[10:47] I call to order the June 27, 2022, city council, successor agency to the redevelopment agency housing authority regular meeting. Would you all please stand and join me in the pledge of allegiance.

[11:31] A is changes to the order of the agenda. Are there any changes?

[11:38] No changes from staff this evening, Mayor.

[11:45] A is a proclamation for

[11:47] Parking Recreation Month.

[12:30] Okay, today we're going to recognize July 2022 as Parks and Recreation Month, whereas

[12:35] the U.S. House of Representatives has designated July as Parks and Recreation Month, and whereas

[12:40] Parks and Recreation is an integral part of communities throughout this country, including

[12:45] the city of San Carlos, and whereas Parks and Recreation promotes time spent in nature,

[12:50] which positively impacts mental health by increasing cognitive performance and well-being and alleviating

[12:56] illnesses such as depression, attention deficit disorders, and Alzheimer's.

[13:00] And whereas park and recreation programming and educational activities such as out-of-school

[13:04] time programming, youth sports and environmental education are critical to childhood development.

[13:10] And whereas parks and recreation increases the community's economic prosperity through increased

[13:15] property values, expansion of the local tax space, increased tourism, and the attraction and

[13:20] retention of businesses and crime reduction.

[13:22] and where as our parks and natural recreation areas ensure the ecological beauty of our community

[13:27] and provide us place for children and adults to connect with nature and recreate outdoors.

[13:33] And whereas thousands of children, adults, and seniors benefit from the wide range of services,

[13:38] facilities, and programs provided by the San Carlos Parks and Recreation Department,

[13:42] including the Youth Center and Senior Meal Program, the events such as hometown days,

[13:47] the goblin walk, night of holiday lights, music in the park, and family camp out.

[13:51] and res the city of San Carlos recognizes that parks and recreation areas are fundamental to the well-being of our community,

[13:58] enriching the lives of its residents and visitors, as well as adding value to the community's homes and neighborhoods.

[14:03] Now therefore, be it proclaimed that I, Sarah McDowell, Mayor, and-

[14:09] Eason, Mayor.

[14:12] Of the city of San Carlos, on behalf of the City Council, do hereby declare July 2022 as parks and recreation month.

[14:18] And in doing so, urge the community to continue to use and enjoy our parks and recreational

[14:23] opportunities.

[14:24] Thank you, Amy.

[14:27] We're going to sit down, we'll listen to Amy.

[14:30] Thank you, Madam Mayor and our guest mayor for the evening.

[14:33] Just want to take a minute to thank the mayor and council for once again recognizing parks

[14:38] and recreation profession.

[14:40] Our programs, our events, our facilities in the community again this July 2022.

[14:45] We hit the ground running this summer as you may know.

[14:48] and so hope to see you guys out in our camps or our events, our concerts, our movies and to roll

[14:57] into fall our art and wine fair that we are taking on.

[15:00] This year, and all of our fall events. So thank you for your support. As always, it is greatly appreciated.

[15:13] For BEA's approximation for outgoing commissioners.

[15:19] Okay, so I'm going to call Don Bradley up. Don, I'm going to present you with the proclamation. We also note the service of Mark Berger, Mishant, Garg, and Sandy, Nirenberg tonight. But I don't think they're here to join us, but I want to thank them very much for their service. But I'm going to

[15:38] come up and we would you like to come with me, Eason?

[15:41] Okay, we'll present this to Mr. Broadley.

[16:07] Ready?

[16:08] Don, it's such an honor to have you here tonight.

[16:11] You've been such a wonderful public servant.

[16:13] I remember when I was serving on EDAC,

[16:15] you were serving on the Planning Commission

[16:16] and we went and walked downtown together

[16:18] and I just really want to appreciate your service tonight.

[16:21] So I'm going to read you your proclamation if that's okay.

[16:24] All right.

[16:29] Res, Donald W. Bradley was appointed by the City Council

[16:34] in 2016 to serve on the Planning Commission and was reappointed for another term in 2019.

[16:40] And whereas as a Planning Commissioner, Donald Bradley's primary duties were to participate in

[16:45] the administration of the zoning laws and policies of the city. Make recommendations to the City

[16:50] Council regarding land use, review proposed development projects, and advise as to the overall

[16:55] development and maintenance of the general plan of the city. And whereas Donald Bradley's distinguished

[17:00] career in the planning field spanned over 60 years and provided him with an understanding

[17:06] that planning involves the physical, design, social, economic, and political aspects of

[17:12] a whole region, all of which made him an invaluable asset to the Planning Commission.

[17:17] And whereas Donald Bradley led the Planning Commission as chair in 2018 and served as chair

[17:22] of the Residential Design Review Committee for a total of three years, and whereas during

[17:27] During his tenure on the Planning Commission, Donald Bradley made vital contributions on some

[17:32] of the most significant projects in the city of San Carlos, including the East Side Innovation

[17:36] District Vision Plan, and single family house size study, and has helped shape project

[17:41] approvals for key projects, including 626 and 817 Walnut Housing Developments, and new

[17:48] R&D and life science developments at 887 Industrial, 1091 Industrial, and 1030 Britain Avenue.

[17:55] And whereas Donald Bradley's six years of dedicated service as a member of the planning commission represents and embodies the St. Carlos traditions of volunteerism and service to the community.

[18:06] And whereas Donald Bradley was a great asset on the planning commission and will be greatly missed by his staff and his peers.

[18:13] Now therefore be it proclaimed that I Sarah McDowell mayor and Eason mayor of the city of St. Carlos.

[18:22] Do hear by express sincere appreciation and thanks to Donald Bradley for his contributions on the Planning Commission and dedication to the community of San Carlos.

[18:31] Thank you, Don.

[18:32] If

[18:46] my wife were here, she would warn you, I'm a big talker, but I'll try to remember her last remarks as I left home today.

[18:55] Don't talk about Senate Bill 9.

[19:00] If you don't know what that is, I won't tell you.

[19:04] Thank you, Council members, staff, the city, other volunteers, hard work, staff, and friends.

[19:17] It's been my honor and my duty to work for these past six years.

[19:23] It went by rather fast, as Ellen and I were saying on the way in.

[19:31] Let me, I like quotes and we have this saying here, as you all know, we're the city of good living, but why can we say that?

[19:44] I think it relates back to 150 years ago.

[19:48] So Abraham Lincoln said, I don't know if it was Gettysburg or a second inaugural dress,

[19:57] he came up, he said, we're a government by the people, by the people and for the people.

[20:07] And that's one reason I think that we're the city of good living.

[20:16] John F. Kennedy's second inaugural speech he said, ask not what your country can do for

[20:25] you, but what you can do for your country.

[20:29] And I would say put in city, maybe state or county or a nonprofit that all helps.

[20:40] And that's why I often say we're the city of good government also.

[20:47] And lastly, I promise, Daniel Burnham said in 1893 in Chicago at the world exposition,

[20:57] they're, make no little plans, they have no magic disturbance, blood, make big plans,

[21:06] And

[21:09] that's why I frequently say we're also the city of good planning.

[21:13] Thank you all so much, I love you.

[21:28] Section five is Council Communications Announcements.

[21:32] Council Communications Announcements are brief items for members of the City Council regarding

[21:39] outcome events in the community and correspondence that they have received.

[21:45] There are information known in nature and no action will be taken on these items at this meeting.

[21:53] Item 5A is an announcement of the newly appointed, but what I'm going to do is,

[22:05] Councilmember Collins.

[22:10] Thank you, Mayor.

[22:11] Just a couple of things, I attended a, LPMG meeting last Thursday, LPMG stands for local policy makers group.

[22:23] but it's the Caltrain Electrification Task Force.

[22:27] And at that meeting, we heard also from high speed rail

[22:32] and they have been deciding on which track options they're going

[22:35] to choose as they run high speed rail down the peninsula.

[22:39] One of those options was called alternative B

[22:42] and it would have run an additional track

[22:45] or two right through San Carlos.

[22:48] They've decided on an alternative A, which does not do that.

[22:51] So, I would like the residents of San Carlos to know that at least for probably another 20 or 30 years or not before tracks running through San Carlos.

[23:01] The other thing I would like to mention is that one of San Carlos's longest residents, Velma Coleman, Velma Harding Coleman of 72 years, she lived in San Carlos for 72 years, passed away last Wednesday.

[23:18] She was my mother-in-law and I thank her for producing my wife's and my and subsequently

[23:26] my family.

[23:27] But I was honored to know her and she lived a long and fruitful life.

[23:37] And so, remember, Dugan?

[23:41] Thank you mayor for the day and I just have a couple quick things.

[23:45] First, very timely that July is Park and Rec month because we're off to a great start

[23:52] Gordon Park and Rec on Friday, I went to the concert in the park, and

[23:57] Moustache Harbor really rocked Burton Park, and I'll say I think there was probably

[24:01] like 2,000 people in the park that night.

[24:03] It was really an amazing turnout, so I would encourage everyone to tune in to our

[24:10] great lineup of concerts in the park, and I understand the movie night, Saturday night was

[24:15] well attended as well, so we got some good stuff going this summer.

[24:19] And then secondly, the week before last, I represented San Carlos at the General Assembly of the Association of Barrier Governments, and there was a robust discussion on rena allocations and it ended up being a discussion of best practices for the further development of a below market rate housing and I participated in some of that, but in particular, I mentioned the good work.

[24:43] We did recently as a city on preservation of blow market rate housing, and how we recently extended our inclusionary blow market rate covenants from previously 45 or 55 years into perpetuity in that we had done the hard work Greg and his team to discover that we could do that as a city and then we did it.

[25:07] And I'll just say that that was well received, and they're prior to that, not a lot of discussion was happening on the preservation of below market rate housing.

[25:17] And I'll just say I got feedback from five or six different cities that their leaders are going to definitely take a look at that.

[25:25] So I just want to applaud the leadership we're showing here in San Carlos on affordable housing. Thank you.

[25:38] I have just a few. I just wanted to congratulate and thank all the commissioners for their

[25:44] service and particularly Don who's here. I would wholeheartedly agree with you, Don.

[25:50] It is a citizen engagement that does make us the city of good living. So thank you.

[25:55] I also attended the Council of Cities dinner on Friday, which is a monthly gathering of

[26:02] The local elected officials, we met in East Palo Alto and heard about some of the boys and girls club activities around there, but it was a good opportunity to talk to some of the council members from South San Francisco who have in place a child care fee right now, so to talk to them as is something we're considering today, so it is good opportunity to collaborate and get more insight from some of the other cities and fellow council members.

[26:28] members, and then lastly, I, Mayor McDowell and I participate in the two plus two meeting

[26:35] this week on Friday, which is two City Council members and two school board members that

[26:40] we meet on a fairly regular basis. We talked around the number of issues. I'll let the

[26:46] mayor finish on that, but around enrollment and funding for the school district that's

[26:51] going to keep going up and down. One of the interesting pieces that I think will be relevant

[26:56] our discussion tonight is, there's potentially a state, some changes to the state law around transitional kindergarten,

[27:03] which would expand the age range so that there'll be all three year olds.

[27:07] So it could impact our child care numbers and an opportunity to partner more with the city.

[27:12] I'm using with the school district around this, those areas.

[27:15] So I'll turn it over to the mayor to finish.

[27:21] The mayor.

[27:23] Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

[27:25] I had a wonderful time touring several different city departments with Mayor Eason here and I wanted to thank our staff for being such wonderful hosts.

[27:34] We had a really great time and Eason has just been a terrific mayor, so I really enjoyed my time with you.

[27:40] Following up on what the Vice Mayor said, I also wanted to report out from the 2 plus 2 meeting that Chief Spell and I gave a presentation on safety regulations for firearms

[27:52] and the good work that we had done as a city and as a council in 2019 to pass several ordinances to require safe storage of firearms.

[28:02] Any firearms here in our city have to be stored in a locked container, disabled by a trigger lock.

[28:09] We pass some zoning regulations that govern where firearms retailers could open.

[28:13] And all of this information is posted on the city's website at cityofsancarlows.org slash

[28:19] fire arms regulations. So if anyone has questions about what's on the books here in San

[28:24] Carlos, I'm very proud of our council's work. And we've done quite a bit. And then I had

[28:29] one other piece of information that I wanted to share with the public, which is regarding

[28:34] safe routes to school, which we also touched on in our two-plus-two meeting. Our public

[28:39] the work director Steven Machita launched a beautiful new web page at cityofsancarlas.org

[28:44] slash bikeped plan where there are several safety improvements listed and maps. Interactive

[28:50] maps where the public can go in and comment on several of the suggested improvements.

[28:55] So it would be great if the public would weigh in over the summer on some of those plans.

[29:09] a pointed downtown advisory committee members.

[29:14] Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

[29:15] So I have the honour tonight to announce, we have 17 new members of our downtown advisory committee,

[29:21] which was established to be an advisory body to the city council as we reimagine the Laurel Street corridor.

[29:29] So those members are Alison Chang and Tom Davis representing downtown property owners.

[29:34] Ali Bourd and Donna Lyra, as downtown business operators.

[29:38] Anthony Cam, economic development advisory commission member.

[29:42] Jean Dainer, as an older adult representative from the adult community center.

[29:47] Mark Maxwell from the Parks, Recreation and Culture Commission.

[29:51] Amy Buckmaster is a representative from Chamber San Mateo County.

[29:55] Madison Blanton is the special needs community.

[29:58] We have Joaquin.

[30:00] Petrin Shri Shundra-Shakran, Alisa Espinoza, and Monet Meredith, at large members. Maya,

[30:10] Nayberg, and Semina-Ginwala, from the Youth Advisory Council. And Elizabeth Min, Cecil

[30:17] Lee, James Bertram, and Tracy Massaro, as altered it. So, I'm really excited about that work

[30:23] getting underway, and I want to thank everyone we had at almost 100 people apply. We interviewed

[30:29] I think 41 different members of the public, and I really appreciated the interest from the public and looking forward to hearing from them soon.

[30:39] That's you, Mr. Mayor.

[30:40] Does Council have any other announcements to make?

[30:50] Council member, do you have any other announcements to make?

[30:53] Yes, thank you, Mayor, for the day and I just, I was remiss, I also just want to briefly thank Don Bradley for all of his long career public service.

[31:03] not just on our planning commission, but this goes all the way back to his service in the Air Force as a young man, and truly a lifetime of service.

[31:10] And Don was the chair of the planning commission when I joined the planning commission back in 2018.

[31:17] And he was as very generous with his time, with his experience, and really did help me get up to speed quickly.

[31:23] And I know firsthand he had a lot of very solid impact to our various planning ordinances.

[31:32] and projects in town, so thank you, Don, really appreciate that personally.

[31:41] We will take public comments on items not posted on the agenda, each because limited to two minutes.

[31:52] If the item you're speaking is not listed on the agenda, please be advised that the city council may briefly respond to statements made or

[32:04] questions posed as allowed under the round act.

[32:07] The City Council's general policy is to refer items to staff for intention or have

[32:13] a matter placed on a future city council agenda for more comprehensive action or reports

[32:20] and formal public discussion in input at all at that time.

[32:26] Crystal, is there anyone wishing to speak?

[32:28] Yes, Mr. Mayor, we do have one person in the chambers, a Laura deck.

[32:34] If you can approach the podium, please.

[32:42] To the mayor and mayor for the day and council members and thank Carlos residents here

[32:49] tonight.

[32:50] Good evening.

[32:51] My name is Laura deck and I'm a 30-year San Carlos resident.

[32:55] I raised my children here and they attended a Rundle T.L. and Carlmont.

[32:59] On May 21st, I attended the hometown day's parade with my boyfriend John and how wonderful

[33:07] it was to see the various schools, clubs, and bands after the long pandemic hiatus.

[33:14] My children marched in the parade as members of the TL band for H and Scouts and it's a

[33:20] wonderful family and community event.

[33:23] At the end of the parade, however, I was disturbed to see members of the San Mateo County

[33:28] Sheriff's Office, marching in full camouflage, fatigues, and carrying assault rifles.

[33:35] There was absolutely no need for the display of these dangerous weapons, and given the

[33:40] recent mass shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde, it was entirely inappropriate and tone-deaf for

[33:47] the officers to showcase those weapons, especially in the presence of children.

[33:52] I felt extremely uneasy and the show of force diminished what was a joyful celebration of community spirit.

[34:01] It's no secret that many St. Carlos residents are unhappy with the ability of the San Mateo County Sheriff's Office to keep our community safe from crime.

[34:12] Just read next door.

[34:14] It's safe to say that the reputation of the Sheriff's Office is in need of improvement.

[34:19] The parade could have been an opportunity for the officers to increase trust and good will by handing out candy or stickers to the children instead of flashing high powered weapons.

[34:32] I realize the parade organizers, many of whom are volunteers, and city representatives may not have had a say in the sheriff's office participation, but someone should have spoken up.

[34:45] I emailed my concerns to the sheriff's office, the hometown day's parade organizers, and

[34:52] the San Carlos City clerk, but did not receive a response from any of these groups.

[34:58] I'm sorry, you're two minutes are wrapping up if you don't mind.

[35:01] One's fine sentence.

[35:03] I call upon the San Carlos City Council to ban assault rifles from next year's hometown

[35:09] days parade.

