Santa Cruz Board of Supervisors 09/15/2026

For those present today who feel more comfortable making comments in Spanish, please let us know. We have someone available to interpret your comments into English. If you require translation of the entire meeting, please make arrangements in advance with the clerk of the board by visiting in person or by calling area code 831454 23 23. Painty dress. Painty dress. Good morning. I'd like to call to order the September 15, 2026 meeting of the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors. Will the clerk please call the role? >> Certainly. Supervisor Dura >> present. >> Koig >> here. >> Hernandez >> here. >> Cummings >> here. >> And Martinez >> present. Next we will have a moment of silence. Would any of my colleagues like to recognize anyone for a moment of silence? I do have a couple that I'd like to recognize. Last month, we lost longtime Boulder Creek residents Dell Townsend. Dell was a devoted father, husband, nurse, artist, musician, and volunteer. He was both a longtime member of the local community emergency response team and an active volunteer for the Mountain Community Theater where he spent countless hours ensuring that everyone had an enjoyable experience including all of the many volunteers that kept the theater operating. We recently also lost Felton resident Albert Kent. Albert was an incredible man, a true jack of all trades with incredible energy and unstopp and an unstoppable problem solver. He was also key to the longevity of the Mountain Community Theater, there since its creation and playing many, many roles over the following 40 years, only taking a break during the two years when he toured the country with the Ringling Brothers Circus. We send our condolences to the friends and families of Dell and Albert. Finally, I'd also like to recognize that September is National Recovery Month and specifically September 21st is National Opioid Awareness Day. We are fortunate that this year so far we are continuing to see a decline in deaths from overdoses, but it's still too many. No one should have to lose a loved one to substance use. There's still a tremendous amount of work that needs to be done from preventing people from starting to use in the first place to connecting them to help and supporting while they work to break the cycle of addiction so it doesn't end in the loss of life. So I want to recognize all the work that's being done to bring people back into the fold and away from substance use. And I want to take a moment of silence for the thousands of Santa Cruz residents who have lost their lives to substances over the years. Please join me in a moment of silence. Thank you. Please join me for the pledge of >> allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Thank you. Good morning, CEO Coburn. Are there any late additions or changes to the agenda? >> Yes, Chair. There are on the regular agenda for item number eight, we have additional materials. There is a staff report that's been revised uh for the recommended action number two in the executive summary and this replaces packet page 21. And then for item nine, there are additional materials. The staff report has been replaced for packet pages 93 through 95 and there is an attachment labeled metro petition sufficiency report and this is packet page 101. Thank you. Would any of my colleagues like to remove any items from the consent agenda? Seeing none, I would now like to invite the public to make public comment. You're welcome to make public comment on any item on the consent or closed agenda or any item that's within the subject matter within any subject matter within the jurisdiction of the board. If you're here to speak on one of the items that's on our regular agenda today, I ask that you please hold those comments and share them when that item is called. If you intend to speak as you are, start forming a line so we can have a sense of how many people are here this morning. See, we have at least a dozen. And madame clerk, how many people are online currently? I have no speakers with their hands raised online. >> Okay, I will set the public comment period for two minutes each. Welcome and good morning. >> Yeah, good morning. My name is James Yuing Whitman. September 15, 2020, excuse me, 2026. Where's my mind? So, I'm actually here because I care. I'll try to Do you >> mind speaking into the mic? >> Is it I don't know. Is it working now? >> That's better. Thank you. >> Okay. So, you know, I'll try to be as polite as possible and I guess the two items on the consent agenda would be the minutes and then the item 19, which kind of has to do with this county's goals for 2026 through 2032. So, that kind of gives me free range to talk about anything. Um, I just think it's kind of interesting. We had the 25 year anniversary of a the 9/11 false flag event. I'm just going to read this. In Madrid, Spain on February 13th, two 2005. Steel beams 32 stories burned 24 hours, never collapsed. The whole building was in was engulfed in flames. It didn't collapse. That was a false flag event. 