BOARD OF SUPERVISORS

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♪ Hello. This system was put in 1957. I'd like to call our board meeting to order. Mr. Clerk, if you could do roll call please?

Mr. Lavinino? Here. Ms. Wolfe? Here. Ms Farrer? Here! Mr. Adam? Here Mr. Carbajal?

Do we have

the approval of the minutes for March 5th, 2013? Is there a motion? Motion's

been made. Motion has been made, seconded. All those in favor? Aye. Abstentions? Passage unanimously. We will now move on to public comment. Mr. Allen, I believe we have four individuals.

Chairman Carpaw and members of the board, we had a couple of additional late requests for public comments. So we have a total of six. And we'll start in Santa Maria with David Price to be followed by Jeff Bard here in Santa Barbara.

Hey guys, how are you? Anyways my comment is I'm a painting contractor and all the building contractors that I work with are going through a big difficulty for getting their permits which is having a huge impact on my business. I've had to lay off my employees because of the delays on the permit process I just ask that it's reviewed and put into consideration that it's a hardship on my family, the families of the people that I employ, my builders.

It's just a big deal. It is getting to where it's not any fun at all. We're trying to make a living and when we put in permits and it's not even considered for months at a time It's just, it's really making a huge impact on my business and everyone that I employ. So if you could please review it, look at it, I would appreciate it. And thank you for your time.

Thank you. Supervisor Lavinino? Just a quick question sir. What type of permit are you applying for?

Well, I'm not applying for the permit myself. I am working for Hossel Builders and all my building contractors they apply for building a custom home doing a remodel and what have you. And it's just taking months and months and months which and they have the work, they've signed it up. They've done everything they're supposed to do from the engineers to the architects and they presented it.

And it's just this huge loop it has to go through and it comes back, and nothing has changed. Our

next speaker is Jeff Bard to be followed by Michelle Salmon Owens.

Good morning. Mr. Chair and members of the board, my name is Jeff Bard and I work via an organization called The Alliance to Teach Everywhere about community health which has sponsored a few initiatives such as the cough hygiene initiative which achieved some bonafide successes prior actually to the advent of the influenza season and we like to think we prevented some cases The Cough Hygiene Initiative is now doubly relevant because as you know, in Los Angeles there has been an outbreak of tuberculosis particularly centered in certain vulnerable populations and the Center for Disease Control dispatched a team from Atlanta to investigate.

I'd like to apprise you a few things you won't read in the media is that the media is rather hyping this whole matter One of the contentions is that this strain is a strain that is unique to Los Angeles. Well, you can't get lab, really turn around lab results quite that rapidly so I seriously doubt that's been scientifically established. It's a very slow moving form of pathogen and it takes quite a few weeks maybe going into months before you can really get lab cultures back with any definitive results.

Another source of media sensationalism is the attempt to somehow shift the blame onto immigrants and foreign nationals and exchange students, and other vulnerable populations. And one story that you may find in the press is a fellow from Nepal which is one of my favorite countries Did a little traveling around and before he got caught, you know treated Diagnosed and so you're gonna find on the internet. There's people that want to you know Erect a Berlin Wall across the Rio Grande because we're all gonna You know come down with Ebola All that said however There are going to have to be some policy changes And I'm always very quick to come up with ideas. I'm not too good at maybe building the support for some of those ideas, but I'm making headway.

I've got a meeting now scheduled with some of the parties that I've been trying to get to change some of their policies and I'll keep you posted, but I kind of want to make sure Kind of keep that discreet for the time being. So it's being worked on, and the C3H has got some good people that are working on it. Thank you.

Thank you

Mr. Bart.

Our next speaker is Michelle Salmon Owens to be followed by Flora West.

Good morning. This is the first time I've actually attended one of these meetings and I felt... Come here! Can't hear me? Okay, and I felt it was really important to come because it kind In regards to this jail postcard policy that's just been recently instituted. There's a lot of media going on, not just in California and not just in Santa Barbara. And obviously a lot of people have seen the article in The Independent and I don't need to quote it fully but it's my understanding that Sheriff Brown has no intent on changing this policy or possibly making changes down the road.

