WITHDRAWN Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing and take the actions necessary to adopt the Fiscal Year 2015 budget as listed in Attachment A. (Citywide)
We're going to vote on on if the tonight's the first night the council is able to vote on any of the budget resolutions if if they would like. And on that, I'm going to turn this over to Mr. West so we can continue. I believe we're hearing also some from the port as well as financial management tonight. So. Mr. West. Yes, Mayor, council members tonight we're going to hear budget reports from the harbor. That's the director, John Slinger up. And then that'll be followed by our finance director giving the finance department report. John GROSS So, Mr. Slinger. You're up. Thank you. Good afternoon. Mayor Garcia and members of the city council. I'm John Slinger, chief executive of the harbor department. Pleased to be here. And with me is Steve Rubin, who is our head of finance and administration, as well as Noelle Hasegawa, who runs our trade and communications organization. I'd also like to introduce Samira Ashley, who. Serves on. Our. Government Relations group. Thank you very much for the opportunity to present the Harvard Department's fiscal year 2015 budget. We are proposing a budget of nearly $858,000,000 million for the coming year. Our proposed spending plan is down about 16% from last year's budget, and this is largely due to the pace of our capital spending, which has slowed slightly from the pace of last year's record capital program. Still, the proposed budget is among our biggest ever. Approximately two thirds of the budget is comprised of capital improvement programs. And to remain competitive, the Port of Long Beach needs to continually reinvest in major facility upgrades. Our capital program leads the U.S. port industry totaling more than $4 billion this decade alone. In the process, we're creating thousands of much needed jobs in Long Beach and throughout Southern California. This is a summary of how we spend or how we plan to fund our fiscal 2015 expenditures. There's five categories that I'm going to be going through in detail, slide by slide. The largest source of funding is our operating revenue, which comes from the leases and fees we charge for use of our facilities. We expect our operating revenues to remain on par with what we forecast for this year. Vessel operators are still struggling to rebound from the 28 recession. And this is especially true with the container cargo business that accounts for the majority of our revenue. Several major shipping lines are forming new alliances that could move calls from one port to another. These evolving conditions create both market uncertainty and potential opportunity for the harbor department. Based on these unknowns, however, we've made a very conservative forecast projecting flat revenue growth for fiscal 2015. Our second largest source of funding is NONOPERATING revenues. These are generally grants from state and federal agencies, and in the coming year, the largest grants will be for the ongoing construction of a replacement for the Gerald Desmond Bridge. Of the projected $1.3 billion total cost of the bridge project approx. Approximately 800 million will come from grants in the near future. We'll be hosting an event to celebrate the next major milestone of the bridge project, the construction of the foundation upon which the bridge will stand. It's going to be a very exciting event to host. Other remaining sources of funds. 53 million will come from the state. I'm sorry, from the sale of the last of the port own gantry trains. And with this transaction, all of the ship to shore cranes will be owned by our terminal operators throughout the port. In addition to help pay for our capital programs. We're planning to borrow $115 million through revenue bonds. Given our financial strength, we have maintained a Double-A credit rating, which is among the highest for U.S. ports. This comes from a disciplined approach to managing our finances. For example, we maintain more than 600 days of operating cash on hand at all times. We also maintain a minimum of a 2 to 1 revenue to debt ratio, which exceeds 1.25 to 1 ratio required by our bondholders. The final funding source of 52 million will come from our existing port fund balances. Now let me shift to our expenditures. Personnel services represent our staffing expenses. Non personnel is for our operations, interdepartmental charges, new equipment and the cash transfer to the Tidelands Fund. Then there's the repayment of our debt, followed by our largest cash outlay, our capital investments. I'll discuss each of these categories in detail as we go forward. But as you can see, we're spending about 16% less in total than last year, primarily due to reduced capital spending. And again, our capital outlay is far and away the biggest share of our budget, about two thirds of our total spending. This capital budget represents our ongoing commitment to investing in the future of our harbor department and the economic development of our city and the region. Currently, these projects support thousands of construction jobs, including employment for several hundred Long Beach residents. Regarding the Desmond Bridge replacement project this year. We've cleared the path for construction and now we commenced actual construction of the bridge bridge foundations. So we're very, very exciting that the bridge is actually starting to take shape. At Little Harbor. Some of the world's biggest and most technically advanced cranes are now being installed and tested. Phase one of this key project will go live next year in 2015. This project is creating the world's greenest terminal operation and is doubling its capacity and cutting emissions. By more than half. Among our other environmental projects are more shore power, plug in