Recommendation to request City Manager to work with the Department of Development Services to evaluate the feasibility of establishing, in accordance with state and federal auditing requirements, a single Emergency Rental Assistance application for landlords with multiple tenants in communities at elevated risk of eviction. This funding would cover past rental arrears and up to three months of future rental obligation for eligible tenants. Participation in this program should allow tenants whose rental debt was covered an additional 90 days of protection from eviction past the final date of payment of back rent, and Direct the Department of Development Services to publicize data regarding the rental assistance program on a public dashboard.
Public comment. Thank you so much for your testimony and testimony and certainly a lot going on in the town. Right now, we're going to move forward with item 34. Communication from Vice Mayor Richardson. Councilwoman Zendaya's. Councilwoman Allen. Recommendation to request City Manager to work with the Department of Development Services to evaluate the feasibility of establishing a single emergency rental assistance application for landlords with multiple tenants and communities at elevated risk of eviction and direct the Department of Development Services to publicize data regarding the rental assistance program on a public dashboard. Fantastic. Thank you. I can't keep up. So I'm going to make the motion on table for me and pull up the presentation. Right. So thanks to community partners, thank the city staff, thanks to everyone who provided data and helped shape this proposal tonight and thank you to council members and they have an Allen for your support on this proposal. So a little bit of context. Long Beach has been a leader in the region, in the nation on the Recovery Recovery Act. $250 million in Recovery Act. The most significant effort with 64 million in rental assistance so far. The ERAP program, emergency rental assistance program that allows for the full payment of back rent for vulnerable tenants and is our most significant tool to keep people in their homes and keep people housed. The city has distinguished itself itself as a leader for efficient management of the pandemic and the recovery. We led the way on vaccination. We're now preparing to be among the first on booster shots. Our rescue our Recovery Act was the first meaningful recovery package, making good use of recovery money to strengthen our city. And our rental assistance program has been recognized by the US Treasury as one of the more efficient programs in the nation. We have just under 30% of our of our funding disbursed, beating the state and national averages. We've already helped over to about 2500 households with rent and utility payments. Those are 2500 households that are now no longer on the brink of eviction. Our Development Services Department and our community organizations have done a great job really rallying and making this successful. At a time when some agencies simply gave the money back because it's a challenge. Compare this to L.A.. L.A. was underperforming, and a month ago they chose to give the money back. And all of those people had to go back through the same process and go back to the back of the line. There was no context on it. Okay. So so here's what we're finding. So in Long Beach, ah, or here in L.A. County, our eviction moratorium ended September 30th, and we still have 15,800 households who are still behind on rent and vulnerable to eviction. That's estimated that over 43,000 people in our city, that's 99% of our population is in this very precarious position, that 16,000 children are at risk of eviction. And we can help make a difference if we expedite getting this funding out at the current pace. We'll take until August 20, 22 to distribute all of our money. And where is the money? What are we hearing? What is the most significant burden to getting the money out faster? Well, first, stringent requirements, so continue to have to prove that their 80% area median income or below. Right. They're below 80%. They actually have to prove their economic situation was was impacted by the pandemic. And, you know, they have to prove that they're at a point of housing insecurity. Those are things that we have to provide documentation of proof. You also have unique challenges. We understand that Long Beach is a very diverse community. We have digital divide issue. We have some areas where it's harder to connect to the to the Internet. We also know that immigration status makes it more difficult. And so the burden. In order to provide the worthiness of this program, although it's a really good program, you know, there are things that we can do to improve. Currently in a currently a ten it alone can apply or as a tenant and a landlord. The tenants who need the most help are often the one who are more likely to not have the required documents in order to actually receive the have a completed application or received the assistance. So the folks who are out of work are having a difficult time getting into work. Those are also a thing. People are having a difficult time completing the application and sometimes the documents just simply don't exist. The proof, they just simply doesn't exist at 4500 unfilled applications because they are processed by one side and not the other. We have 8500 incomplete applications because a tenant or a landlord is having difficulty finding the documents or none of the current proxies like Medicaid or unemployment insurance. Enrollment can be applied in lawsuit scenario. We have a tool called a self attestation form that we just began using. In some cases, it can be hard to complete with language barriers if you're signing up to a test, right? Sometimes it takes a little bit of effort to talk someone through what it attestation form. And there's also again, issues with digital access. And and so these are some of the barriers. The Urban Institute study show that 36% of tenants who haven't finished the application, they couldn't because of eligibility criteria. Another 24% expressed difficulty communicating with landlord. 