[35:10] Thank you.

[35:11] Thank you for your comments, and I'll just ask that stuff follow up, please.

[35:15] Thank you.

[35:17] Okay, go ahead, Ethan. Is there

[35:25] any more people wishing to speak? Yes, we do have one hand from Zoom.

[35:31] Daniel Villasanoor, if you can go ahead and unmute. Hello, anyone here? Yes, thank you.

[35:40] Hi guys, my name is Daniel Villasenor, I've been a son of Carlos resident for 21 years

[35:46] in my life and this Saturday I'm doing a music festival in Burton Park, it's been a

[35:53] long time coming in and I'm really excited for it, it's going to be a bunch of acts from

[36:00] the Silicon Valley performing and then artists will be showcasing their work at the park, I've

[36:05] for like the past month and I think it's going to be a really cool time to see some

[36:11] youth musicians and youths created all together in one place. Yeah, it'll be July 2nd,

[36:18] four to nine. I hope you guys can come through. It'll be a great time. Thank you.

[36:26] Thank you, Daniel. Thank you, Daniel. And there are no further hands.

[36:38] At this point, I think our mayor for the day gets to retire. Is that right, Crystal?

[36:42] Okay. Mayor Eason, thank you so much, you did a great job.

[37:11] Thank you, Eason.

[37:12] You did a terrific job.

[37:14] Okay, we will now move on to item seven, the consent calendar.

[37:17] Do it any of my colleagues wish to pull an item from consent?

[37:21] Madam Mayor, I'm trying to find the item because you have so many here.

[37:27] Now I don't see it.

[37:30] Okay, sorry, since we went through almost a whole alphabet.

[37:34] But on letter K, I'm going to recuse myself from that vote since I live within 500 feet of Burton Park.

[37:41] Okay, noted.

[37:42] Any other items?

[37:45] Seeing none, I'll entertain a motion.

[37:47] Sorry, through the chair, I just want to clarify that item K, there's two resolutions.

[37:53] We broke out the, so if you want to recuse yourself from just the front again, we can do that.

[37:59] Sure, that would be great.

[38:00] Thank you.

[38:01] Is there a motion?

[38:04] Madam Mayor, I will move to approve City Council Consent Calendar Items A through you.

[38:11] Second.

[38:14] In W.

[38:15] Oh, yeah.

[38:15] Do you want to amend that to W, please?

[38:18] You're not getting off that easy, John.

[38:19] You've got to read those.

[38:21] Turn it up.

[38:22] Let's hold my second.

[38:24] I will move to approve City Council Consent Calendar Items A through you and item V, adopting

[38:31] Ordinance number 1583, an ordinance of the City Council of the City of San Carlos and many municipal code chapter 18 to adjust the city density bonus, inclusionary housing requirements of fortability periods, parking for affordable units and making other conforming amendments and item W, adopting ordinance number 1584, an ordinance of the city council of the city of San Carlos, a many in San Carlos municipal code title 18 zoning consisting of modifications to

[39:01] the chapter 1 8.23.210, accessory dwelling units, junior accessory dwelling units.

[39:09] Second.

[39:10] Crystal, could you please call the roll.

[39:13] Councilmember Dugan?

[39:15] Yes.

[39:15] Councilmember Collins?

[39:16] Yes.

[39:17] Councilmember Parmer-Lohan?

[39:20] Yes.

[39:22] Vice mayor Beck?

[39:24] Yes, with the exception of the Flanagan field lights, okay.

[39:29] And Mayor McDowell?

[39:30] Yes.

[39:32] Thank you, Crystal.

[39:33] Okay, we'll move on to item 8, reports to council.

[39:36] We will receive a presentation from Cal Water on Drought Updates.

[39:44] Good evening, Madam Mayor.

[39:46] City Councilmember Steven Machita, Public Works Director.

[39:49] So what's up for you tonight?

[39:50] It is really kind of a drought presentation.

[39:53] So as we all aware, the air is really experiencing drought, another drought this year.

[39:59] So Seth thought it would be a great opportunity for the City Council to receive a report from

[40:03] Cal Water on the status of the drought.

[40:04] So tonight we have Ross Molian, Cal Water's Space Award Disregmanager, and Anthony Meyer,

[40:11] Cal Water's Water Conservation Coordinator here to actually present or make the presentation.

[40:17] So I'll turn it over to Ross.

[40:22] Okay.

[40:26] Good evening, Madam Mayor, Vice Mayor, City Council, staff, and the community of St.

[40:31] I really appreciate the privilege to be here and provide an update on a topic that's probably on most

[40:36] minds of everybody that lives in California.

[40:39] That is the drought, and our focus tonight is really the drought, water use restrictions, and conservation.

[40:48] I'm the district manager, Ross Mullen here, and the Bayshore District.

[40:51] Mycoots is our assistant district manager who's here in the audience.

[40:55] Anthony Meyer will be assisting me on the presentation tonight.

[40:57] He's our water conservation coordinator, and Robert Ceeley who's our regional community affairs specialist.

[41:02] So the Bayshore District, we serve as a whole, approximately 201,000 people through 54,000 connections.

[41:11] And in San Carlos, we have nearly 11,000 service connections that we serve here, population, roughly around 30,000 people.

[41:20] The system of San Carlos is often referred to as mid peninsula, it's kind of a legacy name associated also with San Mateo.

[41:28] But for the purpose of our presentation, we will be of course focusing on San Carlos.

[41:32] We monitor our supply conditions on a daily basis.

[41:36] We have professionals that do that on really looking at self-ply reliability.

[41:40] The drought situation and also really supply from a standpoint of when we're not in drought conditions.

[41:48] This slide that you see up here isn't a slide to create panic or scare you.

[41:53] It's the reality.

[41:54] You may have seen this on the news.

[41:56] I saw this actually on the news this morning as a matter of fact.

[41:58] Really representing our state and the conditions we have from a drought standpoint.

[42:02] A nearly 98% of the state is now in a severe to exceptional drought conditions.

[42:09] This has been an ongoing concern, particularly highlighted last year and into this year.

[42:17] I'm going to go through a timeline of some different things that have happened throughout the state.

[42:21] Some actions taken from the state level with Governor Newsom actually in May 10th, this is of last year.

[42:27] Issuing a proclamation of declaring a state of emergency.

[42:31] Again, this was last year.

[42:35] June 9th, later that year, I called on water agencies to develop water shortage contingency plans, which we did.

[42:41] We followed ours later in June 15th, with the California Public Utilities Commission who were regulated by.

[42:49] And July 8th, the governor issued an executive order calling for 15% reduction.

[42:55] That's a number that we'll talk a little bit more about tonight.

[42:58] On July 14th, we received approval to implement our stage one, which we did of the contingency plan.

[43:05] Moving into October 9th last year, Governor Newsom actually expand the drought emergency state wide.

[43:13] Some of the more recent developments that we've seen, we filed our stage two of our water supply contingency plan for

[43:21] the mid peninsula and South San Francisco systems.

[43:24] Those are the systems we actually do serve as a whole in the Bayshore District.

[43:28] and those are now approved, which include prohibited uses in irrigation and restrictions that you'll hear a little bit more later from Anthony about.

[43:38] The goal of the 15% reduction, really where you see from this slide is if you look, and this is again for San Carlos, back in March.

[43:45] We were actually, and this is comparing usage in 2020 compared to 2021.

[43:50] one. You see 7.4% in March, I have an increase, 4.9% in April. Obviously a little bit concerning

[44:01] where we're being asked to reach a 15% target level. But what you see in May, you see 11% reduction.

[44:09] A lot more communication, community presentations, bill messages, different things that we've

[44:16] done for outreach really seems to kind of trigger some behavior changes when you look

[44:21] at the month of May that's a time where you actually start seeing people irrigating

[44:25] more outdoor the weather's starting to change but instead we're actually seeing the residents

[44:31] in San Carlos and businesses actually use less. It's not at the 15% but what we're really

[44:36] seeing there is encouraging results in the month of May and we expect to see that continue.

[44:45] This is again kind of a slide that kind of captures that in a little bit different way and

[44:48] that's really kind of your total production by month.

[44:51] And if you look there, you can see in 2020,

[44:55] the dark, the dark blue line of how we were doing

[44:58] from a total production by month.

[45:00] And if you look at beginning this year, you can see we're actually starting, as I mentioned, above that line, which we didn't want to see. But you can see the trendy now from April to May is heading in a direction that we're looking for, which is very encouraging. I'm going to leave this slide up. Anthony's going to talk a little bit more about this and the prohibited uses that we have an effect. Anthony?

[45:23] Thank you for the opportunity, council. So just with the slide up and looking at the trend that we have, we're excited to start seeing this kind of a trend and we're hoping that that trajectory

[45:32] you can continue going in the months as we continue to implement stage two of our water shortage

[45:37] contingency plan and also see more and more engagement with our customer base with the programs

[45:43] that we're rolling out. One of the things we've been doing a lot of in recent months is we've

[45:49] been trying to make sure that people are aware of the prohibited uses of water that have already

[45:53] been in place. A lot of people were not aware that these were already in place and so we do like to

[45:58] always through public outreach, we've been doing a lot of public presentations, we've

[46:02] been doing inserts, bill mailers, e-mail blasts, things like that to kind of just make

[46:07] sure people are aware of what's already been in place and then also keep them abreast

[46:11] of what we have as we've moved into stage two of our contingency plan.

[46:16] Probably the most notable change as we have moved into stage two of our plan in the Bayshore

[46:22] District is the irrigation day restrictions and the watering days.

[46:26] So, for all of our base short district customers now, they're reduced to doing two days a week that they can water and not between the hours of 8 a.m. and 6 p.m.

[46:36] And this is based off of the ending number of your street address of your residence or your business.

[46:42] One of the things I would like to point out with this is that the reason why we see a lot of emphasis put on irrigation day restrictions and watering days, things of that sort is because we now know that 60 to 80% of

[46:54] Domestic water use is applied toward outdoor use, so watering irrigation.

[46:59] So these are where we tend to see the biggest footprint and the most significant impact when it comes to, you know, try to meet our 15% reduction goals.

[47:08] Now, there are some in states too of our contingency plan.

[47:11] There are some exceptions to the irrigation day restrictions and we do always like to try to make sure people are aware of this because if you're hand watering or if you have landscaper irrigation zones that are using drip irrigation.

[47:24] or micro spray, those are actually not confined to the watering day schedule.

[47:28] And so, for customers that have large areas of landscape that does use overhead spray,

[47:33] one of our big things right now is reaching out to those customers to see if there's

[47:37] a possibility that they could change the system over and irrigate through drip irrigation.

[47:42] And the main emphasis for this is so that we can keep trees alive, things like that instead

[47:46] of just seeing everything die as a whole, if they're cutting off irrigation.

[47:50] In addition, that adjustments and repairs to the irrigation systems, those could be done outside of the watering days or the times.

[47:59] Another significant thing as we moved into stage two of our contingency plan, the CPUC has authorized us to impose penalties should the need arise.

[48:09] Obviously our first motive attack is we're always going to reach out to the customer first, we're going to try to educate them.

[48:16] 9 times out of 10 when we do come across somebody that has watered on the wrong day, it's just a matter of them not knowing or not being aware of what the irrigation restrictions are.

[48:25] So through our customer centers, we tend to just reach out or we leave the door hanger and we let them know, hey, this is the days that you should be watering.

[48:31] And in most cases, that actually corrects the situation.

[48:36] If for some reason that doesn't, and it continues to be a reoccurring thing, the PUC has authorized us to do for a second violation, a $50 penalty.

[48:46] for a third violation that can result in a $100 penalty, and that can be on a per day basis, if needed.

[48:51] And then for fourth and more egregious violations, which are obviously intentional,

[48:57] they have authorized us to install a flow restricting device on the customer's meter.

[49:02] Not something we would ever want to see, but again, we tend to in the past, we've always reached our goals,

[49:08] strictly through outreach and communication for the most part with our customers.

[49:11] These are more in place for the bad kids, if you will.

[49:16] So, one of the really big things that we're doing right now is we have severely ramped up and rolled out a very robust series of conservation programs and rebates.

[49:27] In many cases we've actually as much as doubled our rebate amounts just to try to capture those people that maybe were on the fence about, you know, doing some of these types of programs.

[49:37] obviously we do put emphasis on inside things like closed washers that are high efficiency, high efficiency toilets, but again we obviously we know where the footprint is is outdoors, so we try to put a lot of our attention into that and those programs we have ramped up severely with our laundry garden and spray to your program.

[49:56] We have these programs available to our commercial customers as well as residential customers.

[50:02] We have seen a lot in the last two months, I would say just being somebody behind the scenes that sees how the engagement goes with these.

[50:08] We've really seen a lot of this ramp up in a lot of engagement with our customers as they've, you know, served to become more and

[50:14] more aware of what's available to them.

[50:19] Probably one of the most significant ones right now, and obviously it kind of goes hand in hand with the CIA requirements of not watering or non-functional turf.

[50:27] is our lawn to garden and spray to drip programs.

[50:31] So for this one, if somebody's willing to remove turf and do some drought tolerant landscaping,

[50:36] we've actually up that rebate amount to $3 per square foot with an additional 50 cents per square foot.

[50:42] If they are retrofitting their existing overhead spray sprinklers into a drip irrigation system.

[50:48] So there's a total of $3.50 square foot available now for those customers and that is for commercial as well as residential.

[50:56] Another really cool program that we're getting a lot of engagement with is our Smart Landscape

[51:00] Tuner Program.

[51:01] This is completely free to our customers.

[51:05] Basically, not show what this entails is we have a contract with the Landscape Contractor

[51:09] Valley soil.

[51:10] Customer can sign up for this within just a couple of minutes on our website.

[51:14] And we will actually send that contractor to the customer's home or business.

[51:17] And they do a very thorough evaluation of their existing irrigation system.

[51:22] If they note that there's breaks, repairs that need to be done or just like severe amounts of work that would bring that up the speed so it's the most high-efficient that it possibly can be.

[51:31] They schedule a second appointment to go back out to that Homer business.

[51:34] They perform all those repairs completely free of charge to the customer.

[51:38] They actually do all the work and they send us the bill and we pick up the tab for it.

[51:41] So as you can imagine, this has become quite popular since we rolled it out recently.

[51:48] And last but not least, and as always, we do have our conservation kits.

[51:52] This again is another free program for all of Cal Water customers.

[51:55] They can sign up for this on our website.

[51:57] And we send in this box of conservation goodies that they can, for the most part,

[52:01] everybody can solve themself in their home.

[52:03] It's got high efficient shower heads, it's got faucet air raiders.

[52:06] As a little tablet kit to check out your toilets and see if they have any kind of leaks that go on notice typically.

[52:12] And it also comes with a garden hose spray that shuts itself off when you're done using it.

[52:19] And as always, we always recommend people go to our website.

[52:22] We keep this updated on a regular basis in any news that there is, that comes up with regard to the drought or any new conservation programs that we do roll out.

[52:31] We keep that current, so it's a really good place for people to go and look and that's it, I thank you for your time.

[52:39] Thank you, thank you for that presentation, I learned a lot, I'll open it up to questions from my colleagues, Councilmember Collins.

[52:49] Thank you, Madam Mayor, and thank you, gentlemen, for a great presentation.

[52:54] I had the opportunity to go visit the HG Reservoir a few weeks ago, and it was extremely educational.

[52:59] And it was the strong message was that we all need to conserve even though that dam was quite full.

[53:08] But a couple questions I have, and this question comes up, it seems like every time we go into a drought, I have residents who say to me.

[53:15] Well, if we have this, the severe drought, why are we still building?

[53:20] Why are we building anything, you know, new housing, new construction at all, if we have this extreme drought?

[53:26] How would you suggest that we answer that question?

[53:32] It's a great question.

[53:35] I think probably the best way to answer it, or one of the best ways to answer it is to talk about that.

[53:40] But projects aren't going to get approved large projects until we take a good look as a community, the city, water supplier, to ensure the water is in place.

[53:51] Thankfully, we haven't run into a situation where that has been a no.

[53:55] We've definitely been working on some of the challenges associated one with the drought limited supply in the future on ensuring that there is adequate supply.

[54:04] And one of the things that we're doing is trying to add to the water supply portfolio.

[54:10] To ensure that growth, if a city wants to grow, is not stopped because of water supply.

[54:17] But those challenges are not easy challenges to get over.

[54:20] There's cost.

[54:21] We want to make sure that the cost is fair, and that we've done feasibility studies on those options to make sure that whatever options we decide to move forward with, they're the smartest option.

[54:33] And that's definitely something we've been working on.

[54:37] And we don't work on it just in times of drought.

[54:40] It's something that we work on in times when there's not a drought because we know that is a future concern and we live in California where drought has been historically a problem for us and anticipated will in the future as well.

[54:53] Thank you, I also got the question recently that our water usage because our population has increased over the last and I'm not just talking about St. Carlos, but the county in general that our water usage or because our residents have increased or populations increased that our water usage has increased.

[55:14] I did talk with a member who's on, I think it's, I forget, but how you pronounce the Ackerman, but it's like Baxa or something like that.

[55:24] Bosca?