berths and community grants for air quality related improvements. Also in the coming year, we're taking delivery of two new fire boats, which are much bigger and more powerful to deal with today's largest ships being built. We're increasing our personnel services spending to satisfy step increases in negotiated salary increases. In addition, we're adding positions to support additional construction activity. We continue to expand our engineering staff with 20 more positions, and one of our key objectives is to reduce dependency on outside consultants to ensure that core knowledge is transferred to and retained by our team. We're also creating an in-house construction and maintenance dove team to reduce construction, construction and contracting costs. And we're adding security staff in large part to help with the traffic that has been been increasing around many of our construction sites. Our operating expenses. Are increasing to accommodate critical projects. Most of the spending is for maintenance of roads and utilities, but these costs also include $1.5 million to support the testing of a clean air barge under development as the alternative maritime maritime emissions control system. This this system. Hooks up to the exhaust stack of a ship which captures the exhaust, then cleans the emissions and effectively produces a near zero emission operation. If approved by state regulators, these barges could be deployed in the very near future, providing another way for us to eliminate emissions from vessels of birth and those vessels that otherwise can't have electrical ship to shore capabilities. We're also spending $1.8 million on the development of a hybrid electric truck system that will operate with overhead electric wires, which will allow zero emission truck operations within the port. And we're planning to spend nearly 1 million to support Long Beach's signature civic events, such as the Grand Prix, the municipal band, many festivals, parades, educational programs and other activities that make this city a true community. Our inter-departmental changes or charges, I'm sorry, are increasing by nearly 18%, largely reflecting the Harbor Department's share of various city operations. This includes the cost of a new city financial and information system. It also includes police services, which are up 3%, reflecting a recent reorganization, as well as fire services, which are up substantially to support the operations of the two new fire boats also are transferred to the Tidelands Tidelands Fund, which supports Beach and Marina projects, is estimated to be about $17 million and and it may be adjusted to reflect. Actual year end revenues. In summary, our proposed spending plan for the coming year is very robust, one of our biggest budgets ever. Because of the evolving alliances and competition among vessel operators, we're forecasting flat growth in operating revenues. But to gain a competitive edge. We're moving ahead with a very aggressive capital program, although a smaller investment than last year. We are proposing to add 28 positions in total, mainly in engineering and security, to support ongoing capital projects. Our spending continues to improve, and greenport operations in creating thousands of much needed jobs and economic activity in this region are really the focus of this budget. Finally, we are proud that the Port of Long Beach remains financially strong and we continue to work on making the port even stronger. That concludes my presentation and I will look forward to answering questions at the appropriate time. Thank you, Mr. Schlanger. Up. And now we're going to be moving on to financial management, and then we'll come back for questions. Director John GROSS. Thank you for them for the opportunity, mayor and Council members to present information about the Department of Financial Management. Many of the functions of this department are behind the scenes, but the functions are critical to the provision of services to our citizens. The title of the department describes many of its functions financial management the department helps plan for and helps set policy for how money will be both used and how it will be saved. Department tracks money in the department accounts for it. The department is also involved in identifying sources of money and in collecting money, and it has major roles in defining and implementing controls to make sure the money is properly managed and spent. Financial management also directs a number of important functions that are outside of traditional financial areas. And I'm going to talk about a number of core services that the department provides. Accounting, financial reporting, accounts payable, call bill paying and payroll or traditional finance areas. We have complex accounting requirements in the city. We're not only large, we also have unusual complexities due to our enterprise in grant operations. Payroll is also very complex because we have employees who work 24 hour shifts, over 500 types of pay, and about a hundred different types of payroll deductions. Financial planning and budget development and management are the flashiest part of the department and they are very important. Developing a good financial plan, having a financially sound budget and good budget management are all keys to long term provision of quality services for our citizens. Long Beach has over $1.5 billion in investments outstanding at any time and a $2.3 billion in outstanding debt issues. These are large portfolios for any city. The existing debt portfolio is complex and require significant ongoing management. But on top of managing the current portfolio, we are almost always working on at least one new debt issue or major financing issue. In addition, financial management not only makes many of the city's purchases, it monitors compliance with city requirements, as