I don't know how many of you are aware, but in Oregon there was an injunction. It's right now it's in the federal courts and this is quite a travesty to people who are what people like to call our system who may be in their awaiting trial for six months, a year or longer and to be arbitrary and take away One right for them to receive mail from their loved ones, from debt collectors.

Whoever it may be is definitely a violation of their First Amendment right. If each and every one of you were for some reason put in jail for something you may not have done Or you may have done. You would be, have that right taken away from you and I seriously think that this really needs to be looked at. February 15th of this year the ACLU actually got involved up in Sacramento and sent a nice letter out to them.

The ACLU is involved in various communities right now in California on this matter. And instead of wasting taxpayers money I really believe that somebody needs to speak to Sheriff Brown. And, you know, you guys have a little bit more of the power. I could go sit down in his office. I don't have a problem with that. Also as of yesterday at about 2 p.m., which would be, I believe...I don't know if they're on daylight savings and East Coast time, there is a woman by the name of Leah Sakala who is with Prison Policy, who actually wrote Sheriff Brown a letter. And at that time he has not responded.

And I'll leave it on this note basically. He said that the policy and this was in the Santa Barbara News Press, the policy will not be reconsidered. Well if the ACLU gets involved, I think he will need to reconsider. Thank you very

much.

So I appreciate your time.

Flora West, to be followed by Judith Everett.

I'm speaking on behalf of seniors' rights. I am under a conservative shield That is, it's impossible to get out of. I don't want to be under the people I'm under. They are the same people that Pat Rosen was under. I called Janet Wolfe, my supervisor and was told to call the public guardian. They said my attorney has to contact them And my attorney said that they wouldn't take me.

I live at the Villa Santa Barbara and a lot of people there know about my problem. I cannot afford a conservatorship, and I do not need them. Thank you.

Our next speaker is Judith Everett to be followed by Zachary King.

I'm Judith Everard, a citizen of Santa Barbara and the greater Santa Barbara County. I really thank the board for your encouragement of public input. I think that's a great advantage to the populations here. requirements of the board and that is that you hear everybody, that the arguments are put in the newspapers for and against these particular titles. And so this gives us a chance to discuss, and there is an increasing number of small groups in this town. And the future lies in the groups getting together and agreeing on what our goals are. For instance, do we really want to spend this amount of funding on the military? Or do we want to spend it on people This division is never made very clear at the level of discussion.

And there are lots of things that can be done for prisoners in jail which will enhance their getting out and enhance their rehabilitation, for instance Mental health treatment for people is very, very important as we've noticed in the events of the country where there are mass killings. And so I would be very supportive of anything that will give rehabilitation to prisoners. And even if they're in a very short time, they may be co-opted to actually work for the jail system instead of working against it and The small groups in Santa Barbara really need to be on the same page of what our goals are. And I personally belong to a group for education called POISE, and it's people for open informal self-directed education.

And it's people who want to work together to make the changes Very important and I'm very interested to hear that the ACLU is represented here. And the younger people too, it's very important so thank you.

Zachary King is our next speaker to be followed by Miller

Good morning Last week I spoke here about the new policy at the county jail to ban all incoming mail except for postcards. As of yesterday, the flow of letters, photos and other mail that keeps the people in our jail connected to their loved ones and supported by their communities has ceased. The vast majority of the more than 3,200 local jails and all 1,821 state and federal prisons across the country managed to keep their facilities secure without a postcard only mail policy restriction.

The leading U.S. professional incarceration organization, the American Correctional Association says that letters are of tremendous importance to an inmate and that facilities should encourage not discourage correspondence. Both major political parties put the issue of recidivism on their 2012 campaign agendas and even the Republican Party stated that they support the institution of family-friendly policies to reduce the rate of recidivism thus reducing the enormous fiscal and social costs of incarceration.

Last week, Sheriff Brown defended the decision stating that due to security concerns we could no longer allow letters to incarcerated people. Any supposed cost savings of security benefit that the Sheriff Department claims will result from banning letters to inmates should be contrasted with the social and economic costs of a more alienated isolated and faster growing jail population cut off from one more important tie with the outside world.

The Prison Policy Initiative has issued a press release calling for Sheriff Brown and Santa Barbara County Jail to immediately withdraw this harmful ban. The statement has already been signed by over 50 local and national organizations. In closing, I've heard from county supervisors and their offices that you are powerless over this decision, that you can't help us, and that you can't help your constituents in the jail.

