City Council — 2023-08-08

Good evening. We are back from our closed session Mr.. City attorney anything to report up

yes Thank You madam mayor the council met in closed session to consider two items of anticipated litigation Related to a transactional occurrence the city's consideration of pending housing development proposed by the Cabrillo Economic Development Corporation for 820 Bryant correctly 320 Bryant and And second, anticipate litigation related to a receipt of a written communication threatening litigation by Cabrillo Economic Development Corporation via their council, the law office of Barbara McCree-Ortiz. The council provided direction to staff and council and has directed staff to send a letter in response to Ms. McCree Ortiz's letter maintaining the city's process. That letter will be sent tomorrow and once sent available as a public record upon request.

Thank you.

Much appreciated. Thank you, Mr. City Attorney and thank you staff And council and we will adjourn our closed session and come back for our regular meeting Okay, we're back hi everybody Welcome to the Ojai City Council regular meeting August 8th 2023 do we have a quorum Weston? Oh

You

Weston and could you please see the say the pledge

for

us

Mayor Stix, we do have one commission report from Chair Akins

of the HBC. Wonderful. Chair Akins?

Brian Aikens, Chair of the Historic Preservation Commission, who found himself on the wrong side of the train trying to get here from the fair. So I apologize. Just from a commission report, two items. One is that happily we did get a tour arranged of the stable. That's the term used in the historic reports. We kind of fantasized it as the carriage house. It sounded a little bit more Historical and so we were able to do a tour of that with City Council representatives our Commission representatives other individuals that were there Some people that couldn't make it that that morning. We did an 11 o'clock and then 8 o'clock if others would like to See what's inside that they could contact the member of staff or they could contact me on I will reiterate what the Community Development Director said in the Planning Commission.

We just need to make sure that we're not violating the Brown Act, and so I keep—I make sure we have proper numbers going there. So again, that was enjoyable to finally see that. I know Bill mildly whispered in the last meeting he's been in there twice already. No shock there. The other thing is from a commission report is I'm just reporting to you that tomorrow, I am on the agenda for the Ojai Unified School District at their invitation for 10 minutes to just come and give some information that they requested along with the city properties Nordoff grammar school property and with the Matilija middle school property. So again, I have sent them information That came that Craig Walker prepared as an individual is a part of the agenda and also to give him a little background I sent them the the motion that was passed by the City Council and And so that is a part of the packet that they got.

I just want to let you know that, again, I will be speaking there and for folks out there, that's at their invitation. OK? Thank you all.

Thank you, Brian. Much appreciated. All right, we will move on to public communication. And just a reminder to everyone, these are items not on the agenda. And because they're not in the agenda, we cannot discuss them. We appreciate your viewpoint and participation. and we can agendize them in the future. Public comment is three minutes, and at the end of the three minutes you'll hear a chime, and when your time is up please stop talking, and in the spirit of equity, and also no sharing of time, and if you agree with the person in front of you, you can just say ditto. So we'll begin with Ron Solarsano, then we have Larry Steingold, and then Kale Starbird.

All right. Thank you so much, members of council. My name is Ron Solorzano and I am the regional librarian for the Ojai Valley and I'm just here to give you another update on what we have going on at the Ojai Library this month. And really, we are so excited to offer two special events this month. First of all, we have the members of the group Trio Minis are gonna come to the Ojai Library at 2 p.m. on Sunday August 20th. They're gonna deliver a special afternoon musical performance The members of Trio Moniz are David Singer on clarinet, Anne Irwin on the flute and Fred Bierstein on the oboe. These talented musicians are going to play pieces by Mozart, Beethoven, Malcolm Arnold, Benjamin Britten and more. The performance is going to take place in the main library space and it is sponsored by the Ojai Valley Library Friends & Foundation.

The following week, 2 p.m., on Saturday August 26th we're going to have our popular storyteller speaker and author Bea Blazer is going to come to the library to talk about her book which is titled Vaccines and Bayonets Fighting Smallpox in Africa Amid Tribalism Terror and the Cold War Blazer will describe the campaign that made medical history, including an overview of the victory over smallpox and the geopolitical threats faced by one public health family. A brief Q&A and book signing is going to follow that talk.