well as encouraging local businesses, minority and small businesses to participate in the city purchasing. The department registers businesses after ensuring that they have the necessary approvals and it collects the associated business licensing tax. Financial management also manages the entertainment process in the city, including hearings, review and revocations, financial management bills, and collects all utility bills, all parking citations, ambulance bills. We also handle delinquent bill collections. Financial management plays a role in the city's financial controls, in financial emergency preparedness, and in designing and maintaining the operations of the city's financial systems . Customer service is very important to us in this whole realm, whether we have internal customers or customers that are residents, businesses or visitors outside of the normal financial area. The department is responsible for fleet acquisitions, fleet maintenance and towing and line sales. With fleet operations part of the financial management department, there is substantial emphasis on financial aspects of these operations and a high degree of emphasis on customer service due to the department's inherent emphasis on customers and its independence from any department that uses fleet services. We have a number of accomplishments. I wanted to mention at least a few. Our annual financial report has received a national award for a number of years. This award by the Government Finance Officers Association is a nice recognition of quality accounting and reporting. Financial management has recently implemented the decentralization of accounts payable. Again, that's our bill paying process that decentralization improves controls and oversight improves efficiency, improves relations with vendors, and helps prepare for our new financial system. That part went through the Budget Office. It's constantly looking at revenues and revenue sources, both to project the amount we will receive and to identify revenue areas that may need to be addressed. However, in general, maximizing revenues is a massive undertaking and impacted by many factors. Our debt issuance function has done very well. We not only provide the city with financing for projects that may need complex finance funding, but we have saved millions of dollars in interest costs by finding ways for the city to take advantage of low interest rates on previously issued debt. The city also has a very good credit rating, an AA rating from the Fitch rating agency and similar ratings from other agencies. This is a testament to both the city's good practices and more importantly, an indication, as stated by the rating agencies themselves of good financial management decisions by the City Council. Over the years, the consistent, ongoing and successful installation of new major systems is another accomplishment, but it is also a source of some concern because of the major diversion that these system, major diversion of staff that these system implementations cause. The systems implemented or being implemented include utility billing, business licensing, parking, citation processing, fleet management systems, debt management and the citywide financial H.R. Systems. Whoops. Going in the wrong direction. In terms of our budget summary, the budget is $65 million, 241 full time equivalent positions, but two thirds of that budget and almost half staff are for fleet and towing operations. These operations charge for the services and the costs are reimbursed. The total general fund budget on the financial side is about $8 million. Budgeted costs for the department are higher than that, but other funds reimburse the general fund for services provided. Most of the significant changes in the department's budget are in fleet services. Spending for the city's fleet vehicles has been unusually low for the last few years. This year we are proposing an increase of 4.1 million to restore annual purchases to a normal level. To begin to keep the city's fleet reliable and cost effective. To maintain the funding comes from dedicated from a dedicated fleet acquisition account, not the general fund. The age of the fleet and repair costs have significantly increased over the last few years. This year we expect to replace 160 to 200 vehicles with this funding, including police patrol vehicles. In other words, our black and whites street sweepers refuse trucks and utility trucks. This is out of a fleet of about 1900 vehicles. The actual vehicles to be replaced will be identified based on a study now underway that will determine what vehicles to replace. And that determination will be what minimizes the city's overall cost with respect to those vehicles. We're also proposing some maintenance work on the Temple and Willow Fleet facilities building. This building has not had significant major maintenance since it was built about 15 years ago. The pros work on the heating system. Roof repairs and exterior painting and ceiling will help preserve the facility. Jeep's, more known as telematics in the fleet industry, will be put on all vehicles where there is benefit to the city. GPS systems have tremendously improved in capability and provide both real time and passive monitoring of the vehicle's health and driver and vehicle behavior. This is a best practices, best business practice and includes real time reporting of vehicle malfunctions, excessive idling vehicle location and poor and unsafe driving behavior. We're going to have about 1500 vehicles so equipped when we're done. Terms of significant issues and opportunities. We have a few big one being the new Financial Human Resources System project. It's a huge but necessary undertaking. The project will bring modern capabilities to our management systems and end the serious risk of major system problems in the future . This type of