21% said that the process of preparing and filing documents is why they didn't finish. And landlords expressed a very similar problem. 30% have said they haven't completed applications due to the complicated criteria. 30% said they expressed issues communicating directly with their tenants. 22% have said that they've had trouble preparing or filing documents. So here's the opportunity. You know, we've been recognized as a leader. We have responsibility, continue to lead. We've learned a lot. We've kicked around some different ideas. Today is to look at some new opportunities put forward by the Treasury. Look at the some of the things we've been kicking around and create some streamlined approaches to get more people in vulnerable areas approved. So the new Treasury guidance allows for advance payments to landlord with lower requirements for proof of eligibility. 2000 applications where landlord have done their site but the tenant haven't found their documents or you know, that could double the allocation overnight if we were to all those 2000 applications. Creating a single, streamlined application. Process. Targeted to property owners of buildings with large clusters of incomplete applications would help us to get the money out faster, allow you to protect more tenants and reach those who those hard to get tenants who we know. Maybe they haven't signed up, maybe they haven't initiated their own application. But if there's already a streamlined application happening within that building, it's easier for them to piggyback on and protect both those units so the neighbors know who their neighbors are, the landlords know who their neighbors are. Want to make it easy to protect more people if we speed this up or be eligible for additional funds. What the Treasury is doing and what the state is doing, they're rewarding the jurisdictions who get the money out faster by reallocate, reallocating funding from other jurisdictions. And so some some programs are mismanaging. Some aren't getting the funding out fast enough. We can reward ourselves by protecting more people with a win win. Of you promising example Kentucky. If your zip code is low income, you automatically qualify. So they're just looking at if you live in a zip code or area, you don't have to prove all of this. You can simply by living in that area, you qualify. Another example, the Carmelita projects. They're different because they're public housing there, but they're one of the only single application processes that have happened. And because they were able to do it that happened right here in Long Beach, they were able to cover, I think, a 20 some odd application, 80, 80 tenants and one application protected. All right. Imagine if we were to do this that most law departments in our city, Harris County, Texas, they use the amount of rent owed per month as a proxy for housing insecurity and lower rent, higher risk. And so here's the recommendation today. The recommendation is create a streamline single application process for landlords, for vulnerable tenants to cover the whole building. Allows tenants to organize with one voice and allows landlords to target their home their whole building, so allow people to organize around one one application. This proposal has had support from folks at every stage of the rental assistance process from tenant and tenant advocate to rental asset. The report provides rental assistance providers to city staff and landlord. You know, it's not often we can hold up a letter from the apartment association in a letter from Long Beach forward both saying the same thing. I'll be leader will continue to look at these ways to continue to innovate. So given the city's mandate to push the state to lower the burdensome application process, we've already had some success in getting the state to do that. I think we're we will be one of the first we will be the first city in the state to make this happen if we can make this happen. So the ask is move forward, begin engaging with the state on a single, streamlined application. If there are other ideas that come out of Federal Treasury or other ideas the City Council has, we want to throw that in the kitchen sink as well. The idea here is to streamline this process and then secondly, create a rental assistance dashboard that can be public, that helps show progress, equity concerns, where where we're making progress , where we're not adding transparency. That's something that's been good during the pandemic, is our most significant tool to address housing insecurity. And so we should have that same that same concern. And again, we're open to additional ideas as well. So that is the presentation, and I'm happy to make this motion. Councilwoman Allen. Yes, sir. Thank you, Vice Mayor. That was a really great presentation, very comprehensive. And I just want to say thank you for asking me to sign on to this item. Housing is a priority to me, and this item provides a real opportunity to improve our Erap program. The item also streamlined the Erap application process, which is really important and helps get those assistance dollars out faster with more tenant that can be covered under the program. So people really need this. I know I've heard from a lot of my residents and looking at your numbers, we all know that this is really necessary. And and I also encourage DAP, if there's anything that happens along the way that you think we can improve this process, we're always looking for that and being a leader. So just happy to support this item today and just a great work by mayor. Thank you. I think I need a second on this notion, actually, Cliff. I'm going to second. In a second to Councilman Allen. Councilman in the house. Thank you. Thank you. Vice Mayor, again for. Ask me to sign on to this very, very important item. Why do we have inequalities? Why do inequities exist today? Because for centuries, certain communities, and particularly our black and brown, low income communities have been left behind. They have been neglected. Policies and programs have not been designed for them because they have not encompassed nor even acknowledge the additional barriers that exist