City Council — January 13, 2026

Good evening, I'd like to call this meeting to order please. Thank you Mr. City Attorney are there any reports from closed session?

Thank You Madam Mayor nothing to report out of closed session

thank you Roll

staff report. The committees with one asterisk historically the appointee has been the mayor and two asterisks has been the mayor pro tem. It is recommended that the City Council consider the proposed appointments to local and regional boards, commissions and committees. Make any changes you so desire and move to fill these positions. Department heads are available to answer any questions you may have specific to any of the boards, commissions or committees. This concludes the presentation.

Are there any questions from council? Mr. Council Member Ayala

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Is this where we request any changes to appointments?

Yes.

Great so I have a couple of things because I don't My calendar is not busy enough. But to start off, City Manager I forgot to make a small little update for you just so that the paperwork's correct. So Regional Defense Partnership has eliminated the 21st century, so it's just RDP and the meetings are the second Thursday not the Tuesday. And so my first when looking at the committee assignments it's a request from either Council Member Judge or Rhodes, if either one of you would be willing to give up your assignment to the Affordable Housing Subcommittee.

I think I would like to sit on that subcommittee for this time around if one of you would be willing to give up that seat. Which one? Okay. And then the second one is to, again, Council Member Judge or Mayor Pro Tem Lidster, the Council on Aging seat.

I'm pretty much on the Council on Aging so I'll stay there.

I absolutely love, love that assignment. However, I know that you have a mother that's very involved right now and you have the real desire. I would be willing to allow a one-year hiatus with the promise so I can have it back in a year. Are we able to negotiate that way?

Well, it's been recorded.

And I am the alternate. Mike is the principal, but so as the alternate and willing to take a one-year hiatus and we'll have this conversation again next January.

Very good. All right that's it for me thank you.

Thank you do I have a motion to move with changes?

I'll move changes to the order of us committees

And to approve all the other sitting committees?

Correct.

And does that include the supplemental with the date changes?

Yes, it changes and I

would

second. Thank you call for the vote.

The motion passes unanimously Madam Mayor and members of the City Council,

Perfect. Good evening Mayor and City Council. Tonight we'll have, we'll be providing our economic development update for the quarter which includes highlights of new business openings, new projects that are in the development pipeline, film activity and so much more. To kick us off I'd like to hand it over to Angel he's our small business liaison also works very closely on managing helping manage the city's economic development efforts.

Good evening, Mayor Cavanaugh and members of the Council. I'd like to give you some highlights of some of the business activity that we've experienced recently. Simi Valley continues to see investment into the community with several new businesses opening recently. Both Urbane Cafe and Chipotle opened their second location in the city expanding their presence in town and adding to the food choices at El Paseo Shopping Center across the street.

Kids Dental Pals and Orthodontics began operations offering pediatric dental and orthodontic services. And Action Drug Rehab and Mental Health added important behavioral health resources to the community. Lastly, Mathnasium, a math-focused tutoring site opened offering additional resources for local students. Looking ahead, we're excited about several new businesses proposing to open in Simi Valley.

Simi Valley Brewing Company is targeting a first quarter opening optimistic about March while California Fish Grill is making progress on interior improvements actually no they just recent are going to be opening sometime this week so that's one more restaurant being added to the El Paseo Shopping Center Portolino's is also advancing towards an early 2026 opening.

Additional food and beverage projects moving through the approval process include Raising Cane's, Popeye's, and Artisan Uprising Wines. Beyond food and beverage, city staff is working with proposals for a pet boarding business, Pickle & Play's indoor pickleball facility, and The Bunker Clubhouse which will bring a simulated golf experience to Simi Valley On the industrial side, O'Brien Electric is in the process of relocating from Chatsworth to the west end of Simi Valley bringing approximately 35-50 new jobs to the community.

