Recommendation to request City Manager to work with the relevant departments, and all relevant outside agencies to consider the feasibility of developing an open space public park area and walking path along the San Gabriel River.
Thank you very much. Next item will be item 28. Item 28. Communication from Councilwoman Price. Councilwoman Mango. Recommendation to request City Manager to consider the feasibility of developing an open space public park area and walking path along the San Gabriel River. Thank you. Turn this over to Councilwoman. Among our custom on price. Well. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I'll go first and I'll turn it over to Councilor Mungo. So I want to thank my the people who cosigned on to this item. Councilman Mungo, I know she's going to have some words to share about this item. And I want to thank Assemblymember O'Donnell, because he has really been working with the Rivers and Mountains Conservancy and trying to identify ways that we can activate this public space through the use of possibly some city of some state dollars, not city dollars. And this is an area that borders three different districts. And right now there is a bike path for the major portion of the river. And the bike path is is the place that welcomes a lot of experienced riders. They often travel in large groups and they often travel fast, which is great, but it's not the ideal setting for a walking path. And so I'm hoping that with the support of the Council tonight, our city staff will be able to work collaboratively to enhance this public space and create some pedestrian access at the very least, and do so utilizing non city dollars through a partnership with the county and through support and some hopefully some resources from the state. So I would like to request our staff work on finding ways to identify what is feasible. What kind of community outreach might be required once funding is identified to make sure that the concerns of residents and also the interests of residents are captured in whatever project could come from outside funding to help with this particular vision. So with that, I'd ask for my council colleagues support. I do want to highlight a couple of things. This is public land that we're talking about, and it is not. There is no proposal whatsoever to use any city dollars to support this project down the road. It's just an ask for the city to work with the county and the state in identifying resources that I believe Assemblymember O'Donnell is already working on, not just for this particular area, but throughout his Assembly district. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Councilwoman. Thank you, Mayor. The area in question has been of significant debate on the east side for many years. I've hosted meetings at the apex of the three districts, and through the years we've had significant challenges in that. The area in each of our districts is very different. But it is a contiguous strip that has three different government agencies as landowners. Each of those government agencies has been open to leasing back that land, potentially as low as a dollar a year. But there has to be a plan and there has to be a plan based on what's possible. And we need to work together to figure out what that is and then reach out for the community input. Councilman Price continues to highlight that this would not cost city resources. It actually would be a city resource saver. Considerable resources continue to be necessary to modify and clean up the areas adjacent to these lands. These properties because of inappropriate uses. And so activation of this space has been something that the residents in my district have been requesting, but only within the last 90 days has the property become vacant because a tenant defaulted in a major way, not financially, but through multiple violations. So we are excited for this opportunity. It's something we've wanted for a long time. We've worked with the Economic Development Department for years on what would even be possible. We've worked with the City of Los Angeles, who it surprises people often that the city of Los Angeles is a landowner in the fifth District, so as a water district and the county of Los Angeles. So it is complicated. But when we have leadership from our state representative, Assemblymember O'Donnell, to really bring all the pieces together, and I will say, I also appreciate Senator Gonzalez, who has been a part of some of our community meetings on our side of town to discuss these issues. It really makes all the difference. And so with the opportunity of some of the additional funding that Governor Newsom has available and the championing of Assemblymember O'Donnell, this could really become a reality. And we need to be prepared for what that is. And we need to quickly put together feasibility of what's possible and then from there really identify what the community is interested in and how that could better support the city budget so that resources don't continue to have to be spent in cleaning up an area. Once we activate it, we believe it will keep itself clean. Thank you. Councilmember Durango. Thank you, Baron. I'm glad to hear that. So projects are taking place at the San Diego River, and we are, as you probably know, we have some projects that are being developed in the Lower Los Angeles River that also crosses three districts that are in development. And hopefully within a very short time, I can bring forward a presentation as to what's going on around the L.A. River. We also we think there's a lot of work to be done, and I'm hoping that I, too, can work with a similar our on council and Senator Gonzalez to bring much needed resources into that area as well. So thank you for bringing the focus on this onto the Tangi River as well. Thank. Thank you. Cats are a super supernova. Thank you. As was mentioned, this involves three districts. The fourth council district has a two mile border along the San Gabriel River. Unfortunately, I was not given a heads up on this item. I didn't learn about it until it appeared on the agenda eight days ago, so I didn't have the opportunity for public outreach. But that being said, we have a great deal of public input on this area at the southern end of the two mile stretch and five years of complaints of encampments and whatnot that are virtually impossible to address. So for that reason, unfortunately, I will not be supporting the item tonight. Thank you. Council member, Austin. Well, I think any time we have an opportunity to to develop longer are open spaces along our our rivers of law L.A. River, San Gabriel River. I think it's it's an opportunity we need to to explore. We need to look at in and if there is funding for, we definitely need to have a plan in place and champion. And so I commend Councilmember Price and Mongo for bringing this forward more. We cannot get enough of open space, green space that is actually programed in and for active use, even passive use in our city. And so I support this and I think this is also an opportunity for some of the the advocacy groups around river projects to to to jump on board with the projects on both sides of the city, east side and west side. Because I want to just say, I heard a lot a lot from people on the east side of the city regarding the projects going on. On my end of town, I think we're still one city and any opportunity we can get to expand open space is a good thing. So I support. Councilwoman Sara. Thank you, Mayor. I also just in general support turning any open land that's public to low impact recreational space. And I think that it's also in alignment with the state's effort to conserving 30% of our as well as federal goals to conserving 30% of our U.S. land and ocean by 2030. So I think this is just contributing to it. So I so that's kind of. What I think is. Yes, I support the item. Thank you. Thank you, Councilwoman Mongo. Thank you. I appreciate councilmember super nice comments. And I will say that I should have reached out and extended a hand. I will say, though, that when my encampment meeting started about five years ago, I was surprised. I had recently been elected and when I asked the community members that were not from my district who were on the other side of the street, if they spoke with their councilmember and this predates you, they said, no, we're represented by Councilman Price. Actually, when I was elected, didn't realize that our two districts touched, but they do in a certain area. And when I was touring the facility three weeks ago with L.A., DWP and community members, only community members from my district were there and DWP identified specifically the third district in mind. So I did not realize what part of that that is. And that was just an oversight or misinformation by L.A. DWP. No slight intended, but I appreciate your perspective. And of course, my community has also stated that they feel as though there's been no community outreach before this item was brought forward, but nothing could be further from the truth. Literally, the very first meeting since I was elected in 2014 included discussions of challenges with this area in our district. And so while the specific item in the way it is written today was not featured, it has been a topic of dozens of community meetings over the years, including our homeless meeting, our encampment meetings, our jerk cross jurisdictional meetings and the such. And I know that I recently reached out to a couple of or my chief has reached out to a couple of other chiefs of staff related to our upcoming homeless meeting where I know this will again pop up and of course anyone is invited as long as we don't have too many members to break Brown Act. Thank you. Thank you. I don't think there's any public comment on this. Correct. So we'll go ahead and go to a roll call vote. Councilwoman Sun has. I'm Catwoman, Ellen. Right. Councilwoman Price. I can swim and super now. They. Can swim and mango. Yes. Councilwoman Sara I. Councilmember Aranda. I know. All right. Vice Mayor Richardson. All right. First, John Kerry.