CALL TO ORDER | |
ROLL CALL | |
PUBLIC COMMENT | |
CONFLICT OF INTEREST DECLARATION | |
RECESS TO CLOSED SESSION | |
CALL TO ORDER / FLAG SALUTE / ROLL CALL | |
INSPIRATION | |
CLOSED SESSION REPORT |
|
PUBLIC COMMENT |
|
AGENDA APPROVAL FOR CITY COUNCIL |
|
CONFLICT OF INTEREST DECLARATION |
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Presentations |
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Item #1 - Senior Officer Promotions – Henry Montelongo, Rick Miranda, and Gladys Harbin | |
Item #2 - 24th Anniversary of Alaska Flight 261 Memorial Proclamation |
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Item #3 - Martin Luther King, Jr., Day Proclamation |
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CONSENT CALENDAR | |
PUBLIC HEARINGS – None. | |
BUSINESS ITEMS | |
Item #8 - Update on Local Storm and Flood Emergency Declared on December 21, 2023 | |
Item #9 - City Council Liaison Committee Appointments for 2024 | |
Item #10 - Reorganization of Specific Positions Within the City’s Parking Enforcement Division and | |
Item #11 - Memorial Day Ceremony at Hueneme Beach Pier | |
CITY MANAGER COMMENTS AND REPORTS COUNCILMEMBERS’ REPORTS AND COMMENTS | |
REQUEST FOR FUTURE AGENDA ITEMS | |
ADJOURNMENT |
Welcome to the closed session portion of the City Council meeting. I'm calling this meeting to order. The time is now 530. | 00:01:02 | |
Madam Clerk, will you take roll call please? | 00:01:12 | |
Council member Gama. | 00:01:14 | |
Here, Councilmember Hernandez, Here Council Member Martinez, present Mayor Pro Tem McQueen Lejeune, and Mayor Perez. | 00:01:16 | |
We will now hear public comments. Comments are limited to 3 minutes. Madam Clerk, does anyone have a public comment tonight? Yes, | 00:01:30 | |
we have a public comment from Joan Dart. | 00:01:34 | |
You. Good evening, Mayor, Mayor, Pro time and council. This seems a little odd. I don't usually comment at people's performance | 00:01:39 | |
reviews, but I wanted to come and show my support for James Vega. | 00:01:46 | |
I've been kind of paying attention to City Council meetings for the last 3-4 years. | 00:01:54 | |
And I just have to say that I really appreciate having a city manager who shows up. | 00:02:00 | |
Who's supportive and still consid? | 00:02:07 | |
The city business and the city interests when he's dealing with with concerns of other people. | 00:02:10 | |
So being involved with a couple of nonprofits, I've reached out to Mr. Vega on when we've needed help and support, and he's been | 00:02:17 | |
helpful. But like I said, he does consider the city's best interests when he does that, but he does it with a lot of respect and | 00:02:23 | |
he listens and he's considerate. | 00:02:29 | |
And I don't know what goes on behind closed doors, what his employees think of him. But from a public standpoint, I am just. | 00:02:35 | |
Really pleased, having sort of learned about how city council's and cities work over the last couple years. | 00:02:44 | |
Umm, I'm impressed with the way that. | 00:02:49 | |
Runs, runs the meetings and how he organizes the agenda and it seems like he is listening to the council and to the public. | 00:02:53 | |
In bringing things in front of in front of the city and the council. So that's why I'm here. I'm gonna leave now. Thank you for | 00:03:02 | |
your time. Thank you. | 00:03:06 | |
Mr. City Attorney, will you please read the closed session item into the record? Absolutely, Mayor Perez, there's one item of | 00:03:15 | |
business on closed session for tonight as Public Employee Performance Evaluation for the City Manager pursuant to Government Code | 00:03:19 | |
Section 54957, subdivision B1. | 00:03:24 | |
Thank you. | 00:03:30 | |
Do any council members have any conflicts to disclose for the listed closed session item? | 00:03:32 | |
Nope. | 00:03:37 | |
All right, we are going to recess to closed session. Council. Recess to closed session. The time is now 532. | 00:03:40 | |
Good evening everyone. | 01:01:24 | |
Welcome to the City Council regular meeting. I'm calling this meeting to order. The time is now. | 01:01:28 | |
6:30. | 01:01:33 | |
Will everyone please stand for the flag salute? | 01:01:36 | |
I pledge allegiance to the flag. | 01:01:47 | |
Of the United States of America. | 01:01:49 | |
And to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. | 01:01:51 | |
Madam Clerk, please take roll call. | 01:02:07 | |
Council member Gama. | 01:02:09 | |
Councilmember Hernandez. | 01:02:11 | |
Here Councilmember Martinez, present Mayor Pro Tem McQueen Lejeune, and Mayor Perez here. | 01:02:13 | |
The inspiration tonight is given by myself and it will just be brief. I don't know the names of all the organizations but I plan | 01:02:20 | |
on rectifying that. But I want to give a shout out to every. | 01:02:25 | |
Agency that came in to help with the disaster cleanup, that help to provide services for the people who were affected, those who | 01:02:31 | |
came in the Red Cross, Salvation Army, those who provided food, the Lions Club who came in to assist with cleaning up and please | 01:02:39 | |
there any other agencies, Team Rubicon and UMCOR and volunteer organizations active in disaster and United Way. I would just want | 01:02:47 | |
to send a shout out to everyone and thank them so much for the the help they provided to our community. | 01:02:55 | |
Mr. City Attorney, would you please provide a closed session report? | 01:03:04 | |
Absolutely, Mayor Perez. There was no reportable action taken in closed session tonight. | 01:03:08 | |
All right. Thank you. | 01:03:12 | |
We will now hear public comments not pertaining to items on the agenda. | 01:03:15 | |
Comments are limited to 3 minutes. This process will be the same for comments pertaining to each agenda item. Madam Clerk, do we | 01:03:19 | |
have any public comments? | 01:03:23 | |
I have two general public comments. The first will be Becky Bernie and it followed by Greg L Ross. | 01:03:27 | |
Yep. | 01:03:32 | |
You need mayor, Mayor. | 01:03:39 | |
Council members. | 01:03:41 | |
I'm here representing real guppy outdoors. | 01:03:43 | |
We have. | 01:03:48 | |
Taking a sabbatical during our fishing days. | 01:03:50 | |
In November and. | 01:03:54 | |
We're going to start that up again this month on the 28th. | 01:03:56 | |
And Kevin is calling it Pajama Jammy Jam. | 01:04:00 | |
Where you can wear your pajamas to go fishing. | 01:04:05 | |
So go to our website. Sign. | 01:04:09 | |
And we hope to see you out there on the. | 01:04:13 | |
Thank you. | 01:04:15 | |
Good evening, council members. Thank you for listening. My name is Greg Ross. I've been a Ventura County resident since 1970. | 01:04:27 | |
I've lived in South Oxnard and Port Hueneme since 2005. | 01:04:36 | |
I'm here to label the. My discussion is. | 01:04:42 | |
Perhaps the inconvenient truth. Apologies to al go. | 01:04:47 | |
We're we're concerned our our represent a small group of homeowners. | 01:04:52 | |
That we're concerned about the. | 01:04:58 | |
And the cancer rates that exist, and there's been a lot of press lately. | 01:05:02 | |
Michelle Lockston and I passed out, I think Mr. Vega. | 01:05:07 | |
Sent that around too as well and just driving over here. It's a 3 minute drive for me. | 01:05:14 | |
I heard another report about the pollution issues of the port. | 01:05:20 | |
Because of the rain recently. | 01:05:25 | |
Fact that the boats coming into the port and they can't hook up to the electrical grid. | 01:05:27 | |
So the cancer rates are are quite intense. Ventura County is 505. | 01:05:34 | |
Deaths per 1000 residents. | 01:05:43 | |
In our area, just our little tiny community. | 01:05:46 | |
Our cancer rates are 10,000. | 01:05:50 | |
Per 100. | 01:05:53 | |
We've lost 10 or more. | 01:05:55 | |
People in the last 10 years to cancer. | 01:05:58 | |
And so basically my goal here is. | 01:06:01 | |
Twofold one is to put it on your radar screen a little bit so that you know that this situation exists. | 01:06:05 | |
Secondly, we don't have all the information we need. | 01:06:12 | |
The nearest. | 01:06:15 | |
Recording, Pollution. Recording is a mile and a half away, not really downwind from the. | 01:06:18 | |
What we just need is more information. | 01:06:25 | |
And we need a way to track it. | 01:06:28 | |
And and verify it. So it's it's science and it's truth not. | 01:06:30 | |
Just me up here talking. | 01:06:35 | |
And saying we got problems, but this is the sort of thing this is in. | 01:06:37 | |
That that you'll see when you when you walk around the port area, Market Street. | 01:06:43 | |
And Surfside. | 01:06:49 | |
My wife and I cleaned our front edge of. | 01:06:52 | |
Our overhead ceiling fan recently. | 01:06:56 | |
This is in your packet as well. These are the rags that came out of that, and it was. | 01:06:59 | |
Clean like a month or so ago before that. So there's a lot of particulates up in the air that we're concerned. | 01:07:04 | |
And I hope that now it's on your radar screen and maybe we can get back in February. | 01:07:12 | |
To address with a little more comprehensive. | 01:07:17 | |
Presentation. | 01:07:21 | |
Thank you for listening. | 01:07:23 | |
Thank you. | 01:07:24 | |
The council's not able to discuss public comment items that aren't on the agenda. At the end of the agenda, we have a future | 01:07:28 | |
agenda item portion where I just can be requested, but the council is not able to discuss at this time. | 01:07:34 | |
All right. We will move on to agenda approval. May I have a motion and a second for approval of the agenda. | 01:07:43 | |
Move to approve. | 01:07:50 | |
Madam Clerk, all in favor. | 01:07:54 | |
All opposed hearing, None motion passes unanimously. | 01:07:57 | |
Thank you. | 01:08:01 | |
Do any members of Council have any conflicts of interest to disclose for any item on the agenda tonight? | 01:08:02 | |
Hearing none, we will move on to presentations. | 01:08:12 | |
The first resentation will be. | 01:08:15 | |
Given on behalf of Chief Federico, the Senior Officer promotions of Henry Montelongo, Rick Miranda and Gladys Harbin. | 01:08:18 | |
Yes, and the chief will be presenting this. That looks like if I had forgotten we have our police presentation. I was just | 01:08:28 | |
reminded as I walked in. So. | 01:08:32 | |
If you want to introduce. | 01:08:39 | |
Thank you all. Tonight we are recognizing the promotion of three officers from police officer to senior police officer. | 01:08:44 | |
These are your two strippers. These are the individuals between the level of officer and Sergeant. | 01:08:53 | |
Tonight I will be introducing Henry Montelongo, Ricardo, Miranda and Gladys. | 01:09:00 | |
The role of senior police officer is your lead position amongst officers in the department. | 01:09:06 | |
The senior officers not only responsible for the same general duties of your port or any police officer, but they are also | 01:09:12 | |
responsible for training others. | 01:09:16 | |
Coordinating the work of others. | 01:09:21 | |
The supervisory of others in the absence of a police Sergeant, and so many other increasingly increasingly responsible duties that | 01:09:23 | |
require a higher level of skill and experience than your police officers. | 01:09:29 | |
They are your supervisors in the absence of a Sergeant, and with that some will be, and some have been acting sergeants for a long | 01:09:36 | |
duration. | 01:09:40 | |
Such as several months on a patrol, shift, deploy. | 01:09:45 | |
Or when there has been a need arrived in detectives. | 01:09:48 | |
With that port, only me. These are your future department leaders. | 01:09:53 | |
And at this time I'd like to introduce. | 01:10:00 | |
Senior Officer Henry Montel. | 01:10:02 | |
Henry started his career with the city of Port Wayne 18 years ago as a police explorer. | 01:10:18 | |
Beginning as a police explorer, Henry grew within the program and became a dispatcher at the age of 18, while still working as a | 01:10:24 | |
dispatcher and volunteering as a Police Explorer. | 01:10:28 | |
He also took on a position with the City of Port or Enemy Community Development as a parking enforcement officer. | 01:10:34 | |
In 2010, Henry was hired as a reserve police officer and then a full time police officer in 2015. | 01:10:39 | |
During his tenure here with the city of Port Hueneme. | 01:10:46 | |
Henry has worked to earn his bachelor's and organizational leadership and organizational studies from Arizona State University | 01:10:49 | |
with an academic standing of *** laude. | 01:10:53 | |
Henry is currently working to complete his master's program from the University of Alabama. | 01:10:59 | |
With his major being an organizational leadership. | 01:11:05 | |
His academic goal is to earn a doctorate degree. | 01:11:09 | |
And utilize what he has learned. | 01:11:13 | |
During. | 01:11:15 | |
Of his work as an officer for the City of Port Win. | 01:11:17 | |
As a police officer, Henry has held many positions in collateral assignments. These include traffic investigator, B coordinator, | 01:11:23 | |
cannabis control officer, and Homeless liaison Officer. | 01:11:28 | |
However, there's one. | 01:11:33 | |
That he holds dear to his heart and it's as an adviser. | 01:11:36 | |
For the important enemy police Explorers. Henry's been an advisor for the Explorers for over 13 years. | 01:11:39 | |
He has overseen the professional development of these young. | 01:11:44 | |
And has also run the auction art in Port Hueneme, Combined Police Explorer, Acad. | 01:11:48 | |
Over the past six years, when? | 01:11:53 | |
He cannot foresee a better opportunity than overseeing the development of teens into responsible young men and women who have gone | 01:11:55 | |
off and started their own businesses, became lawyers, nurses, pharmacists, Marines. | 01:12:01 | |
Navy personnel and of course, police officers. | 01:12:07 | |
And before I move on to his badge painting, I have to note like there is a dynasty of Montelongo's in the family. | 01:12:11 | |
They are part of this. | 01:12:20 | |
Tenfold, many of you already have noticed, but Henry's not the only monologue here, with the city of Port Wenemi as an older | 01:12:23 | |
brother Frank, who's our property and evidence supervisor, reserve officer and explorer advisor. So older sister Veronica, who's a | 01:12:28 | |
recreation attendant and can also be an assist. | 01:12:33 | |
With the Explorer functions, whether it's the Thanksgiving dinner giveaway or the car show. | 01:12:39 | |
Port Hueneme is truly a family affair for the Montelongo. | 01:12:44 | |
Please join me. | 01:12:50 | |
Congratulating. | 01:12:53 | |
And to. | 01:12:54 | |
Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem and Council and everyone here in attendance. | 01:13:47 | |
I like to take. | 01:13:51 | |
For always being there for. | 01:13:53 | |
And of course, my brother, my sister. | 01:13:56 | |
Weapon my rock whenever I'm in my low. | 01:13:58 | |
And who have always lived. | 01:14:01 | |
And of course, thank you to all the explore. | 01:14:04 | |
For showing. | 01:14:07 | |
And I promise this was not a mandatory detail for them. | 01:14:09 | |
Thank you guys. | 01:14:13 | |
Ricardo. | 01:14:23 | |
Ricardo, Ricky, Rick, all his many nicknames. | 01:14:32 | |
Ricky was born and raised in this community. He came from a family of law enforcement. | 01:14:38 | |
He's been involved in law enforcement for over 10 years in different capacities. In 20/19 he was hired by the Portland Police | 01:14:44 | |
Department as a police officer and he served for the past where he served for the past five years. | 01:14:49 | |
He was first. | 01:14:56 | |
Patrol where he worked three years, and during that time he was awarded not only the Mothers Against Drunk Driving award for his | 01:14:58 | |
DUI apprehensions. | 01:15:02 | |
But also the 10851 Stolen Vehicle Recovery Award. | 01:15:07 | |
2. | 01:15:12 | |
Three times. | 01:15:14 | |
And he was also our Port Wayne police officer of. | 01:15:16 | |
So during his time on patrol, he was a field training officer for our newest officers and it's something that he holds dear is | 01:15:22 | |
mentoring our newer officers. | 01:15:27 | |
After only 3 1/2 years on patrol, he was selected to assist an investigations unit as a detective, and as a detective he was in | 01:15:32 | |
charge of investigating property crime, sex crimes, crimes against children and assisted with homicide investigations. | 01:15:38 | |
He's also assisted with their Crisis Intervention team as a crisis intervention coordinator. | 01:15:46 | |
On a very lovely note, outside of law enforcement, he has enjoyed coaching and mentoring the youth in different sports to make a | 01:15:53 | |
positive impact for them. But he also enjoys his family time because he just celebrated the recent birth of his third child. | 01:15:59 | |
So we're very excited for. | 01:16:07 | |
Join me in congratulating. | 01:16:11 | |
Oh my gosh, look at that. | 01:16:38 | |
Oh. | 01:16:46 | |
OK. | 01:16:56 | |
