Board of Supervisors — 2018-06-19

Thank you. It may be

Call this meeting to order. Roll call, please.

Mr. Adam? Here. Mr. Lavinino? Here. Ms. Wolfe? She's here. Ms Wolfe is present. Ms Hartman? Here, Mr Williams?

Can I get a motion to approve the minutes of June 5th?

So moved.

Is there a second? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. And how about the minutes of the budget hearing on June 11th?

Again so moved.

Is there a second? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Both are unanimous. There's no CEO's report and so we'll go into ceremonial items. Would you like to read?

Chair Williams, members of the board if we could first get a motion to approve items A72 and A73 then we will go ahead with the presentations.

Motion to approve

those two. Second.

All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Opposed?

Please read.

Okay, Chair Williams and members of the board we have two resolutions to present this morning. We're going to start with item A72. This is co-sponsored by Supervisor Williams and Supervisor Lavagnino. It's a resolution proclaiming the month of June 2018 as Immigrant Heritage Month in Santa Barbara County. And Abdias Hernandez is here I believe? Come on up. And anybody else that you have with you be happy to have them up at the podium.

I'll read the resolution into the record. Whereas generations of immigrants from every corner of the globe have built our country's economy and created a unique character of our nation. And whereas immigrants continue to grow businesses, innovate, strengthen our economy and create American jobs in Santa Barbara County. And whereas immigrants have provided the United States with unique social and cultural influence fundamentally enriching the extraordinary character of our nation. And whereas immigrants have been tireless leaders not only in securing their own rights and access to equal opportunity, but have also campaigned to create a fairer and more just society for all Americans.

And whereas despite these countless contributions the role of immigrants in enriching our nation has frankly been overlooked and undervalued throughout our history and continuing to the present day. Now therefore it be hereby ordered and resolved that this Board of Supervisors proclaims June 18 as Immigrant Heritage Month in recognition of our countless contributions the immigrants have made and continue to make in our community, past and adopted today.

I'm going to translate

for him. Hello, good morning. My name is Ab Diaz and thank you for this recognition

Hello, good morning. My name is Abdias and thank you for this recognition.

And

these last days I have been involved with the cause organization.

And I've always liked to be involved in events where I learned interesting things. As of late, we went to Sacramento and entered the Capitol. And we talked to legislators that would assist us in passing certain resolutions and bills.

And this is something that I didn't know of, and I'm really grateful to have been able to receive this award on behalf of CAWS.

And we're also here for you so thank you for inviting me.

Okay, our second resolution today is sponsored by Supervisor Wolf. This is a resolution proclaiming the month of June 2018 as Santa Barbara Amateur Radio Operators Amateur Radio Month in Santa Barbara County and Jeff Reinhart. Jeff are you here? Come on up to the podium and Jeff if you have any friends or colleagues you'd like to bring up with you that's fine as

well.

I'll go ahead and read the resolution of the record. Whereas amateur ham radio operators stand ready to serve the residents of Santa Barbara County during times of emergency, providing communications to protect life and property through their use of their skills and use of advanced communication technologies. And whereas the American Radio Relay League's Santa Barbara section includes Ventura, San Luis Obispo, and Santa Barbara Counties with a collective pool of over 5,000 operators licensed by the FCC including about 1,700 in Santa Barbara County. And whereas during the recent fire emergency, amateur radio volunteers were on duty providing emergency and supplemental communications to support the protection of life, property and human services in shelters.

And whereas amateur radio operators are committed to the values of community service, continuous training, staying current with the advancements in technology, providing mentorship to new operators, and never charging a fee for their services. And whereas during the fourth weekend of June each year, amateur radio operators conduct a national 24-hour exercise that simulates field operators under emergency conditions. This year it occurred on June 23 and 24 at multiple locations within Santa Barbara County.

And I'll therefore be hereby ordered and resolved that the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors takes pleasure in designating June as Amateur Radio Month, honoring the men and women who are prepared to serve the county whenever their communication skills are necessary. Pass it up today by the board.

Chair Williams and Supervisors, thank you very much for this recognition. The first of its kind from Santa Barbara County for it's nearly now 1,750 licensed operators within the county. I'd like to ask all of the operators that could make it today to please stand so that this is just a portion This is just a portion of the ham radio operators who are willing to step forward and assist the county in a time of need. And if you think back to where, you know, ham radio station used to have to occupy a whole room in your house this is now a ham radio station okay so it's changed quite a bit over the years but importantly the fact that this emergency drill is coming up at the end of the month we're invited to come to that And I know the folks from the Satellite Club and from the Santa Barbara Club would love to see you there because they also get points if you show up.

