Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing and take the actions necessary to adopt the Fiscal Year 2017 budget as listed in Attachment A.  (Citywide)
Great. Thank you so much. We are now going to move into the hour items which are our budget continuation, the budget hearing. We have a variety of budget items. Once you get past the budget hearing, then we're going to go into the council agenda. There's probably a few of you for some of those items from the council agenda, but those will wait till after the budget is passed. To do this, what we're going to do is I'm opening up the hearing. I'm going to take all the public comment, any additional public comment that maybe we have not heard up to this point. And then from there, I'll turn this over to the chair of the Budget Oversight Committee to go through a variety of of items that she's going to have to go through. So at this time, if we can just take all or any public comment that want that want to be address in regards to the budget. Now would be the time. Am I seeing? No public comment on the budget. Okay, here we come. We figured there'd be about 2 hours of you guys talking, so he turned it on us. Good evening, Mayor Garcia, Vice Mayor Richardson, council members. My name is Margaret Smith. I am a resident of the third district and I am speaking tonight, as I did earlier at the BBC as a representative of the Long Beach Public Library Foundation, which most recently has raised over $1,000,000 for the new Michelle Obama Neighborhood Library. Thank you. We couldn't have done it without all of you, especially Vice Mayor Rex Richardson. But on behalf of library supporters and users throughout the city, we are extremely grateful for this budget, which includes measure a funds for infrastructure improvements to five libraries , one time funds to continue sun hours at three branch libraries. And we are also very grateful that it also includes a recommendation for an additional $65,000 to fund sun hours at the fourth Branch Library in Long Beach, El Dorado. Sun hours are a critically important time for a lot of people. In fact, for some people, the only time that working parents and school age children can share a library visit together. In fact, Sunday hours are important for a lot of people in this city who work or otherwise occupied between Monday and Saturday. Sunday is an important investment. It has immediate benefits to many people throughout the city. In fact, on Saturday at the Michelle Obama Neighborhood Library opening. Mayor Garcia, you emphasized the importance of providing library access to everyone in our community. Access to technology and education and jobs and information and culture. And unfortunately for some people in our city, a safe place just to be. Sunday hours are about that kind of access. And so we thank you, Mayor Garcia, for your continued support of libraries. We especially want to thank Council member Susie Price for initiating the pilot program for Sunday hours and for continuing to support the expansion of Sunday hours at other branches. And we thank all of the council members for considering this additional funds of $65,000 for a fourth branch library. And we hope that in future budget discussions, there will be an opportunity to fund Sunday hours for every single library in Long Beach. In this information age, libraries are more important than ever to everyone every day of the week. Thank you. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. Share your thoughts. And Consultants Form Group and Associates 2007, the city entered into, I believe, what was a statewide, if not countrywide resolution to end homelessness in the year 2007. As of to date, we are at a deficit. Council members. We have a new mayor now. When God told me that you were going to be mayor in 2006, I didn't even know if you had considered to run, but God showed me that you would be the mayor and here we are. So I know that I have arrived at this moment, both in spirit and in person. In his will, as I address this issue. Next year, you will be at a deficit. You will not have met your objective, although you might have received millions of dollars from the federal government to end homelessness by the year 2017. You have not met that objective contrary, and in spite of that, you're giving many of your employees raises. And I'm not going to argue that right now, but you're in arrears and you had a client here with her, her her crippled son, who needed you to meet that objective this year. Gina, your new Rex, your new Al, your new but a host of us, we've been here meeting about this issue since 2012 is when I showed up on this assignment. You are in arrears. To have met this objective. And there's no one in line to applaud you for having met this goal. Think about how many goals you have met for which you have been applauded and commended. But you've not met this one. That should have been at your top of your agenda. The homeless needed you seven years ago and you did not meet that objective. Now I'm a fast forward. This is how God works. First he talks to your conscience. This is how you learn to hear his voice. When you follow his conscience. When you don't follow your conscience, then he sends a person when you don't listen to the person. Then he starts letting walls fall down. Ocean start opening. And you are without any assistance. So we're in we in this warning process. He sent ten signs to Farrow before he dumped him in his chariots and in soldiers. In the deep. In the Red Sea. You may not get no. Other warning if you don't put this at the top of your agenda because you have not met it and you cannot be commended in this regard. You stand guilty and I may be the last warning you get. Thank you, Mr. Assad. Next speaker, please. Good evening. And Cantrell. And maybe the reason you didn't have a lot of people come rushing down to talk is that many of us have not heard the recommendations