good afternoon and welcome to this uh closed session on march 3rd 2026 let's go ahead and do roll call council member blower president council member enriquez president council member via padua president council member ponce is absent council member padilla i know is here she's just she'll be back in just a second uh vice mayor lee uh here and mayor fugazi president Okay, so this closed session, so we have 3.1, public employee, public employee appointment, 3.2, conference with labor and negotiator. This closed session is authorized pursuant to government code section 54957B and 54957.6, and this body will recess into closed session. Are there any comments from the public? We have none. Okay, wonderful. Evening, everyone, and welcome to March 3rd, 2024 Stockton City Council meeting. Let's go ahead and do roll call. Council Member Blower. Present. Council Member Enriquez. Present. Council Member Ponce. Present. Council Member Padilla. Present. Council Member Villapadua. Present. Vice Mayor Lee. Present. And Mayor Fugazi. Present. We have a quorum. Wonderful. At this time, I would like to invite up Pastor McCarter. from Little Flock Missionary Baptist Church who celebrated an anniversary just in 2025, correct? Correct. And I have a fixed, I fixed it for you. I'll give it to you before you leave. Bless you. Thanks. Madam Mayor and to the Council Board, privileged to be before you to say this prayer today. Almighty God, we come humbly submit ourselves unto thee. As the ruler and super ruler of the universe, the creator of all things, as we go through this meeting today, we ask that all hearts will be met at please and all mind at ease. Have your way. Lead us, guide us, direct us. We call upon you for guidance in this day. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. next up we have an 11th grader from stockton collegiate international school samantha sanchez that will be leading us in the pledge of allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag and the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. A report of action taken in closed session. Thank you, Mayor. James Ross from the Rennie Public Law Group is here via phone to make that announcement. Thank you. Today, the City Council voted by a vote of 7-0 to appoint Marcy Arredondo as the City Attorney, subject to successful completion of a background check and subject to approval by the Council. of an employment agreement, which is item 15.4 on the agenda this evening. Thank you. Thank you. So I'm gonna be moving up item 16.4 in case you guys didn't hear that. I know it was difficult to hear. And I need to read it into record. 16.4 is a new business item, which is the appointment of the city attorney. uh... it is recommended that the city council approved a resolution appointing uh... marcy aaron dondo as city attorney for the city of stockton subject to successful completion of background check uh... authorizing the mayor on behalf of the city council uh... i will be reading it to you uh... the employment contract a setting forth the conditions of employment And the proposed employment agreement between the City of Stockton and Marcy Arredondo to be the city attorney includes the following compensation and fringe benefits. One, the term of agreement is three years. Two, annual salary of 315,000 with cost of living increases as provided to the city's unrepresented management confidential and law employees compensation plan. vacation of 30 days annually with 30 days credited upon commencement of employment sick leave of 15 days annually professional development 7 000 annually and that's on reimbursement a technology payment of 250 dollars uh... monthly and vehicle allowance of five hundred dollars monthly and lastly deferred compensation contribution in the amount equal to nine percent of the salary and if you were able to read the uh... agenda item which some of you may not have uh... just to provide context to this so uh... the uh... recruitment process uh... went to league of california cities careers in government linkedin california lawyers association sandwiching county bar association cal her right uh... uh... cal ops municipal management association of northern california government jobs uh... numerous uh... local law schools in california recruitment brochure was emailed to thirty public sector human resources departments and city attorney offices throughout california and it was eight forty five-day uh... process and we had interviews at today and so uh... i don't know if council has any comments uh... before we go to public comment i read everything Okay, any public comment on this item? We do not have any. Okay, so I will entertain a motion. I'll make a motion to approve. Okay, so we have a motion and a second. Council, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. Okay, now let us go back to the regular scheduled agenda. 10.1 is proclamation for Arbor Day. Whereas Arbor Week provides an opportunity to recognize the importance of trees and the vital role they play in our environment, health, and quality of life. And in 1872, J. Sterling Morton proposed to the Nebraska Board of Agriculture that a special day be set aside for the planting of trees. This holiday, called Arbor Day, was first observed with the planting of more than one million trees in Nebraska and is now observed throughout the nation and the world. And trees provide numerous benefits to the community, including cleaner air, improved mental health, enhanced beauty, and protection against erosion. And the City of Stockton has a longstanding commitment to preserving and expanding its urban canopy through tree planting, care, and community education efforts, and looks forward to regaining its designation as Tree City USA. And Tree Stockton is actively improving our community by planting and caring for trees, promoting environmental stewardship, and working to enhance the quality of life for all Stockton residents. And Arbor Week serves as a reminder of the importance of taking action to protect and nurture our trees to ensure that future generations can enjoy the many benefits trees provide. Now, therefore, I, Christina Fugazi, Mayor of the City of Stockton and members of the Stockton City Council, do hereby proclaim the week of March 8th, 2026 as Arbor Week. We'd just like to invite everybody that's listening or viewing to join us for our community tree planting Arbor Day on Saturday, March 14th, 10 a.m., American Legion Park. Thank you very much. I also would like to add that this is our second Arbor Day event, and that it's important that the city is aware that we want to continue to bring trees. TO OUR COMMUNITY. YOU KNOW, IT'S BEEN MANY YEARS, AND SO THE GOAL IS THAT BRINGING THESE TREES, IT'S A BIG EFFORT FOR TREE STOCKTON AND THE COMMUNITY. I INVITE ALL THE COMMUNITY MEMBERS, COUNCIL MEMBERS, AND MAYOR TO JOIN US. THIS IS A CITYWIDE ARBOR DAY AT AMERICAN LEGION PARK SATURDAY, MARCH 14TH. PUT IT ON YOUR CALENDAR. I'D LOVE TO SEE YOU ALL THERE. WE'RE ALSO GIVING AWAY FIVE TREES, AND THESE ARE STREET APPROVED. FOR YOUR FRONT YARD. SO I HIGHLY ENCOURAGE, BRING THE FAMILIES, COME OUT. WE'RE GOING TO HAVE LOTS OF FUN BEVERAGES AND DESSERTS AND THINGS LIKE THAT. IT'S GOING TO BE A FUN OPPORTUNITY TO GET YOUR HANDS DIRTY AND PLANT SOME TREES. THANK YOU. WE'RE PLANTING ABOUT 18 TREES COURTESY, THANK YOU, TO THE CITY OF STOCKTON VALLEY OAK TREES. THESE ARE BEAUTIFUL OAK TREES THAT YOU'LL SEE AT AMERICAN LEGION PARK. Next up, we are in for a special treat. We are receiving an update from my youth advisory committee. We have three of our office holders, and they will announce their name and their position in the committee, as well as where you go to school and what grade you are. So. Good evening, Mayor, city council members, and community leaders, and residents of Stockton. My name is Jocelyn Barraza, and I'm elected board member of YAC, which stands for Youth Advisory Council. I am your sergeant of arms, and I am a junior currently at Venture Academy, and I'm part of the voice committee along with Samantha. First, I would like to thank Mayor Fugazi and the city of Stockton for creating and supporting a space where young people are not only heard but valued. YAC, led under the vision of Mayor Fugazi, represents something powerful. That belief that teenagers are not just the future of Stockton, we are the present. The Youth Advisory Committee was created to give young people a voice in local government. Too often, decisions are made without teenagers, without the youth at the table. YAC changes that. We meet regularly to discuss issues that affect students and teens across Stockton, from mental health, public safety, community events, education, and leadership. our mission is simple to bridge the gap between young people and the city leadership through yac we are learning how local government works how policies are created and how to communicate effectively with city officials but more importantly we are learning that our ideas matter we are organizing events community projects participating in city initiatives and working together to represent the diverse voices of stockton's youth Stockton is a city full of talent, resilience, and culture. As teenagers growing up here, we see both the challenges and the opportunities of Stockton. We know what it feels like to navigate school pressure, social media, safety concerns, and questions about our future. YAC provides a safe space and productive space for us to turn those experiences into actions. When young people are engaged in leadership, we build confidence, we improve civic responsibility, We create solutions that are relevant and initiative, and we inspire other youth to step up and get involved and use the voice that we were given. Tonight, we are not only here to share what YAC has accomplished, but to show that investing in youth's leadership is investing in Stockton's future. Every meeting, every idea, and every project brings us one step closer to a city where young voices are constantly included in decision making. We are grateful for the opportunity to serve, and we look forward to continue working alongside the mayor and the city council to make Stockton stronger, safer, and more united. On behalf of the Youth Advisory Council, thank you for believing in us and giving us the chance to lead. Thank you. Hello, Mayor Fugazi and council members. My name is Andrew Garcia, and I'm a sophomore at St. Mary's High School. I'm the secretary of the YC, and tonight I want to talk about how we make sure everyone feels welcome to the YC. We make sure of this by having multiple, by having three different committees. Our first one being general ed, then community, then voices. General Ed covers voices. Sorry, sorry. Voices help students with being able to build their public speaking, as I might need help with. And then in General Ed, make sure students have all the resources they might have for any education problems. And community helps the YC members with expressing their culture and with mental health. Thank you. Ms. Samantha Sanchez and I am the Vice Chair of the Youth Advisory Council. I'm here on as behalf of Eric Florentino who could not make it who is our chair. We would like to extend an invitation to all youth who would like to come and also be a part of this council. We are open to anybody and we have meetings Wednesdays. We are trying to make an impact in our future and we would really appreciate it if you as the youth would come and check us out. Or if you yourself have any youth in your life that you know would like this, or maybe they're trying to figure out what they'd like to do in the future, this could be something that they would want to do. So thank you. Our next meeting is March 11, which is this upcoming Wednesday here from 5 to 7 o'clock. We also have an Instagram, which is called Youth Advisory Council. And you guys can check us out there and message us if you guys have any concerns about your youth coming. And we welcome everyone. Thank you. uh... moving on to item at ten point three uh... proclamation recognition uh... uh... mo tech asuma sanchez and before we do that i just want to let people know that uh... yes i've received a number of messages and i absolutely respect uh... the way people feel uh... and that people know what they know and don't know what they don't know uh... this proclamation uh... isn't about personalities or or platform it's about an action that took uh... place and so uh... with that if you had no people that deserve recognition by all means reach out to my office mayor fugazi at stockton ca dot gov uh... and let me know what the situation is and how we can move forward with recognizing that individual Whereas the safety and well-being of Stockton residents depends not only on the dedication of public safety professionals, but also on the courage and responsibility of community members who act to protect others in moments of danger. And on March 22nd, 2025, at approximately 7 p.m., Motekuzoma Sanchez and members of his family were confronted in downtown Stockton in front of the state building on Channel Street by an individual who was acting aggressively and making threats in a public space. And the individual produced a large knife and advanced in a threatening manner, creating an immediate and serious risk to the safety of nearby residents and bystanders. And Motecazoma Sanchez acted with composure and sound judgment to create distance between the armed individual and members of the public, helping to prevent harm and escalation in a crowded public setting. And after ensuring the immediate safety of those nearby, Mr. Sanchez remained on scene and monitored the situation until officers from the Stockton Police Department arrived and safely took the individual into custody. and the subject was later reported to be wanted on a warrant of assault with a deadly weapon. And the actions of Motaku Zoma Sanchez reflect outstanding civic responsibility, personal courage, and a deep commitment to the safety of others in the community. Now, therefore, I, Christina Fugazi, Mayor of the City of Stockton, and members of the Stockton City Council, do hereby recognize Motaku Zoma Sanchez. Thank you. I would like to invite Captain Morris up for a moment just because I want her to be able to explain the importance of the public's help when it comes to situations like this. First of all, good evening. I'm Deputy Chief Morris of the Stockton Police Department. That's okay. I want to make sure that everyone understands the importance of reporting any crime. Anything you see, please, it's important that you say. And I say that because it's our department's initiative. See something, say something. Gone are the days that people did not report any crime or anything suspicious in the area. And that's proven by over a 10% reduction in crime rate within the city of Stockton. So it is effective, and this is an example of it. What you can do is definitely help the community reduce crime and prevent any future crime. So it's important that you report, be an active member of the community, and understand that we are partners. And without the community assisting us, it's not just us. It's not just our department, our officers. It takes the community. So it's important that they report and that we work together. I have the floor. Is it working? All right. Thank you for this recognition. I am truly humbled and honored. Quite honestly, I am glad that nobody got hurt that day. It's one thing to hear the situation being summarized months later, but definitely in the moment, it was a life and death situation. And for somebody to... brandish a deadly weapon to a stranger who was out with his family trying to enjoy the movies downtown. It highlights several issues and challenges that still remain in our community. Everybody here, you know, if you've grown up in Stockton, you know violence is a chronic problem. And so I'm glad that I was able to help bring a successful resolution to this incident without any violence. that day and i commend the officers for their professional handling of the situation taking him into custody uh... the individual who was taken into custody actually uh... was wanted on a warrant for assault with a deadly weapon so he had a history of doing such things it also uh... lands more gravity to me on this day because uh... just last night in Sacramento's downtown, a block away from the Golden One Arena, a young man and woman were also stabbed. The young man was stabbed to death right in front of a busy restaurant there in the shopping area of DoCo near Golden One. And that young man happens to be a 21-year-old who went to school with my daughter, graduated the same class, and he was from Stockton. these incidents are are uh... you know required uh... serious response but also requires a lot of prevention and i i hope that you can kind of uh... use this as a reminder your commitment as city council members uh... to do the business of the people to make sure that we are as safe a community as possible uh... whether it be holding up to the promise made ten years ago with measure a or working with community members such as myself to help bring about a dangerous individual to be apprehended. So again, thank you. And we still have a lot of work to do as a community. I'm glad I was able to do my part. public comment towards the beginning of the meeting thank you the city invites the CS doctor invites the public to participate in various ways if you have any questions regarding forms of participation please contact the office of the city clerk General public comment is the time for citizens' comments, announcements, or invitations. You may comment on any subject that is not on the agenda within the jurisdiction of the city council. If you wish to speak on a specific agenda item, comments will be heard during that item. To ensure sufficient public participation and conduct the agendized city business, the public is limited to one... Three-minute comment opportunity. Citizens' public comments are not a time for discussions with the Council regarding subjects not on the agenda for this meeting, as the Brown Act limits such discussions. Comments made by members of the public or Council may not reflect the viewpoint of the Council. We ask that you maintain the rules of decorum as outlined in City Council Meeting Decorum Policy. The Mayor shall preserve strict order and decorum at all meetings. Persons addressing the Council shall not make personal, impertinent, unduly repetitive, slanderous or profane remarks to the council any member of the of the council city staff or the general public nor utter loud threatening personal or abusive language nor engage in any other conduct that disrupts disturbs or otherwise unreasonably impedes the orderly conduct of the council meeting The city council members will practice civility and decorum in the discussions and debate. A member shall not delay or interrupt the proceedings of the council or use personal, impertinent, or slanderous remarks. Council members will not speak twice on any given subject unless all other council members have been given the opportunity to speak. Every member, once recognized, shall be limited to their debate to five minutes. Any council member who violates the rules repeatedly shall be sanctioned and be barred from further participation other than voting on the subject. members shall not disturb any council members while speaking nor disobey the orders of the presiding officer if a point of order is requested the presiding officer will ask the interrupter to state their point and the presiding officer shall make a ruling the rules of decorum set forth above shall be enforced in the following manner warning the presiding officer shall request that a person who is breaching the rules of decorum be orderly and silent. If, after receiving a warning from the presiding officer, a person persists in disturbing the meeting, the presiding officer shall order him or her to leave the council meeting. If such person does not remove himself or herself, the presiding officer may order any law enforcement officer who is on duty at the meeting to remove that person from the council chambers. Okay, so let's go ahead and call our first public... Good evening, everyone. I think I lost my voice. Anyhow, I have two meetings worth of notes, so I'm not going to try to get through all of them. I DROVE BY THE NEW BUILDING DOWN THERE YOU GUYS ARE GOING TO BE MOVING INTO. IF IT'S READY, I'M SIX FOOT SIX. IT DOESN'T LOOK READY, BUT THAT'S HERE AND THERE. I'M GLAD THE MAIL ISSUE HAS BEEN ADDRESSED. I WAS THINKING ABOUT THE BUILDING DOWN THE STREET THERE. IF HALF THE TIME AND EFFORT AND MONEY WAS SPENT ON THE HOMELESS PEOPLE SLEEPING ON THE STREETS, THIS WOULD BE A BETTER CITY. I MENTIONED ABOUT LIVING IN THE DISTRICTS. THREE MINUTES, WOW. I mentioned about living in the district that you represent. I'd like to see the city charter. How do I get access to it? What constitutes what timeframe does constitute residency for all of you? Not just picking on Jason. I said, I was going to one time run a district six, but I don't live in there. And one of the people said, you don't need to, maybe they know something I don't, but I would like to see the city charter. How do we get access to it? I, I complain about. Efforts versus results. i look at the county's twenty five twenty six budget eighty seven pages long city of stockton over four hundred and six four hundred and eight pages a lot of nice pictures in there but pictures are one thing in reality is something else uh... i'm not gonna beat up on jason today because jason's a nice guy he's not that bad he's just not good for the city so that being said I would like other issues addressed. I would like to see less fighting. The direction I see the county going is further down than what it ended at last year. That being said, I'd like to give my minute to somebody else. I'm tired of all this hogwash and infighting with all you guys, and you get very little done. So, whatever. Lee Taylor, followed by Jesse Mejia. Good evening, council. My name's Lee Taylor. I'm a special ed PE teacher here in Stockton Unified. And many of you guys have been to our big Special Olympics events, and we appreciate your support. I've lived in Stockton my whole life. My dad went to college here, and he used to play beach volleyball at the local parks. However, there are no more beach volleyball courts open to the public. in Stockton. Modesto has some, Ripon has some, Livermore has some, Galt has some, and I have to drive over a half hour if I want to play beach volleyball, which is a very popular sport. UOP has a Division I team, and our girls and boys can practice and try to make a college team. but there's nowhere to practice Stockton as we know is a huge volleyball hub and we have all high schools have boys and girls teams there will be plenty of kids who would like to play some high schools have even started having beach volleyball teams St. Mary's has one Lincoln's trying do you know that A minimum of 200 Cambodian people go to Oak Park, set up volleyball courts in between trees, and play every single sunny day. So let's help our community have a place to play beach volleyball. Beach volleyball is one thing you can do. You can play foot volley is where you play with your feet. The Latino culture loves that game. That's a... a very popular sport. Beach tennis is also very popular in parts of the world and the country and could be here as well. We have lots of great parks here and we have lots of activities at our parks. This is one that needs to happen. Let's make Stockton a better place. I yield back. Cool? Am I done? Do we argue about it? I don't have anything controversial to say. Sorry, I think, unless that's controversial. Thank you, guys. Jessie Mejia, followed by Patrick Peterson. Hey, guys. Hey, guys, my name is Jessie Mejia. I am the CFO and co-founder of a local charity. Anyways, I'm here because I wanted to propose something to the city council. Maybe it would be in the best interest of the city. Well, it would be in the best interest of the city if you guys maybe pass an ordinance having all charities or non-profits register within the city limits if they plan to participate within the city. Example, as you guys know, there's a lot of illegal dumping and it's under the guise of charity work. It's nonsense. The city keeps paying to clean up after people dumping COUCHES, FOOD, BLANKET, WHATEVER PEOPLE COULD THINK OF. INSTEAD OF TAKING IT TO THE DUMP, THEY GO AND DRIVE IT AND DUMP IT IN DISTRICT FIVE WITH THE HOMELESS, AND IT'S BECOMING A SERIOUS PROBLEM. OKAY? I DON'T NEED TO GO OVER THAT. YOU GUYS KNOW THE DETAILS. BUT NONETHELESS, I ACTUALLY TOOK THE