It's a really important part of their annual training to do a 24-hour emergency simulated drill, to operate under emergency conditions which means no external power or existing antennas things like that they have to set that up from scratch I have John Kitchens here who is the section manager for the American Radio Relay League in this part of the world. John, if you want to say a word or two?

Thank you for having us and we really appreciate the recognition. These volunteers do a lot of work and it's their own money that pays for their radios and operations such so it's really appreciated to be recognized And as a retired firefighter from Los Angeles, I had breakfast last week with, I won't say old people, the other retirees. But John Sherry wanted me to say hi and bring greetings to you.

He was my ex-boss down in Los Angeles and fire chief from Santa Barbara County. Bob Harrison, stand up Bob. He's from the Satellite Amateur Radio Club down in Lompoc and not only are we having this event this coming weekend but next year in 2019 it's field day as its called the emergency communications simulation is held the last weekend of every June. And Bob and the Satellite Amateur Radio Club are coordinating an event for the community.

And to show how the community can act in safety communications. Coordinated with Walmart in Lompoc at the Walmart shopping mall, they'll be operating Emergency stations, the simulated emergency stations to provide support through CERT, the Community Emergency Response Teams. And also in conjunction with the Sheriff's Department, Fire Department and any other groups such as PG&E and the electrical services and any other county services that provide emergency communications to also be there. So we want Ask for that support also next year and the work that's going to be done by the Satellite Amateur Radio Club.

And they will be at their clubhouse this weekend down in Lompoc, so thank you very much for this recognition.

The wall only goes back so far. I still can't get you. Why don't you go behind Janet?

Okay,

we have one question from

the board.

Thank you Mr. Chair, my question is this I well first a comment I hadn't realized how significant ham radios are as a backup emergency communication system and so I'm really grateful that you're keeping that going and engaged in a lot of outreach especially through CERT. My question is are you doing anything at colleges and universities? Are there clubs because that's kind of the next level

Yeah, in fact STEM training you know science technology engineering and math is more and more important. And a lot of the schools do have ham radio clubs but we're also prepared to support those. Importantly there's a program that reaches out to elementary schools too that connects these students when there's a pass of the space shuttle or I'm sorry the space station There's the ability to plan this out some months in advance, to have these kids actually speak with the astronauts as they pass over the school. So it's really kind of cool what you mentioned too. In this age of cell phones and redundancy and so on we find with the fires and some of the other events that when all else fails ham radio is there.

Here's a report from the Ventura Star a few months ago that one of the sheriffs identified old technologies as the best to fall back in emergencies. And I'll just, I know you have a lot of business so I'll very quickly just add we had Hammond-Ventura County who following the hurricanes was monitoring the frequencies And no one had heard from the country of Dominica, not the Dominican Republic but Dominica which is down in the Caribbean. Everybody thought they were fine. The problem was they were totally devastated and their a country there not under the protectorate of another country like you know the Netherlands or some of the other down there. He heard their call for, it was a distress call. Passed it along to the State Department and that's what got the ball rolling to get relief into Dominica from the UN and other sources.

So you never know when it's going to turn up to be useful. Thank you for your question. Any other questions? Thank you Chair and Board we appreciate it.

Thank you for your service.

Do we have items pulled by the public? Chair Williams, members of the board we have one item requested. That would be A30.

Can I get a motion on the balance of the agenda first?

Second.

This is on all other administrative items besides the two ceremonial and A30 there's a motion and a second. All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Opposed? It's unanimous. Please read A30

I just want to note for the record that as part of your motion today, there were a couple of memos that were out on a couple of administrative items. And I just wanted to note those changes for the record. On item A45, this was from Public Works. There was a request to continue that matter to July 3rd, so that would be a part of your motion this morning and that was in a memo to the board. And then secondly on item A68 from planning and development, this was a set hearing request. Regarding amendments to the county land use and development code the Montecito land use and Development Code and the coastal zoning ordinance, and there was a request to set this for July 10 But there was a memo that went to the board that requested that that be sent for August 14th instead of instead of that date And then as far as item 830 We have requests to speak on that is from human resources.