That was the sweetest pinning I think I've ever witnessed. Thank you for that. | 01:17:07 | |
Just keep it brief. I just want to thank the City Council members for all your support. I really do appreciate it. I want to thank | 01:17:13 | |
my peers. I appreciate all your help. All your mentorship has really got me to where I am today. | 01:17:18 | |
And especially, I want to thank my family, my fiance, my three kids, my family all here, the Miranda clan. | 01:17:24 | |
I want to appreciate everything you guys have done for me and stuck with me through thick and thin which has allowed me to get to | 01:17:30 | |
where I am today. So I appreciate it and I want to thank also the community members for all your support as well for the Police | 01:17:35 | |
Department. So thank you very much to everyone. | 01:17:40 | |
Senior Officer Gladys. | 01:17:54 | |
Gladys was born of Vent. | 01:18:04 | |
And she grew up in Oxnard in Port Hueneme. | 01:18:06 | |
She joined the Port Whereabout Police Department in 2009 as a police explorer. | 01:18:09 | |
In 20. | 01:18:13 | |
He aged out when they get too old to be a police explorer, but that didn't stop her. She became a police volunteer. | 01:18:15 | |
In 2017, she was hired as a parking enforcement officer with the city. That's a common trend among some of our folks, as you hear. | 01:18:24 | |
In 2015, Gladys graduated from the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Academy and became a reserve police officer here with us at Port | 01:18:32 | |
Winnie BPD. | 01:18:36 | |
In 2017, she was hired as a full time police. | 01:18:40 | |
And assigned to patrol. | 01:18:44 | |
She's worked to patrol and investigations, and she served as a field training. | 01:18:46 | |
For our newest officers. | 01:18:51 | |
She has also served as a crisis intervention coordinator. | 01:18:52 | |
I know Gladys has a passion for working with the youth. She holds a great reputation on our schools, especially in elementary | 01:18:58 | |
schools with our staff over there. | 01:19:03 | |
She has also indicated to me that regardless of her future assignments, she'd like to do more in our schools, so I'm going to be | 01:19:09 | |
holding that to her in the near future so she can do some more of that. Ladies and gentlemen, join me in congratulating Gladys | 01:19:13 | |
Harmon. | 01:19:17 | |
Thank you for being here. First I'd like to thank my family for supporting me since day one. My parents. | 01:20:02 | |
This opportunity, the job that I wanted to do my career early on as an explorer. So thank you to my parents for supporting me. | 01:20:09 | |
Through thick and thin to my family who's here? My aunt, my cousin, my mother-in-law and of course, my husband. Without him, I | 01:20:18 | |
wouldn't be here. | 01:20:22 | |
Big support. | 01:20:27 | |
So. | 01:20:28 | |
Thank you all. And also a big thank you to my Sergeant, Sergeant Bates. | 01:20:30 | |
Pushing me and guide. | 01:20:35 | |
All this so thank you so much. | 01:20:38 | |
Thank you all for your support and thank you community for your support. Appreciate you. Thank you. | 01:20:47 | |
Thank you. | 01:20:51 | |
The next presentation will be the 24th anniversary. | 01:20:53 | |
Of Alaska Flight 261, Memorial Proclamation. | 01:20:58 | |
And that is being read by council member. | 01:21:03 | |
Hernandez Thank you, Mayor. | 01:21:06 | |
I'll just give it a. | 01:21:09 | |
Few minutes while everybody that clears out. | 01:21:11 | |
That's family right there. | 01:21:21 | |
That's right, I mean. | 01:21:26 | |
OK. | 01:21:37 | |
I'd like to thank Mayor Perez for allowing me to read this proclamation. This incident in particular is very near and dear to my | 01:22:00 | |
heart. | 01:22:04 | |
As I was serving at the time as the manager for the Sheriff's Office of Emergency Services, I was. | 01:22:09 | |
One of the first on scene in our Emergency Operations center and then continue to work this incident for at least seven weeks and | 01:22:16 | |
continue to show up for the families to this day on January 31st. | 01:22:23 | |
So tonight we're honoring the 24th anniversary of Alaska Flight 261. Whereas on January 31st, 2000 at 4:22 PM, Alaska Flight 261 | 01:22:30 | |
crashed in the waters off Anacapa Island, approximately 13 miles from Port Hueneme and Ventura County, resulting in the 88 in the | 01:22:37 | |
deaths of 88 souls. | 01:22:45 | |
Five or crew members. | 01:22:53 | |
Of that plane, whereas the accident was the largest loss of life due to a transportation accident in the history of Ventura | 01:22:56 | |
County. | 01:22:59 | |
And whereas the crash of Alaska Airlines Flight 261 activated an immediate response from over 75 different federal, state and | 01:23:04 | |
local agencies, the military, local nonprofit agencies, and private organizations, and whereas the City of Port Hueneme police. | 01:23:12 | |
Police and Station 53 of the Ventura County Fire Department were among the first local responders to assist with the immediate | 01:23:20 | |
response and recovery. | 01:23:25 | |
And whereas it is important to see how individuals in our county and the City of Port Hueneme came to embrace the families of | 01:24:08 | |
Alaska Flight 261 by showing and expressing kindness, compassion and giving spirit and whereas it is important to educate the | 01:24:14 | |
public about the event. | 01:24:19 | |
Of historical significance. | 01:24:26 | |
Members of our community came together and continued to do so to support the family members of Alaska Flight 261 in this tragic | 01:24:29 | |
loss of life. And whereas as we gather to remember the 24th anniversary anniversary of this tragedy, it is the intention of the | 01:24:36 | |
City Council and staff to remember those who died and always keep our community a welcoming and warm place for Alaska Flight 261 | 01:24:43 | |
family members to visit to honor and remember those killed on January 31st, 2000. | 01:24:51 | |
Now, therefore, be proclaimed that the City Council of the City of Port Hueneme does hereby proclaim January 31st as the day we | 01:24:59 | |
honor the 88 souls who died on January 31st, 2000. And recognized that the kindness of our community members continues 24 years | 01:25:06 | |
later and will always urge residents support Winemie to exercise compassion in our daily lives for the betterment of our family | 01:25:13 | |
members, our colleagues, and every individual we encounter proclaim this 16th day. | 01:25:21 | |
Of January 2024. | 01:25:28 | |
Thank you, Councilmember Hernandez. | 01:25:31 | |
And next we will hear a reading of the proclamation. | 01:25:33 | |
In honor of Martin Luther King Junior Day by Mayor Pro Tem McQueen. | 01:25:36 | |
City of Port Hueneme Proclamation Martin Luther King Junior Day Whereas on January 15, 1929, Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King | 01:25:42 | |
Junior was born Atlanta, GA and whereas Doctor King was a transformational leader of the American Civil Rights movement and one of | 01:25:49 | |
the most influential orders. | 01:25:56 | |
Or peace, equality and human rights in world's history. | 01:26:03 | |
And whereas Doctor King is remembered for dedicating his life to an unyielding faith and passion for justice and racial harmony by | 01:26:08 | |
championing the principles this nation was built upon and a strong commitment to his belief of freedom, equality, justice for all. | 01:26:17 | |
And whereas Doctor King envisioned a society where individuals were not judged by the color of their skin. | 01:26:26 | |
But the content of their character. | 01:26:33 | |
And whereas Doctor King sacrificed his life to spread the message of universal equality and justice that was displayed by his | 01:26:35 | |
efforts to end racial segregation and discrimination through civil disobedience and other nonviolent means. | 01:26:43 | |
Such as his heroic leadership in the 1955 Montgomery. | 01:26:51 | |
Bus boycott and the 1957 Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1960, the 1963 March on Washington and the Selma to | 01:26:56 | |
Montgomery marches in 1965. | 01:27:03 | |
And whereas Doctor King's word continues to resonate with the world today by reminding us of the imperative to continue to fight | 01:27:10 | |
for justice and equality no matter the opposition, because the ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of | 01:27:15 | |
comfort. | 01:27:21 | |
And convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. | 01:27:27 | |
And whereas people throughout the world continue to be inspired by Doctor King's vision and words, his strength of character and | 01:27:32 | |
compassion, and his model for peaceful demonstration and dialogue. | 01:27:38 | |
And whereas in 1983, Doctor King became the first private citizen to be honored with a federal holiday, which was yesterday. | 01:27:45 | |
Not just us to celebrate his memory, but also to preserve his legacy. One that calls upon us all to exercise our moral authority, | 01:27:53 | |
stand up against injustice, and protect our most sacred tenet democracy. | 01:28:01 | |
Now therefore, be it proclaimed that the City Council of the City of Port Hueneme does hereby proclaim January 15th. | 01:28:08 | |
2024 as Doctor Martin Luther King Junior Day proclaimed the 16th Day of January 2024. | 01:28:16 | |
Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. | 01:28:25 | |
We'll move on to the consent calendar. We will now consider items on the consent calendar, which will be enacted in one motion | 01:28:27 | |
unless a council member has a request to remove an item for discussion. | 01:28:32 | |
May I have a second, a motion and a second to approve our consent calendar? | 01:28:38 | |
2nd Thank you, Madam. | 01:28:43 | |
All in favor. | 01:28:46 | |
All opposed. | 01:28:49 | |
Hearing none motion passes unanimously. | 01:28:50 | |
Thank you. We have no public hearings. | 01:28:52 | |
Moving on to business. | 01:28:55 | |
The first business item will be an update on local storm and flood emergency declared on December 21st, 2023. Will staff please | 01:28:58 | |
present. | 01:29:02 | |
Thank you, Mayor. | 01:29:08 | |
We don't do this very often, but with something like this that. | 01:29:09 | |
Really important in our community. We've asked some of our partner agencies to come out and help us present a little bit about | 01:29:16 | |
what all of the agencies have done related to the storm so far and all the all the work that's gone into it. | 01:29:23 | |
Into recovering from the storm. | 01:29:31 | |
Umm. And so I have a couple of slides that we'll start with and then I'll ask some of our partners who have been working with us | 01:29:33 | |
to, to come up and speak a little bit about it as well. | 01:29:38 | |
I know most of our residents probably know this, but it really. | 01:29:44 | |
Hard to explain to people how severe the rain that hit Port Hueneme on December 21st, 2023 was. | 01:29:51 | |
And you can see from this map, the narrow band that it hit us and a little bit of Oxnard, but it really did not hit many other. | 01:29:58 | |
Communities. And so it's very hard to explain to people just how severe it was in our community while somebody and you know, | 01:30:07 | |
Thousand Oaks or even Camarillo. | 01:30:12 | |
May not even remember that date or that there was a storm. It wasn't out of the ordinary for them. | 01:30:18 | |
But here in Port Hueneme and in parts of Oxnard, it was a very severe storm. | 01:30:25 | |
And so when we're talking about the recovery from that storm, we are still in the recovery phase of that December 25th storm, | 01:30:31 | |
which totaled more than six inches of rain total. | 01:30:37 | |
6 inches of rain. | 01:30:44 | |
And at its peak at approximately 1:30 in the in the morning. | 01:30:46 | |
We were seeing 3 inches of rain in an hour, which is essentially unheard of, I think. | 01:30:51 | |
The estimate is that hasn't happened in over 100 years and it's classified by the county flood control district as what they call | 01:30:58 | |
a once in 10,000 year level storm. | 01:31:02 | |
So some people in this room are are watching May remember this from the morning getting the tornado warning alert. And so we | 01:31:09 | |
didn't end up getting a tornado, but the impacts were not far from from the impacts of a tornado. | 01:31:16 | |
When for those houses in those areas that were sort of in the? | 01:31:24 | |
Right in the trail of this storm or directly located next to some of the the drainage channels and things like that that were | 01:31:30 | |
impacted by all of that water coming down at once. | 01:31:35 | |
We have the storm on the 21st. | 01:31:42 | |
We've been calling it historic for a while, but at this point I think. | 01:31:45 | |
It's officially historic and here we have. | 01:31:50 | |
From the LA Times of one of our businesses here in Port Hueneme dealing with the storm and where Port Hueneme, I'm sorry, the LA | 01:31:53 | |
Times called this a historic, genuinely extraordinary rainfall. | 01:31:59 | |
And so. | 01:32:07 | |
Yeah, some of the photos that. | 01:32:09 | |
Scene And a lot of people in this room probably have seen some of these things already. We've seen more than we'd want to see of | 01:32:12 | |
this. | 01:32:16 | |
You know there are cars floating. There are cars abandoned in the middle of the street because because they were floating and then | 01:32:21 | |
they came to land somewhere after people had to evacuate them. | 01:32:26 | |
There are houses. | 01:32:32 | |
And I think that's the next picture internally that had. | 01:32:35 | |
Feet of water within their. | 01:32:39 | |
Units, not not inches. | 01:32:43 | |
And there on the right is what sort of what we're dealing with right now, a lot of, a lot of our community members are, is that | 01:32:46 | |
that next phase in the recovery? | 01:32:50 | |
Which? | 01:32:55 | |
It's good that we're that we're getting to that phase, but it's not over yet. People are living in situations where drywall's | 01:32:58 | |
taken out of houses, flooring is taking out of houses. | 01:33:03 | |
And that's if you're lucky enough to have had a contractor who's already responded and gotten to that point. | 01:33:09 | |
Because we have so many units impacted in our community. | 01:33:16 | |
And there's only so many contractors out there. | 01:33:20 | |
So we're still in the midst of what we're calling the recovery phase in total. | 01:33:23 | |
The account was 422 structures impact. | 01:33:32 | |
We've gotten a lot of questions about sort of, you know, what was major damage versus minor damage and and what was affected | 01:33:36 | |
damage. | 01:33:40 | |
I think that's actually probably one of the biggest questions we've gotten. | 01:33:45 | |
And you can see from this. | 01:33:48 | |
Chart that minor damage is classified as between 1 to 17 inches, which is a huge. | 01:33:50 | |
Variance there, and I think anybody who has 17 inches of water in their house would say they don't feel that's minor damage. | 01:33:59 | |
And I think we've heard that a lot, but these categories are the categories that we've had to track them in to sort of match up | 01:34:07 | |
with them. | 01:34:11 | |
FEMA's requirements And so we've had a lot of people say, you know, to have 14-15 inches of water in your house and to have | 01:34:15 | |
somebody show up and say it's minor doesn't feel. | 01:34:21 | |
Good or it doesn't feel like we were acknowledging the damage they. | 01:34:27 | |
But, and we So we want to let everybody know we weren't saying that. | 01:34:31 | |
You know that the impacts weren't great. | 01:34:36 | |
But when when we're asked to classify them for FEMA for purposes of tracking, it falls into their category defined as minor, which | 01:34:39 | |
is which can be severe so. | 01:34:44 | |
So we've had this is between. | 01:34:50 | |
This is total structures. | 01:34:54 | |
And impacted by the storm. So it includes Waniba but also includes Oxnard and I think there's been a couple structures from | 01:34:58 | |
Ventura as well identified at this point. | 01:35:02 | |
Why Nimi's total number? I think was a. | 01:35:08 | |
At 188 I think is what our number is. So we're a big chunk of of those structures. | 01:35:12 | |
The other thing that is really mind boggling to think about that maybe it doesn't seem like a big deal when you see it, but. | 01:35:18 | |
There were 644 vehicles damaged. | 01:35:26 | |
We had in. | 01:35:29 | |
Parts of our town we had. | 01:35:31 | |
I saw it times. | 01:35:34 | |
10 or more tow trucks lined up just towing vehicles that had gotten water. | 01:35:36 | |
To the point where the vehicle was damaged or the electronics weren't turning on. | 01:35:43 | |
And so you can see here that in port I need me 265 vehicles damaged a lot of those totaled a lot of those complete losses. | 01:35:47 | |
And people who have been watching the news the last couple years. | 01:35:57 | |
Vehicles are harder to find than ever before. In a lot of cases, more. | 01:36:01 | |
Even used vehicles are more expensive than they've been. | 01:36:06 | |
