City Council

captions standing by. City of david city council tuesday, JANUARY 6th, 2025 captions standing by. Great. Good evening, everyone. And welcome to the JANUARY 6th 2026 meeting of the dana city council, welcome to the new year everyone. Uh, we're going to start. First of all, I'm not going to take roll call, but I'm going to acknowledge that. My colleagues are here at the des with the exceptional advice. Mayor parta is unable to be here this evening due to illness. So we will MISS Her this evening. Um, our next item of business is just to approve our agenda. Is there a motion to approve the agenda? So moved. By chapman second, buy deals, and all in favor of approval of the agenda. Say I I I I any opposition by chapman second, buy deals, and all in favor of approval of the agenda. Say, I, I, I, I any opposition or any abstentions seeing none, the agenda is approved unanimously by those present. Excellent. So we're going to move on next to some ceremonial presentations. We have 3 presentations here this evening. Uh, the first is to welcome mayor. Vice mayor for the 2026 year. The second is a proclamation honoring, uh, beckham vittala for her service as mayor in 2025, and finally, a proclamation honoring terry jw for over 35 years of service to the city of davis. And so we're going to start, I believe. Um, I need to be sworn in and so we're going to do that very, very quickly and unceremoniously. So I'm going to get out to the mic and this morning. I don and neville. I do. Solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the constitution of the united states and the constitution of the state of california. I will support and defend the constitution of the united states and the constitution of the state of california against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Against all enemies, against all enemies foreign and democracy and that I will bear. True face and allegiance to the constitution of the united states and the constitution of the state of california and that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the constitution of the united states and the constitution of the state of california that I take this obligation freely. That I take this obligation through me. Without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion. That any mental reservation or purpose. And that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties upon which I'm about to enter. And that I will welcome you to the discharge the duties upon which I'm about to enter. So turning next to our second ceremonial item that we have the uh privilege and honor of recognizing that. Whoa, for his services, mayor during the 2025 year, we have a proclamation which I think we've given to you and we also are giving to you a an honorary gavl because everyone needs a lifetime gavl, you don't just need 1 at city council meetings. No. So we are very, very appreciative of your service. Um, I think everyone who has ever sat up here, anywhere up hre or in the center seat knows. It's not an easy job to run anything. So if you need I'd like to open it up for a colleague, comments. And any comments from members of the oh, actually, I'm going to hold public comment. But if anyone here on the das wants to offer some comments. Um, thank you mayor neville. First time saying that. Congratulations. I appreciate you hear and sit in the same. Um, pappu, thank you. Um, I appreciate um haven't worked with you, I'm not that you're leaving or going anywhere. These are always kind of a little bit of an offer situation like you're stepping down and not coming back after this evening, which is uh you know have another year with you at least. So but thank you for all your work. Uh, when you're sitting in that seat, I know it's not something that is easy. I know that you always did not want to be there or enjoy being there, but I appreciate, um, your leadership. I appreciate, um, your desire and your commitment to, um, pushing the envelope on things. Um, I think that's something that we all need. Sometimes we kind of get into the normal routine and I appreciate the way that you challenge us when we set up here and I think, um, you being mayor and you being up here has made um made us a better your leadership. I appreciate um, your desire and your commitment to um, pushing the envelope on things. Um, I think that's something that we all need. Sometimes we kind of get into the normal roui encourage uh, the goodness to do that. So thank you for doing your mayorship. So appreciate you. Um, so, thank you. And so, and as you all those of you who know about them, you know, he doesn't want a lot of fans there. So we're going to keep the low key and we're just so thank you and so and as you all those of you who know about them you know, he doesn't want a lot of fans there. So we're going to keep the low key and we're just kidding. He just said, keep it moving, ke wastewater transportation parks and community infrastructure. He is contributed to more than 100, capital improvement projects, leaving a lasting impact on the davis community through his technical. Expertise thoughtful design and commitment to public service. Terry has been a valued senior civil engineer in the public works. Engineering and transportation department known for his deep knowledge of city facilities, his responsiveness, his accuracy, and his ability to find efficient and effective solutions, to complex, engineering challenges. Additionally cherry, terry, excuse me is recognized for his calm demeanor, thoughtful approach, and strong rapport, with colleagues of cross. All departments, consistently elevating, team morale, and fostering a collaborative and supportive work environment. He has generously volunteered. His time to welcome and train new employees, providing tours of city, facilities, sharing institutional knowledge, and helping staff understand the city's infrastructure and processes. Terry has enriched the culture of the public works department and the entire city of davis organization through his creativity and enthuse. His kindness humor leadership and camaraderie have made him, not only an exceptional engineer. But also a cherished friend and colleague whose presence will be deeply missed. Now therefore be it proclaimed that this davis city council on the residents of davis recognizes and honors terry jw for his nearly 36 years of dedicated service to the city of davis. His outstanding contributions to public infrastructure and his lasting positive impact on the community. Congratulations. Please feel free to make some comments and yeah, you have that microphone and whichever 1 uh good evening. Thank you. So john, all right. I came into town. In 1985 to go to school here at uc davis. Ad in JANUARY of 1990. I drove through the gate for the first time or most likely rode my bike for the first time through the gate at the polo orcs corporation yard, I was applying for an engine technician position, uh, while I finished up my degree and lo and behold I the next 35.9 years going through that gate to work for the city of davis. Um, I'm proud of all the projects I've worked on over the years to keep the city running and you know, to have contributed to this wonderful community. Um, I'm thankful for all of the supportive smart hardworking co-workers that I've had throughout my career and um, uh, oh, and I couldn't have been more thankful. For. You know, a wonderful job and career. And work environment here at the city