Together these projects reflect ongoing business activity and investment into the community. Looking at business activity citywide, Simi Valley had 5,780 active locally-based businesses in 2024, decreasing slightly to 5,714 in 2025. This modest decline of approximately 1% represents the overall stability of Simi Valley's business base. Based on available quarter three data, regional unemployment rates continue to improve with California declining from 6.1% in July to 5.6% in September and both Los Angeles and Ventura counties showing steady progress.

Simi Valley continued to outperform the region maintaining the lowest unemployment rate and improving from 5.2% in July just 4.6 percent in September While unemployment trends remain positive locally, broader regional indicators point to ongoing challenges in job growth. According to the SCAG 2025 Southern California Economic Update, new job formation has largely been absent from California, the SCAG region and Ventura County in 2025.

The current pace of job creation was projected to add only 163 jobs to total employment in the calendar year. In response, city staff remains focused on attracting additional industrial and other employment generating uses to further strengthen local job opportunities and long-term economic resilience.

So understanding that job creation is a very important and one of the key priorities for the City Council, we continue to focus as staff on trying to fill some of the vacant spaces that are currently available. And there's been quite a bit of movement over the past few months.

When we look at the industrial vacancy rates across the region, Simi Valley stands out with a 10.2% rate well above Ventura County 4.7 and Los Angeles County 5.6%. These differences reflect both local market dynamics and broader regional trends in industrial real estate. The elevated vacancy rate in Simi Valley may be influenced by several factors, including the delivery of new industrial buildings that have outpaced absorption, tenant turnover and limited demand for certain types of warehouse and manufacturing space.

Recent departures of manufacturing firms combined with unleased industrial space from recent development projects have also contributed to the higher vacancy.

So, to help fill some of the vacancies, the city continues to focus on reaching out to business owners and executives primarily in the greater Los Angeles area. This past fall, the City of Simi Valley was included in the annual Best Cities to Live Work and Play edition of the Los Angeles Business Journal. The write-up focuses a little bit Smaller font there but if you were to see it, the right of focus is on Simi Valley being one of the safest cities in California.

The fact that we do have a very business friendly climate and that the city's very committed under one of the council's goals and priorities to grow film and media production here in town.

For the April through June reporting period, Simi Valley generated strong sales tax revenues with receipts increasing 6.4% over the same quarter last year. The largest contributor to sales tax revenue was the general consumer goods sector which includes retailers such as general merchandise stores, specialty retails and electronic sellers. In the retail market, Simi Valley's quarter three retail vacancy rate of 8.9% is noticeably higher than both Ventura County at 5.8%, and Los Angeles County at 5.7%.

A significant portion of this vacancy about 250,000 square feet is concentrated at the Simi Valley Town Center accounting for roughly 42% of the city's total vacant retail inventory If the town center's available space were excluded, Simi Valley's retail vacancy rate would drop to approximately 5.1%, placing it much more in line with Ventura County and Los Angeles County.

Vacancy rates may be further influenced by specific local conditions such as tenant turnover, shifts in consumer preferences towards e-commerce or mismatches between existing space and current retailer needs. National trends do show that the average retail lease size has fallen to a historic low in 2025, with retailers opting for smaller spaces to adjust to changing consumer behaviors and to reduce overhead costs.

This trend likely contributes to the dynamics in Simi Valley as demand shifts towards smaller, more flexible spaces and larger legacy retail locations remaining vacant longer.

So to help continue the downward trend of vacancies in terms of retail are the city's overhauling completely overhauling our marketing materials and updated a lot of our outdated psychographic and demographic information that we'll be using at the ICSC deal making conference in May. Now this is the largest commercial real estate event of the year and it's going to be a great opportunity for us to connect with retailers and brokers, to share some of these potential opportunities that are available here in Simi Valley including those at the Simi Valley Town Center.

Moving on to some filming activity. In 2025, Simi Valley has hosted close to 300 filming days across a wide range of production types generating an estimated economic impact exceeding five and a quarter million through local spending on hotels food services fuel rentals and support services Currently, a major production is actually filming in the Wood Ranch area involving approximately two weeks of preparation and filming and bringing more than 450 cast and crew members to the city adding a significant economic benefit for local businesses and service providers.

