Recommendation to receive and file a presentation providing an update on the City’s efforts to encourage the production of affordable housing.  (Citywide)
Motion carries. Thank you. Next item next issue is item 24, which is the we're going to 24 and then 33. Item 24 is next. Please report from Development. Services Recommendation Receive and file a presentation providing an update on the city's efforts to encourage the production of affordable housing citywide. Turn this over to staff. Our interim director of development services, Tom Morgan. Point of order, Mayor. We just got. I made them up. I made up a motion, but I didn't get to say it. We just got this today. And then we were dealing with the item 22. And I really haven't had a chance to review this given the issues that we did last week with the QE and given that a lot of our audience is gone and probably gone from the TV as well. I think that we should give this a more focused attention, and I think we could do that in the next 30 days. Sure. If that's if that's your motion, there can certainly be the motion on the floor. Is that your motion? Councilmember? Yes. Okay. Vice Mayor Richardson, is that were you seconding that motion of Councilmember Pierce or actually Vice-Chair? Do you want to speak to that motion? Okay. Councilmember Pierce. Nope. Okay. So this is a motion to to bring the issue back. And what did you do a time certain council member? I think I said 30 days. Okay. Is there any public comment on moving this item? Yes. Please come forward and and please. The public comment has to be germane to moving the item not not the item itself. Okay. If it. Hi there. For those who don't know me, my name started when I was good being out here tonight. I just wanted. To say that. Especially given next week's agenda, which regards a lot of questions regarding the Long Beach rent control ordinance, it might be important to prioritize talking about this. I also do understand, though, if there is a review process, but there are a few people who wanted to speak on this item tonight. So that's all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hello. My name is Mirta Lopez. I'm a community organizer with Housing Long Beach. And I just want to allow some residents to speak because they've been waiting here for a long, long time. And I believe, you know, they're seniors and they're disabled. And it would be unfair for not allow them to speak today. So I want to make sure that you give me 1/2. So I just want to make sure that the motion on the floor is to move the item. It's not to hear the item. And so just prior rules. Councilmember public speakers can speak only to moving the item, not on the item itself. You're sticking to your motion, correct? Correct. I'm sticking to the motion to revisit this that 30 days. However, if they have. So what you say today. I have no issue with that. Okay. I'm I'm okay with that as well. Chair. It's okay. Unless there's any objection, we're going to allow the people that spoke. Okay. All right, cut. Certainly, I somewhat touch on one of the cases because they had to leave. His wife had a fever. They're seniors. The guy is 81 years old. He's been living in his unit for the last 30 years and new property management has bought up the building. It's on 10th and Pacific and they're being put out. Right. They have to move by March 31st, but they have nowhere to go and nothing is being done to assist them. Sorry, he couldn't be here to speak. He had to leave. I don't know if you saw. I know you were all busy, but I had to escort them out because his wife had a fever. And it's really unfair that these people who have been long time Long Beach residents are being put out so unfairly and nothing is being done to protect them. And I'm tired of getting all these phone calls of entire buildings being put out with 60 day notices, and there's nothing to protect them. And when they ask, what is city council doing, there's not much I can't say. And that's the story of Victor Chacon at 939 Pacific Avenue and I'm that somebody else speak. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Sorry Mayor Garcia and counsel. Let me let me actually mama have you first if you can come to that so we can just I want to show that what we can hear you for the record on the mike. Thank you. I I'm sorry. Mayor Garcia and counsel. I had a stroke two years ago. I stay at 939 Pacific. I've been there 19 years. They gave us a 16 hours and they told us we got to leave. We have nowhere to go and withhold our money to make up. And I don't want to be homeless. Excuse me. My daughter will speak better than I can. Hello. Council and mayor. My name is Jennifer Chadwick. I also live by 939 Pacific Avenue. Recently, my mom and I have got a 60 day notice. Our management company has bought our building and is forcing us all out. My mom is disabled and on a fixed income and I have done a lot for the community, including volunteering at the Aquarium of the Pacific, doing beach cleanups and a lot of other things. For years I've supported Long Beach, but right now I'm really hoping that the City of Long Beach can support me as well. I would like to ask the council and mayor to help support and protect the renters on beach. Thank you. Very much. Our next speaker, please. Good evening, council and mayor. My name's John Russo. I'm also speaking of the terms of rent control. We need rent control in Long Beach. Apparently, it's been looked over for many years. Different cities have rent control. Los Angeles has rent control. And I do believe Los Angeles is L.A. County, which I do believe Long Beach is L.A. County. Now, I don't understand that. But anyway, I've lived at this apartment complex for three years. The first year, I wasn't even there a whole year. They wanted to raise my rent. I send them a letter saying, Hey, have you been here a year? You want to raise my rent? Second year they raise my rent 700 and some dollars a year. Okay. This year went up to $100 and it wasn't even 60 day notice. It was a 30 day notice. I called fair housing and they just like, oh, well, they can do whatever they want, whenever they want, how much they ever want. And there's nothing. In other words, we have no rights as renters, which, like I say, matter. That's not fair. I mean, from what you know, there's got to be something done. You know, we're trying to get maybe a rent freeze or something and to to compensate us. But, you know, $100 a month is like 14%, you know, and and it's it's insane. And the building I live in is built in 1946. And a lot of things have been going wrong. And a lot of people are are afraid to ask to get things fixed because boom, they can buda sound at any time. That's a notice thing. They can throw anybody out at any time, whenever they want without any given notice. I mean, you could pay your rent on time for 20 years and next thing you know, we're booting you out because we want to we want to raise the rent. We want to re rent your place and we want to raise it. For. Sure. Councilwoman, did you want to speak after the speakers or. I know you're kidding. After the speakers are now. Addressed, I think the mother and up there they are upstairs. And I know Rajan in my office has been in contact with you and I know it's beachfront property management is your. So we're in the process of connecting with them. So I just want to let you know and Corey and my office will be out here to just make sure and we solidify that we're following up. Okay. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you. And did you want to speak now? Councilmember Councilmember Pearce and I also wanted to ask you guys to reach out to Long Beach Cop. We just created a new fund with them on assisting people transitioning. And so it's another. Good resource that you might not know is available yet because we haven't publicized it. But thank you, Councilmember. And next week, please, Josh Butler, executive director for Housing Long Beach. I'm also a resident of the third district. And with regards to whether or not this item should be delayed further, I can't say that it's any surprise given the lack of urgency that affordable housing has received in this city. We have I was part of a study group to prepare recommendations to bring them forward. It's been almost a year since we put those recommendations forward. We are hoping to hear tonight about the progress that we have made in those areas. The sense of urgency is missing from this body. The people that are here are smaller numbers compared to the people that are coming to see us for housing. Long Beach, whose entire buildings are being sold, they're being thrown out with nothing. The owners of the building are making money. The people who are purchasing the building are going to make money. But these residents, they hurt and they lose. And so delaying this for them delays a conversation about how we get to solving some of their problems. So we would like to have that conversation sooner than later. It's very disappointing to read in the initial report that did come out this afternoon that inclusionary housing looks like it's that we're still a year away from seeing that even come to the light of day. That would be about almost two years from the time that the recommendations were made to this body. It'll be almost three years from the time that we initially had the conversation about inclusionary housing in this city. Meanwhile, 5000 units of housing have been built in the downtown area. Only 3% of those units are affordable. And of those 3%, 97% of them are spoken for, for seniors, veterans. And then the rest are set at 80%. Am I? So there's literally no affordable housing being built in the downtown area? Yeah. We're going to wait longer to have this conversation. It really we can wait because there isn't a whole lot to say. We're still not meeting the mark. We're still not getting there. And I am glad that next week we will be having a conversation about the rent control