TIME OUT OF MY BUSY SCHEDULE TO ACTUALLY SOLVE THE PROBLEM UNDER $1.25 MILLION, WHICH IS ESSENTIALLY WHAT YOU GUYS ARE SPENDING TO CLEAN UP THE CITY ANYWAYS. So this plan, we can get the funds directly from an emergency process. You guys are well aware of that. We could actually get people humanely off the street, get them into housing and getting into resource centers all within 90 days for less than $1.25 million. Okay, I already did the research. I know how to pull the money. You don't even need to vote on it. So anyways, I printed it out and I wanted to give it to everyone on the council. I've tried emailing every single one of you. I've tried Facebook messaging you, Instagram. Obviously, you guys are all busy people. You have private lives as well. So I'm not butthurt or anything about that. But nonetheless, it just gets to the point where some of this stuff earlier, it's like, well, I get guns pulled on me all the time, and I don't get an award. If you want proof, come on. And I'm tired. And you guys all know what I'm talking about. We need to at least have an ordinance. and tell people, hey, if you're going to come from Lathrop, you're going to come from Lodi, don't come dump your garbage because it costs the city $80,000 every time they have to clean up a homeless camp. That's insane. Yeah, it's providing jobs, but that's not the kind of jobs that the city needs to be providing to anybody. So just like I said, in conclusion, I would love for you guys to take this or not, but I have the due diligence to give it to my city. You know, if you can hand it over here. You guys can all reach me. Most of you guys would probably have my info. If not, I'm happy to give it to you guys. Is it on the paper? It's not because I didn't assume you guys didn't want to take it. But I'm glad that there's some positive. Brando has my info. Brando has my cell phone number and all that good stuff. I have connections with the Alameda County supervisor. Many, many people like that who are friends of friends who have guided me in kind of helping you guys find this plan. But again, in 90 days, we can get 60% of the homeless off of the streets humanely and relocated back home to where they belong or into programs. Okay, guys? Reach out to me, please, anytime. All right, guys? Patrick Peterson, followed by Cynthia Gale-Boyd. Good evening, counsel. Most of you guys probably know me. I'm Patrick Peterson, son of Amari Peterson, who was killed in this... This mass shooting of November 29th. I'm the father of a 14-year-old, Amari Peterson, who was killed in the mass shooting. This past Friday, my family woke up to new headlines announcing it had been 90 days since our son was murdered. For the media, it was a milestone, but for us, it was a life sentence. We live this every day. We are tired of our child's death being reduced to a headline in a statistic or a talking point. The cover triggered us. It took us right back to the hospital to the moment we were waiting to hear if our son would live or die. I remember, we all remember, looking up to the second floor and seeing the mayor looking down on us but never coming down to offer a word of comfort or identifying herself as who she was at the time. And then later, her husband messaged us and in the mayor takes this as she told us we would receive follow-up calls from gabriella and laura lawson and guess what you're still waiting for those calls uh... we receive prayers we receive condolences and they were received silence i've called mister ford who just left the room three times this week and i haven't i haven't got a message back received any responses that site that silence is loud Leadership is not just what you say in front of the cameras. It's what you do after the cameras leave. While there has been public bickering and political drama, the people responsible for our son's murder is still out there. Instead of all that energy being spent in fighting, we are asking to use that same energy prioritizing finding these shooters and bringing justice for our child. Put differences aside. Act with urgency. Act professionally. before another family has to stand where we stay. We have been quiet, but do not mistake our grief for weakness. We can get loud. We are asking for speeches. We are asking for accountability. We are asking for communication. We are asking for real action and real follow-through. Make this case a priority. Bring more resources. Show the city that our children matter, since we ain't here talking about the youth. Our son was 14. He had a name. He had dreams. He had a future. He mattered to a lot of people. Just because we're not from Stockton doesn't mean my son didn't matter and he shouldn't be, you know, cared about. Like we need some type of answers. We will not allow his life to be reduced to a 90 day headline. We just want justice and we're still hurting and we still and we're still waiting. But what could we expect from somebody? with the name Fugazi. Thank you. Cynthia Gail Boyd, followed by Barbara King. Right on, my brother, right on. Thank God I'm still alive in this dangerous city. Oh, Miss Mayor, how dare you. PLACE A HIGH VALUE ON SOME CITIZENS' LIVES AND DISCOUNT MY LIFE'S SAFETY AND WELL-BEING AS HAVING NO VALUE AT ALL TO YOU. DURING YOUR EIGHT-YEAR TERM AS CITY COUNCILWOMAN FOR DISTRICT FIVE, YOU DID ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO UPHOLD YOUR OBLIGATIONS TO ENSURE LIFE, LIBERTY, AND JUSTICE FOR ALL AND ME. quite aware of the zone of danger that dominated my life every day. It was not a day that I was not in fear for my life and my families. My Hispanic, racist, dangerous, terrorist-ass neighbors were in cahoots with the Stockton Police Department to destroy my mental and physical well-being. You had full knowledge, ma'am, through our shared text messages for eight years, videos, and police reports, and many court dates that you were aware of. Mayor Tubbs and Mayor Lincoln also had this knowledge due to my constant pleas at all the city council meetings since December 2nd, 2008. I ain't got no award for still being alive in this dangerous city. The only reason you had was for me to give you the perpetrators' names so you said I'm going to have my people contact Dave Viva like you were some big-time-ass mob boss. These neighbors were daily making false police reports. Police responded by carloads. scaring and trying to intimidate me. You knew the terrorist neighbors had been destroying my property. Ultimately, three of them got three bogus ass restraining orders against me while you sat there and did nothing about it. I stayed self-isolated during that pandemic for 20 months. I had my Second Amendment rights stolen from me. I had no way to protect myself. my family, or my property, and you've given him an award? Give me one for still being alive. I brought a subpoena to you to testify on my behalf, and the same city attorney that you appointed tonight represented you so that you didn't have to come and speak. Oh, that talk of yours is cheap, and the rest of that BS didn't run a marathon. Barbara King followed by Jasmine Peterson. Good evening. Good evening, Mayor Fugazi, Vice Mayor Lee, council members. On Monday, February 9th, 2026, San Joaquin RTD drivers staged a protest following board decision to place CEO Alex Clifford on paid administrative leave. buses were halted for nearly four hours which was devastating to some riders who depend on rtd bus line a stable reliable bus line system is imperative without it the functional circulatory system of a city fails leaving residents stranded in local economics paralyzed the ripple effects go far beyond just being late for a meeting or work The former CEO of the San Joaquin Regional Transit District, RTD, says a battle of over $62 million in funding led to him being fired. Allegedly, there was a report that Mayor Fugazi omitted. key details in the $62 million transit funding dispute. Leaders of the San Joaquin Regional Transit District plan to sue the council for allegedly wrongfully withholding Measure K funds of $62 million, which was needed to fix the Asian buses. It was described as a coordinated effort to block critical funding from Stockton's largest transit agency. The RTD Board of Directors voted 4-1 on February 13, 2026, to terminate CEO Alex Clifford for convenience without cause. Mr. Clifford's leadership speaks for itself by restoring routes canceled during COVID and extending some others. Mr. Clifford extended service hours so people could get to work and school earlier and return home later. The frequency was every 30 minutes. I would like to know what qualifies three new board members who never attended board meetings and was only voted in last month to be able to vote in favor of placing Mr. Clifford on paid administrative leave? The moment they were sworn in, they fired the CEO without knowing anything about him. All three were just appointed last month, Mr. Graves, Ms. Murad, and Mr. Edwards. Kimberly Turner was appointed interim CEO February 23, 2026. However, some say she lacks the minimum qualifications, citing a similar issue with her 2022 job application. Another case of an applicant who does not qualify for the job. We look to our city council to make sure that our city and buses are running properly and efficiently so that our neighborhoods remain connected and accessible for everyone at all times. In my opinion, There is $62 million in taxpayers' money being hijacked, and it appears to be intentional. Thank you, Ms. King. Thank you. Public comments hijacked. Thank you. Councils. Thank you, Ms. King. Thank you. Thank you. Have a great evening. Jasmine Peterson. Good evening, Mayor, Councilmembers. Before I begin, I just want to take a moment. Just coming into this space, I feel definitely feeling the grief that our community is holding from the violence in the last few weeks. I came tonight to share an update about our climate action plan and some opportunities for the community to become involved in that process. Ultimately, I just want to share that this work is about safety. It's about caring for each other and caring for our future. And so, yeah, I just wanted to give an update that we have a survey. And our community has engaged in many, many surveys over the years. But this is a pretty important one. It's the time where we're selecting which of the climate actions are a priority for the city and our community to focus on. And so the survey originally closed on Saturday, but we really need a lot more participation and support. So we are extending the deadline to tomorrow to get some more feedback. And the survey is available in English and Spanish. There are flyers out in the lobby if you want to participate. I also have some here, too. I also left some calendar magnets. So if you want a new magnet for your refrigerator, It's outside in the lobby desk as well. Should I? Oh, here's the flyer. Sorry, my hands are shaking. I'm a little nervous. I also wanted to let folks know, please save the date for March 21st. We're having an event at Civic Auditorium in the morning. It's the launch party for the plan. And we're looking forward to engaging with the residents and community members who care about our environment and our future. And thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight. That concludes general public comment. I do have two comments for consent. For item 12.8, Patrick High. For item 12.8, Patrick High. Good evening, Patrick High, President of Stockton Police Officers Association. I find it deeply ironic that this resolution has been placed on tonight's agenda. It is not lost on me that we are once again in a political season. Some of you may be seeking endorsements from public safety, while others may be attempting to block endorsements of your political opponents. Regardless of motive, this resolution gives the appearance of political maneuvering. This resolution, which appears aimed at silencing, Those who do not align with the currently favored faction is yet another example of personal animosities taking precedence over responsible governance. The SPOA has been clear that certain directors over the past year have acted dishonestly in their reporting. It is difficult to ignore the fact that the SPOA consistently prevails in grievance proceedings. That pattern alone indicates an ongoing problem. Yet while good employees are persecuted, often at great cost to the city through future litigation, those who manage to position themselves strategically seem to face no accountability. The idea that I should be silenced from advocating for my membership and for the many citizens who have supported us is beyond belief. Let's also not forget that it was not a member of the SPOA or any other bargaining group who stood before a committee in this very room and argued that dishonesty was acceptable. That occurred during the audit committee meeting on October 27th of 2025. And yet I'm expected to trust that the same individual in future negotiations, that they are going to report truthfully to you or for you. Please ensure that when you press that button and cast your vote, it reflects your independent judgment and your commitment to good governance, not prior political instructions and promises. Thank you. For item 12.9, Linda Christopherson. good evening i'm linda christopherson i'm a member of the pickleball group at groupie park uh... two years ago the city council agreed to build a new pickleball courts at groupie park since then our group has been patient cooperative and actively involved we've submitted plans work with staff and have been eagerly awaiting the start of construction we recently learned that the construction bids were negated and the process is being reopened well we understand the procedures are important this news was very discouraging to our growing pickleball community kind of like beach ball our group continues to expand and the need for dedicated courts is greater than ever the new facility would be a wonderful addition to our city parks and tremendous benefit to local families the gp three pickleball group was recently featured in her life magazine recognized as friendly welcoming and passionate about teaching others our sport. We respectively ask for your support in helping move this project forward and bringing these courts to fruition. We are ready, excited, and hopeful to see this long-awaited project completed. Thank you for your time and for your support. That concludes public comment for consent. Okay, moving on to the consent calendar, I want to pull 12-11, 12-14, and 12-18, just so I got that out of the way. Anybody else? 12-8. 12-8. 12-4. 12-what? 4? 12-4, 12-6, 12-10, and 12-16. 12-10 and 12-16. Also, I'm going to pull 12.1 also. Okay, so you did 4, 6, 10, and 16. Sorry, hold on. 1, 4, 6, 8, 10, 16, and you already pulled 18. Okay. Sorry, there's already a repeat. 12.3, 12.6, 12.13. Okay, you added. Okay. Okay, so I have 12.1, 12.3, 12.4, 12.6, 12.8. 12-9, 12-10, 12-13, and 12-16. Did I miss one? I have 11, 14, and 18. Okay. Is there any we didn't put? Yeah, we said 12-1. Okay, so 1, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, oh, excuse me, yeah, 10, 11, 13, 14 16 16 and 18. okay so we'll just start with 12.1 we'll start at the i move emotions yes the remaining second okay we have a motion in a second please vote motion passes seven zero okay twelve point one let me go to it real quick so I can read it into, adopt a resolution appointing a member to the Strong Communities Advisory Committee. Oh, I pulled that item. Yeah, just a reminder that, you know, I know we've had lots of council discussion around filling all of our vacancies, and I think it's great that we're doing that. Obviously, I'm going to vote to support my colleague in their decision to appoint. Just a reminder, I think the mayor has been consistent in reminding commissioners of our decorum rules. I will be looking for the council to enforce those consistently. So that's the only thing I wanted to say, but I make a motion to approve. We have a motion and a second. Council, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. 12.3, which is adopt a resolution appointing a member of the Measure A Citizens Advisory Committee. Was that you? Okay. Thank you, Mayor. Yes, I just want to take the opportunity, again, in my district, I've been fortunate that we've had always, never had vacancies longer than a month, so we've always had very robust vacancies ACTIVISM IN DISTRICT FOUR, AND I'M VERY THRILLED THAT WE ARE GOING TO BE ABLE TO VOTE TONIGHT TO APPOINT PATRICIA LOPEZ, MS. PATRICIA LOPEZ, TO THE MEASURE A CITIZENS ADVISORY COMMITTEE. I CAN SAY WITHOUT A DOUBT THAT HER ADVOCACY WORK IN TERMS OF LEADING VARIOUS INITIATIVES, COALITIONS, AND HER DEEP KNOWLEDGE OF MANAGING BUDGETS, I FEEL CONFIDENT THAT SHE HAS THE KEEN FISCAL OVERSIGHT SKILLS TO BE AN EFFECTIVE MEMBER OF THIS COMMITTEE, AND I KNOW THAT SHE WILL REPRESENT DISTRICT FOUR WELL. AND AGAIN, I'M JUST THRILLED THAT WE HAVE JUST SUCH A GREAT LEADER IN OUR COMMUNITY THAT WANTS TO BE A PART OF THIS IMPORTANT COMMITTEE WHEN IT COMES TO PUBLIC SAFETY FUNDS. AND I KNOW THAT SHE'LL MAKE THE RIGHT DECISIONS TO SUPPORT THE COMMUNITY. BUT I KNOW SHE'S HERE TODAY IN THE AUDIENCE, AND I JUST WANT TO HIGHLIGHT HER. AND I'M JUST VERY THRILLED THAT I HAVE THE HONOR TO MOTION TO APPROVE TO VOTE FOR HER TO BE PART OF THIS COMMITTEE. SECOND. SECOND. WE HAVE A MOTION AND A SECOND. COUNCIL, PLEASE VOTE. motion carries 7-0 moving on to 12.4 approval of a joint community facilities agreement with the county of san joaquin and catalyst stockton llc for community facilities district number 2009-01 airpark 599 mr crew good evening Will Crew, Deputy City Manager. This project is a county-owned project. The developer is Catelis, and we are working with them on their CFD in order for them, for the developer to pay back water and sewer lines that were put in, that eventually will be owned by the city. We have not annexed that area yet. It's about 275 acres. and we're still determining whether or not that would be appropriate for the city to do. Go ahead. Thank you, Mayor. I pulled the item. I just wanted to say that, well, one, to staff, I'd like to meet with the developer just to get familiar with those that are building in my district, but I want to thank staff for the time to talk about this because... I'm in support of the agreement because it allows critical water, sewage infrastructure to move forward. I know that all of us have been talking for the last year about economic development in my district and looking at infrastructure and all of those things. But the best part about this, it prevents us from having to touch our general fund. And we're placing bond liability on the city. So I just want to thank staff for the work in getting this done. And if there's no other discussion, I just make a motion to approve. Second. We have a motion and a second. Council, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. Moving on to 12.6, adopt a resolution to authorize an amendment to contract with Project Sentinel to amend the scope of work to include tenant landlord counseling and dispute resolution services. Yeah, I pulled this item. I just wanted to get more information on these services. It seems like now more than ever, especially as we go into our housing discussions around making sure that we're providing support to tenants who may have concerns over their landlords, that we understand more about this. So if there's a way staff can just give us an overview of this program, that would be great. Tina McCarty, Economic Development Director. Happy to do that, Vice Mayor. So we entered into this contract last year in 25, and it was for services basically to take phone calls for concerns, and it was a means of distributing information about resources available. They got a lot of calls in fielding those calls. A lot of the calls were in need of more of a moderator and mediation between landlords and tenants. with the goal of keeping people from becoming evicted and unhoused. And so the change before you tonight is adding more funding into the current contract and expanding their scope to now cover the ability to give more mediation services between tenant and landlord. And one of the questions I had, and thank you for that, is how is the information on this service getting out to the community? Because as we've been talking about ensuring that tenants know their rights and know how to enforce their rights, we want to make sure that we can help as a city and as council members getting that information out. I'm going to let probably a better response to that question would come from, we've got the organizer here from Sentinel, and I'd be happy to let her speak to that. That'd be great. Thank you very much for the opportunity to serve the community of Stockton and for your question. Project Sentinel is an entity that is a comprehensive housing service that has a very robust tenant-landlord counseling and dispute resolution program. And the way that we get the word out, generally speaking, is being on the ground in the community holding either workshops or presentations, Q&As, and ways in which people can intersect at community gathering locations like libraries, even the schools, and so on. But we also do a lot digitally, online, social media, our website, and otherwise, distribute brochures. We've just, we're literally in the very ramp-up period. Just minted a whole bunch of brochures in many, many languages, and we'll be distributing those as a first step. I will say that we have become very busy very fast. WITHOUT MUCH OUTREACH. SO THE DEMAND IS CLEARLY THERE, AND THE COMMUNITY IS DEFINITELY RESPONDING. MAYBE WORD OF MOUTH ALREADY. WE'VE ALREADY HAD SOME PRETTY SIGNIFICANT CASES WHERE WE'VE KEPT PEOPLE HOUSED THAT OTHERWISE WOULD HAVE BEEN EVICTED. WELL, I'D LIKE TO MAKE YOU BUSIER, IF POSSIBLE. OKAY, YEAH. I GAVE YOU MY CARD. IF THERE'S A WAY, MAYBE WE CAN HOST SOMETHING IN MY DISTRICT, BECAUSE I WANT TO MAKE SURE THAT people know how to reach you for these services. My colleague and I are working on some stuff that if you can reach out to me, I'd like staff to keep this program close to our conversation. But thank you. Absolutely. We very much would welcome the partnership. Thank you. Yes. Council Member Enriquez. Thank you, Mayor. And as the Vice Mayor said, this is very timely just because This has been something that we've been talking about the last four or five months in terms of housing policy, but specifically with rents or protections, dispute landlord, tenant landlord dispute resolution services. And I know one of the big questions we've been asking is, and we've been meeting with the economic development team is, just for us to get a lay of the land of who's doing what, what are the challenges, what are the successes, what's the data? I know one of the recent asks was to get a breakdown of all the rental properties in Stockton and also understanding what's the average rent. And one of the things we were talking about, which, and I'm glad you focused this on your legislation text, is that this is a potential pathway to being homeless, right? And I know that through my own lived experience that we can't afford rent, you're out on the streets. So this is something that I think, the fact that you also broke down that while you are doing fair housing, you also said that there's a difference that you have to put your resources more towards the tenant-landlord dispute resolution services. So that's critical and I really appreciate that. In terms of the amendment, so the amendment states that it's already started on January 1st, 2026 through June 30th, 2027. While we are voting today in terms of the amendment to hire the bilingual conflict resolution specialist among and opening up 100 cases, and I have a question for that. What has happened from January 1st to today? Or is the timeline going to be starting today and then it's going to be pushed to July 2027? So we are currently under contract and have been since I believe it was May of 25, and they've been providing phone answering services where they have shared resources, other resources, because they were not – hired at that time it was not part of their scope to do mediation services between tenant and landlord the amendment before you tonight will add uh... another two hundred thousand to minority two hundred and fifteen thousand dollar contract making it for a total not to exceed $415,000. And that additional money also with it expands services to include actual mediation. So now when they get the calls that need or asking for help, they can actually advise them and or set up a meeting and help them maneuver and get through conflict resolution with tenants and landlords together. In