To build on this momentum, the city has established a new ad hoc committee to evaluate filming processes and identify efficiencies and opportunities for growth. City staff also continues to participate in roundtable discussions with the Chamber's Film Simi Valley Group to strengthen partnerships and further enhance Simi Valley's appeal as a filming destination.

As a result of this continued filming activity, I know that the Mayor has been invited to present at an upcoming Economic Development Collaborative Roundtable meeting to share information about the City's experience with filming. This concludes staff report and we're available for questions.

Are there any questions from Council for staff? Council member Tim Lister.

Thank you for the presentation, much appreciated. I'm a little concerned of course that we have all this beautiful new industrial building and yet your stats statistics gave us at a vacancy rate I think of 10 point something percent. And then you mentioned in terms of the businesses coming, there was Michael's Electric. It seemed like the only industrial. Are there any specific tools or activities that are targeted towards potential industrial customers that we are engaged in?

So we didn't mention it as part of the report. We try not to put the cart in front of the horse, but we had a lot of positive conversations with businesses that are exploring different industrial sites now in the city. So we continue to have the conversation. We're reaching out and building better relationship with the industrial brokers specifically to make sure that they understand that the city is here to help and that we're available and staff is willing to help streamline We talked about hosting a broker roundtable discussion with some of these brokers.

We can get everybody in the group, we can have presentations from different city staff that will help walk them through hey this is step one, step two, step three. Here's our building official, here's Ted meet him he'll walk you through the process. Here's a planning manager so again not only do they understand the process better and have some confidence in terms of how business friendly we are But they actually get a chance to meet the people that are going to be signing off and making decisions, which is huge. Especially as we get a lot of our industrial businesses out of the L.A. area.

It'll take them three weeks just to get ahold of somebody on the phone. No offense to any City of L. A workers but yes.

Got it, great. One other somewhat related question. You gave the statistics on the number of business licenses I believe in 2024 you said it was 5780 and 25 it was 5,714 so within 70 or 80. I guess maybe because as a small business owner I just went to renew my business license. My question is who monitors that? My experience was that I wasn't able to put my credit card in to pay for it. So maybe this is not the time or place to discuss that, but I just want to be sure when a business goes to get licensed is an easy process. Is that handled directly through you? Or is it handled through accounting?

So the city partners with a company called HDL. And

I'm aware of that and although it's made out to the City of Simi Valley.

And working closely with our administrative services department to work through those issues. We have from time to time had calls from businesses that have questions and of course we've helped walk them through that process as well. So yeah, I mean we're involved and we're here for the city side help but a lot of the issuance of the license themselves in the renewers are handled online through HDL.

We do pass along the fee to our customers. So if that is

something that

Thank you very much for a great presentation. I look forward to ICSC.

Madam Mayor and members of the City Council, next on the agenda is Item 4, Public Statements. Since there are no public hearings under Agenda Item 5, Agenda Items 4 and 6 are combined and the City Council will hear all public statements under this agenda item four. Agenda Item 4 and 6 are the times allotted for public statements on all items other than public hearings appointments and informational reports.

Speakers will be called down in the order in which a card was submitted to speak for this public statement, Item 4. In accordance with the protocols that were adopted on October 6th, 2025 if 20 or more speaker cards are received each speaker's time will automatically be reduced to two minutes each. We have received 20 speaker cards. Each speaker will have two minutes to speak. Persons addressing the city council are requested to state their name and community residence for the record. Madam Mayor unless you have any comments we can begin public statements.

Let's move forward thank you.

I will call three speakers at a time so you will know who you follow. The first three speakers, Michael Shaw, James McGillis and Linda Bosley.

Okay, go ahead and start. Happy New Year everybody! I'm glad to see everybody. I wish you all a healthy and happy new year. The last I spoke, I was all excited and I asked you all questions about what we thought we got accomplished last year. And I got some responses, some I didn't. But I apologize if it made anybody feel uncomfortable because that's not my intent to put somebody on the spot.