of the Budget Oversight Committee. That's what we want to talk about, is what those recommendations are and whether we want you to approve or disapprove of it. I missed the beginning of the Budget Oversight Committee, but I understand that there was a recommendation to take the $500,000 from Measure A and the $500,000 of the budget surplus. Out of the giving it to the pool. And I'm not sure what is going on. We need to have information before we can discuss this. May I reserve my comments until after the Budget Oversight Committee recommendations are made? This is the public. The public comment period. So there was no objection to that. So we're we're doing a public comment period. Mr.. Mr.. Parkin. I think all the public comment period right now, ma'am. Thank you. Will there be public comment period after the motion is. As follows. Robert's Rules of Order. Well, we checked this with the city attorney. We're going to one public comment, period. Is there any change to the city attorney? It would be up to the chair to allow additional public comment. This is the public comment period that the mayor's designated for the budget. Well. Isn't there supposed to be public comment on a motion? There's supposed to be public comment on the agenda item. And today the agenda item is the budget. And so that is the commentary. And it's a continuation of obviously of a hearing we've had multiple times. And so that's just the process. So please continue. Well, I am opposed to taking measure a money or budget surplus money for the pool. And I'm also I've never gotten my questions answered about what parks are receiving artificial turf and the cost in the budget is $2 million. I'm wanting to know if that's new money or if that is the money that was approved in the 2014 and 2015 budgets and which parks are receiving this money. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hi. I'm Laura Spinner. I'm a second district resident and also a member of the friends of the Long Beach Municipal Band. And first, I want to start out by again thanking all of you for partnering with us to bring the six week of concerts this last summer. And also want to applaud and thank Mayor Garcia for recommending six weeks of concerts for this next summer in 2017. In the 25 years that I've been attending band concerts, it's been an amazing thing to watch grow because right now many of you know that the band is servicing over 10,000 people per week at the concerts, and I think it's now up to seven different districts that are being serviced. And I know that many people would like to see all the districts serviced. And I know we. Heard from Dee Andrews last. Week and Rex Richardson, and that is so encouraging. I think that we are all very positive about that. We would love to see more band concerts. Everybody wants more. We want to see 20,000 people. And all these things I'm sure. Are achievable over the course of many years. What I would like to say is our friends. Group, we are very committed to continuing to work with the city and work with partners of parks and work with Parks, Recreation, Marine to help continue to support the band. And we would be happy to to be on a committee and discuss about how perhaps we can continue to increase the number. Of concerts so that we can get to all the different districts. At the same time, understanding the proposals. Of trying to move it. From six weeks to eight weeks and move it all around, I think I'd have to agree with what Miss Price said during the B or C, that it's a little bit complicated to try to figure that out for the next year. But having said that, please let us all continue the discussions with Parks and Rec and the conductor and all of us to try to figure out how. We can continue to bring concerts. To more and more areas of the city. So that's all I wanted to say. Appreciate it. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Mr. Mayor and members of the Council. My name is Sandra Krall. I live on Atherton Street in the third District, and I hadn't planned to speak at all tonight and accept that there have been things talked about and things that are in the budget. I know that. Take me back over the last 14 years that I've been working on issues of homelessness and affordable housing. What I want to say is that my spirit is really lifted these days and not so much by the specifics of the plan, because I've not paid that much attention to that. But I know there are there is money going there, but it's the spirit and the tone of the discussion that I'm finding so encouraging. We are now looking at what we can. Do. For the homeless instead of. What we should do to the homeless. And that makes me very, very happy. I've been involved in this since somebody referred to the ten year plan for the to end homelessness. I've been involved in that. Some of the people who were involved in writing that plan, which was published six years ago, are no longer among us. They have gone on to a better life someplace that we can't quite specify, but I know they would be happy to see. Finally, the council is. Aware and most of you are new to the council since those days, but you have an awareness that this plan exists and possibly something will come out of it. There's lots of stuff in that plan and nobody expects absolutely everything that happened. But I hope you do look at it very closely and find the things that are possible in this day and age and onward and upward. Thank you. Thank you so much. Next speaker. Thank you, Mayor Garcia and honorable mayor and members of the Council. As I'm beginning to speak, I would like to ask all the rental housing owners who are here in the audience tonight to stand. Please. Honorable mayor and members of the council. My name is Elaine Hutchison. I come to you as an property owner in Long Beach, but also with many of my fellow owners and as a member of better housing for Long Beach. I want to especially thanks Stacie Mongeau, the chair of the Budget Oversight Committee and the committee members for their support of the rental community in curbing rate hikes in inspectors in the city of Long Beach. The pier up is now is new and we support waiting to have the full data on the rental communities across the city before making any adjustments. Thank you for helping us let the process play out, including the focus on slumlords. Thank you very, very kindly. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Carolyn Burns. I live in the second district. At first and Falcon and I'm. Here and I know. You can't parcel things out of the budget. You've cobbled it all together and each. Department has worked very hard at putting the budget together and sharing it with all of the districts in the city. However, I. Protest the budget for the water. Department and I protested on the grounds of. Proposal. Prop 218, which states that. A utility in the state of California. Cannot raise the rates unless they can justify that an increase in rates is necessary due to a shortfall. In their budget. Period. Unfortunately, it's come. To my attention and that of several others. That. There has been a very. Large quantity of money. $10 million that has moved from the water. Department to the city Department. Of Revenue. For some reason, that number doesn't even show up on the income part of the statement for the budget. I don't know how that can be. Maybe someone can. Explain it to me some. But I'm also honored to speak to the people who. Are watching at home, because this budget item has not gotten very much attention. But maybe you're the silent ones at home that would like to come out. You'd like to speak out, and maybe you can call your council. Person, or maybe you can send an email. But it's been my understanding that only. 14 people. Have communicated with the water department about this issue. And four. People attended one. Public meeting. There were four public meetings. So I invite everyone to take the risk and come out. People do listen. People are being polite and is being heard. And I would like to have the oversight committee guide. The. Council would like to have the council guide the council that it would be in the city's best interest not to follow a precedent that Burbank and Fullerton have followed in which their citizens. Had rebates. Once the water budget was really analyzed. It would be best not to go down that road. And so I strongly encourage that type of activity within it. At the very least, the water department and I thank you once again. Thank you so much. Next speaker, please. Yes. My name is Josh Butler. Executive director. For housing Long Beach. And I guess renters and landlords tonight also have. In common the color red. As our folks are hearing. Red tonight as well. Everybody can just where we don't need to stand up and take that kind of time. Thanks. The city of Long Beach. A majority of our city rents. 58%. And that number is on the rise within with more units being put online here in the city of Long Beach, especially in downtown. So we need to make sure that we have a robust. Inspection program where we'd like to see improvements to our current inspection program, not expanding the program to meet the needs of Long Beach renters who are living in increasingly aging housing stock would be a failure. This is a community health issue. We have a tenant. Here tonight who has a. Section eight tenant. She could not speak. She had to go. She's going to likely lose. Her Section eight housing because of deplorable conditions that are being kept by that landlord. She's been cited by our program. But when. Housing authority went to do their inspection. Those. Violations were not fixed. They told her that she's going to. Have to very. Likely relocate. We also had something here tonight from the Department of Family and Children's Services. He also could not speak tonight, but. He's going to be speaking in. Soon. He's at a point where he's going to have to break. Up a family and take. Kids out because the families. Living in such deplorable conditions and they can't get the landlord to fix those things. So we have a serious problem. And that's just the tip of the iceberg as we know that many. Residents are fearful of even speaking out or saying anything or reporting problems for fear of retaliation. If they speak out, their landlord can hold over their head an eviction, a rent increase, and oftentimes they do. So we need a program. This is a great this is a great. Start to have a. Program that we can point to. It'd be nice to. Increase the opportunities. For tenants to feel like they. Can call that program without fear of retaliation. We're hopeful we have that conversation. But for the right for right now, to not move forward with this program would be an error. And so we encourage the council to adopt the recommendations made by the Department of Talent Services, and we look forward to improving and expanding the program. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hi. I want to. Address the budget issues around the Belmont Plaza pool. First of all, like Ms.. Cantrell, I was just informed that about $1,000,000. Half of it. And general funds. The other half in Missouri funds are now not going to be directed toward the pool, which I think, as I learned by going to four budget meetings in one week, is a is a really good way to make difficult choices. So I think that's good that that makes you feel like maybe somebody is actually. Thinking and being open to change. So while you're at it, there's another million dollars going to the pool from the Tidelands Oil Fund. It's in 518. Hard to find on that thing. It's a tiny little triangle, but it doesn't have to have a description of what what it is or when it is, because it's not for 17 , it's 18. So why? Why is it even bad now to spend our tidelands money? Why? Because it's a money pit. One