assistance or grants that would help with code compliance. There was discussion about

[23:11] orientation programs that would be helpful for educating newer business owners on getting a

[23:16] business up and running, collaboration with law enforcement around safety and

[23:21] security, ensuring that resources are allocated to address the issue of the

[23:29] unhoused population in the city. To sort of lessen the impact of that on small businesses, and

[23:36] then also a call for meetings or forums where business owners could engage with city

[23:42] representatives, which is kind of similar to that bullet point, I think, on the last slide as

[23:48] well. And then just a few other things that came out of these conversations that were

[23:54] specific to potential policies and improvements. More grant programs, especially for energy

[24:00] efficiency. There was mention of solar panels and general improvements, cleaning services,

[24:07] streamlined approval for esthetic enhancements, a greater number of events to

[24:12] sort of increase awareness about small businesses, and then making sure that there's

[24:19] representation and consideration of owner's opinions in city decision

[24:23] making. And then finally there was and there's a star next to it because it is a part of this

[24:30] initiative as well, was the creation of a small business alliance, where business owners

[24:35] could communicate with each other about what they're experiencing, what their

[24:40] challenges have been, and a space to sort of be in conversation about those sorts

[24:45] of things. Okay. And I am going to talk really quickly about community engagement, which is

[24:54] a really key aspect of the dap project as well. And it is focused on these two subgroups,

[25:01] residents and small businesses. So like I just said, the small business alliance was something

[25:06] that was brought up during that engagement. In 2023. It is being actualized in this

[25:11] project. So we are working on forming a small business alliance as part of the dap,

[25:17] and the intent of that is to provide a forum like we kind of touched on in the previous

[25:23] slide for business owners to share their priorities, discuss common challenges that they

[25:29] experience. The objective is also to kind of discuss those things, prioritize what is most

[25:37] pressing or important, and then advocate advocate for changes around those topics. There's a

[25:45] like a goal to sort of develop lines of communication, I think, amongst business owners as well

[25:50] as with city officials, further develop business owners capacity to advocate and. Take

[26:00] action around the things that they would like to see that would improve the conditions.

[26:05] as business owners in the city strengthening relationships, I think, again, with each other

[26:11] and with the city, and then elevating policy programs and funding to the city's attention.

[26:16] that would make being a small business owner easier, more attractive and supportive, I

[26:24] guess. And then on the left hand side is just an image of sort of the first part of the

[26:31] small business alliance that has been completed. We've developed a small business

[26:36] alliance charter, which basically just kind of outlines the intent of the group, some

[26:40] of the topics that they might address. And yeah, kind of outlines the overall goals and

[26:47] objectives of the of the alliance. The other thing that is currently active is a small

[26:54] business survey. The intent of this is to understand the challenges, whether they're

[27:00] physical, operational or financial, that small business owners are facing. It's also

[27:07] intended to collect a little bit more information about the actual property in which

[27:13] business owners operate. And so there are some questions on there about how property owner

[27:20] or small business owners decided to operate out of a particular location if they've

[27:26] ever had to relocate. Why that might have been, how long they've been in a certain place,

[27:31] whether they rent or own, etcetera, etcetera. So trying to get a bigger picture or a

[27:36] better picture of the conditions that business owners are currently working with. And

[27:42] then it also gets some feedback about some potential policies and programs. And optionally,

[27:48] business owners can provide information about their their business, if that's like number

[27:53] of employees, what kind of work they do, what kind of industry they're in, etcetera, etcetera.