citywide system replacement is the single biggest computer project a city can undertake. These huge private projects can be problematic. It is the goal of this project to avoid major problems. Staff assigned to the project will need to be immersed in the implementation of the new systems to understand them at the most detailed level. And they will need to know the city's detailed processes and procedures to be able to design how the new systems will be configured and programed. In addition, many of the city's financial and human resources, processes and policies will need to be redesigned either because they are antiquated already or because they do not work efficiently, or sometimes even at all. With new systems, key staff will need to be dedicated to the project for an extended period of time. The impact will be felt most strongly beginning next year and for at least a year after that. While the goal of the project will be to minimize the impact as much as possible, the project will need to be a top priority for finance, human resources and the Technology Services Department. The Civic Center, if City Council chooses to move forward, is an extraordinarily complex financial transaction. It will also require a major effort. Labor negotiations over the next year will also occur and require substantial effort. As I previously mentioned, we're making changes in the way we determine which vehicles to replace and when we are conducting a study to improve our approach to vehicle replacements, not replacing vehicles too soon or too late, but rather at the point that minimizes total cost. At the same time, we are constantly working to make the fleet greener. Whether it is through the use of alternative fuels, fleet reduction or reducing the size of vehicles themselves to get better mileage. And I guess in conclusion, the department in all its operations, including Fleet, Fleet and Towing, has many dedicated employees. These are people who put a lot of effort into their jobs and have a desire to do a good job for the city and improve the city for its residents and businesses. Other departments, including the city auditor, have also had a substantial role in financial management and control and in budget development and management. They are all part of the citywide team that provides these financial services to the city and I very much want to express my appreciation for the work and dedication of the financial management employees and the employees throughout the city who work in similar functions. That concludes my presentation. Q We're going to begin with council questions and Mr. Off with Councilmember Price. Thank you. Mr. GROSS, first of all, thank you for all the work that you do for the city and all the insight that you give us on our budget. As we move ahead, I really appreciate it. I wanted to talk with you specifically about the $4.1 million, roughly $4.1 million one time adjustment for the Fleet Acquisition Fund . You mentioned that that money is coming from a Fleet acquisition fund, not the general fund. Is that correct? That is correct. And so does that mean that that $4.1 million is earmarked specifically and limited to use of fleet acquisition? Yes, it is. In one more comment. It really probably isn't one time. The the the Fleet Fund has had a ignore abnormally low expenditures last year. It would probably normally be our recommendation to spend around the amount you're seeing in this FY15 budget. We are very far behind. That is really just a normal level. And the Fleet Acquisition Fund, how is that fund created? The fleet acquisitions operation looks at each vehicle, identifies how long its that vehicle lasts and then charges let's say it lasts for five years. I'm simplifying things. That would be the case of a police vehicle. The police department has just basically charged one fifth of that cost each year so that in the fifth year the money has been accumulated. That's done for each department on a vehicle by vehicle basis. Thank you. Was that it comes from reprice or. Okay. Thank you. That's. Thank you, Councilmember Austin. Thank you very much. I just had a couple of questions. And first, I want to thank Mr. Slater up and Mr. GROSS for for their great reports. In last year's budget, a new bureau was actually created in financial management called financial controls. And Mr. GROSS, can you describe what this what role this bureau is currently providing for your department? Yes, this is a small bureau, has three FTE that is intended to generally improve financial controls and management in the city. Our financial controls and processes are not as good as they should be. That's something that became evident when I came to the city. The causes include antiquated financial systems in there and in the cities, and it's many. It's really a good thing, but it's a relentless focus on productivity and services to residents and cost cutting. Those are very good things. But what often happens in an organization is when you do that, you are unintentionally weakened controls. That has happened here and it's happened in innumerable other governments and organizations whenever budget cost cutting and efficiency improvements occur. So this this bureau is intended to help improve controls throughout the city. There are two specific areas that that we're going to be focusing on. The new financial systems, which will be a major effort and a major opportunity to improve controls. They will be this group will be focused on that next year and also on financial controls and processes in emergency situations. This is what happens in the event of an earthquake or something similar to that. That's an area in which our financial controls and processes really badly need work. So those are two areas of emphasis. Sometimes it's asked of me, Well, how is that operation different from our city auditor? And