I respectfully disagree. You possess at least as much power as me and anyone else in this room. You probably possess more, and I think that through your statements, your statements to the press, your statements to the sheriff, your public positions, I think you can have a lot of sway over this. So lastly just please raise your voice with us in defense of the safety and rights of your constituents. Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Miller to be followed by Steven Storman.

Hi, how's it going? I just received notice a couple days ago that there's another rule that they're adding to the books as far as the letters ban in Santa Barbara County Jail. That if you've been to county jail in the last six months, you can't put money on someone else's books. So that's another rule that they didn't tell us about last week and I wonder how many others that they're trying to sneak in there and not tell us about but Also, they say that the reason is because of security and they don't want to subject the guards to drugs or something like that. They all wear gloves when they open the letters and if someone wanted to soak a letter with drugs, they could also soak a postcard with drugs. And it's not what they were telling the inmates the real reason was.

They were saying that there's just too many letters. They don't want to read them all. They don't feel like doing it. Officers in there just sitting around doing nothing all day. I don't see how they can't just read one letter per person a day, and if there's too many inmates who can't take care of them and handle your business then they have no business arresting that many people.

Might as well try something different besides taking away letters and everything else trying to punish people. Another thing is people who have been committed a felony cannot go visit anyone in county jail, not allowed on the property. So if your loved one's in there and you're a felon, you can't visit them at all. And if you're not a felon and you're trying to visit somebody there they could get punished for like I was in county jail once and I got an inmate discipline report where I was going to the bathroom and had to finish up when they called count And I got out too late. And we're going to take away two weeks commissary and visitations. And with commissary, you can't buy phone minutes either. So you can't get letters now. You can't call anyone.

No visitations. Just the list goes on and on. It's getting crazy in there. Yeah. That's about all I've got to say right now.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Steven Storman to be followed by Ted Sands.

How do you do? My name's Steve Storman. I'm a resident of Lompoc, and I spoke to you last week about the decision on the postcard only policy at the county jail. I am here to speak to you about that again. Specifically, I want to respond to Sheriff Brown's comments at the end of public comment. I want to thank Sheriff Brown for telling us that this was about safety first and foremost. We didn't know that there were no public statements made, no public hearings, no public input, no accountability towards this decision before it was implemented yesterday.

I think at the very least the public need deserves a little more time. The families of the people who are in jail I want to say that. I appreciate that he's doing his job. His job is to come to you and talk about the policies that he needs to implement or that he feels should be implemented in order to make the most safe jail that he sees possible. Safety is definitely one big concern at a county jail, but I think another one is ethics and I think another one is communications rights and the rights of the people, the inmates at the jail.

You know he presented his case for what safety means at county jail. And I think that the countervailing opinion that we're bringing you today is what a what justice at the jail looks like and I think it like Mr King said it's about preventing recidivism. It's about Not punishing the families of inmates by restricting their access to their loved ones and being able to continue a relationship with them.

It's about not, it's about not punishing North County more so. As we mentioned last week, North County is farther away there's no public transportation poor inmates can't afford phone calls or To take time off of work to visit letters really are the only substantive form of communication available and the only. And yeah a postcard you know you have five page letter that's twenty five hundred words I don't care what size of postcard you have. That's not going to fit in my mailbox.

So, I just want to again bring to you that this is the voice of your constituents that we want a more just jail. Communication rights are important. Don't publish the families of inmates. Don' punish North County. Thank you.

Our next speaker is Ted Sands followed by Joe Halsell.

Morning, Mr. Chairman and members. My name is Ted Sands. I live near on Villalobos Padres near the county park First of all, I'd like to mention as you recall several weeks ago we discussed the issue of a fee which I feel is really a tax on fire prevention and fire education. I have not seen or heard of a letter from you to the state and I hope that you consider that a high priority.

Second issue I'd like to mention is that an earlier speaker said even the Republican Party supported more freedom for prisoners. I'm not sure what the speaker meant by that comment. I don't think it added anything to the discussion, thank you.

Thank you very much. By the way, sir, we did send a letter and if we could get a copy of that letter to him as CEO, that would be great. We'll get you a copy of that letter. Yes. If you hang out a few minutes, we might actually bring it to you.