I was excited to talk about what we thought of last year. So I'm likewise excited about this year because believe it or not, we've got 10 months and we've got elections Ten months and the only forum we have of us to get to know you guys is three minutes at a time, now two minutes every two weeks. Not very productive so I'd like to see us put our heads together and see if we can come up with another forum. And I plan for the next ten months to show up and ask you questions. Why do you want to run? How do you view your public service? You all know me.

You know that I'm all about public service. I'm about transparency, accountability and we can talk about that and as we move our way to our next election everybody will have a better sense of who were voting for and who we're talking about because right now all these people they don't know you and I want them to know you. Last but not least This STRs, I've reviewed it. You guys kick this can down the road. This has got more holes in it than Swiss cheese and I'm telling you this dog won't hunt so thanks for listening.

Mayor Cavanaugh City Council and staff. I'm James McGillis 18 year resident Simi Valley. This is our final alert regarding short-term rentals in Simi Valley neighborhood council number one met on January 8th to consider the project on page seven of the online materials. The Neighborhood Council's feedback is sought and proposed changes to the Simi Valley Municipal Code, Title IX modifications include adjustments to allow uses permit requirements and definitions to include STRs specifically whether STR should be allowed within the city. Title V modifications deal with the permit process if approved by the Neighborhood Council's Planning Commission and the City Council The changes to Title IX and Title V would legalize residential short-term rentals throughout the city.

If passed, any private home, townhome, condominium or mobile home could become a legal hotel within the city. An individual that might own one of those is an LLC, a private person, any legal entity that can own property. Your only opportunity to tell the City Council that you do not want hotels next door to you is to attend your neighborhood council and vote no on proposed changes to the municipal code Whether citizens or not, as long as you're a legal resident of Simi Valley, you can attend a neighborhood council. Identify your council online NC1 met here January 8th. Thank You Mayor Kavanaugh for being here. NC2 meets January 13th 7 p.m.. In the library NC3, January 15th City Hall Community Room. NC4, January 20th 7 p.m., in the Simi Valley Public Library.

Please join us at Neighborhood Council and voice your opinion on this important subject. It's time we the people tell our city council to ban all residential short-term rent Remember, you must attend, sign in and stay for the vote. There are three remaining neighborhood councils. I will be there with you supporting democracy throughout our city. Thank you.

Good evening, my name is Linda Bosley. I'm a resident of Moorpark. Tonight I am speaking on behalf of a coalition made up of the residents management and owners of Villa de la Roya mobile home park and local business owners near the homeless encampment on West Los Angeles Avenue. Our coalition is grateful that the city took the necessary steps to clean up the homeless encampment In tandem with Ventura County coming out ahead of the cleanup to offer housing and other services to the individuals.

We would also like to recognize the positive relationship fostered by Sergeant Johnson with our park manager, specifically his continuing efforts to keep us updated on the cleanup status and plans for enforcement of the no trespassing ordinance on the property after cleanup is completed. As of 515 today, the cleanup crew stated they will be back tomorrow and we'll be able to finish the project tomorrow.

On a personal note I went out on January 8th to observe the cleanup process there was approximately 15 to 20 people from the encampment on the sidewalk with their belongings. I thought the county would take this opportunity to offer housing to those people But that did not happen. When I expressed this opinion to a few people, I was surprised at their reaction. They stated the homeless were already given a chance to get help and they refused it.

It reminded me of a story that carried me through many difficult situations as a public school teacher over my 34-year career. One day, a young man is walking along the beach and sees an old man picking up one starfish after another and tossing each gently into the ocean. Why are you throwing those starfish into the ocean? He asks because the sun is up and the tide is out. And if I don't throw them further in, they will die.

But don't you realize there are miles and miles of beach and starfish all along? You can't possibly save them all. The old man listened carefully and calmly, and then bent down and picked up another starfish and threw it into the sea. Ms.

