City Council — 2021-05-25

I

think

it popped up for all of

us. Ready to go, Gail?

Okay we're ready.

All right thank you okay call to order we have a quorum welcome to the May 25th City Council meeting. 24th city council meeting. Oh oops yeah because yesterday was your birthday. Thank you very much. Ohio City Council meeting may we have the roll call please Gail?

will be joining the meeting shortly, Council Member Francina here, Council Member Haney

consent calendar. Not

consent it's the agenda and I will second that.

Great thank you very much and then we have a couple presentations James

yes And the first presentation item. And so for both of these items we have short videos, one shorter than the other but and so we'll introduce it will go to those obviously during COVID trying to do presentations and bringing people into chambers is difficult so Both of these, we tried to do videos to make them kind of work under these circumstances. But the first item is a presentation of the Ojai Valley Community Hospital for all their work during the coronavirus pandemic and specifically what we really wanted to recognize is all of the work that the hospital put into the vaccine clinic at Nordoff High School And I think working on this with the hospital, with all the other partners, the school district, help of Ojai, the hospital, like Ventura County.

What we saw kind of firsthand was that Ojai probably wouldn't have gotten a vaccine clinic if it wasn't for organizations being willing to really step up and advocate and not only advocate, but show up and have staff set up and run the clinics. So it almost seems like old news now that we had a vaccine clinic here very early in the Ojai Valley was able to get a large amount of people vaccinated very quickly. But as it was happening and up to it happening, like we really saw firsthand the amazing amount of work and collaboration from all the organizations But specifically with community Ojai Valley Community Hospital really taking lead and making it happen. So with that in mind, we asked the hospital if we could give them a make a presentation to them and We ended up agreeing to do it on site about 10 days ago so one note before we show the video is They mentioned in the video, the upcoming vaccine clinics.

Those were the clinics that just occurred so with that note we're going to go to the video of our presentation of the Ojai Valley Community Hospital on behalf of the city.

Hello, it's my pleasure to be here today to present a proclamation on behalf of Ojai City Council to Ojai Community Hospital and also in gratitude to Nordoff as well as the city. And it's a great example of all of us working together to collaborate so much gratitude to the hospital and all workers. City of Ojai proclamation. Whereas when the coronavirus pandemic first hit in early 2020, the Ojai Valley Community Hospital took immediate action to safely continue serving Ojai residents. And whereas, the hospital increased infection control practices at both the hospital and its skilled nursing facility. Began COVID-19 testing, created negative pressure rooms for use should the hospital need to house COVID- 19 patients and even delayed tearing down its old skilled nursing facility in case the space was needed for patients.

And whereas the hospital processed more than 60,000 COVID-19 tests. Offered a vaccination clinic at Nordoff High School in coordination with other local agencies and administered more than 15,000 vaccine doses. And whereas Hospital staff and volunteers put in long hours away from their families to maintain increased precautions and ensure community safety. And whereas, as a result the hospital experienced zero cases of coronavirus transmission at the hospital and skilled nursing facility Zero cases of staff to staff transmission and overall played an essential role in keeping Corona case numbers low in the Ojai Valley.

Now, therefore be it resolved that I, Betsy Sticks, Mayor of the City of Ojai and on behalf of the Ojai City Council do recognize the Ojai Valley Community Hospital for its extraordinary service to the community of the Ojai Valley during the coronavirus pandemic. Thank you And what an honor it is to present this to the hospital, and we're so grateful once again for all of the incredible work. So it's my honor right now to introduce our City Manager Mr. James Vega. Thank you!

Thank you, Mayor Sticks. I'm Ojai City Manager James Vega and we're here today to show our appreciation to the Ojai Community Hospital as well as all the other organizations that have been part of launching the Ojai Vaccine Clinic here at Nordoff High School Over the last 14 months, as we went through this unprecedented pandemic. There have been numerous challenges and obstacles that key organizations within the Ojai Valley have banded together to address and to overcome.