for the working class families. So I really, really want to thank Vice Mayor Richardson for putting forward this item, as well as Councilwoman Allen for your support. Because in this item we are doing, what we are doing is acknowledging the inequities that exist within our rental assistance program, and it is proposing a solution for it. And I think that's what we really have to focus on. There are about 8500 applications that have been incomplete. That means that there are thousands of potentially low income households who need this support, yet, because of technical technicalities, wouldn't otherwise be receiving that kind of support. I am proud that Long Beach has been a leader in the management of this program, but we need to do more with more than 43,000 people at risk of being evicted. We need to do a better job of ensuring that no family is evicted, especially as we have our holiday season coming up. And since most of the funds that that are for this particular thing are available, so we need to make sure that there are not only available, but that they are accessible to all of those who are really in need of them. In regards to the new application options for landlords, I propose that as we identify specific neighborhoods and buildings with the highest needs, that we ensure that every individual in those buildings receives funds if they are in need of it. I would like for the application to process to be as easy as possible. I think that that's also where we get hung up and where these technical technicalities occur. So I think that it's very important that we make it as easy as possible for for the landlords to apply for the residence to apply, and for them to actually receive this these funds in a very timely manner. Not only are we helping out our residents that are in need of this, but we're also helping out our landlords who have been and who have also been very patient and have been allowing, you know, all of the tenants to just stay there without paying rent. And they are also suffering as well. So we really need to make sure that as much as we we can that we help our tenants. Thank you, Councilwoman. I don't see anyone else cued up. Is there. Should we do public comment? Well, cancer. Thank you. And I want to appreciate this item I figured out. It's one that I'm happy to support. I was proud to introduce the original item for rental assistance only about a year ago, and that was $5 million commitment from the City Council, from our CGP CDBG Fund. And since then our, our emergency rental assistance program and the funding coming from the federal state government has expanded significantly. I think that that we've been able to help a lot of families and and I really appreciate the commitment of this council and our staff to, uh, to help not only tenants but also to housing providers during a very, very difficult time. We've come a long way and over the past year I think we've learned how to deliver and continuously improve on our processes and systems to provide rental assistance to families and keep families house. So I fully support anything that eliminates barriers and red tape that improves transparency in the process. And allows us to deliver on these critical services to families in need. So with that, I'm happy to support this motion. I think you and I will do public comment, but I'm quick. Can the following people please line up for public comment? Elaine Hutchinson. Garcia. Lopez Reyes. Married. You gone, Mike Murchison. John Edmund and I can face an uncertain. Good evening. Honorable Mayor Garcia. Honorable Vice Mayor Richardson. And members of the Long Beach City Council. It might not working. 1/2. The mic is on and I. Know it's on. It's just not projecting it. I'm not speaking into it. We're going to we're going to check in with this. HUTCHISON Can you please put your mask on while you're doing public comments? Thank you. Thank you. May I go ahead or. Why don't you wait 1/2? Thank you. I think it was working before, and now it's not. What do you do? Why don't you restart and we'll just restart the time, all right? Okay. Now? Yes. And your mask must. Remain on the mask on. Put my mask back on. Yes, please. Thank you. Okay. Like this. Okay. Okay. The Honorable Mayor Garcia and Honorable Vice Mayor Richardson and members of the Long Beach City Council. My name is Elaine Hutchison, and I'm here this evening on behalf of the Apartment Association of California's Southern Cities, located at 33 three West Broadway here in Long Beach. Just to mention, we're very proud that this year we are celebrating our 97th year serving the rental housing industry here in Long Beach. We want to thank Vice Mayor Richardson and council members the data's and Allen for bringing item 34 forward to streamline the application process for the Emergency Rental Assistance Program. We know from calls coming into our office that both tenants and owners have difficulty in communicating to meet the requirements, either because of language barriers or difficulties with understanding the process or simply to understand the purpose of the program and how they felt. And then the steps to be taken. We here in Long Beach are very fortunate to have seen several awards of rent relief funds, and we still have 46 million of unspent funds. So while there may be federal or state guidelines to work with, we must remember that our end goal is to help pay unpaid rent and thereby prevent homelessness and to help stabilize the tenants in our community who need assistance. We are very pleased to support item 34 and urge the City Council to approve this item. Thank you very much. Good evening. Mayor and council members. My name is Grisha Lopez Reyes. I'm the director of the Long Beach Coalition for Good Jobs and a Healthy Community. COVID 19 has revealed the vast inequalities in our communities, but we applaud the city's efforts to develop a strong recovery plan for the COVID 19 pandemic to ensure that we get the necessary resources to residents that have been impacted by this public health crisis. The rental assistance program is key to making this happen. However, while this program has tried to help many