And so to know that 265 vehicles were damaged and there's people who lost two vehicles and had damage inside their house. | 01:36:09 | |
It's it's a pretty. | 01:36:18 | |
Heartbreaking situation. | 01:36:20 | |
So that's a little bit on, you know the rain, what happened that day, some of the impacts we saw from that day. | 01:36:23 | |
For us, we've had we've gone through a few phases of the storm. | 01:36:31 | |
Preparation and we're going to ask, we're going to have our fire department representatives come up and speak a little bit to how | 01:36:37 | |
they prepared to. But the city and other key agencies such as the fire department had taken steps to prepare for the storm by | 01:36:44 | |
increasing staffing and inspecting areas prior to the to the storm. So that was sort of phase one. | 01:36:50 | |
And at that time, it was forecasted to be a couple inches of rain over the 24 hour period. | 01:36:57 | |
Well, we ended up getting a lot more rain than that. | 01:37:05 | |
And so we ended, we ended up having to go into emergency response. | 01:37:07 | |
Phase of. | 01:37:13 | |
And we along with County Fire, the various our Police Department and other police agencies in. | 01:37:15 | |
Areas, because it did impact Oxnard and in some other areas we had to respond to hundreds and hundreds of emergency calls that | 01:37:24 | |
day. | 01:37:28 | |
I think the damage is so much that we lose track of this, but we do want to point out, you know, we responded to hundreds of calls | 01:37:34 | |
and there is no loss of life and I had not. | 01:37:39 | |
Heard any reports of significant injuries? We know one person went to a hospital, but it was more for. | 01:37:45 | |
Pre-existing issues so. | 01:37:51 | |
In that immediate response, no loss of life and no significant injuries. | 01:37:54 | |
Is something we don't want to take for granted. | 01:37:59 | |
And then the next few days after that, people probably saw some of our employees going out with with clipboards and things like | 01:38:02 | |
that. Actually we have tablets now. I guess I'm dating myself. | 01:38:08 | |
But they went out with tablets and they actually went into hundreds of units and assessed the damage to be able to provide the | 01:38:15 | |
damage assessments to FEMA and other agencies. | 01:38:19 | |
And we went out and assessed over 180 units for damage in the the couple of days that followed the emergency. | 01:38:25 | |
And then while we were doing that, we saw the need for dumpsters, which we were able to roll out. | 01:38:32 | |
And but even we had some of our public works team members out with. | 01:38:41 | |
Scoopers and things like that. Lifting people's couches and beds and things like that, that they had pushed to the curb into the | 01:38:47 | |
dumpsters. | 01:38:50 | |
Because just the amount of heavy items that were ruined that we had to help remove and get out of the way. | 01:38:55 | |
So there's just a lot of work with that. | 01:39:03 | |
We also worked with the county OES to coordinate with volunteers and service providers. | 01:39:07 | |
And I'll talk a little bit more about that towards the end of the conversation. | 01:39:13 | |
And we continued to and still continue to document needs to try to get state and federal aid. | 01:39:18 | |
And we keep advocating for those, the state and federal aid as well. | 01:39:27 | |
And so after those first few days, we really entered recovery. | 01:39:32 | |
And to be honest, what we're finding is this is the hardest part of this emergency. | 01:39:39 | |
Maybe the immediacy is not there. Maybe it's not. You know the urgent circumstance that it was on day one. | 01:39:45 | |
But there's a lot of people who need a lot of help. | 01:39:53 | |
One of our key challenges right now is we have some gaps, things like FEMA. | 01:39:58 | |
FEMA based on sort of outdated. | 01:40:03 | |
Requirements on their end. | 01:40:07 | |
They don't. | 01:40:09 | |
This as an emergency at this time. | 01:40:10 | |
Because. | 01:40:14 | |
Not because of the level of damage wasn't severe, but just because we didn't have enough people who had severe damage. | 01:40:15 | |
And so that's one of the challenges we're working for. We've been advocating with the county OES and city of Oxnard and and | 01:40:21 | |
ourselves. | 01:40:26 | |
We've been trying to advocate the Board of Supervisors issued some support. We've met with Congress, people and other | 01:40:30 | |
representatives. We've asked them for support and they're. | 01:40:34 | |
They're working on that. And then on tonight's agenda, we have a recommended approval of a letter that we would send to also try | 01:40:39 | |
to advocate for support. | 01:40:44 | |
So the recovery phase is a challenge right now, I think the elephant in the room is. | 01:40:50 | |
We hear from a lot of people right now who say there just isn't enough help coming. There's not any funding yet. There's not. | 01:40:56 | |
You know. | 01:41:04 | |
Help replacing items and things like that and we all feel it. We're not. | 01:41:07 | |
Ignoring that or acting like it's not happening, we're trying. | 01:41:13 | |
Make sure we advocate and we try to get help, but it is, it is what I would call a gap right now that we're trying to to address. | 01:41:17 | |
So. | 01:41:26 | |
By advocating with with FEMA, so. | 01:41:28 | |
And I just spoke a little bit about how we're doing that. So I won't go back through this. | 01:41:32 | |
The good news and one of the partners that we have speaking here today is that the first sort of. | 01:41:37 | |
A form of state assistance. | 01:41:44 | |
Has come through with the announcement that Small Business Administration loan assistance is available. | 01:41:46 | |
It opened up officially on Saturday and will be open Monday through Thursday, I believe at the South Oxnard Library. | 01:41:54 | |
And we have some of the representatives here and later in the presentation we'll ask them to give some more information on that. | 01:42:02 | |
So with that we're going to have, I'm going to, I've asked three of our partners to speak. | 01:42:10 | |
Fire Department representative. | 01:42:17 | |
Captain Williams, the County OES, Representative Patrick Maynard, and then our SBA representatives. And so I'll be introducing | 01:42:20 | |
each of those and ask them to just. | 01:42:26 | |
Give a little bit on what some of each agency has has done thus far. So Captain Williams, we have a couple slides here for you. | 01:42:33 | |
Do you want the clicker or do you want to just say next? I'll say next. OK, I don't need that power. | 01:42:45 | |
Good evening, Mayor, Mayor, Pro Tem, City Council, staff, members of the public. My name is Joe Williams. | 01:42:50 | |
I'm a division chief with the County of Ventura and I'm your acting Fire Chief with City of Point. | 01:42:55 | |
Tonight I'm going to talk about our responses as an OP area and OP area means City of Oxnard, County of Ventura and City of. | 01:43:00 | |
Ventura. | 01:43:08 | |
To the reigns of the night of the 20th. | 01:43:11 | |
Hang on, SO. | 01:43:15 | |
Beneficial for me is I'm a duty chief and so I managed the entire county. Umm. | 01:43:18 | |
We have 3 shifts, so on the C shift duty chief, I was on duty that night and days prior. | 01:43:24 | |
We have a conference call with the National Weather Service and they let us know what's pending and so based on. | 01:43:30 | |
The weather I think it was estimated 2 to 4 inches coast and. | 01:43:36 | |
Mountains were 4 to 8 inches and. | 01:43:40 | |
Based on that and the possible amounts per hour, we instituted a plan to flooding. It's kind of our middle. | 01:43:43 | |
Next slide please and it. | 01:43:49 | |
We added an extra 112 personnel, so command staff, PIO, safety, logistics leader, about 11 people, 2 swift water teams, 6 persons | 01:43:52 | |
each. Oxnard fire also had one swift water team, five utility trucks which have two people on it each. It's usually for flood | 01:43:59 | |
mitigation. | 01:44:05 | |
Or hand crews. Each crew has about 20 personnel with leadership. | 01:44:13 | |
They were instrumental in the Winemay Bay Club for doing search. We were able to grid out, go door to door and make sure everybody | 01:44:18 | |
was safe. | 01:44:22 | |
3 heavy equipment teams. Those are dozers front load. | 01:44:26 | |
Two helicopters, we have a fire Hawk and a Bell 412. They were on 24 hours and we added dispatchers. I was in the dispatch center | 01:44:30 | |
that night. I think I texted Mr. Vega at about 3:00 AM, letting him know how bad the flooding was. | 01:44:37 | |
We had 98 pending calls that people couldn't even get. | 01:44:45 | |
So I think the next slide please will show the the level of calls on that night. | 01:44:49 | |
It was another slide show too, I'm not sure. | 01:44:57 | |
What street that was. | 01:45:01 | |
Might be Oxnard, I think. | 01:45:03 | |
Because the county's slides include the whole affected area, which included some parts of Oxnard, I didn't recognize it. | 01:45:06 | |
That day we responded to 981 calls and it's not just VCFD, that's the that's the county because our dispatch center. | 01:45:17 | |
Dispatches for the entire op. | 01:45:25 | |
231 were weather related and we averaged 576 a day. We ran 981. | 01:45:28 | |
I'd venture to guess that most of those 231 were between 2:00 and 4:00. | 01:45:34 | |
Because that's when that cell kind of parked over. | 01:45:38 | |
One interesting thing about that cell was as it parked over this. | 01:45:41 | |
I was anticipating it to go north because that's where it came from, either hit Camarillo, Ventura and then Ohio. But it seemed to | 01:45:46 | |
peel left out into the ocean. So unfortunately we got the worst of it here. The rest of the county was spared. Next slide, please. | 01:45:52 | |
Significant impacts when Amy Bay Club about six blocks of senior living homes were flooded. | 01:46:00 | |
60 homes were affected. We had 10 rescues. | 01:46:08 | |
Overall that day we had 14 swift water rescues. That is usually people who drove across moving water on a street and get stranded | 01:46:12 | |
and then on the roof and that's when our teams go out and get. | 01:46:18 | |
And one ocean rescue. | 01:46:24 | |
I believe that's it for the counters of response. Does anybody have any questions? | 01:46:29 | |
Thank you. | 01:46:34 | |
So the next. | 01:46:37 | |
Speaker is going to be Patrick Maynard from our County Sheriff's Office of Emergency Services. | 01:46:40 | |
To talk a little bit about some of the post disaster recovery efforts. | 01:46:47 | |
Good evening, Madam Mayor and members of the council and residents of Port Hueneme. Thanks for the opportunity to speak tonight. | 01:46:51 | |
As Mr. Vega indicated, my name is Patrick Maynard. I'm the director of the Sheriff's Office of Emergency Services. | 01:46:59 | |
As Port Hueneme residents, you may wonder why the Sheriff's Office is involved in this. | 01:47:05 | |
What I can tell you as our Office of Emergency Services provides service to all 10 Ventura County cities, we operate the county's | 01:47:10 | |
Emergency Operations Center, and we're here really to support all 10 cities. | 01:47:17 | |
As well as our unincorporated areas when these disasters happen. So we often find ourselves in communities that are unfamiliar | 01:47:24 | |
with us. Other than seeing, you know, sheriff's deputies out in the field, our team is here really to support the cities when | 01:47:28 | |
things like this come up. | 01:47:33 | |
We do a lot in the Office of Emergency Services or we call ourselves the Office of Everything Services. | 01:47:39 | |
Councilmember Hernandez knows all too well, but one of the big things that we really work to accomplish following one of these | 01:47:44 | |
events is securing important state and federal disaster assistance. So I really wanted to take this opportunity tonight and talk | 01:47:51 | |
about a couple of the federal disaster assistance programs that we have available to residents. | 01:47:58 | |
Following an incident like. | 01:48:05 | |
So the first program that's available and out there is what's called the FEMA Individual Assistance Program, and as the title | 01:48:07 | |
indicates. | 01:48:11 | |
This program is geared towards assisting individuals with damages that may occur following an incident. | 01:48:15 | |
To qualify for this. | 01:48:23 | |
FEMA looks to have found. | 01:48:25 | |
Upwards of 1200 either destroyed or structures with major damage again. | 01:48:28 | |
Mr. Vega alluded to this earlier. Major damage is classified as water into the structure over 18 inches. | 01:48:34 | |
It's very disheartening that that's the the look that FEMA is going for when it comes to classifying major damage. We all know | 01:48:41 | |
that two inches of water in a structure is. | 01:48:46 | |
Major if not feeling like destroyed to all of us. But when it comes to flooding, the big thing that really is a tipping point is | 01:48:51 | |
once water reaches on average 18 inches, it makes its way into those electrical outlets and your entire electrical system within | 01:48:57 | |
your house has to be replaced. | 01:49:03 | |
More often than not, not always, but more often than not. So that's kind of why there's that tipping point. Once we we get word of | 01:49:09 | |
of damage, we go out and do damage assessment. We determine, you know ultimately how many structures. | 01:49:15 | |
Meet that requirement or meet that that level of damage. | 01:49:23 | |
And we share that information off with the California Governor's Office of Emergency Services. | 01:49:26 | |
Calories, as we call it, is our state partner in disaster response. | 01:49:32 | |
And the state then makes a determination as to whether or not our event is large enough, and whether or not they want to reach out | 01:49:37 | |
to FEMA for assistance. | 01:49:41 | |
So in the case of what we saw on December 21st here in Port Hueneme. | 01:49:45 | |
Both fortunately and unfortunately, we did not have 1200 structures with major damage. | 01:49:51 | |
You know, flooding is unique, we see. | 01:49:57 | |
Destroyed structures are unimpacted structures with fires, but there's a lot of ambiguity to flooding incidents and again, | 01:49:59 | |
fortunately and unfortunately, we just did not see that level of damage. | 01:50:04 | |
If this program is activated, it can provide residents up to $41,000 of grant funding to help them recover. That funding can be | 01:50:10 | |
used to make repairs. It can be used to purchase lost personal property, things like clothing and bedding and and all that kind of | 01:50:15 | |
stuff. | 01:50:21 | |
Again, it is a grant program and it is one of the only grant programs that is available through FEMA for residents. | 01:50:28 | |
Unfortunately, I just want to set expectations clearly. | 01:50:36 | |
While the requirement is for 1200 structures, we recognize the need locally, so we recognize how challenging the situation is. | 01:50:40 | |
And just because we know it requires 1200 structures doesn't mean we didn't attempt to get it. And we're still trying to this day. | 01:50:49 | |
I can tell you early on we enlisted the power of many of our state and federal elected representatives to go out and really rally | 01:50:56 | |
both the state and FEMA for this assistance. | 01:51:01 | |
Thus far, we we have not been told that we received this. Again, I want to set expectations clearly and state that, you know, we | 01:51:07 | |
got an uphill battle here. | 01:51:11 | |
Odds are not in our favor, given the number of structures that we. | 01:51:16 | |
But we're doing everything we can. We know that this is a vital piece of assistance. So please know that just because we didn't | 01:51:20 | |
see 1200 structures out there with this level of damage doesn't mean that we didn't even try. We're still trying and and really | 01:51:25 | |
have since day one. | 01:51:29 | |
Next slide please. | 01:51:35 | |
The other program that's available from the federal government, which? | 01:51:37 | |
Going to hear a little bit more about is a disaster loan program and that program is made available through the SBA or the Small | 01:51:41 | |
Business Administration. | 01:51:45 | |
We typically think of the SBA as being there to help businesses but post disaster. | 01:51:49 | |
That program is actually there to help residents as well. | 01:51:54 | |
Of course, when you're impacted by disaster, free money is always better than a loan, so we'd much rather have grant opportunities | 01:51:57 | |
and loan opportunities. | 01:52:01 | |
But absent those grant OPP. | 01:52:06 | |
Alone is better than nothing, I. | 01:52:09 | |
So I don't want to steal the SBA's Thunder. What I will say is that we quickly submitted our data. Shortly thereafter, | 01:52:12 | |
representatives from the Small Business Administration responded to Port Hueneme and also Oxnard and together we conducted what's | 01:52:19 | |
called a joint preliminary damage assessment. So if there are any residents in the audience that. | 01:52:25 | |