I'm also very happy to mention this year's One County, One Book community reading program has begun with copies of this year's selection which is Solito by Javier Zamora available to borrow at the library. Solito is Zamora's memoir of his migration from El Salvador to the United States at the age of nine. From the book's official description, Solito not only provides an immediate and intimate account of a treacherous and near impossible journey but the miraculous kindness and love delivered at the most unexpected moments. Solito is Javier's story, but it is also the story of millions of others who had no choice but to leave home.

The One County One Book Capstone event is going to take place on September 30th on the campus of CSU Channel Islands. It will include an author presentation featuring Zamora. It's also going to include a special event sponsored by the Ventura County Library Foundation an author reception prior to the talk, A Taste of Central America during which attendees can enjoy a light lunch, complimentary copy of Solito and a book signing with the author.

Now the author talk itself is free and open to the public. Those wanting to attend the reception will require tickets those can be purchased for $75 each at www.vclibraryfoundation.org And that's all I have for you this evening thank you so much

Thank you, Ron. Much appreciated. Next we have Larry Steingold then Kale Starbird.

Larry Steingold, resident. Many of your constituents have been giving me notes for the past week so here they are. What has the city been doing about the Ojai Unified School Department properties? Are we going to get blindsided? What do we doing? How are we going to get involved? How are we going to provide direction? Thankfully, Ms. Palmer is doing the road cutting and that's all nice and everyone's seeing road cutting all over the city.

Thank you for the police for Rite Aid or was it Rexall? Rite Aid sorry. The Becker Agreement when everybody was campaigning for office we've heard calls like oh we can make a better deal We can make a better deal. Well, has anybody called the beckers to see if you can make a better deal so that we can do a win-win? We get rid of the lawsuit, we get rid of this, we get rid of that and we get moving. Valley parking, that's on our agenda. 25 mile an hour speed limit.

Is it easier to make the whole city 25 miles an hour and then make exclusions, exceptions or just keep making roads like I know drown is 25 and daily is 30? Because it's wider. And when the roads get paved, the traffic will get faster so does that mean we need more speed bumps or traffic pillows? Helmets for electric bike riders. Somebody said that because of all the electric bike riders, we should require helmets and bells please like they require in the Ojai Valley Land Conservancy on vehicles because 20-25 miles an hour down the bike paths is pretty scary for a lot of people.

And no cash alternatives to restaurants again Okay, so if you could please put that on the agenda so that we can mandate that very easily just like San Francisco. Thank you.

Thank you Larry. Next we have Kale Starbird.

Hello Sousa. Hi Kale. It's so good to see you. So nice to see you. I have a message from Ray. His message is you're the best city council member of all.

Our goal is to work together.

Yes, I'm sure it is but you are marvelous and always have been Thank you. It's a nice surprise. I wanted to talk about my subject tonight is about solar panels and white roofs. July was the hottest month in the worldwide history. The Gulf Coast had 100 degrees waters each of us must do what we can to lower emissions worldwide. Ojai is a small valley but we could do more.

What if the city Past the regulation requiring everyone to paint their roofs white or put solar panels up. I am trying to envision this, it would change the ambiance here but perhaps with some imagination we could make it pleasing to the eye. We could research other cities that have already done this to see their approach. We are in trouble climate wise, we must do something quickly, quickly, quickly to divert the danger if at all possible.

Thank you.

Thank you Kayle. Any comments on Zoom? Weston?

Not on Zoom Mayor but we have one more for general public comment. Nury?

I'm so honored and I'm so grateful the way our city council is and mayor. Oh, sorry. And it's beautiful and I'm hoping that more people of Ojai would know about all of the things and the connection that exists would be involved and would know. I don't know how, but you folks know better. I am willing to cook monthly real cooking with a lot of love That one of you every month, I go out myself with my partner and we have dinner with the homeless, houseless folks.

So one of you are invited, I will do the cooking every month that we go sit there and eat together. That's respect. So I wish we could pass that as something That we would do in connection of people's representative with people and Environment, you know, and they just talked We could City Council one of us fortunately this place is lot of trees and all that but we had a Thomas Fire.