location. Because the Belmont Pool Project is to be built on sand at sea level. And projected sea level rise must be calculated into the design. It will be constructed on top of a seven foot high cement base. I have it from a member of the committee that the base alone will cost $500,000. It has plumbing in it, though. Still, there is other possible sites able to receive Thailand. Fund moneys that would. Not be on sand. And so you don't have to spend half of the budget on a seven foot high piece of cement size. It is not a replacement for the old pool complex, as people like to say. It will not have one but two Olympic size pools, a diving tower and a diving pool. Others smaller pools. And a restaurant. A good community pool. Again, 10 to 12 million for community pools could be built for the cost of the base that block of cement time. Due to falling oil prices, the Tidelands Fund has not provided the income that was expected. The savings set aside are not keeping up with the projected four plus million dollar cost increase. In reality, we have. Less funding every year, so I'm here. Strictly on a budget related matter to say why. Not? As long as you're at it, take that million dollars out of Thailand's. You could hire a. Couple of lifeguards. Then maybe those kids you honored last last couple of weeks, you know, you wouldn't have to count on them. You know, they were only there that day because the wind came up. Spend it on lifeguards and better yet, swimming lessons. Then you wouldn't need so many lifeguards. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Vice Mayor, an honorable council members. My name is Matt Barnett. My address is on record for ID. I am also serving as the president of the Eldorado Park South Neighborhood Association. I want to echo my comments I made earlier in front of the Budget Oversight Committee to fully support the Budget Oversight Committees recommendation to increase funding for homeless services and the Neighborhood Safety Campaign Program. And additionally, I want to provide my input on a conversation that was had during that committee meeting on using Prop eight fund for other purposes. When the campaign was kicked off, many of you sent out fliers showing exactly which streets would be repaired. And I want to make sure that we stay true to that promise as a city, to make sure that we are always repairing our streets, that if that's what the campaign said, we would do. The fifth District has the most streets and the most sidewalks of any other district, and some of the streets are often damaged by large trees and need constant repair. I use my Long Beach job whenever I can to repair any potholes or sidewalks. But the plan for Prop eight as it was presented to the voters was very clear on which streets would be repaired. And I want to make sure that we stick to that. Thank you. Thank you. Any other public comment? Please come forward. Okay, guys. So let's go to the lineup. If there's any more public comment, please come forward. Mr. Good Hugh Laurie, good to you. CLARKE As he dressed like a number of other people, I want to repeat because of the import of what I had mentioned at the budget hearing . And let me start with the. This situation you face is in large measure of your making. You made a choice to urinate away near $9 million. On this build on a. Replacement building here. Excuse me, $90 million on the replacement of this building, which, if my information is correct, you were told face no imminent danger. Though the elevators should be replaced. On the pool. Its design. I'm not a swimmer, but I would. I'm hopeful the city will rely on those who are. Well skilled in designing and using such pool pools. But as I. Pointed out. Last week. Also to think of it just as a pool is. Rather parochial thinking and the playing the. Race card really doesn't serve the public well. There's a full. List. I read them off and I'll read them off again. Bike paddling. Board paddling. Stand up paddling. Canoeing. Kayak surfing. Kayaking. Outrigger outrigger canoes. Sailing, windsurfing, even skinny dipping. And watching. The sail with the submarine races are a whole variety. Of things. That are not available in other parts. Of the city, period. Again, it's design. I would leave to. Those people that are skilled in that and it would. Be an outstanding facility for people that want. To be another Michael Phelps or Patty McCormack. I personally am not that enthralled about swimming, but if you come down and swim, get your butt out of there and avail yourself when you're finished are the full range of other. Activities you can have in terms of an overarching position relative to the budget in an ad hoc, unrelated conversation. Our city attorney. Seemed to have opined to me that he seems to think that the price of oil will soon reach $300 per barrel. So I don't think the financial situation is as dire as people projected to be. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hi. My name is Roman. I'm from District five. Um, I am like, to compliment the mayor or someone named Daniel. I don't know what he looks like, but he has. He said that one of the best things to do is to get people together and sign documents. In the more people I get, the better off, the easier it's going to be to get some of the stuff that we want. So, um, I've been in communication with my district office and went through some of the neighborhoods with some of the others. And I've got about, this is just one set of about 500 signatures and it basically says that we want to have our parks fully watered. We got we're only watering about 80%. And so it's asking for more money that we have not budgeted currently. So, um, this is just one package of about six or eight more. So there's about 3000, maybe more or less of how many people I just got these documents from some of the block captains today. So, I mean, it's here. We're we're wanting to have that. We're also