The good news is we qualified for the SBA program. Really we have to have 25 structures in our operational area with at least | 01:53:02 | |
major damage. We were well beyond that. We were somewhere in the range of 50. | 01:53:08 | |
So fortunately, that program was ultimately approved. The SBA can act on their own accord and issue an emergency declaration at | 01:53:16 | |
the federal level. | 01:53:20 | |
And activate those programs, they've done that. And as of Saturday, they're actually operating in the city of Oxnard providing | 01:53:24 | |
residence loans. | 01:53:28 | |
Next slide. | 01:53:32 | |
I mentioned this earlier, but I want to restate it. We've been advocating from day one and when I say we, there's more than just | 01:53:36 | |
us in this room. It's been a team, a team of people that recognize the need very early. | 01:53:42 | |
Recovery. As Mr. Vega alluded, it's the worst part of a disaster response. We often think of the initial emergency phase as being | 01:53:49 | |
the most challenging, but I will tell you, recovery lives on for years. | 01:53:54 | |
So we knew that we needed the support of everyone to to try to get what we can. So that advocacy started the night of the | 01:54:00 | |
incident, or really the morning of the incident rather. We quickly began gathering damage information and sharing that over with | 01:54:05 | |
the state to kind of give them a heads up. | 01:54:10 | |
It being the holidays, it's challenging to ensure that they have staff in place to come down and do those preliminary damage | 01:54:16 | |
assessments. We wanted to give them a heads up. | 01:54:20 | |
So we stayed in constant contact with him. About a couple weeks later, we we. | 01:54:25 | |
A little less than two weeks later, we hosted an elected officials briefing. | 01:54:30 | |
And organizing that, it was very strategic. So there's a reason why every council member other than Brown Act issues wasn't | 01:54:34 | |
invited. We strategically wanted to invite our state and federal elected representatives with purview over our areas that were | 01:54:39 | |
impacted. | 01:54:44 | |
To put them on notice that we needed their help, we need their help advocating as much as I want to say that. | 01:54:49 | |
FEMA is there to help us, and the federal government and the state government is there to help us. You know as well as I do that | 01:54:56 | |
we need to advocate for that support. So we wanted to put them on notice early on that we needed their help. | 01:55:01 | |
So we hold that briefing. We shared this important information with them and challenged them to go out and meet with the other | 01:55:06 | |
state and federal agencies in Raleigh for support. | 01:55:11 | |
And then lastly, the county Board of Supervisors heard an item just a couple of weeks ago now. | 01:55:16 | |
And issued a letter of support. | 01:55:22 | |
Calories act specifically requesting Director Ward consider a few things. I've already talked about the programs that we asked for | 01:55:26 | |
within that letter. We made that request early on. We reiterated that request on January 9th. | 01:55:32 | |
One of the additional things that we did ask for is absent any of these federal programs, again, we know that we have SBA | 01:55:38 | |
assistance, but absent FEMA assistance. | 01:55:42 | |
Or any other state assistance program. | 01:55:47 | |
We asked the governor to consider any type of one time funding opportunities that could be made available. | 01:55:49 | |
Any of the jurisdictions, whether it's a city, the county, an NGO. | 01:55:56 | |
Consider providing some type of state assistance LOC. | 01:56:01 | |
To assist our. | 01:56:05 | |
The two programs I highlighted are both federal programs. There is no state program specifically geared towards assisting | 01:56:07 | |
individuals respond to disasters and that's a huge void that we feel, especially on these small incidents that don't qualify for | 01:56:13 | |
any of the major programs. I think my last slide if I'm not mistaken. | 01:56:20 | |
Talks about that. So some of our challenges. | 01:56:27 | |
I'll be frank. These programs are broken. They're really broken. | 01:56:31 | |
Especially with inflation and with the price of goods nowadays, even when these programs are activated, you know as well as I do | 01:56:36 | |
that $41,000 is just drop in the bucket if you lose your entire home, especially if it was paid off. | 01:56:42 | |
So I say all of this to say that these programs are broken. California has no individual assistance program. There are other. | 01:56:48 | |
With within the United States that have their own state programs for these smaller type incidents. | 01:56:57 | |
Calais has tried on three separate occasions over the last 10 years to implement a state program. All three times it's failed in | 01:57:02 | |
appropriations. | 01:57:06 | |
It's a bummer because we are feeling the void, the lack of a state program in these cases. | 01:57:11 | |
And then of course, again, I mentioned this, but our federal programs are just completely inadequate. | 01:57:17 | |
So something is better than nothing. But we recognize that all of these programs are just not ideal when it comes to responding to | 01:57:21 | |
disasters. | 01:57:25 | |
That's really where we we lean on our community organizations and that's my last slide, I believe my last slide, we highlight the | 01:57:30 | |
availability of our voluntary organizations, active and disaster. | 01:57:36 | |
Government. All too often we look to to save the day, but government often lets us down. We we've all experienced that. So in | 01:57:43 | |
comes our community based organizations and our non governmental organizations to save the day. | 01:57:49 | |
There have been some tremendous efforts by the American Red. | 01:57:56 | |
Team Rubicon. | 01:58:00 | |
That there's too many to name. If I start naming, I'm gonna leave some out, but they've been out there helping as much as they | 01:58:02 | |
can. What I can tell you is that leaves us at collecting information from residents on any unmet needs. We understand that | 01:58:08 | |
everyone has a unique variety of needs. We encourage you to report that information to 211. You can call 211 from any landline or | 01:58:14 | |
cellular telephone and file an unmet needs report. | 01:58:20 | |
I want to make this very clear. 211 does not have all the answers right now, nor do we. | 01:58:26 | |
So if you have not heard back on some type of unmet need, it's very important. Please be patient and I know that. | 01:58:32 | |
Cliched and painful, but know that we are working very diligently to go down that list of unmet needs and connect individuals with | 01:58:38 | |
resources. That's a tricky process. It definitely does not happen overnight, but I want everyone to know. | 01:58:45 | |
While we may not have the answers, we're continuing to work to try to connect people with resources. Just today, we had a great | 01:58:53 | |
meeting. | 01:58:56 | |
Looking at ways that you know soliciting. | 01:59:01 | |
The private sector and making donations and how we can make that potential money available to residents. So with that, that | 01:59:04 | |
concludes my presentation. I'm happy to answer any questions. | 01:59:09 | |
Thank you. | 01:59:14 | |
Mr. Ghana. | 01:59:17 | |
Yes. In regards to the SBA, does that stand for a small Business Association? | 01:59:19 | |
Administration Are those only available to small businesses or residents available? | 01:59:25 | |
Access. | 01:59:31 | |
Thank you for that question. I, I don't want to steal the SBA Thunder because they'll be presenting next, but both the SB, the SBA | 01:59:32 | |
loans are available to both business and businesses and residents. | 01:59:37 | |
Answer your question. | 01:59:42 | |
Thank you, Mayor. Thank you so much, Mr. Maynard, for being here tonight and helping our city and our times in need. I know that | 01:59:48 | |
you. | 01:59:52 | |
Directly involved from like 1:30 to 7:00 in the morning helping with evacuations, which is a rarity. You don't, I mean. | 01:59:56 | |
Somebody up your level, your stature, doesn't get out in the field like that often, I imagine so. Thank you so much for your help. | 02:00:06 | |
I really appreciate it. And I just wanted to express my gratitude for for all your assistance. My pleasure. | 02:00:12 | |
Thank you. | 02:00:21 | |
Thank you, Patrick. And I want to thank Chief Williams for coming. And and Patrick, I've, I know all of those agencies are just | 02:00:23 | |
running ragged right now trying to get all these things in place and trying to get programs in place. | 02:00:29 | |
I joked at the board meeting but I still mean it as I cannot figure out when Patrick has gone to sleep. So so we really appreciate | 02:00:37 | |
them and also taking the time to come out here and help. | 02:00:42 | |
Explain some of those things that we're doing. | 02:00:49 | |
And then last, we're going to invite up, I think George and Claudia are here from SBA and we're going to give them an opportunity | 02:00:52 | |
to talk a little bit about the disaster loan assistance program that became. | 02:00:59 | |
Available and open for. | 02:01:06 | |
Saturday but but really today too. So with that I will. | 02:01:08 | |
Turn it over to George. | 02:01:15 | |
Hello. We did submit slides. I don't know if you have them or not. And if you don't, that's OK. We can give you. You've got a lot | 02:01:18 | |
of information there, which is super helpful. There's a chance that could be maybe posted online so people can read the | 02:01:23 | |
information. That would be phenomenal. I know it's very short notice. So First off, good evening, Honorable City of Port. We need | 02:01:29 | |
me, Mayor Misty Misty Pres. Mayor Pro Tem Martha McQueen Lagoon. | 02:01:34 | |
Councilmember Steven Gama, Laura Hernandez, Bobby Martinez and City Manager Brad Connors. My name is George Kasturko. | 02:01:40 | |
I am with the US Small Business Administration. I'm here to provide an overview of SPA disaster loan resources available to assist | 02:01:48 | |
people. | 02:01:51 | |
Impacted by the December 2020. | 02:01:55 | |
Storm and flooding. | 02:01:59 | |
Just a little history just so you kind of see how this rolls out. I think emergency manager did a phenomenal job of really kind of | 02:02:02 | |
giving you the playing field of where we're at and why we're here versus maybe why FEMA is not. | 02:02:08 | |
SBA received the Administrative Disaster declaration request on January 8th from Cal OES for damages to and businesses resulting | 02:02:15 | |
from the flooding that occurred December 21 through 23. | 02:02:21 | |
Ventura County met that damage criteria for an SBA administrative declaration following a survey that was conducted on January | 02:02:27 | |
3rd. | 02:02:31 | |
Our administrator signed an administrative declaration on January 10th. | 02:02:35 | |
So to kind of frame it and give you a bigger picture, Council member Gamma SBA offers low interest loans to businesses of all | 02:02:40 | |
sizes, nonprofits, homeowners and renters. | 02:02:46 | |
Not covered by insurance or other recovery funds. So essentially for those that are not insured or underinsured, we can provide. | 02:02:52 | |
Opportunities for funding. At this point, I also want to acknowledge the muscular effort of the Ventura County Sheriff's | 02:02:59 | |
Department Office of Emergency Services, led by Patrick Maynard and Kim Delacourt. | 02:03:04 | |
With their swiftness and helping us get the word out and what we can offer, it's only been a couple days and I'll share a little | 02:03:10 | |
bit about what happened on Saturday at the Recovery Center. | 02:03:15 | |
Finally, we have less some information at the back of the room with more details. That same information can also be found at the | 02:03:21 | |
Disaster Loan Outreach Center at the Oxnard Library. | 02:03:25 | |
So essentially to frame the disaster. | 02:03:31 | |
SBA disaster loans are available to homeowners for up to $500,000 to replace or repair their primary res. | 02:03:34 | |
Renters and homeowners can borrow up to 100,000 to replace or repair a personal property. | 02:03:42 | |
Businesses and nonprofit organizations. | 02:03:49 | |
Can borrow up to $2,000,000 to cover disasters, losses not fully covered by insurance. | 02:03:52 | |
Businesses up to $2,000,000 can borrow funds to help meet financial obligations and operating expenses that could not have been | 02:03:59 | |
met had the disaster not occurred. That's a second loan. That's not a physical loan that's considered any ideal loan. So I'm going | 02:04:05 | |
to get into a little more detail. | 02:04:10 | |
So to frame it also, when this county was declared under an administrative declaration, unlike a presidential, which we of course. | 02:04:15 | |
Experienced. | 02:04:24 | |
So there are 4 eligible California counties that can apply for the storm and flooding disaster loans. So essentially while the | 02:04:26 | |
Ventura was the primary. | 02:04:30 | |
Earn Los Angeles and Santa Barbara, they're contiguous. They all enjoy the same benefits. So last year, for example, under the | 02:04:35 | |
presidential. | 02:04:38 | |
Ventura was. | 02:04:42 | |
You guys would have received physical anti ideal loans, but any contiguous counties were only eligible for EIDL loans. | 02:04:44 | |
That's the difference between a presidential declaration and the administrative declaration. So in a sense. | 02:04:51 | |
There's a broader spread of benefits, of course, as the emergency manager mentioned. Really the the pain, the the devastation was | 02:04:56 | |
concentrated pretty much in this community with a little bit Oxnard, other than the vehicles that were hit. | 02:05:04 | |
So SBA offers low fixed interest rates with terms up to 30 years to help in recovery. | 02:05:14 | |
There's no cost to apply and no obligation to accept the loan if approved. | 02:05:19 | |
The December 2023 storm and flooding disaster loan rates are as low as 2.688% for homeowners. | 02:05:24 | |
As low as 4% for businesses and as low as 3.25% for nonprofit organizations. | 02:05:30 | |
Eligibility is based on a case by case review for each applic. | 02:05:38 | |
Some other recent developments along with the increase in the loan amounts which happened last year. | 02:05:42 | |
There's no interest for the first year and no repayment requirements for the 1st 12 months. | 02:05:49 | |
SBA disaster loans have no closing costs and no prepayment penalties. | 02:05:53 | |
This is very critical though. This is the deadline, so when we have a physical disaster, it's basically a 60 day deadline. There | 02:05:58 | |
can be extensions and sometimes there. | 02:06:02 | |
O in this case, the deadline for anybody who has suffered any damage and is interested in applying with the SBA programs. | 02:06:07 | |
Must do that by March 11, 2024. So essentially, if you've gone online, if you visited the center, if you called the 800 number and | 02:06:14 | |
you've gotten the process started, you're good. | 02:06:20 | |
Don't have to worry. It doesn't end. There's no, we're not going to run out of money. There's none of that kind of stuff. | 02:06:26 | |
Sometimes there's like pool money. There's only so much for a community to get. That's not an issue here. Everybody has the same | 02:06:30 | |
opportunity for the same amount based on the. | 02:06:34 | |
So the EIDL loans, which are economic injury disaster loans, is a second program. | 02:06:40 | |
This is this is primarily for businesses, and what it does is it provides working capital loans up to $2,000,000 to help small | 02:06:45 | |
businesses, small agricultural cooperatives. | 02:06:50 | |
Small businesses engaged in aquaculture and most private nonprofit organizations of all sizes to meet their ordinary and necessary | 02:06:55 | |
financial obligations that cannot be met as a direct result of the disaster. | 02:07:01 | |
These loans are intended to assist the disaster recovery period, so let's say for example in this in Port Hueneme. | 02:07:08 | |
You had an abalone. | 02:07:14 | |
Farm that that would be the kind of thing that they would be benefiting from the program, not only the disaster side but also the | 02:07:16 | |
economic impact. I'll just give you a modest example. In Santa Barbara County last year we had a number of those. | 02:07:22 | |
Though so that's an example of that Loan rates are as low as 4% for businesses and small agricultural cooperatives, and 3.25% for | 02:07:30 | |
private nonprofit organizations. | 02:07:34 | |
And again, that can go as long as 30 years. | 02:07:39 | |
So if if an EIDL loan, if it's a cash flow, kind of a situation paying employees, that kind of thing. | 02:07:43 | |
The deadline for that is a lot longer. That's October 10th. So that goes, depending on the declaration, either eight or nine | 02:07:50 | |
months. So that one people haven't. Our companies, individuals, nonprofits have until. | 02:07:55 | |
October. | 02:08:02 | |