I describe it as a symbiotic relationship. They work in synergy. The Financial Controls Bureau does not do audits. The city auditor does audits. On the other hand, the city auditor does not develop financial controls and processes. And this financial control bureau, that is its primary function. So they work together to try to improve financial controls and management in the city. So let me answer your question. Yeah, that you quite you did. And I thank you for for going into detail. And this is the first time that I actually heard that we there was a symbiotic relationship between that bureau and the city auditor's office. So so thank you. So you you forecast that being a long term bureau or D, do you see yourself in the next couple of years reorganizing in any way? That's a good question. I think in the next I don't think in the next couple of years its focus will be on our financial system and the emergency financial control procedures. Those are the areas that most badly need the work on the financial systems because we're putting in brand new systems and this is the way, best and fastest way to improve controls. And as I said before, our emergency procedures badly need work. The Bureau will not go away. The need for improving controls and revising them is a pretty big task. What will happen, and I think what you're referring to is what it works on will change somewhat. They will move to different emphases. As time moves on, we get something improved. We will move to change it so that the effort, what they will work on specifically will change. The overall goals will not. Okay, I guess it sounds like it's working. I also noticed that the projected revenues from the business licenses is down from f y 13 and you're actually projecting lower revenues in FY 15. Do you have any explanations as to why we're experiencing such a downward trend in that that area revenues? We're not really expecting a downward trend in business revenues. I think what is happening is that we're doing extremely well this year and and that we're not necessarily suggesting that it's going to be that . Well, it could be. It could be as well next year. But there's been a change in the we don't expect a decrease. And then my last question, I guess, would be for the city manager, because it's just been something that has been bugging me. I notice that Fleet Services is under financial management. Can you explain why organizationally that is the case? Councilmember Fleet Services is in financial management in many organizations. It's also in public works. It recently was in public works. We basically took it took fleet services out of public works. Public purse was growing so much and wanted to have a little bit more control in operation. So we put it to finance under Mr. GROSS. We also have a brand new fleet manager, Mr. Dan Berlin, who's with us tonight as well. And he works in finance managing this Fleet Department. Thank you. Thank you, Councilmember Richardson. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And Mr. GROSS, thank you so much for that riveting presentation. I know I only have questions for Mr. Slager up. But I thank you for the presentation. Mr. Slinger up first of all, your PowerPoint was much more colorful, colorful than the others. And and so whatever you're doing, keep it up, because I was able to so pay attention to read the whole thing. I just want to I just wanted to chime in on one slide in particular, operating expenses. I noticed a couple of things, the clean air barges and and I know that's a program that that is it's new technology and it's taken us in the direction to have a zero emissions port. Can you expand on that? My question is, when can when, by your estimation, if we keep heading down this direction, investing, making investments like this, how soon can we say we'll have a zero emissions port as it relates to providing options for every single container ship that that comes in the Amex's? Service in the Amex. System. Is being tested and. Demonstrated as part of its commissioning and approval process. In other words, the the various regulators and in the city have to approve. I mean, in the state have to prove the viability of the system. An actual demonstration is occurring tomorrow morning, which is one of the final demonstrations that we're going to see before certification takes place. And once certification does take place. Then the the next effort is, of course, is going to be to purchase and and and build and then deploy numerous of these image systems across the port. Now, what it does specifically. Is that the technology itself and. This is this is a company that's been working on this for many, many years. But the technology itself in isolation is not new. These are known technologies. The what's what's been done that's. Unique is the integration of these various technologies into one. Comprehensive system that basically. Takes exhausts from diesel engines. And scrubs all of the bad pollutants out of it, basically delivering an inert exhaust. Free of things like NOx and Sox and all the bad things we want to eliminate out of emissions. It's like a gigantic catalytic converter on a car, rendering it very, very clean. In this case, more than half of the. Ships that visit the port do not have the the means to electrify their vessels and take advantage of of ship to shore electrical connections. And that's because these ships are infrequent. Visitors, but work or contracted by shippers, and therefore they have not. Or will not make the investment necessary to ship electrical plug in with this system with a assuming it's going to be certified. And we have. High. Confidence it will it will, in fact, change the the entire nature of our green program, because 100% of our ships at berth, as well as those that are being anchored offshore, could, in fact be subject