And just one of them was the challenge of rolling out and launching a vaccine clinic very quickly and effectively. And allowing the community here in Ojai to be vaccinated. And as we went through the processes of responding to those challenges, multiple times whether it was testing vaccine clinics or numerous other challenges. Ojai Community Hospital was a leader in the community and was able to coordinate these things for Ojai residents.

Behind me is the Ojai Vaccine Clinic here at Nordhoff High School. We will be introducing in a moment representatives from the Ojai Hospital who will tell you more detail about the thousands of people that were vaccinated here in Ojai through this vaccine clinic and some of the other efforts that the Ojia Hospital has made during the pandemic. So with that, I'd like to introduce Hadi Laskari from the Ojai Community Hospital and he will be speaking

next.

Thank you.

Mayor Sticks, Council Members, Mr. Vega, distinguished members and guests my colleagues and I are honored to be here today to receive this proclamation on behalf of Ojai Valley Community Hospital and Community Memorial Health System. I'd like to introduce some of the members of our team that are here with us today Connie Patterson Connie's been our site coordinator for this collaboration throughout the last 14 weeks. Nancy Thompson, Nancy as well has been involved from the very beginning at each of the clinics. Chris Rock, the director of our foundation has been involved as well as Steve Frank. Steve most of you know with Lifeline also the president of our foundation.

We have many other members of our team that have been involved from the beginning. Members of our hospital team as well as volunteers, Kate Barnhart one of our foundation members was here on many days escorting patients to get vaccinated. Dr. Hirsch and Ed Polito and others and I run the risk of missing folks anytime I go into names. Over the last year, we've all participated and bear witness to sacrifices that we've all had to make to combat this deadly pandemic.

For many of us it's been personal sacrifices and losses. And it's something that we're gonna always remember. Those of us in healthcare have received, had access to receive the COVID vaccine at the end of December. It was one of the first signs of hope. And we knew that at the time as we were getting the vaccine, that normalization in our community wasn't gonna really begin until distribution was widely spread and that we reached herd immunity. Which has been a really big part of the goal of what we try to accomplish here in the valley.

This collaboration has been a perfect example of what can be accomplished when a group of people come together, both public and private partnerships with a common single goal. And that's exactly what's been done. The county's COVID clinic here at Nordoff High School has given over 15,000 COVID vaccine doses to date. We anticipate that we'll have hit 16,000 doses by the end of the 14 week commitment.

That's really over a period of 27 clinic days and we will have distributed Moderna, Pfizer and J&J vaccine at this site. There's a number of folks that I really want to thank in really being able to make this collaboration happen. I want to thank the Ojai Unified School District for their support in utilizing the Nordoff High School Gymnasium, Superintendent Dr. Tiffany Morris was instrumental And really supporting getting a site here in Ojai, as well as Principal Dave Monson and his entire crew. They've been such gracious hosts hosting us as we've gone through over the last 12 weeks.

The County of Ventura should be recognized for their efforts to be supportive of public and private partnerships. Specifically, Dr. Livin, Barry Zimmerman, Brittany Lundquist and their dedicated staff have been so instrumental in getting this off the ground and supporting us in bringing a vaccine clinic here in the valley. Terry Wolf with help of Ojai has been so very instrumental in really serving some of the most Hunter served in heavy hit populations and really ensuring that we have access to the vaccine to all populations here in the valley.

Steve Frank with Lifeline has been there every step of the way throughout the pandemic, and certainly as we had this clinic running here. I wanna thank Mr. Vega. Mr. Vega, council members the mayor and really the city of Ojai for being supportive of the hospital on the vaccine site. I also want to recognize the city's effort for helping disseminate and implement science-based approaches throughout The entire period, I think back to a lot of the discussions we've had and from the very beginning. You know, I think the way that the city conducted themselves in their approach to running the city and businesses has just been right on point with matching the science so kudos to all of you.