asking for the there is $1.7 million that have been, we believe, been allocated for artificial soccer fields. And we want to keep that money, even though we're not going to use it for for artificial turf. We want to keep all of that money for District five and not give any of it to the seaside park or to the admiral kit. That's what we're asking for, and we're going to keep pushing for that. Also, this document doesn't have that. But but Marie has asked for more bands to go from 6 to 8 weeks. District five has been pushing for that for a long time. And I understand. Ms.. Price doesn't quite understand things. It's more convoluted, but I think that if she looks at it more closely, she'll see that it's a very sound plan and it's something that we support. I'm going to continue to try to get more money or not more money more more people to sign this thing. We've got about 3000. My goal is to top about 5000 to make sure we go over the top. That's pretty much what I think Daniel said. So I'm going to keep going. That's about it. I thank you for your time and I'm going to give my time to someone else, whoever's got it. But I appreciate you listening to me and we're going to keep pushing for that. It's going to be even stronger because we need to get more signatures from District five. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening. Honorable mayor and council members. My name is Maria Lopez. I live in the first district. My address is on file. I'm here to support proposal for more funding as well as more code enforcement for our communities. But I have to say that efforts to weaken program, this program, especially from districts that don't have high numbers of renters, would be selling out our single mothers, our communities of color. But especially our low income communities. There are many communities where we see more problems. Especially slumlord problems, old housing stock, as well as our residents being taken advantage of because they don't know their rights because they have a language barrier or because they have children that they have to fend for. And so they don't put up a fight because their children need to go to school tomorrow and their children need a place to sleep. So, P.S., please remember, don't sell out our communities. We all deserve inadequate. Housing in the city we love. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening to the ladies and gentlemen of the council member. My name is Harriet Lawless. I live in 4109 Massachusetts Long Beach. I have been a resident of Long Beach since 1970. I bought my first property, then unit apartment in 1978. The experience that I have gotten over the years. I own steel, a few properties. Is that an investor or a property owner who is going at today's market, invest two $300,000 for eight or ten years in an apartment. He's not going to let it go down or, you know, become a slumlord. There is some slumlord I dealt on the west side of Long Beach back in the eighties. Yeah, there are few, but I think there are very few. I look at my property tax bill and a lot of things think one thing that many tenants do not realize is that the property bears unified school, district taxes, community college, and every time that there is fees against the property, the rent is going to be going up. So if you really I mean, there is a department in Long Beach. If a tenant has a problem with a slum landlord with an issues with their you know, with a unit, you can always call the department and, you know, there is a person or an inspector goes and inspect the property. Over my 35 years of owning your property, I had one time a tenant who moved out after he messed up the apartment, who called the city. And they come out and, you know, we have a nice talk. And I explained to him what was going on and the damage that was done. So by creating another department and hiring more inspectors and go in and knock doors, eventually you're going to be imposing fees against the property owners, which we're going to be passing to the tenant. So before you know what basically you're trying to do or try to accomplish, helping tenants is, you know, is going to be backfiring. It's not going to be helping them because property taxes, unified school district, everything goes on the property and the rents are going to be going up. So that's another view that I want you to take a look or see before you make a decision. You know, hiring more inspectors and spending more money. Thank you very much. Thank you. Seeing no other public comment, I'm going to close public comment period for the budget hearing. Okay. I'm going to go ahead and close that for the budget hearing. Thank you. So we're going now transition on to the budget. We just need a minute to go over the order. Just give us one sec, because there's a series of votes that have to start. So we'll just resume on that in just a minute. Okay. Thank you. I'm going to go ahead and turn over the floor to the chairwoman of the BBC. There's a series of actual votes that have to be taken on a on a series of different items. And so the way this will work is Councilman Mongo will call the number of the item. Madam Clerk, I'll have you repeat the number of the item and then we'll turn it back to the chairwoman who will walk us through each one. That makes sense. So I'll turn this over to Councilman Mongo. So I hear a lot of talking in the crowd. This is similar to last week. We're passing each budget of each department, one at a time like we did before. So the first one will be item 16, dash 809. Is that what you'd like me to call it? Which is the citywide? Originally noted on the agenda as item one. Yes. Wonderful. Report from Financial Management Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing and take the actions necessary to adopt the fiscal year 2017 budget citywide. So there would. Be no motion or a vote on this item. You would go directly into your next item.