Recommendation to request City Manager to work with the appropriate City departments and City Attorney's Office to report back at the next available City Council meeting on gaps in prevention, services and housing for individuals and families who are precariously housed or experiencing homelessness, as well as the costs, and opportunities to address these needs. The report should include a recommended funding strategy and implementation timeline for a dedicated local revenue source to address for housing opportunities for individuals and families experiencing homelessness, as well as early and late prevention strategies and services for those newly homeless and those experiencing chronic homelessness.
Great. Thank you very much. Moving on to item number 12, Madam Clerk. Item 12 is a communication from Councilmember Richardson. Councilwoman Gonzalez. Vice Mayor Andrews. Councilman Austin. Recommendation two requires city manager to work with the appropriate city departments and city attorney's office to report back on gaps in prevention, services and housing for individuals and families who are precariously housed or experiencing homelessness. Thank you very much. I'm going to turn this over to accounts from Richardson. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Tonight, we're going to have a conversation about local revenue options in both short term and long term strategies to address our housing crisis and support for individuals and families experiencing homelessness. It's not a new conversation. I do want to acknowledge all the work that this council has done. In fact, over the last two years has been over ten different ideas generated from the Council around the issues of homelessness over the last two years. But there hasn't been one item addressing the issue of a local revenue option. This issue of housing affordability has become increasingly urgent in California, with rising housing costs, limited supply, taking a toll on communities across the state and everyone's feeling the effects of the California housing crisis. So Long Beach is not immune. Far too many of our residents are experiencing housing instability. The housing crisis affects millennials who graduate from college and must immediately move home with their parents. It affects families who, despite the best efforts, can't save enough to put down a down payment on a home. It affects seniors living on a fixed income who can't afford to stay in their own homes. It affects people who've lost a job or face a health care crisis and forces them to get behind on rent and face the brink of homelessness. Now, here's a deeper dove into the housing instability problem. In January 2017, our city had 1863 individuals living on our streets. And we know as many as 3000 to 4000 people, including children, seniors, transition aged youth, students, families, men and women. They'll become homeless each year in Long Beach. For many, it will be temporary, but for some it'll be long term. Nearly 20% of our residents live in poverty. Currently, 21,000 households or 60,000 people are precariously housed, meaning their household income is just 30% of area median incomes. And this means the families are paying more than 90% of their income just on housing. Additionally, 222,000, or roughly 47% or half of our residents existing in Long Beach. Our cost burden, meaning that they spend 30% of their income on rent. At the same time, 56,883 Long Beach residents live in overcrowding conditions. In fact, accounting for population growth, an astounding 28,000 additional units are needed by 2040. If we're going to meet our goals to house those individuals or families in need, we know the main issues, main causes associated with homelessness are loss of jobs, insufficient income, increasing rents , break down the family dynamics, domestic violence, physical behavior, behavioral issues. And while the housing crisis statistics are devastating, our city has been doing a great job with the resources that they do have. A city, a Long Beach has experienced a 41% decline in the bi annual point in time count in the past six years. And this is just a one day picture of who's in our city shelters and active on our streets. This decline is is due to the incredible work of our homeless services team, the interdepartmental coordination with our health department, police department, fire department, parks and Rec department, public works, our city attorney, our city council, all of us are our Health and Human Services Department brings in over 12 million annually to service the services to support homeless prevention efforts and supporting those who are homeless. The Chief Housing. And thanks to our nationally recognized continuum of care, which is our system of delivery, we have permanently housed over 3000 people since 2013, and 390 of those were veterans in 2017 alone. So before we move forward, I want to just take a moment and hear it for our homeless services team, the continuum of care and our team, our entire wraparound service. We can just hear it for our health department. Thank you. But despite the efforts of this amazing team, issues of affordability and availability of housing continues to persist in our city. In the last two years, we've taken several steps to begin aggressively addressing the housing affordability crisis here in Long Beach. In February 2014, 2016, a group of housing leaders and advocates were assembled to comprise comprise an Affordable and Workforce Housing Study Group who were tasked with preparing policy recommendations on both revenue tools and incentives for the production of affordable housing. In May 2017, the City Council started the discussion of identifying new revenue source to address the housing shortage through a number of through the adoption of 29 recommendations as prepared by the study group. This is this is that report. In September 2017, city staff returned a memo this this memo in September 2017 to the city council with options for revenue source outlining the costs and benefits of a local housing bond that could meet some of our affordable housing need in our city. And so that has been in our hands since 2017. And in November 2017, we launched Everyone in Economic Inclusion Initiative, which is a call to action to Long Beach leaders to begin to look at and institute and implementing national best practices that really focus on economic inclusion. And a central element of that work is acknowledging that access to adequate housing is a foundation for economic success. And then most recently, this May, the city launched Everyone Home, which is another initiative designed to amplify the work in play and identify and fill the gaps where we have greater challenges. So despite federal, state and county funding that currently supports these various services initiatives, there's still a missing piece. The lack of a local dedicated revenue lack lack of local dedicated revenue to support the development of local affordable housing. Currently, the City of Long Beach does not have the resources to build the number of housing units necessary for those needing low income in homelessness house homeless housing, nor does it have sufficient resources for preventative services. Are continued care funding through the Federal Department of Housing and Urban Development provides rapid rehousing, transitional housing and permanent supportive supportive housing as well as job, job training and other supportive services. The county's Measure H funding supports additional rapid rehousing, outreach and case management services, as well as some of our homeless prevention services and apartment owner landlord incentives. However, as the second largest city in the county, these resources do not meet the growing need for services as housing becomes more difficult to access in the city of Long Beach. Historically, municipalities across California have been involved in financing programs such as bond financing that facilitates the development, expansion and retention of affordable housing units. Such municipal bond bond issues were issued by redevelopment agencies. RDA used redevelopment tax increment to pay debt service on the bond. However, due to the loss of redevelopment in 2013 and the elimination of associated tax increment revenues, the use of RDA municipal revenue bond is no longer an option for the city of Long Beach. Since the loss of redevelopment, cities are funding innovative alternative approaches to funding the development of affordable housing and supportive services. For example, in November 26, November 2016, voters in the city of L.A. overwhelmingly approved Prop H, H, H, which developed which will develop 10,000 permanent supportive supportive units for upwards of 20,000 homeless individuals and those at risk for homelessness throughout the city. Additionally, in the city of San Francisco, the city currently has 7500 supportive housing units, as well as four fully funded navigation centers that provide counseling, housing assistance and employment assistance. This November, San Francisco voters will be voting on a measure to raise $300 million for an additional 4000 supportive housing units. Likewise, in August 2016, the voters of the City of San Diego approved $290,000,000 million housing levy to produce no city of Seattle. I'm sorry to to produce and preserve 3000 units for low and very low income individuals. Allow along with dedicated funding for substance and mental illness support. And what we have in common is a will. What they all have in common is policy connected to the will of the voters to fund a local revenue measure. That's what all of these comprehensive strategies have in common. They marry the local revenue strategy to part to policy, and they go to the voters through community discussions, analyzing research and looking to other cities. What we learned thus far is if affordability and availability are the chief barriers to addressing the needs of our communities, then we cannot truly address or end homelessness without a comprehensive prevention strategy coupled with a local source. So funding to support and promote the development of affordable housing in our city, even if it's just the means of matching funds as the next city council at the next City Council meeting, this motion asked for us to be presented with options for recommended funding strategy and implementation timeline for dedicated, low level local revenue source to address affordable housing for individuals and families experiencing homelessness, as well as early and late prevention strategies for those newly homeless and those experiencing chronic homelessness. While we figure out the best route to funding the development of additional housing, there are some things that we can do today. First, we've been having conversations for months now, even years, about the need for a year round homeless shelter. For the past seven years, we've hosted temporary winter shelters in North Long Beach. Each year, the council declares an emergency. The community has very little time to prepare. The facilities are often below standard, with inadequate restrooms and issues with different operators. However, by leveraging recent state funding, we have a real opportunity to finally acquire a site and create a comprehensive plan for year round shelter with services and a foundation for a larger, permanent, supportive housing complex. Similar to what you see on the West Side with the century villages of Cabrillo tonights, I want to add to my motion for staff to immediately begin the process of acquisition of a building to be utilized for the year round homeless shelter, and they can start by considering previous sites for the winter shelter. Secondly, over the past two years, I've had the honor of serving as chair of our homes, our housing authority. And during this time, we work to create a package of incentives to entice landlords to accept more of the housing choice vouchers. Housing choice vouchers. Some called Section eight, what used to be called Section eight. It's a critical tool for cities to be able to provide support and a tool for people on the brink of homelessness to obtain quality, affordable housing in Long Beach. However, despite our best efforts, there's currently over a thousand voucher holders today that can pay for an apartment, pay for somewhere to live. They can't find a place to rent. One of the contributing reasons for this outdated practice is that so one of the one of the major reasons that people can't find it is that a lot of times, if you look at an advertisement says no housing choice vouchers and no Section eight, and this is an outdated practice. And so while a landlord could could choose whether or not to accept any tenant they like, it's come to our attention that this practice may be outdated and may not be consistent with state law. So as a result, many Long Beach residents need to wait years on a list to get approved for a voucher only and have that voucher expire before they can actually use it to get into a unit. And so we shouldn't, in this housing crisis, have the luxury of stating that we're going to discriminate anyone's going to discriminate based on source of income. And so today, I'm going to add some emotion for city staff to begin the process of creating a source of income discrimination policy in the city of Long Beach. Finally, last summer, we began a conversation on the persistent crime, blight and violence associated with nuisance outdated motels throughout the city. In many cases, human trafficking has taken root in these motels. Drug activity has taken root in cities all over California. Motel conversions are starting to serve as additional tool to address temporary and permanent supportive housing needs. So it's time that Long Beach build on our work with our Nuisance Motel pilot program and begin to find opportunities to convert nuisance motels into supportive housing. And so the final piece of this is I'm going to add to my motion, too, for staff to begin to research and identify funding strategies and partners to purchase nuisance motels for transitional permanent housing opportunities. So to reiterate, reiterate, my motion consists of four things. One Staff return to City Council at the next available meeting with dedicated local Let local revenue strategy and options for the development of permanent supportive housing and comprehensive prevention services. Number two, Considering past winter shelter sites, initiate the process of purchasing a building to be utilized for a year round homeless shelter. Number three Create a source of income discrimination policy in the city of Long Beach and for research and identify funding strategies and partners to purchase nuisance motels for transitional and permanent housing opportunities. I want to thank everyone who's participated in this conversation over the years, but more specifically, folks who have stepped up over the last two weeks to contribute their voices in this conversation. And I'm going to call them out. LLC Building Strategies Council, Centro, Chas, Long Beach Forward. Long Beach Ministers Alliance Apartment Association of the Southern Cal of California Southern Cities. Libra Housing. Long Beach Pacific West Association of Realtors. Pacific Six. Long Beach Community Action Park. A Ship Walk. Long Beach Adobe Communities. California State University. Long Beach Private Real Estate Professional Association Century Villages at Cabrillo Link Housing. Clifford Bia's Housing. Habitat for Humanity's Innovative Housing Opportunities Long Beach Affordable Housing Coalition Goodwill Scamp Century Housing Corporation Meta Housing Corporation The Richmond Group The Guidance Center Skid Row Housing Trust City Fabric Children Today Long Beach Veteran Affairs Health Care System, Los Angeles Local Initiative Support Corporation and the Top Inn Thomas Safran Associates. And with that, that's my motion. I urge city council support and I look forward to the conversation. Thank you. And if we can go to public comment, that would be great to. Have counsel Boston Public comment first. Okay. Let me go to public comments. If you're going to make a comment, please come forward and line up at the podium. Thank you. There may be a lot. Of people on this topic there. Just to give you a heads up. My name is Michael Caldwell. I live in. The first district. Your income? Yes. Thank you. If I'm hearing that correctly. I would assume that that state that it would be wrong. For a. Landlord to request or require that a person needs three times the amount of. Rent just to. Qualify for an. Apartment. I've been on the brink of homelessness three times. I'm 40 years old. I have a job. I barely make $1,000 a month. I currently rent a small place in the first district. It takes a person 30. They need to make $30 an. Hour just to get by. In a standard two bedroom apartment. For a person like me, I would probably have to work three jobs just to have a place over my head. I had an apartment for 15 years on the border of Lakewood. I got booted by it from that. From that apartment. I was giving. Them money every week. I worked at Disneyland for ten years. I was behind on the rent. I gave them money every week. I gave, I gave, I gave. I could not give. I couldn't give anymore. I was I tried. Different. Programs. No one would no one would listen to me because one rule was I had a job. I wasn't homeless. I had I had a means to do it. I had to end up living in a motel across the street from the Long Beach Town Center for nine months. I hated it. They came by and they. Said, Why are you still here? And I told the truth. I had a fiancee. We had a nest egg of $25,000 in a bank account. We called up multiple people. We told the truth. We said, we have this money. We will gladly pay it. For one year's bit of rent. They said, no. You only bring in 1200 dollars a month. And we were devastated. I had to move I had to move out of Long Beach for a year. I hated it. I love this town so much, I did not want to leave. So I think the problem if. This initiative of yours, Councilman. Richardson, works and these landlords take out that requirement, it will greatly solve the problem. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Thank you. Good evening, Mayor. Council. City Council. I'll be brief. I love Long Beach. I chose this city 20 years ago to raise my children to live here the rest of my days. To. Just to enjoy the things that you have in the city. I'm now in trouble along with a lot of other people my age, our retired vets. My landlord has decided that he wants to raise our rent $300. All of us who live in that building on fixed incomes. We're disabled. We have our vets who've gone on to foreign wars for us and came home and most of them homeless before. And I'm asking you for your help. We voted for most of you, and we really, really are on our way out into the street. Our landlord convoy has given us until September 1st to pay that extra $300 or we're going to be asked to leave. We can't do that. Not at this age. Most of us have sicknesses. We have disabilities. Mentally, physically, emotionally. We can't afford to get put on the street. I've been homeless once for four years with my family. The reason being there aren't any policies in place for me. I worked. I worked hard. And there still aren't any policies to help me and my fellow people here. I live at 401 West Sixth Street. I've been there for four years. I don't want to move. I can't move. The only option that I have is for you to come to our rescue. We need for you to talk to our landlord and explain to him that we just want to talk. We have some issues that he'd be glad to hear. But he won't. He refuses. So I'm here to ask you to beg you. Please contact Carl Voight. He has nothing to lose and we have everything to lose. Thank you. Thank you so much. Next speaker, please. It's. The Gateway. It's okay. Oh, okay. Good evening, everybody, including you. I am here for one reason. I wanted to ask you just to protect our seniors. I am a senior. I'm 85 years old. So far, I've never been homeless. But the way. It's going, I mean, looks like I would be. But no, I will not, because I will fight and I will fight for anyone. If you would in the Institute rent control, these things could not happen. I live here. No, it could not happen. Okay. I live here totally in health. I lived in Detroit for 40 years. 41 years. I came out here because my family lives out here. Their children, you know. Anyhow, I go and find a good job for their children. A good education. And I want. All of the children of this area, of any area to be able to do it, not just to get except. Okay, maybe. An extra whatever it is that things I bought, you know, maybe an extra airplane. No, we cannot let it happen. We live in a state that has enough state, enough reserves. It's one of the most. Beautiful states that's just in the United States alone. We have to keep it that way. We have to let everyone know we are. Here to fight. And we will do it. Right now. My rent is like minded dollars. My Social Security is 1120 $8. This I'm like, okay, fine, because I have a little bit of net debt somewhere. I don't know all it's going to last, but I make it. But I want you just make sure that you whatever you can do. If it's lawyers, judges, your friends, please talk to him. Make sure. That we get read the. Control that you will put it on the ballot and we see who want to hold us. I want to thank you very much. Have a good one. Thank you very much. All right. Next week, a peace treaty. Honorable Mayor Eric Garcia, members of the City Council. And ladies and. Gentlemen, my name is Paul Harrison. I'm 67 years old and I've been arrested in Long Beach since I moved here. In 1962 with my parents. I grew up here. I went to school here. I married here and raised my family here. I'm a retired nurse after. Working in the field for 55 years. I'm currently active in my church and when my boys were younger, I was active in the Boy Scouts of America, the Long Beach Area Council. I am currently working to vote and probably voted for some of you in this chamber today. I currently live at 41 West Sixth Street at the Lexington Apartments. And I've lived there now for five years. I am here today to support your efforts. In providing funding for. More affordable housing for seniors. We baby boomers are the. Fastest growing segment of. This population as we plan for the future. Let's not ignore the housing problems of here and now. Today. Many seniors live at or below the poverty level. I currently bring. In 1100 a. Month. I am. Blessed to have Section. Eight housing. Other wise, I too would be homeless. As it is, it took me ten years to get on the housing waiting list to receive my voucher. Owners are becoming more and more reluctant to accept these vouchers. Now. What fewer affordable units there are out there. Now have a 4 to 5 year waiting list to get into them. I am here today supporting my neighbors to collect sound apartments. They have received a 30 to 50% rent increase. I have one neighbor who has lived there for 19 years who received a. $500. Rent increase. This neighbor became outspoken about this absorbing IT. Rate increase. And has. Received an. Eviction notice for his efforts. My neighbors living on fixed incomes cannot afford. To leave the U.S. apartment. I know of at least 15. People who are going to have to leave these apartments. If the situation continues. Some of them face becoming homeless. As was mentioned before, we have asked to meet with the owner, Mr. Kenneth Boyd. But to no avail. All of our police have fallen on deaf ears. Long Beach has plans for the future. We must also look. At giving tenants. Some basic rights. Thank you very much. Now some. Safeguards. It will be a revolving door and rents will rise uncontrollably. Natural evictions will go on unchecked. Thank you very much for your time today. Thank you very much for speaking to the next speaker, please. Hello, council members. My name is Ruben Lopez. I'm a Vietnam vet with PTSD. I live in Long Beach at LAX and apartments with all my other neighbors. On June 12th, I rent was substantially increased and most of us can afford the increase and we are all at risk. Of being homeless. We have tried to contact our owner, Kenneth Boyd, to discuss the possibility that some type of. Solution through HUD and we had no luck. So far. Me and my neighbor have had many ups and downs in our lives and we are in the. Process. Of being homeless. All of us are. Most of us. I served my country and now we need your help to contact our landlord, to sit down with us. And try to discuss a solution. To our rent control. People say that Vietnam. Vets are tough. They don't ask. For help or. Cry. But we need your help. Desperately. Really, desperately. Thank you. And God. Bless America. Thank you. Very good due to two suggestions. One, to engender cash monies for homeless people. One of the things that could tried is to eliminate a full time mayor and his staff instead of having what we have now. I don't know how many millions it's costing us and put that toward housing. Number two, something I've referenced before in a very serious about this for our veterans. There was an article posted and there have been several articles posted in the paper. They're called pod houses. They were very impressive from the outside and from the inside. I think I've sent some some of you pictures of them. And what I'm suggesting the city do is down in the Marine Stadium just north of eight end, which is the building that is being rebuilt. It has the sign Marine Stadium. There's ample room to put there. Three of those pods were veterans. Who are currently undergoing treatment up at the VA hospital or at the point where they may be six months away from going out on their own. So that will be an excellent transition place for them. And it's easy to get to particularly those that have motorized vehicles to bus stops are relatively close by. But I think that's something the city should consider. And again, I'm very serious when I say we eliminate the costly full time mayor, his humongous staff, and the millions that are spent traveling back and forth here and there trying to build his political career. Long Beach survive very well without the full time paid mayor. Even when we had honest mayors. Thank you. Oh, Tokyo. Good evening. My name is over at Stewart. I live at the Lexington Apartments and I didn't pull it up. Good afternoon, Mayor. And Council people. Members. I'm sorry. I'm 86 years old. I've lived in Lexington Apartments at 41 West Sixth Street for the last six years. I retired from Lockheed after 38 years of service. Excuse me. Moving would be extremely difficult for me at my age and my physical condition. And if the rent has gone up, like the colleagues before me have said, you know, and I agree with them wholeheartedly. And the proposal that Guardsman Richard Husband award should be taken care of and done quickly. And I'm speaking a little bit off the topic now, because this is something that's been bothering me a little bit the last couple of months. But. The growing homeless population of the seniors or elderly. I don't know. Which do we use now? I'm elderly, so I'll say elderly, huh? The Social Security Administration Cost of Living Increase Research Estimate. In 2014, we received 1.7% increase. In 2015, we receive zero increase. In 2016, we received 2.3% increase. 2017 increase was 2%. 2%. The year 2014, there was a slight increase in our. Social Security. To 2016. The 2015 increase was zero, which means there no percentage increase. The next increase was the 2016 to .03 increase was taken up by Medicare. The 2017 increase, which showed that $24 was taken up by Medicare, leaving me with a whopping. $5 a year increase. If you think about it now, you're talking about 13, 14, 15, 16, 14, 15, 16, 17. In three years, Social Security had my part had an increase of a whopping $5. That's a lot of money. Thank you. You can almost buy a tank of gas. Thank you very much. I'm very sorry. Okay. I ran out of time. There's a couple more things, but thank you. Yes. My name is Reverend Leon Wood. I'm the pastor at Saint Mark Baptist Church. And I first want to compliment you on taking this effort and bringing it to the table, because the homeless effort is really a serious effort. And I should I compliment you all for taking this and bringing it to the table? The couple of things I wanted to add to this, though, the homelessness is a very serious, but it's a multifaceted issue. There's some people who have been homeless for a long time. There's the new homeless, the aged. There are those who have mental deficiencies as all kinds of things. And we cannot use one particular. We can address it with just one issue. We have to address this in a multifaceted phase. I would suggest that we really have a planning effort that includes the faith community. When I say the faith community, there's many churches in the community that have space that could be used temporarily until we get the other parts addressed. I know that they say St Mark's, they have this entire facility there that could probably house several people. But we have to do this as a joint effort in the community. Right now, it looks like we're still not using the total resources of our community to address this major issue. And I would like to suggest that we begin to expand the people that are coming to the table, bring the entire community together because it is a total community issue and really try to work this through it. And I include the university. I put all the mental resources that we have to address this issue because it's economic, it's spiritual, it has all facets and you can't just solve it would just providing some housing, it has to be addressed in a total sense to eradicate it totally if we can. That's how I would look at it. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Honorable Council members. I'm Annette Mazo at the Hamilton Neighborhood Association. My address is on file. We support Councilmember Rex Richardson's advocacy regarding homeless solutions proposed here tonight. Additionally, the impacted areas proposed are currently crime ridden, including but not limited to drug dealing, illegal drug consumption and sex trafficking. Transitioning these locations to a solution to help homeless and create affordable housing feels like a win win to me. Thank you for your advocacy empathy regarding all the issues included in this proposed solution. Thank you. Hi, Mr. Vice Mayor. Right down to the council and staff. My name is Gary Shelton. Along with only on word. We're both past chairmen of the city's Homeless Services Advisory Committee. We've gone to the. Depths of this issue many times over the. Years. You're going to be hearing a lot more about the folks from 41 West Sixth Street, the likes of an apartment building, the 45 people that are not going to be able to live anywhere once they exhaust their funds and can't pay those rent increases anymore and then get another rent increase maybe next year. We'll be hearing more about them. But what I wanted to talk about. Was, was the emotion. Initially. We talked about the opportunities for getting out of homeless, the. Opportunities. For early prevention, and their brass rings. In many senses that. We could grab on the way around the carousel. But if you don't know that brass ring is there, then you're not going to reach out to grab it. And I think that's one of the problems we have, is people who are facing the onslaught of homelessness in their own lives don't know what there is. That they can do. And the information isn't there. The education isn't there. The other is the core causes of homelessness. You recited them. They're common. But not everybody goes. Through those. Core common causes of homelessness. And ends. Up homeless. You have folks like the people at LAX Honor Apartments who, for no fault of their own, simply will not be able to afford to live anywhere there or probably in Long Beach. But I want. To address the. One motion part of your motion that you made. Which was. On finding a location and beginning the purchase of a homeless shelter year round homeless shelter. That's a great idea. And we've been working on something like that for years, in fact. What I want you to be aware of is there are two places in town where by right a homeless shelter can be built. But the problem with. Those two places is one. Of them is along the corridor. On Anaheim Street, near the multi-service. Center. Between there. And Santa Fe. And the other is at the villages of Korea. The village is a Korean model of shelter, does not include what we think of as homeless shelter, where somebody can walk up to the thing. And say. At 430 in the afternoon, find a place to be that night because they're stuck. The other. Problem is along the corridor. In the court. There on Anaheim Street. There's nothing appropriate there. There's nothing available there. It's just not. Going to happen. But the thing that will be. Faced if there's no by right siting of a shelter is NIMBYism. And that's what this report I hope will also address, is how do we. Get rid of these really deep down inside those issues? We don't know what to do if we're going to become homeless. We pretend it's not going to happen. So we don't find out about things. You know, we don't know how to reach. Out to something at a brass. Ring. We don't know what the causes are because people go through all those causes and don't. Become homeless. In many, many. Ways. So something's different about that. And when it comes to NIMBYism. Why in the hell does that happen in this city? Thank you very much. Thank you. Good evening, members of the council. My name is Nina Dooley. I'm vice president at Link Housing. We're a nonprofit builder of affordable housing and permanent supportive housing for. People who've. Been homeless. Our headquarters is right here in Long Beach in the second District. We're statewide, but we care about our own hometown and would like to do more. I want to commend. Councilman Richardson and others on the council for bringing forth these four motions, which we think will really make impact. I'd like to address one in particular, and that is creating a local source of funding for housing, and that would. Help us tremendously because having a local source of funds will leverage other, larger sources to come into Long Beach and build that housing. But we need that local source to be competitive and win those other dollars. So thank you for your leadership on that. And we hope to go forward with the fund. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening. My name is Phillip Holmes. I'm a 77 year old former member of The Hunting for his Airborne Division. I got my apartment in Alexandria nine years ago through the VA's Vash program. You see these. Three people over here in these chairs? They are all living in Lake Zana. There are three other people in chairs in the building. If we are forced to move, it's going to be too traumatic on all of us. We got to come up with the money to move. We got to either put our furniture in storage or we got to pay to move in. Man. We need some help. And we're asking for. Thank you. Good evening, honorable mayor and council members. My name is Sonia Andrew. I live at 317 East 60th Street and I'm here to speak from various perspectives. I have experienced homelessness. My teenage daughter and I were homeless. And I can tell you that we went through the Multi-Service Center. We went through two, one, one. I have house on me because I had a college degree, I was professional. And it just so happened that the economy in 2007, 2008 and some health issues hit me at the same time. So I found myself having to tell my daughter that if we have to take showers in 24 hour fitness and sleep in our car, we're going to make it now. Language is a beautiful place, but what's not beautiful, no matter where you go in this country, is when you drive along the street and you see tarps and makeshift tents and people sleeping on the ground and shopping carts. That's not beautiful. So I am standing in support of this motion to say whatever efforts you have to do, please do them. I want to also speak on behalf of the homelessness, and I'm going to tell you that dorm style shelters are not working, and it's not because people don't want help. But having been there, you don't want to be somewhere where someone is restricting your ability to live, to be told that your child can't be in extracurricular activities, she has to come right home, fails that because if you're in that situation, you're doing everything you can to hustle, to get out of it . So when you get into facilities that lamport rules on you, it makes it impossible. My dada, because I didn't capitulate to those rules, ended up going to Duke University on an athletic scholarship. So that extracurricular that I had to fight for sleeping cars in parking lots while she was at a neighbor or friend's house. We were separated at times because I didn't want her in the car with me. She made it, but she made it because we had to do things out of the norm. So it isn't a one size fits all and it's not always everybody's going to go into a dormitory situation. So you do need to give people the. Respect. Housing first, treat people like they're human beings. Just because you're down on your hard times does not mean that you're less than or have equal rights. Thank you so much. Thank you. Before we have the next speaker, I'm going to close the speakers list. The gentleman that's at the at the end of of the of the line, sir, he's going to be our last speaker. The gentleman in the in the black shirt and the dark shirt. Oh, you spoke, please. Yes. Okay. So, yes. The lady that's coming to the end of the line will be our last speaker right now. So let me let me go ahead and close the speaker's list. And the speaker's list is close. Mr. Butler. All right. Good evening, Mr. Mayor. Members of the city council as a member of the Mayor's Affordable Housing Task Force. Well, the first installment, I did not make the sequel. I hope to be a recurring member of the cast, but I hope that the series does not go on long. The community needs solutions and we're getting tired of the script. We know things are bad there, worse than bad. And we need solutions now. Well, we're moving in the right direction. We're not moving fast enough. And it would be foolhardy to believe that this is the solution. If a single thing could solve the problem for Long Beach, that'd be great. But at this point, we need it all. Inclusionary housing, a permanent source of funding, not just a bond as well as rent control and just cause eviction. It's absolutely appalling to me that Long Beach has no amount protections. Working families, seniors, veterans and other vulnerable citizens, many of whom are here tonight, are being given 30 and 69 notices left and right. Rents have skyrocketed. Credit checks are expensive and nonrefundable. Applications require prospective tenants to make 2 to 4 times the monthly rent to even be considered. People being forced to live in overcrowded conditions and are too afraid to ask for the most basic repairs because they could be kicked out for it. The only response has been, but cities like Santa monica and San Francisco have rent control and they're even worse. Like we don't know about Costa Hawkins and the Ellis Act and other pro landlord legislation. Rent control is the only reason many low income residents are able to still live in those cities. I'm sure the lobbyists for the landlords will say how much they support this. I'm sure they do. They would support anything but rent control and they'd be happy to pass the cost on to US. Renters. As they normally and. Typically do. And will continue to do without rent control in place. We also can't keep doing this on a building by building basis, but if that's what it comes to, we will continue to bring residents down here. Other organizations will continue to bring residents down here in the meantime, on which residents are being forced out of here while we're having this conversation and doing studies, 1000 S.E. vouchers are in the hands of Long Beach resident or former Long Beach residents, and they are currently unused. One of those people was my aunt. She finally got her voucher after years of waiting, only to find that she could not find a place to live and has now left Long Beach. We have a councilmember bragging about how much affordable housing lies in the district without mentioning how many of her residents have been forced to leave the district because their buildings have been sold, and the naturally occurring affordable housing that we've relied upon for years has now disappeared. There is no plan to build 28,524 units in the next 20 years. We don't have funding to build over 1000 units a year. We don't have anywhere to put them. Thank you, Mr. Butler. There is no plan to stop the bleeding, and the residents who are here tonight don't have time. So we need a sense of urgency and some action right away. Thank you, Mr. Butler. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker. Please. Good evening. My name is Lorena. Kim and I work on economic justice issues throughout the county. Went to school for urban planning. And anecdotally, I also have a dear childhood friend that's been trying to look for a place to rent in Long Beach since October and has been having to commute an hour and a half each way on public transit to get to his job. So this issue is very important to me. And we know, as the reverend mentioned, how complex these issues are and how complex a solution is required. We know that to address these crises, that we must both increase job quality and job opportunities, as Councilmember Richardson has highlighted, tackle social issues like domestic violence, find ways to increase supply, as well as ways to stabilize rents, and critically to explore funding opportunities for permanent supportive housing and affordable housing. Also, because I work a lot on job issues and with the building trades, I would like to just underscore the opportunity that new housing could create jobs, especially given the projects labor agreement that Long Beach has. And this could be good union jobs that go to local Long Beach residents hopefully. So I would like to just speaking to support and commend this effort to address this complicated and pressing issue, to apply Councilmember Richardson and his colleagues for bringing this forward and for starting to dig into this complex and critical life changing issue and looking, especially adding the pieces mentioned tonight around income discrimination and innovative opportunities such as nuisance hotels. I know that's something the city of Los Angeles is also looking into and it has a lot of support from housing advocates there. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening, mayor. City Council staff. My name is Brian Deandra. I'm with Century Housing in Century Village that cabrio. I'd like to offer a little bit of a different perspective on the matter at hand. Later this evening you're going to hear from some of my colleagues about the successes at the village of the Cabrio over the past year. And the city really should be very proud of what's been created there and its role in standing behind that model. But those successes don't exist in a vacuum. They are the direct result. Of a series of choices and investments and conditions that exist in the city of Long. Beach that have applicability to the matter at hand. I want to take a moment to reflect on a few of those conditions and talk to you about how they relate. First, unlike neighboring jurisdictions, the city of Long Beach has its own health department, its own Health and Human Services Department that has a dedicated continuum of care contract with HUD. The city has its own unified funding agency status. We have a multi-service. Center that serves as a front door to persons. Experiencing homelessness. We have our own police and fire departments. We have our own housing authority. We have a local VA hospital. We have dedicated elected officials and talented city staff that are working on this issue. And we have leadership. We have leadership and we have alignment across all of these resources. These resources represent critical ingredients. To tackling this issue and speaking to the many needs you've heard about this evening from. From our fellow residents. We have a strong system locally, but what we're short on is resources. These elements are the critical. Ingredients to tackling this issue. They're the reason that establishing a local source of revenue for affordable housing can be immensely impactful. And Long Beach. I've had the honor of serving on the Mayor Study Group and on the current Everyone Home Task Force, and I'm very encouraged to see the dialog this evening. And we want you to know that you can count on us at century to stand behind these efforts. Thank you. Thank you so much. Next speaker, please. Good evening, Mr. Mayor. City Council for carry that out with Libra. I want to thank. Rex Richardson for bringing forward this motion. And it's a bittersweet because we've been asking for this for years. So it's it's about time that it's finally coming due. I want to make three points around a. Local source of funding. One, definitely we need a robust funding source. And and this and two, it must be targeted and it must be dedicated funding targeted to those most in. Need, targeted to the. Extremely low and the very low income. If you look at the regional housing needs. Assessment and you look at the current development of the city, you'll see that there there. Is no equity in the development. That the city is doing. It's almost achieved over 80% of it's above moderate, moderate income level developments and about 15 or 20% of it's extremely low and very low income housing development. So this funding source. When it's when it's created, should be dedicated. So we are talking about equity here. We developed an Office of Equity. So I hope we're going to abide by that same. Sentiment and. Philosophy. And also, we shouldn't rush this. You you mentioned measure. Jason Measure H that that was a. Lengthy process and it was a very detailed. Measure and we should not rush this at all. We should do it right. We should include. Community. We should include the stakeholders. We should include everybody that we can so that we're making sure that we get this right. And as much as we need this boost in production housing and we know we cannot adequately address our houseless and precariously housed, we have to stop the bleeding. We have to stop the bleeding today. And there's ways that we can make it happen today. You introduced a suggestion Section eight discrimination would immediately house 600 people that are holding on to vouchers. That would end that would that can very well find themselves on the streets. So we're talking about prevention of homeless listeners. We're talking about prevention of people that don't have homes. These are the tenant protections that we've been asking for for years, just cause eviction and limits on annual rent increases. So, Mr. Mayor, you've come out publicly against that. So I want you to look these folks in the eye. I want you looked at the veterans, the seniors, the disabled, and tell them right. Now that limits on annual. Rent increases do not work. Tell them. Look him in the eye and tell them tell us that because those annual those annual limits on rent increases would be saving their lives right now and we wouldn't have to be fighting. So if you're not going to support that, I hope that your office at the very least. Can make. A call or send an email to the landlord, because we're already talking to HUD, we're already talking to the Housing Authority, even even nonprofit developers that are willing to buy that building. But we need to bring. That landlord to the table, and we need your help to do it. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Rivera. Next speaker, please. Mr. Murchison. Good evening, Mayor and Council Members. I'm going to take a different perspective on this tonight. You know, I haven't heard at. All from the business community. I haven't heard from the neighborhood associations across Long Beach. I haven't heard from the rental property owners. None of these groups that I'm aware of, some of them I represent. Some that I just. Know because I've lived in this community my entire life, are here tonight. The reason is, is that this I am just came up on the agenda. Yes. Councilmember Richardson mentioned that there's been long discussions. But it's the discussions. That have happened with other groups, not with the groups that ultimately are going to have to pay this revenue source that you all are asking for. Who are the who are the groups that we're talking about? You're going to be looking at a parcel tax. You're going to be looking at a property tax. You're going to be looking at uut tax night. I remind you that 40% of people that live in Long Beach are the ones that would have to pay that tax, not 60%. You take that into account. I want to give you some suggestions. Tonight to take a look at number one. Take your time in evaluating this. There's not a lot of time for city staff to take a look at this and come back. By the next counts mean August 7th, which happens to be the last council meeting that you can place an item on the November six ballot. That is not enough time to evaluate a tax that is going to impact 40% of the residents in Long Beach. So if you want to get creative with it, look at other taxes. I don't know. I'm not a tax expert, but how about a tax on movie tickets? How about entertainment tax? How about creating more tax on the airline tickets that you purchase? Something that doesn't get to the bottom line, which is a parcel tax or property tax on residents who have lived here their entire lives. Yes, I do. Understand what's. Going on with the homeless and yes, I'm with them to create more housing. I represent affordable housing developers. But what everybody is missing is. It's not a. Simple solution that can be done in. Ten days to determine. That you're going to put a tax on the residents of Long Beach that own their properties or the businesses that own their properties. We need to be very creative. We need to look at other options. That are out there. You have I am 16 on your agenda later on this evening. That's another personal tax that the County of Los Angeles is contemplating putting on November ballot. Need I remind you, residents of Long Beach that own their homes are going to have to pay that parcel tax. So it's just one thing after another of these taxes. Let's get creative. Let's look at different ways to approach this. It can't be done in the eight or ten days you have until August 2nd, August 7th. Thank you very much. Thank you. Speaker, please. Good evening, Mayor City Council. My name is Mark Garrison. I lived in Long Beach off and on most of my life. My brother and sister graduated from Long Beach, Jordan and in the nineties I went to school to become a EMT and worked at a local ambulance company, Bower's ambulance company that was off of PCH and Long Beach Boulevard. As an EMT, I felt like I want to help people. And I've been to many of the hospitals in the area, Long Beach Memorial Community Hospital, etc., etc. But now I'm in need of help. I'm an even helper from a predatory property management company. That predatory property management company is named West Star Property Management. They own many buildings in Los Angeles, I mean, and Long Beach, and they're kicking out all of the tenants. I myself had high hopes for this company. They come in, they do some light repairs, paying over some. Things, but they don't dress any issues whatsoever. This company ignores repair requests, ignores mold, ignores groundwater. And they don't want us to live there anymore. So in our 12 unit building are kicking everybody out. I've gotten a 60 day notice for my efforts. I've talked to code enforcement. I file complaints. And the action that they've taken have been retaliatory. I have my day in court. Most definitely I will. But I don't think that these shady property management companies should be able to treat tenants like that. They went in so far as to change the lock on my. Mailbox. To restrict my mail access. I know it's not legal, but like I said, I have my day in court. I just want to issue a warning to everyone that homelessness is going to continue. If you allow companies like West, our property management, to come in. Purchase properties in. Long Beach and evict tenants out. I know of. Tons of buildings. That they own and they're doing the same thing to them as well. They must be stopped. Or you're going to have an. Increased amount of homeless in Long Beach. Thanks for your time. Thank you very much. Speaker, please. Good evening, Mayor Garcia and councilmembers. Why? I am passionate about this issue. I have moved to Long Beach six years ago. I was attracted to Long Beach for the diversity, the dynamic energy, the older architectural buildings and the affordable rent. We call 2014 Chestnut Avenue our home, and many have resided there for 5 to 12 years and we are being evicted from our homes. Please tell me how it is morally right to legally evict residents with a mere 60 day notice for no reason. Many residents in the Wrigley area of Long Beach and I'm sure around other parts of Long Beach live paycheck to paycheck and do not and cannot come up with available funds to move in 60 days while paying monthly expenses. West Our property management has taken over ten buildings that are known thus far. That is over 159 units, which is potentially 159 to 636 residents that have been or we will be evicted. And we are confident. More Long Beach residents and community members are facing the same situation and are not speaking up. If Long Beach Mayor Garcia and members of the Council do not see this as a growing problem in your city, then we challenge you to show your financials. Prove to us that your pockets are not being mined by these slumlord property flippers. Thank you so much for your time. Hello. City elected officials. My name is not Roberto Lopez. I'm a community organizer with Housing Long Beach, and I've been working with the Pacific residents and the theater residents. And to be honest with you, it's disappointing to see that the fact that there's no policy being introduced yet. I like the motion right that's being introduced by Rex Richardson. But just so you know, Teresa Harris spoke here and her daughter spoke here. Another homeless, Victor Chacon, is a week away from being. Homeless and the. City residents are going to court next week on Monday and my time working on housing Long Beach. I've been there for seven months and I've. Seen over. 100 families get evicted from their homes. And where are they going? Some of them are on the streets right now and nothing's been done. No policies being introduced, nothing's been done to save these people. Residents have been living in this neighborhood, in this city for the past 30 years, past 25 years. And yet they're being. Pushed out and. Nobody's doing anything for them. The organized effort only goes so far. We've been able to delay some of these evictions for four months, five months. But we need policy now. And we hope that, you know, as a city, elected officials do take action and defend these residents. Maybe it's not affecting your district right now, but as soon well people are going to your. Districts being pushed out from District. One to District nine, and that's what's happening with some of the city residents right now. Thank you. Good evening. Elected officials. My name's Edith. I was born and raised in Long Beach, specifically in District one, and I moved away a couple of years ago to complete my master's degree in business and public policy. And I was fortunate enough to have a fellowship, paid fellowship this summer with Housing Long Beach. And like Mayor Garcia, I, too, took a tour of Long Beach. But guess what? It wasn't the pictures he showed on Twitter, because I've been talking to my family, I've been talking to my neighbors. And what is happening here with this housing crisis? It's fucked up. It really is. It's messed up. It's immoral. I can't believe I was excited to come back to my city. But what I'm seeing, it's really sad hearing everybody here talk about the problems they're experiencing. I mean, I myself, I am fortunate that I got a stipend. And with that stipend, I'm helping my parents this summer pay for the rent because their rent has gone up almost 700 bucks in the past couple years. And that's just something that cannot continue. We can't be pushing families away. We can't be separating families. So I understand that this policy talking about year round homelessness, that's great, but that's a future thing. What are we doing now? We need a policy now that's going to prevent families from being separated, that's going to prevent families from keeping being pushed away. So that is what I what I am here to ask you, what are we going to do now? Because even students like myself who have gone away for a couple of years as a first generation student to complete a degree and now plan to come back to their town where they were born and so they can help their communities. I don't even know if I can come back and do the social justice work that I want to do in the city of Long Beach, where I was born and raised. So the question is, what are you doing now and not in the future? Thank you. Good evening. My name is Suzanne Brown. I'm a senior attorney with the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles. We want to thank the council for considering this item. We strongly support a dedicated local source of revenue for affordable housing. As with any policy, details are critical. Therefore, we offer the following recommendations to the City Council. First, the city should identify a robust funding source. Our housing crisis is at an epic level. We have nearly 2000 homeless persons in our city, and the Southern California Association of Governments has calculated that we need nearly 3000 affordable units by 2021 to meet the housing needs of our extremely low, very low and low income residents. Second, any revenue source must be coupled with specific income targeting to ensure that it benefits those most in need. Many of the very people that you've heard from today, Long Beach, should look to the recently passed measures by the city and county of Los Angeles, measures H, H, H and H as models for income targeting and revenue creation. Long Beach should also be mindful of the immense opportunity to leverage the county's Measure H funds. Measure H includes $355 million over ten years to address homelessness and homelessness prevention through wraparound services, not construction. This money is largely targeted to extremely low and very low income households with a small portion for low income households. Third and finally, Long Beach should take the time to get this right. We do need action, but we need robust legislation that will address our needs and we need the right folks at the table to get the right policy for our city. Thank you for your consideration of our comments. We look forward to partnering with you on this endeavor. Good evening, council members and everybody. Thank you. My name is Christine Pettit. I'm a sixth District resident and I'm the executive director of Long Beach Forward. I didn't plan to speak tonight, so my comments are more on the spirit of the matter rather than the technical details. But I really want to ground my words and the experience of the renters who spoke tonight and to the people whose names we heard, who came and spoke here, and our homeless and those who are on the verge of homelessness. Because to me, that's really the important message, is that we talk a lot about how we value our diversity in Long Beach, but what are we doing to really support that and to retain the heart of our community veterans, seniors, LGBTQ youth, people on fixed incomes, low income families, everybody who makes up the fabric of our community. I definitely want to support the efforts that were introduced tonight by Councilmember Richardson and your colleagues and just really want to reiterate reiterate the point about the local source of funds. We definitely need that we've been advocating for for a long time. It does need to be targeted to low income residents to ensure that if we're trying to address homelessness, we're really addressing homelessness. And also, I just want to encourage us to be real in our conversations. Addressing homelessness is an important step. We also need to prevent this. We also need to address homelessness prevention, and that includes tenant protections, protections for renters. And when I say we need to be real in these conversations, I'm saying that because I'm on the mayor's Everyone Home Task Force. And we were recently presented with a report looking at how cities have approached tenant protections beyond what is there in the law. And I was really happy to see things like just cause eviction in that report. But one thing that was missing and it was glaringly missing was limits to rent increases on an annual basis or rent control or rent stabilization that was missing. It wasn't discussed anywhere. And that's because I know there's opposition to that by our mayor, by the council. But we need to be able to have honest conversations, but look for everything on the table and say, hey, you know, if we're actually looking at this issue, this is one of the top issues, a top strategy is that cities are using to address tenant protections. And so we need to look at all of the information. I really just want to impress upon us that we need free democratic discussion of all of the issues. Thank you. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, and the City Council. For the record, I am a gentleman, in part because I grew up here in Long Beach. My name is Dave Chappelle and I'm a resident of the third. I'd like to counter the idea previously expressed that we haven't yet heard from the landlords, the people who are going to be bearing the unbearable costs of not having homeless people in our town. The issue isn't the 40% of folks like my parents and other people you don't speak for who aren't creating the problem. It's all the out-of-town capital or the out of town landlords, people who don't even bother to show up when there are hearings like this. Who are you speaking for, sir? Oh. We've heard plenty. From those landlords. These 30 and 60 day notices. On what basis? Retaliation. Pointing out code enforcement issues from a very old building. So seniors having to live in in, you know, I mean, we like to sell, you know, ourselves as all as, you know, people who come to this town on a vision of the city. But do we deliver on it? Do it. I mean, you know, it's the folks, you know, who came down the whole building came down to talk to you about something that's a result of policy measures that you didn't take up earlier and look like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, don't quit the club. This is not an easy job. I don't envy any of these people. I really don't. I mean, this is hard. And, you know, we're not going to penalize, you know, renters. We sure as hell shouldn't penalize them for trying to deal with the problem or, you know, landlords who seem to think that their freedom depends on someone else's unfreedom, which is a whole separate topic specifically for the dedicated local source of funding. It needs to be needs based. It can't just be. I mean, there are people who sleep in their Lexuses because they're homeless for a couple of months, you know, at the gym. I mean, we we need to deal with the enduring kind of roots of poverty. This has to have an equity focus. The process has got to be iterative. I mean, maybe putting it in front of the voters, maybe the whole idea all year of putting this behind the voters is an abdication of your responsibility, frankly. I mean, can't we have a rent freeze or something that you can just decide to do and just stop the bleeding? How hard would that be? I mean, what more data do you need and who do you need it from? I'll work for free and I'll get it for you. I'm serious. Put the RFP out tomorrow by ten. I'll fill it by four. I'll do it for free. What? Don't you know that you need to know to fix this? You've heard from me more than once. And I really don't like speaking here because I really don't think it's really my place. This doesn't directly affect me, but this is our city and it affects all of us. I mean, we see it, we drive by it. We have to live by we have to deal with the consequences of it every day. How much longer? My name is Tiffany. Davey and I live in the second district. I love the city and material in my daily life. I've had to speak here more often the past few years because of experiences I've endured in this great city. Not just in the past four years, actually, since I've been 18, I've worked really hard to take care of my family. I've been a caregiver for my mother for nearly a decade now. That was all of my youth. We faced homelessness many times. But one thing I have faced with the city more recently is when I've come to different points where I don't know who to speak with, they don't know who's listening. And folks can reach out to different departments and kind of end up in a circle for a very long time. And the city has been paying for something of mine for quite some time. And I feel bad actually for causing the city to pay more and more day by day, for what it had to endure. I've been a victim of violent crimes. I've said this many times, had to reiterate my story to many different folks, and it's something I haven't wanted to share with. My community have come up today because there's so many people here, especially who speak for other people who can't make it. Who don't know how they're going to make it through this moment. This is a very important time in history, and we all have responsibilities to each other and to these people who don't have many people showing up for them. I try to be a senior advocate, not just for my mother. But for people like me, just about every week who have new obstacles, they don't know where to go to, you know, close the resource. So there's. I'm grateful, you know, that we we seem to be moving forward. But history has done a number and it's taken much time and there's a lot of work that you all have to do. And there's going to be a lot more people who have many more issues than me. Growing up here, I have never seen this many people living on the street. I've I've been homeless twice now. I find myself in a precarious position as we speak. I just hope that when we do come to you and when we are seeking answers, you try your best to find them. I want to thank Patrick West's office for listening. I've had Janine so far. Listen, there's there's just more that we can do, because you're not the entire city. Thank you. Thanks. I'm trying to over to back to Councilman Richardson, then Councilman Austin. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So first, I just wanted to thank everybody for the testimony and talking about these situations. Sometimes I get it. It can be difficult, but I appreciate all the different perspectives I hear on the topic. So I want to acknowledge a few things. So first, in terms of the timeline, so you know, everything, every example that we gave from those cities, those are comprehensive examples where policy meets revenue options. And they weren't rushed through. They were developed in a way that sort of people can come together and figure out what's right for that city. And for that to happen in Long Beach, you would need a long process like that. Now, somebody came up and mentioned, Oh, you're rushing something through. Well, in order for something to happen this November, let me just clarify. Number one, there would need to be a special meeting next week. That's not in my motion to have a special meeting. So unless someone here at the council asked for a special meeting, at that meeting, the council would direct. We would get the options at that meeting and then direct the city attorney to come up with a resolution, all these other documents to be voted on at the following meeting. That's not in this motion. So unless somebody here brings that forward, that's not in the motion. So in case there's some misinformed, very heated, misinformed people that think we're trying to sneak something in. No, we're trying to bring up a conversation that needs to happen immediately. That's what we're trying to do here. Next. This is a conversation that will happen next. I get it about the conversation around tax burden. I get it. The process in California. You know, sometimes education bonds or have a lower threshold to pass and sometimes local measures have a different threshold to pass. And it's been a lot of measures. I get that. I completely understand it. But our democratic process allows us the process to put certain questions to the people. And there are more than one option. It does not necessarily have to be a parcel tax, a bond. There are a number of revenue options. Well, we're asking city staff to come back, is present to us those options so we can begin the process of picking one and moving forward. All of those conversations will happen next. We don't have a date in front of us. That will happen next. So I want to I want to just just clarify that, you know, to do something like what we showed today, it would not be the 20 there would not be time to do that in the November ballot. If the council wants to choose to move forward with something, you still have that ability, which is why we did the timing here. You have that that ability. But I don't I don't you know, unless somebody makes a motion that's not that's not what's in front of you tonight. What's in front of you is what we talked about. Begin the conversation on revenue. Take a look at the shelter. Take a look at motel conversion and take a look at our anti-discrimination policy. That's what's in front of us tonight. Thank you. Thank you, Councilman Austin. Thank you, Rex, for for clarifying that. And I want to thank you for also having the courage and thoughtfulness to bring this forward in the way you have. I will also want to thank the residents who spoke this evening, shared their perspectives and stories. They're very moving and touching, especially those affected by by, you know, major rent increases. Most recently, this this is the homelessness in our affordable housing, obviously still is the issue of the day. And for this council, I think it's it's our responsibility to have it at the top of the agenda and keep the conversation going and look toward policy solutions that make sense for our city. I want to just just really end with in terms of homelessness, we have been working and we we we we are looking for answers as a council. There's no nobody who has a silver bullet or a magic touch. The cities that have been identified that have made their made policies toward local funding sources are cities that still have serious homeless and affordable housing issues as well. The County of Los Angeles, the city of Los Angeles County of Los Angeles has over 50,000 homeless individuals, people facing homelessness. The city of Long Beach has 2000. We we still have effective programs in place. And obviously, one homeless person and one person facing facing housing insecurity is too many. Recently, the state legislature and the last hour, our advocacy on this council as well we were able to get those in the state budget when. Wall of how much money? 12.5 million. Approximately 12.3 million. 12.3 million. That was realized just a few weeks ago. Measure H was passed when? A little over a year ago. That is we'll get how many how much? KELLY It's currently about $3 million of services into Long Beach. $3 million in services in Long Beach. But I think there's a lot more that'll be coming behind that. But the point is, these moneys and these these dollars are have not had an opportunity to actually even hit the system yet. And there's still a lot I would just say to to I'm not going to say people be patient, but bear with the staff here, the city here. We are working to to end the council to to to get get those those resources where they need to be and to to to tackle this problem. That's several million dollars that that we have right now that we have to put to work the the the issue before us. An item being discussed is developing even another local source of funding that can be helpful, that can be leveraged to improve everything across the board. And I think it's one that we need to have, but I'm glad that we're also being realistic in terms of approach in that it may not make it to this this ballot. It may require a special election. It may require and is definitely going to require a lot more community input. The item before us asks staff to come up with a strategy. Right, and to come back in a week or two with the strategy. And that's going to be two weeks, I believe, with the strategy to do that. Now, I would say that they've been developing and working toward a strategy already. And so that will be unveiled and we'll have an opportunity to to hear about that strategy and discuss that the strategy and determine priorities as a city council. But this is a going to be a process, and this is what governing is. Nobody has the automatic answer I've heard from we've heard from many people here. If everybody if somebody here has the magic, magic answer, then then, you know, they should probably be sitting here. I don't think any of the policy solutions that have been thrown at us or this council have been criticized for for not moving forward with is the the panacea to the issue that we are facing. This is a challenging issue. And I appreciate Reverend Wood for his comments. We have had some some conversations with clergy and community around this. This is not something that anybody and I can tell you that myself, I'm not taking this lightly. Rex brought this issue to my attention a few days ago and asked me to sign on his support. And I'm absolutely happy to support this because this is a conversation that we need to be having and we need to be like I said, it needs to be on the forefront of every one of our city council members minds. And I can tell you that it probably is. You know, aside from the public comment members here today, we all hear from constituents on a daily basis. People are contacting our office with challenges and problems and we are challenged to to to come up with solutions and provide resources. And I can tell you that this issue is one that vexes me and causes me sleepless nights on a on a daily basis. This is something that is very important to me. So probably one of my script a little bit in saying that. But I think a local source will allow this this the city greater resources and the ability to help control his own destiny. When it comes to the issue of homelessness and housing insecurity, I'm glad that this conversation is is before us. And I am looking forward to hearing from a comprehensive strategies from from our city staff moving forward and in continuing this conversation, but also moving toward action and solutions. So thank you very much, Rex, for bringing this forward. Happy to cosign on this and look forward to working with everybody moving forward. Thank you, Councilman Austin. I do have a lot of folks that are queued up to speak, so I'm going to make a few comments and then turn it over to Councilwoman Price. So I want I really just thank the authors of the motion. Of course, I think this is important, and I want to just go back a couple of steps and then go over some of the items that are in front of us and then talk directly to a local revenue source as well. So the first thing which I think is important is and it was mentioned a few times today. Is the conversation of a local revenue source isn't a new conversation. In fact, it was first proposed by the Affordable Housing Study Group that proposed a variety of recommendations for the Council to consider there. I would say that most of those recommendations are all moving forward and we've been getting regular updates on the status of those. I think obviously people are aware of our community work right now with Airbnb process. I think the inclusionary zoning ordinance, which were I think a lot of us anxious to get in front of the council for a debate on that I know is being worked on and is currently in the process of being developed as well as other issues that are going to be before the Council in the next in the next few months. The bond the bond issue was clearly spelled out in that report as either a bond or a local revenue source to provide funding for affordable housing. That's something that was discussed with a lot of members in both, not just the advocacy community and the housing community, but also on the property owner and business community side. So I think a lot of people have talked about that, that funding piece. Let me also say that staff just a few months ago presented the council with a very lengthy report about what a bond could raise for the city and what other local revenue measures could impact the the ability for us to build more housing. I think we have to be very honest and remember that the city lost its main source of funding affordable housing. We used to have redevelopment that built a lot of affordable housing. We no longer have that. And I think at times asked, why isn't the city itself building more affordable housing? The city doesn't build housing. The city is not a home builder. Every unit of affordable housing that we build is subsidized by the city. The city subsidizing that, whether it's through local grant, federal grants or state grants. And so we build as much as we're able to get in subsidy. And so for every affordable unit that we build and all this and all the affordable units that we build are rent stabilized units. There are 7000 rent stabilized units in the city of Long Beach or rent controlled units or whatever you want to you want to call those units. Those units are are most of them in perpetuity or have long multi-decade covenants on them? Because we are we are paying an annual subsidy so that they stay and remain affordable. I think there is wide consensus that we need to have more rent stabilized units in Long Beach. Think most people have said that and we're working on expanding those types of units across the city and we build those and we're continuing to build. There's about a thousand of them right now that are under construction in and around the downtown and across the city. And so we work and continue to work on those on those units as it as it relates directly to should the city look and work with the community to find a local source of revenue to fund more affordable housing? I mean, the answer to that is my opinion is absolutely yes. And we should be working with everyone, all of the partners that came forward with us today, but also those that spoke. When you when you put measures like this in front of a community, you have to bring everybody to the table. You don't pass things without some kind of community conversation that involves all the all the effective people that are going to be part of this this type of campaign, an effort that would need to take place. I've heard from a couple of people that the city shouldn't, not tonight, but those that have some folks have called me that the city shouldn't pass on or the city should tax folks. And just a reminder, the city doesn't we don't tax anybody. The only the taxes that pass the city are voted on by the voters. And so this council doesn't go and increase someone's tax or or do a partial tax. There's only decided by by voters in the city. And the city continues to work on on a variety of items, particularly when it relates to homelessness. I want to mention, I think this is a good discussion. It's one that I that I completely support. But I want to also mention there's a lot of work happening in this area. And I know that for some folks, it's not fast enough and it's not I don't think it's fast enough for anybody on this council. But the work that's happening on the Everyone Home task force that have now met on a couple of occasions is going to produce, I believe and staff believes, some pretty significant recommendations for the city council and they are discussing issues around ensuring that people are able to stay in their homes. Issues on not just building affordable housing, but also issues around homelessness prevention. And we know that homeless homelessness prevention is is done first and foremost by ensuring that people that are on the verge of becoming homelessness have. Rent the ability to bridge that rent or to have rental assistance. They can stay in their homes and increase and to be able to increase the rent stabilized units that we discuss. So when it comes to the issue around tenant protections, that's something that staff have been researching for many months. They've been looking at best models from across the country. They're meeting and going to be meeting with with the with property owner groups. They have been meeting already with many of the housing advocacy groups. And that and that is going to continue. And those those recommendations are going to be in front of this body as the Everyone Home Task Force completes its work. And so I just want to make sure that we're all aware of that, as well as the funding that we just got from the state, which is a one time $12 million infusion to help us do the homelessness work. The we get annually, like Ms.. Colby said, about 3 million from Measure H. Is that right? Three and a half million? Yeah, it'll be about 3 million or so. So. So because of the the state funding, which was a piece of legislation that the the that the ten the mayors of the ten largest cities proposed to the legislature, that's an additional $12 million that we're going to get in one year, which is significantly more than we get annually from Measure H. So that's going to allow us to do some pretty exciting things like open the the permanent winter shelter, the permanent citywide annual shelter, do a bunch of other innovative projects around homelessness that this council has talked about. And I'm very excited about getting started on all those initiatives around homelessness. So we the last thing I'll say is one thing that we have charged, the Everyone Home Task Force is also identifying the amount of units that we need in Long Beach to create that are affordable and that are that that we have to create, that we can house every person that's experiencing homelessness in the city of Long Beach. And we know right now that's about 1800 people are experiencing homelessness in Long Beach and what that exact number is, so that we can actually set goals to build those amount of units annually. I think all those things will be will be important. And so I want to just take us through it because the staff's working really, really hard on this. And I want to ensure that to the staff that's here on this issue, that we appreciate the work and will continue working on this issue. That is the most serious issue that we face right now as a city. And so thank you. And Vice Mayor. Councilman Richardson, it's going to take me a while to adjust. Councilman Richardson, thank you for bringing this forward and the signers. And I want to turn this over to Councilwoman Price. Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor, for your comments. I agree with many of them and to Councilman Richardson for bringing this item forward and of course, to the Cosigners. I want to I want to thank everyone who came out tonight to talk on this topic. I think it's it's a really important one. But I'll be honest, I'm going to go into it a little bit more. I think there's two different issues here. And for whatever reason, they're merged together on this item. And I'm going to talk about why I think there are two different issues. Both issues are very important issues. But merging them together, I think, confuses the issue, albeit it might be politically advantageous to throw the word homelessness in there. I think the conversation we're having really should be about affordable housing and finding an ongoing, sustainable local source for affordable housing. That's a very separate conversation, in my opinion, than the very complex issue of homelessness, which I'll talk about in a minute. I want to thank Councilman Austin for pointing out the work that every single member of this body has done collectively and individually to try to address the issue of homelessness that we're seeing in our communities. We're all hearing from our residents in different ways. Residents and business owners, community leaders are coming at the issue of homelessness from very different perspectives. Some are concerned about the quality of life impacts they're witnessing. Some are concerned about the the the lack of opportunities or our ability to communicate those opportunities for services to the homeless. So together as a body, every single person behind this dais has been very, very actively engaged and involved in homelessness. It's this is a conversation about homelessness that started long before today. And one of the things that I think we've realized when we're looking at what's going on around the country and Councilman Austin said it beautifully, there is no silver bullet or magic bullet. I don't know the word he used, but there's been no answer that anyone has found. And every entity, every municipality is looking at homelessness and trying to chip away at the problem by looking at different long term solutions that we. Utilize. For example, one of the things this council studied was the possibility of implementing a social impact bond, which some cities have done, which is public private partnerships that invests in homeless individuals. Another is a homeless work programs that we're going to be implementing, hopefully in the near future in the city. But one thing that's for sure as we look throughout the country is that homelessness is such a complex problem that housing vacancy alone, free housing vacancy in the form of a shelter has not been proven to be a solution because you can't force people into a shelter. At some point there's got like, for example, in Orange County, they have homeless, really tent city type encampments that have developed all over. And yet some of their shelters, their free shelters still have vacancies because people aren't accepting the service of the shelter. Maybe the barrier to entry is too high. Maybe they're not at a place where they're looking for that. Even our own winter shelter here has vacancies and we have beds available. So sometimes the issue or many times the issue with homelessness is so complex and some of the speakers talked about it. Most often we're dealing with mental health issues. We're dealing with substance abuse issues. Many times when you survey the homeless population, for anyone who's gone on a homeless outreach right along, which I've had the opportunity to do several both here in L.A. County and also in Orange County, the individuals that you speak with will tell you that the impetus of their predicament started with mental illness or substance abuse, then loss of a job, then loss of housing or some variation of that. But it's never just an inability to pay rent, not never. Sometimes it's inability to pay rent. But a lot of the individuals that we see that are homeless today are suffering from a myriad of issues, one being the inability to pay for long term housing. So I think homelessness is a very complex issue and the shelter is one solution, but the shelter is not. The homeless shelter is not the same as affordable housing, affordable housing. And the city's commitment to affordable housing, especially in the area of loss of redevelopment funds, is a critical and very important issue, and it's an issue that I absolutely support. But to say that a local source is going to be dedicated to homelessness, but also to affordable housing, I think that needs to be clarified a little bit better if this is something that we're going to actually take out to the community and talk to the community about. My understanding, and this is really a question for staff, I heard Councilman Richardson direct staff to look for a permanent homeless shelter. But I swear, I've been having that conversation with staff for months. Staff is currently has been for months looking for a permanent homeless shelter. It's not an action that's being directed tonight, correct? Yes. That is something that we have been actively pursuing and something the council has been very active about and talking about. We had a very successful winter shelter program up on a on a site up in North Long Beach. I believe that's what he was referring to. So we interpret that as help understand how to move this item forward and get it funded. So do we have and I I'm grateful to have the opportunity to meet with our director of Health and Human Services for quarterly briefings. And I think at our last briefing, there was a discussion about as having funds available to purchase a site, as do we. Is that still the case? His term your maintenance. So we'll be coming back to it on the report on that. We do have some funds from the county to be able to to implement a shelter and do the operations. We are still putting together the final funding strategy on how to acquire the building. And then, of course, it's depending on what building we choose to acquire and at what price. So the state funding of the $12 million that's coming in, we think, will be a great funding source for a portion of that work in addition to other priorities. That's great. So when will we know whether or not the state funding that we've received will allow us to cover any funding gap that we have to acquire a building? Because operationally, the county is helping us implement the shelter. So purchasing a shelter we could theoretically do with the money we already have, right? Yes. It all comes down to really what building we're going to purchase and at what price, which is kind of part of a closed session discussion about, you know, those negotiations. So before we can say exactly here's how much we're going to be spending, you know, we want to make sure that we have an agreement on a property. Do you think that that's something that will be discussed by council in the next six months or so? Or do you think we're looking at a longer timeline just to kind of take a look at this item and how funds revenue sources would be utilized? We hope it will be much, much quicker than that. So we can as soon as we have some some news, we'll get into closed session and talk about, you know, specific parcels and properties. And at the next meeting, we can talk in general about, you know, some of the efforts that have been going on. Okay. Great. Thank you. I think a couple of my colleagues and some of the and the mayor certainly talked about several initiatives that have been passed in regards to homelessness specifically. And we are the beneficiaries of thanks in large part to the mayor's efforts and those of other mayors. We are the beneficiary of state funds. We're also the beneficiary of county funds through Measure H, which we've already touched upon. But I think the advantage that we have right now is we're able to implement some of these dollars and see what works and doesn't work before we come up with longer term proposals of where we want to invest money into solving the issue of homelessness. I think the Everyone Home initiative that the mayor initiated, that initiative is just now underway. I mean, this group is just now getting started. And I hope and I fully expect that they're going to come back to the table with some recommendations that are specific to homelessness, that address not just the housing gap, but also some of the other issues that make homelessness such a complex issue. Well, I think it's really important for us and I agree with George Rivera. I don't think he's in here anymore. But is he here? Yeah. One of the comments that he made is and I agree because I remember meeting with him about this early on when I took office about the need for local source, for affordable housing. And when we had that discussion, we didn't talk about specifically about homelessness because the issue of affordable housing is on its own. Absent the homeless crisis that we're experiencing as a state and as a nation, an issue that warrants its own consideration and its own deliberation and solution, and this is a conversation at least the entire time that I've been on council and many, many years before then, since redevelopment funds went away. I think it's important if we're going to have any sort of proposal about future revenue that we have. A very comprehensive and inclusive discussion that addresses all the different options and isn't something that is. I have to say this seems a little bit rushed and the part about it that seems rushed, as I thought and I've shared this with Councilman Richardson, that we were just going to be starting the discussion tonight. But when I look at the first paragraph of the item, it asks city staff. To report back at the next city council meeting on this very broad category, which is gaps in prevention, services and housing for individuals and families who. Are. Precariously housed or experiencing homelessness, as well as the costs and opportunities to address these needs. I guess my question would be for staff, because I myself have submitted items in the past around homelessness and been told that it's going to take many months to respond. Is this realistic for staff? Would you be able to come up with a comprehensive report that talks about gaps in prevention services and how housing for individuals and opportunities? And and how is that realistic in light in the context of all the other items that other council members have brought in the past? So. Councilmember that's a good question. We actually have been doing a lot of work in this area dating back to the Affordable Housing Task Force. We've been talking about the revenue sources for about 14 months when that first came up, and we've got some of that data already available. You know, we will do our best to come back on the seventh, at least to start that discussion. We think we can come back and talk about some potential funding strategies. We can give some sense of the need. I think you make a good point that to really dove deep into understand fully and, you know, the complexity of all of this is going to take some more time. But we understand the request is to start that discussion quickly. We have a lot of this information. It's a matter of compiling it, and then we'll let you know what we don't know and what we still need some additional time. And so this will certainly be a work in progress. We don't expect to have everything done by next Tuesday or the seventh by any means. Okay. And I guess my next question would be to my colleague, Councilman Richardson. Are you okay with that, knowing that there's probably going to be more information and we might have to flush out a little bit the issue of affordable housing versus homelessness? Absolutely. So. So, number one, I think they are linked. Affordable housing, particularly the lack of very low and extremely low income targeting. I think they are linked the three examples of revenue of options in those cities. Some of them have done a really good job at linking both policy to revenue, but it takes time. You know, in talking with city staff and preparing this, we knew that there was already sort of a number of sort of things prepared. But this type of report hasn't been requested to be heard in front of city council to start that comprehensive discussion. So I get it. If it seems like we're asking for a lot. No, we're asking for them to present what they've been working on for years and give them their day for us to talk about specifically. Revenue and revenue could address both affordable housing and homelessness, and I believe they're linked. We've seen examples that they're linked. There's ways to link them. There's ways to do dual measures. One addresses policy, one addresses revenue, and they sort of work together like Measure H and H in L.A. County, L.A. City work that way so we can have that conversation. So I think the timing, I think we're fine with in terms of this this conversation, there was I want to just say something about the shelter conversation. Yeah. Every year, the winter shelter, it's an emergency. And every year, at least the last like nine years it's been between District nine, District eight. And so with that history, there needs to be a little bit of buy in before council can for city staff can even really move forward on some of those conversations. So they haven't gotten that sort of direction from us before. And hearing that from me personally and specifically talking about evaluating former winter shelter sites, I think that needed to come out and be heard, particularly in front of, you know, North Long Beach residents, which, you know, I know that with sort of this history of NIMBYism Council offices really haven't been willing to step up and say, hey , I'll take on this fight, I'll take on that conversation. So so it comes with a little bit of experience in doing that. So I think that should be respected a little bit in this conversation. Absolutely. And the record should reflect you are very respected and I that that I appreciate you clarifying that. And just so everyone's clear, very respectful of the efforts of the districts that are willing to take this on. But, you know, I think it's important also, I've been telling my residents for about eight months now that we're looking for a permanent shelter site. So I just wanted to make sure that tonight wasn't the start of that conversation, which I'm glad that it's not. And I'm grateful that that you've brought that item forward and we're moving it even one step forward. I think that's fantastic. I do have a question, though, about the proposed revenue sources. I know council is going to come. Our staff is going to come back with something. Other than a bond is has staff thought about general fund allocation? Has that been something that's been discussed? So as we understand the item and really to combat an issue of this magnitude, we're really focusing on additional revenue. As you know, we go through budget processes every single year and there's a lot of things that need to get funded. And so in order to do something of this magnitude that we believe the issue is we we really think we should be focusing on new sources. We provided some information to the council in the past, and I think the last one was probably 2016, where we kind of did a PowerPoint and went through what are all the options, you know, what are the things that could be considered. And we actually went through that process of identifying those measures for the measure, and obviously we settled on a sales tax measure. So we are prepared to come back and show what some of those are. And and because of the magnitude of the issue, there's the ones that generate the largest amounts will be likely at the top of the list. Okay. And I appreciate that. And I know I know staff is going to go back and give it a really hard look and come back with different revenue options. It seems like we've done nothing but go to the voters with tax increases and additional revenue sources that are impacting them. I cannot imagine a situation where I would personally or that my residents would be looking favorably upon any additional revenue source that's going to cause an additional tax at this juncture. So to the extent that staff can be looking at things that don't impact residents in terms of an additional tax on property sales tax, anything that's going to hit people even harder, I think that would be very welcomed and a conversation that I think we could meaningfully have with our residents. But beyond