Yeah, Mr. Sands, we can get you a copy of the letter.

Please proceed.

Good morning, Chairman Carbajal and members of the board. My name is Joe Hossel. I am a local business owner. I own and operate three construction companies out of Santa Maria. We serve the entire county. We work all over the county every day. And I'm here to talk about how The permitting process from the land use. Process through building plan check process has affected my business over the past few years. We rely as do.

Probably all other businesses, certainly all other contractors on a continual flow of work to not just keep our business operating but to keep our doors open. And we have experienced the largest delays and the biggest problems I've had the opportunity to work in over 25 jurisdictions, cities, counties all over the state. And I have seen permitting processes that work really smoothly and are very quick. And I've seen others that have a built-in They have built-in uncertainty and I feel And I can tell you with the lion's share of my experience in Santa Barbara County that I just can't depend on when a permit will be issued and how much this permit will cost me.

It may be two months, it may be two years. There are so many pieces of the permit process that are just fully discretionary up to That I believe that we have shoved a lot of the activity that should be permitted underground and away from us. And when it became apparent to me was when I was trying to hire a carpenter and an operator for our machinery, I can't find any qualified candidates for a carpenter in Santa Barbara County because they're working at the same time that we're not really issuing any permits.

We are working, the industry is working without permits. We have made the process so difficult in Santa Barbara County that we have told them if you want to keep your doors open work without a permit And I can drive around. My colleagues that I work with, they're doing everything in their power to do jobs without permits. And without going into all the details of exactly why, I would like to find out how I work with you guys to bring the permit money and the permit activity back to the county because it has a major impact. The timing of projects has a major impact on whether or not we work without a permit. Thank you very much.

Our next speaker is Mark Lloyd to be followed by Sam Cohen who's our final speaker.

Mr. Chair, honorable board members, my name is Mark Lloyd. I didn't intend to speak today. I'm here to monitor an item but I felt compelled to speak after hearing a couple of public testimonies as to the permit process in Santa Barbara. As many of you know, I have many years, in fact several decades of permit experience in the county and in many other entities too And through that course, I've had a number of boards that I've worked with of different political persuasions and focuses. And through those varying experiences, I felt compelled today to tell you that I have never seen the Planning and Development Department work better under the leadership of the Director and the Deputy Directors The department has never responded better to the public community.

But even more so, you have an excellent staff, supervising staff and planning staff who are responsive to applicants' issues Are responsive to the needs and timings of applicants. And so things have never worked better. With that said, Mr. Chair, you have had over the last couple years specifically some budget issues that you've had to deal with. And consequently you've cut staff throughout the county and I've also cut it in the planning and development department. I would say to you that as the economy is picking up and we're all seeing the headwinds of that and the effects of that You are going to see problems in the planning department because of these staff cuts and the lack of money in the department. You're going to see longer waits and longer times to get permits.

So these speakers that have spoke, I'm sure they have issues and individual projects that may have languished. But as someone who's worked in this environment for many, many years, I think you should have comfort that the department has never run better. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much.

Our final speaker is Sam Cohen.

Good morning Chairman Carbajal, members of the Board of Supervisors. Sam Cohen, Government Affairs and Legal Officer for the San Ynez Band of Chumash Indians. You know I didn't even realize you were doing your SDF grants today but I guess I'll hang around for that. The real reason I'm here today is to cordially invite you to the 36th Annual California Conference on American Indian Education Which is being hosted by the Chumash Tribe here at the Fess Parker Doubletree Resort starting Monday, March 17th through the 19th of this week. And I'll be pleased to leave some brochures at the back counter.

Yes sir?

Mr. Lavinino.

Mr. Cohen you said Monday, March 17th. Monday is the 18th. Is it the 18 or the- You're

right. It's Sunday, March 17th. I was

actually listening.

Yes. Thank you! And thank you for the correction. It starts on Sunday? There's some events on Sunday, but most of them are on Monday and Tuesday. Okay perfect. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Mr. Cohen

was our final

speaker. Thank you very much. We will now come back to our agenda and are there any administrative items that any of my colleagues would like to pull? Mr. Lavinino? I'd like to pull A14, please. A14. Supervisor? A4. Anyone else?

We have one request to speak from the public on item A1.

