Recommendation to request City Manager and City Attorney to draft an ordinance to prohibit the assembly, disassembly, sale, offer of sale, distribution, or offer of distribution on public property or public rights-of-way of bicycles and bicycle parts, under certain conditions and with certain exceptions; authorize the Public Works Department to work with the Police Department to remove bicycles and bicycle parts following notice of violations of this prohibition.
Councilman Austin. Motion carries. Thank you. Number 17, please. Communication from Councilwoman Price Councilmember Super nor Councilman Andrews Councilman Austin recommendation to request the city manager and city attorney to draft a bicycle chop shop ordinance. Thank you. Councilman Price. Thank you very much. I want to urge my colleagues to support this item tonight. Bike thefts are a major problem throughout the city. And in looking at the bike theft data from all of the four divisions of our police department, it's clear to me that bike thefts are definitely underreported citywide. That's especially true in my district. One of the things that we have found and let me go through some of those numbers. So in East Division in 2017, we had an average well, we had about six between 6 to 22 bike thefts a month during the calendar year and west, there was about 1 to 3 in north , 1 to 9, but usually it hovered around 1 to 3 and in south between 1 to 10. If you talk to the residents at community meetings, it's clear that bike thefts are much more prevalent, especially along the ocean and our business corridor as well. We encourage bike and pedestrian activity. It's it's really important. I think if we're going to be a city that's promoting bike infrastructure, that we do everything that we can to deter bike thefts, but also to penalize those who might be using stolen bikes as a method of currency by creating bike chop shops. So that's what this item is about. We have found that there's a clear problem throughout our parks, our beaches, our sidewalks and our parking lots with multiple bikes and bike parts strewn about. It wouldn't stop. This particular ordinance would not stop anyone from working on their bikes individually or take doing emergency maintenance in public. But for those who are dismantling and selling multiple bikes in public spaces, this ordinance would make such activity illegal. Applied with similar this. This particular ordinance should be applied with similar logic to the ordinances that we have that don't allow the dismantling of cars in city streets. You can't remove, for example, the transmission of a car that's parked on a street the same. The same should apply with multiple bikes. It's important to note that this particular ordinance would not affect any illegal business operations who conduct programs in public or permit bicycle related events, including swap meets and any established bike repair stands, of which we have several along the coast in the second and third districts. I ask for the support of my colleagues on this item. This is a problem that I think our police department is seeing more and more of when they are out in the community, especially when they are in places where there appear to be abandoned items in the form of encampments there. You always know when you're going to be coming up upon abandoned items because you'll see bike pedals, bike frames, wheels, things of that nature as you walk up to an area that seems to have a lot of abandoned property. So I ask for my colleagues support. Thank you. Thank you, Councilmember Sabrina, thank you. And thank Councilwoman Price for bringing this item forward. I'm happy to sign on to it and support it. And for all those who email us and call us and tell us, you know, we used to have a bicycle licensing program locally. Yeah, we will definitely do that. We will have community events, probably. Councilmember Price and I will do one together. We share a two and a half mile border and that will be the spirit of this is let's get these registration numbers on these bikes logged in and give the police a hand in solving these issues. Thank you, Councilmember Pearce. Thank you. And I want to thank my colleagues for bringing this forward. We've actually been working on a similar item with staff as well. This item. To be clear, does not address increasing the number of registrations, does it, Councilmember? No, not particularly. But I did bring an item about three or four months ago asking for a bike registration program to be reestablished in the city. Great. I have a lot of questions and ideas around the bike registration program, so I think we can work with public works as we have been and PD on ensuring that we we have legal operations, that we are trying to certify them and encourage them to do an increased bike registry. I also wanted to ask let's see 1/2. This item came up fast, which I like. Can somebody from staff describe to us what happens whenever a bike is picked up, whether it's in pieces or it's a stolen bike that we retrieve? I'm not sure if that's PD or Commander Griffin. Thank you. I used to live there and Craig bang on. Okay. I. Signed up. That's what it means. Good evening. Sorry about that. We're trying to clear it up here with Mr. Beck and myself. When we, the police department. Take bikes, we take it into storage, and it's held for 30 days until somebody can. Claim it is basically what what we do for. Storage and. Bike parts would be the same. It'd be. As abandoned. Property. We would take it. For that reason. And so what happens after 30 days? It usually goes out to auction. To auction, yes. It's I guess one of the ideas that came up in my office was, is there a program where we can have these bikes go back into a youth program