Maybe, I don't know what were all the plans that City Council put together for preventive of something like that happening again? If not, let's get together with all those beautiful schools that we have which other places don't have as many schools and plan how we prevent fire and how we fix it after that big fire, which of course so many others happen other places. But we are here as locals one really to study deeply What was wrong, why did it happen? How can we prevent it again and how can we fix it make it up. For example each city council person can plant one tree somewhere in public or their house or anywhere and asking families also for our own health If you're doing it, they will do it. Thank you Mary. So this is two or three things that I am requesting.

Appreciate it. And just for public knowledge we did in September 21 City Council passed the Ojai Wildfire Resiliency Plan so I can communicate with you about that in the future. Okay we will...that's it Weston? OK, we will move on to the consent calendar. Is there a motion to approve? I'll move to approve. And a second? All in favor? Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye.

OK. All right, wonderful. All right, we will move onto discussion item number two. Discussion of possible direction, the pickleball options. So is there a staff report Mr. City Manager?

Yes, I'm going to do my best to give a fairly brief staff report. It's not lost on me that of all the people in this room, I am probably the least knowledgeable on this subject matter and yet I'm the one giving the staff report so go figure. The City Council asked that we place this item on the agenda tonight to give the public an opportunity to make whatever comments people have.

We did so without an expectation that the City Council tonight is going to make any final decisions on a number of issues that I'm sure will arise during the discussion. That doesn't stop the City Council from giving staff direction on follow-ups that you'd like us to pursue, but part of the agreement tonight is that we're going to listen, we're going to hear what people have to say and then that'll give the City Council a basis upon which to start making direction.

The staff report that I wrote is just a simple summary, really, of different options that are available right now for addressing the fact that pickleball is a very fast-growing sport. It's gained a great deal of attention. I woke up this morning and turned on TV and somebody announced it was National Pickleball Day. I said, I already knew that! It was going to be pickleball night in Ojai, I knew that.

But in more serious tone there's a number of issues that people have that deserve to be heard. In the report I tried to identify what seemed to be the three areas of most discussion. One relating to the pickleball courts that are here on the City Hall campus The issues of growing interest and also issues of neighbors with noise. So that's one of the areas of primary interest. Secondly, there has been a lot of discussion on what you all call lower Libby.

the tennis courts and whether there's a possibility therefore for sharing a couple of those courts to provide some pickleball facilities, whether short term or long term. And obviously there has been a lot of discussion there from people who are involved in the tennis activity that has been there for many, many years. So that's the second area of considerable interest. And then the third one, there has been discussion of the Soule Park possibility of following through on negotiations that had previously started there at a City Council ad hoc level and at a Recreation and Parks ad hoc level, particularly the former Some negotiations that some property there could be made available to the city at a fee. That could be converted into pickleball facilities, and that particular option it seems to me would be very ripe at the end of tonight for the City Council to make some direction to staff I would suggest through the City Manager.

to re-initiate those discussions with the county. The issue there would be what would be built and, you know, what would it cost to build it? And I think the council may also want staff to follow up on those questions, get some designs and some cost estimates. There's other possibilities that I'll just briefly mention. People have talked about school sites being a possibility. School sites obviously are the province of the school district, and we're not the school district so all of that discussion would properly be held with them and I don't mean to jump the gun.

There could be noise issues there and all sorts of issues, so that's a possibility. And then there has been some discussion about other city properties or even indoors. Those were not looked upon as primary possibilities. Also with the staff report, and this was a request of the City Council at the previous meeting, that we get the report from the Parks and Recreation Ad Hoc Committee that spent way more time studying this than I did.

And they have in fact issued their final report, the committee did, and the commission had reviewed it right before the commission went on hiatus because of the quorum issue. So that report had not previously been transmitted to the city council so we attached that Luis Gomez is here, is available to answer questions about that. It's a very thorough long report and it attaches some noise studies and some other issues so those are all of the inputs that we've provided to the City Council tonight and if I've learned anything in my time doing this job it's that I should keep my staff reports as short as I can because the people want to talk And so that, Madam Mayor is the end of my report.

Thank you very much. All right, any informational questions from council at this point? I have a question.