terms of number one, hire one full-time bilingual conflict resolution specialist. Will they be tasked with leading the new 100 cases, or is that just ongoing? It says number two, open up to 100 cases for extensive counseling and dispute resolution. What would be the role of that specific specialist? I believe that their recognition for the time served thus far in the contract is the recognition that they do need a bilingual interpreter to help them. They're seeing a number of people calling that are, I'm going to assume, Spanish speaking. Spanish-speaking, and they don't have current personnel enough to cover the need that they're seeing in terms of the calls. So this is an additional personnel member they will hire so that they can be responsive to the calls that are being made. And to my colleague's point about just the outreach, I know in 3, 4, 5, and 6, you do list the specifics of how you reach out in terms of distributing 1,000 brochures. the postcard campaign the 10 educational presentations and on that note number four I would like to see where those will be at and that they're evenly distributed across the districts if that makes sense just in terms of equity because this is mainly focusing on educating the community on tenant protections and landlord obligations if there are key hot spots so to speak that makes more sense to direct them in other in specific areas I get that But at the same time, I think everywhere throughout the city of Stockton, we have rental properties and we have challenges. So I think with these 10 presentations, I would like to know, and I think my colleagues will also like to see where they're at, timeline, when they're gonna happen, how we can promote it, and also how we can let people know. Because if it's one person, and I know the limitations, not everyone speaks Spanish, but if that's gonna be critical, if you have a 45% Latino city and most of them, let's say, for example, are renting or not, That's also another data point that would be helpful because, again, this is going to guide the work of this specialist. And in terms of the new cases open up, I think also the success rate would be helpful. So if we can capture that data and come to a point where you can present to us, that would be helpful because it's going to guide the conversation we're having with the rental property ordinance as we dive deep into that, but also other possible options to help get people just more education. So I think that's all the questions I have, but I appreciate it. I have a couple questions. So is there a satellite office here in Stockton or is it just a phone number and meetings? There currently is not a satellite office in Stockton but they are available and present as far as their interaction with the community. Well, I think that's great but I do think that we need to have a place because we get calls all the time. all the time from people that are in trouble and that brings me to my next question was, are there any direct legal services that are being given to these individuals or is it because I saw that there were talking about 41 of the total 107 intakes that were at risk and was there legal assistance provided? project sentinel is not necessarily they're not legal advice now they may have some resources to be able to share with them in terms of when resolution they believe might benefit from additional legal help but sentinel itself is not a legal team okay then in the city of Sacramento and Mary Elizabeth shared this with me so I want to give Mary Elizabeth a shout out she said that in in Sacramento they have a list of registered rental housing units that we might be able to share with the public if we are getting people in order to that we can say hey they've already there's a tenant you know, tenant-landlord process and agreement with them, and that we've worked with them really hard on that so that people won't maybe have some of the problems that they are coming in contact with. So I will share with you that information. I'll go ahead and send that to you. But I think the more information we give people, the better equipped they are to make decisions that are best for themselves and their families. Again, sometimes it's already at the courthouse, and we need to be able to direct them because I know we have the rural, you know, league that we send people to, but even then it's like almost too late at that point, and people are given a three-day notice. So we want to make sure that people have what they need. So, Vice Mayor. Thank you, Mayor. Okay, so my colleague's comments created more questions for me. So there's no satellite office. Where is this? company-based? They're based out of Stockton, but they don't have a retail front door. Okay. So I guess one thing I would say is that this needs to be a data-driven experience, right? For me, when we get into the housing discussions, we're going to want to know where hotspots are. Are we tracking the slumlord calls? You are. Okay. So you'll have data that shows where you're getting calls, where the volume of calls are, because at some point when we get into the ordinances and all those things, I mean, if we have people who are intentionally hurting residents, they end up in jail. At least that's what I would hope. And I think this data would be helpful for us in assessing that. The other thing is, I think to the mayor's point, if we don't have a satellite office, we do have a substation in District 6, we do have housing authority as a partner, are we putting information for people to become educated on how to reach you through those community partners? I CAN'T SPEAK TO HAVE WE DONE IT IN THE PAST, BUT CERTAINLY WE CAN LOOK TO DO THAT. IF YOU DON'T MIND, I'D LIKE TO UNDERSTAND WHAT YOUR OUTREACH EFFORTS ARE, BECAUSE AGAIN, YOU KNOW, WE ARE IN A NEWS DESERT, AND UNLESS IT'S, YOU KNOW, THERE'S SOME BIG CRISIS, IT DOESN'T REALLY HIT THE INTERNET LIKE THAT, AND I WANT TO MAKE SURE THAT WE USE ALL OUR COMMUNITY CENTERS, ALL OUR COMMUNITY PARTNERS TO GET THAT INFORMATION OUT THERE. YEAH, WE'RE CHOMPING AT THE BIT TO BE HERE. WE NEED OUR CONTRACT IN PLACE, SO I'M HOPEFUL TONIGHT THAT WE'LL GET THERE. WE HAVE BEEN ACTIVE SINCE January 1st. We've had an incredible run already in two months in terms of there were, first it was one, then it was three, then it was nine. Tenants who are vulnerable, tenants on subsidized housing assistance who are seniors, people with disabilities, and a property manager who was new, probably not with all the training needed, came into a very large property provider. and issued 30-day notices for everybody to be evicted. Our director, because we're still just about our conflict resolution specialist starts next week, took it upon herself to intervene inside the conflict, made contact with the property manager, went as high as corporate with the property provider, met twice with the regional office, and got those 30-day notices withdrawn. This is the way in which upstream, when you're working in the prevention space, it happens. Where there's a gap, there's a misunderstanding, there's something went on, somebody's not trained well, it was just a staff turnover, whatever, and very vulnerable citizens become subjects of eviction. And so that's just one example, which in about three to four weeks it took to get everything withdrawn. and those people stable again. We got all the rent ledgers. We got everything that we needed in place to make sure that, in fact, every I was dotted and every T was crossed when we got these things proven. these evictions were unfounded. So here's what I'm saying. We know your service is needed. My question was... So partnering in each district. No, I hear you. You don't have to sell me on the partnership. I think as the mayor and my colleague brought up, here's the message that I want you and staff to get. I'm talking about making sure we get all the information pushed down as far as we can into the community. So with our community centers, with our housing authority partners, with our community partners, we have tons of nonprofits out here. who are outreaching. We need to outreach. And the more demand you demonstrate for the service that we know is a critical need to our community will be helpful in us helping you. We've done a little bit, but we've been waiting to get our staffing at capacity because the minute that goes out, we will be very, very busy. Which is why tonight, if we're going to approve more funding, what we're saying, I guess, let me just be more clear. that it's, for me, my vote is contingent on us making sure that we're doing more outreach, that we're making sure that this is going as deep into the communities. And I do want to make one comment my colleague said about equity. There are populations IN WHICH THE DENSITY OF SOME OF THESE CHALLENGED LANDLORDS ARE HEAVIER THAN OTHERS. WE DON'T EVEN NEED TO GO THERE. I JUST WANT TO MAKE SURE WHEN WE TALK ABOUT EQUITY THAT WE'RE REACHING ALL OF THE PEOPLE WHO ARE VULNERABLE TO SOME OF THE CHALLENGES THAT YOU'RE ADDRESSING. ABSOLUTELY. AND WE ARE VERY EXPERIENCED IN REACHING OUT TO COMMUNITIES, SO I HAVE NO DOUBT WE'LL MAKE THAT IMPACT. THANK YOU. THAT'S ALL I HAVE, MA'AM. THANK YOU. COUNCILMAN VILLAPOTUA. YES. I JUST WANTED TO KNOW IF THERE WAS ANY COST WITH ANALYSTS. the breakdown of the cost with salaries for each one. Is there any information on that? Lana Lozano, Homeless Initiatives Manager, Economic Development. So we did receive a budget that we went through with Project Sentinel that will be included in the budget amendment. It will be. Once it's approved tonight. And there are personnel costs included in that budget. Okay. All right, thank you. And then my last comment was based off of, you know, we can add Cambodian eventually, Punjabi eventually for language, to reduce language barriers. And I would just say, you know, As Councilmember Enriquez stated, we do need more information. Like I said, bringing up that 41 out of 107, I'd like more details on that. How are we able to help people actually stay in their homes? I mean, I realize that there might be a dispute, but what if it's a financial dispute? Are we able to get them funding, money, so that they don't lose their housing, if that's part of it? But we appreciate any help we can get for our residents to keep them housed. We do not want any more people living on the streets in their cars, couch surfing, you know, staying wherever they can. So thank you. I'll make a motion to approve. Second. I have a motion and a second. Council, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. Thank you. Okay. Now going to 12.8. Let me get to it. Adopt a resolution appointing the city's collective bargaining representatives and delegating authority to negotiate with the city labor groups. I pulled it. Oh, okay. And I know Vice Mayor wants to talk to me. Go ahead. Okay. I think I understand the intention of the resolution and that is to ensure that the negotiations occur through designated labor representatives. We are not negotiators up here, and the meet and confer process should be handled in a structured and professional way. However, at the same time, it's common that council members regularly meet with or meet or communicate with constituents, employees, sometimes even the media, So I think it's important that the language should reflect the reality while still protecting the integrity of the process, of the negotiation process. So I think with that said, I would recommend and I'd like to hear some discussion from my colleagues with regards to the language And I believe it's particularly regarding item number E. So I would like to hear from the rest of my colleagues as well. Vice Mayor. Thank you, Mayor. Yeah, a couple things. One, I want to just acknowledge the fact that when we came into office, one of the things that was clear in speaking to our public safety... unions and staff was that it seemed like the groups were not happy with our current negotiator. And I will say I think the council did a great job of finding or managing, whoever did it, found a great negotiator, I think, to lead the discussions for the council and for staff. The second piece, I did want to respond to Officer High because I have a lot of respect for him. This whole council does and our city does, and he provides an excellent service, him and his men and women, to our city. And I said, ironically, it's really interesting to see a union and a management staff have such a good relationship, too. So I want to be very clear, speaking for myself and my colleagues can speak for themselves. I never politicize our relationship with the unions. I would never put our unions in a position to act in one way or another or act on my behalf or on behalf of the city related to politics when it comes to how we relate with them. I think the intention in Section E of this... resolution says council members shall refrain from discussions with the press on meet and confer issues until a final agreement has been reached for labor group for that labor group unless the majority of the entire council authorizes and let me just say what i think the intention means but if we need to clarify we can um i think that us when we talk about bargaining As it relates to this bargaining unit, we usually do it in closed session. We're not going to discuss closed session with anybody, whether it's the media or anybody else. I think the intention is that we not discuss bargaining matters in closed session with the public or anybody, media. That said, if any council member was to be called by a bargaining unit to have a meeting, we're going to show up and have a conversation with our bargaining units We're just not going to do direct dealing. We're not going to negotiate on behalf of the council individually. And then we're not going to go out and talk to the media and say, this is what we heard was happening. I will say that if we ever ended up in a situation where I felt like the city wasn't negotiating in good faith with a bargaining unit and we were violating their rights intentionally, which I doubt under this manager's leadership will happen, I will go out there and speak on behalf of the city and and what I feel is right or wrong because I'm always going to advocate for what's right or wrong regardless of who is involved. But I just wanted to clarify at least my understanding for Section E is that we would not be prohibited from talking to our bargaining units if they desire to talk to us. Council Member Enriquez. Thank you, Mayor. Yeah, no, I agree with what my colleagues have shared so far. I mean, ultimately, for me, speaking as an individual, I want to make sure that the resolution in front of us should make it explicitly clear that there's nothing wrong with a council member meeting with workers or the union to listen to their concerns or perspectives, even during negotiations, so long as that the council member does not attempt to engage in side bargaining or anything that violates the Brown Act. As my colleague has shared, there's a lot of discussions we do with negotiations in closed session. But ultimately, that's my thoughts on this and whatever we can do to make either amendments or to have more dialogue, I think that would be most appropriate. Council Member Blauer. Thank you. Yes, I agree with my colleagues. I mean, I think we all want to have the ability to be able to have these discussions. I know, as you said, we wouldn't be involved in negotiations and that's, you know, and that's important, you know, to note that. But I also think that having dialogue and discussion with them as long as we're within those bounds, there shouldn't be something wrong with that. So with the language that's in here, do we need to add something just stating that it's okay if we still have those discussions? What do you guys recommend? So I'm reading it and it says prohibits direct dealing. or attempts to bypass those representatives, and it says directly negotiate. I mean, I'm looking at the key words, and we agree to that, and we're not gonna go to the press. Actually, we've had that conversation about can we let the press know, and we've said no, we have to wait on that. So as I read the language on here, to me it's like none of us can go and negotiate a contract with any bargaining unit. But it doesn't say we can't meet. Well, that's what I'm thinking. So I don't see anything in here saying we can't speak. Is that correct? That is correct. And much like our employees, you have a right to talk with our employees. We don't want you to direct them to do work. Okay? So you have a right to meet with the union. We don't want you to go outside that scope on meet and confer. is as simple as that much like you've been saying okay vice mayor thank you mayor a couple things one there was something else that sergeant high said that i do want to address when it comes to um being forthright with information sharing being accurate making sure that council is fully aware and knowledgeable what's being discussed that's important i mean obviously we don't want any surprises and if we were discovered that through a conversation i think that would be problematic But the language, council members shall refrain from discussions with the press on meet and confer issues until a final agreement. To be clear, just because we're on public record, that's not prohibiting the mayor or the council from, if the press was to call and ask for a question, we wouldn't discuss the bargain. We would refer back to management, just so we're clear. section c where it says no council member shall disclose any discussion that takes place in closed session unless the majority of the council authorizes is that talking about us waiving privilege because that okay okay well because we know that's a rule so we're putting explicit in there just so we remind ourselves okay just making sure okay uh councilwoman padilla thank you mayor um i i understand that we're all on the same page and it just seems like the wording um uh the wording is just more convoluted I guess than it really is and I I thought of a slight modification line item to clarify that council members refrain from discussing specific proposal strategies or bargaining positions related to ongoing negotiations with the press until a final agreement is reached unless authorized by a majority of the council council members could still provide general public statements about the process so long as the confidential negotiations are not disclosed. So is that the same? Okay. So I don't know if we need to modify or just keep it as it is. And I'm open to discussion. Would you want to know whether or not we modify it or? No, I would keep it as it is. Once again, you ALLOWED TO TALK WITH THE UNION ABOUT EVERYTHING EXCEPT MEETING CONFER. UNION NEGOTIATING ITEMS. OKAY. VICE MAYOR? THANK YOU. OKAY. Just so we're clear, we can still talk with the union. Yes. In fact, we should always talk with our union partner. Open communication. The issue is when it crosses into meeting and conferring or discussing issues that we meet and that staff are meeting and conferring with is where the conflict. I think the intent of the document, which we all agreed, was to put a wall up so people understand we are not the negotiators. But if... There is an instance where the bargaining unit feels like council is being withheld information. They can inform us, we can listen, and then we come back as a group discussing direct staff. Meaning, for example. The key word is listen. You can listen and hear anything. But that's what I'm saying. That's what the intent of this language is, is that it doesn't prohibit us from meeting and listening. It prohibits us from meeting and conferring. It also reinforces to the bargaining units that we are not to be put in a position to meet and confer. Correct. So I think the language, as long as we've now on the record discussed the intent, I'm okay with it staying as is as long as we've had this discussion and we know. Councilwoman Padilla. Thank you. And I understand with this discussion and I respect Sergeant High and I just want to make sure that that is just the union not understanding the language as it's written. Well, I'm not going to try to... No, I know. I agree. He was talking about, because what I partly heard him say was dealing with the past. I'm talking about moving ahead with this agenda item and for what it is. And the key word, you can listen, but let's not do any... discussion, which then becomes communication. Yeah, we're not nodding and I don't. Okay. Councilman Blower. Oh, excuse me. Enriquez. Sorry. Thank you, Mary. Just two questions. If you're able to answer city manager first, I'm just curious as to why this is coming up now. I can understand, I can make some assumptions, but I want to just get some clarity and also for the public to understand why it's coming up now. And then also on page two of three of the legislation text under present situation, it mentions here obviously we have nine recognized employee organizations and it gives the nine. And I'm just curious in terms of how, if all those nine are aware of this, obviously I know we had Sergeant High who spoke, but what about the other eight? TO HAVE THEY READ THROUGH IT, WHAT ARE THEIR THOUGHTS ON THIS? I MEAN, I WOULD LIKE TO HEAR FROM THEM AS WELL TO HAVE A DISCUSSION, BECAUSE I ALSO DON'T WANT TO RUSH SOMETHING WHEN THESE NINE GROUPS ARE VERY CRITICAL AND IMPORTANT FOR OUR COMMUNITY AND THE EMPLOYEES THAT WORK UNDER THEM. SO I WANT TO JUST BE ABLE TO UNDERSTAND HOW MUCH THEY KNOW AND ALSO TO GIVE A SAY. SO IF YOU CAN ANSWER THOSE TWO QUESTIONS, PLEASE. THE ANSWER TO THE FIRST QUESTION, WHY NOW? BECAUSE WE DO HAVE A NEW CHIEF NEGOTIATOR, NUMBER ONE. And these are the ground rules that we are working with the chief negotiator to put in place. So that's why it's coming now. Thank you. And we do have meetings that are scheduled for the month of March, this month. And our next council meeting is March 31st. So if we delay it, then we would sort of put ourselves in a position of not having to this policy in place. Other option, if you don't want to have the policy in place, that's fine and a-okay, and of course your votes would reflect that. Yeah, I just want to make sure, again, you didn't answer my question, have these other eight groups been notified and do they have context to provide their thoughts on this matter? Uh, no, not all eight necessarily has been notified of. And would it, in terms of if we were to push this to the end of March, I mean, again, it's three, three and a half weeks, give or take to give this out to these groups so they can provide their comment and we can get more understanding from them. Because again, only one of nine groups spoke and I want to make sure we're not rushing it, but I also want to make sure we're not impeding on anything that's, that's needed for our city as well. We have no problem in getting this out to the other uh... representatives of the of a union we're not necessarily asking them give us feedback on this this is the ground rule that we're putting in place for the council and asking you to abide by these rules thank you yes and i i do want to make a clarification because it said who put it on and it does say office of the mayor so i just saw that right now and i i just want to make a comment that This was something we all discussed. I didn't say put it on the agenda, but we did discuss it, and we talked about the new negotiator, and there was no political motivation behind this whatsoever. Vice Mayor. Thank you, Mayor. Yeah, I was actually going to jump in and say that, you know, the Brown Act does prohibit us from discussing closed session conversations, so we can't get too deep into that. This was discussed as a group. So this was the ground rules being set by the new negotiator coming in and wanting to establish one order to move us efficiently forward, I think, and also working with our manager and the council in a structured way to get us closer to resolution. So that is accurate. And so, yeah. Again, I think we're clear on the intent. uh... and and i think uh... i i i appreciate the conversation because it was never our intent to make anybody believe that this council is not interested in fact it's the complete opposite uh... that we we we want to i want to keep talking some end up in the brown that trouble but you know me but we'd like nothing more than to settle our contracts yes Councilman Rodriguez. Yes, just really quick. And the reason why I brought up who, why now is, again, I don't know if you're referring to political motivation from what I was saying, but that's not what I ever said, if that's the case. BUT JUST IN GENERAL, THE PUBLIC MAY NOT KNOW IT. THE PUBLIC MAY NOT READ IT, SO I JUST