Board of Supervisors — 2022-06-15

I'll move approval of the minutes.

And I will second, is there any discussion? Madam Clerk would you

motion passes unanimously

CEO Miyasato do you have a report today no report this morning chair okay madam clerk any announcements

Chair Hartman and members of the board, I just have one quick announcement this morning. I would 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 the agenda. Members of the public can now attend meetings in person both in the Santa Barbara Board Hearing Room Chambers as well as the Santa Maria Board Hearing Room Chambers Please note the board is following all local and state guidelines and are no longer requiring face coverings indoors.

If you attend the board meeting in person, you will no longer be required to wear a face covering but please be advised that the Public Health Department is still strongly encouraging all county staff and members of the public to mask and socially distance themselves in crowded areas. I would also like to remind the public that if you require any special accommodations please contact the clerk of the board to make that request preferably on the Friday prior to the board meeting.

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. You'll be placed on mute until it is your turn to speak.

The clerk will call you by name and when removed from mute, you will hear a notification that your line has been unmuted. If you're using a touchstone 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 Board's Office at area code 805568 Thank you

madam clerk so turning to our administrative agenda would any board members like to pull any item.

Nothing from the North County.

Okay, and nothing from South County. So would any member of the public have they signed up to pull any item? Chair

Hartman and members of the board we have no request to speak from the public on our administrative agenda.

Okay so I would entertain a motion to approve the administrative agenda.

So moved.

And I will second and Madam Clerk would you call the roll?

motion passes unanimously

so madam clerk would you read administrative item number five into the record please

Chair Hartman and members of the board, administrative item number five is a resolution sponsored by all members of the Board of Supervisors. It is to adopt a resolution proclaiming June 19th 2022 as Juneteenth Independence Day in Santa Barbara County And we have members of the public, um, of our community joining us today here in person and on Zoom. And we have Jordan Killebrew from Juneteenth Santa Barbara, Simone Ruskamp from Healing Justice, Warren Ritter from the Santa Barbara Young Black Professionals Yasmin Dawson and Cosette Blau from Collective Cultures Creating Change, also known as C4 in Lompoc.

Wendy Sims Moten from the African American Women of Santa Barbara. Lawanda Lyons Pruitt from the NAACP in Santa Maria Lompoc. Connie Alexander Boetti from the NAACP Santa Barbara. Siobhan Hoover from Endowment for Youth. James Joyce III from Coffee with a Black Man, Akil Hill is one of the members of the black faculty and staff from Santa Barbara City College.

Daryl M McNeal from Santa Barbara Black Culture House and Vashti Wilson from Juneteenth Santa Ana's Valley. And like I said we have a few members joining us here in person in Santa Barbara today and a few members on Zoom. And I'll go ahead and read the resolution into the record. Whereas hundreds of thousands of African people were forcibly brought to the territory that is now the United States between 1619 and 1801.

And whereas Africans forced into slavery suffered indignities that are unimaginable today, often being brutalized, humiliated, dehumanized, stripped of their names and heritage and torn apart from family members when sold at auctions under the cruelest of public spectacles. And whereas after the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation by President Abraham Lincoln on January 1st, 1863 and the passage of the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery in 1865 some landowners in Texas continue to hold enslaved people of African descent in bondage And whereas, on June 19th 1865 two and a half years after the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation some 2,000 Union troops arrived in Galveston Bay Texas to announce that more than 250,000 enslaved black people in this state were free by executive decree.

Whereas notwithstanding outcome of the Civil War Excuse me, the legal abolition of slavery and the passage of the 13th 14th and 15th amendments. The United States Constitution more than 150 years ago a system of racial segregation known as Jim Crow arose across many sections of our nature nation and whereas it is acknowledged that the cumulative effect of the institutions of slavery in Jim Crow Laws on the lives of African-Americans and the consequences of these evils continue to manifest themselves today throughout American society. And whereas, despite the stubborn legacies of slavery and Jim Crow, Santa Barbara County's African-American community has made and continues to make rich and meaningful contributions to our cultural and civic life.

And whereas in 1979 Texas became the first state to make Juneteenth an official holiday commemorating the effective end of slavery in the United States And whereas in June 2021, Congress passed a resolution establishing Juneteenth as a national holiday. And on June 17th, 2021 President Biden signed it into law as a federal holiday and whereas the County of Santa Barbara acknowledges and denounces the wrongs committed against African Americans by the institutions of slavery and Jim Crow.