Louise. You won't be surprised at my question. Can you give us an update? Our interim city manager used the word re-initiate negotiations with Soule Park. I thought that the negotiations were ongoing and that there was going to Yeah, I need could you give us an update a really concise update what happened

sure of course And so what I'll go ahead and do is just share it a little bit of information in regards to that and that is that Earlier this year City Council delegated or asked the Commission for input The Commission was scheduled to go ahead and discuss it That was if I'm not mistaken. That was presented as a commission at its April meeting and On During its May meeting. Unfortunately, they didn't have a quorums were unable to me They were scheduled to go ahead and review and provide input on the MOU Provide that back to City Council unfortunately as Mr. Scott has noted they have been unable to go ahead and do so because of the lack of quorum and So they haven't had an opportunity to go and provide an update on that MOU quite yet.

And I don't believe there have been any further negotiations in the county. That is correct. In fact, as you know better than me, the city council subcommittee are no longer members of the current council so all of that came to a stop. It doesn't need to stay stopped it can be reinitiated and I think it probably should.

Okay, so you have another question

yeah The is the park and rec Commission able to do the job that we test them with or can council decide tonight That we can just do it ourselves. I

I think that's ultimately a decision for council to go ahead and make. I know the commission did want to express their comments, but unfortunately they're not able to do so because of the circumstance at this moment.

I would just say especially given that you're going to have a new commission, not all of them will be new, But anytime you have a change, it's a new commission. We have a new council from when that report was initially drawn. It's appropriate for the council to provide the direction to its commission as to what role it would like them to assist in. And I'm sure we'd like the new commission to have a role in all this, but all of these things ought to be directed out at the City Council level. The commissions work for the council and I think they should be directed at the council level so I think we're starting back at that point and you the council can direct it out however you choose to do

So we can do that at the end of the discussion in public hearing.

If

you're ready. Okay, thank you.

Any other questions before public comment? I do have a question. Council Member Ruhl?

I'm trying to...I'm going back in my memory and replaying many, many, many council meetings ago. Did we vote to bring on the recreation department? Do we vote to give them sort of the ability to review and or to comment. Was that a vote, or was that something more informal is my question? And would we then have to re-vote to take that back, or what would that process be?

My question is to the chair. My recollection is the council voted to have the Park and Rec Commission look at the existing draft agreement between the city and the county for Soule Park. As noted, the commission hasn't been able to meet to provide that do that so the council would have to vote to take it back or could vote by default. It would stay with Park and Rec Commission who would pick it up when they can then meet once the quorum issue is solved.

And so we would be able to move forward and have them review, you know as we moved forward

with that. That's

an option for council or

as also requested today take it back either is an option.

OK thank you.

And I recommend you take it back and make it clear

Okay, thank you.

Okay all right let's go ahead and move on to public comment we have 26 public comments and probably some online I would imagine too so we'll begin with Karen Wilson then Bill Miley and then Laird sorry and then Stacey Potter

Good evening and thank you very much. I'm Karen Wilson. I am a parks and rec commissioner, one of the three remaining. And I'm co-author of the final report findings and recommendations from the pickleball ad hoc committee which you have in your packet. First of all, before I get into more comments about that, I want to thank a number of people, a number of groups that actually helped us do this study and do this report and create a very comprehensive view of the situation, meaning expansion of Pickleball and noise complaints.

So first I want to thank Tim and Brenda Kraut, and the Ojai Valley Pickleball Club. Karen Quimby and the Citizens for Sound Pickleball Policies. Dwayne Williamson in the Ojai Valley Tennis Club. And many many other individuals who spoke with us gave us their input in many different ways over meetings and so forth but allowed us to really do a good job on this report.

I want to let you know that my colleague, Ryan Firestone and I spent 13 months and approximately 600 hours in an open market. It's about $150,000 worth of work if you want to know. And we did spend that time studying ways to address pickleball expansion and noise complaints as directed by the City Council. I'm not sure you had a chance to read the report closely, but I really want to urge you to do that. I think you would find it very, very helpful in all the different things that you're going to have to consider before making the decision and very likely many of the things you will hear tonight are actually addressed in the report.

We did the research and analyses that you and the city staff do not have time to do. And it was our privilege to do that in our considered opinion we made five recommendations which offer a clear community-sensitive and fiscally responsible path toward maintaining an expanding pickleball while addressing noise complaints at current and future sites. We give you something to work with now, and in the future. And it was all for your benefit, for your decision making, and for the benefit of the greatest number of community members. We had that as our goal.

