Board of Supervisors — 2023-06-27

Good morning.

I will call to order the June 27th, 2023 meeting of Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors. Madam Clerk please call the roll.

Second.

All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Opposed? CEO's report.

No CEO's report this morning Chair.

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

Chair Williams and members of the board, I do have a few announcements this morning. We posted an addendum to today's agenda on Friday June 23rd amending the closed session agenda as well as withdrawing administrative item number 67 The closed session agenda was amended to add an additional closed session agenda item, conference with legal counsel existing litigation. Paragraph run of subdivision D of government code section 54956.9. This is the County of Santa Barbara v. the Regents of the University of California at all. Additionally, we received a request from the department to withdraw administrative item number 67. Administrative item number 67 is from the Social Services Department. It is to consider recommendations regarding an agreement with Karasoff Technology Corporation for LinkedIn license to access talent and site tools in the Bercuder platform.

Lastly, departmental item number seven has been added to the agenda. Departmental item number seven is sponsored by Supervisor Williams and Supervisor Capps. It is a hearing to consider recommendations regarding an ordinance to amend County Code Chapter 44 to revise Article 4 Just Cause for Residential Evictions and add Article 5 Mandatory Right of First Refusal and Mandatory Offer of Residential Lease.

This addendum was posted online and made available to the board and the public. Additionally, I do have a brief announcement on administrative item number 40. Administrative item...

You need to first be added.

Administrative item number 40 from the Human Resources Department is to consider recommendations regarding a performance-based salary adjustment for County Council. Prior to the Board acting on this item in accordance with Government Code Section 54953 Subdivision C3, County Council's salary information shall be summarized verbally. County Human Resources recommends that the Board of Supervisors approve a 2.5% performance-based salary adjustment for County Council effective July 10th, 2023 based on the performance review of County Council completed by the Board of Supervisors on May 9th, 2023. By adopting this recommendation, the Board of Supervisors will approve an annual salary of approximately $269,116 for County Council.

Lastly, 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 two of our agenda today. Individuals that would like to provide verbal public comment may do so via Zoom by registering in advance via the link available on page 2. If you have any questions please contact the Clerk of the Board's Office at area code 805-568-2240 again that's 805 568 2240 and that concludes my announcements for today

I have a 7 and a 9 pulled by Mr. Nelson is there any other requests to pull any items from the administrative agenda perhaps by the public?

Chair Williams and members of the board yes, the public has pulled A9, A13 and A76 and I believe we had an additional request from a board member for A70. All

right then can I get a motion on the balance of the agenda? So moved. Second. All those in favor please say aye.

Aye. Sorry to interrupt could we also include the withdrawal on our addendum that was a excuse me 67 and can we separately take the action on A40 which was the county council announcement?

Sure, we will take A40 out of that motion if that's okay with the motioner Great, well done.

Second.

All those in favor please say aye.

Aye.

Opposed? The balance of the administrative agenda is approved and then we will take up a let's do a vote on A40.

Hello everybody, my name is Ivan Vega. I'm also here with Future Leaders of America and I'm here today to strongly support the behavioral wellness to continue its partnership with Future Leaders of America through the approval of the contract for 2023-2027 in front of you. I believe that this contract is vital to addressing substance abuse and preventing drug related issues among the youth in Santa Barbara County.

As we know, substance abuse has been an intergenerational issue and through this partnership FLA is making an impact in educating our youth to make better decisions or better informed decisions when it comes to substance abuse and various drugs. By approving the contract between Behavioral Wellness and FLA you're not only supporting a trusted and proven organization but also Ensuring the long term success of our community and efforts to combat substance abuse.

Thank you for your time.

And that concludes public comment on this item.

I just want to not only thank FLA staff for presenting, but also for the the FLA youth leaders that spoke. You represent your generation well. Can I get a motion?

I wanted to thank FLA for doing this work. It's important for our youth in this community, especially in the Santa Maria Valley we have a lot of issues around substance abuse along with our partners at Good Samaritan and Finding Back Santa Maria Valley on really addressing some of these significant uses that are really impacting our youth Something came up, it's not specific to FLA but as I was going through some of these various contracts we had quite a few contracts and this agenda was when there's federal funding involved with system community-based organizations does that make those organizations subject to the Hatch Act?