It's consider recommendations running these civil and respectful workplace policy Bruce Korsaw is here to speak about them

Chair, members of board. My name is Bruce Corsaw with Local 620 and I'm here to speak not really against but with a recommendation of not approving the civil and respectful workplace policy whereas Local 620 supports the theory, supports the sentiment behind it. This policy as you've been told before earlier last year when it came forward will create a lot of workload for a lot of people It will be used as a tool for individuals to basically either get even or to target other individuals based on their perception of actions or comments made by other people. There isn't a day that goes by that this body doesn't meet, that could be construed or interpreted as a violation Respectful workplace policy.

During a day that doesn't go by, the boss doesn't have to call an employee in give them evaluation which may be interpreted by that employee that this was disrespectful. This day and age people's feelings get hurt very easily and typically it's based on interpretation I've been married for 40 years I can say most any comment with the best intentions and it'd be taken the wrong way.

So, I do know that as I've stated earlier, EEO operations should be handled by either CEO's office or this board directly is handled by HR. It should be a neutral body under this policy allow the functions will be handled by this individual. And again, it's our understanding that there is a issue with the HR department. With the EO officer right now and that other individuals are covering some of that work.

Again this will create a lot of work for a lot of people. It'll be used against a lot of people whereas the sentiment is correct and it should be a mission statement. This policy definitely should be a mission statement and it should be a working process that we all try and achieve some type Respect in the workplace, being professional and polite to everyone.

Just too much abuse is going to happen here. So I strongly recommend that this board disapproves it, looks towards making a mission statement, works towards working with the labor groups, the civil groups to try and develop something that is actually workable. Again many of the issues here in this policy rest in the civil service rules now we have civil service rules and policies to handle the majority of this with a neutral body to hear it.

Thank you.

Any other requests

to speak on this item? No further requests on the administrative agenda. Supervisor Hartman.

I wonder if it would be possible to have Ms. Gentles answer some questions about this.

She is here and available.

Good morning. Hello, I had a couple of questions one it's my understanding that this policy fills a gap in our policies and procedures that deal with things that can go awry in the workplace so I wonder if you could describe how it fills that gap and what the process is and whether there would be a huge increase in workload or not?

So as you know, the Human Resources Department has embarked on a massive endeavor to revise our civil service rules that were established in 1970. The reason why we're doing that is because a lot of the provisions that are in the Civil Service Rules are outdated and they don't contemplate things that are occurring in a 21st century workforce. The Civil and Respectful Workplace Policy that we're putting together really does narrow the gap. There's a provision in the civil service rules that talks about harmonious working relationships, which is very, very broad and a lot of our managers are not covered by the civil service rules. And so a lot of the complaints that we receive from employees have to do with their managers.

And the allegations are that of bullying or abusive behavior or treatment, what have you. And we really don't have a mechanism to address those issues. We have the civil service rules that talks about harmonious working relationships but again, that's very subjective and it is very broad. This policy that we've put together has attempted Clearly define what we mean by abusive and bullying behavior. In terms of the workload issue, so I've been doing human resources work for about 30 years including investigations in EEO. And in addition to that, in putting this policy together we surveyed our counterparts. We surveyed 58 counties. 20 of the counties responded to our survey and three of the counties basically said that they have a similar policy.

Of what we're trying to propose. It was El Dorado County, Ventura County and Los Angeles County. In my 30 years of experience I can tell you anytime you roll out a policy or any program that's new like this, you may see a slight bump in activity but it quickly plateaus off. That's just a normal kind of reaction however with the counties that we surveyed All three of the counties said that they did not see any significant increase in workload whatsoever. This is really an additional tool to be proactive and preventative where we see the workload come up, and what takes a lot of my time, staff time, county council's time is because we don't take care of issues early on, and they escalate into the legal realm, and that's where the real workload.

An effort comes in, so this is part of a larger strategy to really be proactive and preventative. And to be a county that visibly demonstrates that we're creating and fostering an environment that's fair for all employees. And fair treatment and free from abuse, abusive behavior. So hopefully that addresses your question.

Supervisor Adam.

Well, the devil's really in the details isn't it? I mean you know I was listening to a podcast the other day and they were talking about in societal terms how we organize ourselves as a government and comparing it to how children play house And this guy made an example of each individual that's in the game plays a part in the family and how long it lasts kind of is the measure of success.

And same as our governance within the county, and same as our governance on a local and national scale. I can see what your point is here. But in another sign of the apocalypse, I find myself also agreeing with Bruce Corsaw that the potential for abuse here is tremendous. And if that's not the history of other places, you know, that's fine. You know we always say that we're different from everybody else and so maybe this time Bruce and I will be right. Don't know but I don't know what my colleagues propensity is to deal with this thing but it's got some potential for abuse and it really would all determine or be determined by how And to the extent that you are the person, if you do a great job and then the next person comes in and all of people want to continue to play with this set of rules.