like L.B. Capp or something like that, were able to get these bikes into youths hands that might be disadvantaged and not have access to a bike . So there is the bikes 90800 program that has had an opportunity to utilize some of the unclaimed bicycles. The program has been gone for at least five years. Yes. So that was a program that was done in the past. Right now, we do work with some of our partners to deliver more newer bicycles. There's a great partnership with local bicycle shops where they deliver bikes to some of our elementary school kids and our middle school kids. It's a fantastic program, but right now we don't have the connection for the collected bikes going through a specific program where you're actually teaching youth how to build bicycles and bicycle safety programs. And then at the end of that, they actually have a bike that they've worked on. Seems like a great program we should try to put together. I know that's a bigger item than this, but I'd like us to just explore what we could possibly do to reconnect that, and we can do that in some staff meetings over the next couple of months. Yeah, I think that that's that's it for now. I think whenever we come back with the bike registry item that we can work together to make that productive. So thank you. Thank you. Councilman Austin. Yes, I. Am firmly in support of this item. I want to thank the councilmember price for for bringing it forward and happy to sign on and support. We witness this type of activity happening all the time. I live next to a park and I see these these actions happening. I can only wonder where these these bicycles are coming from. And I think, you know, by putting some sort of conditions in place, I like the fact that, you know, disassembling and multiple bikes in public is, you know, I think I think that's an obvious, obvious sign that there's something something awry there. And this gives our officers a little bit more to to work with in terms of tools. I am concerned with with obviously, the the Prop 47, because I don't know that that, you know, the bicycle therefore reaches that threshold for for a real crime. And so maybe you want to speak to that as well. Sure. So the individuals who are disassembling the bikes wouldn't actually be charged with bicycle theft if, in fact, it was proven that they stole the bike and the bike's value was $950 or more. It would be a felony. It would fall out of Prop 47. But if the value of the bike is $950 or less and the individual is charged with bike theft, so they're caught in the act of stealing the bike or they've admitted to stealing the bike. Or there is a witness who comes forward and says they stole the bike. So the police have some indicia of criminal activity that it and it's the bike is under 950, then it would be a misdemeanor. This particular ordinance as as it's requested at this time and again, this is going to go to the city attorney's office . They're going to do some research, hopefully on best practices and other cities that have bike chop shops, what which ones would pass constitutional muster, etc., and it will come back to us. The actual request right now is that it be penalized as a wobbled let, which means it could either be an infraction or a misdemeanor. And the whole point of that is not really to punish people per se, because as you've said, we're not looking at a crime that reaches the threshold where this person is going to get any sort of custody time. I mean, even for a misdemeanor, 180 days or less, the L.A. County jail is releasing people on the same day, whether they received one day or 180 days. So we understand that this isn't something that's really looking to penalize. However, if an individual is charged with assembling or disassembling bikes, running a bike shop, chop shop, then the individual will have the opportunity to hopefully go through the process where now we're going to have clinicians in the jail as part of our new efforts with the city, and that person could be linked to services. What I have found with bike. Chop shops, and certainly not everybody who operates a bike chop shop is addicted to drugs. I'm definitely not saying that. But what I have found is in talking to individuals, reading multiple police reports, is that bike parts are stolen or sold as currency for drugs. That's the common most frequent currency for drugs. And so if an individual has a substance abuse problem, then hopefully we're able to get them in the system and root them to services as a term of their probation. So as a term of probation, they would have to do some sort of diversion program or have a stay away order from the place where they were storing the bikes, or see the clinician go to L.A. County Health Services, whatever the case may be, to get the services that they might need. Thank you. And so my my hope and the reason I'm supporting this is I hopefully deter that activity in and to deter thefts in the future. Thank you. Thank you, Councilman. And yes. I want to thank Councilwoman Susan Price, because the fact that I really realized the enforcement of this ordinance could aid and possibly reduction and recover stolen property. And thank you again for this item. But thank you, Councilman Durango. Yeah. I also want to express my support for the sale of my I've been seen as I drive around Long Beach that there's always this assembly of individuals around some bicycle. And I was wondering what was going on. And, you know, every time I pass by there, I see an exchange of bicycles taking place and tubes and wheels and all that kind of stuff, you know. So I was I was somewhat amazed that they were doing that. They were so brazen, actually doing it in parking lots of liquor stores and markets. And so I'm glad to see that this ordinance coming up. I want to commend the councilmembers for putting this forward and I totally support it. Thank you. Thank you. Councilmember Pearce. Yeah, I just had a question for PD. Do we have the numbers or stats on how many of these bike thefts are actually associated with with drug situation ers? Yes, ma'am. We do not have those numbers. The majority. Of the time that we're. Responding to these bikes, they're not reported stolen. So our hands are tied in what we can and cannot do and some of the questions we can or cannot ask. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Any public comment on this item? Larry Goodin. I bring the hammer down this way. First of all, I get Sacramento involved and to anybody guilty of it. We'd have to spend 10000 hours of community service. But the key is getting Sacramento involved. Let them start earning their payroll, their money. And again, I'm very serious. 10000 hours of community service. Thank you. Thank you. Next week, a police. Rather repeat the name of Jesus. Tell my. Thing around. So see me. Yeah. This is a good thing because I got three of them taken in the last year and a half. But I thank you. But I propose you do a set up like those fake cars and everything. They got. Me over on Carson and cherry hours. And I wasn't in it 15 minutes. There's somebody over the L.A. Fitness watching, and they've taken bikes. Left and right. To the point where. People parking their bikes on the inside. So do set ups, put. Them on them, wire things, then. They're going to come for that. But they've even getting lax. It's like they got a minor sore. So you're gonna have to. Do set ups and a lot of them cats. Are doing drugs is apathy was going down. Check the canals it go straight. Downtown that's the whole thing I'm sick of my bikes get mad I got taken. By the motel six by. What's that. A cafe next to it. Yeah. The load of cafe. Was that. Yes. I'm glad. Get out there. Do. This is a good thing. Don't take it waste 954 Grand theft now is not 409. It's not. Fun anymore. Why not? Okay, so anyway. Yeah, this is a good thing, so. I'm not going to drag this out. Why is she still here? Janine Pierce. All right. I got off topic. Okay, well, just keep it on top. Okay, good. Keep me on topic. I like the bike thing, but I like an. American bike system, not a communist bike system. Okay, no communist bike system. This is real good. And Jeanine still got to go. Thank you. Thank you. Make speaker, please. Hi. Curtis Kaiser. I'm a resident in support of Councilwoman Price's proposal. I've gotten a bunch of bikes stolen. I think the city has done a. Great job of starting to build out an infrastructure so that bicyclists feel comfortable, excited to go around the city. But it's disheartening when you see all the chop shops going around. So I think this is a real step in the right direction. I appreciate it. I would recommend or request that we have a lower number than five. We I sometimes see five or more, but I more frequently see two or three. And so if there's any way for us to have an ordinance that penalizes. People who are doing two or three instead. Of five, I would appreciate that if. You're a broken down and your friend's broken down and you're legitimately fixing your bike or one or two, you should do the trick. And I thank you very much for doing this. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Seven words, and so did Democratic Socialists of America, Long Beach. As a criminal defense attorney, it goes against everything that I believe in, to support the addition of a criminal an additional criminal offense into our municipal code. However, after reviewing the proposal from Councilman Price, it is obvious that this misdemeanor offense or wobbler, it strikes the right balance between the rights of the homeless of homeless residents within Long Beach and the interest of other residents. I urge everyone to take notice of the care and concern the Councilwoman Price has taken into crafting this ordinance, ensuring that there is no way to make sure that this new law could be challenged on the basis of having an illegal, discriminatory effect or impact. However, the precision of this ordinance only highlights the existing sections of our municipal code that would not stand up to judicial scrutiny if they were to be challenged in the courtroom, in the courts. As I first told then Vice Mayor Garcia in 2014, Long Beach was for code sections. Chapter 10.18, Subsection 040 Living in prohibited women in vehicles prohibited Section 9.4 to subsection 110 capping and in certain prohibited areas. And Chapter ten, subsection 30.090. Special Regulations Against Camping Overnight. All these laws were designed and enforced in a manner that leaves our city vulnerable to a potentially crippling civil suit by homeless advocates. Our police department and city prosecutor's offices are also ill equipped to handle these sorts of cases on their own. By their own admission, their sole tools for assisting homeless people that they come into contact with, involving administering citations for infractions or misdemeanors. To actually solve the problems of chronic systemic poverty, we need to radically restructure the entire society by written by rebuilding a shredded social safety net and obliterated workers rights movement. But for the purposes of triaging the problems of the homeless homeless people here in this particular city, we need to provide direct financial assistance to these individuals in the form of increased general relief from the county and indirect aid from the Health Department and county social services. Social and social worker agencies. Prop 87, for example, was a wonderful law that removed the social stigma of felonies from thousands of people enabling, enabling them to reenter society and contribute positively to their communities. It is time of the Council continue this trend away from criminalizing people at the bottom of society by directing the city attorney to remove the aforementioned sections of the medical code and to direct the city manager to provide an assessment of all available funds to see what money can be redirected to the Health Department so they can take the appropriate role at the head of a comprehensive anti-poverty program here in the city of Long Beach. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hi. My name is Nick Russo. I'm here representing my employer pedal movement, which is local bike services facility. We operate the bike station downtown Long Beach, as well as the interim operations of the bike share system. And we just wanted to voice our support as pedal movement in support of this measure. I think like other speakers before me have noted, it's obviously a huge problem and we see that every day as clients come in, you know, remarking on their stolen bikes, which, you know, as much as we appreciate the business, it's a really unfortunate situation to encounter. We share many of the concerns that homeless advocates or other advocates of low income communities may have with ordinances like this. But I believe the care that's been put into crafting the proposal does mitigate that issue. We would also just like to recommend a certain language in the proposal that states something more specific other than just bike repair stands. We are in the process of rolling out a program for basically mobile bike facilities throughout the city. And while we are a valid business licensed in the city of Long Beach, we just feel that because these facilities will be taking place often in parks and other public spaces, that it may potentially negatively affect our business. That being said, because of the considerations built into it already, we're not concerned about that. And I personally would just like to voice my support of this because before I was a resident of Long Beach, I was here visiting and bought a bike and had it stolen during my trip. So luckily it was at the end of my trip and I was able to use bike share along the beach. Thank you. Next week, please be here. Good evening. My name's Maureen Bailey, and I'm representing the Belmont Heights Community Association, and we just like to share our support of this proposed ordinance. In our view, it takes a reasonable method, another tool in the toolbox to allow our public safety folks to kind of make it uncomfortable for this type of commerce to take place. And the fewer places that the commerce can take place, hopefully the fewer times that bicycles will be stolen and chopped up and then resold. So we've got to chip away at the problem if we do want to be a bike capital. And I think we're well on our way. Our district has two bike boulevards. They're well-used and we'd like to see more people on their bikes, of course. And we really appreciate our councilwoman taking the lead on this. She listened and we appreciate that the the the ordinance. So thank you very much. Thank you, Councilman Austin. Thank you and I appreciate the public comment. I guess my question is to the author or Councilmember Price when one of the speakers mentioned how we got to five or more. Can you can you explain that? And and would you be amendable to this? Absolutely. And I appreciated that comment as well. And I have a note here. The reason we chose five, really, it's an arbitrary number. We researched other similar statutes. And I know that our city attorney is always very prudent in his administration of the laws. And I wanted to make sure that we put us in a position where we weren't exposing ourselves to potential liability. So one of the things I was going to ask as part of this motion is if we can look at reducing that number to two or three, because that's an excellent point. You know, if you're helping your friend with their bike, you've got to. Anything beyond two. We've got an issue here, at least enough PC for the police officers to ask why these people have more than 2 to 3 bikes. So I think that's great. Yeah. Thank you. I think that's great as well. Thank you. Councilman Price. Thank you. And the final thing I was going to add, I was going to make the comment about the number of bikes and also for the city attorney, if it's possible for us to think about wording, that's a little bit broader in terms of the type of apparatus that would be available for individuals to work on their bikes to include the types of stations that we talked about. So if we could have something that was more broadly classified as bike repair, facility, stand or station as opposed to just a bike repair stand or station, and that would encompass a more structured bike infrastructure that's designed to allow people to to pull up and have their bikes worked on. So obviously, we want to make sure that we're not going after pedal movement for infraction violation or any other facility or organization that's similar to them. But I want to thank the residents of the city, especially the third district, who came out tonight. I do hear a lot from you about this issue. This is something we've been working on for a long time. And I want to thank our public works department and our police department because they helped shape the language of this particular proposal. So thank you. Thank you, members. Please cast your vote. Motion carries. Thank you. We're going to go ahead and take public comment right now. So we have five speakers so can reside. Larry GOODHEW, Lee, Richmond, Charlie, Jim Oberst and Somer Hanson. So can you up in Larry and Lee, if you could, you know, be prepared to come next.