WANT TO REITERATE THAT OUT FOR THE PUBLIC THAT'S WATCHING AND THAT'S HERE, JUST SO WE HAVE A CLEAR UNDERSTANDING THAT YOU ALL UNDERSTAND AS WELL. SO EVEN THOUGH I LIKELY KNOW, I WANT TO MAKE SURE THE PUBLIC HEARS FROM US DIRECTLY. SO THAT IS WHY I BROUGHT THAT UP. YEAH, AND I WAS RESPONDING TO PATRICK. Sergeant High, who said it's election season and thought that this was politically motivated. And I think that is so far from the truth. And I see my colleagues were all on the same page on this. There was no ill intent whatsoever. New negotiator, wanting to start fresh, clean, and get things done. Councilwoman Padilla. I don't want to just continue and go over this. However, I like the fact that my colleague Enriquez brought up the fact of these other nine bargaining units. I would like to hear their thoughts. I'm sorry, I guess I'm just confused. Sorry. I've got a recommendation. Is it possible for us to approve the new negotiator and then come back with the language for, you know, how we move forward until all the other bargaining units are aware of it? Yes. Okay, so that's... Yeah. Yes. The only thing I want to say is that, and I'm not breaking the Brown Act. Well, I'm not breaking the Brown Act. When we give direction, I think it's important that we be very clear and stand on it because I don't want to get out here because perception matters. And when people watch these meetings, people take what they take from it. And when this kind of conversation happens, it may look like something shady was happening when we know as a group that that was far from the intention. But I agree going back, proving this negotiator who I fully believe is capable of doing the job on behalf of the city and then being very clear when we come back with what the guidelines are. I just want to just make one quick comment. The reason that we're not discussing it with the union is not for the union. This is for you. Okay, so what is the pleasure of counsel then? I like your recommendation. Okay, so is that a motion? I have a motion to accept your recommendation of just appointing the negotiator and then would we revisit the language? We'll table that until the next meeting. Second. Okay, I've got a motion and a second. Did you get that, Taryn? Chair, if I may, I understood the motion to approve the resolution for subsection one with the continuance of subsection two and the letters underneath for discussion with the labor negotiation groups and then clarification for the council. Correct. Okay, council please vote. Motion carries 7-0. Okay, now we are moving on to 12.9. approve motion to reject bids for the groupie Park pickleball courts project all right Thank You mayor yeah let's talk pickleball first of all I really want to thank the groupie Park pickleball players for coming out you are such a passionate group I love the coverage that you got in her life magazine when I saw this item come forward, I immediately thought I better reach out to you and get you to kind of understand. And the reason I pulled the item is I really want you to kind of know the details of what happened and why this item is on there. Because I know when you first see that approved motion to reject bids, that that may set off some alarm bells. And before I have Penny, our public works director, get up here to discuss this, I want to take the opportunity to thank you, Penny, and thank City Manager Johnny Ford and staff for getting this item to us as quickly as they did, because this was originally not going to be an item we were going to do until the end of the month. You know, I pointed out, boy, if we do that, we're going to lose a month on the whole project. So, I asked them if there was any way to expedite and get this item here before us tonight. So, I really thank you guys for doing that and getting on that. So, would you mind kind of addressing and just sort of explaining why we're here, what happened with the three bids? Certainly. Good evening, Madam Mayor and members of the Council. Penny Pasalusalu, Public Works Director. As Council Member Blower indicated, so the three bids that were received, the bid that was going to be awarded, the contract, they wrote the city and asked for a relief, meaning that they asked for their bid to be pulled back or canceled, so to speak, because of an error that they made, and they admitted that. They sent the city a letter to that. The second bidder was 34% higher than what the project would cost, and the third bidder didn't provide the city any numbers. So therefore, we are before the council this evening to reject those bid, but also we are ready, staff is ready to go back out for bid tomorrow morning. We've got our city engineer here, Mr. Alvarez, who signed off on the specs and the plans for the project. So we will go back out to bid tomorrow with the plans to award the closed bids by the end of the month. make an award and bring back to council on April 14th for an official award for contract for construction to begin. And is it your feeling that all three of the original bidders will most likely resubmit? Possibly. Okay. Yes. Or maybe we even get a fourth one in there. We could possibly get a fourth one, but we've reached out to... to those that provided the bids before as well. And you feel pretty good confidence that by mid-April we'll have a bid before us that we can approve? April 14th, council meeting. Perfect. And once that gets approved, then what's the timeline? So once that is approved and as long as we get all the documents from the winning bidder, they will provide us the timeline and we'll provide that to council. And can you bug them every day and make them go quick? I shall bug them every day. Okay. All right, well, thank you very much. Well, I would like to make a motion to approve this item. Second. We have a motion and second. Council, please vote. Thank you. Motion carries 7-0. Moving on then to item 12.10, approve motion to authorize professional services contract amendment number two for the French Camp Road and McDougal Boulevard traffic signal project. listen i was happy to see this on the agenda uh... yeah i was gonna actually asked when this was coming up but just wanted to know timeline because my neighbors every time i go somewhere ask about the stop sign i'm gonna to the time over to our city engineer to to talk about time good evening members of council uh... okay so this project is the uh... french camp and McDougal traffic signal. So it's, what we're doing right now is authorizing an amendment so that they can proceed with the NEPA. The good thing about this project is that we actually completed the design and we did that on purpose so we could leverage other money. We then applied for CMAQ funds because this is on our high priority list for signals. And we lucked out pretty good. So we have a little over a million dollars for construction. So the money is there for construction. But now since it's federal funds, it has to be NEPA. So this will enable us to complete the environmental, specifically the federal fund NEPA. And that will probably, we anticipate probably advertising some time by the end of the year to get through that NEPA. So this has to go through Caltrans. But the design is already done. I just want to thank you all for making this happen. You're welcome. So I have a motion to approve. Second. Council, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. I pulled 12.11, and I think Councilmember Enriquez did as well. So I'm actually happy that this is... Similar to Vice Mayor, I'm very happy that this is on the agenda because I think about Light Up Stockton and the fact that we said we were going to start in South Stockton and work our way up because we're talking about 133 lights that will then be along the Greenbelt in Western Ranch. But there was a problem with the first set that we got, we approved. Back in February? There was, per the PG&E standards, those poles were a little too tall. They were about 20 feet, and they were closer to the PG&E lines. So we had to send them back, and we got most of our money back. And so now we're acquiring the ones that are actually going to fit and not cause more problem. And these are solar lights, and we're going to install them on the existing poles and existing foundations. So it'll minimize the issues we've faced before with the theft of copper wires. And so this is a better option, but also, again, as mentioned, due to the standards that PG&E has set, those ones that were purchased earlier were too tall for the project. Okay, so what is the lifespan of what, I mean... Because we don't have to worry about the wires and then having no lights, but what is the typical lifespan? Because you figure with technology we've improved so much on it, and I know you did a pilot program already making sure that these were the right lights to have. What do they average? I don't have those details in front of me. With tonight's approval, we'll look at the options of the lights that we will purchase for this project and should be able to provide that information back to Council. And summer 2026 is supposed to be done? Yes. Okay. And then the last thing, how many, do you know how many lights we've repaired, fixed, changed out, ballpark figure? A lot. A lot. Okay. Okay. Well, and I just want to remind the public if there are lights out. Please make sure that you report them. If you can put the poll number, that helps us out. But we don't want any dark areas. I know Councilwoman Padilla, you know, she has a whole neighborhood because they came and got the wires. So I would say moving forward, solar is the way to go. Let's eliminate the chance of people destroying them by stealing the wires that end up costing us an exorbitant amount of money when we could have just put solar up. And then we don't have to worry about the wires. And the fact that we have CFDs in all these little communities, cha-ching, there should be some money there to replace those lights. So did you want to speak on that one? Okay. So if there are no other questions on this, I will happily make the motion to approve. Second. I have a motion and a second. Council, please vote. MOTION PASSES 6-0 WITH COUNCILMAN PADILLA BEING ABSENT. OKAY. MOVING ON TO 12.13. I THINK THAT WAS VICE MAYOR MAYBE? NO. OH, OKAY. ADOPT A RESOLUTION TO AWARD A PROFESSIONAL SERVICES CONTRACT FOR THE BRIDGE REHABILITATION AND REPLACEMENT PROGRAM PHASE FOUR PROJECT. YES. Mayor, members of council. Okay, this item is regarding our bridge program. What it does is it's, this is going to start the design on our next five bridges. We have a program list of bridges that's actually approved through FHWA and Caltrans. What that means is that we can get federal funds against those bridges, but only when the money is there. So we tend to get about four or five bridges off that list. And so one, and we coordinate with Caltrans. When the money's there, we start moving the project into design. And that's what we're doing here. WE HAVE THIS PROJECT IS APPROXIMATELY $878,000 WITH ABOUT 270-ISH OF FEDERAL FUNDS, THE REST BEING OUR LOCAL MONEY JUST TO DO THE REPAIRS OF ITEMS THAT AREN'T ELIGIBLE. AND THAT'S TO APPROVE A DESIGN CONTRACT FOR ABOUT $724,000 WITH CSG. AND THAT'S ESSENTIALLY WHAT THIS IS. THANK YOU FOR THAT OVERVIEW. JUST REALLY QUICK, YOU JUST MENTIONED THE The design project. Can you just, for the public, can you describe what that design, what it entails for these five bridges? And it says that the design will be completed by the first quarter of 2027. Sure. So basically we're talking about bridges here. So the consultant will first go and do a survey of each bridge, but predominantly what the design will entail, it comes off the bridge survey inspection reports from Caltrans. They go out there and they inspect them and they tell us what needs to be done. So that's the scope for this consultant together with some other miscellaneous repairs. The type of design work that they're doing predominantly is for bridge surface rehab. It's kind of like a resurfacing of the concrete of the bridge. And thank you. And then what can folks expect and what can this council expect after the first quarter of 2027? What would be the next steps for these five bridges? Okay, so once we get past the design, then we have to coordinate with Caltrans on programming the construction funds. And that's what we'll be doing. So... of the trick here is let's getting the design done and then we can leverage that construction money with caltrans so that's what you can expect next is for us to come forward once we have money for construction and advertise the project great thing and then by then by the end of or roughly we could say by the end of the first quarter of 2027 then obviously you just mentioned the next steps but we can also be able to by then get roughly a timeline obviously i know funding always plays a factor into that but that'd be helpful and then uh just for my district and just for the so i can say it out loud i'm proud that ONE OF THE FIVE BRIDGES IS IN MY DISTRICT, THE PERSIAN AVENUE OVER SMITH CANAL BRIDGE. SO THANK YOU. YEAH, OKAY. AND I HAD A COUPLE QUESTIONS ON THIS ITEM. SO MY CONCERN IS HAVING BEEN UNDER, WELL, WE CLEAN UP DUCK TREE, DUCK CREEK FOR COASTAL CLEANUP EVERY YEAR. AND THE FACT THAT IT HAS BEEN WORN AWAY AND WORN AWAY AND WORN AWAY UNDERNEATH THAT AS WELL AS MORMON SLU AT SAMUEL KEENE STREET, YOU KNOW, Part of the importance of this is making sure that our infrastructure isn't compromised to the place where it would create a situation that we don't want. And so I don't know if we're doing anything to kind of repair those or putting stabilizers in so that we don't have any collapse or anything like that. Yeah, good thought, good question. So I did talk with staff. As I mentioned, one of the items here isn't eligible for federal funding, and we've added on money, and that is for doing some slope stabilization under airport and Duck Creek and the San Joaquin River Bridge over Mormon Slope. So we're addressing that. Wonderful. Thank you so much. If there's no other conversations, a motion to approve? Second. We have a motion and second. Council, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. Okay, moving on to 12.14. I know that I pulled that one and I think Councilmember Enriquez did. So part of my thing on this, it is the approve a motion to award a professional services contract for the KITS traffic control system project. So anybody that's been driving down recently, down center in El Dorado, all of it used to be timed. where you could get from one end to the other end. If you drove, it's 40 miles an hour I want to say, I could, yes, especially on El Dorado. But now you've got to stop and smell the roses and stop and smell the roses. And it is slowing traffic down, but sometimes there's a little traffic jam. So this traffic control will help us in that endeavor to make sure that traffic is moving. Yes, traffic questions. They're always nice. So yes, it will. This is actually the platform that we use as part of the city's traffic control management center. And if you don't know right now, we're rebuilding that. And it's almost complete in our new city hall offices. And this is the platform that we use to communicate with each signal intersection out there. And it's specifically for what we call synchronization, timing the signals, and getting that progression to move as efficient as possible. Yeah, because some of the concern obviously is purging, you know, when they come off and it would be nice if it was, it had to be activated because there was a car there. Right. And I don't care if they were all red, but until a car gets there, it doesn't turn green. That's one specific location that staff is currently using it on and they're monitoring it and we have discussions on that regarding. the amount of congestion there, and relative to speeds. So we do adjust them that way. And then the last thing that I get asked all the time is about red light cameras. And I know there's a new law regarding red light cameras. And instead of the money going somewhere else, I think I was told that the money from red light camera violations would come potentially back to Public Works. But I know that... IT'S BEEN SOMETHING THAT HAS BEEN ASKED, AND I KNOW OTHER CITIES ARE STARTING, THEY'RE UP. SO I DON'T KNOW IF THAT'S IN OUR PIPELINE, BUT I KNOW IT'S SOMETHING THAT WE GET ASKED ALL THE TIME. CERTAINLY A CONVERSATION HAS BEGUN REGARDING THAT TOPIC, SO PER THE CITY MANAGER'S DIRECTION, I'VE GOT SOME PEOPLE TO MAKE PHONE CALLS TO SO I CAN GATHER DATA BEFORE WE START BRINGING SOME SERIOUS CONVERSATION ON THAT SUBJECT. OKAY. THANK YOU. OH, OKAY. OKAY. SO BRING IT BACK TO COUNCIL. Motion to approve. Second. We have a motion to second. Council, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. 12.16. Oh, we just, oh, no. Yeah. Adopt a resolution to award a professional services contract for the Airport Way and 6th Street Traffic Signal Installation and Synchronization Project. Vice Mayor. Never thought I would see this. This is great. If you can just share for the public this, what we're going to do here. It would be great. Anybody? Okay, my pleasure. Okay, so this project right here, we're entering in design. It has essentially two components. One is the airport way and 6th Street signal. And then the other pieces of this is being able to synchronize signals from MLK all the way to the ARCH airport. So it has that component together with some upgrades of those signals in order to enable us to do that. So that's essentially the project. So let me understand this. So we're not putting a traffic signal there? At airport and 6 we are. Right now it's a T intersection with stop control along 6. We're going to put in a signal there. So help me, okay, so I'm coming from my grandmother's house on 6th Street to turn right on airport. There'll be a signal there? There'll be a signal there. Instead of a stop sign? Yes. But there won't be a signal going the other direction? There'll be a signal at all directions. Really? Yes. Oh, wow. So that will also help because you'll be able to put pedestrian crossings across as well. I mean, yeah, this is exciting. I don't know where it came from, but I'm glad that it's here. Oh, yeah, I did. I want all the credit for this. Yeah, and if I can brag a little bit about staff, they actually put together a grant and they've been putting these together and getting money, CMAQ money for air quality for these signals. So it's a big win for us. No, it's interesting because as a kid we always wanted to cross that street, but you know, you're risking your life doing that. So this is great. What is the timeline for this? Well, this is designed similar to the other one. This one has to go through all the environmental and all that, and it is federal funds. It normally takes us around six to nine months just to get through the design. And then after that, we can look forward to, we have money for construction, so when we advertise and go to construction. So with any luck, we can finish design maybe by the first quarter of next year and then advertise a project. So a timeline, like completion. Completion, well. I'm going to have three years. Is federal usually you got to have it spent in five years or something if it's federal? Yeah, well, I mean, there's all kinds of deadlines. But with us, it's, there's no, once we get the money and it's a go. So right now, we're just trying to get through design. It takes six to nine months just for design. So let's say by the end of the year or beginning of first quarter of next year, we can advertise the project. And then eventually award next year sometime. And then if we get into construction next year sometime, we might be able to have it in by next year, maybe. It just depends on the weather. It depends on if we encounter any issues in design. So I can get a better timeline. Yeah, if you can get a timeline, that would be great. Yeah. But that's great. Motion to approve. Second. Council, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. Okay. The last consent item that was pulled was adopt a resolution approving the property tax allocation agreement between the city of Stockton, San Joaquin County for the Murray Ranch project annexation. And I know this is something that this council has been talking about quite extensively and actually Murray Ranch, we had it, we continued it, we had it again. But I know vice mayors talked, quite extensively about getting this tax sharing agreement done. And I just want to thank staff. I want to thank the county. I mean, Mario, excuse me, Supervisor Gardea and I, we talk about this a lot. And just so people understand, you know, we're at 90% to 10%. So the county gets 90 and we only get 10%. Now it's going to be 60% for county and 40%. the city and so i did a little calculation and you can correct me if i'm wrong but there's 217 proposed lots for murray ranch let's just say they each sell for on average four hundred thousand dollars um so you look at that one percent of those houses we would have gotten 86 800 that would be our share of the tax agreement And now, while some people will say, oh, it's not that much, we can almost buy one of those houses then with what we'll be getting with the 40%, which would be 347,200. But remember, it's cumulative. It only grows. It is going to help us out. And what would you say then we would be able to do with those funds? Well, the money goes into the general fund, so. So we would be able to fund projects that we haven't been able to fund, maybe? Well, playgrounds, just all kinds of different things within a general fund. And we can maybe, with our long-range financial plan, not be so down low. Vice Mayor? Thank you, Mary. Yeah. One of the things, you know, as an entrepreneur, I always think about, you know, how do I increase my revenue? Because with more money, you can do more. So with more, you can do more. Right. And one of the things that has been challenging is just really coming in as a new elected is looking at this in a way. How can we increase our tax base? How can we increase our revenue? Because when we have more, we can do more. We can fix more things. We can increase. We can fix a lot of things that we lost during the bankruptcy. There's a lot of things you can do when you have more money, and you become less reliant on certain special taxes, and you can probably look at doing other special taxes. I know one thing, since I've been here, that gets Will excited is when we talk about how we fix this tax share agreement. So I just want to say, City Manager Ford and Will, both of you, great job with you and staff for getting us here. And I think, as the Mayor indicated, I mean, to be able to go from a 90-10 or 80-20 to a 60-40, uh... as we continue to build the city allows us to earn a lot more resources so that's a great accomplishment i'm just glad that we were able to do that and i just think for district six as we start to get into more development discussions and i'll share more of my council comments we're gonna be looking at infrastructure that's a whole other conversation but we need more money to be able to address some of the challenges that we've had for years so thank you if there's no more questions i'll make a motion to approve i just have a quick question when's it gonna go before the board of supervisors because if we approve it tonight will it go onto their agenda for next Tuesday? They're working on that. I'm not going to promise for them, but they are working towards that, yes. Okay, because it's not a done-dada until they vote on it. Correct. Okay, well, council members, make sure you call your supervisor. I'll make a motion to approve, and I'll get the word over there. Okay, second. Everybody seconded. Okay, council, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. Okay, that brings us now... to 16.1. Does anybody need... Oh, he went out. I was going to say a quick break. Okay, yes, please, is what I was told. Back to order, and we are going on to new business. So 16.1, adopt a resolution to approve the Downtown Stockton Property and Business Improvement District 2025 annual report proposed 2026 operating budget and fiscal year 2526 property assessments. Hello, Ms. McCarty. Good evening, Mayor. Tina McCarty, Economic Development Director. So the item before you, you read the resolution and the actions that are before you tonight, so I will not repeat myself. The one point I do want to make about this item is that this item is an annual report from the Downtown Stockton Alliance. It comes before council and needs your approval for their current budget. It gives them an opportunity to share with you the results of the previous year, and we need your approval for the in the coming