ordinance. It seems like that's the only way to get anybody's attention around here on this issue, is that people got to do it themselves because we're getting no support here. We don't want funding is great for people to get dollars to help them pay for an application fee or for a rental deposit. But we would prefer them to not have to move in the first place. There's nowhere for them to go right now. That's the problem. I know it's late to you all here. This is a wait to me because I was here just as late at Housing Long Beach last night with an office full of people who are being kicked out of their units. We're hoping to come here tonight to get some answers, only to be told that we have to come back for that. And so I guess we will be back. But I guess the first priority will be to have a conversation that's being brought up by districts three, four and five. The east side of the city, which is the homeowner dominant part of the city, is going to have a conversation next week and start to dictate to the rest of the city, to the 60% of the people that rant about what we should and shouldn't have, what policies we should and shouldn't have, and what are going to affect us and not affect us. So I think the priorities here are just getting a little bit out of whack and we'd like to figure out how we can bring them back into the mainframe. Thank you, Mr. Butler. Thank you, Mayor. Before I do the next speaker, make the maker of the motion wants to speak. I think, given the fact that there are people here who are interested in this item, I figured that we wanted to have a more robust conversation on this. But certainly, if they're ready to move forward, I would withdraw my motion. Okay. Okay. So so we want to have now we're going to have the presentation. Okay. So what we're going to do is we're going to go back to public comment in a minute. We're going to but we're first going to we're going to do the presentation and then you'll be the first one for public comment if there's no objection. Okay. So we are going to do we will do the presentation counts. From your accounts. We recognize requests. There's an emotion. There's emotion. Second, I believe, to receive it far this presentation. So why don't we start and please staff do the full presentation. Okay. And Mr. West or Mr. McEwan. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Members of the Council. I'll be turn this over to staff to go through the the PowerPoint presentation. But where we all started with this was back in May 2nd, 2017. This Council received and filed a very extensive report on revenue tools and incentives for the production of affordable housing and really adopted a very robust workplan for staff to follow on affordable housing. So there were 29 different recommendations that are really designed to encourage and increase the production of affordable housing. We prevent provided a number of written updates on those recommendations. Throughout the last several months, we've made great progress on some. Some were still going on and some were still working on. And this is in response to a request on January 16th to give us a formal progress report. And so with that, I'll turn it over to Patrick Geary, our housing officer or housing bureau manager, to go through the report. Thank you, Tom. We seem to be missing our clicker. I don't know if it's around here somewhere. Thank you. Just as a reminder, the 29 policies that were adopted in May are broken down into three categories policies to implement immediately existing initiatives and process and new initiatives for development and implementation. So I'm just going to run through them in order. Excuse me. Starting with 1.1, which is to encourage housing preservation. This is ongoing. Since 2014, 1376 at risk units have been preserved in fiscal year 17. We worked on Beechwood Apartments, which you can see here on the slide, a photo of the existing building on the left and a rendering of the new building on the right. This is currently under construction. And then we just are wrapping up the preservation of Sara's apartments, which is 29 units at 240 West Seventh Street. Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of that project, but that one is also underway. And then one point, too, is to encourage the use of project based vouchers. This is also ongoing and we've been partnering with the Housing Authority quite a bit lately with the beacon that's currently under construction. There's 160 units in the project and 158 project based vouchers. And then with the spark at Midtown, that's 95 units with 40 project based vouchers. We're hoping if we get all the financing for this project, we'll start construction by the end of the year. And with Last Fontana's Apartments, this is at the corner of Long Beach and PCH, we're very excited about this project. 101 units with 40 project based vouchers. This will also begin construction at the end of the year and then again spares apartments that was also preserved with 29 project based vouchers. 1.3 is to continue to waive developer impact fees for affordable housing. This is also ongoing and recent fee waivers include Emmanuel Place, Anchor Place, The Beacon, The Spark at Midtown Las Fontana's Apartments and Vista del Puerto. Here, the total value of these vouchers. I'm sorry. These waivers is over $3 million, resulting in the funding for 552 units. 1.4 is to promote the city's density bonus program. This is also ongoing. The program is regularly promoted by two housing developers, by both planning and economic development staff, housing staff as well. I think a lot of the recent affordable projects have taken advantage of the density bonus program. 1.5 is to continue to partner with developers in the pursuit of housing funding, and this is also ongoing. And in fiscal year 17, staff assisted with funding applications for the beacon in the amount of $70.4 million. And we're currently working on funding applications for Last Fontana's Apartments, The Spark at Midtown Vista, still Porto. And in total these projects will include $174.2 million in leveraged funds and $19.5 million in city funds. Policy 1.6 is to explore the development of student and workforce housing. This is also something that the economic development staff and housing staff discuss when they meet with developers. When we meet with developers, which is pretty regular. And then there is an exciting new project that the Planning Commission just approved on the Broadway block that includes 400 units, 14 of which are affordable, which was a voluntary A for affordable allocation. And then that that project includes housing for students and faculty, of course, who will be. 1.8 is to support sector reform. This is also ongoing during this one. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I missed 1.7 track federal and state housing legislation. This is ongoing through the city manager's office. In fiscal year 17, the city supported funding for CDBG at home programs SB two, which is the Building Homes and Job Act that will give direct funding to the city for affordable housing. And then SB three, which is the Veterans and Affordable Housing Bond Act. That's a $4 billion general obligation bond that will be on the ballot in November. 1.8. Support seeker reform. This is coordinated through the city manager's office and there are currently eight bills in the at the state level that are under review. And 1.9 is to create and maintain a database of publicly held land that maybe may provide housing for housing opportunities, excuse me. And economic development is preparing a comprehensive list of potential development opportunity sites throughout the city, including government owned sites and privately held sites. The city also notifies market rate developers of housing, operating or affordable housing developers of opportunities when they dispose of city owned land. Here is our next section 2.1. Accessory Dwelling Unit Ordinance. This has been completed adopted by the Planning Commission on July six, 2017 and the City Council on December 19, 2017. 2.2 implement state requirements for reduced parking for affordable housing. At the time that this was put in here, it was AB 744 was the bill that imposed new parking restrictions. And although the city has not codified that state bill, the city is implementing that bill and all of our recent developments have been able to take advantage of that. So. 2.3 contact financial analysis and next to study the coastal zone. And Lucy. This, I admit, has been going on for a long time. But we do have a financial analysis from our consultant. We have met with community groups. We will be proposing some significant, I think, increases to the in lieu fees for the coastal zone program. We are working with the city attorney's office currently on preparing an ordinance or a changes to our existing ordinance, and we're hoping to have that back to the council in September. And the same goes for the condominium conversion ordinance 2.4. Again, we met with the advocate groups and hope to have that back in September. 3.1 explore a local bond measure as a one time source to capitalize the housing trust fund. So we did some analysis on this. We sent a memorandum up to the Mayor and Council on September 25th, 2017. Our analysis indicated that to develop a thousand units of affordable housing, we would need about $126 million in subsidy. And so should the should the council council wish to proceed with a bond measure, city staff would conduct further analysis to refine those numbers. 