To start that. | 02:08:03 | |
As was mentioned earlier, the SBA has a disaster loan Outreach Center at the South Oxnard Branch Library at 4300 Saviors Rd. zip | 02:08:05 | |
code 9303. | 02:08:10 | |
As you were alerted today, the hours of operation were expanded pretty dramatically based on the need. | 02:08:17 | |
So right now the hours are from 9:00 AM to 7:00 PM. | 02:08:23 | |
Monday through Thursday. | 02:08:28 | |
Saturdays are 9:00 AM to 3:00. | 02:08:29 | |
Now when somebody shows up at 2:59, we're going to stay to help them. The doors might close, but if they're in the building, | 02:08:32 | |
they're going to still be helped. So we don't turn anybody away. That's not the way SBA works. | 02:08:37 | |
And I mentioned earlier the muscular efforts by not only the county but the cities to get the word out to those interested in SBA | 02:08:43 | |
help. | 02:08:47 | |
On Saturday, the opening day of our disaster loan outreach center, we had more than 100 people arrive for assistance. That is a | 02:08:50 | |
phenomenal amount of folks that shows a need, and I'm certainly hoping that helps. | 02:08:56 | |
Mr. Maynard and others as you work towards talking to the count to the the state and the federal government in terms of any | 02:09:03 | |
additional assistance. | 02:09:06 | |
While some of those people had to leave for work or after learning they they had the ability to register and or enroll online. | 02:09:11 | |
Our field operations staff assisted 71 people that first day. | 02:09:18 | |
Probably the largest group in recent memory for a first day of an agency disaster loan outreach center. | 02:09:23 | |
So that's really speaks volumes to your organization, this city, the county. | 02:09:29 | |
The chamber's getting the word out for folks to show up, and we are grateful. We really are grateful, because when we can show | 02:09:36 | |
that kind of need, that means we can be here as long as possible to help folks. | 02:09:40 | |
We try to keep the open this the disaster loan outreach centers open until the need is met. | 02:09:45 | |
So we asked those that if we asked that if there are those in the community with needs we haven't that haven't come in yet, please | 02:09:51 | |
come to the center at the Oxnard library. It's really great to have that one-on-one help because sometimes the forms can be a | 02:09:56 | |
little confusing. The kind of information they're asking for when you get that person, they're walking you through and giving | 02:10:01 | |
examples. It's super helpful. | 02:10:06 | |
But if. | 02:10:11 | |
Someone that is unable to get to the disaster loan outreach. | 02:10:14 | |
They can also apply online through SBA secure site. SBA dot. | 02:10:19 | |
Right hand slash. | 02:10:23 | |
And that is another way to go ahead and apply. | 02:10:26 | |
So we we also have an SBA customer service number which is 800-659-2955 and anybody can e-mail disaster customer service all run | 02:10:31 | |
on at sba.gov. | 02:10:38 | |
So finally, this disaster is clearly devastating to this community without a. | 02:10:47 | |
As you can see, it's impacting the businesses, the homeowners and I'm sure a number of renters were were really hurt with this. | 02:10:54 | |
So basically SBA is really here to help and that's I'm glad I was able to get. I was getting the opportunity to speak that even | 02:11:03 | |
though we're called SBA, we do help homeowners and renters. So if anybody has any questions, I'd be glad to answer. | 02:11:09 | |
Thank you. | 02:11:15 | |
I had just two quick ones if I could, and one is because I actually spoke at a kind of a town hall meeting this morning and I said | 02:11:18 | |
something and some people in the room. | 02:11:24 | |
Seem to think. | 02:11:30 | |
Maybe I was interpreting it differently, so I just would like to know, but. | 02:11:32 | |
Reading the fact sheet had noted that the loan can be repaid without interest for the first year. | 02:11:38 | |
Right. And so we were trying to tell people because some people are saying, well, I'd rather wait and see if if FEMA assistance or | 02:11:42 | |
something like that comes through rather than start the process for a loan. | 02:11:47 | |
And so when we spoke with a couple 100 people today, we. | 02:11:52 | |
You you don't lose anything. You the only way you're going to lose something is if you don't come in and inquire and find out. I | 02:12:31 | |
think you gave them excellent advice. Our hope is that we do. | 02:12:36 | |
More assistance here on the federal level, I think it's when we worked in partnership with FEMA, we actually. | 02:12:42 | |
While we're equals lead especially. | 02:12:48 | |
First response aspect of it. So we're kind of part of the recovery thing. So what would happen in a typical presidential, let's | 02:12:52 | |
say, and some of you in the community may remember this. | 02:12:57 | |
You come in, you talk to FEMA first. | 02:13:02 | |
And then in that FEMA application, you can refer to SBA. Some people come straight to us and we obviously want to work with them, | 02:13:04 | |
but we also explain to them, please talk to FEMA. There may be some benefits here that you might be eligible or grants, the kind | 02:13:10 | |
of grants that Mister Maynard was bringing up, we unfortunately. | 02:13:15 | |
Give money away and and not ask for repayment or it's all the what happens with these loans is when they're repaid, they go back | 02:13:22 | |
to the US Treasury and then they're recycled through. And then that's why I want to emphasize that there is no limit. We do not | 02:13:26 | |
run out of money. I know we've heard. | 02:13:30 | |
Some stories where FEMA can run out of money in terms of allocation. The SBA is a different setup. We're set up with the financial | 02:13:35 | |
industry. | 02:13:38 | |
We have banks that are there that are eligible, that are, that are backed by the US government and their loans, so they are, they | 02:13:42 | |
are ready to. | 02:13:45 | |
Offer the funds. It's just that there are certain requirements that you're going to have to meet in terms of the loans, so. | 02:13:50 | |
Could you also talk on if you are denied first, there is a second or like an appeal? | 02:13:57 | |
So what that person? What will happen with that individual or businesses? They'll get a denial letter. | 02:14:43 | |
But in every denial letter, there's an opportunity to appeal, to provide additional information. We certainly encourage people to | 02:14:48 | |
get denial letters to come to the center or to call or get online and follow up and find out what what was the reason why? | 02:14:54 | |
We, I can tell you that on the back end in terms of when we look at loans. | 02:15:01 | |
There's a lot of especially with the newer the with the enhanced loan programs, there's a lot more flexibility in the program that | 02:15:06 | |
we had before. So this administration has really bent over backwards to try to make sure that where we had maybe really strict | 02:15:13 | |
collateral standards at a certain dollar amount, those have been basically those are very flexible in terms of having that | 02:15:19 | |
collateral to get a loan. In terms of looking at some of the financials, if you don't have regular tax records, W2 can work those | 02:15:25 | |
kinds of things. So there's. | 02:15:31 | |
There's opportunities to work around it and everybody's financial situation is considered on its own. | 02:15:38 | |
So everybody, everybody will have a different outcome. People ask, well, how long is it going to take? Well, it really depends on. | 02:15:43 | |
Soon all the pieces come together. | 02:15:52 | |
If we have all the pieces, we can come back usually in about two to four weeks with and what I don't really call an offer, but | 02:15:55 | |
basically an outcome in terms of what would be available for that person based on their financial situation. | 02:16:01 | |
And that sometimes in that case, the denial letter comes, but we were always interested in reviewing those denials. | 02:16:08 | |
The only thing that's missing here unfortunately, and this is where there's some confusion because of some people suffered losses | 02:16:14 | |
last year in the presidential. | 02:16:18 | |
Is you'll have. | 02:16:22 | |
FEMA will deny you initially send you to S. | 02:16:24 | |
And this drives people crazy, but unfortunately it is a process. | 02:16:28 | |
On a navigate so SBA will go. | 02:16:32 | |
You're. | 02:16:37 | |
This does it seems really what you need is to go back to FEMA and we will once we deny and go back to FEMA then they can go and | 02:16:38 | |
look at a second level or a third level and that goes into some of the grants I think that Patrick talked about. We don't have | 02:16:44 | |
that safety net right now with FEMA. It's just SBA here right now. So I just want to be very clear that. | 02:16:51 | |
While we have an internal re review process, we don't have that ability to reach out to another federal, federal partner for a re | 02:16:57 | |
review or reconsideration. | 02:17:01 | |
Thank you. | 02:17:07 | |
Any other questions? One last question, it's just. | 02:17:08 | |
Today we've we've had a couple meetings with a couple 100 people and so some of the questions I've heard and sorry to put you on | 02:17:11 | |
the spot on this, but just so we know sort of you know where potential gaps would be that we would need to focus. | 02:17:18 | |
You mentioned Social Security number, are these programs only available to U.S. citizens at this point? So what we're what we're | 02:17:25 | |
trying to do is we encourage people no matter what their background to come in and apply. | 02:17:32 | |
It's really based on. | 02:17:38 | |
And and we're not going to discriminate based on, I mean. | 02:17:40 | |
Are we just asked people to come? | 02:17:44 | |
And and find out what's available. | 02:17:47 | |
Thank you. I would and I would echo that for anybody watching anything. We we do hear right now a lot from people saying that | 02:17:49 | |
they're aware of people who haven't come forward and reported issues because of that and we the city doesn't consider that as a | 02:17:54 | |
factor and I think to echo your point of you know come talk. | 02:18:00 | |
You know, there could be, there could be somebody in your household. | 02:18:06 | |
You know that that either there would be questions that we'll ask and we'll find out that there is somebody that's eligible, maybe | 02:18:09 | |
not you as an individual, but maybe somebody else is and then they can work at that, work it out that way. | 02:18:13 | |
Thank you. | 02:18:19 | |
Yes, I think this is more of a comment, not a question, but I would hope that we could double down our efforts to communicate to | 02:18:20 | |
residents that you can apply for an SBA loan. | 02:18:26 | |
Because small business, you know that it just, I just want to make sure people understand this is available to residents. | 02:18:33 | |
Right. Well, we'll keep getting that message out. We've been, we this came together very quickly, which is great. I think it was | 02:18:41 | |
over like what Thursday to today where we've been putting out the word and getting the word out. But we'll keep trying to get that | 02:18:46 | |
message out because today too that was a question a lot of people had. They're like well I don't have a business you don't know, | 02:18:51 | |
but I'm, I'm I'm so glad to hear that you know you're busy. | 02:18:56 | |
You have 71 people come in. Oh no. No. We were we were super. We were grateful we you would not that may. I think we're the ones | 02:19:01 | |
that are. I mean that is one end we see the the I mean the pictures tell the story. The stories we're hearing complete unexpected. | 02:19:09 | |
Tragedy. I mean people losing everything they own, you know, in in some instances, but also at the same time. | 02:19:17 | |
You know, we want people to come in and ask questions and they are asking questions and the other thing I want to share with you | 02:19:23 | |
today and it took a little while and it came at the same time as the enhanced hours as we were able to get out our. | 02:19:29 | |
Robust messaging in. | 02:19:35 | |
And so we sent out emails today, not only one in English, but one that really is written in Spanish. And we asked people just to | 02:19:38 | |
use that, send that out to the community so they can see we're working with the. | 02:19:43 | |
You've got. | 02:19:49 | |
The console here, we're going to be reaching out them till we already let them know that we're going to be coming. So we're going | 02:19:52 | |
to be working with the consulate, working with Spanish media. And so having those documents in Spanish makes it a lot easier. And | 02:19:57 | |
I do want to share with you that Univision and NBC. | 02:20:01 | |
In Los Angeles on Saturday was very interested and I sent them pictures and video. | 02:20:06 | |
So they wanted to cover the event even though they couldn't send. | 02:20:11 | |
We were able to send them some things so they were able to get the word out to the community. So I'll be reaching out the laser | 02:20:14 | |
broadcasting tomorrow couple hours. I kind of was hesitant at first because I didn't have that. | 02:20:19 | |
That document now I do. | 02:20:24 | |
Right. | 02:20:28 | |
Anybody else? | 02:20:28 | |
OK. Thank you. All right. We do have materials back there and please, are these live streamed or? | 02:20:31 | |
OK, good. Anybody out there, please don't hesitate to come to the library. Our staff is ready. We've expanded the staff. We're now | 02:20:37 | |
in the computer room at the library, which makes it a lot easier for everybody. Little more room, a little more privacy I think | 02:20:41 | |
before. | 02:20:45 | |
The first day was. | 02:20:50 | |
Siloed, I think people felt a little claustrophobic and the the line and people waiting, we've improved that. So we appreciate | 02:20:52 | |
every, We appreciate the community's patience with SBA as we try to gear up and provide the best that we can and certainly lay the | 02:20:58 | |
groundwork if there's any opportunity for reconsideration with any other federal help. | 02:21:04 | |
So thank you very much. Thank you for coming. | 02:21:12 | |
Mr. City Manager, do you have anything else? | 02:21:16 | |
I think that's. | 02:21:18 | |
Yes, I think that's it at this time. We had a couple meetings with different neighborhood groups today and we try to answer some | 02:21:22 | |
questions specific to the different neighborhoods that we were hearing. But I think for the purpose of this item, we appreciate | 02:21:29 | |
county OES, our fire representative and SBA for for coming and talking about it. | 02:21:35 | |
Think you heard it from each of those people, and for me that right now the biggest challenge we have is we all feel this. You | 02:21:42 | |
know, the vacuum of where FEMA normally is. | 02:21:48 | |
And that we're trying to each kind of piece. | 02:21:53 | |
Together help, but it is hard because we don't have that sort of magic bullet that FEMA usually provides. | 02:21:57 | |
So we're still advocating for that. We're still. | 02:22:05 | |
Going to keep advocating for different assistance from different places and I think the message we were trying to get through to | 02:22:10 | |
residents when we've been having meetings recently is this isn't a case where. | 02:22:15 | |
You know, we forgot about people and we're just back to day-to-day. We're all, we're actively working on it. | 02:22:21 | |
We know it's to the point Patrick made is is the FEMA challenge. Feels like an uphill battle at this point, but we're going to | 02:22:27 | |
keep trying for that. | 02:22:32 | |
Thank you. | 02:22:36 | |
OK, so I already asked it. I asked if there's public comments on this item. | 02:22:39 | |
No, but there are no public comments for this item. | 02:22:44 | |
So we have a recommendation to receive an update on the local emergency declared on December 21st, 2023. | 02:22:48 | |
And to approve a letter to the California Governor's Office of Emergency Services advocating for disaster relief. | 02:22:55 | |
Due to recent unprecedented weather events and authorized staff to continue advocating for disaster relief for residents. | 02:23:02 | |
And to receive an update on the third party liability claims, May I have a motion and a second? | 02:23:09 | |
Were we up? | 02:23:19 | |
No. And you know, if there is an emotion on the floor yet, so I can just speak very quickly to it. | 02:23:21 | |
And partially it was because we ended up, we went out and met with Whining Bay where some of those liability claims issues are | 02:23:27 | |
extremely relevant. And I didn't hear anybody from Wyoming Bay here today. So we weren't going to speak to just that specific | 02:23:34 | |
issue. But in a nutshell and I think it says in our report, we're aware of. | 02:23:40 | |
Some issues related to to. | 02:23:48 | |
Some claims we've received based on one of the emergency response vehicles and the city is working closely with its claims | 02:23:54 | |