You know, and then the next person comes in and replaces you and they don't, nobody wants to accept the rules anymore it becomes a problem but at that point it will be an institutional of reality and nobody will be able to get rid of it. So I see a lot of tension here between something that might be a very good idea, well executed but become problematic at some other point.

Can I respond to that? So this policy is just one component of a larger systematic steps that we're taking to create positive and productive environment. We have the policy put together during the last budget workshops, the most recent budget workshops. You heard both myself and county council present proposals for early intervention and early resolution of these type of issues. Again trying to stop things at the lowest level possible before they escalate. Last year we also implemented a comprehensive anti-harassment pro civility And we did that for all management employees and we integrated accountability by tying it to the performance evaluation process. So managers could not get a salary increase without participating in that program, and we had 98% attendance.

We're capturing the remaining 2%. Can I interrupt you?

Of

course

they did. You made them if they wanted a raise.

Yes, we did because we believe that accountability is important. Because one of the things that I've received feedback from day one when I first started from the board was putting in systems that would prevent some of these problems that we see later on down the line. I'm in litigation, and so this is exactly what we're trying to do. And again it's part of a larger systematic process that's not done in isolation. And again if I could just respectfully say it, I've been personally in the trenches doing the HR work, doing the EE work. EEO work, doing investigations. And I can tell you that the fear that this is all of a sudden going to create a floodgate of activity just doesn't bear out.

We know that bullying does occur in the workplace. We receive it now. I believe I provided some statistics for you. It's our number one complaint that we receive and we don't really have a mechanism to deal with it.

How does everybody else deal with bullying?

Well, one of the things that, so for Ventura County. The grand jury they actually received a complaint from employees and the public regarding bullying and abusive behavior in the workplace. The grand jury got involved in 2011 and actually forced them or put a report together that encouraged the board of supervisors to put together a bullying policy which is what they have now. And so- Does

that policy have a definition?

Yes sir, it does.

Well I'm not sure I need the

actual

definition but the thing is we don't have one right?

We have examples of what the AB 2053 kind of gives examples of what-

I realize that but there's a critical distinction between 2053 and what we're doing because you took out the malice portion

Right.

And see I'm really uncomfortable with that because it sort of puts on a filter that you can't just wind up having disgruntled for any reason people come up and say, and this is the part where if everybody's going to play along and everybody understands what the rules are but the problem is when When it doesn't go somebody's way or to somebody's liking and then you wind up in court, then you're litigating the words on the paper.

Do you have a comment for that?

Chair and Supervisors, although the board agenda letter recites NA for county council concurrence we actually did review this and were involved with HR on some things that I think should remove some of the concerns on this. I would view this as a policy call for the board It is a legally defensible framework. I think one piece that was not mentioned was that a complaint and an investigation does not automatically yield termination or discipline, so the county has been a long practicer of Progressive discipline and I know that both as County Council and as a manager myself Sometimes just bringing somebody in talking with them early days is the desired approach on this so my comment would be you had received a comment about the framework for investigations, and I think that You're in a legally defensible framework for that by having, as long as you're complying with having qualified personnel.

They can be in HR, they can be in CEO, they could be someplace else that focuses on qualified personnel. So again I think you're looking at a policy call do the expected benefits outweigh the expected costs of investigation?

Well, and that's kind of my questions. Let me just give you a couple things that really bother me. One is this idea that some third party can complain on someone else's behalf. And the other thing is it can be oral.

And that's how it exists today. That exists today. Well,

yeah but that's in an informal setting I mean when you create another setting that's got a higher level of scrutiny I don't know why you wouldn't want to have somebody document their actual complaint rather than... And we have that at our farm. Somebody comes in and complains or complains to a foreman or something, then our HR people go do all the documentation.

That is correct. That's our process. That's what

you're planning

on doing? That's exactly right, this is the exact process and if I could just take a step back and respond to the malice piece. I believe we had addressed that issue because in our civil service rules now with the harmonious working relationships that is without malice as well so Us taking malice out is no different than how our civil service rules apply today. And in terms of the process, so we didn't want to prevent employees from having to fill out a formal long document articulating their complaint. A lot of the times employees don't really know what's happening and they'll use terminology such as I'm being treated differently. It's our job to suss out what that really means and Mr. Corsall said it could just be a management right, a management taking an action against an employee that's within their right and it doesn't rise to the level or it could be something a little more serious.