households with rental and utility payments, the difficulty of the application process discourages tenants, especially low income renters and or undocumented communities from accessing these funds. It is confusing, inaccessible and requires the necessary amount of documentation. For this reason, we strongly support the recommendation put forth in tonight's item by Vice Mayor Richardson, Councilwoman Sun has and Councilwoman Allen to lower administrative burdens for eligible residents to ensure that those needed the most are receiving the assistance. Our Coalition has engaged thousands of renters through our organizing efforts this month, but I wanted to lift one story from Shelly Ward. She's a Long Beach resident who tried to apply for rental assistance but experienced difficulty due to the long and complicated process. Due to the drawback she faced when starting the application process. She was then served an eviction notice. Shelly and her family are now facing the threat of displacement, which could have been avoided if the process was easier and more accessible. This new process will open up the opportunity for tenants and landlords to work together and make it easier for the funds to be distributed effectively. By voting yes and improving this recommendation, Long Beach will continue to be a strong leader on COVID 19 recovery and an example for other cities. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening, Honorable Mayor Garcia and the city council members. My name is Mary. You. I am a pastor and. A faith rooted organizer with Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice, also known as crew. I represent hundreds of. Faith leaders connected through crew to speak in support of this item today. First, I want to say thank you to the city for developing such a strong recovery plan to provide resources for our community. And specifically, I want to say thank you to Vice Mayor Richardson, council. Members and Council Member Allen, for bringing this item up. We all know that availability and access are two different issues. We have our city has the rental assistance funding available to tenants, but the tenants who need it the most don't have access to this resource because of the burden of paperwork. The majority of our vulnerable tenants, of people of color. So streamlining this application process is the key to address the issue of access rooted in the racial injustice. In our society. And as a pastor of an immigrant congregation, I have witnessed firsthand how family and children have been impacted by this pandemic. And our youth have been feeling stressed out because they see their parents struggle to choose between paying rent and putting food on the table. So this burden impacts their capacity to engage in school with their studies. So if we want to make sure that our children can have a healthy development and can succeed in school, then we need to make sure vulnerable families have access to the resources that they need the most right now. So this new, streamlined process will change the futures of many families and youth, which will change the generations to come in our city. Our Christian sacred text teaches that we are all connected in one family as children of God. And some of us, if some of us are in pain, all of us are impacted. For this reason, we believe that developing the development of the streamlined process to provide rental assistance to our tenants as quickly as possible will support the well-being and healing of our city. So we ask that you vote yes to approve this recommendation. Thank you. Mayor. Vice mayor, council members. Good evening. My name is Mike Murchison. I represent Spier. I represent 100 hundreds and hundreds of other rental property owners that want to commend the vice mayor for bringing this item forward. We also support your fellow colleagues who signed off on this. Councilwoman and Councilwoman Allen, thank you very much. I also want to mention the hard work the development services does on this issue because it's been a difficult one. I want to thank Christopher and Oscar for their dedication to this. I support the vice mayor's recommendation on this. I support, believe it or not, and be on the same page with a good jobs and healthy community. That's going to be a first for me. But I think the two main issues that I want to bring forward is, number one, streamlining the permit process. And I think other speakers have brought that up. That's critical. But the other bigger issue, and I brought this up months ago, is that the federal government has income requirements. And you all saw that in Rex's presentation, the 80% of area median income. Those are going to change because you're not going to get to all the tenants in Long Beach. You have, I don't know, 250,000 tenants that live in Long Beach. And I don't know how many of them a high percentage, the oh deferred rent, if you want to get to every one of them. Then you go to your California congressional and federal delegation and you talk to them about waiving or reducing significantly that 80% of area median income until that changes. I support obviously expediting and making a one page permit or excuse me, application process, but that income level is what makes it extremely difficult for everybody in Long Beach. That has to change. Otherwise, we're going to be in the same boat four or five, six months from now. So I just want to encourage you to reach out to Congressman Lowenthal and others and see what can be done to reducing or getting rid of that income requirement. Vice Mayor Richardson, thank you very much. Council people. Thank you. I really appreciate it. One of the rare moments in life where you know me and Mr. Murchison agree. I think that. Am I wise? It makes no sense. We have we have a zip code. I love the example that the firemen are use with respect to the state of Kentucky and using zip code measurements. You know, we we know which zip codes are poorer than others and area median income is based on that. There are zip codes that have a spectrum of incomes. 