year so this happens annually this is not tonight's actions have nothing to do with the redistricting that we've spoken about over the last few months this is the current district that is currently in place and asking for your approval for the budget for this last current year under the P bid the action you would previously taken takes effect January 1 of 27 With that, I'm happy to introduce CEO Mike Huber to give you a presentation about DSA. You're up. Thank you, Ms. McCarty. Mayor, Vice Mayor, Council Members, hope everybody's well tonight. I'm Mike Huber. I'm the Executive Director of Downtown Stockton Alliance, and I'm here to present for our 2025 review and 26 budget. Let's see if this is loaded up. THERE WE GO. SO THE DOWNTOWN STOCKTON ALLIANCE, THIS IS FOR OUR 25 ANNUAL REPORT FOR THE REVIEW OF OUR BUDGET FROM LAST YEAR AND OUR BUDGET MOVING FORWARD INTO 2026. THE DOWNTOWN ALLIANCE IS A 501 NONPROFIT PROPERTY AND BUSINESS BASED IMPROVEMENT DISTRICT. WE ARE CONVERTING TO THE CID, WHICH YOU GUYS VOTED ON. IT SEEMS LIKE I JUST WAS UP HERE. This is our current map. The colors represent the service zones. So the kind of blue-purple in the middle is for all services. The pink areas on the outside receive just maintenance and marketing. And the orange, which is west of Center Street going down Weber, is just for marketing. In 2027, all those will blend into all services provided. Our 2025 budget, and I know when you look at net income, that residual money is from American Rescue Act funds that were given to us that we're slowly working down and we'll have to have spent by the end of the 2026 year. Our budget for 2026 will show a small net income of $7,100. That is for administrative services for the grants that we are managing. This is the maintenance team. They do sidewalk cleanup, waste removal, empty the garbage cans, weeds, abatement, leaves, pressure washing. I'm real proud of this team. And this is what the stats were from 2025. As you can see, we empty a lot of trash cans and do a lot of power washing and waste removal. Clean and safe team, keeping downtown beautiful. The community ambassador team does a lot of things. The most of what they do is try to connect the unsheltered with services. We get out and talk to them, but we also do escorts. If you have a car that has broken down and you need a jumpstart, we'll do that for you. Wayfinding for our visitors. And we participate in the business watch with the Stockton Police Department. There's one of the cars if you haven't already seen one. Marketing and economic development. We will market for any of the businesses or property owners to help them fill their properties or if they've got things going on. Business ownership, if you're looking to sell your property or we need to get you some resources and we can advocate for you, we do that. We have a entrepreneurial loan fund that will loan up to $65,000 if you want to start a new business in downtown, or if you want to grow your business. And then grants, the American Rescue Act and coming out of COVID, we managed quite a few grants for not only the city, but the county. Someone's broken windows, entrepreneur, where if you would pay your first chamber membership, just to enhance downtown. We did a facade program in 2024 for the city that was very successful. We were able to do 83 properties to really help out property owners that suffered through the pandemic. These are our American Rescue Act statistics. Interestingly enough, the window wraps that we have done that puts an advertising in the windows, none of those windows have been broken. And I don't know whether that's an anomaly or whether whoever breaks the windows is respecting the artwork, but none of them have been broken. So that's an interesting statistic. Mr. Huber, you just reminded me of something. Okay. So we have window wraps at the arena parking lot that have been there for 10 years. maybe less they're really starting to fade I don't know if there's a possibility for I just thrown it out there because they've gotten really light from the Sun beating down on them so not the ones under but on the edge so I know our still looks great over there but thank you events that we support their downtown seems to be the kind of the hub of all the events and we're proud to partner with all of the promoters and the city and the county to promote events downtown promote our sports teams I don't for those of you that have seen we did the crosswalk murals for both the parts and the Kings and just recently added to the Kings because of their championship last year And there are our QR codes if you'd like to follow us. We increased our memberships on our platforms by over 270% this year, so we have almost 30,000 followers that follow us. We did a commercial last year that ran on Fox 40 that reached out to a 50-mile radius outside of Stockton with hopes of bringing people into downtown to see what a great and historic downtown we have. THANK YOU. ANY QUESTIONS? COUNCIL MEMBER VILLAPUDO. WELL, THANK YOU, MIKE. I APPRECIATE EVERYTHING YOU GUYS DO AND YOUR CREW. NOT TOO LONG AGO, I WAS OUT THERE CLEANING UP WITH YOUR TEAM. THEY SHOWED ME A GREAT HOSPITALITY. THEY GOT ME TO WORK, BOY. AND I LEARNED A LOT ABOUT THEM, HOW THEY CARE ABOUT THE CITY. And I'll be going very shortly, do some water pressure for you, actually for our district. So keep up the great job. You've done phenomenal. Looking forward to working with you and your team in the future. So thanks. Thank you very much for coming out and volunteering that day. The crew really felt really good about having your presence there. And, yeah, we're going to get you back out there in the next couple weeks to help out again. Anyone else? Well, no, is Brando a hard worker? You know, he actually was, and I got pictures, so we can share those with you. If you go on our Facebook page, you'll see he was out there. My guys were supervising. What was he wearing? That's the question. We put him in a maintenance shirt and hat. He's got to be part of the team if he's out there for safety reasons. Okay. Do we have any public comment on this item? We do not. Okay, bring it back to council. if you want to make a motion or comments or discussion or a motion motion to approve second we have a motion a second council please vote motion carries 7-0 okay moving on to item 12 point i mean excuse me 16.2 acceptance and posting of the fiscal year 2025-26 annual budget document oh don't drop anything Hello, Mr. Garcia. While they get that queued up, I'll introduce myself again, Gilbert Garcia, CFO with the City of Stockton. And I'd also like to introduce our new budget officer, Mr. John El-Amin. Is it there? All right. So first, I'd like to acknowledge our budget team. They've worked very hard. We've had a lot of vacancies in ASD. And even within the budget office itself, and our team has consistently stepped up, provided high-quality work. So I just want to publicly acknowledge them here. All right. So normally, a budget is published within about 60 days of adoption. However, in this case, we waited a little longer. because staff wanted to make sure that the budget that we're presenting reflects the budget that council adopted on June 24th. So I'll probably be providing this overview a couple of times as I present quarterly reports. But our overall citywide budget for 25-26 was $982 million. About half of that goes to three departments. namely police, fire, and municipal utilities. Our general fund budget is about $328 million. About 76% or roughly three quarters of our budget goes towards police and fire. THIS SLIDE REFLECTS CHANGES OR ADJUSTMENTS THAT WERE MADE TO THE PROPOSED BUDGET AND WERE PRESENTED IN THE STAFF REPORT ON JUNE 24TH. THEY REFLECT BASICALLY BUDGET REQUESTS THAT WERE DENIED AS WELL AS A TRANSFER FROM THE ERP PROJECT WHICH IS THE TYLER MUNIS PROJECT OF 1.7 MILLION AND ADJUSTMENTS TO OUR SALARY VACANCY FACTOR. So we increased the vacancy savings within the general fund. This next slide or this slide reflects all of the items that were on the previous slide, plus a couple of additional items. So one was the adjustment to the city manager's community engagement budget, which I'll talk about a little more in the next slide. and then yes vice mayor has a question thank you mayor yeah you know you know i've been waiting for this presentation i have lots of questions but i just want to really quick understand this slide a little bit because some you know the one thing i do appreciate about this group is that when we came into office we did say and i think the mayor was one that said we're not going to do a budget in four hours right and i think we spent three days if i can recall at the bottom it says optic salary allocation to other funds what is that line item So both of the bottom line items reflect the amount of salaries that are budgeted to other funds. So we'll just say those salaries were charged mostly to the general fund, and then the allocation to other funds was increased, which decreased the allocation to the general fund. OK. I'm new to this process, so you have to give me budget for dummies, right? What does that mean? So it means those people, their time is charged less to the general fund and more to other funds. So for every hour they work, for every dollar they make, less is charged to the general fund and more is charged to the other funds that they work on. So for example, yeah. I'm confused. All right. And the reason why I'm confused is because as we get through here and I get to my questions, the Optic Department is not in this budget. So when we talk about OPTIC, I'm just trying to, because for me, we're not talking about monopoly money. We're talking about taxpayer funds, and we're all stewards of those funds. And wanting to understand OPTIC's salary allocation to other funds, what does that mean, especially when we're talking about a budget that doesn't include the department? First, let me go back and try to clear up the steward transition from Ministry of Service Department to Department mud and public works so both mud and public works are their own funds and so whereas the minister of services that was within the general fund by taking that function from the general fund and putting it over into those other funds those other funds now are carrying that budget okay And so the store's responsibility is still with the total city, but it's now located within Mudd. And with it being located in Mudd and Public Works, those monies are coming out of their budget and it reduces the amount of money that was attached to the general fund. And so the store's transition from ASD to Mudd and Public Works, those allocation changes, are those monies that go from one department to another? In essence, yes. In respect to this. But not fully transferable. So 100% of the money within the general fund did not necessarily go to. Correct. So for example, let's say my time right now is, all of my salary and benefits would be budgeted in the general fund right now. And let's just say we say you know what the municipal utilities district you know a lot of your effort and work goes to that so 20 percent of your time should go towards say municipal utilities. And so then you would see a drop in the admin services you know general fund budget and then a proportionate increase in municipal utilities or what other whatever other fund I happen to be spending time on and we could document that I am spending time on that activity. But for my own education, for the public's education, I guess the reason why I'm asking the question is if that's the case and we know that funds transfer from department to department require council approval, is there something that for this particular instance it would not apply? Meaning your salary that may come from ASD now 20% needs to come from Public Works. Would that fund, that funding that comes from Public Works that we approve then have to be approved by council to then pay for? SOMETHING IN ANOTHER DEPARTMENT OR TRANSFER. SO TYPICALLY THOSE ALLOCATION CHANGES WOULD BE BROUGHT TO COUNCIL. SO MY QUESTION IS, BECAUSE I'M GOING TO TRACK EVERYTHING WE TALK ABOUT HERE, FOR THOSE ALLOCATIONS, I DON'T REQUIRE, I DON'T REMEMBER US, MAYBE WE DID DO A COUNCIL APPROVAL, WAS THERE, DID YOU FIND WHERE WE APPROVED THOSE FUND TRANSFERS? NO, THOSE WERE NOT SPECIFICALLY BROUGHT TO COUNCIL. I BELIEVE THOSE WERE MEASURES THAT WERE MADE TO PARTIALLY OFFSET the additional positions in OVP, but I wasn't here, but just looking at the, roughly at the dollar amounts. So I believe that was part of the balancing measure to offset the additional salaries. During the original budget approval process? So those were approved, right? The additional OVP were brought to council, but the offsetting was not brought back to council. Okay, so in layman terms, did we follow the rules with that? Not we, because y'all weren't here. So I would say we're presenting it now, and one of the actions that council could do is direct staff to make any corrections. The question, I want to be very clear on the question. The question isn't what can the council do, because we know our authority. The question is, was what happened, did it follow proper protocol? Um... Yeah, I would say I would have brought it back to council. So the answer is no. Okay, we can move on. Thank you. Sorry, Councilwoman Padilla. Thank you, Mayor. Just so I can get some clarification. So on this slide, the general fund, it says request. So, for example, optic salary allocation to other funds. So that was a credit. to another funding account. That's what this is saying. Right. There was an offsetting increase in other funds outside of the general fund. That came into the general fund. So no money was transferred into the general fund, just less money was spent in the general fund and then more money was spent elsewhere. Okay. And then to other funds, do you know what other funds? Off the top of my head, I don't. I'd have to look that up. Okay. Thank you. That's all I have. Vice Mayor? I'll be brief, and if the mayor wants to help me, because she's had more experience at this than I have, and I appreciate the honesty. I think the thing for me is we know we have a lot of taxpayer money, and we know we have multiple accounts, and we have, and you just showed the slide where there's different uses for different accounts. But we don't commingle funds, and we don't dip in and out of accounts without structured process, and we have rules that we have to follow, and then we have processes for oversight. We oversee budget allocations because once it comes before us, we go through a thorough process. We as good stewards of the money, we approve it, and then staff go back and do what they need to do. And if for whatever reason things need to be changed, they bring it back to us. So that's the oversight mechanism. And that's part of why we're in an audit because we have had some challenges before you all got here, and we're grateful that you're here now. Specifically for these two items my colleague just brought up, What I understand if I can just understand here one more time is that there was money spent to offset cost to the general fund by these other funds. So it may be a position in one department or division, right, or office that then is pulling money from different locations other than the general fund to pay for it. What you're saying is that it should have come back to council discussion approval correct yes that's what you would have done right as a budget balancing measure I would have communicated to counsel with a follow-up that this is how a balance the budget was and so when we talk about optics salary allocation to other funds is that SALARY LIKE JUST PAID POSITIONS OR IS THAT POSITIONS MATERIALS EQUIPMENT AND SO FORTH JUST SALARY OKAY THANK YOU AND JUST FUTURE REFERENCE IT SHOULD BE UH EQUIPMENT AND OTHER THINGS BECAUSE THEY ARE USING THOSE EQUIPMENTS FOR THOSE OTHER DEPARTMENTS SO WE WILL START TO TRY TO CAPTURE THOSE EXPENDITURES Yes, and then I have a question piggybacking off that. So in the 24-25, before we got on here, but that budget, there was an ORT chart, you know, that shows all the positions that are funded. And at that time, there were 41 positions funded that fell under the city manager's umbrella. And so... AS WE LOOK AT THAT, WHO HAS THE ABILITY TO RESTRUCTURE OR CHANGE THE POSITIONS UNDER THAT BUDGET, UNDER THAT HEADING OF THE CITY MANAGER'S OFFICE? WHO CAN CHANGE THE POSITION? IF WE INCREASE It's got to come back before council, right? The city council, yes. Right. If we decrease those numbers, or often the position just sits there vacant, correct? That happens a lot. And then there's vacancy savings. Correct. Okay. So did we increase any numbers? Did we increase from 41 from the 24-25 year in the budget, or did we decrease? Overall. for the city manager's office. YOU CAN ANSWER IT LATER. ACTUALLY, I HAVE AN ORC CHART IN MY OFFICE I CAN GO GRAB, BUT I'LL WAIT. BUT JUST GO AHEAD WITH YOUR PRESENTATION. I'LL LOOK THAT UP. SO THE CITY MANAGER HAD $150,000 IN PREVIOUS YEARS APPROPRIATED FOR COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT. That money was reallocated to various departments, so about $73,000 went to the city attorney, about $55,000 to the city clerk, and the remaining funds were distributed to the mayor and city council in their discretionary budgets. So this chart shows where the reserves are as of our fiscal year 25-26 budget. So the good news is we are 16.7% working capital reserve is fully funded in the current year budget. However, we still have a lot of work to do to the tune of over $100 million of beefing up our reserves that were set by policy. So there are two items brought for your consideration this evening. ONE IS TO ACCEPT THE STATUS REPORT ON THE 2526 ADOPTED BUDGET AND THE OTHER IS TO DIRECT STAFF OR ACCEPT THE BUDGET DOCUMENT AND THEN TO DIRECT STAFF TO MAKE ANY CHANGES OR CORRECTIONS TO THIS DOCUMENT. AND I'M HAPPY TO TAKE YOUR QUESTIONS. VICE MAYOR? THANK YOU, MAYOR. Okay, before we go on, I want to flip to our budget books. I don't know if Council has their budget book, but I do have mine. Page K6, well, actually, before we go to K6, I just want to highlight for the record that this budget book that you provided is different than the one that I have in the back. In one respect, before we even start, that it was prepared at the time at in june when we went through the process by o p d a which was the office of performance data analytics that department in subsequent conversations to my understanding was eliminated prior to that budgeting process but nonetheless the budget book was presented when developed by the department and the reason why bring that up and why i like that is important is that on page k six under the city manager department there's an actual drawing in this budget book A ORG CHART OF THE CITY MANAGER DEPARTMENT AND IT STARTS WITH CITY MANAGER AT THE TOP AND THEN A LINE DOWN TO CITY DEPARTMENTS AND THEN THERE'S A DEPARTMENT IN HERE, OFFICE OF PERFORMANCE AND DATA ANALYTICS. SO IT'S IN THE BUDGET BOOK BUT IT'S THE PAGE THAT WAS IN THE ORIGINAL BUDGET BOOK THAT WE APPROVED THAT PREPARED THIS BUDGET HAS BEEN DELETED. THEN I WANT TO FLIP TO PAGE K-8 WHERE IT SAYS THE OFFICE OF PERFORMANCE DATA ANALYTICS AND IT DESCRIBES WHAT THAT DEPARTMENT DOES. Then I want to flip to page K-25. And this is the thing that I think is the most disrespectful to this council's oversight. And I also want to acknowledge that the staff who are here presenting weren't here when this happened. You know, if you look at Office of Performance Data Analytics, which is in this budget book, what does the last column show you? It's the 25-26 budget is blank. The department that created the presentation, the department that's listed herein is zeroed out. I can say zeroed out is correct, right? Correct. Okay, so when we voted on this budget, it didn't have an optic department or an office of optic in here, and it's still not in this budget book, correct? That's correct. Okay, and so can you please explain to the council, because maybe some of my colleagues may not know, If this department was zeroed out, where's that money for that department or office? So that money was moved to the administration budget, so the category right above it. Okay, so that means – and I'm sorry, I used office of – I mean, I used department of – Performance Data Analytics, it's Office of Performance Data Analytics. And the reason why I have to say that is there are rules that govern how money is transferred between offices within a department and then departments. So within the manager's department, and there's different offices, he can move or she can move money around or positions around. If a position is to go from one department to another, that would require council approval, correct? That's correct. Okay. And so can you just explain for the public and for council, if this office was zeroed out, where did the money go and then what happened? So the money was eliminated from the Office of Performance and Data Analytics, and it was moved into the city manager's administration budget. So not all of the money was moved because they had some one-time money, and so that was not – INCLUDED IN THE NEXT YEAR'S BUDGET. SO YOU'RE NOT GOING TO SEE A ONE FOR ONE, BUT THE POSITIONS, I THINK IT WAS THREE POSITIONS THAT WERE IN OFFICE OF PERFORMANCE AND DATA ANALYTICS THAT WERE MOVED TO THE CITY MANAGERS OFFICE. THE FUNDING FOR THOSE POSITIONS AND MAYBE SOME MATERIALS AND SUPPLIES WERE MOVED TO THE CITY MANAGERS ADMINISTRATION BUDGET. SO IF OPTIC IS NOT IN THE BUDGET, that were being presented tonight, then how were the positions then paid for? Were they paid for through this administrative budget? So the positions themselves are funded in the administration budget. OK. So in layman's terms, if I was just somebody that fell upon this, the Office of Performance Data Analytics was eliminated. It was zeroed out in the budget. The money was then put in the administrative account. We approved the budget with the money in the administration account, and then office of optic was created from that that is a funding source for i guess the short answer is yes that that's how it was paid for and here's the reason why i bring that up i bring it up for a few reasons one this council was tasked with a whole extra day of figuring out how to find money for our office of violence prevention and for our city attorney and our city clerk and we had to really i mean we had to squeeze things around to make this fit and we were never told that there was money being held for an entire department in an administration fund it would have made our conversations a lot easier especially when we were talking about prevention services because i think when we when we approve this budget and not even think and my colleagues can remind me we said 190 million was going towards pd and 2 million at the time or a little over 2 million was going towards ovp And then OVP had to come do a whole presentation. So I just, for me, I feel like I wasn't presented with a proper report. And I don't know how and why that happened, but nonetheless, that's what happened. Now I'm still looking over documents because the other thing that I said was I believe the presentation of OPTIC was a department initially, and then somewhere along the way it turned into office. Does anybody, I don't know if the city manager, anybody find anywhere where it was presented as a department and then later converted to office? I'm looking through transcripts as I'm talking, so. What does OPTICS stand for? Oh, I know what it, yeah. It's an acronym. Yes. I know what OPTICS stands for in this context, but when it was first presented, I believe it was presented as a department. I could be wrong. But the thing that's important to note is that when we were told about the vision of OPTIC, we were not, we did not approve a OPTIC budget. And it's not, to your point, you said it's not in the budget, correct? That organization is not reflected discreetly or separately as its own thing in the budget, no. Then I'll just ask one more question, then I'll move on. How do we fund materials, computers, phones, phone bills, other expenditures from a department that's not in our budget? are we paying for that and where's that money coming from so so that is within the city manager's administration budget okay so and it and it may have been called a department and changed to an office but uh now it stands as an office as an office okay i think one thing that's important for council to know is how much are we now spending from this administration budget because there's no specifically defined allocations for this office correct correct in the budget it's not broken out and