Board of Supervisors — 2021-09-21

Madam Clerk, are there any announcements or changes to our agenda today?

Chair Nelson and members of the board, I just have a couple quick announcements this morning. I would like to remind the public that our Board of Supervisors meetings are being interpreted and broadcast live in Spanish. We are broadcasting our meetings in Spanish both for Cox Cable subscribers in South County as well as Comcast cable subscribers in North County.

Members of the public can now view our meetings in Spanish by turning on the secondary audio programming also known as SAP or SAP under their language settings. Lastly, I would just like to remind the public who are participating in our meeting today of the board's updated methods of public participation. For the Board of Supervisors' methods of public participation and to provide public comment on general public comment or an item on the board's agenda please see page 2 of our agenda.

Members of the public can now attend meetings in person in both the Santa Maria Board Hearing Room Chambers as well as the Santa Barbara Board Hearing Room Chambers. Please note, on September 5th 2021 a new County Health Officer order went into effect requiring indoor mask usage for anyone over two years of age regardless of vaccination status. If you attend the board meeting in person, you will be required to wear a face covering or mask at all times regardless of vaccination status.

Information regarding how to properly wear a mask has been posted throughout both locations. As a friendly reminder, masks should cover your nose and mouth. Wear the mask from the bridge of your nose to all the way under your chin. Tighten any loops or ties so the mask is snug. If you do not have a mask that fits properly we will provide you with one. Individuals that would like to provide verbal public comment virtually may do so via Zoom by registering in advance via the link available on page two.

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing important information about joining the virtual meeting. Once the chair has announced the item you want to comment on please join the meeting with the information provided in the registration confirmation email. You will be placed on mute until it is your turn to speak The clerk will call you by name. When removed from mute, you will hear a notification that your line has been unmuted. If you're using a touchtone phone, you may need to press star six to unmute yourself.

Again if you are using a touchtone phone, you may need to press star six to unmute yourself. Each person may address the board for up to three minutes and this is at the discretion of the chair. If you have any questions please contact the clerk of the boards office at area code 805-568-2240 Again, that's 805-568-2240. And that concludes my announcements for today.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Turn Nelson just quickly, I think some of our residents were notified of a possible PSPS event by PG&E was very limited in our county only affecting 19 customers. And this morning we did receive an email from them saying due to improved weather conditions PG&E had delayed the decision for the PSPS to customers in Santa Barbara County and they will be revisiting that. We're looking at the weather conditions this morning so just wanted people to know that

right thank you.

Thank you Mr. Chair, I just wanted to take a second to congratulate a couple of our county employees. They were honored by the Santa Maria Elks Lodge this last week during their Law Enforcement Appreciation Night and they were Santa Barbara County Sheriff Detective Jonathan Fleming and then from Santa Barbara County Probation Department we had the Deputy Probation Officer of the Year was Lucia Esparza And then from the Santa Barbara District Attorney's Office, District Attorney Paul Zellis.

So just wanted to highlight those individuals and also to thank the Elks Lodge of which I'm a proud member for honoring our county employees in our local law enforcement.

Thank you Supervisor Avenino.

none, I've

got 823. Madam Clerk? Do we have any items from the public?

Chair Nelson and members of the board, we have no requests to speak on the administrative agenda from the public.

All right Supervisor Leoneau can we encompass 823 into the entire motion? Okay can I get a motion to approve the administrative agenda? So moved. Second. All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Motion passes unanimously. And quickly please read item A23 into the record for comment from Supervisor Lavinino.

Chair Nelson and members of the Board, Administrative Item Number 23 is brought to us by Supervisor Lavinino. It is to consider recommendations regarding the approval of a contract with Santa Maria Fair Park for the 2021 Veterans Stand Down.

Mr. Chair, I just wanted to take this opportunity to highlight October 16th is our ninth annual veteran stand down event. There's some county employees that play a very significant role. Especially want to thank Frank Mejia and Heather Gardner as well as Amy Lopez. They've been there since day one and I want to actually just thank all of our partners who are actually adding some new items this year. One of them, of course would be COVID testing and also you can get your COVID vaccination shot there so once again this event is open to all veterans it's there are specific Things there that are geared towards our homeless veterans and those most in need, but every veteran is welcome to show up October 16th the gates open at nine o'clock. Everything from haircuts and showers and taking care of your pets and your kids to medical dental.