90804. If you live on the western, part of that zip code is much different than the eastern part of that zip code. Narrative five is another example. Nine over six I mean, there's a there's multiple zip codes where you have, you know, quote unquote, low income people with middle income and higher people living in the same zip code. So if the process is to streamline this effort to pay off the first rent, then I would have to agree we have a rate of above 80% because it's just not realistic. There's a reason why over 12,000 applications are not processed yet. I'm unfulfilled, and it has to do with the, you know, the education of those who even know the paperwork, the understanding of it, how difficult it is. And with respect to the streamlined effort, for one, I agree in green in agreement of this. I have to say honestly that a lot of the third party organizations that have partnered with the city don't have the reach that they claim that they have. You know, our piece was, I don't know, these no bid contracts that are going through organizations who aren't present in the communities that allegedly they represent in regards to housing . They have not been able to fulfill their part of the bargain, if not solely on the backs of the city, for why people get these applications in. And with respect to the city, we're going to need massive, you know, boots on the ground. You know, maybe a couple of dozen fellowships need to go out and really streamline this on the city side as well as on the applicant side. And also, you know, these rare times that we get federal money to do anything with housing, it shouldn't just be about paying off rent. You know, we should be pushing and creating opportunities for tenants to become homeowners because this is just going to become cyclical. Who's to say what's next for Corona 37 or whatever that's going to come down the road and completely shut down our economy again? And then we're just going to have to keep doing these things. We need to create opportunities for tenants to become actual homeowners. So just for future mine, because we shouldn't be sending back any money. And although 30% is a, you know, better than everyone else, that's still, you know, a failing grade. So thank you. Good evening, honorable mayor and Council Members. My name is Elsa Tung, District seven, resident and program manager at Long Beach Forward. I'm proud to join this eclectic group of public commenters in support of this item. Language four does support item 34 to explore creating a streamlined single application process for the ERAP program. And we thank Vice Mayor Richardson and Council women's and they have and Allen for their leadership. Now as the presentation showed. Despite Long Beach ranking above our pier cities in rental assistance allocation, the dual eviction and homelessness crises require us to do much, much better at our current rate of rental assistance. Disbursement. Long Beach will not be able to pay out its full allocation until August of next year. A streamlined single application process would allow property owners and tenants to organize around submitting one application for groups of vulnerable tenants in eviction clusters to get erap money faster and for more tenants, especially the more vulnerable tenants are covered under the program. Here I want to emphasize the data driven policy opportunity. This is an opportunity for the city to develop a proactive process that matches tenants based on vulnerability and geography. So let's first identify clusters of incomplete applications, potentially from a single building or a single particular neighborhood. And then let's use well known, publicly available data and metrics. Median household income, racial concentrations of poverty. COVID 19 impacts even concentrations of rental arrears that fall below 80% area median rent. To then target the city services and screen requests for advance payments. On the note that the previous commenter made about various income levels being within the zip codes. Yes, that is true, but there is lots and lots of data at the census tract level that can pinpoint and target services and rental assistance even more precisely. Emergency rental assistance is not the answer to the eviction crisis, but it is an answer. So let's please vote to make it a more efficient and effective answer. Vote yes on item 34. And finally, justice for Moana Rodriguez. Thank you. Good evening. Honorable Mayor. Vice Mayor, City Council, honorable city attorney, city manager, city clerk and staff. Thank you for your time and dedication to the city of Long Beach. My name is John Edmond and I'm the executive director of the Apartment Association of California Southern Cities. I'm a long time watcher and a first time speaker. I'm speaking today in support of item 34, sponsored by Vice Mayor Richardson and co-sponsored by council members that has an Allen Long Beach has been a leader in distributing of the erap funds. And I just want to say leader in the state for sure. I'd my hat is off to city staff and being able to put together a program and executing it and doing what they've done so far. And it's pretty tremendous at the time that they've had to be able to do that. And I think what's happened is we've learned best practices about what can be done, what needs to be done, and what can be implemented with a one application process. Property owners, many of whom are small property owners, stand at the ready to be able to assist. They have a lot of information that the tenants need and that the city needs in order to be able to make that happen. And so we want to work with city staff and the city to ensure a streamlined process and being able to make that happen so that we're able to get those funds to those in need . Thank you for your time and consideration. Thank you. Councilwoman Price. My question is really for staff. I know I've been talking about this for a long time with you guys. And I know there were some efforts, like kind of a summary. What are we doing? What have we done about the income level? That's something that I think our office has been very focused on and trying to expand and broaden that income level because we had a lot of landlords and residents in my district who were not eligible. So