[55:24] Bosca, thank you.

[55:25] He's a council member in Sunnyvale.

[55:27] He said he had seen a report not long ago that said that even though there had been a population increase in Santa Clara County of 20% or whatever it was over the last 10 to 15 years,

[55:40] that the water usage had been relatively flat, and I'm wondering, is that true of San Mateo County,

[55:48] and if it is, is there a way that we can access that information that we could share with our constituents?

[55:56] We can definitely share information that we have from a standpoint of what cow water provides,

[56:03] and maybe it can be able to give some additional information on the county.

[56:06] I think there's definitely some truth in the situation that we've seen from the last route that we had back in, you know, 2014, 15, 16, that was pretty significant that we all remember.

[56:18] And behavior hasn't completely gone back to what it was before that, which is encouraging.

[56:24] People definitely learn from that situation and haven't resumed.

[56:27] And I think people made a lot of changes to their landscaping and different things like that.

[56:31] So I think there is somewhat some truth in that statement.

[56:33] The other thing that we're seeing and you mentioned development earlier is in some cases sometimes development depending on what's going in a location or a parcel could actually use less water than what's there now.

[56:45] So in some cases development can actually include more efficiency, less outdoor landscaping and things of that nature which a lot of cities like yourself also encourage so it's definitely something important.

[56:58] So I think that is definitely true in some areas, maybe not holistically though.

[57:05] Thank you, and thank you for the links for water saving.

[57:09] I'm going to make sure that I put them on my Facebook page.

[57:12] Right.

[57:13] All right.

[57:13] Thank you.

[57:14] Thank you, Ron.

[57:17] Let's see.

[57:17] We'll go to Council Member Dugan, and then Vice Mayor Rack, and then Council Member Permalohan.

[57:21] Yeah.

[57:22] Thank you, Madam Mayor.

[57:23] And yeah, thank you.

[57:24] a good presentation, I too learned a lot, and I would say in particular I'm planning to sign up for your Smart Landscape

[57:33] Tuner Program. That seems like a good one. And Jeff, I would say that's a good candidate for the City Newsletter,

[57:42] maybe emphasizing the irrigation day restrictions, and then that tune up, advertise that out to our folks.

[57:51] And then so my question though is, hopefully this does it and I know we've made some progress as a water district on conservation but if this drought continues, things will likely get even tighter.

[58:07] And could you just explain what the enforcement mechanism is?

[58:12] Is it, are you monitoring for usage that exceeds the average or you know, you're waiting

[58:19] for people to report someone they think is overwatered?

[58:23] Like, you know, can you just take me through what the enforcement mechanisms like?

[58:27] And I am glad that, you know, you start out with warnings and relatively minor fees

[58:32] before it gets more serious, but I just kind of want to understand what that regime will

[58:36] look like if we do end up in a more severe drought.

[58:40] Let me take that one.

[58:41] Yeah, for sure.

[58:43] So pretty much the way that we have that structured right now

[58:47] is we have several different systems

[58:49] for reporting water waste.

[58:51] It can be done on an anonymous basis through our website

[58:54] or they could contact our customer center.

[58:58] For us, the biggest aspect of that is we have to put eyes on it.

[59:01] We can't go off of hearsay and things like that.

[59:04] So the turnaround is crucial as far as responding to these things, and now that we have online reporting and phone calls starting to come in, we have to kind of weave through those and make sure they're not angry, neighbor disputes and things like that so we can, you know, try to settle them accordingly.

[59:20] First order of business with it, though, is obviously trying to see if we can get one of our field staff to go out and put eyes on it or witness it while it's in the, you know, being done in the act.

[59:28] And at that point, we would either try to knock on the door, talk to the customer.

[59:32] In most cases, it would result in leaving a door hanger or something, just so we can

[59:35] notate that we actually did something physically to try to notify the customer.

[59:40] As we move into more serious stages of that, like a second violation through fourth violations or

[59:46] egregious violations, those fines are done in the form of sort of a surcharge in the billing system.

[59:52] So it's not like we're writing a physical ticket to somebody.

[59:55] You know, we have to document those and you know, there's obviously a huge paper trail that has to work.

[1:00:00] We're here for us to make sure that we validate any type of enforcement actions, but that is kind of what that looks like in the form of a search on their bill. Okay. All right. Thank you. Appreciate that. Thank you Madam Mayor. Thanks for the presentation was helpful as well. I'm going to be sharing the links. The question, and I'm curious if this wasn't touched on at all. I know some communities are using recycled water.

[1:00:31] Can you touch a little like, what would be the process to do that, how, is that something you help support, or do, or kept, create, or if St.

[1:00:40] Crowe's wanted to participate in something like that, how would something like that happen?

[1:00:44] Well, at a high level, those are some of the projects I was referencing that we're looking at.

[1:00:49] Recycle water, it's around us today, it's been utilized by other communities, certainly.

[1:00:55] So it's definitely something that is definitely on our radar and has been for a while.

[1:00:59] And it's not just one particular project.

[1:01:01] It's actually several in the area on the peninsula.

[1:01:05] And what I mentioned to you earlier about, how do we go about putting that together?

[1:01:10] It's really kind of that aspect of kind of the feasibility.

[1:01:12] What makes the most sense?

[1:01:14] Is it a combination of more than one project?

[1:01:16] Or is it one big project that we implement?

[1:01:20] The distribution system that's necessary to provide that water, that recycle water.

[1:01:26] It has to be a separate system.

[1:01:27] There's a lot of conditions that go along with that.

[1:01:29] You've probably heard of the purple pipe system and that basically is something that's very common particularly in areas

[1:01:35] I've worked at in the past I can Southern California. So it's definitely something doable and possible, and

[1:01:40] we may see that here in the near future. Hard to say for sure. We're still kind of at the stages of trying to decide what makes the most sense for our customers.

[1:01:49] What's the most sense from a cost standpoint as well? And the reliability factor and also the amount that it produces.

[1:01:57] So those are some significant projects that are in play, and they're not new.

[1:02:03] It's not like a brand new concept or something new in the area, it's been ongoing, and it's very possible.

[1:02:10] I appreciate it.

[1:02:11] I think it's a useful exercise from the standpoint of, I mean, we keep hearing that this is not going to go away.

[1:02:18] It's not going to, maybe we'll have some reprieve here and there, but

[1:02:21] But a long term, it seems like a good potential solution.

[1:02:24] Obviously, I have to figure out to make it work in the infrastructure and the cost and everything else.

[1:02:28] But I appreciate that you're looking into it.

[1:02:31] Yeah, and we would certainly not be doing that behind closed doors with the city of San Carlos or any cities we serve.

[1:02:37] And we'd be working with you guys together and probably choose workshops and

[1:02:41] different planning groups to make sure that people's concerns about that are addressed and

[1:02:45] questions and different ideas that they might have.

[1:02:48] Thank you.

[1:02:51] Thank you.

[1:02:53] Thank you.

[1:02:54] Thank you.

[1:02:55] Thank you for the presentation.

[1:02:56] This is a conversation I've been wanting to have for a long time.

[1:02:59] I know many people are concerned about the prolonged drought and building on vice mayor racks.

[1:03:04] You know, question around recycling.

[1:03:07] What I'm curious about it.

[1:03:09] And I'm thinking about I had the good fortune to travel to Hawaii many years ago in the main island.

[1:03:14] And there's an entire community that's built on a very dry side of the island

[1:03:21] that gets virtually no rain during the year.

[1:03:24] And they have a very elaborate water capture system

[1:03:29] and are able to live a very viable life on that side of the island.

[1:03:34] And I'm just wondering, you know, it's sounding to me like we're at the point

[1:03:38] where maybe we need to start thinking differently about

[1:03:41] about how we think about our water infrastructure.

[1:03:45] And to your point about having some initial conversations

[1:03:48] and ideas around recycling,

[1:03:50] where are we in that long-term visioning planning

[1:03:55] with Cal water with respect to water capture,

[1:03:59] office-assisting ability, for example,

[1:04:00] has been offering barrels on a pilot basis.

[1:04:03] You can get them in different sizes.

[1:04:05] But it does take some knowledge and know how

[1:04:07] to cobble these solutions together.

[1:04:10] And I'm just curious, do we need to be more,

[1:04:14] I'm feeling like we need to be more proactive

[1:04:17] about our future state with respect

[1:04:18] to how we capture our water and recycle and reuse it.

[1:04:23] And I'm just wondering, kind of where is the conversation

[1:04:25] with respect to how water on this?

[1:04:28] Thank you.

[1:04:29] Yeah, absolutely.

[1:04:30] And it's a great question.

[1:04:32] And I think the perfect answer is,

[1:04:35] we've been doing this for a long time.

[1:04:37] We've always been assessing recycled water,

[1:04:39] looking at different water sources,

[1:04:41] and trying to find that balance between

[1:04:43] what is fair for the rate pairs to pay

[1:04:46] and the most cost effective sourcing of water.

[1:04:48] And so as that moves into different phases,

[1:04:50] as technology improves, and this new infrastructure

[1:04:52] comes out, we move forward.

[1:04:54] So we're working on different plans

[1:04:56] and exploring different avenues behind

[1:04:57] what those scenarios might look like,

[1:04:59] going into the next 10, 20, 30 years,

[1:05:02] measures as well as what's happening in the immediate future to try and satisfy the needs

[1:05:07] of growth, of reliability and sustainability and kind of all of those things coming in.

[1:05:12] So it is happening, it is a conversation that we're happening recently with city staff

[1:05:16] here to have a partial conversation about that.

[1:05:19] We're going to continue to go forward with exploring these possibilities and working them

[1:05:23] into our plans in the future.

[1:05:25] Great.

[1:05:26] Thank you.

[1:05:26] I appreciate that.

[1:05:27] I'm glad to hear.

[1:05:30] Okay.

[1:05:31] Thank you, Council Member Palmer-Lohan.

[1:05:32] I have a couple of questions as well and actually they were brought to my attention from a resident so I'm going to pass them along and hopefully we can get some answers tonight.

[1:05:43] The first is has cow water investigated installing smart meters like PG&E to allow real time updates for users on their water use and building on the PG&E analogy.

[1:05:56] We all get, you know, these updates in the mail from PG&E, comparing our homes to similar sized homes.

[1:06:05] And do you have kind of a program like that in place where residents can maybe find a more complete picture of how they rate and then how they compare to other residences in St. Cirlis?

[1:06:16] Yes, so thankfully a lot of guesses to those.

[1:06:19] First of all, yeah, from a smart meter, which we often refer to, one of the common acronyms is AMI meter infrastructure, is definitely something we're piloting now.

[1:06:30] We definitely hope to expand that much broader here in the near future, something that we will submit in our infrastructure improvement plan, and we have been, which is why we're actually in a pilot phase right now.

[1:06:44] So I think it's safe to say that you're going to see more of that in the in the future and all of the communities that we serve

[1:06:50] As far as the water use comparison. I'm going to let Anthony talk a little bit about that

[1:06:59] Could you refresh me on what the water use comparison? Oh sure so

[1:07:03] So PG&E

[1:07:04] Sends I think we all get them in the misstatements that says here's your usage for the month

[1:07:09] And here's how you compare to homes of similar size and you get like a happy face or or because it goes down from there

[1:07:15] So if you're like a big user of power, then the gold star.

[1:07:19] Yeah, right, yeah.

[1:07:20] We actually are doing a similar program to that.

[1:07:23] It's the gold star looks a little bit more different.

[1:07:25] But what we're doing is because our conservation goals

[1:07:28] are obviously trying to meet that 15% reduction in comparison

[1:07:31] to 2020 usage.

[1:07:33] So in our bills now, they're starting to reflect

[1:07:35] where we're showing somebody what they're,

[1:07:37] if they were at the address in 2020

[1:07:38] and showing what the comparison was for that parcel.

[1:07:42] Hopefully we don't get into the stage three type of situation.

[1:07:45] But if we ever should wear budgets and things like that become into more into play,

[1:07:50] obviously those will be more based on the parcel size and

[1:07:53] what the figurative usage projected usage for that parcel would entail.

[1:07:57] And it would give people kind of a red to green scale of where they're sitting every month on a month-to-month basis.

[1:08:03] In addition to that, one of the things that we were actually trying to make a little more user friendly is we do our billing in reportables of CCFs.

[1:08:14] So a lot of people get their bills and they see that and they're like, well, I don't know what a CCF is and they don't know how to do the math.

[1:08:19] So we are looking at kind of making more layman's terms involved in our billing where people can see, okay, what does this mean?

[1:08:24] This means how many gallons we try to have some of that show in the bills where people can say, wow, because a CCF sounds like it's a one unit, what does that mean?

[1:08:34] Well, it's 748 gallons of water, that's a lot of water.

[1:08:37] So when you see it on a more layman's term type scale, it tends to make people think a little more and

[1:08:42] and kind of get a better grasp on what that looks like

[1:08:44] as far as their actual home water use or business water use.

[1:08:48] Thank you.

[1:08:49] Yeah, I agree with Lehman's terms.

[1:08:51] I think that's really helpful.

[1:08:53] If I could do a little, just a side answer to the first question.

[1:08:58] In the areas that we don't have AMI technology

[1:09:00] already available to customers,

[1:09:02] and like he said, we're trying to implement that

[1:09:05] and it's on an as-need basis obviously,

[1:09:07] because there's a lot of cost involved.

[1:09:10] The trickles down to the rate payers.

[1:09:11] What we are doing the offset that right now we did just do a pilot program with flume technologies and it's

[1:09:17] It's a similar type of technology, but it's a retrofit

[1:09:20] So it's a device that can just velcro onto a customer's meter and it can supply the same type of data sets to them

[1:09:25] And they can get notifications of you know if it looks like there's maybe a leak happening because the meters turn for a long period of time

[1:09:31] So it is the same technology, but it's a retrofit and we are making those available

[1:09:35] I think we are the device typically costs about two hundred dollars and in our pilot program

[1:09:40] we are doing an instant, I think it's 75% rebates, ends up costing about $50, and they

[1:09:46] get that at the point of sale too. So they are limited because it is a pilot program,

[1:09:50] so there's only so many in each district, but if we start to see that be impactful and get

[1:09:54] good feedback from the customer base, we're going to try to magnify that and obviously make it more

[1:09:57] available. Thank you. I have one last question. She's wondering, regarding the assignment of

[1:10:06] water days, it seems like that's still kind of open to abuse because someone could just water a

[1:10:11] whole lot on those two days. So has there been any talk about giving a property owner an

[1:10:16] allotment of gallons to use and then they can kind of see how that is managed if they go way over

[1:10:22] or if they're cutting back and going under? That's a very good question. And kind of what I touched on

[1:10:28] a second ago, that is that is part of what we would look at if we were to ever move into stage three

[1:10:33] or we do have allotments and things like that where we're having to measure those on a parcel basis.

[1:10:38] As far as like right now in stage two, we're not really giving people per capita use caps that they have to stay within.

[1:10:46] But at the same time, the way our billing structure is when we see high use that's in comparisons to prior months or even prior years.

[1:10:53] We do have a very proactive outreach approach as far as reaching out to customers and just letting them know,

[1:10:57] hey, this month it looks like you used a lot more water than you did this same time last year.

[1:11:01] And we have found that a lot of those communications do are impactful.

[1:11:06] Great, thank you.

[1:11:08] Okay, I see no further questions, so I will open it up to public comment.

[1:11:13] If you're participating remotely by Zoom, you may raise your hand at this time.

[1:11:17] Or if you're here joining us in person, you may fill out a speaker card.

[1:11:20] Crystal, is there any public comment this evening?

[1:11:23] I do not have any speaker cards, and there are no hands raised on Zoom.

[1:11:30] Okay, well thank you all very much for joining us this evening was very informative, thank you.

[1:11:38] Okay, we will now move on to item nine, new business consideration of adopting a resolution, approving and

[1:11:44] adopting the child care impact fee nexus study prepared by economic and planning systems,

[1:11:49] ink for the city of San Carlos, state of July 14, 2021.

[1:11:58] So Judy, hello, well, all right, we'll get started soon as you see a full screen there.

[1:12:05] Good

[1:12:09] evening, Mayor, City Council, and St. Carlos community.

[1:12:12] My name is Cijudi Hock, and I'm the Senior Management Analyst for the Community Development

[1:12:17] Department.

[1:12:18] And tonight I will be doing two presentations related to child care, along with our

[1:12:22] consultant and a principal with Economic and Planning Systems Inc, Ashley Cannon.

[1:12:28] The first presentation, which will be fairly brief, is on the approving and adopting the

[1:12:34] child care impact fee next to study.

[1:12:37] The childcare impact fee nexus study was prepared by EPS and completed in January 2020 and then updated in July 2021.

[1:12:49] The preparation of the nexus study was part of the city council's effort to address childcare shortage in the city.

[1:12:56] EPS developed the technical analysis and prepared the required nexus study to support potential implementation of a childcare development impact fee.

[1:13:05] It is important to note that the city currently has several development impact fees, none of which is child care.

[1:13:12] The Nexus City provides legal context, assumptions, child care facility, cost estimates, fee calculations, and program implementation and administration.

[1:13:23] Basically, acting as a guide on how to properly implement and administer a child care impact fee program.