to this type of technology. And therefore, we would have a dramatic impact on emissions profile for the port. And it's part of our objective for attaining the Air Resources Board. Standards for the next generation of clean emissions, and that's in 2023. So we've achieved all of this. We've achieved the 2014 attainment, and we're our eye now is on the 2023 attainment. So these are the types of technologies we're going to employ to do that very thing. I just want to applaud you in and just point out that it's really special that we in the near future will be able to see 100% of the ships that come and dock with us to take care of it, manage all of their emissions. I think that's impressive. And, and and I want to see that in future budgets, you continue to make these investments and to boards now and the community outreach you folks do a great job your team here and your your report does a great job with supporting the community festivals and things like that. I specifically want to call out the educational programs you guys have with your scholarships. Many folks might not know that you have a great scholarship program. That's something I'd like to see you expand in the future. Thank you. Thank you. Any other questions? Seeing them there. I mean. Any other council questions? Let me just say first also to our two presentations tonight, and I know this concludes all of our our presentations from our departments and that have come forward. So thank you all. You all done a great job of presenting and putting together a great budget and budget presentations. And so, Patt, also make sure you communicate to your staff that we're appreciative of all these discussions and a lot of exciting stuff happening across across the city department. So thank you for that. And with that, I'm going to turn this going back to I think Vice Mayor Lowenthal is going to make a few comments and then I'm going to open it up for public comment and then we'll begin some of the budget resolutions. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I wanted to go ahead and thank staff for their presentations and also really the finance staff for all the homework that they've done to support the BRC in their deliberation and consideration of these items. On on hearing item one. If we could take up council members the initial items, 1.1 to 1.9. These are administrative budget items, which also include the budget for harbor and and the water department. And if we can go ahead and take up the motion to adopt fiscal year 15 budget items 1.1 through 1.9. I want to make sure also, Mr. Schilling, I mean, I need to do public comment as well, so. That's correct. And if we could take the items. Individual, individual, please. Thank you. Absolutely. I appreciate that. We can do that. Vice Mayor. What I'm going to do is I'm going to go to public comment, but did you want to make a few more comments in the public comment? I do. So we'll go ahead and take them individually after our comments. So the Budget Oversight Committee has met a few times in the start of this budget process, and I wanted to thank all the members of the community that's come out to speak on these items. We've heard community priorities from public safety, which is always a community priority. We've heard priorities for park rangers, we've heard priorities for language access. And earlier in the Budget Oversight Committee, the recommendation was to receive and file the staff recommendation for language access, which I believe amounts to just over $149,000. However, in further consideration, I will be making an amended motion and hoping to receive support to find an additional $100,000 for language access. In order to bring that up to a rough estimate of about $250,000, I just wanted to provide that caveat because I know just about an hour and a half ago, we left the meeting with a different with a different motion, and that is the box motion. But we will make it in an amended motion here and hope to receive support from the Council on the Park Rangers item. I do believe each council member supports the concept of greater security at parks, but when we consider what council members have have spoken to and supported, we we would like to support greater security through our police department. Our police department does a phenomenal job here in the city of Long Beach. And what we would like to do is ensure that the parks are really considered as part of their their territory as well to provide greater public safety for our residents and our visitors. The Parks Department director has provided us an update on his park security program, the pilot program, we we believe, through Budget Oversight Committee, and will make this recommendation, certainly to give that program an opportunity to be successful, to launch initially and then be successful. And we'll also make a recommendation to shift the cost center of the park rangers to police so that they are reporting to police as opposed to a non sworn director of Parks Recreation Marine, which he's a fabulous director, but we don't know that park rangers should be reporting to them. And so our recommendation is not to expand the park ranger program, but it will be at the time that we make the recommendation, certainly will be to ensure that the cost center of our existing park rangers get shifted to police and that we would support the Director of Parks, Recreation and Marine in his proposal for the pilot security program. And those are the comments I have for right now, Mr. Mayor, and I'll wait for the remainder comments when we make the motions. Okay. So what we do now is open up for public comment on on the budget and then we will begin going through all the different I believe there's a total of 16 resolutions that we have to go through tonight. So public comment, please come forward if there's a