what have we done? What can we do? What are our limitations? And then the other question I would have is, I think a streamlined process is great, but our streamlined process is really just more of the application process. The requirements are still going to be what's required statewide, regardless of the type of form they have to fill out. We're not we're not able to eliminate any of those. Documents that are required. Is that correct? Well, thank you, Councilmember. I believe this motion will allow us to reach out to the state and Treasury Department to see if there's other mechanisms beyond what the current regulations allow in order to streamline the process. We've been having conversations with both entities to further push the the risk profile to be able to streamline the process. So we will continue that based upon your motion today. In terms of the area, median income, we they prescribed very detailed requirements, 30, 80% and 50% priorities. The charge was to start with 50% priority 50 and my priority then the 80, 80% and my priority. We've also modified that a bit to focus in on those that have potential risk exposure to eviction. So we've been moving that forward in terms of any adjustments. That's something that we would need to discuss with the the state and the federal government. Is the risk factors. Are those still tied to the income requirements? So there's no risk factors that would outweigh the threshold income requirement. That is correct. The risk profile is really based upon the the information and the type of information that we collect. We've been using the attestation process to help those that are requesting funding assistance. We've provided forms in multiple languages to be able to do that, and we keep pushing the envelope, I think. The vice mayor indicated the zip code. We've been pushing for the zip code here in Long Beach to be able to have an easier attestation process that goes along with the zip code in areas of need to be able to do that. So as far as the the income level, those haven't changed. And so we continue to review that and better understand what we can do to help those income allocations. Yeah, I think that's good and that's great and I appreciate everything you're doing. Obviously, we want to be trying to help as many people that are in need as possible. But the. The the fact that the risk factors there's no mechanism for the risk factors to alter that threshold level for aid is ridiculous. Because the whole point of this is to try to keep people housed and not. It's ridiculous. Not by your doing. I make that clear. You're limited to what the regulations require you to. But the whole point is to keep people housed and not on the street at a time like this. And if someone is at risk of losing their home and they happen to live in an area based on their income and the rent, that they're still going to be kicked out of their home, there's no alternative for them. There's no there's zero alternative for them. And I tell you, we get emails all the time from people who are at risk of losing their home and because of their income level, they're not eligible for any sort of aid. You know, I've got staff members calling around the property owners, begging them to open up properties at a lower cost so that people don't get evicted. And that's just it's ridiculous that the risk factors don't have some sort of mechanism to lower the threshold for people that are at higher risk regardless of their income. And I just don't know if there's any way around it. So it's really loud. Council Member There There isn't a way around the income level, but just in case anyone is listening, I would encourage people to apply. So what we are able to do with applicants in that situation. So if your prior income was over 80% and you know you would not qualify based on your tax return, we can still qualify that person, but we have to qualify that person. So if my income was at 200% of am I on my last tax return but it's fallen to zero and I can document that it's fallen to zero for a sustained period of time, that the more complicated application. But we may be able to qualify that person if a person's income used to be at a very high level and has fallen so much that they qualify for a different form of assistance, whether it's food assistance or any other form of government assistance because they've been qualified as low income under that other program, we can use that as a proxy to qualify them. So we are working on those cases that are more complex or difficult, but it's also because they are more complex and difficult. You know, they require hours of staff, time for one application and obviously we have thousands of pending applications. So we're doing everything, everything we can. But I think with this item, we're going to have some backing to talk to the state about, hopefully providing us some further flexibility. That's wonderful. Thank you. But I did not know that that option was available. So unfortunately, I may be routing some people over to you. So thank you. And Councilmember, one last thing. If nothing else, there may be a level of legal protection if they do apply, and we haven't been able to process them because of various levels. So we would encourage everybody that may or may not qualify, that may have a need to nevertheless submit their application to the city. We think that concludes public comment. And in the motion there is a motion and a second on the floor just just added. I obviously am very supportive of this. I think the streamlining is really critical. And I do want to thank Mr. Murdoch and our team. And you guys are working really, really hard on this topic for many, many months. And I appreciate the regular updates and I know how creative you're all you have all tried to to be and to get as many people support as possible. And I know that it's very we have a very complex regulatory and state system that we're working under. So thank you very much. And thank you to all all the folks involved in this proposal, particularly Vice Mayor Richardson and Councilwoman Allen and Councilwoman Linda has. Please cast your vote. Motion is carried.