[1:13:30] The nexus study establishes the maximum development impact fee based on demographic employment and land use assumptions,

[1:13:39] justifiable under the mitigation fee act that could be required for new developments within the city.

[1:13:46] The study found nexus between the impact of development and the need for child care in Sam Carlos, and

[1:13:52] the maximum fee is proportionate to the impact.

[1:13:55] During the public hearing item, which is coming up next, staff and consultant will deep dive into the impact fee amounts.

[1:14:04] However, before Council can adopt an ordinance implementing a child care impact fee, it is required that the Nexus study is adopted as well.

[1:14:13] I will clarify that if Council chooses not to move forward with the upcoming ordinance implementing a child care impact fee, it is still okay to adopt the Nexus study tonight.

[1:14:24] With that, I will end the brief presentation on the Nexus study with staff recommendation

[1:14:31] to approve and adopt the childcare impact fee Nexus study prepared by EPS for the city

[1:14:37] dated July 14, 2021.

[1:14:40] I'm here to answer any questions you may have along with our housing and economic development

[1:14:44] manager, Adam Aronson, our CDD director, Al Savae, and our consultant, Ashley.

[1:14:50] Thank you so much.

[1:14:53] Thank you, Sajudi. Any questions from Council? Vice Mayor back.

[1:14:58] Thank you, Madam Mayor. Thank you.

[1:15:00] Thank you, so Judy. And thanks for the presentation and for the work on the study. I don't have any sort of concerns about anything. I'm just, my question is, as I mentioned earlier, we at the two plus two meeting, they talked about some changes potentially in state, I don't know if it would be state law, some of the regulations around transitional kindergarten that might change some of the impact and the numbers, sort of the impact on what the needs are in our community. Is there, and this may be

[1:15:29] be a question that might be better for the next discussion, but is that have any impact

[1:15:34] potentially on the fee structure that would be recommended, or how that might impact

[1:15:40] that if all of a sudden we only need half as many slots, because now the school district

[1:15:44] is taking half of them because of the changes in the law.

[1:15:48] I'll have our consultant answer that.

[1:15:52] Thank you, good evening.

[1:15:53] This is Ashley Cannon.

[1:15:55] I heard you reference that earlier and I started thinking how am I going to answer that

[1:15:58] question when that comes out?

[1:16:00] I did appreciate it, I think that if we were looking potentially at an impact fee on residential development I would say yes I would actually want to go back and take another look at that but we are if you go down the path of thinking about an impact fee program tonight I think we're just looking at non residential development the basis for that nexus tonight was a survey that was conducted of businesses in San Mateo County that have child care

[1:16:29] facilities on site and a survey was conducted looking at all the employees working here

[1:16:35] on site, how many of these employees are taking advantage of the on-site child care.

[1:16:40] And that survey found that 4% of employees take advantage of on-site child care.

[1:16:45] So it's a very different approach to establishing that nexus.

[1:16:48] We didn't look at the, on the non-residential side, we didn't look at the same demographic

[1:16:52] factors.

[1:16:53] So I would say, you know, thank you.

[1:16:59] Any other questions? Okay. Seeing none, Crystal, is there any public comment?

[1:17:10] I am not seeing

[1:17:11] any hands and I do not have any speaker cards for this item. Okay, is there any further

[1:17:16] discussion on this item? Seeing none, I'll entertain a motion.

[1:17:21] Madam Mayor, I move to adopt a resolution 2022-17. A resolution of the City Council of the

[1:17:32] The City of St. Carlos approving and adopting the child care impact fee nexus study prepared by economic and planning systems ink for the City of St. Carlos stated July 14th, 2021.

[1:17:44] Is there a second?

[1:17:46] Second.

[1:17:47] Christel, could you please call the roll?

[1:17:49] Vice Mayor Rat?

[1:17:50] Yes.

[1:17:51] Council Member Dugan?

[1:17:52] Yes.

[1:17:52] Council Member Collins?

[1:17:53] Yes.

[1:17:54] Council Member Parmelo-Hem?

[1:17:56] Yes.

[1:17:57] And Mayor McDowell?

[1:17:58] Yes.

[1:17:58] Yes. Okay. Thank you. We will now move on to item 10a, consideration of introducing an ordinance, adding chapter 8.52 to the San Carlos municipal code, establishing a child care development impact fee for new non residential developments in the city of San Carlos, and we have to do it again.

[1:18:17] Good evening again, I'm back.

[1:18:19] So we will move right into the next childcare item,

[1:18:23] which is a public hearing to introduce an ordinance

[1:18:25] adding chapter 8.5 to you to the code,

[1:18:28] establishing a childcare impact fee

[1:18:31] that will be applied for new non-residential developments

[1:18:34] in the city.

[1:18:37] This meeting will focus on three items,

[1:18:39] which are the development impact fee program parameters,

[1:18:42] potential use of revenues and actions and next steps.

[1:18:48] Now before we jump into the development impact fee, staff really wanted to highlight all of the Achievement City Council has accomplished to

[1:18:54] date to remove regulatory barriers related to child care.

[1:18:59] Last year several municipal code updates were made including removing minor use permit requirements for commercial child care centers and specific zoning districts.

[1:19:09] the outdoor space requirements were removed, staff-level review for pickup and drop-off places were allowed allowing minor use permits, requirements for parking non-compliance, and updated hours of operation.

[1:19:23] Finally, other sections were also updated to ensure compliance with state law for small and large family in-home daycares.

[1:19:33] Now, the goal of these municipal code updates is to make it easier for operators to either

[1:19:39] expand or start new child care facilities.

[1:19:43] In addition, earlier this year, staff launched a new city web page with information and resources

[1:19:48] for parents and operators, child care advocates, and the community at large, so be sure to check

[1:19:54] it out at cityofsandcarlos.org slash child care.

[1:19:57] Now moving on from the regulatory achievements to the goals and recommendations for tonight's ordinance.

[1:20:06] The goals are to create new child care spaces and improve access to child care.

[1:20:11] Staff has been working with the child care subcommittee for the last few years on developing the impact v parameters

[1:20:18] and shared the fighting with the full council earlier this year at the March study session.

[1:20:22] The recommendation would be to adopt the ordinance establishing a child care development

[1:20:28] impact fee that would only be applied to new non-residential developments and include

[1:20:33] an on-site option.

[1:20:36] We will deep dive into the recommendations shortly and I will now hand it off to Ashley

[1:20:41] from EPS who will present the data on the impact fees, briefly touch on the potential use of

[1:20:46] revenues and provide more details on the build on site option.

[1:20:50] I haven't

[1:20:59] been in an in-person meeting in two years.

[1:21:01] I have to relearn all the remotes.

[1:21:03] Ashley Canett with EPS, thank you for having me here tonight.

[1:21:06] Next slide, please.

[1:21:07] Oh, I'm going to do it.

[1:21:08] I'm sorry, I'm going to learn.

[1:21:10] Thank you.

[1:21:12] So what are development impact fees?

[1:21:14] There are one-time charges on new development.

[1:21:16] As Sajudi just mentioned, they're authorized by state statutes,

[1:21:20] specifically the Mitigation Fee Act.

[1:21:22] They're set according to Nexus Logic,

[1:21:24] which establishes what we call a reasonable relationship between new development and the impacts of new development.

[1:21:31] As the Judy just mentioned, they can only be used to fund capital projects, they're really not for maintenance or operations.

[1:21:37] So we're really focused on expanding the number of childcare spaces in the city.

[1:21:41] And of course there are one of several tools that can be used to help address the childcare need in the city.

[1:21:50] Consistent with the Mitigation FIAC and the Nexus standards, we completed a Nexus study, it's part of your packet.

[1:21:56] you just adopted it, that establishes the maximum allowable fees for both residential and non-residential

[1:22:02] development. It's not at all uncommon that the maximum allowable fees are too high.

[1:22:08] That is, they may start to impact the financial feasibility of new development.

[1:22:13] So what you see on the right, while on the left are the maximum fees calculated as part of the

[1:22:19] nexus study, but what you see on the right are a set of recommended fees. You might be noticing that

[1:22:24] these fees are approximately half of the maximum and then rounded down.

[1:22:28] In my view, this approach across the board helps us maintain the, or it's a proportional

[1:22:34] reduction and it maintains the proportionality across land use categories.

[1:22:38] But again, this will be up to you.

[1:22:41] You have the authority to adopt fees if you decide to proceed with an impact fee program

[1:22:45] at any level up to the maximum.

[1:22:49] If tonight you decide to move forward with a childcare impact fee program, the fees will be considered

[1:22:54] for adoption as part of the next reading of the ordinance by Resolution.

[1:23:00] The next several slides show you how we arrive at the recommended fees and we'll show

[1:23:06] you what other cities are charging and how the new child care fees affect the overall burden

[1:23:11] for new development.

[1:23:16] So in these next slides we're focusing not just on the non-residential land use categories

[1:23:22] per your prior direction and starting with office and R&D relative to other cities that

[1:23:29] charge child care impact fees, a fee of $10 per square foot of new development would put

[1:23:35] you way out in front of the pack. A reduced fee of $5 still has you among the leaders,

[1:23:42] but behind Santa Monica, which has been quite aggressive in its child care efforts and

[1:23:46] liver more where the fee is a broader social and human services fee of which child care

[1:23:51] is just one part.

[1:23:52] For

[1:23:57] retail, we have a maximum fee of $5 a square foot versus a reduced fee of $2.50 a square foot.

[1:24:04] This puts you in a similar position below Santa Monica and Livermore, but closer to San Francisco.

[1:24:12] For hotel land use categories, we move from $3.35 a square foot to $1.60 a square foot.

[1:24:20] San Francisco charges a little bit more at $2.00 a square foot, just for comparison.

[1:24:27] And we're in a very similar situation for industrial.

[1:24:30] Here we have a reduced fee of $1.60 a square foot to lower than San Francisco and Livermore

[1:24:36] just a bit higher than San Mateo.

[1:24:41] So while the proceeding slides showed you just how the nexus-based maximum fees and the

[1:24:46] reduced fees compare with child care impact fees charged in other jurisdictions, this slide

[1:24:52] estimates the total fee burden in San Carlos.

[1:24:54] So, for each land use category on the left, we calculated the total fee burden per square

[1:25:01] foot of new development.

[1:25:03] The existing fees, I believe Sajudi mentioned include traffic impacts, sewer and commercial

[1:25:07] linkage fees.

[1:25:08] This calculation doesn't include planning or building permit fees.

[1:25:13] We then indicate what the total fee burden would be if the child care fees were to be adopted

[1:25:18] at the maximum levels and the reduced levels, and we show the percent increase as well.

[1:25:22] The resulting increases range from about 8% to 23% for the reduced fees.

[1:25:32] You had another request from our last study session on this topic, and that was, well,

[1:25:38] how does San Carlos' existing fee burden compared to the total fee burden in other nearby jurisdictions?

[1:25:44] And how does all of that shift if the reduced child care fees are incorporated into that analysis?

[1:25:49] So, we looked at impact fees in Belmont, Redwood City, San Mateo, South San Francisco, and Menlo Park.

[1:25:56] The first set of vertical bars are the office and R&D, and then we move into retail, and then hotel, and then industrial.

[1:26:04] And the solid orange bar is San Carlos currently.

[1:26:08] You can see it increases a little bit.

[1:26:10] The orange bar with the diagonal lines is when we add in the reduced child care fee.

[1:26:15] So, adding in that reduced child care fee do not change your relative ranking for office

[1:26:22] R&D or industrial.

[1:26:24] For retail, the reduced child care fees bring you just a smidge ahead of San Mateo and South

[1:26:29] San Francisco.

[1:26:31] For hotel, the reduced child care fees are adding in the reduced child care fees bring

[1:26:36] you again, just a bit ahead of San Mateo, but well below Belmont and Menlo Park.

[1:26:40] In no case here, are we seeing a competitive disadvantage by adopting the reduced fees?

[1:26:50] We also took a deeper dive into how a few of our neighboring cities are managing their child care programs.

[1:26:56] So Redwood City, for example, they do not charge a child care impact fee.

[1:27:01] But the city employs a full-time child care coordinator who's housed in the parks and recreation department.

[1:27:07] The city's waived all planning related fees associated with large family child care facilities.

[1:27:13] In South San Francisco, childcare also is housed in the Parks Division, and the city manages three preschools there.

[1:27:20] A fee in South San Francisco was adopted in 2001.

[1:27:23] They have a current balance of about $2 million, and they've been collecting and spending along the way.

[1:27:29] They've just approved a childcare preschool center for 80 children with total cost expected around $8 to $10 million.

[1:27:38] The city of San Mateo has had a child care fee since 2004 and it applies to new development over 10,000 square feet.

[1:27:47] It has a current balance of more than a million dollars, and in San Mateo to support parents and

[1:27:52] providers, the city partners with the San Mateo County 4Cs, the Child Care Coordinating Council, I don't know you're familiar with there.

[1:28:04] So your decision to proceed with the child care impact fee, it may depend in part on how the revenue can be used.

[1:28:11] and how effective you think the fee program will be.

[1:28:14] The mitigation fee act, as I've mentioned a couple times now,

[1:28:17] really constrains how impact fee revenue can be used.

[1:28:20] In case of childcare, the fee revenue can be used

[1:28:22] to expand the number of childcare spaces.

[1:28:25] It can take the form of acquiring land,

[1:28:27] building a center, which I understand is probably

[1:28:30] not your preferred use of funds,

[1:28:32] subsidizing the development of a childcare facility

[1:28:35] being built by a private developer, for example,

[1:28:38] and or even potentially offering loans or grants to home daycare providers to help fund improvements that would allow those operators to expand their capacity.

[1:28:48] Importantly, the revenue cannot be used to subsidize operations or otherwise provide direct assistance to families.

[1:28:58] But in prior study sessions we received direction that you're interested in solutions that are really focused on creating spaces and directly helping the San Carlos community as much as possible.

[1:29:09] So, if you move forward with an impact fee program, you'll see in the draft ordinance that there's a build on site option.

[1:29:16] And what this is intended to do is provide an option for developers who are proposing large enough projects to build a child care facility on site rather than pay the fee.

[1:29:26] This is really only a realistic option if the size of the development is such that it can accommodate a minimum of 5,000 square feet of child care space.

[1:29:37] We, what we've learned is that if the child care space is any smaller, it's much more challenging to operate with any efficiency.

[1:29:45] And it's the size of the larger project, rather the size of the larger project should be large enough.

[1:29:51] I'm sorry, the size of the project should be large enough such that the child care space is really an ancillary space.

[1:30:03] The ordinance proposes that new development greater than 50,000 square feet may allocate 10% of the space to child care, such that the minimum size of the child care space is 5,000 square feet, which would serve at least 50 children or about 50 children. Of course, the space is only of benefit if the developer also contracts with a licensed operator and child care and the child care needs, if the child care

[1:30:29] care use works within the general plan and zoning requirements as well, of course.

[1:30:35] Another option if on-site development is not feasible, the city could consider letting the applicant meet its fee obligation by building a new child care center off site, and that would need to be mutually agreed to.

[1:30:51] Thank you, Ashley.

[1:30:53] I know that was a lot of information, but all that data is just really important when you guys are considering to adopt an ordinance establishing a child care development impact fee.

[1:31:02] Again, it will only apply to non-residential developments, and will include a build-on-site

[1:31:08] option.

[1:31:10] Now, if the council chooses to move forward with adopting the ordinance, today would

[1:31:15] be considered the first reading, and the second reading would occur on August 8, 2022,

[1:31:20] and during the second reading, a resolution adopting the exact fee levels, which again would

[1:31:26] be based on tonight's feedback from council, would also be considered for adoption during

[1:31:31] that same council meeting and that would make the ordinance go into effect on September

[1:31:37] 8, 2022. That concludes our presentation.

[1:31:41] Me, Ashley, I'll add them. We're all here to answer any questions. Again, thank you so

[1:31:47] much for your time.

[1:31:50] Thank you, Secretary. Great presentation. Thank you, Ashley. We'll open

[1:31:53] it up to questions. Councilmember Dugan. Yeah, thank you, Madam Mayor. And thank you for

[1:31:59] the good report and all the very good work on this, and I appreciate highlighting the work

[1:32:05] we've already done as a city on child care. But this is truly substantive when you think about

[1:32:12] our ability to actually get more child care in town. So I really like what we're doing here.

[1:32:20] Some questions, though. First, I just want to make sure this works like our other fees in that

[1:32:26] This is just with net new square footage, so if someone tears down 20,000 feet and

[1:32:32] put its 100,000 feet, the fees do on the 80,000, right?

[1:32:38] Okay, and it's a one-time thing if the ownership of that changes, but the square footage

[1:32:44] doesn't change, the fee doesn't come back around, doesn't?

[1:32:47] No, it will just be a one-time fee unless there's a special use permit required

[1:32:51] during the change, and there's a menu square footage.

[1:32:54] Okay, but O is tied to news square footage.

[1:32:58] Okay, great, and then fees are great.

[1:33:02] We can do good work with them, but we really do need child care now.

[1:33:07] So I'm very glad we have a direct billed option that we're considering, and

[1:33:12] I just want to make sure that it works without any unintended consequences.