of davis. I've gained numerous friendships throughout the years here at the city and I'll cherish all the fun times we've had at all the city staff this. So I'd like to thank uh, the mayor city council and city davis for this to honor. Thank you very much. I don't know if you have any family or anyone you'd like to get a photo with before we move on. Would you like a photo or with staff? Yeah, absolutely. Whatever you like. Take just a couple minutes to do a photo. Sure. I'm going to turn next to some brief announcements from the city manager dunstan. Thank you, MADAM Mayor and congratulations. Congratulations to you as well. Um, council member wittler and before I do these announcements, uh, I I do just want to um thank terry for 36 years of incredible service uh, to the city of davis. And um, he's been there 36 years, I've been here 3 months, uh, hey, he's 1 of the first people that I met and it was clear to me um, how genuine, how warm. Um, and, you know, he's an incredible talent, but he's even better person and um, although I have known him long, uh, I am grateful that I had the opportunity, uh, to meet him. Uh, we got a chance that to hang out, uh, had a really good time and, and terry, you've got a round of golf coming on me. So thank you again for your service. Uh, with that, um, the city will celebrate DR. King on mlk day on JANUARY 19th. Um, the city and human relations commission will host its 302nd annual, uh, DR. Martin king JR. Celebration at the veterans. Memorial theater the doors open at 10 A.M. Um, and it's a free event. We encourage all to come out. Davis, media access will live stream the event. Uh, at davis media.Org and that concludes my remarks here. Thank you. And you also reminded me. I was remiss for not asking if anyone else in the audience wanted to offer connet just on the ceremonial presentations. We just made if any other staff or anyone wanted to know comments on those items? So not seeing anything. Very good. Thank you. Then I'll just move on to brief announcements from city council members and you reports from 2 by good. Is there any intention to pull items from the consent calendar? Okay, very good. Nothing will get pulled from consent. We will turn next item 3 which is general public comment. This is an opportunity you to address us on matters that are not on our agenda, this evening, but tat are within our subject matter jurisdiction, speaker, has 2 minutes to speak and im gonna also read a statement that um, we read prior to the last meeting as well. Um, I want you to know that members of the public are welcome to record or photograph the meeting including video and audio as permitted by law. However, any recording that you do must be conducted in a non-destructive manner. This includes maintaining a reasonable distance from other attendees council members and staff know 1, MAY place a camera or recording device in close proximity to another person in a way that interferes with their ability to observe participate or feel safe at this meeting recording MAY not be used to harass intimidate follow or target any individual? Any conduct that disrupts? The orderly conduct of the meeting MAY result in a warning direction to any conduct that disrupts, the orderly conduct of the meeting MAY result in a warning direction to to modify the behavior or you know what result in removal from the meeting you so it to law. But with that, I will invite anyone who wishes to offer 2 minutes of public, comment up to the podium. Somebody else in here. So, um, my name is yuan and I come to the meeting um all the time. Um, today is kind of special day for me because um, I had a home, I had lunch yolo, and it's a mobile home. So I paid 4 price. 279,000 ad uh, 8 days ago. Did someone send a a wheat? I've nver heard of it. I've never been to court. I've never, you know. Um, there were no dual process 8 days 2 days ago and 6. If you remember 5 years ago, those wires, you know the infiltrated, my uh, government. So on j, 6 today, uh, after lunch, they came to my house. Just push me out and locked my door. Um, I believe it is a communist attack. Uh, I'm a real woman and, you know, I'm a model as well. Um, this is behind the I believe it is all. Um, the reason is because I am the legal owner of a new 1. So pop and u um, the 1 family, my family is the last chinese in paris, family has a lot of fun. Um, I believe they ae confucious institute agents, and they are looks like chinese woman. Um they call themselves cia confusions institute, agents cia and the forged all the documents uh, to send me city letters, you know, uh, from NOVEMBER. But the number of them was filed. You, if you are lawyer, you know, you have to file the paper to send it to other party and that didn't happen. Uh, I have 1 more question. Um, so I will probably back to they are confucious institute agents, and they are looks like chinese woman. Um, they call themselves cia, confusions institute agents cia and the forged all the documents uh, to send me city letters, you know, uh, fo please come forward. Anyone else? Hey, good evening city council. My name is spear. I use them pronouns. And I've been a resident of davis for the past 7 years and a couple of months. Um, I'm here today to give a comment in response to the audacity of our federal government's actions domestically and internationally. The this administration is violating domestic and international law, without major consequence, as almost every political or societal entity across the aisle benzene to this fascist regime. This administration must face immediate consequences for its decisions to attack. Marginalized people like queer and trans folks as well as those of hispanic or latino descent both here and in venezuela. If we are a city true to its tenants of inclusivity, the city of davis must stand up to this federal administration. The city of davis must protect the immigrants and queer, folks, attacked on an ever going basis. As we cannot roll over the same as others before us. Davis should davis should never be a hegemonic culture. And city council has a responsibility to do that. As DR. As DR. King said on your slide, present and justice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere and you MAY neville just took an oath to the constitution. It's time to resist. I'm here today to call on city council to enact 1 of the many, scalable options of resistance, including the adoption of sanctuary city status for immigrants and queer, folks, the establishment of community oriented uh programs like mental health crisis response without police intervention for the & benefit of marginalized peoples, the distribution of living supplies and living assistance for resident immigrants in town the withdrawal of any city funds from us bonds. And ultimately the encouragement or active commitment to a general strike. And any of these such actions, both resist, the federal administration's desire and promotes beneficial outcomes for for the marginalized people attacked by this regime. Please consider these comments seriously and thank you for your time. Any other in-person public? Comment general, public comment. Thank you. So we are there recorded. On some of the calendar items. So, first off on the transportation impact fees, I'm glad that the state now says that the analysis around these fees should be based on the size of the residential development. As opposed to just the number o loan units because obviously the size of the development