is there going to be an amendment before council today on that because at some point we need to legitimize the office or maybe or don't we so you can uh AGAIN, YOU COULD DIRECT STAFF TO MAKE THAT, TO BRING THAT BACK, OR TO IMPLEMENT THAT CHANGE IN THE BUDGET, IF YOU WISH. BUT, AGAIN, I WANTED TO KEEP THE PROPOSED BUDGET DOCUMENT AND THE ADOPTED AS CLOSE AS POSSIBLE, AND I DIDN'T WANT TO INITIATE THOSE CHANGES. SO I WOULD REQUIRE DIRECTION FROM COUNCIL TO DO THAT. I'LL YIELD UNTIL MY COLLEAGUES HAVE. THANK YOU, MAYOR. SO I HAVE A COUPLE QUESTIONS. WHEN MUST A PROPOSED BUDGET BE COMPLETED? SO TYPICALLY... I MEAN JUST FOR COUNCIL. IS IT LIKE MAY 15TH OR SOMETHING LIKE THAT? SOMETHING LIKE THAT. SO WE NEED A PUBLIC HEARING AND THEN 30 DAYS FROM THAT FOR ADOPTION. SO SOMETIME AROUND MID-MAY TYPICALLY IS WHEN IT WOULD HAVE TO BE COMPLETED IN ORDER TO MAKE THAT PUBLIC HEARING DATE. RIGHT. AND THEN IT COMES BEFORE COUNCIL. as as the vice mayor said we discuss you know uh... uh... in ask questions about the budget in the allocations uh... uh... and like o p d a the term optic i think was was from the beginning but i i want a point i want to ask another question so previously We had a PIO office, but I don't, community engagement, I'm trying to remember what it was because it went to the voters and the voters approved a PIO I think when we got elected. And then there was a PIO position that was created based on the vote. But it was Connie, Rosie, and Thomas that were in that office. You wouldn't know because you weren't here. And then you said OPDA had three positions? Correct. Okay, so three plus three is six. How many people are in OPTIC? I believe there are three, and if you count the PIO, that would make a fourth person. I would say there are five, and I'm counting the PIO. But there is still Thomas. THAN LOUIE, MARIANNE, AND ERNESTINA. SO WE ACTUALLY ARE A PERSON DOWN, BUT THEN BECAUSE THE PIO POSITION WAS VOTED ON, THAT'S AN ADDITIONAL POSITION THAT WASN'T THERE PRIOR. THERE WAS A COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT. I'M TRYING TO REMEMBER WHAT CONNIE'S TITLE WAS. I CAN'T QUITE REMEMBER. COMMUNITY RELATIONS OFFICER. OKAY, THANK YOU. SO IN TRYING TO UNDERSTAND HOW OUR BUDGETS WORK, INITIALLY, IT'S JUST PROPOSED. WE COULD HAVE CHANGED ANYTHING WE WANTED TO IN THAT BUDGET. WE COULD HAVE ADDED POSITIONS AS STATED, WHICH WE DISCUSSED FOR OVP THAT LATER WHEN GRANT FUNDING, BECAUSE WE TALKED ABOUT GRANT FUNDING WHEN GRANT FUNDING CAME AVAILABLE. But the number of positions, just like 425 officers, we budget for 425 officers, even if we don't have 425 officers, correct? Correct. And so if there are 41 positions, no matter what the title is, but there's 41 positions in the city manager's office, those 41 positions still stay there, vacant or not. And that... whoever is the city manager Johnny could then go in there and say oh I want to change this position to is that I mean mr. Ford am i saying something incorrect okay okay so so I just I'm doing a numbers count and I realize that salaries are probably different so we have to look look at that but the authority for positions in the city mayor managers office is the city manager correct within the city manager's office yes so any position in there he can ebb and flow how he desires correct okay thank you vice mayor thank you mayor and thank you for that training i think the thing that's important to note is that this council and i can ask us all to raise hands for the public if we want to how many people up here were aware that the OPDA, the Office of Performance Data Analytics was eliminated prior to us going through multiple audits. I can say my colleagues up here without question did not know. One person should not know about how the money is moved, how the offices are dismantled, how the reorganization of our city is happening without the full council, especially if we're talking about money moving from department to department. And the reason why I say department is because I'm looking at a transcript here from one of our meetings where I said, and we were talking about the budget, specifically in $926,487 of taxpayer money being spent, I said for this department, which is to me, and I mean, and I go on and say, I don't even know how to make sense of that given the needs we have for OVP, just thinking about our Office of Violence Prevention. I went into the breakdown. down in down in the transcribe and again this is why we're having this public discussion but the record is important i asked specifically about this and what the pio said at the time was that he refers to this as a department and he says that he uses the word department as a colloquialism i think that's how you say that word that's not how we discuss our money transferring within the city We talk about money transferring within the offices. The mayor just said, yes, the manager has the ability to move money around, but the manager does not have discretion to hide money from council, get it approved, and then go move it around like it's on a monopoly board. That's just not the way taxpayer money should be used or should be handled. And I know with the mayor's experience, she would not even approve that. So again, I don't want to debate that here, but I just want to point out that a couple of things for the record. We have a office here functioning defined within the institution that I don't even know has policies that doesn't have line item structured council approved budgeting and is pulling from an administration account that's being treated like a slush fund and that is not proper fiscal stewardship. So I'll yield on that point but I just think that before we leave here I do want to give some direction if we can as a council. ANY OTHER QUESTIONS FROM COUNCIL? OTHERWISE, WE'LL GO TO PUBLIC COMMENT. DO WE HAVE PUBLIC COMMENT ON THIS ITEM? CYNTHIA GAYLE BOYD. MAYOR, I'M SO GRATEFUL FOR YOU MOVING THIS UP TO THE TOP. I KNOW BEFORE, MAYBE TWO MEETINGS BACK, BECAUSE IT WAS THREE MEETINGS IN A ROW WHERE THE PUBLIC WAS KIND OF HELD HOSTAGE UNTIL THE END OF THE MEETING. AND THEN ONE OF THOSE YOU SAID IS BECAUSE WE NEED THE PUBLIC TO STAY AND TO BE INFORMED. WELL, YOU SEE, SOME OF US DECIDE TO STAY ANYHOW AND TO BE INFORMED. BUT THERE'S BEEN A LOT OF WORDS FROM OVER THERE, AND I CAN'T REMEMBER ALL OF THEM, BUT ONE THING THAT STRUCK MY INTEREST WAS WHEN YOU SAID SOMETHING ABOUT THE CITY MANAGER GIVING UP HIS MONEY. I DON'T REMEMBER IF IT WAS $150,000, WHAT IT WAS. AND THAT IT WAS GIVEN HERE, AND SOME OF IT WAS GIVEN THERE, AND THAT MAYBE IT WAS $50,000 THAT WAS GIVEN TO THE CITY CLERK'S OFFICE, WAS THAT, AND I'M NOT GREAT AT ALL THE NUMBERS, BUT WHATEVER AMOUNT OF MONEY THAT THE CITY MANAGER, AND IT WAS PROBABLY THAT COLANGIO AT THE TIME, WHATEVER AMOUNT THAT WAS GIVEN FROM HIS OFFICE, AND I DID HEAR A RELATIONSHIP WITH THE CITY CLERK'S OFFICE, WAS THAT THE CITY CLERK'S ALLOWANCE LIKE THIS COUNCIL MEMBERS GET DISCRETIONARY MONEY YOU CAN PUT OVER HERE DO OVER THERE OR WAS IT SALARY FOR THE CITY CLERK'S OFFICE BUT I KNOW I HEARD THE CITY CLERK'S OFFICE AS A PART OF THAT MONEY BEING DIVIDED OUT I JUST WANT TO KNOW WHERE THAT WENT DOES THE CITY CLERK HAVE A SMUSH FUND AS HE REFERRED TO A DISCRETIONARY FUND OR WAS IT SALARY FOR THE CITY CLERK'S OFFICE WHAT WAS THE CITY CLERK MONEY ABOUT WORDLY Yeah. No, no, that's a program, Wordly. Wordly. Wordly. It's a software program. Just for council to just refresh where the $56,000 went, not only did it go to Wordly, which provides translation services for council meetings, it also went to the newly acquired Just FOIA software, which will be running our PRAs to improve transparency to... the citizens who are doing public information requests. The clerk's office has no slush fund, no extra money. We have run a very tight budget. Okay. Thank you. Any other public comment? No. Okay. Bringing it back to council then. So this is accepted. Oh, Vice Mayor. Thank you, Mayor. The other thing is I want you to highlight, I know we had gone through this in a meeting and discussed the funding of the The move, the funding of the DEI Program Director position, that was noted in here as being transferred to Human Resources in the approved budget, correct? Yes. And where was that? Can you tell me the page just so my colleagues know and for the record and I can highlight it? So within the, I guess there's a summary of it. Let me go in the back. Human Resources, so 028. 028. under human resources. 028 under human. So it's the second to the last category. Moved one payroll, wait, one, moved one diversity, equity, inclusion officer from CMO to HR and reclassified to human. resources and that we discovered that through our investigation around the dismantling of DEI. So what this represents is that this position transfer from one department to another based on the charter requirements was approved by the council. Yes. Can you tell me where in this document under personnel listing was the transfer of OPDA positions to the managers ADMINISTRATION BUDGET AND THEN VIS-A-VIS TO THE OPTIC FUNDING? SO IT'S NOT IN THE PERSONNEL LISTINGS LIKE THE DE OFFICER REORG WAS DONE. IT'S ONLY THE BUDGET THAT WE DISCUSSED EARLIER. BUT THE ACTUAL POSITIONS CHANGING FROM ONE PART OF THE CITY MANAGER'S BUDGET TO ANOTHER IS NOT IN HERE. SO THEN LET ME ASK FOR MY OWN EDUCATION. AND THIS IS ME REALLY NOT PLAYING MATLOCK. if money's in the office of opda opda within the manager's department and then you're going to now dismantle the department and then move that money to an administration budget would there be a line item in here that we've eliminated these jobs and move this money into this part of the city managers And the reason why I ask the question is we as council people, we're lay people. We're not accountants. I mean, I'm not a CPA. We need to be able to track where money is going. We need to be able to look in a book and do the questions we're asking now. Would we track that? So, yes, I would say a way to track that, probably if I were to bring forward that kind of organizational change, we would have a blurb. in the budget document explaining the change and then you would see that department division or office however we want to term it set up in the budget document clearly and then if you look at page 021 so you see the and this answers mayor your question about whether there were changes so there was the loss of that one position that we just talked about in the city manager's office. So that's consistent with the proposed, but then you would see potentially the reclassifications. So, you know, the elimination of one type of job to the other so that it would be clear every step of the way, one with a narrative description, two with a, you know, with the somewhere in the budget where we show here's this new division and then a description potentially if, it was appropriate if it happens, then, you know, job classification changes. So is what you're saying, is this organizational changes that we need to direct staff to make, or is this would have been proper financing one-on-one had we had a CFO at the time and all of that? Yeah, I probably, I can't really answer. Okay. Yeah. Okay. I mean... if i can i know we're going to go to voting to approve this i guess one thing i would say before in terms of council direction i'll just look at my colleague councilman padilla because i remember a conversation we had specifically around with optic that we wanted to see something before i think you may have even said april 2026. we're in march of 2026. so i i I WOULD LIKE US TO GIVE DIRECTION TO STAFF TO COME BACK WITH SOME EXPLANATION FOR WHAT WE'RE DOING WITH OPTIC, WHETHER WE'RE FUNDING IT, WHETHER IT'S NOT BEING FUNDED, WHETHER WE'RE MAKING A MODIFICATION TO THE DEPARTMENT. I MEAN, REALLY TAKE A CHANCE TO EVALUATE EVERYTHING. I DON'T KNOW WHERE SUPPLIES ARE COMING FROM, WHERE COMPUTERS ARE COMING FROM, WHERE JUST THE DAY-TO-DAY FUNCTIONING OF EQUIPMENT, BECAUSE I DON'T SEE ANY LIGHT ITEMS HERE. AND I WOULD WANT THE PUBLIC IN FULL TRANSPARENCY TO BE ABLE TO SEE WHAT WE'VE SPENT SO FAR what the department is doing, and you have a chance to evaluate what the go-forward plan is and bring it back to council. I don't know, do you need four people to support that? You need four people to? Do we need four people to support that? No, you gave them direction. Oh, that's okay, okay. It'll come back. Thank you. And then make sure there's PEG funds in there. Okay. Okay, so bringing it back to council. whether you're going to accept Mr. Garcia's annual budget presentation proposal? I guess my question is, how do we accept a budget that doesn't have a department or have an office defined in here? Like, we're going to approve something that doesn't have an office defined in here and we don't know the cost. I think if we approve something, it needs to be accurate or amended. to reflect what we're currently doing with our taxpayer funds. Otherwise, we're going to re-approve a budget that's still not fully accurate. I don't feel comfortable and I don't think any of us for our voting records should feel comfortable voting to approve an inaccurate budget. Is it a report on the status or is it the, because that's what I read here, resolution accepting the report on the status. of fiscal year 2526. And directing staff to amend the 2526 annual budget if appropriate, which is what you just asked. That's what I said. I would feel comfortable directing staff to amend the budget for an appropriate approval. So amend it, come back with it, like clean it all up, spell it all out, let us for the record approve that. I can't approve of inaccurate budget because we've already done that and we just did it the first time without knowing this time we know the Bible says when you know better you do better. So I can't in all good faith vote to support that. So can we accept the report and then direct the amendment and vote on that separately. Yes. Yes. I could support that. Okay. So do you want to make that motion? I can second it so we're clear. Okay, that's fine. So I recommend that council adopts the resolution accepting the report on the status of fiscal year 2526 annual budget. And we will come back with an amended 2526 budget with the corrections. I second that. Okay. Understood. Okay. Council, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. Thank you, Mr. Garcia. Okay, moving on then to item 16.3. It's an update on city council directed referrals and city attorney. Thank you, Mayor. On November 12, 2025, the City Council directed the City Manager's Office and the City Attorney's Office to refer potential charter violations, abuse of authority, and possible misuse of public funds to the Attorney General, District Attorney's Political Corruption Unit, and the Grand Jury. On January 13, 2026, the City Attorney's Office sent communications to the Attorney General, DA, and Grand Jury Those communications relayed the November 12, 2025 action by the City Council and identified each referral item, Hunter House, Sutter, Bricks, and Beechip. The communications also attached records related to the Hunter House matter. Because the City Attorney's Office had not received records related to the other three matters, these were not included. On February 18, 2026, staff provided an update, reflective of what I've just provided, to the Audit Committee regarding the referrals, and the committee directed staff to provide an update to the full council at its next meeting. Following the February Audit Committee, the City Attorney's Office, City Clerk's Office, and the City Manager's Office coordinated to gather and review records related to the outstanding referral items. And on February 26, 2026, Following receipt and review of the records, the City Attorney's Office emailed and mailed via certified mail the remaining referrals to the AG, DA, and the Grand Jury. This is all reflected in your written report as well. Okay. Do you have a question, Vice Mayor? Thank you, Mayor. And thank you, City Attorney, for that. I just had a question. I know with the... RELEASE OF EMPLOYMENT FROM DEPUTY CITY MANAGER COURTNEY CHRISTIE. I WANT TO MAKE SURE THAT WE'VE PRESERVED HER EMAILS AND DOCUMENTS. I LOOKED IN YOUR REPORT, IN THE STAFF REPORT ON PAGE TWO, IT TALKS ABOUT EMAIL RECORDS AND GOES INTO PHYSICAL RECORDS, BUT I DON'T SEE MS. CHRISTIE'S NAME HERE. AND MY UNDERSTANDING IS, YOU KNOW, WELL, IT'S NOT MY UNDERSTANDING. I MADE HER THE POINT PERSON FOR OUR STATE AUDIT AND FOR A LOT OF THESE VARIOUS CONCERNS. And I know that there was hallway talk about whether or not her records were preserved. Can you just give us a status update on her documents and why they weren't included in this referral? After conferring with the City Manager's Office as well as the Economic Development Department, we felt that the names listed here captured relevant communications to the extent that there were additional names that should have been included. We can certainly conduct a subsequent search, but based on the information provided, it was staff's belief that these would capture those communications. Well, my question is, are her records preserved? Oh, yes. It's all preserved. Okay. The second question is, I don't see I don't see the city clerk's office named in here, and I know that they handle all of the PRAs for the organization. So I know that at the time I had made PRAs, other people had made PRAs. Is there a reason why we didn't include any relevant PRAs from the clerk's office? So the search parameters directly overlap with the PRAs that were conducted by the clerk's office. We made sure that the timeframes and account search were reflective of all PRA records as well. Okay. And so do you feel that all of the adequate documentation that was needed to provide color to these concerns were provided in the referrals? We believe that we gathered the relevant documentation. Okay. Thank you. We do. Alyssa Leyva to the podium please. I almost changed my mind because I don't want to be unduly repetitious since I've been talking about grand jury reports since SUSD and here a lot of times. But I just wanted the public to know that I did a public comment in regards to the suspicion of Maltec Sanchez being the chair, self-appointed chair of the Salary Sending Commission where Mary Fugazi was in attendance. With already, he already wanted to approve a council member raising for them without prior discussion from commissioners and Dr. Hart wanting more information about that. And then he didn't bother to show up at the last commission setting for that. And another thing I'd like to flag is that I also think that this discussion is related to the item with the police in regard to the contract negotiations. And I just think it's really suspicious that our police department is having town halls where Christina Fugazi brought former Mayor Anthony Silva when he's under investigation by the fraud audit at SUSD. And as a former youth from LULAC who has witnessed Mayor Silva grooming somebody who was a senior in high school with me, I think that it was very disingenuous today that Motec Sanchez speaks on public safety and the sovereignty of our constituents, working with known actors such as former Mayor Silva and other pedophiles in our city. And I'm just really disappointed. I really feel a lot of grief as what Jasmine was saying earlier. in regards to the mass shooting. I'm hearing that there's stakeholders who may know that who killed them, who killed at the mass shooting. And I'm also tired of the continuity of investigations and selective truth, trust, and transparency of who was in the mood of deciding to tell the truth that day. And yeah, so for the FBI, if you're listening, I hope that you're taking notes of the meeting today. That concludes public comment for this item. Okay. This was an informational item. So everything has been forwarded? On February 26th. Okay. And you'll update us if there is a response back or whatever? requested read receipts on all of the email communications and sent the physical documents the same day okay great okay thank you um moving on to item 17 a city manager's update no report mayor what no okay moving on to council comments Oh, Vice Mayor buzzed in, reminding me of me. I had to beat you all to it. Okay, well, first of all, I hope everybody enjoyed the meeting as much as I did today, because we got through a lot of stuff, and knock on wood, we're actually getting out of here early tonight. Okay, first I want to say that this week has been trying. I am going to practice a page out of Michelle Obama's book. She says, when they go low, we go high. I always say, Cardi B is my friend. She said, when they go low, we go to hell. And that's usually been my route. But today I'm going to follow Michelle Obama because our community is tired of the chaos and the madness. And I see our leaders in the room, and I want to be better. Because the Bible said, when you do better or you know better, you're better. Anyway, the good book says a lot of things. It is read across America. People are reading all over the place. Literacy is an important thing. I'm an author. I'm somebody who did not like to read even though Hardy Boys was a book that we all used to read in school. I ended up learning to love to read later on in life and then became an author. One of my friends, Tiffany Haddish, is a successful author. She is a Grammy award winning author and she's somebody that has poured a lot into this community. She was invited here to be a part of an event at a school who reached out to me. Shout out to the principal at August Knot School, Tarsha, who is an amazing leader, who's done a phenomenal job. And she invited me and Tiffany to participate in an event. Tiffany was not able to go to that school. You've seen everything online. I don't need to tell you why, but I did have a video I want to show you so we can cue it up. City Clerk, please. Thank you. I want my five seconds back. Can we start over with the sound, please? Thank you. Sound up. I can't wait till New City Hall. We're going to have a sophisticated presentation. Over, Captain. Thank you. would have been able to do that there. what I would have been able to do in third grade. My kids are amazing kids. I just want to say this is the best school that I've been to so far since I've been like that. I just want to say that. The best behaved, the most respectful, so nice. I just want to thank everybody who had kind words to say outside. As she mentioned, Tiffany did want to come today. She has books here. Life is going to be challenging. You can literally be any want to be and then if you get tired of doing that you can go and be something else and if you get tired of that you can go and be something else life is about figuring out what you want to do finding the passion to feel what you want to do and then doing it and then doing it over and over again and along the way somebody's going to tell you that it's going to be hard or impossible and you can't do it i want you to know you can do it all thank you made unicorn hats out of paper they did and they all colored them oh wow and i would i probably would have started crying and i would have because i love that like well next time tell them to save their hats i might show up and so um while i was at august knot um reading this book, Layla, The Last Black Unicorn, which is about a black unicorn who is struggling to find their way of fitting in with a group of colorful unicorns. I thought it was very telling about the times that our kids find themselves in. Tiffany went to Aspire Secondary Academy. school and read to all the kids there and then we dropped off books with our CSD director Audrey who was amazing at the Maya Angelou library and over at Cesar Chavez we put books there we also surprised Van Buren with books and I'm going to give this book to the mayor I've already given books to my other colleagues so that way you can put them in a school in your district I know Councilman Padilla took a couple she got some autograph books for hers I want to shout out I'll get you one too Ponce give it to your son Okay, shout out to our city manager who went as well. It was a great day for all those kids. I just think it's important that we continue to keep kids at the forefront of all of our thoughts because those really are the compass of what we're doing here because investing in them is investing in a better city. On March 26th, I'll be having a Safer Stockton Coalition meeting where I'm pulling together a lot of my colleagues across the county and the city who want to start to address A LOT OF THE PUBLIC SAFETY CONCERNS WE HEAR IN OUR COMMUNITY. WE'RE GOING TO DO TOWN HALLS THROUGHOUT THE COMMUNITY IN EVERY SIDE OF THE CITY TO HEAR DIRECTLY FROM YOU, BUT ALSO SHARE SOME OF THE RESOURCES THAT