[1:33:18] So I'm a little hung up on why we want to limit it to just projects,

[1:33:23] 5,000 feet or over, it sounds like the constraint is, we feel like they need to be at least 5,000 square foot facilities.

[1:33:31] But I think if someone wants to have a 5,000 foot child care and a 20,000 foot development, I think we should be fine with that.

[1:33:39] So is there any reason we should limit it to just 50,000 and over, should we just say it has to be at least 5,000 square feet?

[1:33:46] That's a great question, I'll have Ashley answer that.

[1:33:51] It is a good question, thank you.

[1:33:53] As we think about the kinds of applications that are going to come before the city, they

[1:33:58] are, for the most part, not going to be primarily child-new child care development.

[1:34:03] So the thought is that the child care is really going to be an ancillary use.

[1:34:07] And in your example, which I remembered the numbers, if it was like what, a 20,000 square

[1:34:12] foot new development and 5,000 square feet of child care, that would be 25% of the square

[1:34:18] footage that would be allocating to child care, and while there may be no reason not to accept

[1:34:24] an offer like that, it's very unlikely that with the economics of the development,

[1:34:29] the developer, an applicant would want to allocate that much potentially revenue generating space

[1:34:34] to child care.

[1:34:36] That made that, I mean, that might be the case, but why would we want to preempt that as an option

[1:34:42] for them. I mean, don't we just want to say that a minimum size of 5,000 square feet is what we're requiring?

[1:34:51] And if they want to devote 25, 30, 50% of it to child care, we should be okay with that.

[1:34:58] Well, you want as a child care onsite that has all the potential to operate as efficiently as possible.

[1:35:04] Yeah. Because in particular, what concerns me is I believe it's proposed here, if someone was

[1:35:10] I was proposing 100% child care, like they just want to build a new child care center I believe and it was under 50,000 square feet.

[1:35:21] They would have to pay the fee as well, so they're providing child care and would also have to pay the fee, correct?

[1:35:29] Right, so any new child care use has exempt from impacts used generally in the city?

[1:35:35] Is that one of the regulatory, I'd need to step back and let the city start.

[1:35:38] Sure, I mean, that's true, it's because we've already exempted child care otherwise.

[1:35:46] Okay, okay, that helps, and then I'm wondering about larger development.

[1:35:54] So, take say 500,000 square foot development.

[1:35:59] Now, 10% of that would be a 50,000 square foot child care center that's probably more than anyone would ever want to build.

[1:36:09] So is there a provision to provide for that, like, for example, say they wanted to build a 10,000 foot.

[1:36:17] Would they get an exemption for, you know, the first 100,000 square feet of that development, and then they could pay the fee on the other 400,000 square feet?

[1:36:26] Or are we saying if they don't do 10%, they don't get any fee relief?

[1:36:32] The thought here is that an application of that size would be probably part of a development

[1:36:37] agreement, not necessarily subject to a development agreement but part of a development agreement

[1:36:42] because of the size of the project, at which point you have a very broad latitude to negotiate

[1:36:48] for the size of a childcare facility that makes sense, a combination of onsite versus

[1:36:53] and a fee potentially, broad latitude to do what really makes sense for the development

[1:36:59] And then a community at that point?

[1:37:01] I mean, sure, I understand plan development.

[1:37:03] I guess I just don't know why we wouldn't allow a partial direct bill option.

[1:37:08] I mean, is there any reason we wouldn't want to do that?

[1:37:12] Meaning like the 500,000 if they just want to do 10,000, we relieve them of 100,000 worth of fee.

[1:37:19] That's something that could be negotiated with them.

[1:37:22] Well, wouldn't we, I mean, is there any reason not to just make that part of this fee if we're not in plan

[1:37:28] and development?

[1:37:45] Good evening, Honorable Mayor, members of the City Council.

[1:37:48] Could you say a little bit more, Council Member Duggan about your idea?

[1:37:53] Yeah, thank you, all. It's Council Member Duggan.

[1:37:56] I'm sorry.

[1:37:59] So the idea is just if someone's doing a larger development and the 10% would be required

[1:38:11] for the fee relief, right, for the direct bill.

[1:38:13] But if that 10% doesn't fit into their project, I'm just interested in encouraging as much

[1:38:21] direct bill as possible.

[1:38:22] So I would rather they do a partial direct bill and get partial fee relief than decide they're not going to

[1:38:30] do, build any child care, and now we have that four or five year delay between receiving a fee and

[1:38:36] maybe doing something with it.

[1:38:39] So, I'm just asking maybe we should consider just that, a partial direct bill.

[1:38:48] My example was 500,000 square foot project to do direct bill that have to do 50,000 square feet of child care.

[1:38:59] Wouldn't we want them to be able to do 10,000 square feet of child care and get partial fee relief?

[1:39:05] I think that's an option, and in fact, what I think I understand about the way the ordinance is set up right now is that that would be negotiable, isn't that correct?

[1:39:15] Yeah, so it would be negotiable.

[1:39:17] You could do it that way.

[1:39:18] Now, if you want to codify that in the ordinance, that might actually limit your ability to negotiate to some extent.

[1:39:28] And so that's just one idea, but you could theoretically, yes, you could, you could change the ordinance to do it that way.

[1:39:37] And one comment I wanted to make about developments under 50,000 square feet, a developer still has the option to build childcare in a development less than 50,000 square feet.

[1:39:50] So this ordinance does not limit a developer that wants to build a small childcare facility in a development less than 50,000 square feet.

[1:40:01] And I'm not sure that that was clear.

[1:40:03] Well, they would still have to pay the full fee though, isn't that right under this ordinance?

[1:40:08] Under the ordinance, they would have the ability to, and you can clarify this, I don't think they would have to pay the full fee.

[1:40:17] They could actually, and is that right?

[1:40:20] Yeah, so I think what they could do is either you could negotiate with them to build a facility at the full fee if that's okay or they could pay a partial fee and build up a smaller or some small facility as well.

[1:40:36] So through an agreement with the city, could be a development agreement or some other kind of contractual agreement.

[1:40:43] that they could do either one of those ideas, so it does not limit the city or the developer.

[1:40:52] But the average developer reading the code wouldn't be aware of that option.

[1:40:57] That's what I'm concerned about, I'm sorry.

[1:41:00] Okay, I know ahead, I think it does say something in the ordinance, doesn't it?

[1:41:04] That through another type of agreement, a developer could negotiate with the city to build

[1:41:14] something and if it's not clear in the ordinance it should be clear.

[1:41:18] Yeah, I just want to make sure that it's very easy for people to use this direct build option and actually build the child care because that's what we're trying to accomplish here.

[1:41:28] A lot more interested in making sure it's as easy as possible for developers to understand this option and actually build it as opposed to handing us money in five, six years later, maybe more child care comes around.

[1:41:42] And maybe it will take us just a moment to locate that language and point out in the ordinance for you to see if you think it's clear enough so maybe we could do that.

[1:41:53] Through the chair, it's in this, it's a second paragraph that kind of falls on the next page on page 104 of the packet that talks about an agreement as a possibility to satisfy the requirement.

[1:42:08] But it's in section 8.52.060, which is the same one where the $50,000 square foot number is stated.

[1:42:19] Okay.

[1:42:21] We are happy to, you know, clarify additionally in the ordinance if it's unclear, so we're happy to go back and edit that.

[1:42:30] Okay, I just, in agreement, would slow down the process, etc., right?

[1:42:35] So here in the ordinance, it can be articulated in a development agreement or a similar mutually agreed upon agreement which could be an MOU or something that works quickest for the city and the developer as long as both parties mutually agreed to the terms.

[1:42:54] Got an MOU's required anyway, right?

[1:42:57] Because even if any direct bill needs the MOU.

[1:43:01] So, okay, all right, thank you, appreciate that.

[1:43:03] Thank you, Madam Mayor.

[1:43:04] Thanks, John.

[1:43:05] I appreciate those clarifications.

[1:43:07] Council member Collins.

[1:43:09] Thank you, Madam Mayor, and thank you,

[1:43:11] Sir Judy and Ashley, very thorough presentation.

[1:43:16] Very informative, too.

[1:43:17] I'm very, just think you just did a great job on it.

[1:43:21] A couple questions, I don't know of who answers

[1:43:23] It was a masterly hercicidity.

[1:43:25] A couple of things stuck out to me on our office and R&D, I think, was it?

[1:43:34] Yeah, Santa Monica and Livermore have pretty high fees.

[1:43:39] How are those working out for them?

[1:43:41] Do we know are they prohibitive?

[1:43:45] Are they discouraged, office and R&D growth?

[1:43:48] Have they been a non-factor or is it too hard to tell?

[1:43:51] because they're overall fees, just incorporate those.

[1:43:57] I haven't looked at it very specifically in a while now.

[1:44:01] Santa Monica does not seem to have very much trouble.

[1:44:04] They have high impact fees in general.

[1:44:06] They do not seem to be seen any slowdown in their development activity.

[1:44:10] In Livermore, the fee is, child care is a part of a health and human services fee,

[1:44:16] and so there's more that they're doing with it.

[1:44:18] There's also a program that's helping with some of their senior programs and senior facilities, for example.

[1:44:26] And so it does not seem to be deterring development, but there's more that they're doing with the fee as well.

[1:44:33] And I understand they're completely different demographics, and there's fairly complex that you can't break it down to one fee.

[1:44:39] So, this whole concept of providing childcare is based at 10%.

[1:44:46] Is that a commonplace practice?

[1:44:51] Is it somewhat commonplace in the development world these days and municipalities?

[1:44:57] No, please.

[1:44:59] Speaking not.

[1:45:00] Not just of child care impact fees, but impact fee programs in general. There are often provisions that developers may comply with the impact fee requirement by providing in kind or actually building the facilities. In those circumstances, you often need to enter into credit reimbursement agreements and those types of things, but it is not at all uncommon that a developer might comply with the impact fee requirement through a direct build.

[1:45:26] And I guess that's more to the point of my question is, are they actually building the child care space?

[1:45:35] In other words, is there are there 100,000 square foot facilities out there that are building 10,000 square feet of child care space, and are they?

[1:45:43] Is that, in any way, a potential deterrent for commercial developers to do that?

[1:45:54] Or is there a certain percentage of them that say we're just not going to do that, we don't have enough, you know, we have too many things that we need to put into that 100,000 square feet, so we'll, we'll pay the fee.

[1:46:06] Right, well, so it is an alternative, it's not a requirement, this on build or build on site option is, it's an alternative to paying the fee.

[1:46:16] And the developer would have to determine whether or not that makes sense for that particular project.

[1:46:22] Is there physical space? Is there, you know, what are the other needs of the other uses? Is there child-on-site child care a use that would be a benefit to the employers and attractive thing for an employer to be able to offer to its employees?

[1:46:37] I am not. This is a creative approach within the realm of childcare fees. It's a creative approach to trying to accelerate the provision of childcare spaces rather than having the development of childcare spaces.

[1:46:52] It's lag a little bit, right, when the fee comes in, the fee then needs to be deployed and leveraged.

[1:46:57] But this is an attempt to respond to council direction to get childcare spaces built as quickly as possible.

[1:47:04] But I do not know a very many childcare impact fee programs where this is codified in the ordinance.

[1:47:10] It happens more often through the development agreements.

[1:47:14] I mean, I'm fully supportive of providing more child care in town and encouraging developers to do it.

[1:47:20] I don't want to happen as that we put ourselves in a position where we've made it unattractive for developers to come here.

[1:47:29] And that, at least in my last question, is probably more speculative on your part is that what's your impression of the overall attractiveness

[1:47:42] of our city to potential commercial developers, or is it becoming a non-factor because so

[1:47:49] many municipalities are doing and they're saying, well, you know, this is not new, we have

[1:47:55] to do it in this city and that city, so St. Carlos is pretty much following suit.

[1:48:01] My understanding is that there are a lot of developers interested in building and being

[1:48:06] in St. Carlos.

[1:48:07] We looked at this question in a number of different ways, as we presented in the PowerPoint.

[1:48:13] Both the comparison, how would these childcare fees compare to other jurisdictions with childcare fees?

[1:48:20] What does it do to the aggregate fee burden in San Carlos?

[1:48:24] And then how might that aggregate fee burden in San Carlos compare with the aggregate fee burden in other nearby jurisdictions?

[1:48:30] I did not see any red flags, or I didn't see anything very alarming from a competitive

[1:48:37] of perspective there, it didn't change your ranking to other nearby cities very significantly.

[1:48:43] Okay, thank you, thank you Madam Mayor.

[1:48:45] It is speculative though, so thank you.

[1:48:47] I know, I know, I know, I didn't want to mean to put you on the spot.

[1:48:50] I just wanted to get your overall impression of it because you know obviously this is what you do, so thanks again.

[1:48:58] Good questions, good questions, Ron.

[1:49:00] Thank you, Vice Mayor Rack.

[1:49:01] Thank

[1:49:05] you Madam Mayor, and I want to thank John and Ron for the questions was helpful.

[1:49:13] So I'm, first question I had is when you talk about, and this may be, I don't know, who should answer this?

[1:49:23] When you talk about the fee burden, are there, are there things that aren't included in this number that are sort of any kind of planning fees, building fees, other stuff?

[1:49:34] like how does that overall compare to a San Mate or something else?

[1:49:38] I mean, because I guess my question, I see these fees, but maybe are planning some of our planning fees are lower, so the overall number isn't quite as bad.

[1:49:48] We tried to keep our comparison as apples to apples as possible, focused just on these impact fees.

[1:49:54] So while we have not reflected planning or building fees in San Carlos, we also excluded them in the other cities that we looked at.

[1:50:01] To the extent that to your question, to the extent that the other cities are significantly higher or lower than San Carlos with respect to planning or building fees, that's not reflected in this aggregate comparison.

[1:50:14] Right, so we don't have a, but when you say don't compare apples apples, how would that not, by including those, how would that not give us a better picture?

[1:50:23] Typically, so with the impact fees, and when I'm comparing them across jurisdictions, I want to normalize them to a per-square-foot of development.

[1:50:31] That's one way I can keep the comparison apples to apples.

[1:50:34] When we start to talk about planning and building fees, that's not necessarily how those fees are calculated.

[1:50:40] They may be based on the type of application.

[1:50:43] They may be based on the value of the construction.

[1:50:46] And I haven't put together prototypes, you know, like a sample development project

[1:50:51] to help work through that.

[1:50:52] So we kept everything on a per square foot basis.

[1:50:55] Just looking at it in fact, please.

[1:50:57] Okay.

[1:50:58] And how do we define the various categories of the,

[1:51:05] I hotel, I understand it, but I'm just struggling

[1:51:08] between sort of when we look at industrial and office and R&D,

[1:51:13] do we bifurcate it all?

[1:51:15] So if something is an industrial facility,

[1:51:18] but they've got, you know, some office space because that's just how they operate right there, so they may have that.

[1:51:23] Do we look at that when we calculate the fees or is it your zone for X, so this is what it is, and that's what the fee is, how does that work?

[1:51:32] One of the underpinning assumptions that help us to differentiate fees across land use categories is employment density.

[1:51:40] It's one of the ways that we get at the proportionality of different land uses.

[1:51:45] And it used to be, when I started during this work a long time ago, that R&D was more like industrial.

[1:51:51] It looked, it felt employment densities were a little more like industrial and

[1:51:55] industrial and R&D went together.

[1:51:58] Over the last 10, 15 years, we've really seen R&D start to look a little bit more like office with employment densities, more like office.

[1:52:07] So there's an example where employment density is really driving the way that we're

[1:52:13] categories in our land use categories, if ever, or categorizing the land uses, if ever you had a situation where an applicant came to the counter and wasn't sure or wanted to contest which land use category most accurately fit their use.

[1:52:29] We have a provision in here typically that it's left to the community development director or similar.

[1:52:34] Okay. And then, I was intrigued with some of the things that Councilmember Dugan mentioned

[1:52:44] about, because I do think we need to encourage more onsite as best as we can, right? That's

[1:52:49] the best way to get more childcare versus trying to build a, I mean, I know how expensive

[1:52:52] it is for us on the impact fees for housing, how difficult and how expensive it is, so the

[1:52:57] more we can do that. So, I'm glad that we got the clarification on the sort of negotiation

[1:53:03] the agreement, because I think that's helpful to understand from that.

[1:53:07] And then I just would, and not really a question, but kind of echo a little bit of, I know we're sort of not don't have all the crystal ball on this.

[1:53:16] But just read a little bit of concern like Council Member Collins mentioned.

[1:53:21] I just don't want to price ourselves out of the market because I do think that we lose the intention of these fees.

[1:53:29] So we end up not getting development to come in eventually because people don't want to come in.

[1:53:35] They can go to Redwood City or somewhere else, and it's a more cost effective place.

[1:53:39] And we don't, assuming that we're not going to get funding from the state or

[1:53:44] the county for other things, that's sort of our vehicle to get to solve some of these problems.

[1:53:48] And so I understand sort of tough to balance it.

[1:53:52] So I guess it's more just registering opinion versus a question around that.

[1:53:59] Okay,

[1:54:02] thank you, Vice Mayor.

[1:54:04] I don't have any questions.