A couple Saturdays ago, I broke for lunch during the clinic and I'm going to try not to get emotional. I have a tendency to do that at these types of things. We were breaking for lunch and one of our critical care nurses was here from CMH. And as I shared, we've had a lot of volunteers from a lot of our different departments without the health system that have participated in keeping this clinic running. And over lunch, the critical care nurse and I really had an opportunity to talk about how hard it's been over the last year and a lot of the sacrifices that have had to be made And we talked about how every vaccine that we get today here at the site is one less person we see in the emergency department. And one less patient we see with a COVID diagnosis.

We also talked about how the clinic has had a really therapeutic impact to all of us as a team, and to all of us healthcare workers and volunteers with a lot of the sacrifices that have made it over the last year. And so while I'm accepting the proclamation on behalf of the hospital and on behalf of our team, I think it'd be really important to also thank our team. I wanna join the council in publicly thanking our team I never ceases to amaze me the nurses, the doctors, respiratory therapists, lab personnel, housekeepers, facilities staff and all of the sacrifices that have been made over the last year. Keeping things running, and especially how the team has really responded during times of adversity. And I've witnessed this during the Thomas fire most recently through the pandemic and it really makes me feel like I have the easiest job in the world because of the team that I get to work with.

So thank you for the proclamation and Ojai please join us in getting the vaccine we have three more Saturdays here and we hope to see you here thanks

So as I mentioned, we filmed that a couple weeks ago. So those dates, those vaccine clinic dates have passed but we just wanted to make sure and we wanted to do it before the clinics ended because we wanted to show our appreciation to the hospital And all of the people who stepped up to make that happen. At one point, we talked about sending a link to every hospital employee and asking them if they wanted to come on and do like a big Zoom thank you. And we realized it'd be 1,000 little boxes on our screen. So we decided to do it this way but obviously I think on behalf of the city, we told them thank you from the city and from our residents in the whole community.

Mayor Sticks, can I say something really quick? We have to be so grateful and thankful for the people, for the institution. I think back at how close this community came to losing a hospital in the valley in the way this community rallied and now have what I think one of the better institutions small community has anywhere for hospital care It's really important and I'm just so thankful.

Thank you, I think there was a point early or early on where we thought that we very might well not have a vaccine clinic in Ojai and that people kind of the answer had been that people would have to drive to the fairgrounds And we talked about, you know the elderly and people at risk not being able to do that. And so the hospital really stepped up a lot they mentioned a lot of organizations contributed but if we wanted to recognize the hospital for that and so they made it happen.

Council Member

Haney I see. I just wanted to say too that I agree with Bill's statement 100%. Mayor you did a beautiful presentation Hadi did an excellent job saying thank you to his staff. And I would just like to take the moment and say thank you to James Vega, because I know that he was the guy duplicating the greasy wheel behind the scenes. And James was pushing hard on seeing on the county supervisors and county managers, city managers who actually understand and recognize the need that this community had. So thank you, James. Thank you, Hadi. And Mayor, thank you for the lovely presentation.

Thank you.

Pleasure. Yeah. And I'd like to just reiterate that. Thank you so much, James and Dr. Vega almost at this point. You know so much. It's such a great example of how our community can come together and collaborate and support each other. So, thank you.

Thank you. If no other comments we'll move to the second presentation Which let me share my screen for one second. And then we have a, we have a short video on this too but A couple weeks back the City Council approved a recommendation that came from a disaster council meeting which was to have an Ojai emergency preparedness day And we talked about, you know, we eventually want to make this big and make it maybe emergency preparedness week. But for this first year, we're going to start with Emergency Preparedness Day. It is Thursday, May 27th. So it is coming up. It will be at Libbey Park in the Fountain Area at 11 a.m.. We have presentations from the city, Supervisor LeVere's office and Ojai CERT And then Ventura County Sheriff's Department and Ventura County Fire Department with some other organizations like Humane Society and the crew.