911 was a false flag event. So what are we involved with now as a supposed nation? You know, we had something that happened on the 28th of February, an attack of Iran, one of the few countries that is still sovereign and not using the financial system that the rest of the world is using. How about the f false flag event on October 7th? So what is going on with all the shortages? Are people paying attention? I took a picture yesterday that diesel in Santa Cruz was $8.19. Everything is moved around on diesel on this planet. When Henry Ford built his diesels, they were never designed to work with prochemicals. They were designed to work on fuel, on seed oils. So, we have all these solutions and I don't have that much more time. So, I suppose whatever. I just kind of wish that people would start using their brains and not seem to be so indoctrinated sheep. Thank you. >> Good morning. My name is Joanna Edmonds. Um I'm a live oak resident and I have a son who's 5 years old who has duchen musculardrophe. And so I was here to express gratitude for your proclamation for World Duchen Awareness Day which was on September 7th. Um this is a rare disease. It affects one in 5,000 male births and it affects all um races and nationalities. Um we have about 15,000 boys in our country that have it and there's no cure. It's a progressive muscle wasting disease. Um, so one of our biggest strengths is being able to raise awareness. Um, so thank you for sharing it on your agenda today. And if you'd like to learn more, um, Parent Project Musculardrophe is a really great organization that helps advocate, fund raise, and support families. Um, there are a lot of new treatments from organizations like that investment into getting awareness out there and putting money into research. So, we're really thankful for all the good work that they do. Um, and again, thank you so much for recognizing this. It's a really hard disease to deal with as a family and so we really rely on our community support. So, thank you and please learn more about it and spread the word. And we have also another parent who's going to speak after me. Thank you. >> Hello, my name is Sarah Alofy. Um, I am here for the same reason. My son is walking Luffy. He is 12 and he also has duchan musculardrophe. Um I just want to say I'm very appreciative that you did a declaration. Um the community knows a lot about this from my son. We actually did a fundraiser a couple years ago and in three hours your community members uh raised $100,000. Um so it's something that's very important to a lot of people in this community and I appreciate you bringing more awareness to it. Hello, my name is Allison Edwards and I'm a resident and homeowner of Davenport. I'm here on behalf of many Davenport residents to um encourage you all to support Supervisor Cummings proposal to add a measure to the March 2028 ballot which if passed would require a vote across the population of Santa Cruz County to change any zoning of the county for all possible construction of AI data centers. We are in full support of the supervisor of supervisor Cummings proposal on this matter and urge the county board of supervisors to back it and the transparency it supports. And I would just add that since March 2028 is pretty far away in the interim I would encourage the board of supervisors to be extremely transparent about any possible development of any data centers in the county. Thank you. Morning boards. Since Stafford, deputy county executive officer. I'm pleased this morning to be introducing Trish Daniels as our new county budget manager. Uh Trish has over 20 years of county experience in public works. We started in the county executive office at the same time about 10 years ago. And then most recently, she's been for the past five years in the human services department. and her foresight last year around this time was one of the key factors in the reason that we didn't have any uh layoffs in HSD this year. And so we're really pleased to have her and her experience in our office and I'm really excited to be getting a colleague back. >> Uh thank you um for this honor. I'm so grateful that Nicole has placed her trust and faith in me and I'm um committed to helping get this county back on track from a financial standpoint and doing the best that I can and hoping to work with each one of you as well too to um help our county make good choices. Thank you. >> Good morning uh chair, members of the board. My name is Troy Boon. I'm an environmental consultant who works with small and large water systems across the county. I'm speaking on item seven regarding the local privacy agency. I'm also uh a former LPA lead. I ran the program for 13 years. Um I'd ask you to reconsider terminating the LPA and instead looking at restructuring it rather than eliminating it. The data here is compelling. 73% surveyed small water systems want to keep the LPA program. 19 of 26 are willing to accept phased fee increases to preserve it. Comment after comment describes the same thing. Local staff who understand the complexities of running small water systems, the lack of resources, and the specific history of each system, and who also show up when there's a problem. That relationship took years to build, and the big basin water company emergency showed exactly what why it matters. if the county staff uh it was the county staff, not the state who stepped in when it counted. Rather than walk away from that expertise, I'd encourage the board to direct staff to explore a structural fix, consolidating the land use section with the drinking water program. This accomplishes several things at once. It increases personnel coverage across both functions so that the drinking water program isn't carrying its staffing gap alone. It creates real professional development pathways for staff who currently sit in narrower roles and critically it builds cross trainining capacity. Land use staff gain the training to recognize and respond to well and water quality issues far better um uh and in a far better way. And these issues already cross their desk in permitting and land use review which is exactly the kind of problems that currently fall through the cracks between the divisions. This isn't a subsidy problem to be solved by walking away. It's an organizational design problem and the county has a real opportunity to solve it by combining these functions rather than dissolving one of them. Thank you. >> Thank you. Um I want to thank you for your comments and I just want to clarify