Bosley I'm sorry your time is up. Thank

you.

That is a wonderful story.

And I hope the city and county continues their efforts with the homeless. Thank you. Thank you.

The next three speakers Karla Castilla, Aliyah Ewing, and Jennifer Frank.

All right, well since time got cut down I'll get right to the point. City Council you may think that you've done enough by finally putting ice activity on the agenda and having SVPD presentation. Sorry to break it to you but that's not enough. It doesn't even begin to scratch the surface in making Simi Valley a safe city for everyone Two days after that meeting on December 17th, a woman was kidnapped on the corner of Erringer and LA Avenue in broad daylight. Two days after our meeting where you did not really comment.

After everything you heard that day your response was please tell us what to do we are open to suggestions. We gave you almost a nine minute long list of what neighboring cities and others in the country have done. I guess you needed it in writing. With the rest of my time, I want to honor and say the names of those lost to ICE brutality and violence. And I hope that you, Mayor Kavanaugh, adjourn the meeting in memory of them because no one should die at the hands of the state.

In ICE custody, Henry Ruiz Guillen, Sarawit Gezaheng Dejeneh, Maxime Cherniak, Brian Garzon-Rayo, Nong Yuk Nguyen, Aberaldo Avellaneda Delgado, Johnny Noviello, Isidro Perez, Chow Feng Ji, Lorenzo Antonio Beatriz Vargas, Santos Venegas Reyes, Ismael Ayala Uribe, Norian Guzman Fuentes, Miguel Angel Garcia Medina. Josue Castro Rivera, Gabriel Garcia Aviles, Francisco Gaspar Andres, John Wilson Brutus, Fouad Saeed Abdul Qadeer, Nenko Stanef Ganshet, Juan Alexis Tineo Martinez, Jesus Molina Vella, Mary Angie Blaze.

Tianxuan Fan, Oscar Rasconduarte, Juan Bingxi, Leo Cruz Silva, Hassan Ali Motsaleh, Kaiyin Wang, Pete Zumala-Montejo, Shiraz Fahaly-Shawazin. May them rest in power.

Shiraz Fethali, Delvin Francisco Rodriguez, Luis Beltran, Jaime Alanis Garcia Alaniz. He was a father actually murdered in Ventura County so if you haven't heard his story yet definitely look it up. Silverio Villegas. Carlos Robeta Montoya Valdez, Ana Victoria, Keith Porter who was just recently murdered in Northridge. Renee Good who we all obviously heard on the news because she's white. Jocelyn Rojo-Caracina and Nenco Staban Ganchez may they rest in power. Do I have a timer?

Awesome. Well, I'll use the next two minutes to talk about what I was hoping to talk about. Thank you so much. May they rest in power to everybody who we just mentioned before as Carla mentioned before nobody should die at the hands of state violence. Unfortunately many people do continue to die at the hands of state violence because we have elected officials Thank you very much.

to actually participate in actions that support us. We have asked you before to create a committee to focus specifically on immigration issues that fell on deaf ears, ears that were unwilling to listen to their constituents intentionally because you don't want to be held accountable for your actions or your decisions. We know it's because you guys are considering running for office again and it's easier to win Upseat when you're an incumbent. We know that you guys have been here for a long time I've been talking to you guys since I was a minor And so with my remaining minute, I'm gonna encourage the audience To consider running for office There's a training that will teach you how to run for office how to fundraise for office January 24th It's on zoom So, you know on a weekend should be pretty accessible there will be former candidates those who have been elected and those who have not Candidates of color who are willing to walk you through the entire process.

There will be former campaign managers and community organizers in this space to provide people with the information that they may need so if you feel like, oh my god why would I run for office? Like I'm so under qualified look at the people in front of you Are any of them qualified? Hmm. So if you think you're underqualified to run for office, I guarantee you you're not because you can get elected to office with absolutely no policies in your campaign and with zero experience having done it before so why can't it be you? Please consider running. Thank you so much.