comment. Okay. See, see? No public comment. You can do that through the circles of the. Oh, I'm sorry. I just. I know. Sorry about. That. No problem. It's okay. Good evening, Mr. Mayor. Members of the Council. My name is Renee Castro, and I live at 6.6 Grand Avenue in the third district. I just want to start by thanking Councilmember or Vice Mayor Susilo at all who contributed another $100,000 to the language access policy. I mean, that's incredible. It's it's an incredible sign. There's been a lot of community engagement on this. We've been doing large visits with you, Mr. Mayor, members of the council. It's it's been an incredible discussion. I really also want to appreciate staff's work on this. I do, though, along with the coalition, really want to emphasize that, you know, to fund the full policy, again, is 360,000. There would be 150 plus the 209,000. I feel like the full policy is 1.2 million, as you all know. And, you know, we continue to talk about costs. But, I mean, there's there's really efficiencies that we could create when we focus on greater language access and democratic engagement. And I'm not smart enough to do those to do that kind of analysis. But, you know, hopefully at some point we can continue to talk about efficiencies. I think this is just a really unique opportunity for the council. And you, Mr. Mayor, in your in your first term, what I hope is your first term, you know, to really demonstrate some bold leadership. I realize it's it's a tough ask right now, especially for one time funds. But again, we really plead with the council and you, Mr. Mayor, to thank you so much. A couple of weeks ago, you lifted the cap and you said, I think this is reasonable. $360,000 to support people who are monolingual like yourself. Mr. Mayor, growing up in this city, I think I think is a is a reasonable investment. And I thank you so much for your leadership. I think this is a great start. But tonight, again, we're hoping that the council supports us with the full 360,000. Thank you so much. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hello. My name's Madison with the Long Beach Immigrant Rights Coalition and the Language Access Coalition. And just to add to what our partner Vinny said, while we appreciate the potential over 100,000 added to the already 150 allocated, we do want to reiterate why this additional money of 10 to 210000 is important. There have been some issues raised at the B or C, but we would like to address the importance of, again, the translation of documents that 30,000 documents translated into garlic for documents that already exist in Spanish for an additional 7000 automated voice mails in languages in three languages at 1000 907,000, the translation of 25 most commonly used web pages. The training of staff acting as interpreters at 56,000. The notice of policy for the use of outreach for the community at 13 K. And then the use of a citywide language learning not just public works at 50 K. So again, while we appreciate the work that has been done. We do feel it's important to fully implement this policy at the 210,000 key that we ask for to have a real meaningful startup up for our community. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening. My name's Laura Merrifield. I'm with Building Healthy Communities Long Beach. I wanted to I wanted to say that if it feels like there's a lot of numbers that have been going around, it's because there are a lot of different numbers that are going around. And part of that is the hard work, right, both on our staff side, on us as advocates looking at these different reports. And so, you know, I know it's been just a lot that's been floating around. And just one thing I did want to just reiterate is that the last week council directed staff to look at something beyond, you know, to look at additional funding without a cap. And so I really appreciate the additional 100,000 suggested. And that brings us very close to what we've been asking for, which is, as Rene said, you know, about 360,000 in total. So we're really only asking now 100, 110 above those basic recommendations. And, you know, it's taken us a long time to get here and those numbers keep moving. But we know that the more resources we have, we can really fund this policy. You know, we're asking for additional telephonic lines, not just I believe it'd be about 67 covered under these new recommendations. We want to make sure that, you know, we have 25 Web pages, not just ten. We want to do this in full and not just our as full as we can with the resources we have. Council Member Mungo earlier mentioned a potential 311 line to direct phone calls, which we think is a great idea. But again, that phone line only is as useful as the language access behind it once people are referred. And so we just want to be very clear, you know, that we're here. We're going to we really we feel like we've made some compromises, but we're here to ask for full funding at 360,000 and to consider that funding from these one time oil revenues and other sources. Thank you. Thank you so much. Next speaker, please. Good evening. My name is Jonathan McGregor. I live at nine four Redondo Avenue, and I'm here with Alex in Long Beach. First, we want to thank you, Mayor Garcia, for a meeting with those earlier today. We are hopeful. City Council follows your lead. And addresses their concerns. Remain hopeful that we will be able to. Work together to find meaningful and comprehensive solutions to the housing crisis here in Long Beach. At the same. Time, this budget process has been a frustrating. One for community members who have come in support. Of affordable housing and the use of and funds housing. Long Beach Staff Board and resident leaders. Have attended every public budget meeting to date and have received no recognition. Or support from the City Council regarding their