adjuster right now as we speak. Our risk management team is working with them. | 02:24:00 | |
We are getting them all the information that we can get on those claims. To try to expedite that process, we also asked our | 02:24:07 | |
insurance providers to contact the residents who right now are waiting. | 02:24:13 | |
We've heard that some are waiting to make repairs because they're waiting for the outcome of this claim investigation and we've | 02:24:18 | |
asked our insurers to contact them, make sure they have all the information and then get out of the way and let them make the | 02:24:23 | |
repairs and then ultimately. | 02:24:28 | |
When the city and our insurance provider get together, then we're going to. | 02:24:33 | |
Review it and make make the determination. So we're actively working on that, we're aware of. | 02:24:38 | |
The questions related to it and we don't want people to know or we don't want people to think that it's something that we're | 02:24:45 | |
hiding from or we're ignoring. We're we're not. We're working with our insurance company. | 02:24:50 | |
Going through that process. | 02:24:55 | |
So we have a motion. Do we have a second? | 02:24:58 | |
2nd Thank you. | 02:25:01 | |
Any discussion? | 02:25:04 | |
Madam Clerk, can I confirm with the motion who made the motion? | 02:25:07 | |
Councilmember Martinez, I made the motion. OK, thank you all in favor. | 02:25:13 | |
All opposed. | 02:25:20 | |
Hearing none motion passes unanimously. | 02:25:21 | |
Thank you. | 02:25:24 | |
The next business? | 02:25:26 | |
The next business item is City Council Liaison Committee appointments for 2024. | 02:25:29 | |
Well, staff, please present the report. | 02:25:35 | |
Yes. So just at the beginning of each year, we typically go through our committee appointments for the City Council and discuss. | 02:25:38 | |
Those appointments and whether there's any desired changes to those appointments. | 02:25:48 | |
So today. | 02:25:52 | |
We have in your packet. We have the list of the different committees that we have appointments for. | 02:25:54 | |
And the current list of who's appointed to each committee. It's a lengthy list, so I'm not going to read it item by item. | 02:26:00 | |
But essentially this is the opportunity for the New Year and with and with our reorganization. | 02:26:08 | |
And the rotation of the mayor and the mayor Pro Tem positions for us to talk about. | 02:26:14 | |
Adjusting those for the coming year. | 02:26:19 | |
My suggestion would be essentially opening it up to. | 02:26:23 | |
Council to discuss whether any changes are desired and if so, which what? What are those changes? | 02:26:27 | |
OK. So I guess I will start with Council Member Martinez. I don't want to keep calling you Hernandez. | 02:26:34 | |
I'm not just Martinez, but I'm Brambilla and I'm also Hernandez, so that's probably why. | 02:26:41 | |
So seeing as I teach between 8:00. | 02:26:47 | |
2:30 PM There's a couple that I'm alternates that if anybody wants me to take over, I can take over, such as the. | 02:26:52 | |
Water agency or when you mean water agency. | 02:26:59 | |
VCOG or the air pollution, which nobody's assigned to that one yet. That's at 6:30 PM every Tuesday when necessary. | 02:27:02 | |
But honestly, like if anybody still wants like for example Gama, if you still want to be called, that's fine and. | 02:27:13 | |
Councilmember Mayor Pro Tem McQueen Lejeune, If you still want the water agency, that's that's fine too. | 02:27:19 | |
I'm I'm just letting it know that I'm I'm comfortable with my appointments and if anybody wants to rotate that's fine. | 02:27:25 | |
I'm. | 02:27:32 | |
Those are my comments. | 02:27:34 | |
Thank you. Good. | 02:27:36 | |
Yeah, I'm comfortable with my appointments. I'm more comfortable with the Beacon and Animal Services. I feel like I'm. | 02:27:37 | |
Contributing mightily to those two organizations among among the executive committee with the with Beacon Peacock has been a | 02:27:45 | |
challenge for me trying to. | 02:27:51 | |
Purpose. And I think I found that purpose in reviewing our priorities last week. | 02:27:59 | |
One of the priorities that VCOG has is waterways and beach health. | 02:28:05 | |
So I got reinvigorated. | 02:28:11 | |
And I really want to try. | 02:28:14 | |
To work vcog to help. | 02:28:17 | |
Get all the interested parties and and and working to better our ocean environment so. So I'm very comfortable with the three. The | 02:28:22 | |
only thing that I'm a little concerned about is that I think I saw that we have a new committee. | 02:28:28 | |
OK, I'll dominate. | 02:28:36 | |
Mayor for that one, Which Which? Federal outreach and Advisory Council? | 02:28:37 | |
But I want to trade you or I want to go to that, but how about do you want to try the water agency? | 02:28:44 | |
Mr. Martinez. | 02:28:49 | |
Since you're so gung ho, yeah, no. | 02:28:51 | |
The water agency, I think. | 02:28:54 | |
It's. | 02:28:57 | |
Is it? Yes, the three of us. | 02:29:00 | |
Yes. | 02:29:02 | |
I see your net. Oh, I see. OK, I see. It is. I I wouldn't mind. I mean, I'd be more than happy to take on the role. | 02:29:04 | |
To represent us on the Port Wyoming Water Agency. | 02:29:10 | |
OK, and just because Councilmember Hernandez asked this at the last meeting if she could send her comments knowing she was going | 02:29:12 | |
to be having to leave early? | 02:29:18 | |
Umm, so she did send her comments and I'm not sure if we if we got that to everybody, so I guess I. | 02:29:24 | |
So just to just because a couple of the committees that were just discussed. | 02:29:32 | |
On her list. So just so everybody. | 02:29:38 | |
I think, Councilmember Hernandez proposed. | 02:29:41 | |
That the Federal Outreach and Advisory Council which is part of the. | 02:29:46 | |
Association of Defense Communities. | 02:29:51 | |
Essentially it have the same representatives as the regional defense partnership because of the tie in. | 02:29:54 | |
And that's that's what was request. | 02:30:01 | |
It doesn't necessarily have to be the same, so it's obviously the choice of the council, but I just want to let everybody know | 02:30:05 | |
that that was a request. | 02:30:08 | |
And. | 02:30:12 | |
The other two requests that I see from Councilmember Hernandez. | 02:30:14 | |
VR. | 02:30:19 | |
Proposing council member McQueen Lejeune and oh, with the alternate being Hernandez. So that's just a switch. | 02:30:20 | |
And then VCOG proposing. | 02:30:28 | |
Mayor Perez with Councilmember Hernandez as the alternate. | 02:30:30 | |
But again, I just want to let her make sure everybody knows that, but it's also ultimately up to the council to decide. | 02:30:34 | |
And I I was thinking about be called but it takes. | 02:30:40 | |
It causes me to have to leave work early to attend that meeting. So I thought about it over the weekend and elected. It's not good | 02:30:45 | |
for my work schedule. Yeah, it's 4:00 PM on a work day in in Camarillo, which means I have to leave at 3:30 or, yeah, 3:30. | 02:30:52 | |
Yeah. And I'm reinvigorated. | 02:31:00 | |
But she can be the. | 02:31:04 | |
I'm the alternate currently. | 02:31:09 | |
Yeah, yeah, I mean that'd be switch that, since she's requesting to be an alternate. | 02:31:11 | |
So alternate Hernandez for that one, yeah. | 02:31:17 | |
For Peacock. | 02:31:23 | |
So right now I'm just going to sort of track what what we agreed to and then at the end then we'll obviously need a motion to to | 02:31:25 | |
approve all those things. | 02:31:29 | |
Ask one more question. | 02:31:34 | |
Is it true? | 02:31:36 | |
Oh, I'm sure it is the Ventura County air pollution. | 02:31:37 | |
Newly added and we don't have any representation on that. | 02:31:41 | |
Right. So there's three, there's three committees there. Well, the board and two committees. So I'm on the board and then I'm on a | 02:31:45 | |
standing committee, there's a third committee, the advisory committee and that's been vacant. | 02:31:52 | |
Port Hueneme has had a spot on that and it has never been. | 02:31:59 | |
And what exactly does the advisory committee? Because I might be interested even though my time? | 02:32:05 | |
Tough. | 02:32:11 | |
I think that's something. Yeah, I'm, I'm just looking forward to Pete. I can tell you what it is. | 02:32:13 | |
The meet once a quarter, Yeah, it's it's meet you meet at. I want to say as as needed, but let me let's find it first. | 02:32:18 | |
It's on page 5 of 11. | 02:32:26 | |
Ventura County Air Pollution Control District Advisory Committee is newly added. | 02:32:29 | |
It's an appointed body that reviews proposed new or amended rules as part of the public engagement process for rural development. | 02:32:34 | |
The Advisory committee makes recommendations to the Air Pollution Control Board. | 02:32:42 | |
Regarding adoption of the new or amended rule and the Committee's recommendation is stated at the Board's public hearing | 02:32:46 | |
considering the rule action. | 02:32:50 | |
The committee occasionally takes up other issues related to air quality and is comprised comprised of 20 members. | 02:32:54 | |
Each county supervisor recommends 2 members in each of the 10 cities has one member as one member appointed. | 02:33:01 | |
So it sounds like it's sort of like an initial review and then make a recommendation that then the board approves? | 02:33:07 | |
Declines. | 02:33:14 | |
So maybe, like the vetting, vetting process, our Advisory Council? | 02:33:15 | |
Yeah, yeah, exactly like our Citizens Advisory Council. So then does our city have two appointments from ours, 11 from our | 02:33:20 | |
supervisor and who is that? Well, each city has one appointment. So that's the appointment we have is is our city appointment. | 02:33:28 | |
And then the Super about each supervisor also gets to make appointments. But that's not what we're being asked to do. At this | 02:33:36 | |
point, we're just being asked to fill our city spot. | 02:33:40 | |
And so at some point, our supervisor will make an appointment, Yeah, and theoretically they could ask us to appoint somebody else, | 02:33:45 | |
but they haven't done that yet. | 02:33:49 | |
OK, I'll avail myself to that. | 02:33:57 | |
So I would like. | 02:34:04 | |
Umm. | 02:34:06 | |
Council member Martinez Martinez. | 02:34:11 | |
I would like to try the water board agency out or the water board agency, the water agency agency. It's almost like being water | 02:34:14 | |
borders. | 02:34:17 | |
But I I would I'm still interested in doing. | 02:34:26 | |
The. | 02:34:30 | |
The Federal Outreach and Advisory Council. OK, good. So let me say this so I know there's been. | 02:34:33 | |
Request or a proposal that the same person on the RDP does the federal outreach. But I'm on the RDP and I have already a standing | 02:34:39 | |
air pollution board meeting on the day of this federal outreach, so I won't be able to do that. | 02:34:46 | |
And that's on Zoom, so I don't have to worry about having to drive. | 02:34:55 | |
Yeah, it's on Zoom because it's there's representatives all over the country on. | 02:34:58 | |
So sounds like maybe a consensus, then, that Mayor Perez. | 02:35:02 | |
And then do we want an? | 02:35:08 | |
They didn't request. | 02:35:12 | |
Sometimes they don't have alternates, for instance, it they you can appoint an alternate, but it's not required. | 02:35:14 | |
Design. | 02:35:24 | |
Well, that's up. That's up to somebody. If they want to be an alternative, I don't. I wouldn't mind being an alternate. It's early | 02:35:27 | |
enough that if needed, I I can participate. | 02:35:31 | |
Councilmember Martinez is alternate. | 02:35:37 | |
It's for RDP, right? | 02:35:40 | |
No, that's for the Federal Outreach and Advisory Council. | 02:35:42 | |
2:00 on Tuesday. | 02:35:46 | |
Can't do that one. | 02:35:50 | |
Your school schedule. | 02:35:51 | |
You can put me under as alternate. I'm sure if I can make it. | 02:35:53 | |
For whatever reason that we can, we can call someone else. | 02:35:57 | |
Alternate. | 02:36:00 | |
Anybody else want to make changes? | 02:36:02 | |
So so for me the only change would be the. | 02:36:05 | |
The switch. | 02:36:10 | |
Council member VRSD, right? | 02:36:13 | |
And then I'll keep the, I'll keep the other ones that I have. | 02:36:19 | |
Councilmember Martinez, what's happening with REACH? | 02:36:25 | |
Yeah, that's that's a tough one. | 02:36:29 | |
Or suppose, I mean, we're supposed to be meeting up tomorrow. | 02:36:32 | |
I the members that are left, I mean, I've been calling. I'm not trying to. | 02:36:36 | |
You know, point anybody out, but I've been calling and calling and I haven't really gotten a response. | 02:36:40 | |
So the idea is to like. | 02:36:47 | |
Light the fire back up and bring it up. | 02:36:49 | |
I went to the last meeting too, and I think that exactly what Council Member Martinez. | 02:36:52 | |
Just said is I think. | 02:36:58 | |
Reaches sort of figuring out how to regroup and kind of restart. | 02:36:59 | |
So I think that's going to be a big part of that job this year is helping the reach board figure out how to. | 02:37:04 | |
Kick start again. So that's going to need a new board. It's going to need some work. | 02:37:11 | |
So everyone else is good with their changes? Do I need to make any changes so I am no longer on the water agency? | 02:37:20 | |
I am. I guess I missed that one. Is that one you're you're off of the water? | 02:37:30 | |
Mr. Martinez is. | 02:37:37 | |
And then we we had an alternate before We need an alternate. That's what I was going to say. | 02:37:39 | |
Before, so I don't know if you want to reapers, OK? | 02:37:45 | |
I think it's time for you to get educated in water. | 02:37:53 | |
What I have as far as changes is. | 02:38:00 | |
Federal Outreach and Advisory Council Mayor Perez. | 02:38:05 | |
With the alternate Council Member Martinez. | 02:38:09 | |
Water agency. | 02:38:12 | |
Are. | 02:38:14 | |
Where Councilmember Martinez is the appointee and Mayor Perez is the alternate. | 02:38:16 | |
VCOG new Alternate Council Member Hernandez. | 02:38:24 | |
Ventura County Air Pollution Control District Advisory Committee, New appointee, Council Member G. | 02:38:29 | |
And Ventura Regional Sanitation District. | 02:38:36 | |
Swapping where it's now, Council. | 02:38:39 | |
McQueen. Would Mayor Pro Tem McQueen? | 02:38:43 | |
As the appointee and Councilmember Hernandez as the alternate. | 02:38:46 | |
So if that all sounds good, there could be a motion to approve. | 02:38:52 | |
I'd like to make a motion to approve the recommendations second. | 02:38:56 | |
All in favor. | 02:39:04 | |
All opposed. | 02:39:06 | |
Hearing none motion passes unanimously with Councilmember Hernandez being absent. | 02:39:07 | |
And the two points are for the federal outreach. | 02:39:13 | |
I already said that I'm on the EDC. Oh, we have to change the City Ports Committee. | 02:39:16 | |
We have. | 02:39:22 | |
Martinez and Add. | 02:39:23 | |
McQueen. | 02:39:25 | |
Right, OK. | 02:39:27 | |
Do we need to vote for that? It's essentially with the rotation. My understanding is that. | 02:39:29 | |
OK. So we'll make that change unless there's a motion to do something other than that. | 02:39:34 | |
We are done with that. | 02:39:48 | |
Oh, sorry, I didn't ask if there were any public comments. | 02:39:51 | |
No public comments. | 02:39:55 | |
So item number 10, which is the reorganization of specific positions within the city's Parking Enforcement Division and City | 02:40:02 | |
Manager's Office. | 02:40:06 | |
Will you please present the report? | 02:40:11 | |
Yes, thank you. And I'm going to keep this one pretty brief normally. | 02:40:14 | |
Doing some of these reorganization, reorganization type things. | 02:40:19 | |
Do not require council action and typically when we're talking staffing, those are things that are handled administratively. | 02:40:22 | |
But this is on the agenda for two reasons. One is we wanted to sort of let people know that we are looking at making a change. | 02:40:31 | |
Umm with our Parking Enforcement Division moving it to the Police Department to work closely with our Police Department. | 02:40:39 | |
On identifying priorities and then doing priority based enforcement. | 02:40:46 | |
And being able to work with the Police Department in doing that. | 02:40:53 | |
So we just wanted to let people know about. | 02:40:58 | |
And then second is because the reorganization does include the elimination of one position. It's a position that was created in | 02:41:01 | |
2020. | 02:41:06 | |
It's the in the city managers. | 02:41:11 | |
It's it's bounced around from the city manager's office to the Police Department and back. And I think part of that was just. | 02:41:15 | |
Trying to figure out how to make it work, but it was the position that was titled the city's Emergency Preparedness and | 02:41:23 | |
communications manager position. So as part of the reorganization and and where we're trying to look to increase. | 02:41:30 | |