is relevant to its impact and the impact of studio versus a 5 bedroom apartment versus single family homes of various sizes is going to be very different so I'm glad that this difference is now being accounted for and the analysis. I'm curious how the state is measuring size here whether it's purely square footage. Or if it's more complicated than that, as I think it should be. But either way, it's certainly true that the size of the development will be relevant to its impact and I'm glad that being accounted for here and I hope that all impact fees account for this. As well. And then I aso hope that impact the analyses account for other relevant factors as well. So for instance, for transportation impact fees, I think a relevant factor, that should be accounted for here is the distance from residential development to places that people travel to on a regular basis. So, for instance, grocery stores and downtown, and in the case, david, the campus and other such locations. And these types of factors should also be prt of the analysis as well. And then finally 1 of the consent calendar items talks about a roof replacement and improving or replacing each back as part of that. And I think that in general we should continue to improve, filtration and ventilation whenever possible. Hello this is alan miller general public comment. Item number 3. I hear that on FEBRUARY 3rd, on the consent, calendar will be the item known as napa on the consent calendar. Oh my GOD. Sounds like a wipe out to me. Thank you. Zoe. Um we are just concluding public comment and please come forward. Go ahead. I got here. Um, good evening. My name is beth born and I'm here to put down a resolution to our outgoing mayor, whereas bapu vaitla was selected to be the 44th mayor of davis by his council colleagues last JANUARY and whereas mayor bow has publicly supported policies and views on transgender ideology that harm children and vulnerable people by promoting the use of hormones and surgeries that sterilize and MAY um individuals, irreversibly, removing healthy body parts. Um, in pursuit of an unattainable transformation, that only profits big pharma and the gender industry. And whereas mayor bapu believes that girls in davis should welcome males into their sports sacrificing their safety and fairness and males into their locker rooms um regardless of their privacy and dignity because it is no concern of his whereas mayor bob, who has failed to oppose indoctrination of kids in public schools where there are taught boys can become girls and girls can become boys, which is confusing, um, to young minds in eroding, biological reality, whereas mayor bapu has shown a pattern of condemning beth born and discouraging diverse. Viewpoints favoring public comment at city council meetings. Uh, stifling open dialogue and favoring his far-left ideological con conformity, over a free expression. And whereas mayor bapu often plays the role of victim to deflect, criticism. Yet his actions reveal him as nothing. More than a bully who will go down in history as 1 of the elected officials who most harm children disregarded, women's women's rights in silence free speech. Now, therefore as a concerned, citizen of davis, I urge the city council and this community to reflect on these failures of mayor bapu as he concludes his term. And to commit to policies that protect our children, uphold women's safety and champion. True, diversity of thought moving forward. Thank you. You are a coward mayor. So that concludes public comment and I do, I'll just make a quick comment too about public comment times and times on the agenda, you'll notice as you read our agendas, there are times listed for items, but there is a note in every agenda that makes it clear that those are not time, certain certain those are just estimates. And so if you do plan to give general public comment, yu do want to be here at the beginning of the public comment period. I just want to make sure everyone is aware of that. So we're going to turn next to the consent calendar. And is there any anyone who would like to make a motion to approve? The consent calendar by council member do seconded by council member chapman, all in favor of the consent calendar. Say I I I and he knows. Extensions, very good. The consent calendar is passed unanimously by those members presentations. Excellent. So now returning on to our regular calendar and our first item of business is a presentation on the local area formation commission, 1 of those very little known areas of local government, but you are going to come here and demystify it for us. So I'll give you a moment to get yourself situated. Excellent. So I want to welcome here jd tbec and, um, oh, forgive me. I haven't met you and I'm christine crawford. Christine crawford, good evening, mayor neville, congratulations and members of the council. Um, I am, christine crawford, I'm the executive officer for yolo. Lapco and um, I'm here with jd tbec. Our new, uh, deputy of officer as of JANUARY about a year ago. Now, maybe not so new. So we're here tonight because our commission which includes um, uh, council member partida. Serves on lafco and um, unfortunately she's not here tonight but um we're here tonight because our commission wanted us to get out into the community and give presentations and do a more outreach about informing everyone & about the good work that yolo local agency formation commission does and our role and and how we work with all the agencies in the county. So um I'm going to turn it over to jd to run through some brief informational slides and we're here to answer any questions and and that's our purpose tonight. Thank you. Thank you. Uh, nice to meet you. All, as christine said, uh, my name is jd trebek and I'm the deputy executive officer. So we're going to present a little bit of information to maybe reintroduce. You or introduce you to last go. So why why laugh so why why laugh go so lasko stands for local agency formation commission? It was a result of the post world war ii population. Boom cars became very popular and folks were moving out of the cities into the suburbs so there's a proliferation of developments out there. um they were creating a lot of special districts, that weren't providing surfaces. Very efficiently, the city's reacted by basically, trying to annex more land to provide the funding for them to recover their revenues and so the state had concerns about the efficiency of this process and the misuse of land resources. So in 1961, the state started, the state boundary commission, where the state was going to handle all these different, um, arguments over what, what the boundaries we're going to be and that didn't work very well. So in 63, the state created, the last goes, for each county to restore that, um, better process for handling, boundary disputes, and annex annexation issues to the local governments. So, there's a lack go in every county in california. And in 2000, there was kind of a, a refresh on lafco, law with a quartet cortezi hanberg, local government, reorganisation act and we're giving our mission statement to um discourage urban sprawl preserve open space and prime agricultural lands, efficiently, provide government, services and encourage the orderly formation development of local governmental agencies based upon, local conditions and circumstances. So in short, uh, the commission, organizes local government to promote efficiency, efficient community