Good evening. My name is Jennifer Frank, and I'm here to speak about the Simi Valley Library Foundation. Our mission is to raise money for the renovation and revitalization of our library. First, I would like to invite each of you as well as everyone here and those listening at home to attend the Library Foundation's Love & Laughs Comedy Night. It will be on Thursday night, February 12th at 630 p.m., at our lovely Simi Valley Cultural Arts Center We will have a dessert reception with food from right here in Simi Valley, followed by a comedy show featuring local talent.

All of the money raised from Love and Laughs will go towards refreshing and upgrading the library's community room. This is the most utilized space in our library, and if you've been in there recently, you know it is in desperate need of some help. New carpeting and a fresh coat of paint will go a long way to making the room more comfortable and inviting. We also plan to buy modern Furniture, an interactive presentation board and a mobile podium with Bluetooth connectivity to benefit everyone who uses the community room.

Love & Laughs is right around Valentine's Day so this would be a fun evening to spend with your sweetheart and it's for a great cause! Also in regards to Love and Laughs, last month the Library Foundation participated in the special events grant process. We are so appreciative to the committee for recommending that Love and Laughs receive $1,214 in funding to support this event.

I strongly urge you to approve this funding tonight. It will help us offset the costs so that more money can go towards upgrading the community room. And very quickly, I just wanted to share on the progress that's been made on the updates to the teen center in the library. Today, the carpet was installed. Yay! Finally! And next, the furniture will be ordered and then placed in this space for our teens to use it.

Thank you all so much for your time and attention, and I hope you'll approve the funding allotted by the Special Events Grant Committee. And I look forward to seeing all of you at Love &

Last next

month.

The next three speakers, Nikki Leehan, Ken Hurst and William Quirt.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council. My name is Nikki Leanne and I'm here on behalf of Body Brain Train, a Simi Valley based nonprofit dedicated to bringing fitness movement and cognitive wellness to our senior in Parkinson's communities. I want to sincerely thank the mayor city council and city staff for your support of body brain train. We know how competitive the events grant process is, and we truly are honored to be among the nonprofits selected.

This events grant helps sponsor our annual Punch-A-Thon fundraiser, which in turn allows us to sustain our programs for much of the year. That support directly impacts our ability to offer accessible inclusive classes that help older adults stay strong independent and socially connected. And for many these classes are not just exercise they're a lifeline. We are deeply grateful for the City of Simi Valley's continued investment in community wellness, aging with dignity and quality of life for all residents. Thank you for believing in our mission that movement makes miracles and for supporting the work we do. Thank you for your time and I hope to see you May 9th at our 4th Annual Punch-A-Thon!

Good evening. My name is Ken Hurst, and I'm a resident of Simi Valley. You heard the names of 37 people who have died either in detention or directly at the hands of ICE recently. Since the start of October, ICE has been involved in 13 shootings, eight people have been wounded, and three people have died as a result. The most recent death was a woman who was shot and killed, Renee Good, who is a legal observer, a mother, a US citizen and a concerned community member.

Then they prevented a bystander physician from attending to her. Time may tell if it was murder. It certainly looks that way. Will the council consider having a moment of silence and adjourning tonight's meeting in honor of those killed by ice? I think that would be appropriate. Thank you.

Good evening Madam Mayor and members of the Council, my name is William Court. Thank you for the opportunity to speak I'd like to briefly highlight an opportunity to reduce one of the city's largest wastewater operating costs, sludge handling by up to 50% without expanding facilities or disrupting plant operations. Sludge handling is a major expense of wastewater utilities It typically represents 30 to 50 percent of total operating costs driven by sludge volume, polymer use, hauling and disposal fees.