ARE GOING ON THAT WILL HELP US DRIVE BETTER POLICY MAKING AND ALSO TO CONTINUE TO ENSURE OUR RESOURCES ARE GOING TO THE RIGHT WAY. IN RESPONSE TO THE PARENTS OF AMARI PETERSON WHO CAME HERE TODAY, I'D LIKE THE CITY MANAGER TO CHECK IN WITH OVP TO MAKE SURE THAT WE'VE DONE EVERYTHING THAT WE SAID WE WERE GOING TO DO. AND I KNOW THAT YOU'VE BEEN ON TOP OF THAT, BUT IF YOU CAN JUST GIVE US A REPORT ON THAT. And also yesterday I saw online and we got emails from PD about three people who were found deceased in my district from alleged fentanyl overdose. I reached out to the director of behavioral health services here. I just want to give a number out to those who may be in need of mental health resources or substance abuse, if they're struggling. If you need help in this community, you can call 209-468-9370. That's 24-7 or walk in for an outpatient screening at our integrated access center here in Stockton at 620 Aurora Street, Suite 311. And then outpatient walk-in is open this site Monday through Friday, 8 to 5. And if the community wants to get involved with public health, opioid coalition you can get information at calling two zero nine four six eight three four one one i do want to congratulate deputy chief morris on her probation at s p d i have found her to be extremely resourceful and attended all the needs that i've had in my district and within the city i think she goes above and beyond uh... i'm glad that the chief uh... promoted her i think also uh... it's great to see a woman of color and a leadership position within our department and I love that I won't be able to attend the promotion in person the promotion celebration but I did want to acknowledge that on April 15th we're going to hold the district 6 economic. development developer meeting where we're going to talk about the development needs in my district all the work we did last year to put together the presentation some of our infrastructure challenges that we know that we have and part of the meeting that we had yesterday with tiffany here was i do sit on the board of her grocery store diaspora groceries where she believes and i believe that communities that are food deserts should not be a food desert. We should be figuring out how to bring healthier grocery options that are affordable to our communities. It's something that's a passion project of mine and that has been of hers. And so we met with staff yesterday to talk about what that could look like. Tiffany already has the money. She needs to find the land. We'll figure it out if it makes sense for this community. So I want to thank all of our economic development staff, our city management team who came together for that discussion yesterday. I want to thank our public work director and my commissioners who drove all throughout District 6 looking at potholes because we want to catch up with Council Member Enriquez. We want to fix potholes, signs, lights. And they went through and took a survey of everything in the district that we need. And there's going to be more ongoing ride-alongs. But I still want to encourage the community to use the Ask Stockton app. to report everything so we can track it and again remind staff that we want to be able to improve our Ask Stockton app experience so that way people can track their items as they get entered all the way through the conclusion. Last week I spoke at the Delta College Black Nursing Informational Program with several nurses of color at different stages of their education. I spoke alongside my cousin Dr. Anitra West-Williams. uh... was a highly respected health care professional this community has been for years uh... and we spoke a lot about their experience and just encouraging people to get into that profession before i got in the entertainment the job i love the most out of all my jobs is working in health care for eleven years but on the labor side but still being able to interact with health care professionals understanding that uh... you know it takes a certain level of patience heart courage determination to be at the bedside with your most vulnerable people at a time where they need you the most. And so we love our nurses. And I just want to say shout out to all the young people there. The only question they asked me out of everything they could have asked me about how successful I've been is what does Rihanna wear for perfume? We need to shift the public conversation. Also, I want to thank our city attorney for the referrals to the agencies. And specifically, I want to acknowledge the mayor's advocacy for Vernal Hill. and I'm not going to steal her thunder because I know that's on her list of things. I won't even get into all of the amazing news that came across the Internet yesterday, but we do need more housing here in our community, and my criticism of the Vernal Hill projects has been more process and not substance. I think that keeping the fact that we have... homegrown or people living in our community doing amazing projects for our housing community. Congratulations to him. I look forward to that. Now moving on, the audit committee is going to be meeting on the 16th. I did find two more contracts that are bid split contracts that the last city manager exceeded his authority in authoring. I'm going to bring those matters to the audit committee to decide what we do with that. uh... and also i was unfortunately made aware that the forensic audit that this council was told was happening that we actually directed staff to do uh... was never started so all these months that we've been going believing that a forensic audit was happening uh... i found out that no forensic audit has even started and that is quite disappointing that too will be discussed at the upcoming audit committee meeting this is the first time my colleagues are probably hearing that i mean they're probably disappointed as well but either way we will get that on track. I do want to address one more elephant that's been in the room, because I don't dodge any issue. And in fact, I got lots of calls, emails, I've seen social media reports, people expecting me to do certain things. And ever since I took this office, people have called me to denounce people, whether it's denouncing a developer, denouncing an alleged slumlord. I don't need to denounce everybody uh... i want to speak specific to the proclamation today the proclamation and ask my colleagues to not respond or address it because it we don't need another divisive conversation at the council i think we did a great job of getting through the business of the city today but i did want to address that because proclamations are not something that a council member decides that is the mayor's decision she chooses who she wants to give a proclamation to and she authors our signatures ON THE DOCUMENT. IT IS A DECISION THAT SHE MADE. AND I'M NOT GOING TO DEBATE, AND I SHOULDN'T BE ASKED TO DEBATE WHETHER OR NOT ANY TAXPAYER IN THE CITY DESERVES IT OR DOESN'T DESERVE IT BECAUSE I DIDN'T MAKE THAT DECISION. THAT'S THE MAYOR'S DECISION. SO IF THE TAXPAYERS HAVE A QUESTION, YOU SHOULD GIVE IT TO THE MAYOR, AND I DON'T THINK SHE'LL DODGE YOUR QUESTION, BUT THAT'S SOMETHING THAT SHE HAS TO OWN. SO WHETHER COUNCIL MEMBERS FOR THIS PROCLAMATION TOOK THEIR NAMES OFF, DIDN'T TAKE THEIR NAMES OFF, SUPPORTED IT, DON'T SUPPORT IT, YOU KNOW, THE WHOLE WEAPON OF MASS DISTRACTION THAT OCCURS IN THIS CITY WHERE PEOPLE ARE THRUSTED INTO DISCUSSIONS OVER PICKING SIDES AND LIKING THESE PEOPLE OR NOT LIKING THOSE PEOPLE. I DON'T WANT TO FOCUS ON THAT. THAT DOESN'T DENOUNCE ANY WORK THAT'S BEEN DONE BEFORE THIS COUNCIL. THAT DOESN'T FORCE ANYBODY TO LIKE WHAT I SAY OR DON'T LIKE WHAT I SAY. THERE ARE PEOPLE THAT CALL ME ALL THE TIME WITH WHO I SHOULD LIKE, WHO I SHOULD NOT LIKE, WHO I SHOULD TALK TO, WHO I SHOULD NOT TALK TO. at the end of the day we have real serious issues in this community and that is not defending the mayor that is putting all the responsibility for this proclamation on her and this is not saying whether or not mr sanchez deserves it or not because that's not that's not for me to make that determination that's for the public and the mayor to make that determination and other than that i just want to say again to staff and to everybody that showed up tonight to make this meeting what it was thank you because it feels good to be able to get through the business of this city And I believe we had really spirited dialogue over a few matters. But hopefully all of my colleagues feel that they were respected in tonight's discussion because I felt respected. And I also want to acknowledge Council Member Villaputa and Council Member Padilla for apologizing for the experience that I had to go through with the well and out discussion at our off-site planning discussion. I did feel like they were genuine. uh... and it it was the beginning of moving forward with something that i was stuck on and i did appreciate that and i appreciate their commitment stand to work together and tonight uh... that's all i have thank you councilman padilla thank you mayor uh... i want to take a moment to highlight some things that are happening in our city uh... you know i want to make a commitment to share the good uh... community pride events and the progress and that is what reminds us why we all care so deeply about our city. This past weekend I hosted my monthly coffee hour with my residents and one of the takeaways of the conversation in the discussions and we've had discussions as a council up here is the importance of changing the narrative about our city. That doesn't mean ignoring the challenges that we have, but it does mean making sure that we are highlighting the positive things that are happening here in Stockton. Whether it is through a post that we make, something that we comment, or even the stories that we choose to elevate in our community. So I'm just going to provide a couple of examples that stem from opening parks, to youth art programs in our community, as well as many local events. Currently there is a McKee Student Art Exposition. What that is is an art contest that showcases thousands of K through 12 students in our county. You know this supports youth talent and it also strengthens Stockton's cultural community. They also announced that we have a Stockton of the Year recognition provided by the Greater Stockton Chamber of Commerce, and the 2026 Stocktonian of the Year is John Vera. And why this is positive news, because it honors our individuals who gave decades of service throughout our community, people that support philanthropy, volunteerism, ism and civic leadership. I apologize, I don't know what's going on with my speaking tonight. The reason why that is so important is because it promotes civic pride and it also recognizes community leadership. I also need to highlight because residents spoke up with regards to see something, say something, the Stockton police were able to make two arrests in connection with the mail thefts that were going around in District 1. We know that that work is not done. However, it's a great example of how law enforcement and our residents can work together. So speaking up to protect your neighborhood is something we should encourage, and looking out for one another is always the right thing to do. We saw that Stockton Con bring thousands of visitors to our downtown arena, drawing from people across the region, supporting our hotels, restaurants, and local businesses. So this was an event for families, youth, and pop culture funds. Our city has also opened up applications for the Youth Summer Success Program, which provides paid summer job opportunities for local teens to gain work experience and develop valuable career skills. Also at Oak Grove Regional Park, there is the Bog McMillan Memorial Fishing Tournament. Why this is positive? Because it creates a family-friendly community, encourages youth participation in recreation and nature. It also supports park usage and local community bonding. At the Stockton Civic Theater, there is the Grand Horizon Stage production. This is local theater that continues to produce live performances featuring community actors. This strengthens the local arts economy and community creativity. One of our local high schools is providing a Broadway musical, which is called Mary Poppins, and that is at the Tilly Lewis Theater at San Joaquin Delta College, March 13, 14, 19, 20, and 21. This showcases local student talent. It brings families and community members together. It uses Stockton venues such as San Joaquin Delta College, and it supports arts education and youth creativity. I said that already. All of these are examples of community involvement, youth development, arts, and recreation. These are all indicators of a healthy city environment. These moments matter and they remind us that Stockton is full of people who care, who show up and who continue to work every day to make our community better. Last Monday I was also a part of the Parks and Rec Department. There will be a beautification at Victory Park. UOP students will be volunteering at that beautification. Silver Lake, we mentioned that. at this council, and they are working on an RFP that will be going out in March. Exilus will be going into Victory and Oak Park. The next Exilu on the list will be American Legion and Matty Harrell Park. Anderson and Loma Parks are currently under rehabilitation and that should be done in March. Solar powered lights are going in on the sport courts at Van Buskirk and those will be implemented when the weather gets better which hopefully that should be soon. Fence repair is slotted for Magpie picnic area and I'm sorry I don't know where that park is. And also, it was mentioned again, Supervisor Mario-Guardia would like to see a fitness trail at Victory Park. So maybe you two could get together. In our events that we have in our Parks and Rec Department, there is a field trip to the Walt Disney Museum for the ages of 15 through 19. And those applications close on March 7. This is free. It's a hands-on field trip. During spring break, which is happening this month, most of our parks and community centers will be having the Playmobil. They will also host park programs day camps with sports, games, and crafts. There is a fee, but they do also offer a scholarship. With regards to sports, there is a volleyball, soccer, and golf clinic, and you can find those applications on the Park and Rec's website, and applications do close mid-March. There is also lifeguard classes going on from now through May. And during those lifeguard classes, individuals are able to obtain their certification. The goal of that is that we need lifeguards for all of our pools over the summer. So the more, the better. With them going through those classes and getting that certification, we're hoping that they will apply for the jobs that we have here in the city. We did have some reports from the school district. SUSD is partnering with the Chamber of Commerce for career tech, and they are looking for professional attire, ties, suits, business dresses. and those can be dropped off at 1776 West March Lane. Lodi School District, their elementary schools are full in Trinity Parkway, so they will be looking at the building site on Stevens Creek Road. That has been an empty lot for quite some time, so with the development going on out there, they are going to progress with a new school site. Lastly, this Thursday, March 5th, I will be having the ad hoc homeless meeting. This begins at four o'clock right here in city chambers. We'll be discussing an ordinance on solicitation and panhandling in our streets. We will be going over city surplus properties for our safe grounds initiatives. And then there will be a presentation by Red Rabbit Advocacy. So I hope to see everyone there Thursday. I hope everyone has a great week, enjoys the weather. And I apologize. I don't know why I'm spaced out tonight, but maybe just tired. But great meeting and a lot of good accomplishments tonight. So thank you. Councilman Villalpudo. Thank you, Mayor. As well, thank you everyone for coming here tonight. I just want to start my meeting with thanking our city manager. Thank you for everything you're doing, Mr. Ford, as well as the chief police and our fire chief as well. Tomorrow I will be having my office hours from 4 to 5 if you need to come and SPEAK ABOUT ANYTHING REGARDING STREETS, CRIME, OR ANYTHING THAT IS IN YOUR MIND, PLEASE COME BY. I WILL BE HERE FROM FOUR TO FIVE. THIS PAST SATURDAY, I WAS AT THE EVENT FOR STOCKTON JUNIOR JACKETS. THIS YEAR, I PLEDGED $2,000 FOR THE EQUIPMENT AND HELMETS AND THINGS FOR THE KIDS. mayor for guys if you're doing that for years so thank you for uh... introduced me to them uh... so as well as unbound charter school uh... was re i read to them last past week as well and i will also be pledging them for the opening game of the uh... ports so i'm looking forward to those fourth graders uh... as well as yesterday at a pleasure uh... taking a tour of columbus park is coming around everyone thank you city staff and penny the playground is all up the the bathroom is up the basketball is not there yet but I will be giving people more update as close as we can I think I was speaking to the TO CITY MANAGER, THEY'RE LOOKING LIKE POSSIBLY MAY, SO WE'LL BE CROSSING OUR FINGERS, HOPEFULLY SOME GOOD WEATHER AS WELL. I ALSO GOT THE GOOD NEWS OF SUZA PARK POOL THAT WE WILL BE OPENING THIS SUMMER THAT I'VE BEEN WAITING ON FOR A WHILE. SO IT'S A GREAT EVENT. THANK YOU, CITY MANAGER AND CITY STAFF. SO IT'S GOING TO BE A GREAT, GREAT EVENT THERE FOR THOSE KIDS THIS SUMMER. AS WELL AS I WILL BE HAVING THE 18TH AT MY EAST COMMUNITY CENTER ON, I'LL BE HAVING A JUMPER THINGS AND LETTING YOU KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON IN THAT AREA AS WELL AS NEXT WEEK I WILL BE AT SHRIBBLEY PARK HAVING MY NEIGHBORHOOD WATCHES AS WELL. NEXT WEDNESDAY FROM 3 TO 4 O'CLOCK AND THE SAME THING COME BY. to see anyone that's in the area, Shirley Park come out. PD will be there discussing all kinds of items. As well as tomorrow, we have Kaki's Chicken Grand Opening ribbon cutting. So if you have anything to do tomorrow, please come by at one o'clock, 4027 East March Lane. They were located in Councilmember Enriquez's area, but they got relocated. So hopefully we can stop by you know, congratulate them. As well, last week, you know, the passing of Jesse Jackson affected a lot of the residents throughout our nation, leaving a lasting impact in our community here in Stockton. I had the honor to attending a memorial service where many Stocktonians share their personal stories and connection with Mr. Jackson's legacy. So I was inspired by this spirits of remembering him. I am actively getting with local spiritual leaders and residents to create a memorial mural. And I'm gonna look for city staff, city manager for a place that I could use some of my city funds and I'm gonna get people to do a mural of the Reverend Jesse Jackson, so. And then lastly, I want to talk about Mormon SLU. So I want to share an update about the conversation that's getting started regarding our city-owned part of the Mormon SLU, which is part of my district. I began working with city staff to explore ways that we can improve this area. We're still in the early stages, but I'm focused on understanding what can be done and what challenges and opportunities we might have for our community. You should know that I've already engaged with staff about the efforts that will require coordination between the city staff and federal agencies. A request has been sent to the Federal Rail to help define the UP right of way in these lease. This will allow the state and the city to work together uh... to rehab the track in creating connects uh... connected body of water this project also ties into our ongoing discussion about housing construction and cleanups efforts as the city staff pointed out this will uh... require nearly the entire five million in budget however if we proceed as the plan between the slow and housing development we could potentially access tens of millions in the state and federal westland grants a local business man has shown interest in this property and i'll be working with them and the city staff to explore what's possible i want to assure that uh assure you that we'll keep these discussions open and honest following the city policies and keeping our community priorities in mind i'll keep you all posted as we move forward your thoughts and feedback are important to us. So I want to thank everyone for coming here. I want to wish everyone a great week and a great weekend. I want to thank my colleagues for all the great wins as well tonight. And let's keep doing this. Thank you. Councilman Blower. Thank you, Mayor. I just want to thank everybody for coming out here tonight, particularly my groupie pickleball park. They're Grippy Park Pickleball players. They're a passionate group, and I just appreciate their enthusiasm and really getting out and advocating for getting those pickleball courts. I think overall this was a really good meeting for the most part. I feel like we got a lot done, and gosh, we're on track to be maybe not the earliest we've gotten out, but certainly top two or three. ANYWAY, WE HAVE LOTS OF GOOD THINGS GOING ON. LAST FEBRUARY 24TH, SO THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN LAST TUESDAY, I WAS HAPPY TO HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO REPRESENT THE CITY AT THE CHILDREN'S MUSEUM RIBBON CUTTING FOR THEIR NEW EXHIBITS. AND, YOU KNOW, THAT'S ONE OF THOSE JUST JEWELS THAT WE HAVE IN OUR COMMUNITY. I KNOW MY DAUGHTER CAROLINE, I THINK WE HAD HER FIFTH BIRTHDAY PARTY THERE. JUST A WONDERFUL PLACE TO for people to be able to take their kids. The new exhibits they have, they have a new health lab. They have the amazing Airways exhibit, which is pretty cool. The 211 exhibit, just letting people know about 211 and what resources are available in our community. There's also new outdoor playground equipment and musical instruments out there. And then they just recently added a lactation pod for lactating mothers, which is great for them. Anyway, that was a very nice, well-attended event. Then Thursday, February 26th, oh my gosh, that was a packed day. That started out with the Rotary read-in, so the Rotary clubs, all of us in Stockton combined, and gosh, I think this was my, I think I've been doing it since 2002, so I've been a Rotarian since then, and just a great event. I think a lot of you also participated and did that. I got the opportunity to read in Mrs. Blauer's third grade class. And so that was a lot of fun. One thing I did notice looking around in her classroom, she did not have a copy of Layla the Last Black Unicorn. So hopefully we can do something to help that. So I was done with that. We had the Community Improvement and Crime Prevention meeting here at City Hall, which meant I was late getting to, but I got the tail end of the Gospel Center Rescue Mission New Life Program Multipurpose Center. And I know the mayor was there before we... I missed you by the time I got there, so I'm sure you have plenty to talk about on that. But that is a great addition to our community, and they do wonderful work there. When I was done there, I went down to the... COUNTY COURTHOUSE, AND I WATCHED THE SWEARING IN OF CARRIE KRUEGER TO THE SAN JOAQUIN SUPERIOR COURT AS A COMMISSIONER. AND I'VE KNOWN CARRIE FOR A NUMBER OF YEARS, AND I JUST REALLY WOULD LIKE TO CONGRATULATE HER, AND I KNOW THAT SHE'S GOING TO DO A WONDERFUL JOB AS A COMMISSIONER. AS DONE WITH THAT, I RAN DOWN TO DAVE WONGS FOR THE CENTRAL VALLEY ASIAN CENTRAL, GOSH, I'M STARTING TO GET TIRED. CHAMBER OF COMMERCE. THEIR MIXER, AND SO THAT WAS, THEY WERE CELEBRATING THE YEAR OF THE HORSE, AND THEY HAD SOMEBODY, WELL, TWO PEOPLE DRESSED IN A HORSE COSTUME RUNNING AROUND, AND IT WAS GREAT. THE FOOD WAS WONDERFUL. THEY ALWAYS DO A NICE JOB THERE. THIS LAST SATURDAY NIGHT, THE APL, WHICH IS THE ANIMAL PROTECTION LEAGUE, HAD THEIR THIRD ANNUAL DANCING FOR THE DOGS AND CATS EVENT. IT WAS A GREAT EVENT, AND THEY I just want to congratulate the dancers. I participated two years ago, and I tell you, it was really outside my comfort zone to do that. I took second place, but I had a great time doing that. So I congratulate all the dancers that participated. And I recommend if any of you get an opportunity to do it, I'd say do it. It was a lot of fun. The last thing I just want to mention, Council Member Padilla brought up the Stocktonian of the Year. That will be on Thursday, April 16th. You should have all received your invitations for that, and I do encourage you all to try and go. John Vera will be our 72nd Stocktonian of the Year. Are you emceeing? What's