And I had a late hit to County Council ask her that question. I don't know if she has an answer right now but maybe something we should look into the future making sure Those requirements with these various organizations that choose to contract with the county. So, I don't know if County Council has any thoughts on it?

Mr. Chair members of the board that's something I can definitely look into. I do think it applies in some circumstances. I'm not sure for these specific contracts but I'd be happy to look at that further.

Thank you. I'd like to move this item. And I also want to thank, she didn't identify herself as such because I know this is the work with FLA as executive director but that was also Santa Maria City Council member Gloria Soto so we appreciate her leadership on this. So I'll move this item.

I'll second. Do you have another comment?

Chair Williams and members of the board, I believe the department has a comment for the board. Melissa?

Sorry, I was just going to respond to the Hatch Act question. We do include that provision in these subcontracts so any of the activities that are being funded through behavioral wellness cannot include political advocacy well they can include certain aspects of education around policy advocacy but no other political activities can be paid for through this particular funding So I did just want to clarify that and that's something that we do look at as part of our annual monitoring process.

Thank you. I have a motion, a second all those in favor please say aye.

Aye.

Opposed? Motion passes A70.

Chair Williams, I'm sorry is that a 70s?

Well by Supervisor Capps.

Yes, Chair Williams and members of the board A70s from the Social Services Department it is to consider recommendations regarding an agreement with Managed Care Solutions SPC for quality jobs equity strategy and training disaster recovery national dislocated worker grant services.

Supervisor Capps

Thank you. I just want to step back a little bit we've had a lot of this is a huge agenda and a lot of money, and we just passed a massive budget of 1.5 billion. And in just my fresh eyes sort of item after item today was Contracts and consultants, and I've shared my concerns with the CEO of just how much that is in going to outside work rather than our employees. So I'm definitely not singling out our director here by asking some questions here but I just I do see it as a concern of I just know I've been a consultant. I've been around this world and there is inflation of costs and I want to make sure we're being as diligent as possible. So this one caught my eye because of a few things, and I'm hopeful that Mr. Nielsen can address those but first it's about $1 million from federal funding so not out of our general fund to train about 100 people and the consultant is not local raises some questions about how a non-local Firm can help train people to get jobs locally.

And also, that there's high risk around the vendor and that was a section in the contract that is standard but I just want to understand why are we approving some consultant contractor that's high risk so if he can go into that so just in general I'm looking for you know when I'm sitting here approving The justification for why is this not in-house? And in many of these, I didn't see that. And so I'm just asking department heads if they can provide that in the future and I'll be better about asking in advance but I just think it's really important again this is taxpayer funded work. I have no dispute about training people for jobs 100% behind that but if you could please elaborate as to my concerns thank you

Absolutely, Supervisor Capps to the chair. So I'm going to address the why not in-house part first and then I'll turn it over to our Workforce Development Board Executive Director Louise Servine to speak to the use of this particular vendor so the Workforce Development Board has underlying funding to do their core services where they serve adults dislocated workers and youth in the community.

And then they also have About approximately seven additional grants currently that we have just with our Workforce Development Board, and then they're a partner in about five other additional grants with the Regional Planning Unit which were in collaboration with San Luis Obispo County Workforce Development Board. And all of these grants range in longevity anywhere from approximately one to three years.

And so we have assessed over time many, many times how to best get that work done when these grant opportunities come along. And time after time the most economical way, the way that gets allows us to get the grant and to serve the most people is by having vendors that we oversee to provide the services Because it's just not possible to have a core staff based upon that funding.

Sometimes the funding gets extended six months or year, but all these grants are term limited. And so there's an issue of inability to hire a lot of staff. To provide these services from that angle, because if the grant funding goes away and no additional grant funding has appeared that person could work on then they would have to be absorbed back within the Department of Social Services.

And if we didn't have vacancies. That they could be absorbed into that could potentially lead to layoffs. So, that's one issue the second issue is the expertise of staff to be able to do the work and so when we use different vendors contractors to do the work. We're selecting ones that we believe have the expertise to do that sort of work. We have in the Workforce Development Board several years ago and looking at all the totality of grants, I told the former director Ray McDonald that I was comfortable with him having one staff person. That we were counting on consistently being funded by the grants because there was enough that we could anticipate and we knew end dates.