These costs continue to rise each year due to fuel, labor and regulatory pressure. The key to reducing this cost is not at the disposal end but upstream before sludge ever leaves the plant. The approach we're proposing focuses on reducing the amount of sludge generated and improving how well it dewaters using the city's existing infrastructure. By enhancing biological stabilization earlier in the process, less excess sludge is produced. Polymer demand drops significantly and the sludge that remains requires fewer truckloads to haul and dispose.

Facilities using this approach consistently achieve 30 to 60% reduction in sludge production, sludge volume. 40 to 70% reduction in polymer use and overall up to 50% reduction in sludge related operating costs. To put this in simple terms, if the city is spending $1 million annually on sludge handling, a 50% reduction represents approximately $500,000 in recurring annual savings.

This solution requires no major construction, integrates into current operations and typically delivers a payback in under one year while also reducing... Mr. Cort,

I'm sorry your time is now up. Thank you.

The next three speakers, Cindy Slack, Glenn Becerra and Justin Link.

Happy New Year Madam Mayor members of the City Council my name is Cindy Slack and on behalf of our team at the Simi Valley Library Foundation I want to thank you all for your continued support of programs that truly strengthen our city We are incredibly proud to see the enhancements beginning today on the Teen Center, which you heard already. This project represents more than improvements to the building. It is an investment in our young people, their safety, their growth and their future. We are deeply grateful to everyone who has shown interest in making this important project possible.

Looking ahead, our focus will be refreshing the ever popular community room bringing some light and life to it We are also excited to invite you and the entire community to join us for our Love & Laughs event on Thursday, February 12th at the Simi Valley Cultural Arts Center. The tickets are $60 and there are under 100 seats left. We are raising money. It's an evening of promises, sweets, and laughter so we thank you again for your continuous efforts and support of the Simi Valley Library Foundation.

Good evening, Mayor Cavanaugh and Council Members. My name is Glenn Becerra. Tonight I wanted to give you a quick update on the progress we have made at the Simi Valley Town Center. We closed escrow 15 months ago and have done extensive community outreach to share our thoughts on the future of the town center while at the same time hearing directly from the community on their wants and concerns for this site.

We take this feedback very seriously and incorporated many of the ideas into the plan. We have completed an economic study, which is under review by your staff. We've completed a branding study, engaged a signage designer and fabricator as well as extensive architecture design. And today we kicked off phase two of our civil work in our architectural design.

We are working diligently to attract new tenants and retain existing ones, but we keep hearing that the lack of progress on our plan makes the site less desirable for new food and beverage in retail. That's one of the reasons that we lost exporting goods. At this point, we are waiting on city staff to provide us with a draft development agreement that would outline a plan to move forward benefiting both the city and the center. We've been waiting since October for this language and as you know delays stifles progress and advancement for our community.

We have also agreed to carve off a portion of the site for a future entertainment and cultural center that the city desires. We hope that these efforts and the fact that we're investing tens of millions of dollars shows our commitment to improving this center. We don't want to be the fourth failed owner of this site, and with your participation and partnership we can bring great things to Simi Valley.

We also would love for you to consider creating a subcommittee of two council members to oversee the progress on this site that would allow you to both hold us as the developers accountable and the city staff accountable.

I'm sorry Mr. Becerra, your time is up.

That's all i have to say so thank you for your time tonight

Good evening Mayor Cavanaugh, Mayor Pro Tem Litzter, Councilmember Judge, Councilmember Rhodes, Council Member Aiello. My name is Justin Link, Public Works Principal Engineer Traffic and President of the Simi Valley Engineers Association. We are 763 days without a contract and rather than negotiate in good faith management has directed their attorney to file a frivolous unfair labor practice charge against the SVEA which we intend to vigorously refute claim by claim This is surely a waste of staff time and a waste of taxpayer dollars.

The facts remain, total compensation for engineers at the City of Simi Valley is well below market. SVEA's proposal was reasonable and our proposal is within the city's means. We firmly believe that after the fact-finding process is concluded these facts will be confirmed. What the SVEA has proposed is not monumental. It is a rounding error in the city's total budget.