that? Are you emceeing? I will be emceeing for my, gosh, 13th year, I think. So, yeah, I've been doing that. And so one point of clarification as a... past president of the Central Valley Association of Realtors. You mentioned that the greater Stockton Chamber of Commerce is doing that, but they do it in conjunction with the Central Valley Association of Realtors. In fact, in 1954, the Stockton Board of Realtors hired Marian Jacobs and asked her to do some PR. She came up with the idea for the Stockton Board of Realtors to do what was called the Mr. Stockton Award. the Mr. Stockton Award, in 1972, they had to change the name because Mrs. Pearl West was the recipient. And so it has been the Stocktonian of the year ever since then. And so, again, I just encourage all of you that can make it to the 72nd annual. So thank you very much, and that is it for my comments. Before more than half of this council was born. 1972. Okay, Councilman Enriquez. Thank you, Mayor. So I have a lot only because I usually always talk 15 minutes but I'll speak as quick as I can only because I missed the last meeting but I want to just address that. I just want to address it just again transparency and also just because I don't want any folks to think for those that don't know. But for those that didn't notice I was not present at the last council meeting nor was I at the goal setting meeting planning session meeting with my colleagues. I posted on Facebook and Instagram a few days after, but I was hospitalized with pneumonia shortly after on Friday the 13th and then leading into that weekend. The biggest lesson I learned is listen to your mother because that whole weekend my mom told me every day, go to the ER. And I said, no, I'll get better the next day. I just got to sleep it off. And then it wasn't until Monday morning where I woke up and I looked at my mom. I said, mom, we're going to the ER. I have always had a deep respect for our nurses. But even after this experience, I have an even deeper love for the nurses who were just doing round-the-clock care. The nurses each had 12-hour shifts, so there was three consistently that I saw, Shauna, Stanley, and Pumanjit, who were the three nurses that took care of me. But I'll be honest, it was a very scary time. I had a fever, low sodium levels, a fever that wouldn't go down, and just my lungs were on fire. BUT I WANT TO THANK MY COLLEAGUES, ALL THE CONSTITUENTS THAT DID REACH OUT. I WAS TRYING TO BE VERY ON THE DL WITH THAT DURING THE FOUR DAYS JUST BECAUSE I DIDN'T WANT TO SCARE PEOPLE. I DIDN'T KNOW WHAT THE OUTCOME WOULD BE, BUT THANKFULLY, I THINK THAT NIGHT OF THE GOAL SESSION MEETING, I WAS ABLE TO GO HOME AROUND 10, 11 PM. during that time, but I just wanted to put that out there because again, I take my role as a council member very seriously, and I wouldn't miss a council meeting just for the sake of missing it, or just because I wanted to. I did catch up with a meeting, I later on streamed it, and I was able to catch up, and then I know particularly I want to dive a little bit deeper into the tobacco ordinance, as I know that was a discussion, a deep discussion that evening, and then also getting a recording of the goal setting just so I can make sure. But I would say, when I was in the hospital bed, I did text, Councilmember Blauer, because I think there was a point where they said, what are the top three issues? So I like, when I opened, I was like sweating. I'm like, okay, three issues. And apparently the mayor and I also had similar issues and as well as the vice mayor. But I want to just thank everybody. I'm still on the mend. For those that don't know pneumonia, I think there's still about three, four more weeks I need to recover. So this is exhausting as itself, but I'm happy to be here and just give updates to my constituents. So let's get to it. Infrastructure. Potholes. I want to just share that we were able to get eight small potholes fixed alongside East Jamestown Street, which is north of El Dorado. And that is a key area because as you drive into that street, you can't miss it because a lot of folks drive on that street because there's a lot of apartment complexes there. There's also the Stockton Nursing Center. So that's a very heavily used street entryway. And I'm glad that we were able to get that fixed. We also were able to get one that was smack down in the middle of 4550 Shelley Court, also right before the Stockton Nursing Center between two apartment complexes. So it didn't matter what side you were on, you would always hit that one in the middle. There is another pothole in progress near Stag High School. So for my neighbors and also for the students, that is in progress and that was submitted. IN TERMS OF SPECIFIC INFRASTRUCTURE IN OUR PARKS, I LOVE THAT MY COLLEAGUES SHARE SOME UPDATES ABOUT MY DISTRICT. I LOVE THAT THERE'S A LOT OF DISTRICT FOUR LOVE, BUT I WANT TO JUST SHARE A LITTLE BIT MORE DETAIL AS I AM VERY HANDS-ON AND I HAVE SOME MORE INSIGHT, BUT I WANT TO THANK MY COLLEAGUES FOR SHARING UPDATES ABOUT THE EXCLUS. I WANT TO THANK PENNY PASALUSALU FOR HIS WORK. HIM AND I WERE ABLE TO GO TO VICTORY PARK LAST WEEK JUST TO GET AN ASSESSMENT OF THE EXCLUS. And I'm very detail-oriented and I like things to be just right. Even though some of them were partially ready, I didn't feel comfortable fully opening them because I'm really particular about, we need to power wash the sidewalks. We need to clean, you know, I don't want any handprints. If there's cracks or tiles, we got to fix them. I want it to be perfect. Yes, will the public potentially not make it perfect within 24 hours? likely for a public restroom. But the way I want my projects and the presentation is really important to me. And I think it's a reflection of the work product that we deliver as a city. And that's what I want. I want us to be elevated when we open something, it needs to be perfect. Every little detail. Even if we have signs that are granulated, nope, I want a high-res sign. Go back and get a high-res graphic. And that's the detail I want. So I want no handprints. I want all the tiles fixed. I have the Xs. I want power wash. And that was all communicated, and I'm proud that our city said, yes, council member, we will do it. I'm not gonna just do a 85% job. I want 100% job when it comes to our projects, and that's across the entire city, but particularly for my district and my constituents, that's what I expect. I did coordinate with the Pacific Southern Little League, and we are gonna be doing a ribbon cutting. As I promised them last year when I threw the first pitch, their opening day is on March 28th. So I told them last year, it will be ready by next year. So we already worked with the staff, and it's going to happen. So on March 28th, we're going to have our Little Leaguers do the ribbon cutting with me as we open up that XSLU, since that will be a very popular XSLU. And then also with Oak Park, I also drove by it as well briefly. And that's also in progress. But again, I want to thank our staff and Penny and our city manager for, I know this has just been years in the making. So I say this not to take credit, but as a council member that has been elected, my job is to ensure that projects get finalized and I work with our staff and that's part of the job. And I want to be clear with that because there was some misinformation when I posted an initial update about the Oak Park X loop. But again, my job is to get things to the finish line and to let my constituents know what's happening. Uneven sidewalks, I know there was a conversation about that. I'm trying to avoid any lawsuit that we can, and that tends to happen. And I'm proud to say that we got one sidewalk fixed with patching on West Elm Street near American Legion Park, and also another uneven sidewalk that was fixed on West Alder Street, which is a block away from the Miracle Mile. And I'm proud to share that neighbors on both of those streets told me, because they saw me, and they're like, what are you doing? Are you a realtor? Are you selling the house? And I had my phone. I was taking photos of it. And they said, no, I'm actually a council member. I'm here to fix your uneven sidewalk. And both neighbors of those streets both said, this has been uneven for years, and thank you for getting it done. Again, my focus is fixing my district block by block, and that's what I'm committed, and I have the receipts to show it. And we also have a third sidewalk that I've identified that is in progress. So I ask anybody, if you see any uneven sidewalks, please utilize Ask Stockton. Don't just go straight to your council member or the mayor. Everyone has the ability to report something and get it fixed. And if you do use Ask Stockton and you don't hear back, please reach out and let me know, and I'm happy to follow up with our staff. Now moving on to graffiti. Again, always thankful to our graffiti team. We were able to get two graffiti marks cleaned up in the parking lot behind Kokoro on the Miracle Mile. I texted Tammy, who was my former boss when I was a host there a couple years ago, and her and her husband Johnny were very thankful. Again, we need to elevate. We need to be clean. We need to make sure that we can clean up everything we can block by block, and that is a priority. We also did another cleanup alongside both sides of the bridge that goes over the Calaveras River on Pershing Avenue as you pass University of the Pacific. And also another one was cleaned up alongside a white fence. on West Walnut Street. So for those constituents listening, that has been cleaned up. And then another one on 22 West Jamestown Street. I mentioned those eight potholes on the other side of El Dorado. Well, on the other side of El Dorado, there's a huge long fence and there was graffiti throughout. So again, we got that cleaned up. One thing I did flag to our city manager, and again, just for the public, I do want to get an update on the ADA ramps. I know early or mid last fall, we, this as a council approved, I believe over 60 ADA ramps, a majority of them were in my district. But again, when folks see that, folks then tend to say, well, what about this? What about my street? Or what about this corner? We also have to start finding a way to educate the public about what the order is. We have a long list. Obviously we're limited to our budget. And the reality is we need more money for infrastructure. So when it comes to ADA ramps and tree stumps, if there is a list, just to be able to get an update for my colleagues and the mayor about where we are with that, so that way when someone does submit, hey, I want an ADA ramp or my tree stump removed on my corner, where am I on the list? Just to be able to provide that would give some context and would be helpful, but that's something I want to know. In terms of events, again, I missed last meeting, so I haven't utilized my six minutes. I attended the Stockton Firefighters at their annual craft feed fundraiser earlier in the month of last month. I saw a couple of my colleagues there. February 9th, I mentioned it, but I want to just give a summary. I want to give a shout out and thank you to our Stockton police officers. I think eight of them joined me for my first annual Walk the Block with Mario at Lewis Park. There was an issue of public safety concerns in that area. I heard my constituents and we walked out there. to the police officers that were there. I want to say thank you. Your presence mattered and the neighbors noticed. One resident shared that seeing us walk together made her feel safer in her neighborhood. I'm also thankful for the neighbors who joined us along the way, including a married couple, a father and son, and two women who've been caring for dogs in the area and raising concerns about spay and neuter in that area. While I did provide donuts from California Donuts on North El Dorado Street and coffee from Bennett's Coffee, formerly Terra Coffee, Not many people drink coffee or ate the donuts, so I put it in my car and I donated it to the American Discovery Cancer Shop to the volunteers there on Alpine, also in my district. February 13th, that is the evening I got sick, but I attended the Quad meeting in North Stockton, and I shared the good news again of the wood pallet ordinance that my colleagues and I all voted on and that it would be in effect at the end of the month, as well as upcoming legislation that I'm working on REVIEWING PUBLIC SAFETY AS CHAIR OF LEDGE. FEBRUARY 26, WHILE EVEN THOUGH I WASN'T FEELING MY BEST, I COULDN'T SAY NO TO THE KIDS, SO I ATTENDED THE BOOK READING TO A THIRD GRADE CLASS AT TAFT ELEMENTARY, AND I READ THE BOOK, THE BEARS LOST GLASSES, FOLLOWED BY THE COMMUNITY IMPROVEMENT AND CRIME PREVENTION COMMITTEE MEETING WITH COUNCILMEMBER BLAUER AND COUNCILMEMBER VILLAPUDOIS. AND THEN FEBRUARY 28, I DID ATTEND MY MORNINGS WITH MARIO WITH OUR PUBLIC WORKS DIRECTOR, And we had a few folks show up, but again, every conversation matters. So whether it's one or two people or 20, 50 people, every person we listen is important. That afternoon, I also attended the Japanese American Citizens League Stockton Chapter Day of Remembrance. This was my third year of attending, and I had the honor of lighting one of the candles of the 10 internment camps, honoring those that were in the internment camps. Upcoming, March 10th, please join us as the San Joaquin Council of Governments at 11 a.m. at the Oak Park Senior Center. They are organizing the electric car sharing launch. There you can preview and learn about the electric vehicles called MEOCAR, and you can also sign up to become a member of MEOCAR as well. Just in the future, as I promised you, I will be taking it easy, but in between, I will be in San Francisco next weekend March 12th to the 14th for an immigration policy conference to continue to find ways to support our immigrant community in terms of policy and legislation that I can help introduce to my colleagues here in Stockton. My next Mornings with Mario for the month of March will be on March 21st at 10 a.m., this time at the House of Shaw near the Miracle Mile. And then March 27th and 28th, I will be in the Bakersfield area for the Well Conference, which is a focus on water policy. and then as well as California League of Cities, Transportation, Public Works, Infrastructure Committee that I represent for the city of Stockton. In terms of committees, we have our Legislation Committee coming up on Monday, March 16th at 4 p.m. And that one in particular, again, I know we had to cancel the last one in February, again, due in large part because I was sick, but I want to thank... Councilwoman Padilla and Vice Mayor Lee for their patience as we want to continue the initiatives and efforts. Again, it's probably my favorite committee because I think the three of us get a lot done and we always are able to have good discussion on what we are thinking we want to introduce and present to the full council. But for that one in particular, I think it's really important. I know we're continuing our work on housing policy and research and renter protections and I know that's a key issue that we're working on and we want to get it just right. I don't want to rush anything, but that is in the pipeline. But some of the things I know we want to address is the drinking in public in parks. I know that was something that our police officers addressed to us. We heard them loud and clear, and that's something that we're editing. That way they can be able to do their jobs more easily, especially when it comes to drinking in public areas, but specifically our parks where our kids and families utilize. ALSO, WE HAVE AN ORDINANCE FROM CLEVELAND SCHOOL REMEMBERS, WHICH I DO WANT ON THE MARCH 16TH AGENDA. I KNOW THIS WAS SOMETHING THAT WAS INTRODUCED SINCE NOVEMBER, AND FOR NUMEROUS REASONS, SOME I DON'T KNOW, SOME I DO, HAS BEEN PUSHED BACK. AND I WANT TO SPEAK VERY CLEARLY TO US, TO OUR STAFF, AND THOSE THAT ARE PRESENTING, IS THAT THIS WILL BE ON THE MARCH 16TH AGENDA AT 4 PM, SO PLEASE COME PREPARED. AGAIN, THIS IS SOMETHING THAT I DON'T WANT TO DELAY ANY FURTHER, BECAUSE OUR CLEVELAND SCHOOL REMEMBER TEACHERS and organizers did a lot of due diligence to provide their research and provide this ordinance. So whether you like it or not, this is something that has to be addressed because I want my colleagues to be able to understand what it is and whether it passes or not, it's still an opportunity to say, we are listening to you loud and clear and let's take the time to have a good debate and discussion on public safety and when it comes to gun control. policy. That's something that is critical in our city and throughout many parts of our country. So I want to just say that that is a key priority. And as usual, I have 15 seconds left, so it's perfect timing. As I continue to get better, I will take it a little bit slower. So please be patient with my email responses. I'm going to work to utilize the Ask Stockton app. You can email me at dist4 at stocktonca.gov, and I'll follow up shortly. Thank you again. Have a good night. Councilwoman Ponce. Thank you, Mayor. I wanted to remind everyone it is Women's History Month, and I also want to take a moment to congratulate Deputy Chief Annabelle Morris on the promotion. Fantastic work. I also want to make a quick update that's happening in my district. This Saturday, March 7th at 10 a.m., there will be a bench dedication at Fong Park, 2525 Blossom Circle. Dedication The dedication is organized by San Joaquin Lions Club Bags for Benchants, round nine. City crew will be installing the bench near the basketball court. So please join us to dedicate a bench and recognize the plastic partners. 1,000 plus pounds of soft plastic kept out of our landfills. Thank you everyone and have a great night. Okay, thank you. Taking a page out of Councilwoman Padilla's book, All my stuff is positive, unless you get caught. No, just joking. So the first thing is, and you'll understand when I say it, Venture Academy. Venture Academy was one school out of eight in the nation that received an award from MIT, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, one of the top science schools in the nation, if not the top. for Innovate, and it was high schoolers that solved problems and developed different projects to help you in everyday kind of world, being creative, People have lost that ability. You know, we've got dummy phones, not smartphones, but being able to use your imagination, I was very impressed by them, and I was sad that there was no media there other than SJCOE. But these are things that I would like to read about from our, you know, news stations. record and I know Stocktonia is here so love to have something like that to read rotary speaking of reading rotary reading I read two books I brought three actually I brought four but I let somebody have one so that they could read it one of the books I read was if you give a dog a donut So those that know me know how I feel about donuts, and I brought donut holes in because you didn't want to give these third graders a whole donut. I was with Councilmember Enriquez at Taft Elementary. I ran into a lot of the people that I used to work with that I know and outside of school as well. The other book I read was Mother Bruce, like Mother Goose, but Mother Bruce, who was a... a bear that ended up being mom to these gooselings, and he was not happy about it at all, and they wouldn't leave him alone. But in the end, he loved them, and they stayed with him. Gospel Center Rescue Mission, yes, 110 new beds. There used to be, they're called old ladies, and I don't mean anything bad to, I'm an old lady, but there are two Victorian houses that were removed, and they have this new building with an elevator in it, so anybody that has ADA requirements, you know, or in wheelchair, have trouble climbing stairs, they don't have to worry because they can use the elevator, but 110 additional beds at Gospel Center Rescue Mission. FRIDAY, THE MARRIAGE OF TWO CITIES. IN CASE YOU DIDN'T KNOW, WE HAVE SEVEN SISTER CITIES. SO THIS WAS BETWEEN THE CITY OF STOCKTON AND PARMA, ITALY. PAUL BESTILORIDIS WAS THE PERSON WHO PUT THE MOVIE TOGETHER. IT WAS A DOCUMENTARY. DIANA LOWERY LED THE EFFORT. AND EDITH VILLAPUDUA IS ACTUALLY THE PRESIDENT OF THE SISTER CITY ORGANIZATION. SO IF YOU WANT TO KNOW MORE ABOUT IT OR LEARN MORE it we've got cases out here that have items in it that have come from our sister cities and if you go on the first floor and you look at the flags that are up each flag represents a sister city we had our first spay and neuter clinic this past weekend 194 pets received their spay and neuter And this is something that the public really, really, really has been asking for. I'm putting it for the camera, sorry. But just to see people be able to bring their pets and get them spayed or neutered for free, I think is very important. If you're interested... This was District 6 that was prioritized. The next date is April 10th through the 12th, and that will be District 5. May 15th through the 17th will be District 3 and 4. And June 12th through the 14th will be District 1 and 2. Moving down, yes, Hunter House. Hunter House received a $35.9 million home key funding program. for 77 beds, 32 for veterans, 10 for foster youth that have aged out or youth that are in a danger of being homeless. Also Light Up Stockton happy about those 133 solar lights as well as our tax sharing agreement. AT&T reached out. We have received a $10,000 grant from AT&T and 200 laptops. So if you are an organization and your people need laptops, please reach out to me and I'd like to get you some laptops for your organization. Caltrans, speaking of grants, we received a $126,997 award, the city of Stockton. Thank you, Dale Applewood, for the application. It's the Stockton Youth Environment Stewardship IT'S A CITY-LED INITIATIVE ENGAGING MIDDLE SCHOOL STUDENTS IN ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION, COMMUNITY SERVICE, AND WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT. SO WE HAVE THE HIGH SCHOOLERS, NOW WE HAVE THE MIDDLE SCHOOLERS THAT WILL BE ABLE TO HAVE SOME JOBS, HOPEFULLY FOR THE SUMMER. BUT THERE WERE ONLY THREE IN DISTRICT 10, AND DISTRICT 10 FOR CALTRANS IS HUGE. IT'S LIKE ALL OF THE CENTRAL VALLEY. SO ONE OF THEM WAS HERE IN STOCKTON. They also have the FAST program. It's a pilot program, and in case you didn't know, FAST is for people who drive fast. There are, I was surprised, I was shocked at how many people drive over 100 miles an hour. They give out 18,000 tickets or citations, and this is going to, they have special cars. They have special cars to do this enforcement. They call them, They're a low-profile car, and they're out there now, and they are on the hunt working with the DMV to stop speeding cars because they contribute to 32% of the fatalities that happen on our freeways. Mail theft, thank you so much, Councilwoman Padilla, for leading on that. Also, Congressman Harder. for being open to assisting in that. We need our partners in that. And the neighbors that came out that were so appreciative that they were getting the attention that they deserve for a very, very serious issue. So thank you for your leadership on that. Mobility grant, so our office, the mayor's office has applied for a mobility grant. It's a $500,000 grant and it's for farm workers in Stockton so that they have a reliable transportation option. So we're excited and hopeful in getting that. And then speaking of power washing, I don't know if anybody noticed the steps into City Hall on the north side. but they're lickety-split clean. Even the wax that's been out there for a really long time is mostly lit up or lifted up, I should say. I need to get a lighter out there maybe to get the rest of it. But thank you so much for cleaning that because it has been kind of messy for a really long time. So we got it cleaned up through the Public Works Department. And then, yes, congratulations to Deputy Chief Morris. very well deserved, super proud of her and know that she is the right person for the job and I look forward to her continued success here as a member of the Stockton Police Department. And then lastly, uh... uh... it's my mom's birthday on sunday so i just want to say happy birthday uh... to my mom love you i look forward to being on the golf course with you it's supposed to be seventy nine degrees anything you want mom you got it uh... and and with that i think i pretty much said everything uh... on my list but i too want to thank council for tonight uh... i really am happy with how our our meeting went We're going to get out before 10 o'clock. It's 944. I think that might be one of our earliest times. Is everybody okay to adjourn? Yes. Adjourned.