On A1, why don't we go to the public since it's one person and we'll bring it back to the board.

Chairman Carbajal, members of the board. Item A1 is a resolution that's honorary, that's brought to the board by Supervisors Carbajall and Wolfe at the request of the Board adopt a Resolution of Accommodation honoring Anti-Defamation League upon their 100th anniversary. And our speaker is Jeff Bard. Mr. Bard?

Are you here? I believe he's not. We'll proceed to A14, Supervisor Lavinino.

Thank you, Mr. Chair and I think this is an appointment for me to the Housing Authority. I lost my housing authority commissioner. He was taken by the City of Santa Maria. Mr. Dickerson is now working for the Planning Commission so he got a bump up and I just want to recognize Mr. Robert Doyle. I believe he's in Santa Maria And just wanted to congratulate him and thank him for taking time to serve our community.

And I believe he's in Santa Maria, but anyway, just wanted to recognize Mr Doyle.

Thank you, Mr. Lavinino. Supervisor Adam A4 if you could read that item?

Supervisor Carbajal, members of the board. Item A4 is some community services. The request is that the board consider recommendations regarding the Santa Barbara County Arts Commission application for California Arts Council State Local Partnership Program.

Supervisor Adam? Well I'm just wondering if somebody from Parks can tell me or I guess it's Community Services can tell me if we have a copay to get the grant And if so, how much would that be?

Chair Carbajal and Supervisor Adam, thank you for the opportunity. I'm Jenny Brush, Executive Director of the County Arts Commission which is part of the Community Services Department. This request is a part of what we need to do to apply for the California Arts Council. This is a program where we leverage funding support that we have already from the City of Santa Barbara and the county And so this is money, we use that money that's already in place to attract these funds. So these funds come not even from the state general fund but they come directly from the sale of the California Arts License Plate. So these are completely funded by that and the purpose of these is to allow us to serve as a regional arts agency to provide services county wide.

I think 15 or 20 years, but it does allow us to be part of the statewide system. And what we do with that money is to leverage it to provide arts free art services and increase access to the arts and to provide technical support for all. Nonprofit organizations throughout the county so it doesn't cost you guys Anything in its money that comes directly from individuals that support the program through the purchase of arts license plates The ones with the palm trees and a little Sun on them Yeah,

my question was is there a copay that comes out of general funds?

No, absolutely not.

Because sometimes when you get a grant you've got to put some up like with the jail.

What we're able to do with the grant funds is to leverage what we have from the city because we want to benefit both so we leverage funding that already is in place as part of our budget. We leverage that to attract this money.

Okay, so there's no general fund services that are utilized

to get the grants? No additional costs whatsoever just for benefit. Thank you

very much. Not having any additional issues, is there a motion to approve the administrative calendar? Motion to remain in seconded. Not having further discussion all those in favor? Opposed? Abstentions? Passes unanimously we will now move on to our departmental agenda Mr. Allen I believe the first item has been requested that it be continued can you read that item and

Yes, Supervisor Carvajal, members of the board. Item number one is from planning and development. The request that the board consider recommendations regarding the Naples Coalition appeal of the Planning Commission's approval of the Schulte-Dos Pueblos lot line adjustment. This is in the third district. The request is that your board continue this to your meeting on April 9th.

Is there a motion? Motion has been made and seconded. All those in favor? Opposed? Abstentions? Passage unanimously. We will now

Chairman Carbajal, members of the board, item number two comes to the board from the sheriff and the fire department. It's a hearing to receive and file a presentation from the sheriff's office describing the status of the county air support unit.

And today we have Fire Chief Michael Dyer and Under Sheriff Jim Peterson providing this presentation.

Good morning, Chairman Carbajal, members of the board. On July 10, 2012 your Honorable Board received a presentation from the Sheriff's Office and the Fire Department on the implementation status of the Air Support Unit. This presentation given by Under Sheriff Jim Peterson will serve to update the board in regards to the air support program that includes the current personnel staffing training asset deployment Standardization of operations and budgetary status.

With that, I'll turn it over to Under Sheriff Jim Peterson to make the presentation.

Good morning Chair and members of the Board. With me today also is Lieutenant Bob Mott, he's the manager of the County Air Support Unit and this morning I'll be updating you on the status of the unit and as you recall your board established the air support unit on July 1st of last year. Over the past seven months the personnel of the Sheriff's Office and the County Fire Department have been busy implementing the program and performing the mission that was established.