Mental health, employment opportunities, housing. If there's a need there that you have that isn't being filled at Stand Down let us know and we'll make sure we take care of that. So anybody that's interested sbcountystanddown.com There's a link there to also to Walmart that if you would like to donate some items we can take care of that. You don't have to do anything but give us your credit card number and we'll take care of the rest.

But just wanted to thank all of our employees that donate their time and energy. Thank you.

Thank you, Supervisor Leopold and all the work that you're doing in that effort.

Chair Nelson and members of the board. Administrative item number 27 is sponsored by Supervisor Hartman and Supervisor Nelson. It is to adopt a resolution proclaiming the month of September 2021 as National Recovery Month in Santa Barbara County, and joining us today in person we have Amy Lopez, Veronica Uribe, Katrina Zamora, and Maria Gonzalez. And if you could please make your way to the podium And I'll go ahead and read the resolution into the record.

Whereas, the Santa Barbara County Behavioral Wellness Department provides in partnership with community-based organizations a continuum of care which includes the prevention intervention treatment and recovery from mental health and substance use challenges promoting the message that behavioral health is essential to wellness And whereas mental health and substance use disorders affect Santa Barbara County and all communities nationwide. And with commitment and support, those impacted can embark on a journey of improved physical health, emotional health, and overall wellness. And whereas this year is Recovery Month theme, recovery is for everyone—every person, every family, every community. Celebrates all people that make the journey of recovery possible and spreads the message that people can and do recover every day.

Through Recovery Month, people become aware and able to recognize the signs of mental health and substance use disorders and encourage people in need of recovery service to seek help. And whereas the County of Santa Barbara Behavioral Wellness Department collaborates with partner agencies and community-based organizations in all areas of the county to ensure everyone has an opportunity to achieve and sustain long term recovery by improving their health and wellness, living a self directed life and striving to reach their full potential.

And whereas we encourage continued collaboration and integration of services to ensure success for individuals and groups who are in long term recovery And whereas a recovery month observance will continue the work to improve the lives of those affected by mental health and substance use disorders are raising awareness and educating communities about the effective services that are available, and in celebrating all recovery achievements.

And now, therefore be it hereby ordered and resolved that this Board of Supervisors proclaim September 2021 as National Recovery Month in Santa Barbara County. And encourages all residents to support men, women, youth and their families who are in drug and alcohol addiction treatment and mental health recovery programs throughout our community passed and adopted today.

Thank you. Welcome Miss Lopez.

And

we have.

Thank you, Ms. Lopez. Thank you all for being here. We appreciate your work. Thank you. All right, well now brings us to the time

Chair Nelson and Members of the Board yes we have four requests to speak on general public comment today.

Okay I'll go ahead and close public comment and invite the first speaker.

And if members of the public who have registered to speak on general public comment today could please log into zoom now and provide their comments that would be greatly appreciated. We are going to begin in Santa Barbara with Katie Mickey, and then we will go to zoom for Maria Kessner, Katie.

Welcome.

Supervisor Williams, we thank you for writing to Governor Newsom requesting he veto two terrible wireless broadband bills SB 556 and AB 537. Remaining County Board of Supervisors, we request that you do the same. I quote Larry Ortega, President of Community Union. Top officials formerly with the California Public Utilities Commission have told me that the fees assessed on rate payers and paid by the state's utility have not been audited in at least 10 years. No one within the CPUC, the California Public Utilities Commission can confirm to this very day if fees collected from ratepayers are fees paid by the state's utility The wild, wild west of the information age has led to the digital divide crisis of today. Giving the wireless industry more deregulatory authority while the entire checks and balances within the CPUC remains out of whack and that is irresponsible.

Dismantling our regulatory agencies credibility even further is their inability to confirm if the fees collected from landline customers for upgrades are upgrades that were actually made. The CPUC's network exam published in 2019 found the smoking gun that says fees collected from ratepayers were not used to make upgrades to families living in the digital divide. Not fulfilling upgrades is the root cause why millions and millions of children could not connect to the internet during last year's pandemic crisis.