services, and protect agriculture on open space. How we do this is through 3 things, fundamentally? First, we function as kind of a research institute, so we um provide these municipal service reviews, every 5 years for the different cities and districts and agencies in the oh county. And these municipal service reviews look at the city and financial ability and accountability of the districts and cities and evaluate the structural, uh, governance and operation. And provide recommendations on areas for improvement and improved, efficiency and coordination. And the results of these msrs is to look at the spheres of influence. These are a balanced, uh, planning boundary outside o the current service area that indicates where the agency sees further development expansion of their services and it's a necessary first step to annexation. The second thing we do is implement changes of organization. These often result from our recommendations in the area msrs. And the commission has the ability to create new or dissolve old districts to expand or decrease the size of different agencies or cities through annexations and detachments to clean up and simplify districts through mergers and consolidations to change authorized services for districts. What types of services? They want to provide if they want to provide different services or relinquish some of their services, we the commission, handles that and occasionally authorized extending services outside the agency boundaries in certain uh situations when needed and the other thing we do is uh provide shared services to support our mission. So yolo lfco in the past has done studies to look at animal control services, um, to come up with a broadband strategic plan to, uh, look at we also review joint powers authorities and um, each year, we publish an agency website transparency scorecard, as far as how well our agencies and cities providing information on what they're doing to the public. We also in the past have act as a convener to facilitate collaborative, conversations is where the yet talks that we put on in the past of different topics of concern, for local agencies and governments. Um, it's been paused in 2025 but hopefully we'll start bringing those back again and then we also bring local agencies together as needed to resolve regional issues. So there's 47 special districts in um, yolo county these include and we recently done municipal service reviews for the cemetery districts. Uh, we're currently working on the community service districts in the county, so there's 47 special districts in um yolo county these include and we recently done municipal service reviews for the cemetery districts. Uh, we're currently working on the community service districts in the cu potentially authorizing extend services outside of cities and service circumstances. So this is an illustration of the city of davis's current boundaries and then the hashed areas on the edge are the sphere of influence. So, typically this the public process is through or it is for lafco to um review and office annexations in the sphere of influence. But with a city of davis as you're aware, voters approved a growth measure. That requires any land. Use change to urban development. Must be approved at an election through prj. Um, so, even so even lands in sphere of influence, which typically would the public processes come through lafco. There's this extra step for for a public vte. So davis's experiencing significant gowth pressure housing has become very constrained and expensive. Um, so what lafco sees with y'all doing a update for the general plan lafco? Um, hopes to be a a part of the process to look at what the actual areas of growth for the city will will and to properly designate those in the sphere of influence. So, lasko the commission is composed of 2 county members, 2 city members, and a public member and there's an alternative for each of those areas the county provides 50% of our funding, and then the cities provide the other half of the funding for lafco. And that's based on, um, tax revenue and size. So those are the current members um, we will be uh, changing a little bit. The city's rotate out, um, for their membership on on the last co commission. Then, as I said that the budget for alaska comes from the county and the cities portion by tax revenues and population. And that, finally there's uh our information is on the website for all our municipal services reviews um for the cities in different districts in the county, as well as our meetings reports, uh, policies and presentations. And then, this is our a list of our staff for small but mighty uh christine myself. We have an admin specialist and uh the council for legal counsel. So, thank you for your time and I can try to answer any questions you might have. Great, thank you. Um, if there are no immediate any member of the public have. Comments. You'd like to offer on the presentation. Just on the presentation, offered. So it's a local agency formation commission. Ihave a lot of questions on, so how you oversee the land from your map? Which is um, the project is not & receiving, I have a lot of questions on, so how you oversee the land from your map? Which is um, the project is not receiving, this message is not write the 2 new developments. So, this isn't really an opportunity for question and answer. It's more if you'd like to make a comment or if you want to submit some questions we can get answers. Um I will just make a comment on the map. You know, you present me to uh just a few minutes ago. Could you show the map? Yes, it's on our website. Actually. Yeah I just want to make comments. Um, I don't remember what's the uh, the where did you from? And and these are actually not see cities uh uh property. So I I kind of feel silly should restore, or this hold for that. And my name is a new 1. I'm the granddaughter of lost chinese empire. I'm the legal owner of 21. So pop, would you hold kie row? You said, uh, partnership, uh, I want to know the owner I plus last meeting, I asked it and I don't want to mention the name. I believe there's someone, you know, uh, in the I was a jenny kong. It's & not, you know, uh, it's a communist agent confucious institute, cia stealing 1 found from me. I'm the well known 1. Um they have to actually steal my signature and sign my name to to use the found. So I, I do want to make sure, you know, city follows all these laws. And uh today the make me is kind of its related to uh the ownership of an invite so prop and who I am. Thank you. Do we have any recording? Public comment. So I'm gonna bring it back here for any questions or comments from council members. Oh, okay. Um so thank you for the presentation. Really appreciate it. I know this is 1 of those things where we say laugh, code, people always say what what is lava what do they do? I have to say, I didn't realize that you did these municipal service reviews before which is iteresting. So because there's a number of different entities out there that kind of look at different aspects of local agencies. So you actually it sounds like part of that involves financial ability. Is it really focused though on the financial ability to perform the services? Is it kind of a narrow scope of review that you do? Yes, it's really about the ability, you know, the a certain district out. Mostly these look at different aspects of local agencies, so you actually, it sounds like part of that involves financial ability. Is it