Um, and so we maximize what we can do in terms of that funding. In that regard the other component to the funding issue and the grants is that. If I have a staff person that I hire full time, I have overhead associated with that staff person related to the costs of IT and County Council and HR. And all the other internal county services that get added on to the base salary for that employee. And that's approximately 40% of the salary cost. So if we're applying for a grant And we say to them, well we're going to staff this ourselves. We have our salary cost for that position plus 40%. That usually blows the possibility of getting that grant out of the water in terms of that grantor not being willing to allow that much overhead costs. So that's kind of the general thumbnail sketch of the landscape of why we choose in the Workforce Development Board arena To contract things out and have raised, or excuse me, Luis's staff of approximately nine people play the role of oversight and coordinator and facilitator and that sort of stuff.

But I'll turn it over to Luis to address the decisions that go into and the high risk concern you have.

Sure, well just one question on that. So we have nine people that do workforce development is that?

Play different roles. We have Luis and we have a deputy director and then we have other staff actually I think now we've bumped it up to 11 or 12 because of the Farmworker Resource Center grant so we have three people specifically assigned to their to that grant but there again that's a perfect example that's that's a grant that ends next year The next calendar year, and so we have to be able if funding for that isn't continued by the state or if the board chooses not to fund it at its current level. We have to absorb any of those staff that are no longer funded for that program next year back into the department.

Yeah, I understand that. So thanks for explaining. I just do see this trend and I can dig in more offline with our CEO but we're afraid you know it's like one time funding so we're afraid to fill positions. But then I just see is so much outsourcing of the work and that those costs are very high and I just wonder too. You know work is changing some people are more adept at short term jobs than they might have been even right four years ago. So I want to make sure we're not sort Workforce in a somewhat outmoded way and outsourcing when we could be doing. I mean, any of those nine people do they actually do this kind of work specifically in this

grade? They're doing the monitoring and the work with the programs and the development of new grant opportunities, applying for grants. But I do want to share that several years ago, I had a conversation with the HR director about the need for term limited positions. And we have made progress in that arena in terms of permanent positions for grants because of that recognition that we could potentially if we had a grant for two years, we could potentially find somebody that has the skill set that was willing to take on that job for that period of time.

So it is something that we have on our radar And that we have tried to move forward as a county in terms of having that flexibility to do that. I did want to address the underlying question though, of the cost issue because on this grant So $656,000 of this total grant amount is going to be going directly to the clients in terms of services and job training and supportive services and things like that. I apologize for my eyesight. I'm having a problem with my right eye today. $206,597 is the part of the grant that's going for the actual operation of this for the contractor to do the work and to coordinate all these trainings and that sort of stuff. And so that would be very hard for us to staff this work with our costs being what they are it would be very hard for us to staff it for that dollar amount.

And are these trainings in Santa Barbara County? Are they remote?

No. Yeah, and I'll let Luis address the specifics but yes when we contract with people to do trainings it's for our people here and they have to figure out whether it was a combination of remote or an in-person but it's here.

Okay.

I'll turn it over to Executive Director Sarvee.

Thanks Director Nielsen

Good morning Supervisors. So yeah in regards to the training, there's two elements of the training. The participants have the ability to do work-based learning with a local employer so they could do a paid work experience where we cover 100% of the wages for a limited period of time or they could do an on-the-job training where we cover parts of the wages with our local employer. The other component is for those that want to do vocational training And for those we have to use the state's approved list of trainers. For us locally here a lot of our training providers are actually community colleges, both of our community colleges but we do have an array of different training providers that we utilize.

But yeah, about $660,000 is actually going towards training or what we call supportive services which is funds to help job seekers pay for clothing, interview attire and any other things that they might need while they're participating in the program.

Thank you, and if you could speak to the vendor because again it was flagged that this is a high-risk vendor. That certainly caught my eye not something that you normally say yes let's go with the high risk vendor but if you could speak to this vendor why this vendor when they're making their proposals because I didn't see it in the materials and this is something I would love to see going forward are there successes? Are there metrics of where they've done this Successfully elsewhere, even a narrative of someone who has gone through this program and now is successfully working somewhere. I just the proposals that we get are in my experience thus far on this board don't include sort of metrics of what we're looking for in a successful contract.