[1:54:06] I enjoyed serving with Council Member Parmar-Lohan on the Child Care Subcommittee and we've

[1:54:09] gone through this quite a bit, so I have no questions.

[1:54:14] I guess we'll go ahead and open it up to public comment.

[1:54:17] If you're participating by Zoom, now is the time to raise your hand.

[1:54:22] And I don't know if we have any speaker cards here for in-person.

[1:54:24] No, I have no speaker cards.

[1:54:26] Do you see a hand raised on zoom from Sarah Kinahan?

[1:54:31] You should be able to unmute.

[1:54:36] Good evening, Mayor McDowell, Council members and city staff.

[1:54:40] My name is Sarah Kinahan.

[1:54:41] I am a St. Carlos resident, a mom of two sons

[1:54:45] who use childcare in the city

[1:54:46] and coordinator for the San Mateo County

[1:54:49] Child Care Partnership Council.

[1:54:51] I'm here tonight to express appreciation

[1:54:53] and support to the city for considering

[1:54:55] a child care development impact fee. I wish I was here with our updated needs assessment data

[1:55:02] full report. We don't yet have that. It will be available in the fall. But I do have some preliminary

[1:55:08] data for the city that shows a current need of at least 500 new child care spaces for children zero

[1:55:15] to five. This is a combination of demand from residents and people coming into the city to work.

[1:55:22] There was a question earlier about whether transitional kindergarten will impact this need for child care and we have done projections through 2032.

[1:55:34] And while we show a decrease in the need as children move into transitional kindergarten, we are projecting at least a need of 400 new child care spaces at that time.

[1:55:47] And I want to note that the demand from people coming into the city to work actually is projected to increase by 2032. So you would be addressing that need through this type of development fee on non residential developments.

[1:56:05] The other question was whether other cities have seen developers choose the on-site option and I know of at least five commercial developments in surrounding cities that are including six to 10,000 square foot child care facilities.

[1:56:20] So again, thank you for being a leader on this issue and working with our organization over the last few years on ways the city can support child care and San Carlos.

[1:56:30] Thank you.

[1:56:32] Thank you, Sarah, and thanks for all the good work you do in the county.

[1:56:36] Crystal, is anyone else in Zoom?

[1:56:40] No hands from the public.

[1:56:43] Okay, I'll open it up to discussion now.

[1:56:45] I see Councilmember Palmer, low hands hand.

[1:56:48] Thank you, Mayor.

[1:56:50] And thank you also, Sarah, for the opportunity to work with you on this and subcommittee.

[1:56:54] And I also want to thank staff for taking every business-minded focus

[1:56:59] us to how to approach this topic in our community.

[1:57:04] You know, San Carlos is a really remarkable city when we think about all that it has to offer.

[1:57:10] It really is very much self-contained.

[1:57:13] We are enjoying an economic growth that we haven't seen in quite some time with over four

[1:57:19] million square feet of commercial office being built. We are, you know, we've completed our

[1:57:25] e-side visioning plan that articulates the importance of the creation of affordable housing,

[1:57:32] the importance of childcare, not to mention some, you know, tending to the environmental impacts

[1:57:38] of these projects and addressing our climate change concerns among others. You know, we have

[1:57:47] fabulous schools. We are able to attract the whole the whole demographics. I think of the community

[1:57:53] have really changed over the last, you know, dozen years were so, you know, but what's left out

[1:58:05] in all of that, unfortunately, is our kids. And the kids at this age are the ones that don't have

[1:58:15] the ability to speak up for themselves. And as we've talked many times in council, their families

[1:58:20] are busy raising them, their hands are full and the ability to come to these chambers and talk

[1:58:26] about this particular issue is challenging. And, you know, just to give you, you know, some color

[1:58:31] on this, I have a good friend who several years ago had her first child and planned to take the

[1:58:37] minimum amount of time off of her work. She's a tech worker and, you know, makes a very good living.

[1:58:45] And she planned to just do the minimum amount of time and then get back straight to work.

[1:58:50] And the difficulty for her in fighting child care was so great, it prolonged her ability

[1:58:56] to get back into the workforce.

[1:58:58] And I believe that taking this step and one that is prudent, I believe the analysis

[1:59:04] that's been provided tonight shows that the cost structure will fall within a framework

[1:59:11] that won't inhibit that development that's already well underway and has been talked about

[1:59:16] in many forums with respect to that development, and it will build that important step and bridge

[1:59:25] for women mostly because oftentimes child care falls to the responsibility of the woman to

[1:59:32] participate fully in the economy, which is very important. And so I'm appreciating the fact that

[1:59:42] this could be one small step to eliminate that cost prohibitive burden of $100,000 per child.

[1:59:49] So that's really the biggest barrier that's getting in our way of making sure we have adequate

[1:59:54] capacity in our community. This could really help to pay that down. And I do

[2:00:00] I appreciate council member Dugan's concern about making sure that we allow ourselves flexibility in this ordinance. And I do appreciate Vice Mayor Racks concern as well as council members Collins that we don't price ourselves out of out of the market. All signs I'm seeing are very, very favorable for this action at this time. And I believe the wind is at our back. It's innovative. It's contemporary with what some of the other communities are doing. And I'm really hopeful that council decides to take this very

[2:00:29] important step tonight. And I look forward to hearing from the rest of you as we move into comments.

[2:00:36] Thank you. Thank you, Laura. I'm going to ask for a motion to close the public hearing before

[2:00:43] we continue with Council discussion. Is there a motion? I'm going to close the public hearing.

[2:00:48] Second. Crystal, could you please call the roll? Council Member Palmer-Lohan? Yes.

[2:00:59] Vice Mayor

[2:00:59] member Collins.

[2:01:00] Yes.

[2:01:01] And Mayor McDowell.

[2:01:02] Yes.

[2:01:02] Thank you, Crystal.

[2:01:04] Okay.

[2:01:04] We'll move on to Councilmember Dugan.

[2:01:07] Thank you, Madam Mayor.

[2:01:09] And thank you, Laura, to such a good explanation of how vital child care is in St.

[2:01:19] Carlos and in our society in general.

[2:01:23] I wouldn't, you know, just the very helpful context here.

[2:01:27] And childcare has been, you know, sorely needed in town for years and years, more of it.

[2:01:34] And it's been a top goal of us as a city for years and years.

[2:01:38] So, and we've done some work in this area.

[2:01:43] We've looked at, we've streamlined fees.

[2:01:46] We've streamlined, tried to make it as easy as possible for

[2:01:49] child care to come to town, but none of that really is going to directly get child care built.

[2:01:57] So I'm very enthusiastic about what we're going to do this evening.

[2:02:01] This is a very substantive ordinance.

[2:02:05] It represents a lot of work by staff, by our subcommittee, by our consultants.

[2:02:13] It's a very solid program, so I'm very excited about it, especially in the context of

[2:02:19] all the development that is coming to our town and how much additional strain they'll

[2:02:24] be on our child care system.

[2:02:26] The timing of this is very appropriate and I'm very glad I believe we'll be moving forward

[2:02:33] with this.

[2:02:35] Now there's a very real potential, we're going to develop a lot of fees from this and I just

[2:02:44] We just want us to really be cognizant that it's not great for us to take down a lot of fees here if we don't put that to work quickly.

[2:02:54] So if in three, four, five years, we've got $20 million in the bank, we've done something wrong.

[2:03:01] So I really want us to, number one, think of how can we engage and

[2:03:06] encourage the direct bill option because that's how we're going to get childcare actually built in the near term.

[2:03:11] So, anything we can do as we're talking to developers, et cetera, to be encouraging that.

[2:03:16] I think we should do that.

[2:03:19] And then secondly, how can we be really creative with the fees that we do take down?

[2:03:24] I really like the opportunities of providing loans and grants to childcare operators in town.

[2:03:31] I think that could be a very direct immediate way to get fees translated into childcare in town as soon as possible.

[2:03:41] And I just hope we stay very open-minded and keep looking around the country on what's

[2:03:47] the best way to get these fees translated into child care as soon as possible.

[2:03:53] And then to that end, I am very glad we're also doing the direct billed option.

[2:03:58] And I would just, to my colleagues, propose one amendment to that.

[2:04:02] Because again, I just want everyone to be aware of the direct billed option and just have

[2:04:09] I have every incentive to do it, and I'm just worried that saying it's only available to large developments over 50,000 square feet, I just think that might preclude some smaller developer from even thinking about it.

[2:04:23] So I think we accomplished the same goal just by saying it has to be at least 5,000 square feet, so instead of saying it has to be a project greater than 50,000 square feet, it can be any size project smaller than that.

[2:04:37] But as long as they've built at least 5,000 square feet of childcare, I don't think that makes any change to this program.

[2:04:47] I just think it makes it very clear that even smaller developments could build meaningful childcare as well.

[2:04:53] That's all I have. Thank you.

[2:04:55] Thanks, John. Vice Mayor Beck.

[2:05:03] Okay.

[2:05:05] Thank you, Madam Mayor.

[2:05:06] I just, first thanks to staff and for everyone for the great work on this.

[2:05:13] I feel like this is just sort of another piece in the holistic effort of addressing the gap

[2:05:20] that we face in child care slots.

[2:05:22] And I'm excited to be supporting this and look forward to continue to look at this issue in

[2:05:28] a holistic manner.

[2:05:29] And I think that's the best way long-term for us to really meet the need and to address the gap that's there.

[2:05:38] So I look forward to supporting this and look forward to see how things work out.

[2:05:47] Thank you, Vice Mayor.

[2:05:49] Thank you, Vice Mayor.

[2:05:51] I guess I'll go ahead and share my comments.

[2:05:53] I too want to thank staff.

[2:05:54] This was a tremendous amount of work over the last several years.

[2:05:57] And I'm so pleased that where this has been brought forward tonight, I'm supportive of this fee, I think it's very reasonable.

[2:06:07] I too want to emphasize it's my top priority to have the child care built on site.

[2:06:13] So I think my colleagues were raising that today as well.

[2:06:17] I think that, you know, as we talk about development, and I think councilmember Palmer Lohan talked about this too is when we talk a lot about the impact of development.

[2:06:26] And we talk about traffic and people going downtown

[2:06:30] and another impact is certainly child care

[2:06:33] because a lot of these workers will need child care.

[2:06:37] And I certainly was a user of it

[2:06:39] when I was a full-time working mom.

[2:06:41] I had child care in the basement of my building

[2:06:44] and it was so convenient to drop my infant off

[2:06:46] and go to work and I could visit him at lunchtime.

[2:06:50] And so I think that this is truly a great benefit

[2:06:53] for employers, and I think that is being realized, and also it can be a great benefit to our community.

[2:07:02] I also, I support Council Member Dugins' amendment, and I also agree that we should make sure

[2:07:10] that any fees that are collected should be put to use rather quickly. I've spoken to a lot of child

[2:07:16] care providers here in San Carlos, and certainly land acquisition and acquisition of property is just

[2:07:22] really cost prohibitive, so I think that we will have ample opportunity to put the fees to work through loans or grants, so I agree with that too.

[2:07:31] So I want to thank everyone for their work, and I will pass it over to councilmember Collins.

[2:07:36] Thank you, Madam Mayor. Again, thanks to staff for great work.

[2:07:42] I think it's a great step in the right direction. I do want to make sure that we have a check-in,

[2:07:50] whether it's six months or a year, a periodic check-in to find out how this is impacting

[2:07:56] developers. With respect to an amendment, though, I really prefer an incentive-based approach.

[2:08:02] I'm not a fan of lowering the threshold so that we're imposing a greater burden on smaller

[2:08:11] developments. I'm not sure that's the right way to go, so I would not support that particular amendment.

[2:08:20] Thank you, thank you, Ron, Vice Mayor Beck.

[2:08:23] Thank you, Madam Mayor.

[2:08:25] Ed, I wanted to comment on the amendment, but also a question.

[2:08:29] There's been discussion about loans and other things.

[2:08:31] Can you just clarify, can the fees be used for, I thought they can't be used for operational purposes, right?

[2:08:39] They can be used for infrastructure only, is that accurate?

[2:08:45] Correct. So the idea behind a loan to a at home daycare provider would be if they can currently

[2:08:54] serve eight children but if they were to install a new little toilet they could serve 12 or if they

[2:09:01] create some more outdoor yard space they could serve additional children. If there's some

[2:09:05] capital sort of construction improvement that they can make to their home, to their facility

[2:09:10] that allows them to serve more children, that's the idea behind that program.

[2:09:15] I understand, thank you for that clarification.

[2:09:19] And I guess I would say, I don't, I would say I don't support the amendment as sort of proposed,

[2:09:27] because I don't think it might make sense to have to put a minimum of 5,000 square feet around it.

[2:09:34] If you're talking about a 10,000 square foot bill that may make sense to have a 1,000 foot or 1,500 square foot child care facility, but 5,000 is too prohibited.

[2:09:45] So by having that minimum, I think you defeat the purpose.

[2:09:48] I prefer the sort of the agreement approach that has a sliding scale to me that would be a better, better approach to do.

[2:09:54] I think having a minimum is just sort of, we're not going to get anywhere.

[2:10:00] I think by having a minimum versus a sliding scale.

[2:10:06] Council member Collins.

[2:10:08] Yeah, I just thought of something, I'll make it quick.

[2:10:11] I'm wondering if maybe we could come up with a modification later, kind of work on that a little bit more, see what makes sense.

[2:10:22] I'm with Adam on that, that I'm not sure it makes sense to set an absolute number.

[2:10:28] I think that just requires a little bit more research and we need to talk about that a little bit more.

[2:10:33] But I don't want to throw the baby out with bath water.

[2:10:35] I want to get, I would like to support this and have it passed and then take that up a later point as a, you know, potential modification.

[2:10:48] So Judy, you mentioned that you wouldn't look into this a little bit more. Is that correct?

[2:10:54] Yes, we can look into it.

[2:10:57] I guess if we go with Councilman Collins' suggestion of coming back and modifying the ordinance we can do it that way, however, if we were, I guess, as a question for Greg, if we were to modify it before the second reading, is that allowed?

[2:11:14] Yeah, after the first reading, we are not able to change the text of the ordinance without reintroducing it.

[2:11:26] So if we wanted to make a change tonight and let us know the change that you were through your motion to introduce,

[2:11:35] we could bring back something that you had modified from the text here and then we could adopt as you modify it tonight.

[2:11:44] I think this is a suggestion, I hate to venture into the area where I'm just, I'm the attorney, I'm not the policymaker, but it seems to me you might be able to accomplish the goal by removing the ratio of 10% of total square footage because as Council Member Dugan was talking about, that could be a really big space on a larger development, so it's on the other side of it.

[2:12:11] that I think that percentage might cause some confusion, so if we remove that, then you're just applying the standard to a 50,000 square footer larger project, and then it still would have the mutually agreed provision in it, so it would be able to accommodate something smaller than 5,000 if that was it, or something larger than the minimum would require.

[2:12:37] But that's just a suggestion if that's the direction the council wants to go.

[2:12:43] I guess just to repeat our conversation earlier, the risk of removing any kind of threshold when you get child care centers that are less than 5,000 square feet.

[2:12:56] Let's say 3,000 or 2,000, it's not feasible operationally is that correct Ashley.

[2:13:02] So the operational feasibility and the economic feasibility starts going down.

[2:13:07] So then child care operators are less likely to operate in these spaces, and it really wouldn't make sense economically.

[2:13:16] You want to add anything to that?

[2:13:20] Right, I think we even heard from Sarah this evening saying there are five other projects in the area, all size between six and 10,000 square feet.

[2:13:29] One of the things I've learned over the years is that if you get below a certain number of children, you lose some of the operating efficiencies.

[2:13:36] So, there, we're talking about development feasibility, but operational feasibility.

[2:13:41] The number of staff you're hiring and all of that, you start to, you see some feasibility at scale and for a child care center that tends to be around 5,000 square feet.

[2:13:52] I can't say that you couldn't have a very efficient center at 4,500 square feet.

[2:13:57] I know there's no, it's not binary, but it's around 5,000 square feet that you start to serve enough children to see a really efficient operation.

[2:14:07] Okay, I see some more hands raised.

[2:14:09] Councilmember Deacon.

[2:14:13] Thank you, Madam Mayor.

[2:14:14] I just wanted to clarify, and I understand, number one, I mean, this is a bit of a minor detail.

[2:14:21] I mean, you know, we're all, I'm happy we're all in strong agreement on, you know, 98% of what we're doing here.

[2:14:28] I just wanted to point out that we are setting a hard limit, and the limit we're setting, no matter what we do here,

[2:14:35] There is who can qualify for the direct bill option.

[2:14:39] And as proposed, we're setting a hard limit that only people building at least 50,000 square feet of net new footage can qualify for direct bill.

[2:14:48] So anyone building smaller than that is not eligible for direct bill.

[2:14:53] So I simply made the observation that the 50,000 feet is derived.

[2:15:00] I have to be because that's 10 times the 5,000 square feet. So I'm just saying why don't we define it as the 5,000 square feet so that we don't preclude a 40,000 foot development that also wants to do 5,000 square feet? That's all. I just thought that was a helpful amendment, but I don't want it to interrupt the good work where otherwise you're going to do this evening.