for folks who are here on public comment. Um we are on general public comment right now which is items on the consent agenda and items that are not on the regular agenda. So, if you're here to speak on um the local prim primacy agency water issue, that will be item number seven. That will be next on the agenda. No problem. We appreciate your comments. Um and the appropriate time to speak would be when that item is heard, which will be next um so we can infold those comments into that item. Additionally, on today's regular agenda, we have um our study session related to conflict criminal defense, the metro initiative, um a housing ordinance, as well as the AI data center item. So, those will be called later. And there's a that's the appropriate time to speak on those items. >> Do I speak again? I don't. >> So, and then yeah, no, because you spoke on it on this one, you won't speak again, but you we did note your comments. My appreciate everything you said. It's confusing, so I'm glad I have the opportunity to clarify. Thank you for being here. >> Good morning. Good morning, Dr. Marne Sandival, your behavioral health director. Uh, thank you, chair, and members of the board. On behalf of the behavioral health division, I want to express our deep appreciation for your proclamation recognizing September as National Recovery Month and September 21st as National Opioid Awareness Day here in Santa Cruz County. These observances honor the strength, resilience, and hope of the individuals and families in our community who are living in recovery as well as those still seeking a path towards wellness. Recovery is not only possible. It is happening here every day in Santa Cruz County through services, evidence-based treatment, peer support, harm reduction strategies, and the dedication of the providers and community partners who walk alongside people on their recovery journeys. Your recognition today reinforces our shared commitment to expanding access to care, reducing stigma, and ensuring that every resident feels supported in reaching their full potential. It also highlights the urgency of the opioid crisis and the importance of prevention, education, and rapid access to life-saving services. So, thank you for uplifting recovery, for supporting our behavioral health division, and for standing with the individuals and families who rely on us. Together, we are building a healthier, safer, and more hopeful Santa Cruz County. I'd like to turn it over to one of our behavioral health leadership team to share some comments on the suicide uh prevention proclamation. >> Thank you. Um my name is Andrea Turble, behavioral health program manager. Um good morning. September marks National Suicide Prevention Month, a critical time to focus our collective efforts on saving lives in Santa Cruz County. According to the county's health data, 21 to 23, our suicide rate was 13.6 per 100,000, higher than the statewide rate of 12.8. Our recent updates, In recent updates, the rate has climbed from 13 in 2021 to 17.1 in 2023. These numbers represent more than statistics. They represent neighbors, families, and friends in crisis. Our county's behavioral health services has responded through the 2024 suicide prevention strategic plan update grounded in public health in a public health approach. It emphasizes prevention, early intervention, crisis response, and postvention. To support this plan, the multi- agency suicide prevention team continues expanding training and community outreach supported by the CDPH comprehensive suicide prevention grant we just received for the sixth year running. But strategy alone isn't enough. Action is what saves lives. The county operates a 247 mobile crisis response team, ensuring on-site stabilization and connection to resources. The 988 Suicide Crisis Lifeline offers free confidential support to anyone in crisis. We printed 35,000 English and Spanish behavioral health resource guides and distributed them throughout the county. We launched a youth crisis center, hope forward, at Espironza Adilante, to better serve young people locally. Community events like the mental health awareness prevention walk on September 26 at Sky Park foster connection, healing, and hope. As behavioral health program manager, I see the impact in real time. Our common goal must be to eliminate stigma, promote early helpseeking, and strengthen safety nets, especially for youth, LGBTQ plus individuals, and older adults facing isolation. Thank you for your support. I'm Dr. Daniel Spilman. I've been a physician and resident of this county for nearly 30 years. I have over 50 employees, have called. I provide on call services our local hospitals. I live off of Northdale Gulch Road and I live in fear every day. And that fear gets amplified when we have a hot, dry, windy day like we did a few days ago. We have three washouts on that road, one of which has been present for over 10 years. This is a serious egress route and in the event of a major wildfire, people will die and this is one chance where we can prevent that. In medicine, when we have limited resources, we engage in a process called triage, where we assign our resources to the most critical items first. This is a critical item that needs to be addressed. I would appreciate the county looking at its budget and engaging in more of a triage process where critical items are addressed primarily and everything after that. Thank you. >> Hello, I'm Jim Gilchrist. I um am a resident of district 1. I live off Northdale Gulch Road also. Um but these comments apply to all the county roads, the local roads in the mountains specifically. Um North Rodale Gulch is an absolute mess and it has been for 10 years. 