And so the process is that if someone comes and talks to us, that's called the intake process. And during that intake process, we will capture what the employee is saying. And then regurgitated back to them is did I capture what you're saying? And then we do an evaluation as to whether or not this rises to the level and I can tell you that out of all of the, I think I mentioned 189 different reports in complaints that we've received a lot of those are ruled out just at the first step nothing is ever taken but employees need to feel like they have a venue and And to share their concerns and to feel like they're heard.

Well, one final thing. And it's probably just semantics but it's kind of unclear when or how you're going to determine when it's appropriate to have an investigation. I mean wouldn't you, under what circumstances would it be inappropriate to have an investigation of a complaint?

So investigations, it's both science and art like a lot of things that we do in human resources. So it's through a lot of questioning techniques and we mentioned the word qualified. So somebody does need to be qualified in investigative techniques to find out was this an isolated situation? When did this happen? Did anybody else see or hear this? And a lot of the times it's a one time one off comment. And that's not what we're talking about, unless it rises to the level of some egregious outrageous behavior or something that we know can from experience can lead to something greater. It's going to be ruled out because we don't want to perpetuate an environment where managers are not able to manage their workforce.

By adhering to their management rights, supervising, coaching, correcting behavior for fear that an employee is going to come run to human resources or the EEO's office and there's going to be some big investigation. That's not the environment we're trying to create. And everything that we've put into place thus far is nicely packaging a system for us to treat all employees fairly.

See, you're such a good salesman. I read the words on the paper and it scares me to death because there's just open country between the walls on this thing and I can see that the potential for abuse and I listen to you talk to me and you're giving me a great deal of comfort that'll be utilized in a reasonable way But I don't know how to square those two

things. If I can help you reconcile that, I think we have shown over the time that I've been here and with my team that we are committed to doing the right thing for this organization. And we are trying to put systems in place. You talked about if I were to leave or people, their return over what would happen then? And I can tell you based upon my experience coming into an organization where there was nothing. This is what we're trying to fix. There are no policies. We have 4,000 employees. We don't have policies.

For people. And so we are trying to systematically put structure into place, so that anybody that comes in that succeeds me or anybody else has something to follow. So we are trying to turn the tide and create a structure and a culture that is appropriate for the 21st century.

Supervisor? If I can intervene just for one second and that is you asked the question, how can you be convinced? What can we do? And we can come back to in a year or Ms. Gentles could provide data she has a lot of data already and we could look to see how effective the policy's been so we can look at today, look at the number of bullying complaints And we can bring back to you information what it looks like in a year, how those issues have been resolved. How many investigations we've done? Those kinds of things because I think the only way we can prove something is working is looking at data and providing that to you. And the second thing is I just want to say I came from different organizations that didn't have a civil treatment policy but they had codes of conduct.

And this is the first organization where we've not had a code of conduct for our employees. So there's a lot of discretion now in how HR, how the Civil Service Commission, how everyone looks at these issues and trying to determine where they are on the spectrum. And Ms. Gentles is trying to put a policy together. I have to say those other organizations, they weren't perfect. There is room for abuse.

But those policies outlived those HR directors and those CEOs, and those boards. And city councils such that the organization understood what the code of conduct was, what was out of bounds? And that did help the culture develop into what we want our culture to be.

Okay,

all right thank you Mr Chair. Supervisor Wolk.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm coming from a little bit of a different perspective. I am grateful to you Ms. Gentles for bringing this forward and to your department. It feels right now that in our society we are living amongst a lot of abusive and disrespectful behavior. It's very apparent, I think many of us can agree on what those behaviors are. Nevertheless, when you're talking about human behavior it is very subjective. And so it's difficult we're not talking about widgets here. We're talking about human behavior and what constitutes a civil and respectful work environment.

When Supervisor Adam talked about, was it Children's House? What did you say? A playhouse? Yeah. That reminded me of something that I had read a long time ago, the things that you learn in kindergarten. Which is how to be a good friend, how to be a nice member of your kindergarten class and sometimes People have forgotten what they may have learned in kindergarten.

And this policy for me is a reminder of how to treat people, how to treat people respectfully, how to not bully to get a point across and I'm grateful. Again, to you and your department for bringing this forward. I think it speaks volumes of what our county stands for and that we are finally moving in a, I feel like we've always been trying to do that but now we have the written policy to back it up. So I'm very pleased and I will vote for this policy. Thank you Mr Chair.

Supervisor Herman?