And whereas the County of Santa Barbara expresses its commitment to the pursuit of tolerance and understanding of one another with the goal of eliminating all racial bias, prejudice and discriminatory behavior. And to remember and teach future generations about the history of slavery and Jim Crow laws to ensure that these tragedies will never forgotten nor repeated now therefore be it ordered ordered and resolved that this Board of Supervisors declares June 19th as Juneteenth Independence Day in Santa Barbara County passed and adopted today.

Good morning Chair Hartman and members of the board, members of the public who are here in my brotherhood that's behind me. And others that are on Zoom. It is an honor and always a privilege to be able to speak before you and certainly to acknowledge this resolution, acknowledge this day as we continue to move forward here in Santa Barbara County. As we know things that happen they happen at the local level And I appreciate the efforts that we continue to move forward and to celebrate our differences in a way that everybody feels that they belong. You know, about belonging it says that I truly can be liberty, I can be liberated, I can feel like there's justice there. It's about belonging and it's about appreciating everything that everybody has contributed to this great country that we have but it's not always great for everybody but the more that we do things like this and honor and celebrate as you know the resolution has clearly stated and awkwardly Thank you for having me.

passing and adopting this resolution. And it's not a here we are today doing it, but we're always going to look at that. We have several days throughout the year that we celebrate independence and this is just one we need to add. Not only just add it, but be it part of what we do and celebrate those pieces so that we can have good food, good gathering, breaking bread amongst each other. And we miss so much when we don't come together and celebrate those differences. So I appreciate just the opportunity to stand here and to be a part of this, and appreciate and acknowledge the young folks that brought this forward. And even though we didn't have a resolution, we're going to talk about Juneteenth and we're going to be here. And it doesn't have to take two years, 2 1⁄2 years when something has already happened.

So we're gonna be present and be mindful of what we need to do. So thank you very much.

Hello everyone, Jordan Killebrew with Juneteenth Santa Barbara. It's always hard to follow Miss Wendy but I'll do my best. I'm grateful to be here and grateful to say that we have Juneteenth events all throughout the county, and we have some folks on the line that will share. But I'll talk about Juneteenth Santa Barbara. We are in our fifth year, and we are going to celebrate especially in the Funk Zone or what we were claiming as historically black Santa Barbara. We'll be there Sunday from 12 to 5 p.m.. We'll have local live performances. We'll have free food for up to 200 people at Shalhoub's Funk Zone patio. We will have a kid zone with Princess Tiana showing up And so much more, including a black artisan market. So we're just so grateful to celebrate.

We're thankful to the county for your support. We're thankful to the City of Santa Barbara, City of Goleta, Santa Barbara Foundation and so many other community partners that come together to show up and support our black communities. So grateful and thank you.

Is Simone next?

Chair Hartman and members of the board, yeah that appears to be it for our members who are here in person. So for those of you joining us on Zoom and would like to make a few comments please proceed thank you

Sure, I'm here and I can go next. Well gratitude to each of you. Gratitude as well to Jordan. As he mentioned we're co-founders of Juneteenth Santa Barbara and I'm also one of the co-founders of Healing Justice Santa Barbara. We want to thank the city and county of Santa Barbara, the City of Goleta as well for being sponsors And as Jordan mentioned, in continuing this tradition of Juneteenth we'll also be sharing a wonderful context statement that we've worked in partnership with the state of California to write about the beautiful Black history of the entire city of Santa Barbara. And so we'll have that context statement available for people to review, for people to share artifacts, for people to tell us about their family and bring mementos So we hope that you can come and join our celebration, and also have honest conversations about what else is still needed to support Black life, to prevent displacement of Black people and Black communities from the Central Coast.

So thank you so much, and I'm wishing you all a beautiful Black Independence Day.

And is Warren Ritter next?

I just want to say on behalf of Santa Barbara Young Black Professionals, we are so thankful to the city and the county for everything that they've done to make sure that today happened. We definitely want to give a lot of gratitude to all of the organizations that were part of this especially NAACP, Juneteenth Santa Barbara Healing Justice for making sure that this community feels more like a home and so we definitely wanted to give space for those who do the work day in day out.

Thank you. And Yasmin Dawson and Cosetta Blow.

Morning, my name is Christina Gordon I will be speaking for Ms. Yasmin Dawson and Cosetta Blow. We are with C4. C4 stands for Collective Cultures Creating Change we thank you for inviting us to speak about Juneteenth in our organization C4 is a grassroots coalition, and we work to unify and connect our community. So we are very thankful for the city and county for allowing us to bring this Juneteenth event together.