They're going to set up some tables and have some information as well, and the goal with this event is to get everybody ready for the next emergency because it's not a matter of if but when. We have a short video inviting the community to that event very short I know the last one was 10 minutes the next one is probably 30 seconds I wanted to give a plug that we are going to give away, we have these City of Ojai flashlights. I don't know if you can see that as their little pocket flashlights is part of the emergency preparedness items and We are going to give these away. We'll have an event at the park with face coverings, with hand sanitizer outdoors distanced. But we know that if people aren't comfortable with that yet this is also all gonna be live streamed on the website and the YouTube channel.

And so with that, we'll go to this short video with more information. The City of Ohio is blessed to have good weather, but we are not immune to natural disasters such as earthquakes, landslides or fire.

The message we want to give you today is when you smell smoke and even before that, you need to get prepared to dealing with wildfires.

During times of major emergencies, we work cooperatively with city officials, local officials and you our constituents to prepare you during natural disasters. I would like to invite you for Emergency Preparedness Day on May 27th at 11 o'clock in Libbey Park.

Bring your family, bring your friends. There'll be a fire truck, police car and we can all learn how we can be prepared for the next emergency. See ya there!

So with that, you know we just we wanted to get the word out about that event. Like I said people can live stream it and view it on our YouTube channel as well but everybody is invited on May 27th at Libbey Park at 11 a.m. to get prepared for the next emergency so

great thank you James so much for getting this going so important and a big step forward Flashlights look cool too. Okay, moving on to we have public communication, Gail? Yes, one moment.

Thank you. And we have no commission reports. Correct. We have one person for public communications, Wendy Larmer. Let me go ahead and bring her in. Thank you. Wendy, you should be able to speak if you're muted please unmute yourself and you can go ahead.

Thank you

for allowing me to speak.

Physicist Stephen Conan former Undersecretary for Science with the U.S Department of Energy has written a very compelling book about how the crisis of climate change is not Settled Science. Readers may be shocked by the book's contradiction of four major points of climate orthodoxy. Heat waves in the US are now no more common than they were in 1900, and the warmest temperatures in the US have not risen in the past 50 years. Humans have had no detectable impact on hurricanes over the past century. Greenland's ice sheet isn't shrinking any more rapidly today than it was 80 years ago.

Mr. Coonan is no climate change denier, he is a climate change realist. He makes it clear on the book's first page that it's true that the globe is warming and that humans are exerting a warming influence upon it. The heart of the science debate, however isn't about whether the globe is warmer or whether humanity contributed. The important questions are about the magnitude of civilization's contribution and the speed of change and derivatively about the urgency and scale of governmental response. Mr. Kunin thinks most readers will be surprised at what the data shows I dare say you will be as Mr. Kunin illustrates tornado Frequency and severity are also not trending up, nor the number and severity of droughts. The extent of global fires has been trending significantly downward.

Rate of sea level rise has not accelerated. Global crop yields are actually rising, not falling. And while atmospheric CO2 levels are higher now than two centuries ago, they're not at any record planetary high. They're at a low that has only been seen once before in the past 500 years. When it comes to the heralded computer models, Mr. Coonan is persuasively skeptical and he notes that some of the tuning done to models so that they work better amounts to cooking the books Mr. Koonin's science credentials are impeccable. He has been a professor of physics at Caltech and served as the top scientist in Barack Obama's energy department. Since all the data that Mr. Koonin uses are available to others, he poses the obvious questions why haven't you heard these facts before?

As a matter of fact very few people actually read in the science assessment conclusions. I suggest before you spend millions of dollars and cost residents millions of dollars, you read the science summaries and conclusions for yourself. Thank you.

Thank

you, Wendy.

All right moving on to the consent calendar. Is there a motion to approve everything? Randy?

No move to approve but i would like

Anything else? Nope.

Second.

Okay, all right can we vote on that please Gail?

Okay Randy

you want to talk about I?