that, if we're looking just on the heels of all the different increases that we have passed and asked voters to support, I personally, I don't want to be in a position where we're asking them to pay more into something, especially something that is really. Very. Preliminary at this juncture and won't alleviate a lot of. The concerns we have on some of the more complex issues that need more a more holistic look and development. So again, I thank you, Councilwoman Richardson, for starting this discussion and for allowing us to have an honest discussion where we are representing our thoughts, viewpoints and those of our residents in a meaningful way. Thank you. Thank you, Councilman Mongo. Thank you. Kelly, you had mentioned I've actually seen you at some of the county homeless meetings or your staff actually. And I really appreciate taking part in that. I think that one of the things that's really important to recognize is that the measure H is a local tax levied upon the entire region. And I think that earlier in the discussion we talked about that L.A. County is providing us $3 million. Yes. And that's this year's allocation, is that correct? Well, it's essentially it's essentially our annual allocation. They will go back and revisit. They're very specific to certain strategies. So just for people to understand the measure, H is not, you know, 3 to $3.5 million that that sort of is handed to the city to spend as we wish. There are very specific strategies in which it is which has to be spent, which include prevention, outreach, rapid rehousing. We also have funding coming in to the to the housing authority and then also to Pacific Gateway. And then we also have a $14 million grant that I read that we received for homelessness. Now we have five we have 12.3 million coming from the state of which about two and a half million of that goes directly to the city. And the remainder of it goes to the continuum of care, the city. Which is the city. But it has to be it has to it has to be engaged with community partners and others as part of the continuum of care and to a direct allocation. And that's separate from the other 25 million. But other 25 million, the. 25 million mentioned a minute ago, because I hadn't heard about that before. And that's that there's no 25 million or so that total a total amount. So this year a one time is 12.3 million, which is the 2.5 plus. The remaining nine is coming in from us, from the state and then from the county. We're getting between three and three and a half million dollars direct to the city for specific strategies. But we also can engage in other services with the county that they're providing through other through other resources. So those are the primary. And then every year through the in the continuum of care funding, we just received just a little over $8 million. And then we received other funding from the ISG and other sources that bring it to somewhere between ten and $12 million. Wonderful. And then have you attended some of those countywide meetings? It sounds like within the total pot of annual revenue for homelessness, the annual expectation is how many millions? 3.50 million is the total amount that measure eight is expected to generate annually. Annually, so 355 million. And of the 355 million. Not all of it has been set aside, but a large chunk of it has been set aside for housing. Is that. Correct? No. The measure h funding, actually only a very small amount is set aside for housing and is very much focused on services. Okay. So as a percentage, a small amount, but how much has been set aside for $15 million? Okay. 15 million. And is that concentrated right now? Because none of it is local? It's up in. I don't know whether significant. They're really focused on not buying it or not. They're really not using that funding specific to that. I don't know what that means. I don't know where that's being spent. But Measure H is very is housing funding that is passed by L.A. City and very specifically Daly City. And that one we're not a part of of don't contributing. To contribute to nor receiving benefit from act. But H eventually when measure A falls off, we will be a contributor to. H. Yes, in year seven through ten we will be contributing a half a percentage. And when we have a percentage. And when we become a contributor, we still won't have any formal say except for through the whole county process, we don't have any ability to navigate that and kind of pull it off to ourselves. We will continue to receive our current allocation moving forward with this, we originally sat on the measure h i, I remember meetings around and they identified 29 very specific strategies that they're not funding anything outside of those 29 strategies. And we're receiving all those funds that come through Continuum of Care, Housing Authority and Pacific Gateway are different amounts. The remaining is the work that we do as partnership with the county. And so that that. Clarification real quick it's pretty impressive important that language got any funding directly at all. So most cities in our county don't get any direct funding. There's a number of other funding sources. A lot of times they'll do, what, like a city revenue share. And this was not one of them. So Long Beach is receiving a direct allocation because of the continuum of care that we receive. We kind of wish it had been set up where every single city would get a portion of it, but it was really set up to be a a countywide structure and we were fortunate to get money out of that. And in those years that we become a bigger contributor, our. Local. Contribution will be approximately 25 million. A year. Because we're receiving 53 million on Missouri. A half of that percent would be 20 something million. So we'll be contributing. I see letter. Writing to calculate. It sounds. About right. So at the time there. Will be contributing 25 million receiving 3. Million. Well, I would say that would directly we're receiving for very specific service right there between three and a half million. We also are being supported for permanent supportive housing and all the other resources that they're providing as a regional as part of state. And so I have direct control over the 3 to 3 and a half million. We are benefiting a much larger share from the remaining resources around regional and local service provision. But where's that nearest local permanent housing available through that system? It's not permanent housing and that permanent supportive housing. So permanent supportive housing never and permanent supportive housing through the continuum of care. And then through that, we also have we also can participate in housing for health. They may or may not be work. They may or may not be housed in which they could be housed in other locations as well. Right. So it sounds like there are revenue streams coming in which kind of substantiates and talks through a little bit more of what Council and Price said and that each of these components of homelessness are still being tried and figured out and understood and. While I do look forward to hearing a more formal presentation from the city staff on all the things they have been working on, I also am very cognizant that in my meetings when I sit down with department heads, the long list of things that the council has asked for report back on this in 90 days, report back and this 120 days. Often those aren't even able to make deadline because the number of additional things that come up and the number of additional things we're asking for continues to grow. I've looked at that list before. I know that I've sat down with the city manager's office. I know that we're still waiting for some reports back from Councilwoman Gonzalez and Councilman Pierce's item related to our transportation options of letting people park overnight and the churches and all of these others. And so. Sometimes when I sit with individuals and talk through like I really want the council to address A or B or C, one of the things that I try to do is say, Well, here are the things that are in the queue for department or department B or Department C and where do we want to put this in terms of what's owed back to the council so that we can make good decisions? And so. While I do. Want to hear this, I don't know that there's an urgency for it to be. Next week. I would prefer. All the answers at the same time if that is possible. And so that would be my only comment. It is a large amount of complexity on multiple issues of homelessness and housing and all these different things. And I would love to have a full spectrum sit down of all of the different programs, including the ones that are not included in this item that have come to council already, that we're still waiting for reports back because those two are very complicated and complex issues. And so for. That, I look forward to. Hearing more from my colleagues on where to go from here. Thank you, councilwoman. Councilmember Pearce. Thank you, mayor. And thank you to the cosigners and leading on this, both mayor and and councilmember richardson. And it is i think what's happening tonight is that we all feel really frustrated. We all feel like it's time to stop the bleeding. I know that it feels like every two months we are tackling homelessness and we're tackling housing and it just feels like we're spinning our wheels. And it's unfortunately part of the challenge of this epidemic that we have. And that's what it is, not just for Long Beach, but for the region. And so, you know, I want to talk through a couple of things, and I think I, too, felt a little, you know, having to read through the item and say, okay, what are we talking about? Is it a dedicated source or are we talking about these other pieces? So I think it just raises that we do have a lot of pieces that need to come back. And to clarify what Councilmember Mongeau was talking about with Measure H, I think is really important for everybody to understand is that we don't pay into it now, but we do reap the benefits of it now. And it's not until the last three years of it that we would actually as Long Beach be paying in. And so while we have the 12.3 million, very small percentage of that in Long Beach goes towards developing housing. And so we absolutely need a dedicated source for affordable housing, for affordable housing. And that cannot mean that we to try to get something passed, that we deal with something that has moderate in there. We know in downtown Long Beach, we have the downtown plan and we've seen what that means. We've got 3000 new units coming on board and they're moderate. We've got 17 affordable out of that. And so we know that we as a city need to tackle this affordability issue. I know in my heart what we need to tackle is is renter protections. And I don't know what that looks like yet for us, but. I'm I. Feel exhausted and feeling like it's not going anywhere. And as some of you probably know, I'm a renter myself. I just moved. Trying to stay in my district is not easy. It wasn't cheap. It cost me $6,000 to move. And I don't have that kind of money. You know, it's I'm lucky that I had family to rely on to be able to do that move. And it's a month to month, you know. So hopefully this council lady doesn't have any crazy wild parties. We're going to tackle that later on. But I understand that struggle and my grandmother is 84 and she just got an eviction notice. Now this is in Texas, but I'm here feeling helpless and trying to help her maintain a home that we've had forever. And so these are real problems that have to be dealt with urgently. And I hope to have that conversation very soon, not just on the the general source, but what are we doing right away to try to stop that bleeding? And I expect, you know, the apartment association and everybody else to be at that table, but it's it's time to do something. I have a couple questions for a staff. We have talked about coming back with the motel item. I know that that was an item that Councilmember Richardson brought before this. I know that I have some of those motels in my district. I know we've had some conversation with the villages of Korea and their interest and that where are we with that report back or what was the next steps with that and the timing on that? Exactly. So we did a report roughly about two months ago, if memory serves out talking about the progress that we've made in in engaging the number of hotels and motels that were identified as the top priorities, we've done a lot of data analysis on, you know, to identify those five and starting to do strategies. One of the things that we're still working on is the amortization and kind of what that process looks like and how much would it cost or wouldn't it cost and and what are the options to do that? As we understand the motion today that was added, it's to look at a funding strategy. So we need to help identify, you know, if we were to get into the business of purchasing those, you know, what, what would that cost? And then how to turn those into permanent supportive housing. So that is something we'll do our best to calculate or at least give an update of where we are on the seventh with some more work to come after that. Great. Thank you for that. And then if staff could also give us a report on to know it's been a while and forgive us for not giving you a heads up, but the transitional parking item, we had brought that before council in my first year and we had a report back from you after the consultant. And I think there was a dollar amount tied to that, which was 200,000 or something like like that, if I'm correct. Do you recall. I think that's about right. It was it was it's very much connected to the ability to provide services and others within within that space. But I believe that's about right. Great. So we had to remind everybody of the process. We had brought together a group of clergy to sit down. They worked with our consultant that we brought on, and they were a group that was willing to open up their parking lots to what we called transitional parking instead of overnight parking as a way to make sure that we connect people that are sleeping out of their cars, which I have a family with a young boy, you know, a few blocks from my house is a grandfather and probably a seven year old that are sleeping in their cars. And we're out there trying to get them resources and they're parked on Broadway. And so to have a church that says We'll open up our lot as long as you're committed to being a part of the continuum of care is something that we don't have in the city. And we've had this conversation multiple times. So I would like to ask if when this item comes back, if we could identify also somewhere in our general founder in our budget that first 200,000 to make sure that we can move this along because it's been there and we've been waiting to try to find the other money outside of the general fund. But I think it's time that we pony up that money. So if there's a way for us to identify funds for that, I think that would be a great step in moving something urgently that can happen today instead of a few years down the road. Do I need to make a friendly for that for vice? I mean, councilmember, I. Support the item, but I'm unclear. Are you asking for them to put it in the budget? I'm asking for them when they come back with your item to it to see if there's some funds, if they can identify where some funds would come from for that 200,000. So everything that I made a motion on, I checked with them if this is something they can present. So I'm going to say the same thing. Is there something that you can deliver? Can you give us a status update on it? We can give you a status update. On the cost and the program. I think funding decisions would come at a later. Time budget. Deal with that. COUNCILMEMBER Thank you. Let me just make sure I'm done with my I mean, I think again, I think my last comment is, is on process and knowing that this is something that takes a lot of dialog behind the rail and asking my colleagues and the mayor to consider, you know, we've done a housing study before. When we've started at three are we started at four for us really to have those presentations and to understand what all the things are that we're talking about, similar to what Councilmember Price said, but that we aren't being rush to get to our next items. It's 930, almost 930, and we still have a council agenda in front of us. So to have a meeting where we're able and we're all settled in for the long haul to ask tough questions and what does inclusionary housing look like? How does that connect with our land use element? I, I added density on seventh street mainly to think about affordable housing