So we worked to identify resources needed to create a safe space so that all residents of Lompoc, Vandenberg, Santa Maria, and Santa Barbara have an equal opportunity to flourish as productive members of society. So what does C4 mean to I'm sorry, what does Juneteenth mean to C4? Although Juneteenth represents freedom we also see that it shows how freedom and justice in the United States has been delayed for Black people. The year is 2022 and it's just becoming a national holiday.

If we're honest with ourselves many of us weren't even aware that Juneteenth existed until recently. After the end of 1865 the U.S. saw a wave of lynching imprisonment and Jim Crow laws take root This led to mass incarceration of Black people, discriminatory housing policies and lack of economic investment. And many Black people are still facing these today.

So C4 believes that the importance of the history of Juneteenth and that celebrating this holiday could bring America closer to truly furthering its ideas of freedom and equality for all. We must take inventory of our history so that the past does not repeat itself We are so thankful again for inviting us here to speak. We will be participating in a Juneteenth celebration, it's going to be in Bryan Park and Lompoc, and we're collaborating with the NAACP. Thank you again.

Thank you. And next on my list is Lawanda Lyons Pruitt.

Good morning Chairman Chair Hartman and members of the board. Thank you all for having us today and recognizing the importance of Freedom Day, also known as Juneteenth which is short for June 19th. We're pleased today to accept this resolution on behalf of our members, officers and executive committee. I would ask if we could have a flyer up

now please? It is showing in the Santa Barbara hearing room

Oh, perfect. Okay so we want to share a flyer with you. We will be celebrating on a beautiful flyer by the way and we will be celebrating this Saturday June 18th from 11 to 5 at Ryan Park Lompoc and we chose Lompoc because we do not think that enough is done In that area. And that includes on the part of NAACP, because we frequently were based in Santa Maria and Lompoc and I live in Santa Maria so I frequently would do more in Santa Maria because it's easier than Lompoc but we recognize the importance of doing things in Lompoc. It's a beautiful beautiful park 22 acres.

We will have historic reenactments. We have three, including the Reverend Daryl Tullis. We have a young 14-15 year old lady who does an excellent job of Mamie Moseby, Mamie Tills Moseby, Mobley Emmett Tills' mother and we also have Dr. Brooke Russa PhD, she's one of 100 black visits in the United States and the first black female visits to graduate from Yale. And so we're... And she's one of our scholarship recipients. So we're happy to have her and we want you to come out join in with us and celebrate with us As we continue to do this work to reduce racial and ethnic disparities in criminal justice, education, employment housing. As we continue to speak up, speak out getting good and necessary trouble.

And just one final thing if I could, by the way. Chairman Hart, Chair Hart. We know that Lompoc is your district and last year you were there alone with Supervisor Nelson but now it's your district but as many of you that can come out we want you to come out. We have an area set aside for you it says on the flyer that you should bring your canopy and your chair. Well, you don't need to do that because we've set up something for ya so just come out and we do appreciate the sponsorship from the Racial Equity Fund as well as from the Arts & Culture Department, the fund for Santa Barbara And then of course we are doing this celebration with C4 Collective Culture Creating Change in Lompoc. And then just one final thing, if we could play that little commercial that we have?

It's 15 seconds.

Join us for a Juneteenth celebration this Saturday at Ryan Park in Lompoc. Live music, Juneteenth profiles, arts and crafts, food vendors, mobile vaccination clinic, bake off competition here. Keynote speaker Brooke Russell and more this Saturday. Wow well done.

Yes yes KCLY and we continue our work is

wrapping up its weekend long spring carnival today. It started on Thursday at.

Sorry, LaWanda go ahead. That's okay and we do have them for continuing COVID education and outreach so we will have the mobile vaccination clinic there from the public health department I need that second booster so i'm going to be number one in line to get my second booster thank you so much and again we appreciate that the opportunity to for your sponsorship and also to educate the community about the significant contributions that black people have made in the United States and in Santa Barbara County. Thank you.

Thank you, LaWanda. So I still have others if you want to speak. You're very welcome. Connie Alexander Boitate?

Good morning. I am Connie Alexander, you can just say Alexander. And I am here representing the Santa Barbara chapter of the NAACP. I'm the president of the Santa Barbara NAACP and just want to say thank you to supervisors for giving this time to recognize Juneteenth, to recognize the importance historically of this day of Freedom Day. I like to call it Freedom Day, I grew up with a Texas grandmother So I understand the meanings of Freedom Day.