Even so, it will go a great distance toward retaining and recruiting engineers—engineers who ensure traffic signals operate, streetlights stay lit, drinkable water flows from the tap, wastewater is conveyed and treated, and development is processed and constructed. This would be a win for both the cities, excuse me. The citizens of the city of Simi Valley and members of the SVEA many of whom are residents of Simi Valley and are seated in the first two rows here.

I encourage all of you to put citizens first and support your engineers. Thank you.

The next three speakers Eddie Yamamoto Rob Herr and Anthony Gallo

Good evening Mayor Kavanaugh and Council Members. I am Eddie Yamamoto, Vice President of Simi Valley Engineers Association. I've been employed at the City for 19 years. Currently the Principal Engineer for Billing & Safety. I'm also a proud resident of Simi Valley who has resided here for 30 years. I raised my two sons, both of whom attended Simi Valley Unified Schools, participated in various activities and sports organizations throughout our city and eventually graduated from Simi Valley High School. So I do have a vested interest in our city. Prior to coming to the City of Simi Valley, I was a structural engineer at the City of Los Angeles Department of Building and Safety where I was supervising the plan check section for major structures, which included high-rise buildings and other complex structures.

This was just at the outset of the high-rise construction boom in 2006. Back then, I was able to consider taking a significant reduction in title to come to the city of Simi Valley as an associate engineer because that's how competitive the salary and benefits package was At the time, City of Simi Valley had one of the higher total compensation package for engineers within the surrounding jurisdictions whereas now we are one of the lowest. If I was faced with making the same decision I was faced with 19 years ago which was take the opportunity to work in the same city that I lived in, I would not have even considered applying for it because of the substantial difference in compensation.

All throughout our negotiations, we've been asking to get us back to average compared to the surrounding jurisdictions so that we have at least a fair chance of attracting talent and retaining the talent that we currently have. been a training ground where neighboring jurisdictions have been poaching our talent for years. Now is the time to reverse this trend so that we can start attracting retaining talent, so the citizens of our city have the utmost confidence in a competent engineering staff that keeps our essential infrastructures and built environments safe by protecting life and property. Thank you for your time.

Good evening, esteemed Mayor and distinguished members of the City Council. My name is Rob Herr and I serve you and those in our Water District Service Area as an Assistant Engineer. I moved to Simi Valley in 1979 and raised my family here with nearly 27 years of dedicated service to the city and district. I've weathered numerous challenges including furloughs and deferred cost-of-living adjustments all of which the optimism for a future improvement We've experienced significant loss of skilled personnel to other organizations, as Eddie said. Primarily due to more lucrative compensation packages for less demanding roles.

More than 50% of those that left positions have less responsibility and all left for higher pay. Since I last spoke to you before in closed session in March of 2024 we have continued to lose staff. Since then two people were hired and left from the Water Engineering Department alone. This high turnover creates higher workload and staff efforts to train new employees, which takes a lot of time.

Our presentation for findings for comprehensive class and compensation study underscored a concerning reality that we are under by 18 to 22%. It's worth noting that many of us, myself included, operate within enterprise funds. Meaning our salaries are sustained by revenue generated for the city and district rather than drawing from the general fund. As a citizen I'm concerned that these fees have increased steadily yet employee compensation has not.

I'm grateful to work in the city that I'm a resident of. I am striving to make the city and district a great place to work and I hope you will help. Thank you for your time.

Good evening, my name is Anthony Gallo. I am a senior engineer in the traffic division. I've been employed here at the City of Simi Valley for seven years and I've lived in the city all 44 of my years. In my time here in those seven years we have lost two entry-level engineers each after about six months of employment. We lost those two engineers to adjacent agencies that offer better pay It's clear to us that the engineers use the City of Simi Valley as a stepping stone to gain some work experience and transition that into better compensation elsewhere. That's just one example of how the wages that the engineers here at the city earn aren't competitive enough to retain the engineers for the City of Simi Valley. Thank you.