Thank you, Mayor. Just a couple of questions. You know there's I guess there's a lot of numbers in this report but they're all old numbers. I didn't really see too much relative to today so for instance the eight hour ozone levels in Ventura County we listed 2008 and we listed I think on the previous page it was Oh, maybe it was 2008 was the earliest one. But it doesn't say... It says it twice and just refer back to later years but the actual air quality in our community has gotten better. Am I correct Mr. Vega?

Have I read this report correctly? Yes. I mean a heck of a lot better. So I just wanted to make sure that the community understands that there's a lot of effort that has gone into this since let's say 2008 to present with With the last couple of years being even more eventful and more leaning into air quality from this, from the council as a whole. So that was one thing I wanted to state. The second thing is the residential growth management plan.

It was a formula that says city population times 0.005 and then persons per household but Is that a standard formula? I mean, where does that formula come from and what does that formula mean if we have the knowledge or do we need to bring Lucas in or how does that work?

Yeah. It's the formula that we've identified in our city code for how we calculate the number of residential allotments So it's not necessarily, every city doesn't necessarily do it the same way but it's the way we've identified in our city code that we are gonna do it. So that's what that formula is so that's something you know we can look at as if there's interest in re-examining that we can do that but this report was simply reporting using that existing formula.

So I guess the question would be The residential construction allocations, what is the actual allocations that are available to this community? Is it 183 or has it increased to 215? That would be on page three of five one of 69.

Yeah we should have had it totaled and I don't see it. I believe it's that 183 plus 16 for another Oh, actually no it is. It is there. I think three or five so it is a total of 215

in 2020. So does that mean that we would that we would permit only 215 residential units if we had 20 if we had 215 requests? That's the limit that we would that we would allocate or that we have and no more? Is that what this means?

You know, I'm not

sure if

that's like a hard

cap so we can have... It is the limit. If I could jump in on that one. Sure. It is currently the limit set by the code. There is an exception process if a series of particular findings are made and as I recall, that gets kicked up to the City Council through a particular hearing process but that's the default amount of allotments that remain available under the current code Subject to that process and I'll note that under the current ordinance it is set to expire October 1st of this year so as part of the housing element process, and that's what that date's tied to. As part of the housing element process the council can revisit this and decide is this something to maintain adjust or let go as part of the next housing element?

Well where my questions are going to So the rest of council members understand that I'm hearing that there might be a affordable housing complex being presented to planning soon with the number starting out around 200 units. And I was just wondering how that is gonna be impacted by this ordinance or by this code? So that was one of why I'm asking this question. The second thing is, I just wanted to clarify that as a community Um we're decreasing a population not increasing.

Yes it's we just got to be clear on that and then um and then we had 22 ADUs built in the last year that's part of the facts that are here yes? Yep correct. And then the last thing is air quality again it doesn't really clearly state that we're better off or that you know what's our average reading I mean what's our daily reading, what's our monthly I think that if we're going to provide information, that maybe we could actually state some harder facts on it.

That's all. Yeah, we can clarify that.

Well

let me just

say

Randy what do you want to

know?

I'm the chairman of the Air Pollution Control District. I follow all the OI air data. I'm sorry

Ryan, I can't hear you.

Can you hear me now? Yes. What would you like to know because I deal with this You know, monthly basis the Ohio has improved year over year substantially in the last 10 years to finally become compliant. We've been working on it at APCD forever. Oh, I was the only non-compliant city other than Simi Valley. We're the only one that's not strict, you know, due to a highway driving right by that they can't really control significantly.

But I guess what I'm trying to say Ryan is in a report, you might want to state those facts where we were, where we are, what we did, how we did it So that the community is just, I mean this is a report to the community. It's not just the council. So that's all I'm trying to say is it just maybe down the road we add some, we add a few more facts to it. That's all.

Well, I'm with you. I mean, I think we oughta but I mean that chart on page one dash 70 is the one that actually shows the concurrence and-

Right.