And to continue to encourage you, supervisors, to invest in our community, to invest in the African-American community in Santa Barbara County and to invest in our youth and to have more opportunity for our youth to participate in events like this when you fund things like the Racial Equity Fund, you create opportunity for change. You create opportunity for community, and so we want to continue to encourage you to do that. We look forward to the NAACP Santa Barbara celebrating Sunday the 19th in the Funk Zone with all the other organizations. Special thanks to Juneteenth Santa Barbara for all their hard work, for healing justice, for all of their hard work. And I especially want to recognize the upcoming Uh, context statement that is coming as we have served on that committee and looking forward to that history in the celebration of that history.

So again, supervisors thank you for this opportunity and thank you for your support and I look forward to seeing you and meeting you on Sunday. I hope that you will come out and I look forward to stopping by our booths and tables and having the opportunity to meet you personally. Thank you.

Thank And

Akil is Siobhan. I'm sorry, I am yes my name is Siobhan Hoover and with the Endowment for Youth Committee. The endowment for youth has been serving our community for the last 35 years or so and so on behalf of EYC would just like to express my gratitude for all of your support in this matter thank you. Thank you Akil

Hill

Yes, hello. This is Akil Hill representing black faculty staff at Santa Barbara City College just want to say a big huge thank you as someone who grew up in Santa Barbara who went to the Santa Barbara junior high as well as Santa Barbara High School. A huge thank you and a thank you to all the black families and organizations in town that who have done the heavy lifting in regards to the Juneteenth. I'm looking forward to celebrating with you guys all, uh, and being in community with everyone. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Uh, Daryl McNeil. And Vashti Tamika Wilson

Hello, thank you for having me today. Nice to see you again Chair Hartman and to see everyone else. I am speaking with gratitude today for the proclamation that you have given regarding the injustices that were endured and continue to be endured. I speak on behalf of Juneteenth SYV and also my daughter's company Maddie's Treasure Box And so Maddie's Treasure Box is actually presenting Juneteenth SYV here along with our sponsors Rideau Winery, PHP, Pine on the Hog Catering, Visit SYV and The City of Solving.

And speaking about the proclamation today, One of the things I want to give as an example, and that if you met someone and they had endured an injustice and say their clothes had been stolen or they had been beaten or whatever happened. And then you look at them and he said that was not right. He said, you need a new pair of shoes. You need some pants. You need a shirt. You need two suits. We should give you back what you lost.

And then he said, and good luck with that. And the reason why I say that is because, I am deeply appreciative of the proclamations that are being given. But I also think it needs to be coupled with action. And so we have recognized the injustice. We proclaimed that it was an injustice and that there has been generational trauma impacted upon the black community because of those injustices. But now we also need to couple that with funding. And we need to couple that with programs that are in place to ensure That those injustices can be made a new.

So I charge you with the mandate to employ programs that will allow black female entrepreneurs, black women are the highest educated group of any in the US. They're also the highest number of entrepreneurs yet and still they are the last group to receive any funding for businesses Less than 1% of investment funding goes to women-owned, black-owned businesses. And so I want to charge you with a mandate to create something that will circumvent that injustice if you will and help make that right. And I think that you are just the person and this committee is just the person to do it with the proclamation that was made today. It was absolutely beautiful in its honesty and its transparency And it's desire to make a new beginning. And we can do that coupled with funding, along with what we proclaim to be a new beginning for Black Americans in Santa Barbara County.

Thank you. Oh, and SYV. I should have touched on that real quick. So we have a very laid back kind of feel. We have a DJ. It's all about family. So High On The Hog catering provides the catering. They actually bring it to the park So you simply pre-order your dinner and you're getting delicious pulled pork, black eyed peas, macaroni and cheese, succotash salad. Peach Cobbler, Sweet Potato Pie.

We have live entertainment. We have Princess Tiana who will be doing a live musical performance for the children along with the dance performance. We have kids packs. You have everything you need all you have to do is just pre-order it's free to come but if you want your dinner delivered you just pre-order come to the park get your shirt hang out and everything is already set up we have giant tic tac toes connect fours Everything we thought of so that you just come and it's like a community barbecue kind of feel. So, it is this Saturday in Solving Park from 4 to 7 PM. That's the Saturday Solving Park four to seven PM and you can get pre-order your dinners at JuneteenthSYV.org. Any questions? JuneteenthSYB at gmail.com. Thank you.

Thank you. And we're showing your great poster on our screen up here.

Thank you.

So Madam Clerk, do we have any members of the public who would like to speak on this item? Chair Hartman

and Members of the Board. We have no requests to speak on this

item. Okay and Members of the Board I see Supervisor Hart.