Right. So for this particular contract, we are utilizing the adult and dislocated worker contractor managed career solutions. So last year went through an extensive solicitation process. We received multiple proposals and they were the ones that were selected and approved by the Board of Supervisors to provide the services for the adult and the dislocated workers. And also to oversee the America Job Center. So part of that solicitation process was for the Workforce Development Board through a consultant and a series of individuals that we gathered throughout the state, experts that actually reviewed the proposal and managed career solution was a proposal that was recommended to the Workforce Development Board and then brought to the board here for approval.

So there was an extensive process that was conducted last year.

That's good to hear. So that high risk, can you explain that?

Yeah so the high risk is something we do internally. The high risk is dictated on the amount of the contract or the amount of funding that is contracted out. It's also dictated based on The type of contract that this is, and in other elements that take place. In order for us to mitigate this we do have a very robust process when we get invoices from the vendor. So every month when we get the invoice from the vendor they get looked at very closely by our fiscal department before anything gets paid out. This is a cost reimbursement so we don't pay anything unless we see that there's backup sufficient backup documentation for us to pay these for the services that they provided already.

A high risk designation functionally is simply that there's more scrutiny on what they request for reimbursed costs. Exactly

and also on the program side we do a lot of review with make sure that they're providing the right services from our fiscal side making sure that they're providing us with the right adequate backup documentation for us to pay whatever cost they've incurred

Thank you for your patience in my questions. I'm trying to understand better and I would be interested to hear some success stories when you're at that point, and in general, I think that just is a very important point. It sounds as though you have done your due diligence in picking this vendor but I think it's important to reflect some of that in the funding request of metrics how its worked other counties etc because Again, I'm singling this one out not to put you on the spot too much but most of the contracts that I read over the weekend didn't include kind of a for me an essential item would be metrics of success. Thank you.

Thank You Mr. Chair

Well, and I think the contracting out is a real issue. And there will be a moment when the employment environment, the employee pool changes and we will as an institution have more of an opportunity to reverse that trend. And I would, I think that there are some departments that are already reversing that trend which has been the topic of a lot of discussions for this board this year.

Can I get a motion on this item?

And Supervisors, we will be having a department meeting and we'll be reviewing. It's a good reminder. Thank you, Supervisor Capps to all our departments and how we look at our board letters. And there are differences between a consultant and a vendor just to be clear. So there are some differences there. And just I want to be clear with our unions that listen, this is not contracting out work. We have very clear parameters of when that occurs and when we can negotiate with the unions on that. And so just to clarify, this does not meet that definition. Thank you.

Can I get a motion on this item?

I move to approve.

Second. There is a motion and a second, all those in favor please say aye. Aye. Opposed? And just for clarity can I get a motion to withdraw A67 because that would-

I'll make the motion to withdraw Item A67. Second.

All those in favor please say aye.

Aye. Opposed?

Motion carries and our last item well our last is A76.

Chair Williams and members of the board, administrative item number 76 is from the Public Works Department. It is to set a hearing to consider recommendations regarding the approval of the exclusive franchise agreement for solid waste collection in Zone 4 and Zone 5. And this is in the 3rd, 4th, and 5th districts. And this is setting a hearing for July 11th, 2023. And we do have seven requests to speak from the public on this item.

And we are going to begin here in Santa Maria with Luis Ramirez, to be followed by Amador Salas. Luis?

Chair Williams and Supervisors my name is Luis Ramirez I'm the Public Education and Outreach Manager at WM dedicated zones four and five. Please just a note

This is a set hearing, so you can only speak to when the hearing date is set. The substantive issues will be handled at that hearing. So just since you're setting the tone for everybody else who speaks it is not germane to the subject of this item to talk about costs or any other items. It's just setting the hearing.

In that case I'll shorten it up. I'm here, I was going to talk a little bit about what we've done but I ask you to consider postponing the public hearing recommended for July 11th 2023 and consider reopening negotiations should be a letter in your hands and I'll pass on to the next speaker yes sir.

We will now go to Amador Salas Solis excuse me to be followed by Susanna Garcia. Amador?