Said differently, AT&T and Verizon pre-frontier have had the luxury of being in a deregulated regime over the last decade with the expectation they would build out a world class telecommunication infrastructure. Make upgrades to the network. The upgrades never came so what happened to all the money? Almost 1.5 billion in alleged overcharges has been estimated just in the last two years in California. Until the governor can address the root causes of the digital divide, no further deference to the telecommunication industry should be gifted. SB 556 and AB 537 represent a gift undeserving to an industry who has and will continue to fail millions of our children when no accountability is present.

And in my written public comment, I share with you these pictures. I'm giving them here visually for you to see but this is part of where the money went was in special checks to Senator Ben Husso, Chairman of the Standing Committee on Energy Utilities and Communications And ANTT presented a check of $45,000 grant to his district. And then the second picture is the principal co-author of AB 537 Assemblymember Quirk getting a half a million dollar check for a project in this area from AT&T.

So there is a solution to closing the digital divide and that is fiber to the premises. Please join Supervisor Williams and Mary Murillo and write to our government, Newsom as soon as possible to veto SB 556 and AB 537. Thank

you.

We will now go to Zoom with Maria Kessler to be followed by Jeffrey Schwartz who is our final speaker

Miss Kessner, when you're ready.

Can you hear me? We

can.

Okay good morning Board of Supervisors I just wanted to point out that once again we are running into my daughter and I were denied entry to the board meeting last week she is disabled she is basically exempt from wearing a mask 10.4 effective date September 5 2021 at 5pm clearly states that she is exempt on page for 4.4 number I persons with a medical condition, mental condition or disability that prevents wearing a face covering. We were actually denied entry and we were directed to the courtyard where the county has a setup for people that cannot wear a mask. And this goes directly against your own order. And I just wanted to point out again, just like you deny us our first amendment right to clap in approval of a comment You are again violating the rule of law on your own, your own county order.

And I think this needs to be pointed out because I think the public needs to realize that individuals that work, that our government employees or representatives they ignore oftentimes that are ignorant of the rule of law and are operating under the reputed authority of the government are basically the biggest violators of the rule of law on a regular basis That was basically my public comments. Thank you very

much.

We will now go to Jeffrey Schwartz on Zoom, who is our final speaker.

Mr. Schwartz when you're ready.

Can you hear me?

We can.

Okay again I'd like to give credit to Chairperson Bob Nelson for at least mentioning And talking in positive language about human rights, constitutional rights, natural rights and bodily autonomy. The right of individual people to decide for themselves what goes into their body and not the government deciding what goes on into their bodies. So Chairperson Nelson is the one person on this panel is talking about these things, and that's really good. But the rest of you don't seem to be talking about this at all.

We hear some of the people on this board saying well we govern through science but that's not what you're supposed to be doing. You were forced to swear to say an oath to defend the Constitution And not to defend science and especially science from your government paid or industry people. And one of your people on the board admitted she will not even listen to any dissenting opinions because she thinks there's a consensus, and if anybody is outside the consensus, she doesn't even want to listen to it. So that's her restricted science but you're not supposed to be governing by science. You'll both be governed according to the Constitution And the Constitution clearly lays out our individual rights.

Do you really want to set up a two-class society? Because that's what you're doing, and the Germans did this in the 1930s under their awful leader as you remember him but they had a term for this it was called the Untermensch And this was a Nazi term for the non-Aryan inferior people. It means in German, it means the under man or like the subhuman man. And so are you considering anyone who doesn't take these injections sub human? Cause you're treating us like that. You're saying we can't travel. We can't go on to transportation. We can't come to your meetings if we don't cover our faces, which for some people is either against their religion or against medical advice. So you are creating a two class society and I'm wondering how far is this going to go?

Are you going to insist that we go into locked quarantine facilities, very similar to what happened in World War II where the Japanese people, Japanese Americans were interned in America in large numbers. They're already building these locked facilities all over Australia. So is this going to happen here? And I think you need to start talking about our human rights, just like Bob Nelson is. I want to hear everyone say how far is this gonna go? How far are you gonna go discriminating and persecuting the people who refuse to take these injections?

Thank you Mr. Schwartz that is your time

And that was our final speaker.