and how do we get inclusionary housing there. And so how do these pieces fit together and what funding sources do we need? I think we're just having that conversation again really, really soon. And again, I think the renter conversation is something that I hope that my colleagues will join me in really tackling and not being scared of of of doing the right thing by our constituents. So thank you guys very much for coming out and participating and all the members that worked with Councilmember Richardson. We have a lot of work to do and it's going to take all of your guys help. Thank you. Thank you, councilman ringo. Thank you, marin. I want to thank my colleagues who have already spoken ahead of me. They brought out a lot of good ideas, a lot of good viewpoints and observations about this item. I think staff is being tasked to come up with a report fairly quickly. And so I think that whatever it came up with, it's going to be preliminary as I see it. And it's nice to see this whole issue. It's very, very complex, it's been said. But I look at it as from a perspective of being a holistic approach to dealing with with this whole issue of homelessness and affordable housing and as well as, you know, meals and all that. Bottom line is, is that we are in a in a crisis. And I think this is the first time that I can recall that we're having such a robust discussion on homelessness, whereas Ms.. Sherry Bruce Hart, we need her. You know, she's up here every every council meeting for the last couple of months. She's talking about that. We don't address homelessness here. We are. So in in her, surely we're talking about you. But at the same time, you know, we look at that at the fact that we we do have this crisis. About a month ago, I had a discussion in my district regarding homelessness. I had the the city prosecutor come in and make a presentation, as well as as representatives from our from our homeless bureau also came up and in and the question was asked all the answers questions was asked and the question was asked, well, what are we. Doing that is. Are we looking at other jurisdictions? Are we looking at other municipalities or are we looking at other counties to get their ideas in terms of what is cutting edge from them? And the response was, we are on the cutting edge. So Long Beach is ahead of the game in in a lot of respect. And I want to thank Brandy Diandra, who's here today and make a presentation and a little bit for what's happening in that village is at Cabrillo. I mean, that is a really a state of the art facility that is addressing homelessness from many different angles, not only in terms of housing, but in terms of services as well. Looking at that, again, that holistic approach of addressing this issue, because they provide not only housing, but they provide employment guidance, they provide personal counseling, they provide other types of guidance, as well as some mental health services to address these individuals who are not only experiencing homelessness, are about to experience homeless, but also for the chronic homeless and the and the mentally ill. Just next next week, we're going to be having a ribbon cutting for a behavioral health center that's going to be opening up here in Long Beach. So we're increasing we're addressing these issues about homelessness and mental housing and how they all relate. So it is a holistic approach that we're dealing with this. And I'm and I'm glad that we are finally having this very open, honest discussion about the whole issue of homelessness, because, I mean, it's been it's been the big elephant in the room for a long time. My colleagues, I know we are we've all been addressing that in our own way and in trying to respond to. The concerns of our constituents when they see homelessness over the freeways and the underpasses in their neighborhoods and in the parks. But we've been addressing it individually, too, and I think this discussion is really bringing it to roost in the sense that we really need to approach this issue from from a total totality of the perspective. And even if we have to bifurcate homelessness with affordable housing, we can do that at a certain time. But right now, I'm looking at it as part of a holistic approach that we need to address at all, all at one time, so that we can really, truly identify what are the issues that we're being faced with and how we can address it. We know that homelessness didn't have the homelessness issue that we have here today. Didn't happen overnight. It came. It's happened over a number of years because of what's going on in our economy, what's going on with our building, what's going on with with with our with our own city, in the fact that, you know, we're built out . There's no opportunity for a new land to to get some some some new housing. But we can build up and we can repurpose and re configure some properties that would be able to provide that opportunity for affordable housing. So I'm looking forward to to the report that stack comes up with. And of course, it all costs money. And so by finding those revenue streams as to how we can raise enough funds to to do that would be the that would be the key to this whole factor. So looking forward to report and I'm glad that the Councilmember Richardson brought this forward because we do need to finally come out in the open with this. Let's be honest to ourselves. Let's be honest with our residents in terms of what realistically we can do to to approach this problem and and and get people housed and properly serviced. Thank you. Thank you. Councilmember Spano. Thank you. I have a question about the PowerPoint presentation, and I don't believe it was part of the council agenda package unless I missed something. So when I first look at the item, that PowerPoint was not included. Okay. So I think I saw things in the PowerPoint specific to Seattle that are in the agenda item that I originally read in preparation for this. So it might be in the spirit of the motion, but I wanted to clarify it specifically, and that is, I think that one area where we can bifurcate the issues of affordable housing versus homeless housing would be in this need for mental health services and substance abuse. And well, that was specifically mentioned in the PowerPoint with Seattle. I think it's in the third paragraph under discussion in the agenda item. We lost several things on on on homelessness, you know, robust prevention strategy funding, training, employment opportunities, strengthening family dynamics, reducing domestic violence, ensuring greater access, connection to physical and behavioral health services, but nothing in there on substance abuse. So I don't know if that's a friendly if that was in the spirit of what you want included the maker of the motion. But that would be kind of a deal breaker for me if that's not included because I don't really think it needs to be included. Conversation is at the next conversation is when we start like this is the beginning of a larger conversation and the next meeting is where we can throw everything in. So thank you. So it was specifically mentioned in the PowerPoint, so we're not taking the PowerPoint. Literally, it's abuse. And I don't want honestly, we don't need to load up this motion with everything. So if it makes you feel better to say yes, homelessness and substance abuse, that's fine. Well, it's it's what's in your PowerPoint. So I'm just saying, if it's it's a contributor, like all these things contribute to homelessness, substance abuse, domestic violence. There could be a lot of things. I just don't think it needs to be loaded up in the motion. But if you want that to make sure we keep a lens on that, I'm fine with that. That's not a problem. Okay. Thank you. And I just want to clarify, behavioral health is mental health and substance use combined. So mental health issue. So whenever we talk about behavioral health, we we're talking about both as a common definition. Okay. Thank you. And what I was trying to say that it it appeared from the PowerPoint to the motion here that there's no commonality of there's different terminology use. So thank you for that communication my office put together. The PowerPoint is just examples of what other cities have. Not the prompt, but thanks. Give you a copy if you want one. Gonzalez. You're up. Thank you. I think this goes in the Guinness Book of World Records for one of the longest policy discussions. But it's a very good discussion. And I thank Councilman Richardson for bringing it forward and colleagues for signing on. I'm very interested to see where this goes in terms of the framework and the flexibility that we have as a locality to really articulate the critical needs that we have. And I know we know what those are, and I think Brian and Renee and all of the advocates for being here, because really it's it's your work that we amplify and we really appreciate you coming forward, showing us your social impact study, which you will be doing very soon in talking about the real needs that we have here in the city of Long Beach specifically. So I know we've kind of taken this in different directions, but I just want to hit one point, you know , in downtown and I've been you know, everyone says, oh, why do you always say 1800 units in in District one? Because it's true. We have 1800 units of affordable living in District one. And I make that point because as we talk about a housing fund or I'm sorry that a separate local resource for housing. Absolutely, District One will always be a yes to affordable housing. And when we say affordable, that's very low income. In fact, we have developers that are looking in central Long Beach, a portion of the district for homeless individuals, which I think is just fantastic. And the residents are excited for that because there's a new activation there. But specifically with the downtown, with 324 units of affordable and downtown, 214 of them are in District one, which is great. We're also home to the MHRA, the MSI, the COA, the second Samoan Church, First Congregational Long Beach Rescue Mission, Beacon of Hope. We've hosted the Winter Shelter. We have hosted location points for people who need shelter rides. And we're extremely welcome to to this conversation. But I also want to make sure that we have an equitable distribution of affordable housing throughout the city, because we know that it's very important that we do. And I hear today that my council colleagues are open to that challenge to ensure that we are extremely equitable in L.A.. I know Councilwoman Nury Martinez brought forward a they set a goal, very ambitious goal for 3300 by 2020, and that every single council could hopefully bring forward 220 and originate 220 affordable units. Now, might sound crazy, but it's just an idea to put out there because we do need to establish a local goal goal, and I think we need to be very aggressive with that. We have also put forward keeping senior covenants and especially covenants that are due to expire places like Plymouth West that we know are very vulnerable seniors in downtown that are scared of what, you know, that the new market is bringing. And we want to make sure that we're keeping that. And I know Patrick Carey has been helpful in making sure that we're moving and checking along in those on that issue. Another point I'll make, just to include perhaps and to think about, I don't think that we've clearly established this when it comes to affordable housing or just individuals experiencing homelessness. I know the other cities are looking at accessory dwelling units and incentivizing property owners for accessory dwelling units and perhaps providing another opportunity for people to to live there. So that's another thing that I will say lastly to the residents that were here. I know they just left for a one with sixth street Oxana into my office has actually been in contact with Jorge eight. Libra you forgot to mention us, but that's okay. We've been working with you. We also have been working on ninth and Pacific as well with housing Long Beach. We worked with them extensively as well. So I don't want to create a message that this office or my office or the city council is not willing to work with individuals. We know we don't have a a policy on tenant protections currently that is like stark that you can see that's tangible. But we are absolutely piece by piece, unfortunately at this time working very directly with residents to ensure that they know what their rights are and offering and working and trying to negotiate with property owners to the best of our ability to make it fair for for both sides. So we're doing what we can in the best way we can, and most importantly, with the best interests of our residents. So thank you all for being here. I love that this has been a comprehensive discussion and we look forward to more discussions on this. Thank you, vice mayor. Thank you, Mayor. You know, first of all, I'd like to thank Councilman Rich for bringing this item forward. But I believe that this is among the biggest challenges facing the city, and we cannot address this problem alone. This is a need for Washington, D.C., Sacramento, to help us create a solution to all of this. I think we need to build new housing that is affordable for our seniors, working people and people with special needs. I think the key to building new housing is how to bridge the financial gap. I think affordable housing development needs to see the path to build new housing. I think we as a city must eliminate that path. And I'm sitting and watching people and listening to you. And I know you were saying when? How soon? And that's. Are you here all night? And when we finish, we just. It was just a conversation. So where do we go from there? We'll be back again. You guys are looking for something. A place for me homeless to live on this day. And we can't do it by just talking. We got to start something and get it done now. Thank you. Thank you. Councilmember Richardson. Thank you. Mr. Mayor is wanted to close it out with a couple comments. So so first thank you to the city council members for for speaking up and reminding everybody all the work that everybody's been doing on this. And and we do want acknowledge that work and it's important. The intention here just to refocus. You know, it doesn't take away from anything anyone else is doing. And we want and we like a lot of those ideas. But, you know, the conversation on revenue has been sort of absent on our side of the council. I know that the community, the Affordable Housing Task Force, has talked about it. A lot of folks have talked about it. But it's time for the city council to really talk about it. And talking about revenue is a conversation with the T word sometimes, and it's difficult for elected officials really have that conversation. So I'm proud that we were able to get through this first conversation about revenue. And I know it's difficult. We all have districts, we all have political leanings, but we have to have that difficult conversation about revenue. The other three pieces that were added in the idea here is we're moving from one place to the next. The hope is we move from one place to the next on the shelter. We you know, we've always dealt with this issue of, you know, leadership. Like, are we going to, you know, have that difficult conversation with our districts about, hey, someone's got to step up and have that conversation. So we're hopefully moving into that place. On the motels, we've had a conversation about the nuisance of them, the amortization of them, but we haven't integrated the the concept of converting them into permanent supportive housing. And hopefully we're moving into that conversation. On the housing choice vouchers, we put forth two different programs around landlord incentives to try to stem the issue of the low lease up. But the reality is our housing choice vouchers are at risk if we don't perform a certain at a certain rate. The federal government, HUD, could take that money away. And the reality is we've tried things and and the lease up numbers have not moved. So this is about progressing that conversation to policy. And so all of these things are not taking anything away from anything anyone has done. We support those things. It's not advancing it to the front of the line. What this is is sort of kicking off and bringing these important elements into the forefront of the conversation. And so that's what we're doing. I want to thank everybody and I encourage city council to vote. Yes, thank you. Thank you. There is a motion and a second, please. Members, cast your vote. Motion carries. Thank you and thank you, everyone, for coming out. We're going to move on to item 11, please.