really focused though? On the financial ability to perform the services? Is itk make sure people are getting clean water and and things that are really important out in the rural areas and it's great. Um, when a, when a make sure people are getting clean water and and things that are really important out in the rural areas, it's great. Um, when a, when a school district modifies its boundaries to include area that was previously unincorporated, county area. Are you involved in that process or is actually not involved in school districts? So, okay. More the types of districts that provide municipal services, and mostly that unincorporated areas obviously, we work with the city as well, but um, great. Um thank you for that. I'm going to take a look at your transparency scorecard, too, because I didn't know about it. So I really appreciate because gave us always gets a really high scores so, oh, that's even better. It's really, it's an interesting kind of, um, indicator of. I think how functional some of these rural districts are so it's a kind of a helpful indicator, I think so, yeah. I mean, a lot of people aren't aware at how how many districts are really out there in the world. And they're very lean. You're under 1 million dollar organization with 4 staff and your council comes from the county, right? You take bar 2 county supervisors to city council mmbers, including council member right now. Could you legal counsel or legal counsel? Yes, I'm sorry. Is he's a county council, so you're borrowing him so you're really very mean organization. Yes, thank you. Thank you so much. No further comments or questions. We thank you for your presentation on your time. So, our next item and I'll give everybody a chance to kind of come up to me. Give everyone a chance to come up and get situated. Our next item 6 is going to be a public hearing. And this is a public hearing on our solid waste utility fee. It's being kind of proposition 28 which has its own set of rules and requirements which adrien is probably ready to explain to us, but I'm going to turn it over to uh, staff presentation. And then we will open it up to public. Comment followed by some comments and relations here with the dice. Thank you. Thank you so much, mayor, neville and council members. Thank you for having us tonight. Um, yes, we are here in our ongoing process to adjust our solid, waste fees um for the municipal solid services of the city operates. I am adrienne. Heinig deputy director of public works, utilities and operations. I'm here with our assistant city manager, sam gritzo. Um, and we're asking you to hold a public hearing on our rates, so why are we here uh, to give you a little bit of background that we provided back in uh SEPTEMBER when we were here last on this? City staff, and our consultants have recommended adjustments for our solid waste utility rates. Our rates will last increase in JANUARY of 20123. Um, and since that last adjustment, as you all know, through our own budgeting process and through our own wallets at home, we've seen some pretty significant changes in the cost of many things including labor materials and equipment. In addition we have had regulations that have come from the state that are um you know, are responsibility to uphold and move forward whether or not we receive additional funding from the state to do that. Um, and our expenditures are now outpacing the revenue that we're receiving for this utility, and this is a volatile time for a utility. We start to see a lot of pressure on the utility and the, uh, enterprise fund for us to be able to continue operations. So we are here and make sure that we can protect the health ad the safety of that fund. So, for council to take action on uh utility rates as mayor neville mentioned at the beginning, w go through a process that's defined by the state of california, which is called proposition 218. And part of that process was uh done before when we were before you in SEPTEMBER, where we had the authorization to send out our 28 notices, which go to every customer that pays solid waste rates and offers them, uh, explanation for the rate adjustments. We're proposing in addition, to 45 days to file, a written protest with the city that we would then count for the purposes of this hearing. Um, back in OCTOBER, we did male over 15,000 notices. Um, and then we would have to receive 7,581 validated protests for there to be a majority and us to not be able to move forward with that great adjustment. As of 7:00 P.M. This evening, we have received 68 notices or written unvalidated protests. So, as a reminder, for this adjustment, we are not recommending any significant changes in terms of service level. At this time, we're recommending minor changes in terms of um, structure specifically the size of our carts. Uh, we have a uh, we're beholden to the vendor that provides the carts that we have and they d occasionally differ in size. And so, in order for us to continue to use the carts that we have to, the end of their useful, life that are currently uh, outstanding in addition to the new carts that are replacing those carts, as we move forward with this vendor, we do want to go ahead and modify our subscription levels to small medium, and large and we also have some clarification on our commercial building. Uh, billing for multi family and commercial customers. So, the reason why we're looking to move & forward without having any substantial rate, structure changes, or service level changes at this time is uh, as we've went over last time and went over with the fiscal commission, when we met with them, the pressures on the reserves, specifically that our expenditures are exceeding our revenues. Without any action, we would then to take on additional debt to utility, um, and that can be a challenge in terms of having to pay that debt in the future and then additional pressure on rates. Um, and we also have a new franchise agreement. Discussion upcoming, that we anticipate is going to be inclusive of some pretty significant discussions in regards to service levels rate structure, all of those things. So being a relatively bg change and a relatively short period to me, so we can adjust and make sure we've got a firm foundation with our fund at this moment and then move forward with those discussions. So, we did receive a number of questions and comments and concerns from the public in this proposition. 