[27:58] so that's live now and it will collect responses for the duration of the project to

[28:04] really inform some of the conversations that we're having about policy, as well as the

[28:09] conversations in the small business alliance. And then the residential group is called

[28:16] vecinos de coachella, prospera, and it is a group of five residents who will be kind of

[28:25] informing the policies and existing conditions around the residential experience of

[28:32] displacement in coachella. So the intent is for the ambassador insights to really

[28:38] shape the displacement avoidance plan and form some of the policies and programs that

[28:42] will come out of it. These vecinos will also be collecting data from their own

[28:49] neighborhoods, doing interviews, surveying, and some of the topics that they might run into

[28:58] address or evictions, rent increases, housing conditions and tenant experiences. All of

[29:03] those are really big topics. And so I think the other intent of this group is to educate

[29:11] ambassadors about some of the things that we've talked about here already, but also provide

[29:16] them with the skills to similarly to the sba, advocate for fair housing policies,

[29:23] practices and anti-displacement initiatives. So those are our two. Oh, I guess the last thing

[29:31] about the vecinos group is that we've also kind of outlined the kinds of themes that we're

[29:36] going to be looking at in the sort of first phase of the group. We're going to be doing,

[29:42] like I said, this displacement education, really getting people to understand all of the

[29:46] things that cause people to be displaced, some of the things that prevent it, and

[29:51] understanding like the specific conditions here in coachella, we also are going to be doing

[29:56] like training sessions around how to engage with community members. We do engagement all

[30:03] the time, but it's not like human nature to know how to do that. And often conversations

[30:09] around displacement are sensitive. And so the intent of that part of this program will

[30:16] be to really like, make sure that the ambassadors are well equipped to have those

[30:22] conversations with people and also city decision making, just overall like capacity building

[30:29] for people who are participating. And then finally in like our final sessions,

[30:35] we'll be looking at examples of displacement avoidance plans and really thinking about how

[30:41] the coachella displacement avoidance plan will materialize. This group will meet monthly.

[30:48] that's a list of some of the things that we'll be talking about. And then they will be

[30:53] compensated for that participation as well. Okay, I think that's everything for me.

[31:00] and I'm going to turn it back over to christian. Thank you, thank you. So that was a lot of

[31:08] information that we just threw your way. But I think the biggest takeaways is the city

[31:16] is doing something to enhance the lives of residents within the within the project boundary,

[31:23] using tcc funding to do that. In order to do this large investment, the state has added

[31:29] these guardrails to make sure that we aren't inadvertently causing harm by trying to do

[31:35] good. And one of those harms that could be done inadvertently is displacing

[31:40] both homeowners, renters and small businesses. So ultimately, this plan, all of the work that

[31:47] we're doing is intended to prevent that. Do that while the investment is happening, to

[31:52] make sure that we are keeping our ear to the ground of what are the goings and comings of

[31:59] possible displacement trends, and ultimately to come to you and ultimately to the city

[32:05] council for policies that will then fortify the intention of retaining residents and small

[32:16] businesses. So, you know, we'd love to get your insights. We have some questions that might

[32:24] guide a conversation, but this is the beginning of this process. And so we're learning.

[32:31] you know, corinne was sharing a lot of the stuff that we've been pulling, both at the state

[32:36] and the county level. We're now starting to get more granular. What is happening in coachella.

[32:42] we also know that as investment is happening, implementation of the tcc, things will start

[32:50] changing. So this will be evolving and we anticipate for this process to be really

[33:00] understanding and monitoring for the first two years and then looking at implementation

[33:06] of these policies and monitoring their effectiveness for the last four or the last

[33:13] two, excuse me, for a 4 to 5 year total contract. So we're open to questions. Thoughts.

[33:22] yeah. Anything that is coming up to you at this point. Thank you guys so much for the

[33:28] presentation. I had a question. So the vecinos de coachella prospera will be used basically

[33:33] as an indicator to identify the neighborhoods that are that are being affected or are probably

[33:40] a high risk of displacement. Yeah, it'll be a couple of things. I think it'll be an

[33:45] opportunity for us to ground truth, what we're finding through polling data and as

[33:49] we're finding other sort of more traditional channels of of identifying trends, this group

[33:56] will help us also identify things that we won't be able to see just by pulling data. Right.