3.2 began the development of an inclusionary housing policy. And so the good news to hear is that AB 1505 was adopted in 2017 and this clears the way to allow for inclusionary and rental projects, whereas previously it was only allowed in for sale projects. We released an RFP in October. We actually had interviews with consultants just a few weeks ago and we're wrapping that up and hopefully we'll have a contract in place by the end of the month. And that will take about a year. A large chunk of that is community outreach. But there's analysis that has to be done and and some modeling and things like that. But the community is ready for it. We know where to find you. And then 3.3, investigate the possibility of establishing establishing a local document recording fee to fund affordable housing. This is ongoing. You know, as I mentioned earlier, this, the legislature adopted SB two in 2017. We're still trying to understand what that means. That could bring anywhere from 2 to $300, $300,000 in funding. And as we understand it, some of that money will be allocated directly to cities. And we're hoping and we believe that Long Beach will be one of those cities. So that will be a tool for us to help fund affordable housing. 3.4 Investigate the possibility of dedicating city resources for affordable housing. We do this annually during our budget process and in fiscal year 18 we asked for funding, but there were no general fund dollars available for this purpose. I, I will say, though, that funds deposited into our housing fund from successor agency loan repayments for this year are about $5 million. And then, of course, our federal home funds are about $2.1 million and the housing authority is $75.6 million. Policy 3.6 modify the. The moderate income definition to include up to 150% i. This is pending. This is not something that we have made a decision on. This is something we will consider in conjunction with any new source of funding. And during the inclusionary housing study in mid-May or may not be a good idea. 3.7 Encourage the adoption of specific plans to encourage a more rapid entitlement process. This is ongoing, and I'm sure we all remember that the general plan, land use element, urban design element, place type and height maps were approved by the City Council last week. The Southeast Area Specific plan was adopted by the Council in September of 2017 and the mid-term plan was adopted in 2016. And we're already seeing several new projects in the Midtown Plan area. 3.8 Consider expanding one for one replacement in areas outside the coastal zone. This is pending and this will follow after we are done updating the coastal zone in Lee and Lucy program. 3.9 develop and offer first time homebuyer programs. This is also in process. We have begun some research here on the cost to offer homebuyer programs. We're also researching we're partnering with our economic development staff, and we're researching lending practices and partnerships and homebuyer education programs. 3.10. Encourage the adoption of regulations to allow and incentivize shipping container construction for housing. This is ongoing. We sent a memo up to the Mayor and council on August 2nd, 2017 on this that provides a little bit more information with the memo outlining the suitability, advantages and requirements associated with the use of shipping containers as housing units. Currently, staff is working with local and regional groups to establish development standards that currently do not exist. Okay, let's get to the presentation with the public comment on. 33.2 study short term rental regulations. And this is in process. We have a consultant on board and we're expecting to take about six months to complete this with a proposal to the Council in the fall of 2018. 3.13 ensure that sufficient resources are available to implement the city's proactive rental housing inspection program. This is also ongoing, and for fiscal year 18, fees for existing services were increased by 2.23%, resulting in a $5 increase to each of the three tiers of fees for the program. No new fees or services were included in the fiscal year 18 budget. 3.14 explore the feasibility of using new structures such as enhanced infrastructure financing districts. This is pending as is 3.15 Explore Article 34 Referendum 3.16. Provide the necessary city staffing resources to manage increased housing production contemplated by these policies. And this will be done as part of our annual budget process and in conjunction with any new funding that we receive as part of these policies. So conclusions and next steps. We expect the following accomplishments for 2018 additional housing preservation, additional project based vouchers continue and begin construction on 403 new units. Develop a citywide inclusionary housing policy. Develop a short term, short term rental regulations. Complete an update to the coastal zone and legal fee program and the condominium conversion ordinance. And then there are some additional initiatives that the Council requested on January 16th and February six relating to tenant protection programs and homeowner assistance programs. And so we are beginning to research those items as well. And that concludes my presentation. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Let me go back to start with the maker of the motion. I know you didn't speak to this motion. Did you have any comments? Customary, Ringo, by summary. Richardson. I think I'll just say. You know, it is late and folks have been waiting on this for a long time. When do we. I need clarity on this. Some of this stuff is like red meat stuff like the inclusionary housing policy and things like that. What does that timeline actually look like for the inclusionary housing recommendation? Vice Mayor The inclusionary housing policy will begin right away. Once we have a consultant on board, which is going to be at the end of March, it's going to be about a year to get from that point to when we get back to the council. Okay. I support yeah, I support that. I think it was more politically challenging to do five years ago, but it's pretty standard now and a year from now, you know, it takes a lot of time to develop. So the sooner we can sort of expedite that process, the better. And and I saw you mentioned some of the work we talked about with some of the barriers to homeownership. You know, the barriers becoming more difficult. So have we sort of begun the conversations with, you know, some of the folks who spoke and talked about the resources for down payment assistance? Have we done those conversations yet? We had a meeting scheduled with HSBC Bank last week, but that got postponed until I believe it's tomorrow or Thursday. Okay. But we economic development staff and housing staff have met and we have started talking about this. We also have a consultant working on some cost for subsidy programs, which is just one component. And that really comes out of these 29 policies. But the the research that's related to the March or February six request has been started, but we do still have some work to do. All right. That's fine. And then the last thing is, you know, I know there's a lot of conversation about rent control. You know, I'm not you know, I'm not necessarily there yet. But I think there's a lot of questions and a lot of statements. I, I got the floor listen to use my time. I think the renter protection piece, though, you know, we've heard enough to see that we have to we need to be doing more on the rent protection stuff, particularly when people are you know, I mean, look, we have we have to take it more seriously. We need to have the tough conversations about renter protections. And so my question is, what's the timeline? Look, I know that there was a motion, but what's the timeline to actually get the ball rolling on that? We are conducting research right now and we are planning on we have actually started working on what we think our schedule will be, but we do not have a date certain yet. But we are planning to have a memo up to the mayor and council within the next couple of weeks that will provide a timeline for that . A couple of weeks we will know more. Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. I'm just going to just jump in because I just want to follow up. The vice mayor said, I just wanna go back first. There's three things I want to bring up. First of all, on the inclusionary, I think the report's great, but to me the three things that stand out is one is the inclusionary zoning ordinance. So I'm trying to understand why it would take a year. No question. Can we please. Expert? Let me jump in a little bit on kind of the process and how this how we came to be where we're at. So when we got direction from the Mayor and council in May, that was really the kind of first policy direction of go forward and do this inclusionary housing. We went to the budget immediately, got money to put that in the budget and you adopted that in in October. And immediately in October we put it out on RFP. So this is going to be a big planning effort. This is a lot of technical capability that we're going to need and also to keep all the development projects going. We have a lot of affordable housing projects going, we have a lot of other projects going through needed additional resources. We've done the RFP, we're bringing on the consultant, and then there are a number of steps in and Patrick can go through these. Public outreach is going to be important. That's probably going to be at least several months long. We need to do the research of what other cities do, come up with their recommendations, go to planning commission and then come back to council. So there's going to be steps you see along the way. The year is really from start to the very finish to where you're actually putting something into place, but there's going to be a lot of work you're going to see in 2018. Okay. I would just I mean, I appreciate that. I would just challenge us that it just seems like we could just do this faster than a year. And I think this part this this piece of the policy, there's to me just some general consensus that we there's support. I think that this is how we get more housing affordability immediately. And so. Can we cut that down? And listen, I don't I don't want to I don't want to skimp on public outreach or going through the planning process. But I would just just if