I want to, with your indulgence, demonstrate one of those benefits that we think will come out of our report. And that is quieter paddles and balls. Randy has a paddle that was used in 2020 when we started here. Okay? This is the paddle I use today. You can all hear lower volume, lower frequency, less irritation to the human ear. I'm happy to answer any questions tonight or at a future event as appropriate. Thank you. Thank you, Karen. Could you do the demonstration once more?

I didn't hear that much difference, to be honest. No, I didn't because I don't have the ear for it yet. So that's why I sincerely want to hear it again.

Older paddle?

I'm ready, yeah.

It's a duller sound. It's a lower frequency. A

little bit better. Thank you, Karen. Next we have Bill Miley then Stacey Potter and then Ian Potter.

Good evening. For the record, my name is Bill Miley and I'm a member of the Citizens for a Sound Pickleball Policy. So here are some comments on the Park and Recreation Commission's pickleball report which apparently you haven't read. You got it? I

haven't. We've read

it.

Got it.

I've read it. Good. That's great because I thought maybe the points I'm going to make were preview rather than a review so maybe it's a review. Point number one, on page 27 of the recreation report listing the ad hoc committee's activities it listed surveyed the pickleball community for current behavior needs and preferences. Great! What it did not do is survey the residents who are affected as to their needs etc by not doing that it failed to consider the impacted neighbors too On page 15 of the recreation report describes how they conducted their own unannounced quote unquote pickleball play sound test on May 16th and 17th, 2023. Many of us had no idea that was being done. It appears they had a degree of mistrust of the PSM acoustical study report because the city $13,000 on page three.

On page 19 and 20 of the PSM report sound mapping commentary and maps are presented to the city hall site in surrounding areas. And I sent this to you in an email. This document shows the pickleball sounds carried beyond the play site. You will see the green color areas are sound neutral It appears the recreation report does not address the elements of the sound study even though I focused on that in my speech to them. You'll notice the sound carries well into the city community garden, the memorial garden and onto the city buildings.

Page four, or item four. On page 24 of the recreation report it addresses recommendations. Soule Park is listed. This report may have estimates of cost that may not have estimates of costs for building pickleball courts at Soule Park. And the negotiations you already know about. Cost estimates run from 200,000 to two millions. I did a research on internet and you can get a tennis court and a pickleball court for about $60,000. And last in my email I sent to the council I included three audio tapes.

A patio taping that I made out there, a taping in front of 408 South Ventura Street where the garages and a quiet tape after 630 last evening. Thank

you Bill. Next we have Stacey Potter then Ian Potter then Larry Steingold

Hi everyone, I'm Stacy Margolin-Potter. I want to thank you all for coming and thank you City Council members for giving me the opportunity to speak. I want to ask the audience stand up if you're a tennis

player.

Stand up if you're a pickleball player Okay, you can all sit down please In Ojai we're known for our artists, our avocados, our oranges and for holding the oldest amateur tennis tournament to be held in one place. I was a professional tennis player and now a professional senior pickleball player. There is room for both. We have our historic Libbey Park for tennis and now our community needs its own pickleball facility.

The growth of pickleball is here. 36.5 million people played pickleball From August 2021 to August 2022 so oh I needs more pickleball courts Soule Park presents the best permanent solution why because we can have eight state of the art courts. with barriers between each court. There is no noise issues for the neighbors, there's no conflict from the tennis community. It's a win-win for the entire community.

I'm confident that we can raise the necessary funds to cover the costs. Please give us your support and the opportunity to help us move forward. Thank you.

Thank you Stacey. Next we have Ian Potter then Larry Steingold then Samadi White? Sandy, I'm sorry.

My name's Ian Potter, I've lived here in Ojai for 28 years with my wife. I love all racquet sports, I used to play badminton. We need more pickleball courts and I think Soule Park is our best option there aren't going to be noise problems in the park. My wife and I donated to the paddle tennis, in fact I helped paint the lines on those courts And even though we don't play paddle tennis, we realized that it was a benefit to the community and it was an outlet for young people and old people so we supported it.

So I think we can raise money in short order for the project over in Soule Park and we can build a quality world class facility. So I think we've got some momentum and I'd like to move forward with it. OK, thank you.

Thank you, Ian. Next we have Larry Steingold then Sandy White and then Jim Kosser.