I just want to thank all the people who came today to help us with this proclamation and to announce all the wonderful events that are occurring over the weekend. There are so many people that are deeply involved in the community organizations that are celebrating the rich tradition of black culture in our community, and it is inspiring to see the progress that these events have made over the past five years starting at a very small community level and now growing to events in every part of the county over multiple days.

Inspiring and to Vashti's charge to action that we need to do more than just Proclamations that we actually have to do the work necessary to bring people together, you know I'm really proud of the work that the board has done with the equity fund that we have this help supporting The community organizations that are putting these events together. We have I think a presentation coming up on the board agenda in in the next month or so to talk about all of the equity work that we're doing as an organization in the county, working with community organizations. And I think it's important to check in on that work and to recognize what's being done and to embrace the need to do more every time we have this kind of an opportunity to bring people together.

It reminds us that there's a lot of work to do and it's important, critical to the justice and equity that we all deserve in the United States.

Any supervisors in North County who would like to say anything?

Madam Chair, I think Supervisor Hart hit the nail on the head and I just want folks know that we're all united on this board whether north or south. That call to action is being heard and we're moving in that direction and I just appreciate all those showed up today I'm telling you what, man. You could spend your weekend having a lot of fun this weekend and learning some things, interacting with folks and looking forward to some of the events coming up. So really appreciate the tone and tenor today. And I do hear that call to continue to act.

And I know we are all committed to do that. So appreciate everybody today.

Supervisor Hartman?

Yes, go ahead, Supervisor Nelson.

Thank you, Chair Harmon. I just want to echo the words of my colleagues here that this has been a great opportunity to hear from our community to participate in these events. You know, I got a chance to be one of the speakers last year at the Lompoc Juneteenth event when that was in my district, but it's still Lompoc Valley. So I'm looking forward to being out there on Saturday.

You know, learning about Juneteenth has been one of these pleasant surprises for me once I've gotten into office you know i did not know and I have admitted my ignorance to the holiday and The date, and it's historical significance but you know since I have learned and I've been used this opportunity in this role as a supervisor to talk about that and what that means to our community into our country. Just this morning was able to be on the radio talking about the Juneteenth resolution that we're going to present today, and the importance of that too.

Our community. So again, thank you for bringing this resolution forward I guess it was all of us as the board but i'm looking forward to celebrating with some of my constituents and members of our community this weekend

And I just wanted to add that our board is united. Supervisor Williams happens to be at another board meeting, but he would join us if he didn't have that conflict. But this board and this county is united in trying to redress The grievances of the past. We have a very powerful statement of commitment that Ms. Wendy Sims-Moten helped us draft and we've been looking at our own employment structure and how people are recruited, how people are treated, how people And it's a fundamental commitment on the part of the county, and I think that's important to know. We are also very excited about the equity fund. I believe that has helped create an integration because last year we didn't have as many people from as many different organizations so I think the black community In our county is becoming more integrated, more organized and that will be helpful to us because it can bring a unified voice forward about what the priorities are and how we can begin to address them.

From my perspective I only had a vague understanding of what Juneteenth meant historically, and I think we're all with this new holiday that was declared just a year ago trying to figure out how we celebrate. What does it mean? But certainly it means celebrating freedom. Certainly it means remembering the past and slavery and the legacy that continues from that time. We have to wrestle with that.

It also calls on us to recognize the major contributions that the black and African American community has had in our culture. I can't think of a field from, we celebrated physics but think of the mathematician Katherine Johnson who helped NASA bring the moonshot home and now has a building named after her. But we have to kind of retrieve some of the history of contributions that's been lost, and she's an example of that. Hidden Figures was the name of the film.

But so much the high watermark in human achievement has been from the black community. I think of women athletes, Simone Biles and Serena Williams for example but in many other areas as well. And if you think about music and culture and art Plagg culture has been the wellspring of creativity from which our broader culture has drawn. And so it's been a source of inspiration to everybody, and so I think this is a time to reflect on that. So I'm so grateful to everybody who contributed today to help us think through what this holiday means.

I will be in Lompoc and I will be in the valley. I wish I could be in the funk zone too, but I appreciate that you're organizing so somebody can go to the different events. Really appreciate that. It was a lot of fun and I know it's a lot of work to do that. So with no public comment, I think we've kind of covered from the board thank you so much everyone for participating today.

With that, we go to our general public comment. Madam Clerk, is there anyone who wishes to speak?

Chair Hartman and members of the board, we have no requests to speak on general public comment today.

So I think we are ready then to adjourn. And I've lost the meeting for the next day. Thank you. So we adjourn now till Tuesday, June 28th in Santa Maria.

With that, we're cloned.

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