All right, Mr Chair, I should have said under a 26 but I did want to not let that And I'm glad that the board passed that along with the consent calendar, but it is National Drive Electric Week. The first week in October and it's no accident that it's the same time as Clean Air Day. It's right after Clean Air Day. And it's for people that are thinking about saving a whole lot of money now that gas is approaching $5 a gallon. It's a great opportunity to get out there, a lot more selection of cars and because northern Santa Barbara County is already I'm getting their energy from 3 C E. That means that people who live in the northern half of the county can already get better vehicle incentives. Check out the website for three C E or email myself or Joan Hartman, who are your two representatives on three C E board.

And shortly, beginning next month, South County residents will also be getting their energy from 3CE and can get those same incentives for electric cars or for electric charging through our energy provider community, Central Coast Community Energy, 3CE.

Thank you Supervisor Williams. Back to Madam Clerk?

Yes, thank you Chair Nelson and members of the board. And just for clarification in regards to Supervisor Williams comments that was for administrative item number 26 sponsored by Supervisor Williams to adopt a resolution proclaiming September 25th 2021 through October 3rd 2022 as National Drive Electric Week.

Thank you for keeping us on track with that. That's the conclusion of the administrative agenda and public comment.

Chair Nelson and members of the board, departmental item number one is from the county executive office. It is a hearing to consider recommendations regarding an update on the coronavirus disease 2019 COVID-19.

Welcome Dr. DeRionne Pollard.

Good morning chair Nelson and members of the board. Madam clerk may I have my slides? Next This morning's briefing will go over the COVID-19 dashboard, give your board an update on the booster conversation, update on our testing capacity as well as giving your board an update on our flu season. Next from our dashboard As of September 20th, we have 76 new cases.

And this is a decrease from the two week average of 105. We have 473 active cases, and this is also a decrease from a two-week average of 554. That brings our total cases to 41,402. Our testing, our case rate per 100,000 As of September 16th is at 16 with a testing positivity at 4.2. Unfortunately, we reported three new deaths. These are two individuals 50 to 69 years of age and one individual in the 70 plus year of age range. The individuals resided in Orchid and Santa Maria.

We currently have 45 individuals hospitalized with 12 in the ICU. Our total death is at 497. Next, this is our case rate over the spans of the pandemic. We are currently reporting our case rate at 16. So that is a decrease of roughly 35% over the last two weeks. Next This is comparing case rate by vaccination rate as of September 9th. The top line, the red line describes the trend for unvaccinated individuals and the case rate is at 30. Our countywide rate is the middle line, the gray line so it is at 17.2. The lowest line, vaccinated individuals at six point two. So so as of nine, nine cases were four point eight times more likely to be unvaccinated than vaccinated. Next.

I'd like to share with your board this is a sometimes it's always good to compare our case rate with at the state level and at the national level. So, the blue line describes... And this is case rate per 100,000 per day with a seven-day average with no lag. And so, the top line, the blue line is the national rate at a case rate of 42.79. And California is described by the orange line With the case rate at 14.56, our county Santa Barbara is described by the green line and again our case rate is at 16.68.

So this is really a good depiction of what's happening around us. And just if you are interested, slow case rate is at 27 and Ventura is at 15. Next. This slide describes our hospital capacity as of September 19th. We have 63.2% of our hospital beds in use and we have 70.1% of our staffed ICU beds in use, so our hospital capacity has slightly improved this week but we are still very close to the red zone

Next.

Our vaccination rate as of September 19th, we have 67.4% of eligible Santa Barbara County residents as fully vaccinated and again it's still roughly one in three eligible persons in Santa Barbara County is still unvaccinated.

Next.

We continue to see modest increases at the zip code level and vaccination level by zip code is available on a daily basis on our publichealthsbc.org under the vaccination tab, and you can hover over a particular zip code and see and track the changes in those particular zip codes next. So from the previous slide, this is the highlight we are distilling key takeaways.

The greatest percent increase from previous week were observed in the following zip codes. In the Los Alamos, the Santa Maria, Cosmolia, Antonio, the Guadalupe, Santa Maria Sisquauk and Gary. And lastly, the Lompoc Vandenberg Village, Mission Hills, Concepcion and Acorn. We are seeing more than what we were anticipating. And so this really again is a A combination of continued effort and outreach with our partners in these particular zip codes, as well as the availability of the mobile vaccination clinic. As well as community members being ready to be vaccinated next.