Good morning, supervisors. I'm here today respectfully to ask you for the reconsideration of recommendation regarding the approval of the exclusive franchise agreement for solid waste zones four and five. Excuse me. My name is Amador Solis. My wife and I moved here in 2015 to the County of Santa Barbara. I started my career with Waste Management in 2015 of November I had previously got done playing minor league baseball, had a business with my wife and worked for the Department of Corrections in the state of California.

I was looking for my dream job, and I found it. Waste management gave me the opportunity. I started as a driver. I slowly worked my way up to know the business. I was given the opportunity about 15 months ago to become the route manager. I managed drivers from being here 20, 30 and 40 years. I've worked alongside with them, respect them, and ask you just to consider listening to us and give us a chance.

Thank you for your time.

We will now go to Susanna Garcia to be followed by Stacy Walters. Susanna?

Good morning, Supervisors. I'm here today to respectfully ask for you to reconsider the recommendations regarding the approval of the Exclusive Franchise Agreement for Solid Waste Collection in Zone 4 and Zone 5. My name is Susana Garcia. My husband and I live here in Santa Maria and are both employed by Waste Management. I started my career over 10 years ago in 2013 as a temporary employee on the recycling shoreline, and I was hired full time in 2015 over the last year I've had been given the chance to escalate my career. Today, my title is Lead Scale House Operator but I do so much more assisting my manager with our entire operation. One of the reasons I love working for this company is benefits Waste Management provides. I never had the opportunity to go to college but Waste Management gives my children the opportunity to get a college education at no cost to me and my husband.

For us That is 1 benefit is deeply important as a mother. I want my children to have every opportunity to success, to be successfully and waste management helps provide that. And then when you decide that waste management will not be trash hauler next year, that opportunity for me and my family might also go away. Again, I ask us respectfully for you to reconsider the recommendation regarding the approval of the exclusive franchise agreement. For solid waste collection in zone 4 and zone 5. Thank you for listening

we will now go to Stacey Walters to be followed by Brian Nines Stacey.

Good morning, Supervisors. I'm here today to respectfully ask for you to reconsider the recommendation regarding the approval of the exclusive franchise agreement for solid waste collection in Zone 4 and Zone 5. My name's Stacy Walters. I'm the district manager for Waste Management Santa Maria operation known as Health Sanitation Service. I first introduced myself to all of you about 13 months ago at the Board of Supervisors meeting last year in May when waste management was awarded our current two-year franchise agreement and if you recall, I informed you then that public speaking was not my strong suit That my strengths and skills were in operations and taking good people and making them realize they're part of a great organization. And to me, part of being a great organization is to support the communities we serve.

In cooperation with the county, we've had a lot of change on our road to greatness over the last 13 months implementing 1383 requirements by going weekly to organics collection in Zone 5 and Lompoc. And most recently universal enrollment to provide recycling and organics collection to our commercial customers. In addition, we had events earlier this year that California has not seen in over a decade. Torrential downpours that caused flooding in the Orchard area.

Our drivers all came to work and provided service to the customers of Santa Barbara County. In addition, we received calls after hours on weekends to assist cleanup efforts from the flooding. WM donated roll-off containers to victims of the flood and our local drivers were more than willing to help out when called upon after normal hours. These are just a few examples I could go on but I wanted to share these to let you know that we are a partner in this community.

Again, I respectfully ask for you to reconsider the recommendation regarding the approval of the exclusive franchise agreement for the solid waste collection in Zone 4 and Zone 5. Thank you for listening.

We will now go to Brian Nines to be followed by Justin Hunsinger. Brian?

Good morning, Chairman Williams, Supervisors of the Board and staff. My name is Brian Nines. I'm a Senior Municipal Contracts Manager for WM. I am here about Item A-76 to ask the board to postpone the hearing recommended for July 11th and reconsider negotiations with WM For decades, the County of Santa Barbara and WM have shared a successful partnership one that has held strong through economic ups and downs through floods and pandemics and through all the new legislation from Sacramento Most recently, we were pleased to support your residents impacted by flooding with roll-off containers. Our team responded quickly to after hours requests for support and that continued for as long as it was needed. This is just one example of how we connect with our customers and our commitment to go above and beyond the contract terms to meet the needs of the county as they happen.