Some efficiencies and things like that. | 02:41:39 | |
We see a need in the City Managers office for more administrative support and analytical support to to help with a variety of | 02:41:41 | |
projects and not just focused in one particular area. | 02:41:48 | |
So that part of the item requires an approval because we're eliminating a position. | 02:41:55 | |
And we're. | 02:42:03 | |
Including a layoff of one position within the city. | 02:42:06 | |
And and so that item is on the agenda for approval because that has to be approved by the City Council. | 02:42:11 | |
So as I said we're we're making those adjustments to try. | 02:42:18 | |
Improve some of our service levels, improve the coordination between some of those areas. | 02:42:24 | |
And. | 02:42:30 | |
Be more efficient with the few amount of employees that we have and try to figure out how to maximize that efficiency. So we | 02:42:32 | |
recommend. | 02:42:36 | |
Receiving the update on that process that I just provided and then adopting the resolution, approving and adopting the pay | 02:42:42 | |
schedule with. | 02:42:46 | |
The elimination of a position and the creation of confidential administrative analysts to provide that administrative and | 02:42:52 | |
analytical support. | 02:42:55 | |
To the to our city as a whole. So we recommend. | 02:43:00 | |
Both of those items at this time. | 02:43:05 | |
And I'm happy to answer any questions. | 02:43:07 | |
Thank you. | 02:43:09 | |
Do Council have any questions? | 02:43:11 | |
Go ahead, city managers, thank you so much for the report. | 02:43:14 | |
You spoke about deficiencies and I don't. You don't have to tell me what the deficiency you're trying to. | 02:43:20 | |
Effects are but just for our residents sake, what are some of the? | 02:43:26 | |
Changes or Differences or the results of this reorg What will our residents see? | 02:43:32 | |
Yeah, yeah. I think one of the things for us is. | 02:43:39 | |
You know, our police department's a good example when we're talking about the parking enforcement aspect. | 02:43:44 | |
Of our police. | 02:43:50 | |
Focuses on priorities. We don't have the resources to police every single issue at all times, everywhere in the city. | 02:43:52 | |
So police. | 02:43:59 | |
Focus on those priorities. And, you know, some people may see that if you're going a mile under the speed limit or a mile over the | 02:44:01 | |
speed limit, you're not. | 02:44:06 | |
Our Police Department is probably not pulling you over because there's just other priorities. | 02:44:11 | |
You know that we're working on. | 02:44:16 | |
And I think an easy way to like sort of summarize that is like the Police Department really enforces the the spirit of the law | 02:44:18 | |
versus the letter of the law and hold, you know, holding people to the exact letter of the law. | 02:44:24 | |
And for me, one of the key things is the Parking enforcement Team and and where I've seen parking enforcement really be | 02:44:31 | |
successful. | 02:44:35 | |
And other agencies is when they work with the Police Department and they understand that as well. | 02:44:40 | |
That it's about enforcing the spirit of the law and not necessarily not necessarily the letter of the law. | 02:44:45 | |
You know, we've all kind of heard and seen things where, you know, people talk about getting rulers out and measuring if we're | 02:44:52 | |
exactly 18 inches away or less from the curb. And one of the goals with with having the Police Department work closely with | 02:44:57 | |
parking enforcement would be providing sort of that guidance and. | 02:45:03 | |
And helping them understand the spirit of law. What are we trying to accomplish? What safety improvement are we trying to reach? | 02:45:09 | |
Versus having people feel like it's sort of arbitrary and and you know, the letter of the law but not the spirit of the law. | 02:45:17 | |
And I just think the Police Department is very good at usually working with other teams on that because the Police Department, | 02:45:25 | |
police officers have had to become sort of experts in how to do that well and reasonably. | 02:45:31 | |
So that people don't feel like we're just out hassling people. | 02:45:37 | |
And so. | 02:45:41 | |
One of the things that we have tried to do recently was in the Police Department we. | 02:45:43 | |
Sort of creating a traffic division, for lack of a better word with our motorcycle officer and some of the officers focused on | 02:45:50 | |
traffic and speeding and those issues. | 02:45:54 | |
And so they will be working closely and tying in perfectly with the Parking Enforcement Team. | 02:46:00 | |
To actually be able to sort of target like, what are the actual problems we're trying to solve here, you know? | 02:46:06 | |
So I think for me. | 02:46:12 | |
That item? That's a key. | 02:46:14 | |
Key improvement that we're hoping to see is sort of getting the empowering the department. | 02:46:16 | |
To have that goal of enforcing the spirit of the law, not just the letter of the law, and where our priorities are and where we, | 02:46:27 | |
our community and we want to. | 02:46:32 | |
Focusing on. | 02:46:40 | |
Priority type issues. | 02:46:42 | |
I guess I'll just follow just one more. I'll just follow that up with. | 02:46:45 | |
So what do you imagine that the enforcement team will do differently? | 02:46:50 | |
So I think now it seems like they're just giving tickets. Yeah, what? What other kind of things? Yeah, maybe doing. | 02:46:56 | |
Yeah, actually that'd be great, 'cause I think the chief and I have talked about sort. | 02:47:03 | |
The path we want to take and I it will be sort of moving into his camp, so I'd love to comment on this, especially down the path | 02:47:08 | |
that you're talking about, understand. | 02:47:12 | |
The parking enforcement for decades in the city was under the Police Department and it got moved. | 02:47:17 | |
Probably about 20 years ago or so, about the time I left. | 02:47:24 | |
When it was under the Police Department, it the talk about the efficiencies and effectiveness. There are things that parking | 02:47:29 | |
enforcement used to be able to do in conjunction with police services in the city, Traffic Safety and freeing up your police | 02:47:34 | |
officers from minor tasks. | 02:47:39 | |
That somehow we got away from, and I've seen that in the six months I've been back, for example. | 02:47:46 | |
Parking enforcement handles toes all day long with what we call A180 form. | 02:47:51 | |
Toe farm and they stand by for tow trucks, and they tow. | 02:47:55 | |
It would be nice when in their free time to keep them on our radio frequency. They're on their own radio frequency now. Put them | 02:47:59 | |
on the police radio frequency like they were for decades before, where they could actually come relieve an officer. | 02:48:04 | |
Who's on an? | 02:48:10 | |
A traffic accident? | 02:48:12 | |
To not only help with the traffic control. | 02:48:13 | |
But to stand by for maybe the. | 02:48:16 | |
To allow the officer to go back out and handle pending radio calls. It's very effective, it's a great use and that is how it's | 02:48:20 | |
done. | 02:48:23 | |
In the majority of cities surrounding us that have parking enforcement under. | 02:48:26 | |
The other thing is, when we talk about enforcement, James's point on with. | 02:48:31 | |
Spirit of the law. Letter of the law. | 02:48:36 | |
I think so many folks in this awesome community have gotten use. | 02:48:38 | |
To the police department's ability to have that compassionate spirit side when we have to. | 02:48:43 | |
And when we can and we're kind of more. | 02:48:50 | |
Know when we have to and say yes when we can like we can, we can help folks out. | 02:48:53 | |
And uh. | 02:48:58 | |
There are some parking enforcement rules that yes, when you drive by you see this violation occurring. | 02:49:00 | |
But do I need to cite somebody for blocking a residential drive? | 02:49:06 | |
When the person did not call us. | 02:49:11 | |
And it could be that person who was leaving with. | 02:49:14 | |
The to go to work or something and forgot, oh, I forgot my phone in the house, went back right in the house to get it and they're | 02:49:17 | |
coming out. Well, it's their driveway, so I don't want to take the initiative unless a resident's calling me. | 02:49:22 | |
I shouldn't just observe it and then go take the enforcement action. That's something should probably be generated by the | 02:49:28 | |
resident. There's there's moments like that that we would follow. | 02:49:32 | |
Under the leadership of the Police Department. So it's it's that that's just one of. | 02:49:37 | |
The path that he talked about us taking, but the efficiency and effectiveness. | 02:49:43 | |
There are times when even your police chiefs out here during heavy winds helping with traffic control. | 02:49:48 | |
But we have somebody in the city out writing parking tickets. We probably reuse that resource to help us with traffic control out | 02:49:53 | |
here. So that's that's a good example. | 02:49:56 | |
Great. Thank you. And I I appreciate the example as well. | 02:50:01 | |
Yeah, I just want to. | 02:50:05 | |
Make the comment that. | 02:50:07 | |
The letter of the law enforcement with parking has gotten all of. | 02:50:09 | |
And I think we've been talking about this for years, five years that I've been on council to. | 02:50:14 | |
I know so many stories where somebody forgets their keys, they run inside, they come out and have a $53 ticket and there's no | 02:50:21 | |
capacity to. | 02:50:25 | |
You know give give a little bit of a understanding that hey, you know. | 02:50:30 | |
People have issues like that and so. | 02:50:34 | |
When we implement this. | 02:50:39 | |
We are trying to improve. | 02:50:43 | |
Our interaction with our residents, I think. | 02:50:47 | |
What I'm hearing is that correct? | 02:50:51 | |
Yes, yes. We're trying to not be so much letter of the law. Oh, it's one minute after nine and you haven't gotten your car yet. | 02:50:52 | |
You get a ticket. So we're gonna. | 02:50:57 | |
I think that's really good news for our community and I hope. | 02:51:02 | |
Yeah, I just hope that our community is aware and and works with us and makes it work. | 02:51:07 | |
Then just to sort of answer the question on the second position, I think. | 02:51:15 | |
One of the key things, just big picture. | 02:51:20 | |
Big cities. | 02:51:23 | |
Big cities have a lot of highly specialized positions. A person who does one thing and that's all they do and you know, and in a | 02:51:25 | |
big city you can have a luxury of. | 02:51:30 | |
Of being able to have one thing that you focus on and that's your thing. And I think people who know my history know I worked in | 02:51:36 | |
the city of Oxnard, City of Oxnard's budget at this point, I imagine, because when I left it was 400 million and I'm guessing | 02:51:42 | |
they're about half a billion dollars now. | 02:51:47 | |
We don't have that half a billion dollar budget. | 02:51:54 | |
$30 million budget and maybe getting a little smaller as we as we move along. | 02:51:57 | |
So for me, just big picture, some of these positions that we had created over the last couple years that are highly specialized. | 02:52:02 | |
What we're looking at. | 02:52:09 | |
Just sort of that small city reality that everybody here, and I think all of us can speak to it. Everybody here right now, and our | 02:52:11 | |
police chief who's out on bike patrol and everything else. We all have multiple jobs. No one really has the luxury of just saying | 02:52:17 | |
this is the one thing I do. | 02:52:23 | |
So we're looking at some of the positions that were created in the last couple years where maybe we had more cannabis revenue and | 02:52:29 | |
things like that coming in, but and then looking at sort of. | 02:52:35 | |
How we can make those? | 02:52:41 | |
Broader to help in multiple areas, we need help versus just the highly specialized position. So that second change is essentially | 02:52:44 | |
doing that with one of our more specialized positions. | 02:52:50 | |
And can you oh, do you have anyone one more? | 02:52:58 | |
Yeah. Just for information and for those in the Airways, can you tell us a little bit about, so we're talking about a new position | 02:53:01 | |
and then you talked about the reorganis. | 02:53:08 | |
You said laying off someone. Can you tell me how this new position, I guess in your office is going to affect our budget, since | 02:53:17 | |
budget is something we're all we. | 02:53:22 | |
Yeah, and so one of the things. | 02:53:27 | |
Nice about having an analyst level position is that they actually are sort of the first round of review of? | 02:53:30 | |
Things like the budget and. | 02:53:37 | |
Really. Where? You know we have our budget, but. | 02:53:40 | |
Anybody who's read our budget. | 02:53:43 | |
Knows. | 02:53:45 | |
400 pages or whatever it is of line item by line item budget. | 02:53:47 | |
And so. | 02:53:52 | |
It's not unusual and I've seen in several other cities having an analyst position, who's that person who's able to dig into that | 02:53:54 | |
because a lot of the times when some of the some of us are involved in it. | 02:54:01 | |
We are having to look at the budget very quickly and bigger picture. | 02:54:08 | |
And having somebody who's analyst level who can go in and actually go line item by line item with our finance director working | 02:54:13 | |
closely, but it's somebody who knows and that's part of why that positions a confidential position, it's somebody who knows what | 02:54:17 | |
our goal. | 02:54:22 | |
Is with the budget and knows what we're looking to try to do. That's a key. | 02:54:27 | |
Sort of first step in that budget review process. | 02:54:34 | |
And so there's the budget analysis. | 02:54:38 | |
A lot. | 02:54:42 | |
Analyst level work that they can that that position would help with typically it also helps with sort of like job classification | 02:54:43 | |
analysis and those types of things. | 02:54:47 | |
And that will ultimately. | 02:54:52 | |
Take a lot of pressure off of positions like my mine and the finance director and the HR manager. | 02:54:56 | |
Because they're going to be sort of that first detailed review. | 02:55:03 | |
So that's an area that will really help and then they also can take on. | 02:55:08 | |
And we laid out some, like a lot of other duties that they can help with as well. | 02:55:13 | |
Great. Thank you. Thank you. | 02:55:18 | |
Can you also? | 02:55:20 | |
Just note the. | 02:55:22 | |
Emergency Management for the public view if there's any concerns about the fact. | 02:55:25 | |
Remove the Emergency Management position that will be moved to the Police Department and that will be handled by people with | 02:55:30 | |
experience and who have training and education with Emergency Management. | 02:55:35 | |
So there's no reason to be concerned about the fact that we're losing that position. Yes, I think the Police Department and my | 02:55:42 | |
department. | 02:55:46 | |
Have already. | 02:55:50 | |
Those roles you look at and remember that position, it was kind of two things, emergency preparedness and communications. | 02:55:52 | |
And for example, the Police Department has taken on their own communications and has managed their own Facebook page and those | 02:56:00 | |
types of things for several months at this point. | 02:56:05 | |
And then our the city Managers department would maintain communications for the rest of the organization. | 02:56:10 | |
And then? | 02:56:17 | |
In the emergency situations we've had here since I've arrived, unfortunately there's been more than one people who who don't | 02:56:19 | |
remember the hurricane, which was sort of the first one. | 02:56:25 | |
It's been. | 02:56:32 | |
Kind of the. | 02:56:35 | |
People that manage the EOC and and operate that are myself in the police chief. | 02:56:38 | |
That's what will be occurring moving forward. It's going to be the the city manager and the police chief working closely on | 02:56:45 | |
emergencies and that. | 02:56:50 | |
What I have seen and what I have done in. | 02:56:56 | |
Like I said in really in smaller cities and when I say small, I, you know, I know poor enemy 30,000. | 02:57:00 | |
We're not exactly a small town, but compared to the cities that have sort of a standalone specialized position. | 02:57:07 | |
You know, it's the Oxnard, it's the county, it's the agencies that. | 02:57:15 | |
You know, hundreds of millions of dollars. | 02:57:20 | |
10s of millions of dollars. | 02:57:22 | |
No further questions. | 02:57:26 | |
Are there any public comments? | 02:57:29 | |
We have two public comments that were. | 02:57:31 | |
First, one City Council members. Per the stated recommendation, the proposed reorganization is intended to result in efficiency | 02:57:35 | |
improvements and ultimately allow for better coordination and collaboration across departments. | 02:57:42 | |
Resulting in improved service to the Port Wyoming community. | 02:57:49 | |