we can just please at least look towards a way to get this back in front of the council sooner that I think I think most people would appreciate that. Sure. We'll take a look at doing whatever we can. We do want to reserve some time for the public outreach, but if that's something that we need to shrink a little bit on, if we need to look, if we can go faster as well with the policy recommendations and not do as broad of a study, we can look at areas to tighten that. I just want to make sure that we ask whoever the consultant is that's going to that we're bringing on and we challenge the consultant to do this in a shorter time period. I think that would be and and if we're going to shorten it, let's not shorten the public input part, but if we can just shorten some of that, that would be we'll. Go we'll go as fast as we can. The second thing is, the other one I think that makes a immediate impact is the short term rentals. I think this is a that I'm not also sure why this one is taking as long as it is. Can you please explain that to us? Yes. So short term rentals was the same. We were given direction to move forward. We got that immediately in the budget. We did an RFP process. We are selecting. We have selected one that falls under the City Managers Authority. So we don't we're not having to come back to council for that one. We have them on board right now. They're starting their public outreach in March and we expect to be back in the fall on that. Actually, even though it's six months is very aggressive. The city of L.A., by the way, is that year, two and a half of trying to do short term rentals, and there aren't any closer to actually getting it done. So a lot of cities that we've seen, this has been a 2 to 3 year process to get short term rentals and we're looking to get it done in six months. So we're going to be doing a number of community outreach. We really believe it's important to get out and talk to the community on short term rentals. There's a lot of different opinions. We'll be interviewing stakeholders who are doing community meetings and then doing the research and bringing that back both planning, commission and council, hopefully by fall. And you think and you think this will get to planning commission in the summer? If I remember the schedule, right, it. Was probably August around that time, the Planning Commission and September or so for council. I think and again, I know that there's a an important planning process to go through on this. And so I'm not trying to in any way cause any issues there. But again, I think this is another issue that could bring immediate benefit relief. I think there's a lot of interest in the city in getting a short term rental policy in place. I think that there are some communities that have implemented them. I know that L.A. has been a very different sort of situation, but you're saying that community input or give the community process starting this month? Yes. So we're going to be actually next week interviewing all the council members first and getting kind of your sense of who are the stakeholders you're hearing from. We're going to be doing specific stakeholder interviews so that we get a sense of all the different aspects of people who want to be involved. And then we're going to be doing at least three different community meetings throughout the city along the process to get input, share data, share the data that we've received, talk about some of the recommendations, and then staff will come forward with a proposed recommendation. Okay. And the last thing, I think the vice touched on it as well. I think, you know, the sooner that we can get staff's initial first pass on the studies and the look at the tenant protections that the council passed, I think a big part of that was the kind of national review of what other cities are doing comparable to Long Beach. And I think that the sooner that comes back to the council, particularly the data on what other cities are doing, I think is important for the council to make some decisions there. So, yes, we understand that that is important. We do have a small but mighty housing staff. Most of them are behind me right now. So we will be looking at that one and we don't have a budget for that, but we actually are putting a lot of effort into learning this kind of newer field for us. So we will be bringing those forward again. A couple of weeks will give you an update of what we've accomplished and what else we still have left to do. Okay. Thank you very much, Councilmember Pierson. Thank you staff for sharing with us the two from four memos and giving us a digestible breakdown of that. And I do I want to echo my colleague's sentiment and even echoed the sentiment of those in the audience. It is frustrating because we are a big city with a big vision and we're tackling a lot and so feeling like this is going a little slow. I completely feel the same way and I want to thank staff. I know that you guys just went through the land use element and that we are short staffed with Tom sitting in as director right now. So recognizing those challenges, I know that this is a received file. A couple of things that I want to highlight is with for the inclusionary policy. Look at making sure that we are having the consultants look at both rental and owners to include the highest percentage that we think that we can get to. Also identifying that community process and realizing that it's not as debatable or as intense as STR. So hopefully we can figure out a community engagement process that gets us back to this group sooner. And also wanting to follow up on where we are with the Mello Act. I didn't necessarily see a timeline for that. Did I miss that? Councilmember. Are you referring to the coastal zone and. Yes. Yes. We should be back in September on that one. Okay. And I know last week I spoke a lot about no net loss. And it says in here that we'll look at no net loss after we look at that. Is there a way for us to report back on no net loss at that same time? When you're I'm sorry. When you refer to no net loss you're referring. All on I'll find your your phrases for this is what happens when you've been doing work in the housing community and then you have to learn new words. Council member. Expanding one for one replacement. Correct. I think you're referring to there's a 1.8 replacement requirement in the coastal zone. And at last week's council meeting, you asked for the status of one for one replacement outside of the coastal zone. So that is not on our work program. But based on your comment last week, we're finding a way to put that on the work program. Additionally, there are some changes in state law that took effect January 1st of this year that require us to implement no net loss outside of the coastal zone. So we have a number of report backs that were requested last week. We're working with the city manager to work through all of those. So we can't give you that answer tonight. But you will be receiving a TFF type document about all of the report backs from last week's meeting, and it will give you a clear timeline for that item. Okay. Just to be clear, it's 3.8 on the presentation you guys just gave. So it does say that 3.8 consider expanding one for one replacement, the area outside of the coastal zone. This item will follow up after 2.3. So I just wanted to make sure that we're on a on a track to where we don't have to wait another year after. I understood and it was on. A longer track and based on your. Comments last week, we're looking at what we can do to move it up. Thank you so very much. One other thing that you know, in the conversation around rental protections, it's not in this presentation. I brought it up in one of my briefings today. One of the concerns I have and I'm going to bring it up publicly today and then follow up with staff on how we move forward on it . But one of the challenges that I'm having is that we are having homes or apartments that have illegal conversions that might have been done ten years ago or 20 years ago. And for whatever reason, it seems like we're seeing an increase of people being evicted because they have to go in and the landlord needs to make changes or revert back to the original intent. And one of those cases is even the the women's shelter has a home in my district. And so they've had to remove a whole apartment based on an illegal conversion that was done years ago. So in the future, when we bring up renter issues, I want us to talk about how we're dealing with illegal conversions and what that what those numbers are and if there's any benefit that we as a city can help landlords get to code without removing tenants so that we are in fact protecting existing housing and not losing that in the middle of our time, in the middle of our crunch. So I appreciate the efforts and I expect to in the next month or so, have a deeper conversation around our housing stock. So thank you. Thank you. Councilmember Councilwoman Gonzales. Yes. And I just want to solidify I have to say it on the dais as well, my support and urge for us to just get up and running and started as soon as possible with the inclusionary housing rental protections, of course, shipping, container construction. And I know that will be going through the process and talking to each council member, but I really hope we emphasize on directly working with the impacted neighborhoods. As we know, lots of people, especially in my district, are getting evicted. They are getting sort of thrown out of their their space. And so we want to make sure that we're doing this as soon as possible for for that reason. And then I know we're in this transition. So I just hope that and I don't know what the the timeline is for our new development just development services director , but I hope that whoever that might be is going to be up to date and up to speed with all of this. And that includes an equitable distribution of affordable housing throughout the city. And