[34:00] like they will be able to tell us if they're starting to see a lot of people moving out in

[34:06] their neighborhoods. And so they're going to be the ear to the ground that I was

[34:12] mentioning. So they will tell us what is happening in real time. They will also be the

[34:16] folks that we go to as we're collecting and finding more information of trends that are

[34:20] happening in the city to say is this is this the experience? They will also be the

[34:26] conductors of those conversations, because it's easier to talk to your

[34:30] neighbors about what your experience is like living in the community. We're really

[34:36] going to build the capacity of these five individuals to be those ambassadors in coachella

[34:42] that folks can come to with, you know, any sort of challenges with staying in

[34:48] place. Awesome. Is there going to be any other way or another indicator to get that data, or

[34:53] is it just going to be based on them? No, we'll be well, we're working with key impact is our

[34:59] sort of policy expert. So we've just met with them like an hour ago and talking about all of

[35:06] the data that we need to start looking at. We're going to be looking at other communities

[35:12] comparable to coachella and what they've done and what sort of impacts we're looking at

[35:18] previous awardees of the tcc and what sort of impacts the implementation has had, so that

[35:25] we can then infer what could possibly happen here. The challenge with the displacement

[35:30] avoidance plan happening at the same time as implementation is happening, is that we might not

[35:35] be able to see data trends for another few years, so they're going to be ground truthing

[35:43] what we're finding through more traditional ways, through maybe the american community survey,

[35:48] there are ways for us to see if there have already been any indicators. One thing that

[35:54] we're looking at is what have demographics changed within the project area. So we know that

[36:01] college education is one indicator. So as more folks with higher education degrees

[36:06] come in, rents tend to increase. Also, the different types of ethnicities moving in, who's

[36:13] moving in, who's moving out. So we're able to pull all of that. We want to ground truth that

[36:18] with this group and then what we're not going to be able to find in real time. That's how

[36:23] this group will sort of contribute. Awesome. And I apologize if I missed it in the

[36:28] presentation, but if when the vecinos do come across a neighbor that's struggling or

[36:33] at risk of displacement, are they going to be offered resources? Yeah, that's a great

[36:39] question. So let me go back to our partnerships. In the beginning. Yeah. So and really

[36:48] it's me showing my picture. No the fair housing council of riverside county, they will be

[36:55] doing tenant mediation. And because that's another big problem they'll be doing,

[37:03] they'll be going out to community events. And they have a lot of hud approved

[37:11] information that we will actually be taking. And adding the coachella prospera graphic

[37:17] identity so that residents can see consistency. This is all part of it. So we're taking

[37:22] their content and we're going to disseminate it in the community. And so there's going to be a big push for educating the community and renters on what are their rights, what is

[37:31] currently available to them. And then if renters or folks that are being displaced are

[37:37] having need fair housing council will step in and they're going to be our partner

[37:43] throughout the entire implementation as a service provider. Perfect. Thank you. Yeah. Commissioner, do you have any questions or comments for them? I think this looks great.

[37:51] I really like the work that you will be doing with small business owners. I think it's

[37:57] really important to always keep them with between like arm's length and especially with

[38:01] their employees to have that on the on the form as well, because it's you always to get

[38:07] down to the wire. It's always good to talk to staff themselves because they're the

[38:12] ones that not that the owners don't do the work, but they're the ones that the meat and

[38:16] potatoes of the of dish. So no, other than that, I'm really impressed. Excited for the work.

[38:23] I think you guys did a good job. Thank you. And I think maybe one thing that we didn't

[38:29] communicate is our partnership with kendra and her team and selena and her team. So we've

[38:35] been in constant communication. We're not doing this in a silo and then coming and showing up

[38:39] here with recommendations. We are involving your staff every step of the way. And as things

[38:47] are becoming apparent, we will be looking to them to help us guide and you'll be seeing more

[38:55] of us. So this is really the beginning of an ongoing conversation, and eventually

[39:01] we're interested in having study sessions, joint study sessions, if possible, with you

[39:05] and council. This is really going to take a lot of energy, effort and a lot of great minds

[39:13] like the ones in the room now. And so like I said, yeah, it's really the beginning of an

[39:18] ongoing partnership with you, all city staff, the community and our team. Thank you. I have

[39:25] one quick because my my communications crisis cannot be avoided. It's a project. So if

[39:31] the project is to fall short, is there like a crisis plan in place or are we just hoping for

[39:38] the best? Yeah. Okay, so I'm speaking I can speak on the displacement avoidance plan as

[39:44] part of the coachella prospera. Are you asking like at the larger scale or are you just saying, like within the coachella or the coachella within our our. For instance,

[39:54] if displacements become higher than what we thought would be. Yeah. And it comes to a level

[39:58] that it's just not manageable anymore. Is there a is there a plan that can be well, this

[40:03] this is where you, as an advisory body to council come in. This is why it's important.