As a reminder, the mission of the Air Support Unit is to provide air resources to regional and local governments and on state, federal, and local lands and in related waters in support of law and fire operations, emergency medical services, and search-and-rescue operations. We strive to accomplish this mission within the confines of fiscal responsibility and also a strong emphasis on safety management.

The Air Support Unit is comprised of nine full-time employees, a manager, four pilots, two of whom are currently civilian professional pilots and two who are Sheriff Deputy Professional Pilots. One of these deputy pilots is a sheriff sergeant. We have two crew chiefs, one of which is a fire captain and the other is a senior deputy with the sheriff's office. And to keep everything up and running we have two full-time mechanics. We also use a combination of extra help and collateral duty personnel to supplement the unit and provide for a shift relief factor. If you recall back when both units were separate there were 12 full time employees all together. This is an example of how the consolidation increased the efficiency and lowered the cost of the program.

As of today, this is the current status of our air assets. Copter 1 is our type 3 observation helicopter. It's in service and it's awaiting carting status. And as a reminder, carting is a term we use in order to be authorized by CAL FIRE and or the US Forest Service to be included in the firefighting operations in their jurisdictions and to be reimbursed for those services.

We're working with CAL FIRE to obtain our carding status for this helicopter. We need to paint the rotor blades, and there is also a digital radio and automated flight tracking issue that we are attempting to get a waiver for. As an example, Ventura County has the same waiver on their helicopters, and they are carded. We anticipated we'll also be able to get this waiver and be officially carded in the very near future.

Copter 2 is our second observation helicopter. It's also in service and awaiting the same carding status. Copter 3 is a Type 2 heavy lift operator or helicopter, and it's our newly refurbished helicopter. And it's been in a fantastic addition to the unit. It was commissioned back on December 10th of 2012. And we're happy to report that it has been carted and is available for all missions of the Air Support Unit.

Copter 4 is a twin engine type 2 helicopter that we acquired in 2009 through the federal 1033 program and private donations. It is out of service due to an unanticipated engine issue, and these twin engines have been sent to Alabama for inspection. We're awaiting the results of this inspection prior to making any repairs to these engines. I'd like to publicly thank Project Rescue Flight, a non-profit foundation for again stepping up and paying for the shipping and initial inspection of these engines.

Helicopter 308 is out of service. After an inspection was completed, several maintenance items are being addressed and replacement parts are being installed. We expect this Type 2 helicopter to be back in service within the next four to five weeks. Copter 309 is also out of service, and the management decision as of today is to hold off on any further action on this Type 2 helicopter until we can get a better idea of how extensive the repairs are to Copter 4 and to Copter 308. This copter will be in a mothball status until such time.

And Air 50, our Cessna fixed wing, is out of service receiving its regular annual inspection, and we expect it to be back online in the next three or four weeks. I'd like to take a quick moment to show you a magazine article from Vertical 911. This is a national publication specializing in aviation for emergency services. Copter 3 is featured, and the article talks about the private and public partnership that enabled this copter to be brought into service. It's truly a testament to the great work that the crews at the Air Support Unit do, and in particular, the fundraising efforts of Sergeant Greg Weitzman and Senior Deputy John Simon.

Now since July 2012, the Air Support Unit has been very active. We responded to 18 individual fire calls for service where we actually dropped water over 250 times. We responded to 180 law enforcement types of missions and conducted 23 search-and-rescue calls where 12 people were rescued. The flight hours of each type of helicopter that you see encompasses both training hours and mission specific hours because mission hours also count towards training hours.

In regards to the administrative status of the unit, the operations agreement that combined the two previous units was signed by the Sheriff and Fire Chief. Lt. Mott and his personnel have been very busy combining these separate Sheriff and Fire policy and procedure manuals into one cohesive document. This has been a very arduous task that has allowed us to identify best practices and also make sure that everybody knows what is expected from the unit. We're in the process of the final stages of the editing and reviewing of this manual, and we expect you to have it signed by the Sheriff and the Fire Chief within the next few weeks. I'd like to take this opportunity to thank all the members at the AISU, the Station 32 fire paramedics, and the managers of both fire and sheriff who have been working extremely hard to get this manual completed.