218 protests period. The 45 days which we would expect in this this um, expected from the community. So we wanted to go over the summary basically of the questions that we received. There's a lot more detail in the staff report that you received. But I just wanted to briefly go over it tonight with you. So, the first question is, is what is the solid waste rate for the city of davis? And that's a great question as we talked about with the fiscal commission when we saw them in SEPTEMBER different agencies offer solid waste services in different ways, it's not uncommon to see an agency offer it entirely on their own offer it entirely through a hauler or some hybrid in the middle. And davis is an example of a hybrid where we have city services and we have the hauler services, we are 15% city costs and 85% taller costs. Why that might differ by agency are things like a reserve, whether or not, there is a reserve associated with that utility. If there is debt associated with that, utility, uh, the amount of education and outreach associated with the utility will vary by jurisdiction. And those can be things that will impact the amount of costs that the city holds for the hauler. There are some haulers that the they don't, they're sorry. There are some haulers that do billing directly with customers and the municipality is not involved at all and that is a difference in cost in terms of how much is associated with the caller, and how much is associated with the city. So, there is a wide variety of, uh, opportunities there for differences. So, the next question that we received is, okay, so you know what what types of uh revenue does, the city receive to support the solid waste utility and really in davis. The majority 99.9% of the support that we have is through the rate payer. Um, it's through the rates that we receive. We do receive entitlement grants from cal. Recycle that is our regulatory agency. Um they are very small, they're under 200k or sorry 20k um, for generally, on a regular basis, we have on the occasion received a slightly larger grants around the implementation of some of our regulations but that is not a consistent source of revenue for us um, we historically in this community and & I know we've actually had this conversation about a couple things in my arena over in public works. Um we do not have fees and penalties as strongly associated with our solid waste utility as other agencies mght have. And I know from the previous discussions about other topics that, that is something that this council is very interested in in reviewing and looking at and thinking, okay, what are some opportunities here? Certainly conversation that we can have as part of that new contract process. But historically in this community, we have led from an educational first approach, um and we have, we've not utilized those tools. Other agencies can also potentially use general fund support for. There's always services. Davis has has historically had an enterprise for solid waste services for quite a long time. Um, we don't tend to do that here and of course, general fund also has other priorities, um, that call upon that money. Then that wouldn't be the same for, you know, enterprise fund dedicated to the operation of the facility. Utility my so, number 3, uh, why do other agencies charge different amounts for services? Um, city involvement is 1 particular 1 where we've got that. Of the cost of providing service is the city's cost and then 85 is that holler cost but there are oher reasons why there will be differences in what is charged um, more specifically, what services are offered and how they are offered are going to be 2, major reasons, why you will see differences by agency. Additionally, you'll see that there are initiatives in early adoption. Dave, this has been historically, an environmentally minded community, very open to new initiatives and starting processes earlier than maybe the state, uh, will implement organics collection is a great example. We started mandatory organics collection in these community in 2016, you know, the state then, made it mandatory for customers in 2022. They MAY or MAY not have picked u the phone and said, hey davis, how did you do this? Uh, when they were looking to initiate that because of the cooperation, in our community and the collaboration with our community, in regards to these, um, environmentally minded programs? In addition, other reasons why we would see differences and cost would include the fun characteristics of the waste that we have, um, specifically in davis, we are a university town. W do see an influx in material, that's going to be headed to the landfill in JULY. Uh, JUNE to JULY. We see a higher influx of that material headed from AUGUST to SEPTEMBER, because our turnover happens to be in AUGUST and SEPTEMBER for the most part. As school doesn't start, uh, at uc davis until OCTOBER generally SEPTEMBER, OCTOBER. So, we also want to make sure that we're looking at not other college towns. We're looking at other environmentally minded towns. We're looking at other places tat have service levels that mimic the service levels that we have more closely, um, and we're able to, then offer other agencies that might not be our direct neighbors, but do have equivalencies and service that we can point to and say, hey this is different because we don't charge our commercial customers. Additionally, for organics and recycling. Over. And we have a basically a base charge, right? So our commercial customers will receive as part of their base charge. Trash organics and recycling. Other communities might charge. Additionally for that organics and recycling. So commercial customer. So there's another potentially source of revenue there where it's built into our base rate, so those can be the differences, um, for a non-solid waste example, you might look at something like we have a conjunctive water use system. We're not going to compare our use to a system that is fully operated by groundwater wells because you have a difference in level of service and the um type of of work that would go into providing that level of service. That would be an example. All right. For number 4. Know what goes into recommending a rate and it's it's a lot of information and it's conversations with our commission and with our council. But to distill it down, really what we're looking at. Are those expenditures and revenues and whether or not they match. So our chief focus is going to be looking at. How much does it cost to provide this service? Are we receiving a revenue that is adequate for us to cover the cost of providing the service? Um, certainly the rates of surrounding communities, are going to be very helpful pieces of data in that conversation. Uh, how are other agencies providing service in terms of our upcoming discussions with our hauler and our contract. That's going to be a great opportunity for us to check in with our neighbors and say, hey, how much are you charging for this? What is the level of service that you have for that? What are things that we might be bringing to our commissions? To our community, to council as opportunities and options for us. Um, but it's not going to be what makes or breaks. The setting of a rate, the rate really is going to be associated with the cost of providing a service. And how much does the extension of the waste contract? Come into the conversation that we're having today about these rate adjustments. Um, really, the the reason why we're here and the drivers of cost that we're seeing right now are because of what's happening right now and that would be inclusive in the original term of the contract that would not change. We have 2 fiscal years that are outside of what would be the original contract term in the recommendations from you tonight? And as a reminder, and is in the rsolution that you have this evening, we do come to the fiscal commission and to the spotty every year prior to the adjustment, for that next year of rates, with an evaluation of the status of the fund. What we're seeing, if there are any recommendations that we might have, that MAY be alert or uh you know, or forgo a rate adjustment based on what we're seeing in in the fund. So there's nothing automatic about these adjustments, moving forward. Um we still come in and check in and make sure is everything looking the way that we expected in this is happening with we saw. Um, and & then additionally, as we talked about before, we know that we're going to see some pretty