[40:08] this partnership is important because we are going to be measuring what's happening out

[40:13] there and giving you recommendations, how to control that. Ultimately, this is why

[40:21] this ongoing conversation needs to to to happen throughout the entire implementation period,

[40:26] because we will come to you and say, hey, this is what's happening. Here's what we think

[40:31] can be done. Because we've done the research. We've looked at comparable cities like the city

[40:36] of coachella. This is what they've done. Maybe we're interested in putting something forward that hasn't been done, but we think is manageable and adequate for coachella. And so

[40:45] you all would be considering those policy recommendations, making a recommendation to city

[40:51] council ultimately. And and that's what that's what we're hoping that this will be

[40:56] awesome. Thank you so much. You're our failsafe. Thanks. Yeah, yeah. We just I guess we

[41:02] also had just some questions that, you know, we're hoping to just not that you need to

[41:07] answer now, but really to start helping you think on how we're thinking about it. You know,

[41:12] we're we're interested in knowing if there are signs of displacement that you all are

[41:19] seeing. What or have residents or business owners brought any specific issues to your

[41:28] attention. And then you know what you think are anti-displacement priorities of

[41:34] residents and business owners as is. And the reason these questions are important is as

[41:39] we continue to look and do our research, we want to make sure that we, you know, we

[41:46] displacement could be very broad. So we want to refine our research with anything that

[41:51] might already be in place. So, you know, we're bringing this to you and we'll be talking to

[41:57] the team. If we have any answers to these questions, we'd love to hear them. Okay.

[42:03] thank you. At the moment, I don't think so. I just well, now housing is very expensive.

[42:11] that I do realize that even in the new homes, like we've seen a lot more multiple families

[42:16] living in one same home. And I think those are the you know, it's kind of a sign of a bigger

[42:22] displacement, because if a family or two leave the home, the one remaining is kind of

[42:27] stays behind with like a $4,000 mortgage. Yeah. Other than that, no, not that I can think of

[42:34] right now. Yeah. That's helpful. Yeah, I, I can come back with more thoughts with the next

[42:43] presentation and all of this, but I, I would agree with with the chair like I noticed

[42:48] throughout the neighborhoods, there's, you know, ten cars per house because there's that many

[42:52] people that need to live there. Excuse me, need to live there to, to be able to afford to a

[42:58] home. So I think it's really important to make sure that our residents get more independency

[43:06] to be able to do these, to have a, you know, a beautiful home and neighborhood on their own

[43:11] as a as opposed to always unless they choose to, as opposed to, you know, residing

[43:16] with family members or friends and, and things in that way. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. I think

[43:23] yeah, what you both have brought up is really important. And I think it is helpful for

[43:27] us to understand the landscape of coachella residents. And yeah, we'll continue. We'll

[43:33] leave these questions with you. If community members are coming and you're hearing any reaction

[43:40] to these, we'd love to, you know, hear that from you. And kendra can pass on the message,

[43:47] or we can always come back and speak with you all directly. So yeah, thank you so much. Thanks.

[43:54] just really quickly, you know what you can expect from us next. In early 2026, we'll be

[44:02] meeting with vecinos de coachella, prospera and the small business alliance will be

[44:09] doing a policy precedent research with our partner k impact, and we anticipate to

[44:15] have something to present to the team in quarter one of next year. And we will begin to do

[44:23] community education, outreach and engagement also in quarter one of next year. So you'll

[44:27] start seeing us out and about. And please feel free to point residents our way. Okay.

[44:35] awesome. Thank you so much. Thank you. Appreciate it. Thanks for your time. Council.

[44:47] woodburn. Today's study session at

Dec 17, 2025 Planning Commission Study Session

Agenda

Transcript