Current outbreaks, we are reporting 58 active outbreaks with nine among businesses, 28 among schools and 21 among congregate living facilities. Next. With regards to the Pfizer booster shot, last Friday The FDA advisory panel voted to recommend the Pfizer booster shot for 65 years and older or those at high risk of severe COVID-19. The panel also supported authorization, so this is not a vote they supported Authorization for healthcare workers and others at high risk of occupational coronavirus exposure. So, booster programs cannot begin at the local level or at the state level until the FDA has made their formal approval and CDC issued the clinical guidance.

Next. I'm just wanting to share with your board that we continue to prioritize preserving our testing capacity in our county. And so what this means is that we continue to work with employers, so that they can have a direct contract with the state for free employer-based testing. We continue to support our Goleta Valley Community Center, our built in community center testing, Santa Maria Fair Park testing as well as supporting our two testing sites based out of our healthcare center in Santa Barbara and in Lompoc.

Next? We are happy to announce finally that we are adding to our testing capacity. So it is confirmed that the mini bus will be coming next Monday on September 27th, it will be parked at Direct Relief in Goleta. The capacity is 168 tests per day It will be open from 9 to 5, Monday through Friday. Appointments can be booked at our website publichealthsbc.org forward slash testing or walk-ins are accepted as long as there is space available next well it is Once upon us again, the flu season. The Santa Barbara County Public Health Department wants to remind your board and our community that the flu season has arrived. Flu vaccination will be very important especially because we are still in a pandemic to reduce flu and to reduce the overall impact of respiratory illnesses on our community.

Getting the flu vaccine is an essential part of protecting our health and our family's health. Flu vaccination reduces the risk of flu illness, hospitalization and death in addition to other important benefits. The CDC continues to emphasize the importance of flu vaccination beginning September and for the entire flu season. Flu activity can peak in the coming months, in particular in December Thank you very much.

A places where individuals can get vaccinated, it is so convenient. The vaccine is the flu vaccine is available from your regular health care provider as well as retail pharmacies and in addition many employers like our county schools colleges universities also offer them. And if individuals don't have a doctor that they regularly see, flu vaccines will also be made available through our local health department and our vaccine clinics. And there are pictures from previous years where your board participated in our flu season kickoff by getting vaccinated.

Next. I'd like to end my briefing by sharing with your board an example of our outreach. This particular effort focuses on the facts about COVID-19 vaccines. This graphic is available in both English and Spanish, and will be shared widely through our platforms and our partners And it really just addresses some of the facts that we want to make sure that everyone is aware. That researchers took no safety shortcuts, large studies show that the vaccine is safe.

Another fact that the vaccine helps your body produce antibodies but cannot change your DNA. Another fact, the vaccine cannot give you COVID-19 because it does not contain a live virus strain Fact, it does not have egg proteins and can be given to people with egg allergies. Fact the vaccine can cause mild side effects that resolved in a few days. And lastly fact there is no evidence that the vaccine causes infertility.

So with that my briefing ends.

Thank you Dr. Dovonoso questions from the board?

Yes,

Mr. Chair.

Supervisor Hart? Yeah I just had a question for Dr. DiIorino about the flu vaccine. Are you planning to come back to the board to give us our shots at a future board meeting?

Yes, our team is ready and available to join me at our next board update in October. So we will be there with flu vaccines for any board members or those in attendance who wish to get a flu vaccine.

Thank you very much for that.

And I'm going to remind everyone to wear short sleeve shirts.

Thank you Professor Hart Any other questions from the board? I

had a quick question about, there was a lot of talk last year about the flu season and having very low presence of flu in the community. And looking on the dashboard it seems that that is also true. What is the expectation understanding this last year and what we're looking at moving forward?