No, I mean the good news is and it's not strictly the city, it's the valley But we have come down, we're compliant. Since I've been on APCD went from non-compliant to compliant with this federal and state standards. And we're doing a lot but it's really things we can't control in the city. The general plan is already as restrictive reasonably can be regarding traffic and we're decreasing population. It's external factors out on the 101 and all the way out in the channel, in fact I got a report today about the program we run at APCD where we pay shippers to slow down in the channel to save the whales and then they produce a whole bunch less it's funny with these the engines they use under it's like under 15 knots it's like The hard part is that when you look at air quality data, it's very dependent on the temperature.

So when we're hot, we're not as compliant and has nothing to do with anything we can control. The heat causes the compounding of the chemical reaction that causes these organic compounds essentially to turn into ozone and other types of pollutants, and that's really difficult part. So anytime we have a hot year or like when we had the Thomas fire, that was a real problem with pollution that was built up.

That's where it's different but I can say this, I don't know if anything we really have asked this question at APCD many times What in the Ojai Valley do we have that we have any control over or in the city of Ojai that can change this number? And it's very limited. We've essentially done pretty much what we can, but it's moving in the right direction. So at least for me I want to make sure it's clear about that, but these are not tied indirectly to population. We had the average, the longest average commute you know of any city in the county But it's not even that that's causing it because our general plan doesn't allow any construction. That's new, that has a new rush hour traffic trip essentially in and out of the southern part of the valley to Ventura.

So there's not a ton we can do but if you want anymore data on this I only bring it up and then bring it because I'd be happy. We were going to do a presentation like my world got a little turned upside down bring up some of this stuff a couple council meetings ago. But if there's any other information you'd like, but it's not... This is about housing allotments and people and population. They really don't have much impact. It's about vehicle miles traveled average travel trips and then ultimately heat. And unfortunately it's hot here which is the biggest factor.

Well again I'm looking for just information in fact so I appreciate that. Your input on that, Ryan. And I know James is taking notes on that for the future.

Thank

you.

I'll

go briefly again just one additional point for the council and public's awareness. It is also worth bearing in mind that certain qualifying affordable housing projects that meet various requirements are exempt from the growth management plan requirements under the current code so depending on the structure of this project it might be in the works, it may not need to tap into that 215 It depends on the precise facts which have to be assessed against the code as it moves through the process. That's it, thank you.

Thank you, Bill.

Bill? James Matthews, I was just wondering if we have any update on when we expect the actual 2020 census data to be released at our level, the city level, as opposed to the macro numbers for the states that have been let out so far.

The best information we have is that we should have it available at the first from the feds by the end of September. And then this once that data comes out, I know the timing is not good. Um and then the state takes a month to reallocate at least for the Voting Rights Act purposes to reallocate persons who are currently inmates in the state prison uh to reallocate them to where they originally lived and where they're still living on the books.

And then because the census measures them the feds measure them in the prison and the state reallocates them back out to the communities from which they came. That we should get by the end of October, so short answer end of October uh we'll have to use some estimates as we're looking at this particular program as part of the housing element process.

So the easy answer is whatever the last day is they can give it to us and still make us have to use it for the next election?

That's right absolutely the state has not made that easy

nor

the feds.

Randy

Well, we can move to have an update in late October to amend this report. But instead of doing that I'd like to make a motion that we approve.

Wasn't Bill

gonna speak? He just did. You did.

He already spoke.

And I just want to say thank you, Randy for bringing that up. Good question Ryan great information really appreciate that and yes it's great that we're making progress and what we can do is keep going electric get off the gas and oil.

It is great if we could cool the valley down that would be the biggest single factor but I don't know if we could do that yet. You're absolutely right I'm very proud of the fact that APCD has been working on this for a long time and OHAI is finally compliant. Barely, not by a lot but people don't understand that the air in the valley is not good and the fact that we have this you know north-south valley that all the air gets trapped in from the ocean and from the highway uh is the main factor so we do need to be cognizant of it People don't understand it. But when you go up to the lookout, sometimes you can actually see the haze in the valley. It's a real thing. So I'm glad we're getting not as often as used to.