By all accounts that I'm aware of, members of the community have been very supportive of City Manager Vega and Police Chief | 02:57:52 | |
Federico as they have settled into their relatively new leadership roles in Port Hueneme. As such, it would be nice to see a | 02:57:58 | |
unanimous vote from the Council in favor of this recommendation, allowing them to manage city affairs with the goal of improving | 02:58:03 | |
service to our residents. | 02:58:09 | |
Thank you, Jeffrey Scarber. | 02:58:15 | |
The next one was provided by Laura de Hernandez since she was unable to be here. | 02:58:19 | |
Dear Honorable Port Wenemee City Council, I would like to express my concern regarding item number 10 on the City Council agenda | 02:58:26 | |
for January 16, 2024. | 02:58:30 | |
This item is requesting approval for a reorganization, including the elimination of the PIO and Emergency Preparedness Manager | 02:58:35 | |
position. As a former Emergency Manager and Certified Public Information Officer, I clearly understand the importance of these two | 02:58:41 | |
functions prior to, during and following a major disaster. | 02:58:48 | |
These functions play a very important role in providing for the safety and well-being of our residents, protection of our | 02:58:55 | |
environment, as well as critical facilities and life lines. | 02:59:00 | |
Each of these functions are responsible for a wide range of duties, each of which could respectively justify a full time position. | 02:59:05 | |
To combine these responsibilities into a Management analyst position with additional duties will not increase the efficiencies or | 02:59:13 | |
allow this position to be effective in carrying out their many responsibilities. | 02:59:19 | |
Instead, the position will be forced to prioritize their list of duties and likely place Emergency Management at the bottom of | 02:59:26 | |
the. | 02:59:29 | |
Emergency planning, training and preparing will take a backseat to more pressing issues of the day. | 02:59:34 | |
This reorganization appears to reduce and diminish the value of the emergency preparedness PIO rather than strengthen it. | 02:59:39 | |
In my 40 years as an Emergency Management professional, I have seen this happen in many jurisdictions. | 02:59:47 | |
It happens because people gamble with the notion that a major emergency or disaster won't happen to us. Well, it happened to us on | 02:59:53 | |
December 21st. So why now, on the hills of one of our worst disasters are we eliminating and dismantling this position? What is | 02:59:59 | |
the urgency? | 03:00:04 | |
As a result of declaring a local emergency, the state will be legally required to do a thorough After Action report. | 03:00:10 | |
AAR. This AAR will identify areas for improvement and will enable the city to be prepared for the next disaster. | 03:00:17 | |
Improving our preparedness can only happen if your City Council understands the significance of this function and supports it as a | 03:00:25 | |
high priority. | 03:00:29 | |
I respectfully ask the City Council to not approve the proposed reorganization as it relates to the Emergency Preparedness Manager | 03:00:34 | |
and PIO and instead wait until the completion of the after action report. | 03:00:40 | |
Thank you for your consideration, Laura dear. | 03:00:46 | |
And that concludes public comment. | 03:00:49 | |
Thank you. | 03:00:51 | |
I know it was submitted as a public comment, but since it is a statement from a council member, I'd like to just. | 03:00:54 | |
Reply a little bit and I. | 03:01:00 | |
One thing I would sort of respond to that point is that. | 03:01:04 | |
We. | 03:01:11 | |
My department working closely with the Police Department, we. | 03:01:13 | |
Responded to the storm since 1:30 the morning of the storm to now and continuing on, you know, we were trying to estimate. | 03:01:17 | |
Three more weeks, Four more weeks. It might be longer than that at this point and so. | 03:01:25 | |
I don't anticipate that any of the changes we're recommending. | 03:01:32 | |
Will impact that in. | 03:01:37 | |
And. | 03:01:40 | |
The reorganization intent is to actually provide us support and to strengthen our reaction and. | 03:01:41 | |
Be able to have that support to be able to hand off lower priority things so that we can focus on the high priority things like | 03:01:50 | |
emergency recovery. So I don't anticipate that being an issue and. | 03:01:57 | |
We recommend moving forward with the with the item. | 03:02:04 | |
Thank you. Are there any? | 03:02:08 | |
Comment, Yeah. | 03:02:09 | |
City manager can you just? | 03:02:14 | |
Tell me if is the confidential administ. | 03:02:17 | |
Analysts going to do any emergency preparedness. | 03:02:21 | |
Work. | 03:02:26 | |
So the the. | 03:02:28 | |
Any position in the city manager's office is going to be involved with emergency response. | 03:02:30 | |
And so the reason I was sort of. | 03:02:37 | |
Being fine with what I said. | 03:02:40 | |
The preparedness portion is going to be handled by a couple of positions. | 03:02:43 | |
But. | 03:02:50 | |
This position would be pulled in, for example, into the EOC. To help operate the EOC, the position will be pulled in as. | 03:02:53 | |
One of the. | 03:03:01 | |
Points of contact for our other staff members to be able to get assistance out and and those types of things, so this position | 03:03:04 | |
would be involved. | 03:03:08 | |
Emergency. | 03:03:13 | |
And every position in the city manager's office is and is expected to be. So, yeah, so, so let me, let me. | 03:03:15 | |
Ask it a little further. | 03:03:22 | |
So I think I heard you say that the city manager and. | 03:03:24 | |
Police chief will lead the effort. | 03:03:30 | |
In the emergency services, so this is a support. | 03:03:34 | |
Kind of a support kind of staff. Exactly, exactly. And it's someone you know wouldn't. And we saw this in during the storm and | 03:03:38 | |
I'll ask you to speak in a minute because I know you some of the same points but. | 03:03:44 | |
During the storm, as an example, we had situations where. | 03:03:50 | |
Umm, we were making decisions about what response. | 03:03:54 | |
Was we were going to go out and implement and at the same time we had media requests coming in that were coming to to us. We had | 03:03:59 | |
requests even, you know, just little things like we part of the City Hall was flooding at one point and so then we were also | 03:04:04 | |
trying to coordinate, OK, you know. | 03:04:10 | |
How do we deal with that while we're also focusing on the community and you know, all these things and so? | 03:04:16 | |
The every position in the city manager's office gets pulled into that in the emergency every position, the city manager's office | 03:04:23 | |
is part of that response as are multiple police officers and we had police officers who were sick and and came in at 2:00 in the | 03:04:30 | |
morning and that we told go home because you're too sick and. | 03:04:36 | |
If we really need you, we'll call you back, you know, so. So it is a team effort and I think that's where, you know, kind of my | 03:04:43 | |
initial point was just cities of our size. We don't have the luxury of having one person who does one thing and all the positions | 03:04:49 | |
that we're creating are. | 03:04:54 | |
Provide a variety of support so that. | 03:04:59 | |
Support where we need it and when we need it. So if I could just let the chief add a little. So so two things. One if you remember | 03:05:02 | |
when I did my intro here. | 03:05:07 | |
To the Council when I. | 03:05:13 | |
I think one of the reasons I was selected for the city was my extensive background in incident command, system and Emergency | 03:05:15 | |
Management. | 03:05:19 | |
Not only have I been in government for 30 years and working. | 03:05:23 | |
Incidents, including the 90 storms that we're constantly hearing and referring to, was in the city as a young officer. But large | 03:05:27 | |
events with 60,000 people planned events the LA Marathon. | 03:05:33 | |
And as an ICS instructor, I was tasked with teaching. | 03:05:39 | |
A. Numerous agencies in Los Angeles County. | 03:05:43 | |
Including police chiefs on running major incidents. So it's an extensive background and I was assigned to the Office of Emergency | 03:05:47 | |
Management. | 03:05:51 | |
In the city of Santa Monica for some time, working in the city manager's office there. During some critical times, you add the | 03:05:56 | |
number. | 03:06:00 | |
Earthquakes. I've worked through the 94 earthquake in this city. | 03:06:05 | |
And several other natural dis. | 03:06:10 | |
Coupled with the fact that you just hired a city manager. | 03:06:13 | |
Who just was held to? | 03:06:17 | |
With his fire incidents in Ohio. | 03:06:20 | |
Which at some points can be in a worse position than our city because you have limited. | 03:06:23 | |
Resources. Limited access to your city, so we hired the right person to come in at that role. | 03:06:28 | |
Yeah, at least one thing we don't have that they have is they have one way in and out of hand, and if it's closed, you're stuck. | 03:06:34 | |
And so why need me? We have some advantages over over that community and it's we've talked a lot about recovery, we've talked a | 03:06:40 | |
lot about what's been going on. | 03:06:44 | |
I will also say this, your Police Department has more certified Incident Command System Certificate employees than anybody else in | 03:06:49 | |
the in the city. We're actually fortunate to have a few people who worked in Emergency Management. | 03:06:55 | |
Over there. So everything we set up in the middle of the night in that storm. | 03:07:01 | |
Was kind of trading on the go for those that who hadn't had training for years here in the department, but they picked up very | 03:07:07 | |
quickly and and we got it together. | 03:07:11 | |
We've talked a lot about the incident, a lot about the other stuff going on, but specifically I will tell you this, 30 years in | 03:07:16 | |
government, I've worked in Emergency Management. | 03:07:20 | |
I've worked for a lot of city managers and I've watched. | 03:07:24 | |
People walk into emergency operations centers from the upper management of a city. | 03:07:27 | |
With limited decision making abilities and constantly relying on others. | 03:07:33 | |
James walked into that, actually was making decisions before he got in there. | 03:07:38 | |
On the phone with us, he was on point immediately with the. | 03:07:43 | |
And he made some really tough decisions in that emergency operations center, which started your city's recovery immediately the | 03:07:47 | |
next morning. We did not wait, but that's because he told us move, go make it happen. And he declared a made the declaration of | 03:07:53 | |
emergency right away to allow us to go beyond red tape to get resources and make things happen. So very impressed with him so far. | 03:07:59 | |
Your city employees are very impressed with him. If you ask around, you will hear they're ready to have him lead them again in | 03:08:05 | |
emergency. So. | 03:08:11 | |
Thank you. Thank you. If I could just add quickly, it's sorry I keep doing that to you, but let's say so, but I know the. | 03:08:17 | |
I think there are a couple questions and I think maybe I can see the concern of like well, who's going to be responsible for it or | 03:08:25 | |
you know and. | 03:08:28 | |
Part of the, the reason why I'm saying it's it's sort of that joint effort is because there's different phases of the emergency. | 03:08:33 | |
And I just want to make this point because we just had the presentation earlier. | 03:08:38 | |
To me and what what is typical in small cities, but even at the county, it's the Sheriff's Department, Office of Emergency | 03:08:43 | |
Services. | 03:08:48 | |
And the agency that responds to the emergency and that jumps into action is typically your public safety agency. | 03:08:52 | |
Your police? | 03:09:01 | |
Fire department and and they have the connection and they have the communication locked in and everything. | 03:09:03 | |
So moving forward the, you know, the vision maybe to to address any concern about, you know responsibility. | 03:09:09 | |
The Police Department. | 03:09:17 | |
The agency that should and and would handle the emergency response. | 03:09:19 | |
I'm gonna be in the EOC, I'm gonna be operating the EOC and then I think one reason why I'm saying like. | 03:09:24 | |
You know that there's sort of the split of duties. | 03:09:31 | |
Like right now the recovery phase that we're in on. | 03:09:34 | |
To me, that's where. | 03:09:38 | |
It's in my hands and I'm the person who has the elected officials phone numbers and emails and I'm the person who's calling people | 03:09:40 | |
and trying to get. | 03:09:44 | |
Letters of support, and I'm trying to get FEMA declarations and those types of things. | 03:09:50 | |
So I I don't want to make it sound like we're like, yeah, we'll figure out how it's split up. | 03:09:55 | |
Police will handle the emergency response and emergency. | 03:10:01 | |
I will like the storm. | 03:10:06 | |
Be part of that recovery process and operating the EOC but. | 03:10:09 | |
We we have that kind of areas of responsibility mapped out and. | 03:10:14 | |
It's just part of, like I said, you know, when we had the EOC we had. | 03:10:21 | |
10 finance people in the room helping out because we're a small city and ultimately everybody could get pulled in and everybody's | 03:10:27 | |
going to be an emergency responder or disaster service worker. | 03:10:32 | |
Any of those your your city manager can be your incident commander and your operations chief, your logistics section, your | 03:10:39 | |
planning can be run by can be headed by your Police Department. | 03:10:44 | |
With assistance from all the other. | 03:10:50 | |
If I get to the city before him, I can be your incident commander. Until he gets there, it's it's good teamwork. And in any case, | 03:10:53 | |
my commander, Bob Alverson, could be the incident commander, My administrative Sergeant Beer, incident commander. | 03:10:59 | |
People with experience and training on it so So it doesn't matter if if he's the incident commander as long as he has a strong | 03:11:05 | |
operations, logistics, planning. | 03:11:09 | |
Team beneath. | 03:11:15 | |
The city will be successful in its recovery. | 03:11:16 | |
I just want to say I'm really proud of this council for the hires of our police chief and our city manager and at 2:00 PM. | 03:11:20 | |
December 21st I was communicating with our city manager because I got called over to the port to deal with our issues and then I | 03:11:28 | |
was very impressed to know that you were in communication with him and, you know, by, I don't know, three in the morning. | 03:11:36 | |
Things were up and running, maybe even earlier, and so I I I just. I think it worked very well. I think the two of. | 03:11:45 | |
Rose to the occasion without any hesitation. | 03:11:54 | |
And like I said, it started with myself, communicated with our city manager at 2:00 in the morning because I had to respond to a | 03:11:57 | |
situation at the port, so. | 03:12:01 | |
I'm just proud of both of you and I'm really looking forward to the future with with you two at the helm for any future emergency | 03:12:06 | |
and I know we're well prepared and thank you very much. | 03:12:11 | |
Thank you. | 03:12:16 | |
And I'm getting a little off topic, but I want to give a little bit of a shout out to you that Fred Camarillo was on the phone | 03:12:17 | |
with us at at 1:45 I think was and I think you were here 1st and you and so I want to give some credit there and a couple of our | 03:12:26 | |
other department directors were were here shortly after that. So we have a good team and everybody knows. | 03:12:34 | |
I think, you know, just going back and I've said it a lot. | 03:12:43 | |
In a small city, everybody. | 03:12:46 | |
We're all going to get pulled in. We all need to respond. We all have to. | 03:12:48 | |
All our weight because we don't have hundreds and hundreds of employees that we can pull in. So and I'll just clean it up, but I | 03:12:52 | |
was there that day as well, but I sat in the corner and watched everybody and waited until they needed something for me. | 03:12:58 | |
I didn't want to get in the way, but everybody was. It looked like a well, old machine. Everybody doing what they needed to do. | 03:13:05 | |
Everybody from finance to public works to community development to just staffing. | 03:13:11 | |
Georgiana, everybody was in there doing what they needed to do, so it was a really interesting thing to see. | 03:13:17 | |
Had different department heads like Fred, he's running stuff from the failed, but he sends a representative to the EOC and that's | 03:13:23 | |
all we need. We need, we need communication, but he's getting us vehicles while he's. | 03:13:28 | |
Handling. | 03:13:35 | |
Overseeing what's happening to the water flow in the city. The pump. |