Larry Steingold I don't play tennis or paddle pickleball but I do love the rackets. The idea of Soule Park is wonderful So long as we can still pay for the roads and the pension and everything else, if they can raise the money, if the city can raise the money so it doesn't cost from some other pocket or some other problem. It'll be wonderful. And the ongoing cost is that going to become a line item of a budget item? Or is that going to be taken over by the Pickleball Association because it's going to become a line item? Because do we end up taking care of the police for the whole park Cutting the grass maintaining servicing now becoming is the Park Association Recreation Department going to manage Sewell Park which would be fine.

OK but it's gonna become an item that we're going to become responsible for also Matilla junior high school. Has pickleball courts? Has anybody actually talked to them now, because I think we can probably make a very good deal. Because they're going to need us for variances and permits so we can drive them there too. We

can

respond

just briefly.

Anyway, but Sewell Park makes a lot of sense and the Potters are right.

Thank you Larry. Next we have Sandy White then Jim Kasser and then Duane Williamson.

Hi, Council. Thank you for having us here. I appreciate this opportunity. My name is Sandy White and I'm a resident for 33 years here in Ojai. Before discussing any other issues relating to Pickleball at Libbey Park, I want to clear up one very disturbing Item that has come to my attention. There are several unfounded rumors Floating around that because the current restructuring involving the Pac-12 athletic conference Somehow the Ojai tournament would be shutting down and this simply isn't true As a member of the board of directors of the Ojai Valley Tennis Club, I have several responses to this rumor Absolutely no impact for our April 2024 tournament, none at all.

All current Pac-12 teams including UCLA and USC will be playing and participating and playing their season ending championship here in Ojai as per usual. If the Pac-12 Conference does not play its championship here in 2025, our Ojai Tournament will most likely seek to find another major athletic conference such as the Big West or the Western Athletic Conference both who have played here before.

And to replace the Pac-12. Alternatively we could shift one of our other high profile events, we actually have 28 different events that play here that would be in a substitute for the Pac- 12 and for example we could put our most popular which is probably The Open that could be a tournament that would be played there in Libbey Park So in no way will the Libbey Park courts not be used for tennis during the Ojai.

And then contrary to misinformation being spread about, there's not even a remote chance that the Ojai tournament will close down. As a result of the current PAC-12 problems, our tournament has been around for 121 years. We have over 600 volunteers in the community. It is a beloved tournament and part of the fabric of Ojai. It is consistent with our tournament and the long storied history that the Libbey Park courts will always be in the heart and soul of this great tournament. So I hope that you keep that in mind. Thank you.

Thank you,

Sandy. Next we have Jim Kassler then Duane Williamson then Mike Borders.

I am Jim Kasser, and there could be a little repetition here since the ad hoc committee has been brought up by our esteemed gentleman there. I'm here to discuss one of the recommendations which I guess you guys will all be familiar with when you fully read the report or if you have already. The recommendation I'm highlighting is a recommendation by the pickable ad hoc committee of the full parks and rec commission in its final report that was dated March 30th, 2023. This in-depth and comprehensive report that was adopted unanimously by the full parks and rec commission on April 6th, 2023 following a 13 month intensive effort by the Ad Hoc Committee to pull together all aspects of the current long-running public discussion as the feasibility of establishing additional pickleball courts in Ojai.

One of the key recommendations included, the report states very succinctly that the city quote should not introduce pickleball to the current Libbey Park Tennis Courts unquote. The report contains a substantial discussion thoroughly explaining the rationale for this recommendation But we want to reiterate why we and all the park and rec commissioners feel Pickleball does not belong at the tennis courts at Libbey Park.

Longtime community, non-city stewardship of Libbey Park Courts since 2000. Over 80% of the cost reconstructing and maintaining all eight Libbey Park Tennis Courts most recently in March of 2022 when they resurfaced all the courts have been donated by the tennis club and civic association. The intent of the private donors as well as of the city at the time of accepting these donations creates an implied and equitable, and arguably legal obligation on the part of the city to use these courts for their intended use of tennis.

In light of the Ojai Tennis Community's historical investment in the Libbey Park Tennis Courts we firmly believe as stated in the Parks and Rec Department quote that the council is obligated to recognize the club's considerable vested interest in the fate and use of Libby courts, unquote. And again another quote, the resolutions and dealings with the city over the years support an expectation on the part of the Ojai Valley Tennis Club that tennis is the priority activity of the Libbey Park Tennis Courts.