significant changes to our services. Based on that, call that conversation about our new hauling contract. And so we would see some significant adjustments to our rates at that time. So where are we? We are uh, at the lowest hearing that we're asking you to hold this evening. This is a summary of where we've been up to this point and then also where we will be moving forward. Um, so if you take action tonight on these rates and we do move forward, then we're looking at FEBRUARY 1st as our um uh, the rates becoming effective and then in AUGUST of this year, starting the discussions with this body, um, about the process for the next voice, hauling contract and then getting into those. Um, I'm sure very um, robust service level discussions in regards to our away service, starting in fall or winter of of this year. Um, and with that we do have 1 more slide. That contains our recommendations but that is all from me this evening. Thank you so much anything for me. Stan know, excellent presentation, thank you. Um, are there any questions before we go? Into public comment. Yeah. I do have. Yeah, I was thinking about ask this after public comment before. Uh, I did ask this, uh, when we had a previous, um, proposed rate increase for the utility, but can you just give us a sense of what potential is to try to manage some of the syntax for vulnerable residents of our city. So the low capacities and for security yes. Um, so a couple of things, um, as a reminder in terms of, uh, affordable housing with a capital affordable rental housing, there is a utility cap, that those residents have in the calculation of the rates that they pay to live in those properties. So they, they cannot be charged more than what is set basically by their income level each year that they're living in that property and they qualify to live in that property. So there is a certain amount of protection for those folks in terms of the rent that they're paying for their affordable, housing illness. U, just as a note, um, the do the city does have what we call a water. Assistance program low-income water assistance program, the way that we bill, our utility bill is all 1 bill. We do not bill separately for water sewer uh, storm water, right? So the current amount that, & um, folks can qualify for if they qualify for the pge. Cares program is twenty dollars a month, um, and that can be a discount then on that utility bill, unfortunately, what we're not able t do is provide any type of subsidy. For a customer that goes beyond their fair share of the the the service that's being provided and that is the proposition 218 regulations around. Great structure. We can't use rate revenue to offset smeone else's rates because then we are having 1 customer subsidized another. The city could absolutely choose to use general fund dollars to make more um, opportunity for folks to be able to participate in a cares program or another program with that is that is a policy call for this block. It would be great. Uh great just to get some estimates back at some point. Um, you know, um, and this could be for multiple utilities but uh, I remember asking for this and we did get some information about for, I don't remember which utility, but just what the actual hit would be, uh, you know, general fund dollars. Uh, if we had x dollar uh, increased subsidy for low income assets, right? So again, uh, there's the there's the question of how we're doing the targeting, so obviously pg has its care fair list. I don't know how that this. So this. So the twenty dollars that you're saying, I don't know if you know offhand by the way, what that annual cost of the twenty dollars is in our agreements uh that give us a sense. Yah so maybe at some point that we come back with information increasing the size of the subsidies. And what actually we're looking at because it's not off the table for me to think about some general fund support. Uh, especially if it's, um, addressing direct needs to the most probably seems like that. Thank you for that. And I do call some information you have provided is a couple of years ago. It was, it was really helpful. And I think, my question ties in some way to that way. You spoke about the cap. Um, if, if the affordable housing is rental property. Then the bill goes to the owner of the property, is there still a mechanism for ensuring that the actual attendance in, the representative are still? So I'll clarify uh, for our affordable ownership there is no cap in terms of utility rates. Um, the affordable ownership program. If you own that home through that program, there's you, you qualify at the time of purchase but you're still, do you still pay the utility as the utility is charged for renters specifically for the capital affordable housing units. They have a & cap. It's a third of your income that can go be charged for the utility. That's it of the I should say, the average income for the that is calculated right annually. Um, and and no more than that. So yes the charge will go to the property owner and then what they can then charge, that tenant is always going to be capped for renters specifically. Questions, before we go to public comment. Follow up on that. So how how do we know that the landlord is doing that? Do we have some type of? We have & a um, we have a, a audit auditing program. Um, but we we do so there's there's multiple things that you're required to do for, um, properties that are considered affordable with a capital. A um there's a essentially a um, risk assessment that is done to do a & regular monitoring. If we have locations where we've noticed some issues, we might see them a little bit sooner. Generally you're not going to go 3 years between checking in and you actually take a look & at how they are income qualifying, their tenants um, physically what the tenants are um, what you know, what their unit is like, is their water is their um, smoke alarms running. All of those things are are, um, actively done by the city, as part of that program. Any other questions? Just real quickly. What's the difference between a validating and unvalidated? That's a great question. So a validated process is a process where the city clerk's office have opened that protest. They've taken a look at the counties um, information and made it clear that the person who signed that notice or that protest is the person on record as the owner of that property, an unvalidated protest is when they have not opened that protest or they have not validated that that property owner is the 1 that has signed it. um, generally speaking, you're not going to look to start validating protests until you get to a certain threshold. Then I will no further questions here. I will open it up to public comment. My name is elaine roberts muser. There is considerable consumer angst on next door and in the davis enterprise about the dramatic increase in solid waste rates. A petition was started, but the reality is, the cost of everything is dramatically increased because what is going on at this level, if you can believe it, I spotted a rib roast in the grocery store 2 weeks ago priced at 241. Inflation and increased tipping fees. At the landfill helps explain why the hike in the proposed solid waste rates is necessary. That said this controversy highlights, another serious problem created by the city council itself. The erosion of consumer confidence, when you decided to do away with the utilities commission, by merging commissions, you set