Right. Great question, Chair Nelson. So what we experienced last year was very unique in that we were still there wasn't a lot of mobility in the community. We were still under quite a few restrictions. Everyone was masking social distancing and really limiting their outings and their gatherings so that on top of the flu vaccine Really precipitated us in a good space where we did not see a lot of flu infections and flu deaths in our community, and in other communities as well. This year is a little bit different. We for the most part have resumed normalcy there is no restriction on gathering social distancing. And people have resumed for the most part, their normal typical activities. So we wanna make sure that everyone will continue those precautions as well as take the flu vaccine so that we can keep flu circulating at a very minimal level.

Thank you. Have we had any positive flu cases in the county?

Not that I am aware of.

Okay, thank you. All right. I also had some questions for HR on the testing and vaccine policy. I understand that I've got a lot of questions from various employees in the county over the last couple weeks on the progress, and I think HR has a slide that they can provide for the public and for our employees.

Good morning, Chair Nelson and members of the board. This is Maria Elena, the county's HR director, and I actually have for you a presentation More of an update in terms of where we are with the policy, the county employee vaccination verification and testing policy. As well as specifically the question that you had for us which is on the exemptions. So that's what I'll cover today with me for today's update is Joe Cresano. Our division chief for employee relations, Carlos Silva's Employee Relations Manager and Victoria Tuttle from County Council.

And so the next slide please. So here we have this is specifically the question that you had for us on the exemptions So it can get a little complicated and can be confusing. At the end of the summer in July, we had this state health order start. We received the beginning of three state health orders at the end of July and into August there were total of three state health orders. And basically those state health orders work for a very specific group of our county employees And it was pretty much a vaccination mandate that for our public health, our PUF clinics and B-Well specific employees in their correctional detention and Santa Maria Juvenile Hall and Los Vietos Boys Camp.

And it's a vaccination mandate that said that you had to have your vaccination. And if not, you could have exemptions and there were only two exemptions based on medical or religious reasons. And in order to get those exemptions we identified the declination form and Through that declination form, you'd still need to go through weekly testing. So it was a very specific group of our employees.

It was not the whole county with just these specific groups and it was a mandate for vaccines and the exemptions for those are just these two medical and religious and the form for Is through this declination form, and then it was weekly testing. So that was a very specific group and there are the deadline for those are coming up September 30th for most of the clinical groups and then for the correctional and detention they have until October 14th To ensure that we meet those mandates.

So then at the end of the summer in August, a couple weeks ago, right? August 27th, our county board approved the counties employee vaccination verification or testing policy. Vaccine mandate, but employees had to verify to us that they have their vaccines. Or if they didn't want to show us any kind of documentation, they could choose to go through a weekly testing process and so exemptions are really not necessary since we're not mandating the vaccine and Again, there's no necessary exemptions for testing except for we are creating a form that if our employees are not comfortable with the PCR testing that we will consider an alternative for that PCR testing. But it is not an alternative for the testing itself. Our employees still have to have some kind of testing on a weekly basis, because that is the policy.

You show documentation or you go to weekly testing so the PCR can't if you don't want to do the PCR testing we can look at an alternative type of testing and we are still developing that form And we hope to have that before the deadline of September 30th or soon thereafter. So those are the two different policies, the mandate from the state health order and then the county's policy for the rest of the workforce that did not fall under the state health order.

Then we had our own local health officer order that has been in place for the overall county around face masks that went into effect and will be expiring on October 5th, around face masks. That all of our employees need to be wearing face masks while indoors performing their work in county buildings The exemptions are if you, our employees are working alone in an enclosed office with a door without any other employees in that office or when they are actively eating or drinking.

And if there are issues for our employees with the face mask requirement, our employees can file through or request through Title VII The ADA accommodations process. And there are protocols for that, that our employees can follow to request those accommodations. So since August 27th we have been fielding numerous questions from both our union leadership and our department managers and department directors.

And we are answering those questions And we are posting those on our HR intranet, as well as the forms. The declination form is there and that's our link there. And when we finalize the request for alternate COVID-19 testing, that form will also be there. We will continue to meet with our department representatives as well as our union representatives. And so if our employees have any questions, really the best approach is for the employees to meet with their supervisors and managers, the HR rep at the department level, union leadership because our ER teams have continued to meet with them And then, of course, county HR.