so I just have to put it out there, but I thank you very much for the work and I look forward to engaging in those stakeholder meetings. Thank you. Councilwoman Pryce. I want to thank staff for the report as well. I do want to make a correction because I think when we've talked about the short term rental options, we've been a little bit dismissive. Not just that, not just development services, but we had a report from Financial Services a few weeks ago that had short term rentals in there as a possible run of revenue gap and filler. And that's a concern to me because I have many communities in my district that are adamantly opposed to us allowing short term rentals, which are illegal right now. And so it's important for me to be able to advocate for that community and to that community that that outreach has not even started, that they will be involved in that outreach, that, you know, there's a lot of data out there about whether short term rentals actually limit affordable housing because they're taking away spaces that can be used for long term rentals. But again, these are all discussions that I'm hoping that we can have. But I think to to talk about short term rentals as if it's it's something that's definitely happening would be ill advised because that's certainly not the intent of everyone on council. And so I do think staff I love to see that so many of these policies are implemented. There's a great deal of work to be done. I'm happy to have been part of the creation of a lot more housing in the Ccep area, although I don't know to what extent that's going to qualify in terms of affordable housing, but it is providing some additional housing stock and it has yet to be determined what the price points will be. But I think in regards to our work, there's a lot more work to be done. And again, for my residents who may be watching at home, we have not approved short term rentals. We've not set a policy on short term rentals. We are not relying on short term rentals as any sort of solution for the city of Long Beach. That conversation is just getting started this month. So thank you. And I'd like to confirm that also 3.12, which is the policy that the council asked us to move forward with, was to study short term rentals. So we haven't made any conclusions about what that program will look like. That's why we're bringing on the extra help and some great analysis of what has worked in other cities. And then we'll be doing the public outreach and coming back to you with some recommendations. Thank you, Councilwoman. Since we're on the short term rentals discussion, can you clarify for me? Because it was my impression that even though Los Angeles has no official short term rental policy and they've been working on it for a few years, that they are charging it to vote on on units. And that and I mean, they're receiving tens of millions of dollars without a policy. Is that true or not? So they have they basically are collecting only from one of the providers through a voluntary tax sharing agreement to $2 on a use that is illegal in the city of Los Angeles. So it is a very strange situation. We've been following and tracking this a lot. We have not recommended as your staff that you do that because that precludes you from really making decisions about, you know, how and where you should create your own program because you've accepted the money and you've already program that money. So we're close. We are, as your budget staff are projecting, that you should be looking at that money starting the next year's budget. We're being very conservative with that, and it's an estimate at this point. Can you in in this public phase, that's that's about to start on this issue. I would also like just additional information on that piece, because it is it is clear to me that many municipalities in which short term rentals are, quote unquote, not allowed are collecting significant funds into or out of which governments are using for a variety of reasons, whether it's additional housing opportunities or other uses. I just want to make sure that that I understand exactly what's happening in these other cities. And and maybe it's not a good idea for us. And I can I understand that. But but I want to understand that piece more because I don't have enough information about it. Sure. Thank you. Councilman Mangum. Mr. Modica, in my understanding, the types of revenues that they're using are being programed against one time expenses. And furthermore, if you currently do any illegal activity and create a income from it, the federal government collects income tax against it and this would be no different. I mean, putting it into a fee schedule, the city of Los Angeles to date, I believe, has received $56 million. And so to not allow this group of individuals to be on an even playing field when this council is often fighting over 250. Thousand dollars. And where to put our afterschool programs? I would encourage us to have a discussion sooner rather than later, and I would not limit it to one provider. I would encourage us to ensure that the top five providers know that even while this is not a permitted use, any operation of those programs in the city shall be created with the same 12% total that are leveraged against our hotels so that that money can go back into our communities and ensure, even if we set it into a fund specifically for helping out in understanding the communities that are most impacted by not having rental access to to just leave that money on the table seems . Point made. So we are looking at, if you remember, the July budget projection we are looking at including that money in our FY19 budget. So we are looking at putting $900,000 into the budget. It's a conservative estimate and it is you know, we're not at the level of an LA, but we are looking at that. And right now, the only way to collect that without an ordinance would be through that. One company of the five is the only one that allows that. If we were to go forward with a with an ordinance, we would be looking at collecting it from every single one. So we are seeing that as a revenue opportunity. We would require anyone who does a short term or two to pay our full 12% total under a program. Mr. Motoko, I appreciate your perspective. If we set a fee and state that anyone participating in the use of short term housing is required to pay that fee just because the platform that they're using would not make a transfer of that funding to us easy and convenient does not mean that they would be that they would be exempt from paying it. So if, for instance, I was a neighbor, let's say in the 1988 off of Wardlow Road and I was renting out my property on a platform other than the one you mention. And I rented out my property 65 days a year at $100 a night. Then that $6,500 would then generate 12% that I would be responsible for coming down to City Hall with my check and turning it in and stating, Here's the money that I owe you. I mean, just because the platform that they would be using is not Airbnb, be willing to give us an agreement does not mean that you cannot have a fee associated with a use that is not currently ordinance that I mean, that would be my argument. It seems as though with that kind of money on the table, it should at least be before this dais to make that decision, because every single day that's passing, if you have what is the estimated number of units we believe are on the market in Long Beach at this time. I don't have it off the top of my head, but it's probably over a thousand. So over a thousand at 30% rental would be 300 units at an average of 150 at night times 12%. I mean, we're just watching money not come in that I think is is irresponsible. So thank you so much for hearing us out. And I hope that this item comes back before us. I recognize that there still does need to have a robust discussion about this as an ordinance and as a policy. But that process, if it's going to take till the fall, that's six months of revenue, that could be for our children. Thank you. Councilmember Pearce. Yeah, I wanted to queue up, just to be clear. Obviously, this issue is going to be a hot issue and we will have a long night whenever this issue comes before us. I definitely do not support receiving revenue on an illegal operation in the city if it's not legal. We should not be taking revenue because that tells companies across the board that they can come here and try to bribe us to pass a policy. So I would say that and saying that I hope that that encourages us to get this item before us sooner rather than later. I know that because they took that step in L.A., it has made creating the policy extremely difficult because there is now money on the table that you cannot vote to take that money away should it happen. Thank you, Stacy. So it makes it very difficult. And so I just want to say, we need to have the entire conversation as one package. That was my intent when I agenda was the item. And making sure that we do have constituents from across the board. It also last time when we talked about Oscars, it wasn't reflected in staff's notes that I wanted to make sure that we were exploring using that fund to fund affordable housing. It was not my intent to put that agenda item to say here, this all goes to the general fund, and I know that's how it's already been allocated in the budget, and that's not something I support either. And I know that from talking to the different platforms in this process, that they are supportive of trying to balance out an affordable housing challenge that we do have in the city. So I know that we all have a different idea of what short term rental policy could look like. And it sounds like staff has an idea, as you just said, you would come to the city and tell us what to do with that total. We haven't voted yet, so we need to make sure that we get this item here soon so we can have a thorough, transparent conversation instead of talking about the what ifs every time we bring this up. Thank you. Okay. Thank you very much. Councilmember Councilmember. Councilwoman Mongo. This council supports the collection of authorized sale of marijuana, which is federally illegal. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Mayor Richardson. This is completely unrelated, related to how late it is. But I just want to say I just want to say, you know, these council C measure how many items that we do last year, city council agenda items. You got any idea? I have no idea. Okay. I don't think I don't think it's going to be less next year. I think meetings are going to get like later and later. And frankly, it's just unfair because this these are good issues. And I bet more people would be here and want to engage in this. So all I'm saying is I just want to say maybe I know people may throw a dagger at me for saying this, but maybe we bring a council meeting on the fifth Tuesday when months are like really jam to try to take some pressure. I'm sorry, Sylvia. Don't throw the dagger, but. But I'm just saying, these are I mean, it's it's like. It's like almost midnight. It's like two weeks in a row. I just think at some point we've got to figure out, I mean, we're not having the same agendas that we had before. I don't know if it's the fifth Tuesday. I don't want I we got to figure something out. I'm just saying. Okay. Thank you very much. There is a motion and a second take public comment on on the presentation. Sorry to the the the lady and actually can we get the lady in the front, please? Who was first in line? You guys will get it. Good evening, council and mayor and Vice Mayor. My name is Iyana Cobb, and I think what everyone was trying to do is just kind of get their comments is what they wanted to say since they have been here all night. Not that they wanted to hear the presentation tonight, that they just wanted to say, I just want to get out. I've been here for like 17 hours. So but anyway, I am a U.S. veteran. I'm an Army veteran of. Thank you. And I just want to say that instead of us going outside looking for other examples, I was a homeless veteran and in the city of Long Beach, and it was something that I never thought that would happen to me. Fortunately enough, I landed in the Cabrillo Century Villages, which has done an amazing job. They have amazing resources. Obviously, there's still a lot of things to do, and I think that's an opportunity for the city to actually look at that model, sit down and talk to them and see how they did some things instead of us using our resources. Kind of go out of that is great though. We do have a lot of buildings that are being built for public vouchers, but it still does not resolve the issue with regards to preexisting housing that does not have rent control. It's like we're banding bandaged in it. We're not really treating the issue. We're kind of tap dancing around the situation, not me, myself, that will eventually become a homeowner going through this process. I understand that we don't want to oversight how someone owns homes and how they, you know, issue our rents to people. However, at the same time, we also have to realize the health and welfare issue with someone becomes homeless and that also affects their mental wellness. And then it just took us out to a whole lot of different other things. Some stories I've heard where rents are increase within 30 days, 60 days, 90 days. If you're on a job, you're lucky if you get a raise in a year. So to just kind of like keep giving them, you know, raising the rents is just kind of exorbitant. Just a quick scenario. For example, I was in a situation where my daughter was still in school. I had already given my notice to my other apartment. Complex wants to move into a current apartment complex before I became homeless. And I didn't think to ask what the fee was for because common sense would say the the life will probably be about $25, maybe 50. But when I want to go sign the lease here in Long Beach with Cabin Group Property Management, the late fee was $150 and my rent was only $895. So I was stuck between a rock and a hard place. Like, Okay, I can either sign this now, I'll be in the car with my daughter. So I think there needs to be a lot of oversight with regards to rent control, property management companies, how they do things. And also when we control topic comes up next week, it should be in the beginning of the agenda so that everyone will have an opportunity to actually engage in the conversation. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for your service. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. Hi, Mayor. City Council. My name's Gary Shelton. Years ago, when I was first dealing with affordable housing issues, we worked really, really hard on campaigns to have inclusionary zoning and a housing trust fund. We got the housing trust fund with no money in it. We never got inclusionary housing. You know, that was a dirty word back then. Another dirty word was SRO, single room occupancy. But guess what, folks? We've got it now in zones all over the city. We finally got it. Thanks to you all. Guess what else? Rent control. We're going to be doing a lot of. Talking about rent control over the next year or two. Starting next week. It hasn't already started. What I'm saying is that the previous councils did a lot. Of work that got us nowhere, got us to here, where we're finally dealing with some of these issues and get them on getting them on the plate. One that when we were looking at the downtown plan, we had a campaign about that to temper that down a little bit. We were guaranteed we were promised by council member IT chair one council member. It chaired two different council before you folks that there would be no gentrification. But what do these mean people been talking about? They've been talking about getting kicked out of their places because they're being gentrified. Out of their units. That's right. Now, what I'd like to have heard from this instead of all this. Oh, we're planning this. We've got this going on. We've got these plans going out. Exactly what you asked for, Mr. Mayor, which was immediate impact items. And what can we do to cut down the timeline on this? Because previous councils have always stretched out the timeline. Previous staffs have always stretched out the. Timelines on these things. What I'd like you to ask them, though, tonight is to look at. The arena numbers that we have that we're not matching right now. Remember when we had 873% up above median and 17% of low and moderate? Low and extremely low and very low. We're doing the same thing right now. What I want to hear is how many housing units have we lost to gentrification compared to how many? If you add it up, what Mr.. Your report was I couldn't add it up. Was it 50 units? Was 150 was 800. I don't know. Whatever the total number of units that are on the ground right now with keys being unlocked and lights being turned on compared to what we lost in gentrification just over the last year. Ask that question and see how you like that answer, please. Mr. Shelton, next speaker, please. Good evening. I'm tired, too. I'm trying to gather my thoughts together because I can think it's been a long day. But I am a homeowner. I'm a homeowner in the ninth district. I lived on Hewlett and Elm. I bought my house two years ago. Thanks to my union, I could afford it, I. I have a various apartments that are right around my home, and recently some of the neighbors that I've got gotten to know since I moved into my property. They moved out and I saw signs going up and the signs are saying that the rent for a single bedroom apartment with no parking is $1,600. And I'm baffled because my home, it has three rooms, two bath garage, and I paid $2,000 for a mortgage. And I find it appalling that I hear that the districts that are mostly homeowners are putting a proposition now to talk about rent control or talk about rent. When, you know, as a homeowner, I cannot consciously make a profit and build equity knowing that my community is suffering. I can't do that. It makes me angry when I see two, three families living in one apartment because they can't afford it. It is not an uncommon conversation in Long Beach to know that somebody that you love or know has either been evicted, has to have a bunch of roommates in order to survive. Even in a union wage. Most union workers can't afford to live in Long Beach and working Long Beach. And this is very concerning because these are the best paid hospitality jobs right now in Long Beach. What are we going to do? Are we going to really be that city that outsources our workers because we don't want them to live here? This reminds me of the zoning laws of the twenties in the forties and fifties, where people of color could not, you know, their communities were not invested in and they had to go live a far away and walk in the alley. You know, one of my coworkers, he tells me that he was in the he remembers the day that the first day he was able to walk on Pine Avenue because he's black. And, you know, he just got evicted from his house, from his apartment. And, you know, it's just we got to do better. Honestly, this is this is a conversation that I feel like it's pretty obvious if we have companies that are coming in and paying $3 million for an apartment complex and, you know, are charging $6,000 for rent, they could afford more than 14 units to be affordable for Long Beach residents. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Can we say resident of the first district? And I'm really tired. So if I don't make sense, I apologize in advance, see if I can read my notes. There is so much going on with housing in our community right now and we cannot keep up with what's happening. We have these large corporate landlords that are coming in and buying property, anticipating making huge profit. Profits on short term rentals in conjunction with the. Olympics. We're seeing it downtown. We're seeing it in the north side of town. They're going into the low income areas. I work at the senior center, used to be once a week I'd have somebody come in and tell me that their rent had been raised 2 to $300 and they're on fixed income. That was their food budget. What were they going to do? How could they get access to food? I tried to find housing for a woman that was becoming homeless. She had to go to L.A. to even get any. Services because there was nothing in Long Beach. The building next to the one that the people were there, their residents all got two and $300 a month income. They're all seniors on fixed incomes. My building. Our. Contract expires this year. We've had some of our residents have been given notice that their buildings are going to be they're going to be moved from one bedrooms to studios so they can convert the one bedrooms to market rate units. Who's tracking that? Nobody's tracking that. There's 33 plus senior buildings in the city. That's another great net loss that we could be experience. Most of those contracts expire in the next few years. Short term rentals. I was here when those people got up and I couldn't believe, why isn't somebody penalizing those? Those are people in the community. And they were proudly announcing that they were making huge profits on their. I was. Appalled. Let's find them. They're doing something illegal. We're talking about condemning our immigrant population. And these people are proudly announcing that they're in any illegal business and we're not fining them. I find that incredible. The rent freeze. We need to look at a rent freeze. Otherwise, we are going to see more and more seniors out on the streets. I have been homeless. I don't want to be homeless again and I don't want any of our seniors to experience that. Thank you. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. Hi there. Jordan Wynn, again, thank you once again for everybody sticking out tonight. I know it's a late night, but hopefully this is reminding you of your activist days. So I'm going to tell a little bit of a story about who I am in relation to Long Beach. I am in a family of renters. We've always rented our home and we've lived in three different homes as long as I've been here. I was born and raised. I lived in the third district, then the fifth District, and now I live in the seventh District in Roberto Aranguiz. And I graduated from Long Beach Poly and I was lucky enough from the space program to be able to get into a small liberal arts school in Portland called Reed College. For my senior thesis, I researched the phenomenon of gentrification, specifically gentrification in Little Tokyo, Los Angeles, and I analyzed three different unit, three different census tracts to track the ways in which the units were changing and the populations were changing at the same time. And what I found was astounding. Gentrification is a fact fast. Acting process that happens within 3 to 7 years. Something that takes place rapidly. It's a crisis. In downtown L.A. right now. It's actually been identified as the most gentrified place. And so I came back eager. To help my city, eager to give back to the community that had given me so much. And what do I find when I come back to our downtown? The same exact phenomenon, gentrification going on downtown and across our city today. Somebody actually told me that a unit on Walnut and Fourth Street, which used to be pretty affordable neighborhood, a studio. Is now going for. 1700 dollars in this city of Long Beach, which is unbelievable for me as a student coming back. I don't have anywhere to live. I'm living at my parents house. My parents just got a rent increase of $300. So where am I going with all this? How does this relate to the study? Well, you know, there's a lot of cool policies that have been outlined, but I think the most important have been sidelined or way far back in the policy process. For example, policies three, one and three, two I cited in the the presentation are in process and pending it are some of the most dire needs for our city. It's one of the ones that is least for the furthest down on the policy pipeline. 3.4 not being available from general funds when 40% of our fiscal responsibility from the city was spent on police really makes me question who we're protecting here. The people who are going to come into the city or the people who are already living here. And then. 310 we can have. Affordable developments, but those can often be parts of gentrification process as we've seen around the country. And I'm wondering with things like what Rex Richardson presented last month, where is that discussion? I appreciate it. And bringing that up tonight, where is REP? Where is rent control? Where is just cause eviction? And the discussion about this? And most importantly, where is wealth building in our most vulnerable communities? These policies that have been presented. Tonight are for a city that is not in crisis. It may be standard process now, as Rex. Richardson said earlier. But this is no longer a standard issue. This is a housing crisis. We are dealing with people who are receiving rent increases of 300, 400, 500, $800. At a time. And my family might get this place of the city. I don't know where I'm going to go after that. The mayor wants to know what. The standard among cities are when it comes to renter protections. And I can tell you with a firm. A firm statement. That it is renter protections. Look into it and thank you. Thank you very much, sir. Next speaker, please. I'm fucking livid. I swear you don't know what's going on. You're asking questions about these things that apparently has been in the works for so long. I'm just like, God damn. My name is Jennifer and I'm a student, Cece UAB. And the only reason I'm able to live where I live, where I live is because I'm using my financial. Aid, all of it, to go to my rent. I don't think my friends even know this, but over the summer I was homeless. I was looking for housing in L.A., and I only found it here. And that's because I had financial aid. And you have people who are being evicted, who have who are disabled, who can't afford better living right now. You guys have the audacity to call this a receive and file. It's a fucking emergency. We might be homeless. At least you'll have homes to go to tonight. I'm calling on you as the people who make the decisions in Long Beach to protect renters in this city. I am one of 60% of renter population that this this fucking city. Many people are being displaced for no fucking reason, not just because of big shit. And that's perfectly legal because we don't got rent control. I stand with all renters who speak out against the injustices due to gentrification. You all really need to fucking do something about this. Let's see what happens if we cut your salaries. How fucking fast you're going to get this shit through. I know you have a right to speak to. Please. I just would appreciate this. The language. Thank you. Yeah, because I hurts. I'm just. I'm. You are. You have a personal right to say what you want. I just wanted to say that you have a right to say whatever you want. Continue. All right, fine. Fuck it. Look into temporary rent. Freeze and just cause eviction until November. Until you guys decide to get together and actually do something about this temporary rent freeze. No more building those goddamn things outside the construction around in downtown. Stop over until you guys come together. And actually do something about it. A lot of Long Beach residents to decide on rent control because we need it. Thank you. Speaker, please. Hi, everyone. My name is Ben. I'm a resident of the ninth District. I've spoken in front of city council before regarding affordable housing issues in the past. I guess what I really want to talk about is just to really let you all know, you know, what informs us and I know this is something the city council is trying to do, is really inform themselves about the issues. And oftentimes I hear from city council members when we bring up issues that the public is not informed or that we're misinformed. And so I want to offer the experiences that have formed my, you know, my, you know, living in Long Beach for the past 20 years, my family living here. And also really to explain the anger that I think a lot of us have when speaking to city council members. When my family first immigrated here to the United States to Long Beach, renting was the most affordable option we have. And so we moved around and we we eventually settled in a spot on Orange and San Antonio in Bixby Knolls that my family lived in for several years. And we were evicted because my mom had complained about several pest issues that were occurring in the apartment complex. And because Long Beach doesn't have any just cause eviction laws, you know, my mom was given no other option but to find another place. And for my mom to have that courage to speak out to her landlord to fix those issues and maintain the property was really difficult because I also come from an undocumented immigrant family and as a single mother, this was very important for her to maintain the well-being of her family and provide a home we faced housing insecurity for. I faced housing insecurity for a majority of my life. And actually for about two years I had my family of five, a single mother and four sons lived and essentially what was a smaller than a studio, a back house of one of our family friends in the ninth District. And so, you know, this issue is very urgent. As people have said, this is a housing. We're not in a housing crisis. We're in a housing emergency in Long Beach. And it's not just affecting Long Beach. It's affecting the whole state. And so what we do here ripples to the whole state. And we have to take leadership locally. We can't just stand and take a whole year to do a study of of what other cities are doing. We know that other cities in California have have set precedents for how we should establish rights for renters. 