Second Randy's

motion. Great. May we have a vote please Gail?

Thank you and a speaker on what item is that Gail? I don't know i can bring him on and he can tell us it's for agenda item one so the consent calendar um it's Colin Jones. Colin you should be able to speak now if you're muted please unmute yourself Are you there? Colin, if you're there. Can you hear me? Yes we

can. I actually wanted to speak on 1M. That's what I wanted to speak about. The request for the City of Ohio Arts Commission to utilize the city government's access television channel. Should I wait to do that?

No.

You can do it now. Okay, now thank you for letting me speak. As a collector of art for over 30 years I watched with great interest the April 22nd meeting of the Arts Commission. Unfortunately, the first few minutes were spent bickering about the need for the Pledge of Allegiance. The commission chair, Marcy Tosha stated that for those so inclined we will recite the Pledge of Allegiance and then added no one wants to do it After some interval, Robin Gerber stepped forward and recited the pledge but omitted under God.

A discussion ensued regarding whether the pledge was required and why it was required. It was referred to as an unnecessary formality. And it was decided that Luis Gomez, art commission liaison would research whether or not the pledge could be dropped from the meetings. Now I know the commissioner's time is valuable But reciting the pledge takes about 14 seconds, less if you rush it and leave out certain words.

For myself as an immigrant I've always been proud to recite the Pledge of Allegiance even before I became a citizen. I'm grateful to my adopted country and I wish to show my gratitude. I believe that in these times when our country is divided a few moments of citizenship Time for us to come together regardless of background, color or political affiliation is necessary and affirming.

The words one nation and the God indivisible was meant for us to reflect back on another time when the country was divided, to ponder the civil war and its devastating effects on the nation. My fear is that there's an agenda afoot to water down our patriotism and pride in our Once one commission abandons a pledge, other commissions will follow suit. And finally the city council will be forced to abandon it.

This has happened in other cities across the nation. So should these commissioners who represent the citizens of Ojai and their money? These commissioners who think the Pledge of Allegiance is an unnecessary formality who seem unwilling to confirm their allegiance to our Republic. Should they be serving in government advisory positions? Should they be given access to the airwaves?

I think not, and I'm not alone. Thank you.

Thanks. Thank you, Colin. Randy?

Those are points well taken. That's a very meaningful statement. I'm hoping the Arts Commission is listening or members are listening. That's the first that I think any of us have heard of that, and I'm not sure what to do with it but I'm concerned with it, that's for sure.

Mayor Sticks? Yes, Bill? Matthew isn't there some sort of statutory element to this in California government code for general law cities?

You know I'm not sure Off the top of my head, if the pledge is required as part of General Law City meetings it is typical every city meeting I've ever attended has begun with the Pledge of Allegiance. But I do not know off the top of my head if it's legally required. It is required as part of, there's a particular format for the oath taken by every public official.

We will take a look at that question and report back to the council with- Yeah, I thought I remembered something in the statutes

but yeah, I'm not

sure. I also think every individual Council Member or Commissioner or anything else has a right to abstain from it if they want and still be part of the meeting.

Recitation of the pledge is not a condition to service.

They can use whatever words they would like to recite during it, I think that's appropriate but the idea that it should be removed I don't agree with and I think everyone should have the right to choose for themselves how they would like to recite it.

I didn't mean to imply you have to, I just remember something about the official thing General Law Cities. That's all I remember.

The recital itself is about choice and allegiance is not guaranteed, but dude, I prefer to recite it because I do mean it when I say it. And that's three not on tonight's agenda. I would recommend we

return to the regular order, return to our agenda. I will answer the legal question, get back to council and then council can consider it further from there. My last point would be if there's discussion or desire for discussion among the council it could be added to a future agenda at future agenda items. Apologies for cutting someone off there.