Thank you.

Thank you Jim. Next we have Dwayne Williamson then Mike Borders then Caroline Burke.

My name is Dwayne Williamson and I'm a resident of Ojai. And as previously mentioned, there's numerous reasons why the Park and Recreation Department recommended that Pickleball not be placed down at Lower Libby and I want to give a little historical perspective on this. In a staff report in February 2022, Luis Gomez stated there exists certain use restrictions binding on the city as to any proposed use of Libbey Park tennis courts for pickleball.

Quickly little historical perspective since the year 2000, the Ojai Valley Tennis Club along with the Ojai Civic Association has contributed over $700,000 to the Libbey Park Tennis Courts which includes the bleachers also includes the lights that are at the courts as well. More specifically in 2010 there was a $250,000 improvement for the lower Libby Courts to make them post-tension concrete This was funded 100% by the Ojai Valley Tennis Club and Ojai Civic Association with no financial contributions by the city.

Therefore, the city in recognition of this contribution passed a resolution 1018. Which states wherein it agreed that the Ojai Valley Tennis Club be given first priority use of the lower Libby tennis courts for the annual tennis tournament, Ojai Tennis Tournament and also for club sponsored youth clinics and tournaments. That means that any of the Libby courts used up may be considered to move to pickleball must be available to the Ojiai Tennis Club in the same condition as the adjacent lower Libby courts.

The tennis club currently has four active events. One, as everybody knows is the Ojai Tennis Tournament which happens at the last week in April. We also sponsor the Jacob Voss Holiday Challenge which occurs during the end of the holiday season either the end of December or first January We also have a high performance clinic for hundreds of junior tennis players throughout all of Ontario County, and we also match usually held in mid-March.

And then we have the Ventura County Junior Tennis Association Tournament, which we usually have in summer or the fall. So with that said to be able to transition those courts is one it's going to be depending on how that is done costly. Two, the time it would take to make those changes would shut down the courts for both tennis players or pickleball players so At this point, we strongly run the council look at that recommendation and support that recommendation. So thank you for your time.

Thank you Dwayne. Next we have Mike Borders then Carolyn Burke and then Scott White.

Hello Mayor members of the Council my name is Mike Borders resident of Ojai member of the Board of Directors of the Ojai Valley Tennis Club In light of the foregoing use restrictions, conversion of Court 6 into single-use dedicated pickleball courts a la the City Hall Courts even with temporary nets would be expensive and inefficient from a programming perspective and thus not a viable option in our opinion.

The initial conversion of Court 6 into a single-use dedicated pickleball court setup costs almost $22,000 for the initial conversion. That's per a 2022 staff report prepared by Luis. And it also includes $11,000 for heavy duty movable nets which would be required because any permanent net posts cannot be installed into post-tension concrete courts. Then, every time that court or those pickleball courts were transitioned to tennis courts and back to pickleball it would cost $17,500. That's each transition.

In addition, and this may be even more important. Each resurfacing, there's two resurfacings when you do one transition. Each resurfacing will take approximately two to four weeks to get scheduled. So if you go one direction and then back the other direction, you're looking at a possibility of four to eight weeks of lost time for either tennis or pickleball on that court As has been mentioned, there's four club events as of right now.

So there would presumably have to be between one and four transitions each year. Either the city or the pickleball group would have to pay for that transition. It gets pretty expensive if there were say two transitions in the first year adding, that's $35,000 adding to the initial conversion cost Of 22,000 we end up with the total just for year one of over $56,000.

Year one, $56 thousand dollars. That same amount of money it seems to us could be spent in a more efficient way like for example paying towards the cost of developing a permanent pickleball complex at Soule Park. Thank you.

Thank you Mike. Next we have Carolyn Burke then Scott White and then Jeff Jenkins.

Good evening. My name is Carolyn Burke, and I'm the current president of the Ojai Valley Tennis Club. I'm going to speak tonight about the pickleball noise issues at Lower Libby. Obviously it's a significant issue here at City Hall. It would also be an issue at Lower Libby. The city has already spent $13,000 to retain Pickleball Sound Mitigation, a nationally recognized pickleball noise consulting firm, PSM.