15 cities in the state of California alone have rent control, and more cities have just cause eviction policies. And their cities. These are cities with smaller renter populations Long Beach, the 60% renter populated city. You would expect that we would have a baseline of standards for how we should treat our renters because they deserve to have this. They deserve to have some stability if they decide to rent and live in Long Beach. And for many of us, Long Beach has been affordable. And with the changes we've had, with the growth that we have, we have to look at different options and respond to what's happening now, because if we don't respond now, it'll be too late. And we'll lose we'll lose the language that we've we've we've learned a lot. Thank you for your testimony. Next speaker, please. I thank you, Mr. Vice Mayor, and members of the city council. I for the record, I wanted to hear the presentation from city staff. So thank you very much. I know that a lot of hard work. Has. Been put in by the community and that we have had community meetings, we have. Had public meetings and we have taken. Public input. And I agree with the City Council. That it seems pretty clear that there is consensus. Among this body and the public that we want to see an inclusionary housing possible right away. And if that can happen, then this body does need to consider a a freeze on development until we can get that policy put in place. You also need to be considering a rent freeze until the election. You're all taking this item up next week now, making it now a much larger part of the public discourse now. And so now that that's happening, landlords are getting even more nervous. And as they get more nervous, they're raising their rents. All of this is going to create a more work in the back end because when that passes, renters are going to go back and they're going to go back and get their money back from the landlords who've been gouging them in an effort to try and raise the rent as much as they can. Before we passed an ordinance that actually does protect renters in the city, something that we have failed to do. What are other cities doing? They're passing rent control and just cause eviction. There are seven cities right now in California, including Long Beach, that are working on getting to the ballot in November . Long Beach is the largest city from San Diego, where the largest population of renters from San Diego to Seattle. That does not have any basic renter protections that we don't have just cause eviction. We do not have rent control. So we want to be a major city. We want to bring the Olympics here. Then let's be a major league city and let's act like the other big. Cities do and treat their renters right, protect their renters. One fifth of our city is living in poverty. I guarantee you those one fifth are renters. We're not doing anything for them. They're not part of this conversation tonight. We had we spent a lot of time tonight not talking about affordable housing, in fact, as very disappointing. We spent a lot of time talking about short term rentals. That's not affordable housing. In fact, we're taking affordable housing units off the market with short term rentals. We're taking apartments off the market for short term rentals. That's not affordable housing. So we're going the wrong way. And if you're not going to put that money into a fund to create affordable housing, then we will stand absolutely opposed to this ordinance. We will stand only for opponents like Santa monica, which says the owner has to be on site. It reduces nuisance, it reduces problems, and it keeps available rental units on the market. We're not going to be a city that has entire apartment buildings gutted so that they can be rented out for Airbnb. 60 days a year. Student housing. That's not affordable housing is not affordable housing. It should not be. Discussed as such. 11 1100 units of. Student housing is not affordable housing. To pretend that it is is is dishonest. And I think we know better than that. Thank you. If you. Want to just complete a. Share. These guys are working overtime. I don't understand why we're in the midst of this crisis. Why we aren't getting these folks more resources to get this work done. You tell them to make it a priority. But what are they supposed to do? They just spent six months on the land use element, and only really half the city actually cared about, maybe even less. You got 60%, 60% rents, but they don't have the resources to address it. So I think you. I hear you. Yeah. Thank you for your time. Want. I mean, we went about a minute over. So thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening, Vice Mayor. Mayor. Council and staff Brian D'Andrea with Century Housing. Like Josh, I too was a member of the Mayor's Study Group. We put a lot of work into our recommendations and our staff put even more work into its 29 point plan that was adopted by Council in May of last year. I'm struck by a couple of things tonight. One is there's a tremendous sense of urgency and recognition of urgency, both on the part of council and the community. And we appreciate that this is an issue that impacts everyone. Second, I. I would be remiss if I didn't recognize the winds and some of the progress that staff reported on in this in this update. And so I want to thank the Council for maintaining a focus on housing, maintaining and maintaining some accountability towards these recommendations that were adopted last year. I just got back from Sacramento, our state housing conference and housing is at the top of the agendas for our gubernatorial candidates, at the top of the agenda of our state legislators. There are new resources that we expect will come out of Sacramento, some of which were discussed this evening. I think one one critical piece for you all to think about is that for us to really maximize the flow of those state resources into our local communities like Long Beach, we need local match. Whether that's in lieu fees through an. Inclusionary ordinance, whether it's bond proceeds that might be invested in affordable housing. Our ability to attract outside resources really depends on those local dollars. So it's something for you all to to think about. So thanks again for maintaining your your commitment to this issue and for listening to the community. Thank you for your testimony. Next speaker, please. Hello again, Vice Mayor and City Council here. Here with Libra. I just wanted to speak on on some of the items today, but I want to sort of offer a context, especially on the heels of the the land use element. When we're talking about building density, it's now more and more time, more than ever. Do we need to really consider affordable housing creation, especially when we're talking about density. Density is not a proxy for affordable housing, and the only way to get affordable housing is to build affordable housing. So I want to thank the council members that actually brought up the idea of renter protections and tenant protections, because housing. Housing is is a very complex issue. And I know that there's a lot of folks, especially up in the capital, that think that we're that we just need to build more housing and that that's going to solve all of our problems. Actually, one of the the candidates for the governor was stating that that's all we need to do. We need to remove regulations and just continue to build more housing and then everything's going to be fine. But I am you know, I'm in my mid-forties and I don't think I've ever in my lifetime seen rents go down. Have you? So even if we built if we built all the housing that we need today, the rents are still going to stay the same. And they're still going to say out of reach for a lot of our a lot of our residents. So we don't believe in the trickle down theory of building more housing and that things are going to get affordable. Studies have shown that it takes decades for that to happen. So I really do appreciate the city council members that really brought up the idea that we need tenant protections along with really considering robust inclusionary housing policies. And I am going to urge the council, too, when we're talking about inclusionary housing, that we're seriously considering a large set aside for the very low income level folks. Because one thing that I still want to see from these recommendations completely stricken is this idea that we redefine moderate income to 150%. Amy. That just needs to go away because that is. Just absolutely ridiculous that. We are going to be building moderate. Affordable housing for people that are making close to $100,000 a year. That we we cannot allow. That to happen. So that just needs to be taken out. And I do appreciate that the that the idea of. No net loss was brought up because there's all kinds of different tactics and strategies that we can be considering to to ensure that we're producing affordable housing, but we're also preserving affordable housing. And we are losing so much affordable housing right now because there are no tenant protections, because we don't have any laws in place that is going to preserve affordable housing. So knowing that laws, policy seems to be a reasonable solution. Thank you for your time. All right. So that concludes public comment. All right. This morning. Kate, we just completed public comment. We do have a motion in a second to receive the report. I see no other additional council comment. Please cast your votes on that. Motion carries. Okay, motion carries. Thank you very much. And thanks for the people that folks that came out for that item. Let me just continue here. Me once. Just give me 1/2. 33. What do you want to know? Thank you. I'm going to please have. And guys, if we can just continue our meetings, we just have the conversations outside. Please, madam, quick, can you read the next item, which is 33? Kelly could you just the mike thank you.