[2:15:23] Thank you, John.

[2:15:25] Vice Mayor Beck.

[2:15:29] I don't know if I guess I'll talk here.

[2:15:33] I guess, so, John, so thank you, and I had one, I guess, one question would be how it would apply in this if

[2:15:43] to Council Member Dugan's question.

[2:15:45] So if you're only adding 40,000, but the overall footprint is more than 50,000, how does that get affected?

[2:15:53] So the facility itself, you're not.

[2:15:55] So, if the existing facility was 30,000 and now is an 80,000-foot facility, or, I say, 70, let's say.

[2:16:04] So, now you're only adding 40,000, but the overall facility might be big enough to qualify

[2:16:08] for a 5,000 square foot child care facility.

[2:16:12] How would something like that play into that?

[2:16:16] Because we've taken account the overall footprint versus the new footprint.

[2:16:22] Sorry to complicate, thanks.

[2:16:24] I

[2:16:31] think that's where, I think the language that we've proposed from staff is to have some flexibility in the agreement, because we can't foresee every circumstance that might come up with a developer wanting to do this alternative, but those are all good points, it's kind of hard to do the math if you, if you, if you say, if you walk in 10%, and we don't have the agreement, it might, you could end up

[2:17:00] But with kind of absurd result on the other end is the point I was trying to make if you have a much larger than 50,000 square foot.

[2:17:07] You might have an infeasible child care requirement and you're just not going to get anything built on that end.

[2:17:13] And if you have somebody who wants to build a smaller, who has a 40,000 or a smaller, but once to build it, we want to create that flexibility.

[2:17:23] So that's why I was making that suggestion, but I'm not, I'm open to any kind of alternative that would be.

[2:17:30] allow us some flexibility because I think the intent of this is to really create a genuine real alternative for somebody to build a data child care center, not just create something that seems like it's good, it could happen, we want to have something that they're going to do it, and I think creating the thresholds might be in the way that that paragraph is worded might be binding us a little bit too tight.

[2:18:00] to these percentages and the square footage is so just food for thought for the council.

[2:18:07] Just to follow on that, could we clarify, I guess, and hopefully if John is acceptable something like this, just clarify in that section that the ability to negotiate an agreement to make sure that we feel like that we're sort of strengthening that particular statement might be at least a step forward and then we can revisit at some point if we think six months down the road it makes more sense to per Ron's point.

[2:18:31] Well, suggestion along those lines might be something like, and I'm looking at the last sentence of that first paragraph of 8.52.060.

[2:18:44] So, mutually agreed upon by the developer in the city with the intention of

[2:18:57] creating a feasible child care and feasible child care space onsite, you know, kind of parodying that to make it reasonable and feasible.

[2:19:13] I'm just thinking Greg, and not to maybe can we say in there that the city encourages the development of onsite child care facilities.

[2:19:24] And therefore, you know, maybe it's not sort of ordinance language, but something to sort of infer that we would, that that's sort of our preferred route in there.

[2:19:37] And then leave it at that and say that our preferred route is to take this and

[2:19:43] negotiate an agreement around this would be a preferred route.

[2:19:47] Something so we sort of indicate a preference to facilities versus the fee would be my.

[2:19:53] And then to John's point, we've got 98% agreement, I don't want to keep dwelling on this.

[2:20:00] Yeah, I'm just trying to give you the ability tonight to introduce the ordinance with

[2:20:05] with the language and the maybe Cedudi as a suggestion.

[2:20:08] I was thinking can we add it under section one after the recitals because that's where all of the priorities are going and

[2:20:16] where all of the intention behind the ordinance is going as well so we can add it there, perhaps if Greg.

[2:20:26] I just think this is where we're really on a nuts and bolts thing here and I do want to create flexibility so I think we would

[2:20:34] I like the idea of having an additional sentence that creates a more flexibility in the agreement that says something like notwithstanding the above, the city and the developer can deviate from these requirements to create a feasible building build out of child care.

[2:21:02] And then that would create some additional flexibility, I think the council might be looking for.

[2:21:09] I'd be fine with that.

[2:21:13] Okay, I see Council Member Palmer, Lohan and Council Member Collins.

[2:21:18] Laurie, go ahead.

[2:21:19] Thank you.

[2:21:19] So I think I like the idea of adding some sort of statement in the early portion of the ordinance

[2:21:25] that articulates what our preference is, because we have articulated that multiple times, right?

[2:21:31] that we would prefer that it get built. And it strikes me that this, we're getting

[2:21:36] tripped up on this 50,000 square foot, you know, minimum 5,000 square foot facility.

[2:21:43] And that to me is more or less just an example of the kind of the entry point at which one would

[2:21:48] actually be able, under these current economic circumstances that were in today, build something

[2:21:56] out that's feasible at the same time economic conditions change over time, right? So I think we

[2:22:02] want to be careful about being so prescriptive in our ordinance that it expires, right, in terms of

[2:22:09] its relevancy by the time we get one of these deals negotiated. So is it possible that this 50,000

[2:22:15] square foot, 5,000 minimum could be expressed as an example of what we would like to see under,

[2:22:22] You know, the current economic conditions and, and I also agree with idea of adding some statement that we will reserve the right to negotiate with developers to, you know, put a plan in place that's feasible and pencils out, right.

[2:22:39] So those are my two cents thinking, listening to the conversation.

[2:22:44] Through the Mayor, I think that is as a good suggestion, Council Member Parmar-Lohan.

[2:22:50] We could phrase that as an example, and that might, that would also increase the flexibility

[2:22:57] in dealing with this issue.

[2:23:01] Councillor Neill.

[2:23:02] Collin?

[2:23:04] I saw such a making that it's best.

[2:23:13] You've been the principal participants in the subcommittee on this, correct?

[2:23:18] You guys have spent a lot of time with staff.

[2:23:20] This seems to me well thought through, well thought out ordinance.

[2:23:27] I'm always getting nervous when we try to remake this stuff when it comes to us in nearly final form.

[2:23:36] But given that, I like, I like Laura's comment, and I'm wondering, is it possible to have us consider, I don't know, two alternatives.

[2:23:47] You know, basically the same ordinance, but one more flexible, one less flexible when we decide when it comes back to us.

[2:23:55] Greg, is that possible?

[2:23:58] You know, with the tweet, you know, one as is, one with the tweak.

[2:24:02] So that we can say, okay, we're going to go this way or that way?

[2:24:07] Yeah, Councilmember Collins, I think I understand we are coming from, but we're not there, if what you're saying is, have two options in the ordinance, I think that's difficult to craft, but I think what we're trying to do is accomplish that same sentiment by creating this flexibility in dealing with circumstances of someone who proposed.

[2:24:31] is the alternative, and I think we kind of meet that purpose.

[2:24:37] If we create two alternatives, then I think we're just going to have two different sets of criteria that

[2:24:43] we might not get the flexibility that we're trying to achieve today.

[2:24:48] Well, if what you're saying is that what we're, what's being proposed already contains that flexibility, then I'm all for it.

[2:24:57] I think with some additional language we'll make it clear that the council's intent is

[2:25:03] to have flexibility in determining the proposed alternative.

[2:25:11] Okay, so on the table right now is the Palmer-Lohan amendment, correct?

[2:25:16] Okay, John, did you have a comment?

[2:25:19] I did, thank you, Madam Mayor.

[2:25:21] I just want to make sure I understand that, and thank you, Laura.

[2:25:24] or I think that is a good idea, because we're all just, we want to see more direct build and I'm specifically reacting to this hard 500, yeah, 50,000 square foot limit.

[2:25:40] And Adam, you raised a great point if someone's just adding to a facility, it could be plenty big to accommodate, but they're only adding 30,000 feet so they couldn't qualify.

[2:25:51] So, I believe Laura's input is, let's get rid of all the limits, no limit on that.

[2:25:59] And then it's just suggestive that, and that's fine because all of any proposed direct bill will be subject to the memorandum of understanding.

[2:26:11] And so we're just now providing an example, if the city's going to agree with it, we want it to be viable health care.

[2:26:17] which to us means 5,000 square feet or more, which will make sense on any significant project.

[2:26:26] So I think that's the amendment that there is no 50,000 foot limit.

[2:26:32] So I completely support that, and then I also support providing guidance that we consider

[2:26:37] 5,000 square foot and larger child care facilities the ones that we would exempt

[2:26:42] under a memorandum of understanding from the fee.

[2:26:50] So I would just so from my perspective, I would support what I'm going to call as it's

[2:26:56] been called now, the Palmer-Lohan amendment to this.

[2:27:01] And then if everyone's good with it or Laura, if you would like to, I would love to sort

[2:27:07] of move this, but I'm happy if you would prefer to since it is your amendment.

[2:27:14] Well, I'm, yeah, I'm, you said you would love to do it bad in my, I don't, I don't want to take that away from you and the mission on the work on this issue over with the subcommittee, so I would certainly defer to you on that.

[2:27:25] Go ahead, Laura. It's your amendment.

[2:27:27] Okay. All right. So let me pull up the document hang on one second.

[2:27:35] All right.

[2:27:35] I'm trying

[2:27:41] to find the meeting action list and we are on.

[2:27:48] Thank you.

[2:27:50] I move to introduce ordinance number 1585.

[2:27:55] An ordinance of the city council of the city of San Carlos adding chapter 8.52 to the San Carlos municipal code establishing a child care development impact fee for non residential developments in the city of San Carlos.

[2:28:07] that articulates our interest in wanting to have child care built out and that the

[2:28:14] exempt and that the dimensions provided for minimum size day care being built on

[2:28:22] site is used as an example to inform a memorandum of understanding.

[2:28:29] Second.

[2:28:30] Okay, before we call the role, Crystal, did I take public hearing on the

[2:28:34] Yes.

[2:28:36] We did.

[2:28:36] Okay.

[2:28:36] It's been so long.

[2:28:38] Okay.

[2:28:40] Any further discussion on this item?

[2:28:43] Can I get one point of clarification and I think maybe I don't know if you said the word

[2:28:47] new, non-residential.

[2:28:49] I missed that.

[2:28:50] I just want to make sure we're new, non-residential.

[2:28:53] Thank you.

[2:28:53] Just make sure we're clear.

[2:28:55] But thank you.

[2:28:56] Sorry to put you on the spot.

[2:28:58] It's got to be right.

[2:28:59] Yeah.

[2:29:00] Okay.

[2:29:01] Crystal, could you please call the roll?

[2:29:04] Councilmember Collins.

[2:29:06] Yes.

[2:29:06] Councilmember Lohan.

[2:29:08] Yes.

[2:29:08] Vice Mayor Mack.

[2:29:10] Yes.

[2:29:10] Councilmember Dugan.

[2:29:11] Yes.

[2:29:12] And Mayor McDowell.

[2:29:13] Yes.

[2:29:16] Okay.

[2:29:16] What is the bill of the council?

[2:29:18] Should we continue for our last two items?

[2:29:21] You guys need a break?

[2:29:22] Short break.

[2:29:23] Short break.

[2:29:24] Five minutes.

[2:29:25] Good.

[2:29:26] Five minute break.

[2:29:26] Where I take our five minute break.

[2:29:28] Thank you.

[2:29:54] 2223.

[2:29:54] and we have Rebecca Mendon-Holton-Mate.

[2:29:58] Good evening, Rebecca Mendon-Holton-Mate.

[2:30:00] Administrative Services Director. It's been a while since I've done this.

[2:30:13] It's just the arrow button, right, Crystal? No, there it goes. It was on, okay.

[2:30:19] So, before you tonight is the adoption of the development impact fees and the schedule.

[2:30:26] Local governments often charge these fees as a condition of approval for development projects to fund public improvements, to compensate for the demands that these developments have on public infrastructure.

[2:30:37] These fees are commonly known as development impact fees, and they're separate from the

[2:30:40] cost of services or the user fees, which is the next item on your agenda.

[2:30:44] These rates are reviewed annually, and are increased based on the indices identified

[2:30:48] in the municipal code.

[2:30:51] Both of these, all three of these impact fees are updated based on the construction cost index,

[2:30:57] and that's based on labor rates in material costs.

[2:31:00] And you can see that these costs have increased a lot this year, due to the supply chain

[2:31:05] issues and increasing fuel costs associated with obtaining and delivering the materials.

[2:31:13] So there are three impact fees that would be increased in accordance with the requirements

[2:31:17] of the municipal code.

[2:31:18] The first is the Park Facility Development fee, which would increase by 15.15%.

[2:31:23] These fees are assessed per the Munich Code section 3.34.

[2:31:28] This fee is accounted for in the Park and Lou fund, fund of 27.

[2:31:31] And is also used for the acquisition, development, renovation, and replacement of parks and

[2:31:36] recreational areas and their development including equipment for recreational purposes.

[2:31:42] The second is the serial capacity charge which will increase by 8%.

[2:31:46] The serial capacity charge was established under municode chapter 13.04 to recover costs

[2:31:51] for the city sewer system infrastructure and assets that provide benefit to the new or expanded

[2:31:56] connections.

[2:31:58] And last is the traffic impact fee which would increase by 15.15%.

[2:32:02] This fee was established under Munich Code Chapter 8.5 to fund transportation improvements to help accommodate new residents and businesses brought to San Carlos as a result of new development projects.

[2:32:13] This fee is accounted for in the General Capital Fund or Fund 25 as a restricted account.

[2:32:21] Since these are development fees, they would be subject to a 60 day noticing period and would be effective August 29th.

[2:32:28] And the approximate net revenue increases to the fees or to the funds noted here are approximately $216,000.

[2:32:37] So, that concludes my presentation on this item.

[2:32:40] I'm happy to answer any questions.

[2:32:43] Thanks, Rebecca. Any questions?

[2:32:49] Councilmember Dugan?

[2:32:50] I just had a quick one, Rebecca. Thank you for the overview.

[2:32:54] The fee increases, you know, pretty dramatic 15% tied to the cost index.

[2:33:00] I just want to verify that can work in both directions if, you know, we enter a recession and all these,

[2:33:06] the supply chain issues work out, and now there's a reduction from that big spike up.

[2:33:11] Would that then be reflected in our next fee review?

[2:33:16] Yeah, it's a fee that we get from the engineering records, engineering news record, and so they compile the fee.

[2:33:28] And so if the fees would go down or the cost would go down, I would imagine the fee would not be as high next year.

[2:33:32] Okay, so it can move in both directions.

[2:33:34] Okay, thank you. That's all I have.

[2:33:38] Okay, I don't see any other questions, so we can go ahead to public comment.

[2:33:45] Now is the time to raise your hand via Zoom.

[2:33:47] If you have a public comment on this item.

[2:33:49] Crystal, is anyone in the waiting room?

[2:33:54] There are no hands from Zoom.

[2:33:57] Madam Mayor, move to close the public hearing.

[2:34:00] Is there a second?

[2:34:01] Okay.

[2:34:02] Crystal, could you please call the roll?

[2:34:06] Councilmember Dugan?

[2:34:07] Yes.

[2:34:08] Councilmember Collins?

[2:34:09] Yes.

[2:34:09] Yes. Council Member Carmelo-Hen. Yes.

[2:34:11] Vice Mayor Rack. Yes.

[2:34:13] And Mayor McDowell. Yes.

[2:34:15] Any further discussion from my colleagues?

[2:34:20] Seeing none, I'll entertain a motion.

[2:34:24] Madam Mayor, I move to adopt resolution 2022-78.

[2:34:29] Resolution of the City Council of the City of St. Carlos, authorizing adjustments to the park

[2:34:34] facility development fee, sewer capacity charge, and traffic impact fee for fiscal year 2022-2023.

[2:34:55] Okay, thank you.

[2:34:58] We will now move on to 10C, consideration of adopting a resolution, authorizing adjustments

[2:35:03] to the cost of services schedule, user fees, and the approval of an additional budget

[2:35:07] appropriation in the amount of $10,000 from the General Fund and the signed balance to establish a field use fee scholarship program for fiscal year 2022 to 23 and to adopt guidelines for future fee increases.

[2:35:22] Go ahead, Rebecca.

[2:35:23] Thank you.

[2:35:36] So on May 23rd, the Council held a study session to discuss the outcomes of a comprehensive overhead allocation and fee and rate study performed by NBS.

[2:35:44] The purpose of this fee study was to ensure that the city is accounting for the true cost of providing various programs and services.

[2:35:52] It's the city's goal to have a well documented and defensible plan that complies with Proposition 218.

[2:35:57] The distinction between a tax and a fee lies primarily in the fact that a tax is levied as part of the common burden or the benefits the public broadly.

[2:36:06] And a fee is a charge for a service that has a direct benefit to that individual or business.

[2:36:11] The city cannot charge more than the cost of providing services so these results serve as a baseline for establishing the costs or the fees.

[2:36:23] So the city is currently recovering approximately 66% of the costs associated with providing user and regulatory fee related services.

[2:36:32] Based on feedback from the council, the city re-evaluated some of the fees and reduced the recommended cost recovery from 89% to 85%.

[2:36:40] For those fees that are not set at 100% cost recovery, the general fund does subsidize those costs.

[2:36:47] So the next slides will discuss the changes of any from the study session.