up a disastrous set of circumstances along with its budgetary duties. You should expected the fiscal commission to also provide oversight subject matter commissioners, had no experience in that, lack of expertise is now glaring. Where to consumers, go to complain about a spike in the utility rates, something, the former utilities commission, constituted worked on preventing the name, fiscal commission, gives no clue. Once they are the fiscal commission, hardly provides consumers. Any confidence in commissioners, ability to grasp the implications of utility rates spikes. This is not a criticism of the fiscal commission. The utility part of their job was hoisted on them by the city council. Whether commissioners liked it or not. The former utilities commission was trusted, whereas the current fiscal commission is clearly not. I and another former utilities commission. Chair jerry, braun are very concerned. There's a lack of any current mechanism to process public input and evaluate utility rate options from an integrated provider and user perspective. you created this mss. You need to clean it up. Any further in-house public comment. William champs. At the SEPTEMBER, 16th city, council and staff ended, the results of its rate survey that cherry picked jurisdictions with greats, higher than davis to paint the picture that our residential rate is lower than our surrounding communities, which is blatantly false, and the city council seemed to be just fine with the commission, uh, the sap presenting that misinformation to the rate payers staff, use that misinformation to support its recommendation to extend rec's contract 2 years which is city council approved with no effective due diligence. Our largest public contract in the effectively 0 public due diligence, by our city council. That sole source, non-competitive 2-year extension puts millions of dollars into ecies pocket at the rate. Payers expense, what did the rate payers get? They got nothing. Not a single dollar in rate relief, for new service. They got screwed. They got a rate that's soon to be 14 dollars higher than the higher than the city of woodlands for largely similar service. I challenged staff and city councils to explain to the rate payers. How extending your college's contractors in their best interests. It was not, a total opposition to their best interest. I also challenged staff and city council to provide 1. Good reason why we should nt conduct a competitive procurement compartment. Excuse me, competitive procurement process and allow our regional hallers to compete for our collection franchise. Competitive competitive procurement is an & industry. Best practice virtually every franchise city in the region has followed that best practice of some point but not davis. And all of those cities that have conducted competitive procurements, have rates that are lower than ours causing effect. You think absolutely, if we can conduct a competitive procurement process, our rates will go down and likely more than a little. With council truly has the rate, payers best interest in mind? There is absolutely, no reason not. No reason not to commit to the competitive procurement here. Tonight the rate payers have everything to gain and nothing to lose from that commitment rate, payers beware if council does not commit to a competitive procurement, don't be surprised if we get more of the same in 2 years your staff and council giving ecology another non-competitive sole source extension that takes more money. Millions more money out of your pocket and puts it puts it in the ecologies. I just asked for you. Do you ever intend to even discuss the option of a competitive procurement, which should have been 1 of? The first things you asked when they came do you ever intend to even discuss the option of a competitive procurement which should have been 1 of? The first things you asked when they came forward with this rating proof. So it's a simple qus 65% 65% for 3 years and then the final 3%, pretty substantial increase is because of a rates. A detailed rates today is done for soon to the terms of the contract, the city entered into ecology in 2023 that showed an 1 8. 8 18.8% entitlement. To the college that went into effect without the council doing anything. It was an automatic as far as I can tell from it, looking at the staff report as well as the fiscal, uh, services commission report. Uh, memo to the council in SEPTEMBER of last year that happened. Plus, I guess there's some tipping fees, but it seems to me that if this happened in 2023. Why are we looking at this now? That's that's been 2 years, plus. Um, so, I would suggest to the council. To to ask staff to wonder themselves. Maybe we were we the consumers were. Last by not having to pay any increase for 2 years now. We're paying a very large increase now. So I think that there's been something is nothing has happened for too long, and that something should happen soon. um, also think that the staff report really was remiss nothing. Having any detail as to the real reason for this last by not having to pay any increase for 2 years now. We're paying a very large increase now. So I think that there's been something is nothing has happened for too long, and that something should happen ` conversations with this body as how you want to move forward with that, procurement process in AUGUST of this year. Um, and then we would then start the conversation with our community in regards to service levels in fall or uh, winter of this year. Um, based on the conversations that we have with you in AUGUST, d you have any direct response to this and sort of competitive procurement process versus, do you have any direct response to this and sort of competitive procurement process versus, uh, the college's performance as far as the vendor the rates, etc? Different agencies uh, different agencies will approach. Uh, this type of contract differently. Um, I know the city of woodland just renegotiated with their current hauler, uh west sacramento, just released an rfp I believe or have an rfp actively out for services. Um, that's a little bit of a newer thing as we've seen some of these longer term contracts come up for renewal, um, so different agencies will handle it slightly differently. Um again part of you know, a lot of what's going to be the driver of your service is going to be the level of service that the community uh, receives the types of services that you're offering your material pile. Collection is going to be a great 1 for us to take a look at given um you know, the cost of whom that this and that being something that is a different service compared to some of the other agencies around us, in terms of exactly how its offered, uh, will. And for example, offers it specifically for residential customers whereas uh west sacramento will offer leaf collection, um, bagged leaf collection, but not sort of the branches and other materials that we might see, um, for our collection service, uh, the city of davis does offer for, u, multi family and commercial customers as well. Do you see a downsides to it? Putting an rfp out there specifying, you know, what, what kind of services we're looking for, and however, the the council wants to move forward. Um, absolutely. We will move forward in looking at, uh, our contract. Absolutely. There are no sort of dis advantages you come to mind about the city of davis has been in a team situation, and that we've had the same contract, um, f