concerns. A basic tenet of healthy democracy is open dialog between the people and their leaders when they go out to talk to my neighbors and friends to encourage them to engage in the local democratic process. Time after time I hear from them. That is a waste of time and why. Vote when nothing changes? But I still go out and we still attend these meetings and stay late. Stay late to express their concerns, because we believe that the only way to find meaningful solutions is by working together. We house in Long Beach and the residents who make up our community base. Understand that the budgets are difficult and that they're allocating. The property tax. Revenues to housing can be a. Politically challenging task. However, for the past weeks we have felt ignored and began. To understand why people must feel discouraged to share their concerns at city council meetings. See, it is not simply the lack of support on this issue, but the silence. The silence from. You. Earlier. That concerns us. The silence and lack of support is not something we expect. It's something we expect from a city council members. Your obligation as city council members is to address residents and their concerns. We share this because we still very much desire to have a healthy working relationship with you. Beyond government. There will be many opportunities that we will have to work together to increase affordable housing and improve the stock of existing housing. Healthy working relationships are building respect and communication, and our desire from here on out is to build this with you. We do this work because we know that housing has a significant impact on the wellbeing of self, in the experiences of families across our city struggling to provide for their families and have a healthy life. If we make housing a priority, we can work together to alleviate the housing crisis in our city. Thank you so much. And we look forward to working with all of you. Thank you. Won't you hold up right there one sec. I wanted to say something to you guys real quick, so I know that you guys have been here for for many weeks and others that are that are in the audience as well. And I appreciate the meeting that I had today and that we've had continuously. So what I just want to say to all of you is I'm fairly certain in my conversations with other members of this council that everyone understands that affordable housing and the discussion around it is important and that we're going to have. And so what I would say is I know that even though we've been in office for a short amount of time or most of us, you've all been advocating for a very long time, longer than most of us have been on the council. And so I understand that frustration. But I will say that we think collectively and I speak, I think, for for for the council. And if not, a people can chime in. We understand there's a there's a need. And over the next few months, I personally plan to engage on discussions. I know others will as well. There's a lot of opportunity at the state level, next year's budget discussions that we're going to have about this issue. And the issue is much broader than $2.5 million, $2.5 million is going to build this. How many units? A handful of new units. The the issue is a much larger issue if we're really going to look at building significant amounts of affordable housing at all levels, low income workforce, we've talked about teacher housing, all the other things that are out there that's going to take a lot of heavy lifting from from all of you, but also from us. And I think I think we have we hear that this is a budget that is being implemented not just by us, but being recommended also by by a former body. And so I think that I'll just say we're doing the best we can with what we have. But I think this is this discussion is going to be elevated. And so you have my commitment. I'm not I don't I haven't been announcing, you know, initiatives or things that are important just to throw them out there. But they are going to be discussed in a meaningful way. And I think at the end of the next year, you're going to see significant progress in the discussion. Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Any other public comment? Okay. So I'm going to go ahead and turn this back over to Councilmember Price. I apologize. I hit that. Oh. Okay. Councilmember Gonzalez. I just wanted to I just wanted to say thank you to the housing advocates. I know you guys have worked so hard. And like the mayor said, you know, we we certainly all agree that, you know, this is certainly important. And I know that our office has been working with other organizations like Habitat for Humanity in obtaining, you know, affordable housing. So this is still going to continue on our radar. It's one of our priorities, the fact that it's not the amount, you know, that we we can we can do now. Does it mean that it's fallen off the radar? So I also assure you that will be committed to this as well. Okay. And with that, I'm going to go and turn this over to two to walk us through some of the items and trips over to the bossy chair to go over the budget resolution items. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And I, too, want to thank the Housing Coalition for their advocacy and firmly believe in what the mayor is saying about us having a larger conversation, a citywide conversation about the need for housing. And I'm thankful that you mentioned that tonight and made that commitment on our behalf. I do appreciate that. Mr. City Attorney, you'd like to see us go through items 1.1 through 1.9 individually, correct? That is correct. Okay. So council members, if. If I may, item 1.1, I move to recommend to adopt resolution approving the fiscal year 15 budget for the Long Beach Harbor Department as adopted by the Board of Harbor Commissioners on July 14, 2014.