The HR internet site is going to be a good place for them to get information and answers to their questions. So that's our in terms of the policy distinction because it can get a little confusing. I thought it'd be helpful for us to take a look at our numbers in terms of who does this policy impact? So the next slide please. So here's where we stand as of yesterday. The numbers have adjusted a little bit from the last time I presented the numbers and that's only because our elections workers are no longer with us, several of our seasonal workers are no longer with us so the total county workforce has decreased And that overall helps the testing numbers. So now we are at 72% vaxxed and verified as compared to, we were at the end of August, we were at 49.3% vaccine verified and now we're at 72%.

And so currently we're at 28%, if we were to look at our testing population, Those that are vaxxed and verified or the rest will be considered our testing population. However, the deadline for our work, our departments was last Friday to get us these numbers but we're still processing a few more departments. We have three or four that are still trying to collect those numbers So we think that these numbers will shift included in the 28% are also employees have the first shot, but they don't yet have the second shot. And as you know, the definition of fully vaccinated is when they have completed the two shots and are beyond them to the second shot so Those individuals are still not considered fully vaxxed. And so they're kind of still in that 28%.

So the numbers will adjust a little bit as we head into the 930 deadline date, but we're looking much better than we were in August and so these numbers will continue to adjust So as we look at right now, the 28%, let's take a look at the next slide that will tell us what our testing process is going to be for this 28%. Next slide please. So here's our testing implementation update for you.

So based on what our departments were saying to us in terms of operational needs, we've identified locations where we will have the testing done. We're looking at the Santa Barbara Administrative Building location since that's a great number of employees, a pod of employees. We're looking at Santa Maria, Calle Real and then we have department specific based on operations and total numbers The fire sheriff, public health, public works and social services are departments that will most likely run their own testing locally as that will help them operationally.

And we've have asterisks on all of this because locations and times need to be determined based on the actual numbers of employees that need to be tested. And we are still processing that. We are happy to report that we have contracted with Color Platform and the Valencia Laboratory as our vendors for the dashboards. That's where we will manage the results of the testing.

Valencia Laboratory will provide us the drop boxes in the Santa Maria area, in the Santa Barbara area and they will test our specimens. We have made the decision to hire medical assistants for our county locations, and this will help in ensuring that we have. Observers and record keepers for this process, they will deliver to the drop boxes. They will be trained and have the appropriate protective equipment that they will need so that Managers and supervisors aren't the ones that are actually doing the observing. If you recall, the test is a self-test but someone still needs to observe and record and make sure that the test kits are handed out appropriately and the employees are instructed correctly and that the record keeping and all of that is done adequately.

And so Here's the implementation where we need to order the kits and you've heard on the news that there's a bit of a backlog with the kids because all employers are having to go through this. The county is not the only employer And so Color Platform is not allowing us to just throw a number out there for the total number of kits that we can order. They really want us to be very diligent and specific in terms of the total kits we can order, and so having that number nailed down is really important.

Once we have that, we can order and then employees can register onto the Color Platform site. Employees will get their emails so that they'll know when to go. Weekly appointments will begin. Then the dashboards can start getting managed and then should there be a positive We already have the protocols through the Cal OSHA standards as to what management is informed, as to what we need to do and follow should there be a positive result.

So that's our process right now. But you know, the ground is always moving and we've got a good team in place with partnerships with county council and my employee relations team That we've been pretty agile in adjusting and adapting as we need to always in communication with the unions. They've been good partners as well, and our job is to make sure that we keep the lines of communication open.

And we need to adjust as we need to when we get more information but so far that's I'm available for the next slide and to answer your questions if you have any questions for me.

So even though we're at 72%, that still leaves a little over 1,200 employees. It looks like that we're talking about testing so curious out of that 72 I mean up and above the 72%. Do we have any idea how many have already taken one shot? So they're on the path to getting out of our testing

Yes, the number is somewhat small. It's not going to make a big dent right now from what we've looked at. Again we still have four departments and one of them is a pretty big one so I'll get more later.

Yeah and then I don't know if this is for Dr. Reynoso or not but is it Is it proper to be getting tested while you're in the protocol of getting your shot? So what I'm saying is like the people that are getting their shots, they're still from what I'm understanding we're still going to require them to be tested until they're two weeks past their second shot.

So does it make sense to test people as as they're in that protocol?

That's a great question, and I don't have an answer to that. But I will check with my team for a response right now.