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I originally had some concerns and did raise some questions with you or your office earlier, Ms. Gentles about some of the individual items and you made it quite clear that it's a pattern of behavior and it's not any single one of these. And so I'm confident that this will do what you say it will do and it will fill a gap, an important gap.

And I am very grateful, as Supervisor Wolf mentioned about putting systems in place. Because too often as you alluded to we sit at the end of the process and it is very expensive to litigate or to settle. So to try to get the expectations clear and up front and in systems is extremely important. I know in my district in schools the rate of bullying is going up.

Have a situation in our culture right now where what's acceptable is much less clear. And so I think it is important that our county be clear about this, and so I'm intending to vote for it. Thank you.

Supervisor Lavenino. Thank you, Mr Chair. I kind of was following the path that CEO Miyasato was thinking of coming back with numbers. The scary thing about that for me is if we approve it and then we come back and we have this huge influx And you're swamped, what do we do with it then? I mean it's probably pretty difficult at that point to get rid of the policy. I guess you could tweak the policy but the only way that I want to vote for it is with that caveat on it that we bring it back in a year and we take a look at it. Then I guess my second question would be would this also applicable to members of the Board of Supervisors?

No comment.

Well, any policy should apply to all county employees. I also had concerns about this policy. I thought it interesting and important that the employee union that could view this as a good way to help their members get back at managers was worried about the whole institution, and I appreciate that. Appreciate the sentiment from the union that we know that bosses sometimes need to be bosses.

I also though looked at some of those concerns and asked staff to look at some of those concerns, including whether other counties have had a strong upsurge of complaints following these policies. And you can argue that some of the policy, that some of those counties may not be comparable or that the policy isn't comparable but There is a sustained upsurge of complaints from the policies.

So my concern is a little bit, And I also think if we look at this after a year, that will also give us good information. I'm not completely certain that this is going to work but I did look at the complaints department by department does seem to me that there is a problem and That a solution should be proposed and that we should be backing up Ms. Gentles in making sure that there, we at least try a solution.

So I'm prepared to move forward today.

Thank

you. Supervisor Wolf?

I don't know if we have public comments. I was ready to make a motion but I'll wait. We have no further public comment. Okay, I'll go ahead then and move that we approve item A30 as presented. With an additional request that HR bring this back in a year so that the Board of Supervisors and the public has an opportunity to review and comment upon the implementation of this.

And requesting that they provide us with a numerical summary of complaints regarding this policy.

There is a motion and a second. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed? It's unanimous. We will move on to public comment for items not on the agenda.

Chair Williams, members of the board we have one request to speak. We're going to go to Senator Barbara for Lee Moldaver. Mr. Moldaver.

Good morning Mr. Chair, members of the board I'm Lee Moldaver a local resident first I wanted to give a shout out to the chair if your colleagues weren't aware you were one of the commencement speakers at UCSB this last week and I really appreciated your challenging the students to walk their talk in real life very very important second while you're meeting in the North County I wanted to say a couple of words I should have said two weeks ago about How much I appreciated the life and service of your former colleague, Tom Urbanski who represented the 5th District with great distinction. And anytime someone is speaking with a time limit, I always remember his little hourglass timer which was beyond refute when it was out, it was out.

I also in that sense wanted to congratulate Each of you who were elected two weeks ago in the election, and everybody who took the time and effort and hard work to run in the election. At the end of May we had Memorial Day where we remember all the people who fell in conflicts in defense of American values. And in two weeks we have the July 4th holiday where it was first proposed that people have the right to participate and help decide how they are governed.

You were about that, but everyone who felt free and unimpeded to run for office deserves our recognition as well, and that was why a former school teacher like Tom Urbanski chose to do it, and that's why each of you did it. So I wanted to take these two minutes to recognize Tom while you're meeting in the North County and appreciate him to his family And to thank all of you who put yourself through the tribulation of raising money and separation from family, to serve and to run for office whether you won this time or not.

And best wishes for the next 4th of July. Thank you.

That concludes public comment.

Then we'll move on to D1.

Chair Williams, members of the board, item D1 is from planning and development. It's a hearing to consider recommendations regarding a request for hearing by David Swank, agent for Oak Hills Estates LLC, owner and proposed Oak Hills Estate project. And this is in the third district and there's a request that we continue this item to your meeting on July 17th.

Is there any question about the request for continuance or can I get a motion?

I did talk to the applicant and he said everything's on course. So, I will move that this be continued until July 17th.

There was a motion in second. Is there any request to speak?

No requests to speak.