[2:36:54] So for the administrative fees, there was one change that was accidentally omitted from

[2:36:58] the staff report, and this would be the electric vehicle charging fee at Wheeler Plaza.

[2:37:02] This has been recommended to be a pass-through fee to offset the cost of electricity and

[2:37:07] other operational or maintenance costs on our end.

[2:37:09] The speed of $0.25 per kilowatt hour is similar to other agencies in the county.

[2:37:15] Redwood City is 27 cents, San Mateo is also 25 cents, and Berlin game is 30 cents.

[2:37:21] There were no other changes recommended, and since these fees are not subject to a 60 day noticing requirement,

[2:37:27] they were become effective July 1st, 2022.

[2:37:34] There were no changes recommended to the proposed police fee schedule.

[2:37:38] And similar to the administrative fees, these are not subject to the 60 day noticing requirement.

[2:37:42] So this fee schedule would also become effective on July 1st, 2022.

[2:37:50] Fire prevention fees are separate from the fee study scope of reviews since these services are contracted from the city of Redwood City.

[2:37:57] So it was done in prior years, staff recommends adopting user fees based on the Redwood City user fee schedule.

[2:38:03] This would be a development fee, so it would require a 60 day noticing period, so these fees would be effective August 29th, 2022.

[2:38:11] For

[2:38:14] public works and engineering, there were no changes recommended to the proposed fee schedule presented in May.

[2:38:21] And since these fees are also primarily related to development, they're subject to the 60-day noticing requirement.

[2:38:27] So they would become effective on August 29th.

[2:38:33] There's no recommended changes to the surcharges.

[2:38:35] There are two surcharges as part of our fee schedule.

[2:38:39] There's a general plan surcharge, which is applied to new construction and additions to existing square footage.

[2:38:44] And the technology search charge, which is a fee that's intended to recover the costs of implementation and future upgrades of the city's permitting and cashiering system applications.

[2:38:55] Since the primary users of these systems are the community development department and public works, these would be subject to the 60-day noticing requirement and therefore become effective on August 29th.

[2:39:10] So, there was a lot of discussion in May at the study session and concerns about the large

[2:39:15] increases in certain fees related to residential development and other various residential fees.

[2:39:21] In response, several of the recommended fee increases related to community development have

[2:39:26] been split to fully cover the costs over a two-year period.

[2:39:30] Teared fees include design review, the domestic foul, historic preservation, plan checks and

[2:39:35] pre-application reviews.

[2:39:40] There are also certain building permits that have been tiered to reduce the large cost increase.

[2:39:46] In addition to the tearing of the costs, there was some discussion about the dead tree fees.

[2:39:50] An inspection is still required, but since it's charged at actual costs,

[2:39:54] it's expected that the fee will be less than the time needed to inspect a healthy tree.

[2:40:01] So although we're recommending the splitting of the costs over these fees over two years,

[2:40:04] It's also recommended that the second year be subject to CPI, as the cost plan is based on current year costs and would also escalate in the next year.

[2:40:16] So I know I realize these slides are a little hard to read, but I thought it might be helpful to illustrate how the tiering is working over the two years.

[2:40:24] So you can see that the first column is what we're charging now, and the next two columns are the revised fee for the next fiscal year.

[2:40:31] And the third column and fourth column after that are the proposed fee for the second year to get to full cost recovery.

[2:40:38] So these are how the planning design review fees would look.

[2:40:49] And these are the design review fees that require planning commission review and approval as well as the sign program.

[2:40:56] And you can see that we've tiered these as well.

[2:41:06] And in addition to the design review, I mentioned there were some other residential fees that we felt could also be tiered.

[2:41:11] And these include the domestic foul or non-household fee, historic preservation fee,

[2:41:17] the planning costs for plan check related to building permits.

[2:41:20] And then the pre-application development review.

[2:41:29] So on the building side, the building permits were tiered for the lower assessed projects for

[2:41:33] single family residential,

[2:41:39] as well as the multifamily residential side on the smaller scale.

[2:41:49] So moving to parks and recreation, as we discussed at the study session,

[2:41:53] the per-player field use fee was also recommended to tier over two years to recover 100% of the total

[2:42:00] field costs. In addition to tiering the fee, the council requested that some funding be set aside

[2:42:06] to allow for a scholarship program so that the field use fee would not be a barrier to participation.

[2:42:12] As such, staff is recommended an allocation of $10,000 equally divided across the sports leagues

[2:42:17] to supplement approximately 5% of each league's current registration numbers of the proposed per-player fee.

[2:42:25] This information was related to the San Carlos Athletic Sites Advisory Council or ASAC at their meeting held on May 31st.

[2:42:36] And it's recommended that this would be an effective date of August 29th to allow the sports teams and the leagues some time to implement it into their schedules.

[2:42:44] So,

[2:42:50] future fee increases were recommending that the Council adopt guidelines to adjust

[2:42:54] most fees annually based on the CPI-W or CPI-West, which is the San Francisco, Oakland,

[2:43:00] San Jose Bay Area, Urban Wage Erners, and clerical workers consumer price index.

[2:43:06] This is the same index that we've used in prior years.

[2:43:10] And the reason for this is the comprehensive user fee study is not an annual requirement,

[2:43:14] and only becomes valuable over time, following significant shifts in the organization,

[2:43:19] local practices, legislative values, or legal requirements.

[2:43:23] And as I mentioned before, even though we're tearing the fees over two years,

[2:43:27] it's still recommended that the second year would be subject to the CPI.

[2:43:37] So in summary, these are the recommended changes for council action tonight.

[2:43:41] One would be to adopt the administrative and police fee schedules with an effective day to July 1st, 2022.

[2:43:48] Adopt the development-related fee schedules with an effective date of August 29th, 2022, allowing for that 60-day noticing period.

[2:43:58] Adopt guidelines for future year increases based on the CPIW index, and appropriate $10,000 from the general fund unassigned balance for a field-use fee scholarship program.

[2:44:09] So that concludes my presentation.

[2:44:14] I'm available for questions.

[2:44:15] Nicole Kism from MBS is available remotely.

[2:44:19] We have staff here who can also answer questions.

[2:44:23] Thank you, Rebecca.

[2:44:24] Questions from Council?

[2:44:29] Council member Dugan.

[2:44:30] Thank you Madam Mayor, just another quick one.

[2:44:32] This $10,000 field use fee scholarship program,

[2:44:36] is that per year, is this gonna be a one time thing?

[2:44:43] We can incorporate it into the annual budget.

[2:44:46] Okay.

[2:44:46] So it would be an ongoing?

[2:44:48] Yeah, I would like to see that as an annual thing.

[2:44:51] Thank you.

[2:44:53] I do have a question about that.

[2:44:55] And this might be a question for Amy.

[2:44:58] I'm wondering what the response-

[2:45:00] The response was from the ASAC meeting, what the sports teams, how they received that, if they felt like that was a good amount of money, and how is that 10,000, how many different leagues is that divided between, and how is that making an impact? Sure. Amy Noobie, parks and recreation director. They understood the increase, and they were really appreciative of the idea of a scholarship program for participants that couldn't afford that big jump. As Rebecca mentioned,

[2:45:28] it does the $10,000, we looked at proportionally between each lead of our most recent participation,

[2:45:36] so I think it was about seven or eight leagues. There's a few like summer-based ball teams that are

[2:45:42] part of that group, so it's about 5% of each league we're budgeting for for scholarships.

[2:45:49] Of course, if we're seeing that that's hitting the max from the get-go, we can come back to

[2:45:53] Council and ask for more money.

[2:45:57] But we think that that's going to be sufficient. But of

[2:46:04] course we'll come back if it's not. Thank you. Yes, please come back if it's not sufficient.

[2:46:09] And then my second question is on the domestic foul increase.

[2:46:17] This is going to be Andrea.

[2:46:21] So I'll wait for you to come up.

[2:46:29] And I know we've already discussed this and I don't want

[2:46:31] to make council member Collins mad by rehashing this but I so after our last discussion I happen

[2:46:41] to have a conversation with a family who does chickens for 4-H and it seems like here in San

[2:46:47] Carlos a lot of well not a lot but people who have chickens in their backyard it can be associated

[2:46:53] with children doing a 4-H project and so this jumped from 300 to 900 and then up to almost

[2:47:00] that seems really like a big jump for a family that's just doing chickens for a 4-H project.

[2:47:07] So I wanted to ask, you know, are there that many people raising backyard foul where we need to increase this?

[2:47:16] Or if it's only like a dozen people, do we really need to increase this?

[2:47:20] Because it seems significant and fairly burdensome on a family.

[2:47:24] Sure, so Andrea Marta, such a principal planner, I need to check the animal code requirements

[2:47:29] because there is a threshold for which you need a domestic foul permit, we have not processed

[2:47:35] any that I can think of recently, even for for age, so it's not a common permit.

[2:47:40] The last one we did, I believe, was a year ago, and it was for a very large project, so this is not

[2:47:47] something we normally see. Okay, so if someone were just to have a couple chickens in a coop in their

[2:47:52] backyard, they maybe would not be subject to needing this permit. Right, I mean to look at that,

[2:47:57] There's a threshold for the amount in the animal code, so I'd have to see what that is.

[2:48:01] We all set an inquiry for chickens at one of the schools as part of a 4-H project.

[2:48:06] That did not require permit because it was through the school itself.

[2:48:10] So, I

[2:48:13] can look that up and come back up.

[2:48:15] Okay, all right, I guess we could do that while I take public comment, thank you.

[2:48:20] Any further questions?

[2:48:24] Okay, I guess we'll go to public comments.

[2:48:26] If you would like to make public comment on this item on fees, now is the time you may raise your hand via Zoom.

[2:48:34] Is there any public comment, Crystal?

[2:48:36] I don't see any hands.

[2:48:38] Okay, we're going to give Andrea just a couple of minutes to look up domestic foul.

[2:48:51] I would love to ask her if we close the public hearing.

[2:48:55] Thank you.

[2:48:57] Crystal, could you please call the roll for the public hearing?

[2:49:01] Councilmember Permanohan?

[2:49:03] Yes.

[2:49:04] Vice Mayor Rack?

[2:49:06] Yes.

[2:49:06] Councilmember Dugan?

[2:49:07] Yes.

[2:49:08] Councilmember Collins?

[2:49:09] Yes.

[2:49:10] Councilmember Collins?

[2:49:10] And Mayor McDowell.

[2:49:11] Yes.

[2:49:12] Thank you, Crystal.

[2:49:36] Okay, we have an answer on the chickens.

[2:49:38] Thank you for your patience.

[2:49:39] So the limit is four.

[2:49:41] The threshold is four.

[2:49:42] Okay.

[2:49:43] So do you have more than four than you are supposed to apply for a permit?

[2:49:47] Okay.

[2:49:47] Great.

[2:49:48] I appreciate that exception.

[2:49:50] then I think that will make 40 shares happy.

[2:49:52] All right.

[2:49:52] Any further discussion on this item?

[2:49:56] Seeing none.

[2:49:57] Oh, I'm sorry.

[2:49:59] Vice Mayor Racken then Council Member Dugan.

[2:50:02] Thank you, Madam Mayor.

[2:50:05] I guess I don't have a, thank you for the clarification

[2:50:08] on the new chickens.

[2:50:12] Fowell, I'm just, I'm going to support this fee structure

[2:50:16] and partly because we have the CPI index in there

[2:50:19] because I guess I just feel like we're, I know it's a large increase but it's covering our costs and it's for development where people are generally benefiting from the development and their homes are gaining value, they're basically gaining value on the backs of the taxpayers, which I don't think is a good way to do this, but given that we're adjusting it over two years and the CPI is in there so we'll have this issue again, I'll support this reluctantly because I do

[2:50:49] we think we shouldn't be costing the taxpayers money, we should be using that money for other things instead versus and so I would I would have preferred for us to do the impact fees in one year and do that because I think that's a better approach and it would allow free up money for us to do other services when people are benefiting from that from that so I may change my mind before the end of the night council

[2:51:18] member do you can yeah thank you Madam Mayor and I'll just say yeah thank you Adam I think it is worth

[2:51:22] with pausing here and just recognizing these are some hefty fee increases and I know they're tied directly to our actual cost as a city.

[2:51:32] But we should take that as a challenge to keep looking for efficiencies and other ways not to just pass major fees on.

[2:51:41] I think most residents will be surprised that the fifth check-in will cost to $1800.

[2:51:47] So, but I'm glad the first four are under the radar as it were, so, and then I'll just say I agree with Sarah that definitely come back to us if the 10,000 is enough for that scholarship program.

[2:52:06] Definitely want to be open-minded with that, and I definitely want that to be an annual allotment, so with that I support this.

[2:52:14] Thank you.

[2:52:18] Okay, I don't see any further discussion, so I will entertain, I take public comment.

[2:52:24] I did, okay, it's getting late, I'll entertain a motion.

[2:52:36] I'll do it.

[2:52:37] Okay.

[2:52:38] I moved to adopt resolution 2022-79, the City Council of the City of San Carlos authorizing

[2:52:46] adjustments to the cost of services schedule, user fees, and the approval of additional budget

[2:52:52] your appropriation in the amount of $10,000 from the General Fund, an assigned fund balance to establish a field use fee scholarship program for fiscal year 2022, 2023, and do adopt guidelines for future fee increases.

[2:53:08] Is there a second?

[2:53:10] Thank you.

[2:53:11] Thank you, Crystal, could you, I'm sorry for the discussion, vice mayor?

[2:53:16] I'm actually going to vote no on this because I just don't think we should be subsidizing people's development projects.

[2:53:26] But I support all the other fees and the scholarship fee, but I just don't think that's the right approach.

[2:53:33] Okay, noted, any further discussion?

[2:53:38] Yes, Madam Mayor.

[2:53:39] So, Adam, you're saying you would want it to be 100% cost for coverings or your development in planning fees because I feel like we are subsidizing.

[2:53:48] And we are subsidizing development by homeowners, individuals who are directly benefiting from that development at the cost of the taxpayers.

[2:54:01] I say, we do get to 100% after two years though, right?

[2:54:04] But we don't in the coming year, so we are subsidizing that.

[2:54:08] And I think that money can be used for other things in the community.

[2:54:16] I'm in a vote in favor of this because having been through a remodel myself, I recognize

[2:54:21] that you start the planning process several years in advance of construction, and I think

[2:54:26] that it's a good idea to give a little breathing room to those who have budgeted and made

[2:54:32] plans, so I appreciate the two-year implementation.

[2:54:38] Any other discussion?

[2:54:40] Seeing none, Crystal, could you please, oh, I'm sorry, Councilmember Palmer-Lohan.

[2:54:44] Thank you, Mary. I just wanted to echo your comments, and I recognize, and I appreciate

[2:54:49] Adam Rick, Vice Mayor, your perspective on this. From my perspective, the first time

[2:54:55] this came before us, I was a little taken aback about just the increases and how steep they

[2:55:04] were just in general. And I recall it in the last meeting, I asked if there was some way

[2:55:10] that we could smooth them out over time.

[2:55:13] In light of the fact that we're facing incredible inflationary pressures right now with gas,

[2:55:18] for example, being almost $7 a gallon, groceries have gone up quite a bit.

[2:55:22] And I appreciate Mayor's comments with respect to home remodels.

[2:55:29] I don't have the stomach for that type of work right now.

[2:55:33] So I haven't gone through it before, but I imagine myself, you know, at some point in the future,

[2:55:38] maybe doing that type of work and seeing the jump in those fees was definitely concerning to me.

[2:55:46] So I do appreciate stuff kind of rounding it out. And I would just suggest that as we move forward,

[2:55:51] let's not let that step be so steep in the future. Let's try to stay ahead and on top of this.

[2:55:58] So to your point, Vice Mayor Rock, we can make sure that we have adequate resources for other programs.

[2:56:03] So I think it's

[2:56:08] okay. Thank you Laura. I see no further hands raised. So could you please call the roll?

[2:56:14] Councilmember Collins. Yes. That's a member of our low hand. Yes. Vice Mayor Mack. No.

[2:56:21] I'll remember do you again? Yes. And Mayor McDowell. Yes.

[2:56:26] Okay. Thank you everyone. We'll move on to agenda setting.

[2:56:30] items discussed in this agenda-setting section will be considered by the council for placing

[2:56:35] on a future agenda. No action will be taken. Item A is consideration

[2:56:40] of agendizing an item to consider calling on setter health to reopen the MAC E. Michaelson

[2:56:45] Arthritis Rehabilitation Centre therapy pool in San Mateo. I put this on the agenda through

[2:56:50] Jeff. And this was in response to an email that I believe we all received about a week

[2:56:57] We could go but noted that several cities had passed resolutions in support of this measure including the county and I would be open to bringing back something along those lines on consent.

[2:57:13] And if you want me to explain further, I'm happy to, but I think we all got that email.

[2:57:17] I'm fine with that.

[2:57:22] Okay. Sounds like we have agreement.

[2:57:25] Thank you. Any other agenda setting items for this evening?

[2:57:31] Okay, I will note for the public that Council will be on recess for the month of July.

[2:57:38] And this meeting is adjourned. Thank you.

[2:57:41] Thank you.

City Council Regular Meeting

Agenda

Transcript