And lastly, we have put into place a schedule that enables our crews to provide coverage from 8 AM to 8 PM seven days a week along with a two-hour callback period. This schedule also takes advantage of cross training opportunities. We do have challenges in the units and one of the challenges that we always face is aircraft availability. Just due to the regular maintenance and inspection requirements along with unanticipated repairs, our helicopters are constantly being placed into and out of service. Normally scheduled maintenance and inspection issues are planned in advance to provide for minimum downtime and added efficiency. However, when unanticipated maintenance issues are realized this adds strain to our fleet and challenges our ability to put Type 2 and Type 3 aircraft into service at all times.

And this is the benefit and frankly the necessity of having redundancy in aircraft When a Type 3 helicopter such as Copter 1 is out of service, Copter 2 is available. When a Type 2 helicopter like Copter 4 is unavailable, Copter 3 is in service. The original direction from your board and the operation agreement between the Sheriff and the Fire Department Specified that two Type 2 helicopters should always be available.

But at this time, due to the unanticipated repairs to Copter 4 and Copter 308 only Copter 3 is in service today. We're working very hard to bring Copter four and 308 back into service and fully capable to handle all missions but as you can see redundancy in airships is critical to fulfilling your board's desire to have two type 2 copters available at all times Training has been going well, but it also never ends. We all believe that safety is of paramount importance and only through increased training of all of our personnel will we be confident that we are doing all we can to promote safety and provide exceptional service.

Due to the constant struggle of airship and personnel availability, training everyone in all types of helicopters for all the missions is challenging. However, we continue to cross-train our pilots and crew chiefs in all of our helicopters in order to have the flexibility and efficiency that your board and we desire. We've been closely watching the first year budget for the Air Support Unit. We anticipate coming in at about $225,000 over our adopted budget. This is due in large part to the unanticipated expenses for Copter 4 and the annual inspection and maintenance of Copter 308.

However, we also believe that we can cover most if not all of the expenses through our regular department budget without coming to your board for any additional funding requests. As we all know helicopters are very expensive to maintain and as you also know we have come to rely on them to respond to emergencies involving fire law and medical missions. As we move through the budget process for the next fiscal year, we're developing a budget that adopts a model based on minimum and mandatory flight hours along with the hourly operating costs of each aircraft. Taking into account increases in fuel, training and maintenance costs. Although this will be presented as a budget increase to our current budget, it'll also be a budget expansion request.

One that allows for the funding of our current service levels but also plans for unexpected maintenance and repairs. I'll be talking a little bit more about this maintenance fund later in this presentation. I'm happy to report we have made significant strides since the inception of the unit back in July. As I already mentioned, Copter 3 has been commissioned and fully carded. The operations manual has been combined and is going through final review before being signed by the Sheriff and the Fire Chief.

And all of our full-time pilots are now cross trained as they are now all fully carded in our Type 2 rescue fire helicopters. And although we have made great progress towards providing the service that your board envisioned for this unit, the training of our pilots and crew chiefs in all disciplines will be an ongoing process. As new procedures and efficiencies are developed and new best practices are identified, our goal will be to be out in front of that training curve to be the best aviation unit that is possible.

But we also want to develop and train additional extra help pilots and crew chiefs. This will enhance our flexibility in scheduling, and also provide a much needed relief factor when our full-time pilots and crew chiefs take time off. The motto of the ASU is Semol No Secadant. I'm not quite as good as Sheriff Brown with a Latin phrase, but what it means in Latin is together we succeed and I would like to take a quick moment to publicly commend Lieutenant Bob Mott.

Bob has been an invaluable manager of this unit for the critical time of the air support unit. He's been a model of leadership that both the fire department and the sheriff's office have appreciated and enjoyed. He has made it known that he is planning to retire within the next six months. We're already looking at a transition plan for this very critical position, but I feel that it's necessary to acknowledge his truly outstanding and dedicated service to the Air Support Unit and the County of Santa Barbara. So thank you, Lieutenant Mott. And with that, I thank you for your time. And we are certainly available for any questions or comments you would have.

Well, seeing as how we don't have a chair, I will go with Supervisor Farr.

Thank you, Mr. Temporary Chair.