10 years ago in 2017, there was a slide. It's been a one- lane road ever since then. And that slide came 6 months after a previous slide was repaired. So in reality, it's been about 15 years that we've lived with this situation. Our supervisor, Manuk, we had a phone call with him, Zoom call August 11th, where he said that um that main slide would be repaired next year. But I looked at the county public works um website yesterday and it says now that it's going to be repaired in May of 28. This is the same thing we've heard year after year. It's going to be repaid next year and now we're out into 2028. The priority of the county and the board of supervisors specifically need to be the safety of the residents of this county, not fancy little projects like whale bridges and repaving roads that are already in good conditions. And my favorite project, actually, this wonderful space we're in here right now. The county spent $2.8 million to remodel this. I don't know how, but they did. At least according to what the county says. And they say that was not taxpayer money, but it was cable fees. Maybe you don't understand. Cable fees are paid by the residents, the taxpayers of this county. We need to straighten things out, get our priorities right, and start looking at the safety of the residents. We need to fix roads before we start improving roads that are already in good condition. Thank you. Good morning. I'm Linda Gilchrist and I live at 1440 Hidden Valley Road in SoCal, which of course Hidden Valley is a feeder road to North Rodeial Gulch. North Rodeial Gulch is an extreme fire danger. And at a firewise meeting we went to recently in a conversation I had with a member of the fire department, he told me that they recognized that Rodeo Gulch is an indefensible road in the county and that if there's a fire that they would have to forget it and go to the areas where they know that they could do some good. That put chills running through my blood as you can all imagine. as those of us who have lived there on that road. I've had eight back surgeries in the last 10 years. And I can't tell you what it's like coming back from surgery and going down that road and living with it day by day. That that's a personal issue I have. It's also a personal issue that my family doesn't want to come for big holidays anymore. No one wants to go down the road. But my biggest concern is the fire danger that we all have. And I think that the board of supervisors needs to take a hard look at what it takes to repair rodeial gulch. The last slide, my husband, who's an engineer, wrote a letter to the county saying that he'd walked the road past the last slide and it looked like there would be another slide if there was a storm. He got a notice back stating that the engineers had looked at it and the road was fine. and the very first storm we had that road slid and that's the third slide we have right now. So please please look at our road as an emergency within the county. Thank you. Hello. Uh this is the first time I've actually been at one of these um meetings and I'm with the group here from Rodeo Gulch. So I won't repeat what they've already said, but Manu has been very instrumental in trying to help us understand the issues of the roads countywide. And we need the support of the others here to start really focusing on all of the issues that are underground that are undermining all of these roads. First for safety, but also just for property valuation and everything else, you know. Um, it's just very difficult for us to have to constantly ask for your support to get something done over a 10-year period. So now what we're doing is we're actually organizing residents in all of the districts, not just Mano's district, but we're going to start reaching out through the Firewise networks in all of the districts to see if we can get more support from all of you to get this issue and other issues on the table for uh serious upgrades to roads and culverts that have been neglected so that our roads don't further deteriorate. So some of the statistics manu gave us were that uh right now our roads are good. We need to put in at least you know4 to50 million dollars a year to keep our roads at good. If we don't continue to do that then our roads are just going to get worse and worse and worse. And we're not sure in the future if we're even going to get FEMA support because everyone in every state is having severe weather issues. So, we need you to start helping us prioritize the road issues now so that your residents are safe and so that people want to live here. So, um we really appreciate your time and hope that you can help us with this. Thank you. >> Good morning, supervisors. I'm Rob Darcy. I live on North Rodeo Gulch. Um it's approximately 2 and a half miles from 41st Avenue. There are three storm war washouts. As you've heard, all three damaged roadsides create a one-lane road with stop signs and barricades. We've no we've voiced these concerns to Supervisor Conig, and to his credit, he's working hard to help. There are over 300 residents living on North Rodeo Gulch. Our community has created the NRG Firewise community, identified three alternative egress routes, and held two egress drills to teach residents how to find and navigate them. All of these escape routes travel through private property and easements. Central Fire has stated that none of the egress routes meet the county standard uh road standard and the only evacuation route for our area is North South North Rodeo Gulch County Road. North Rodeo Gulch no longer meets the county standard either. The day will come when we relive our CZU or Paradise tragedies. The third egress route has experienced resistance for a few of the neighbors. They claim there's too much liability potential for road damage and the egress routes don't read the meet the road standard. and central fire captain Tim Wely in 2023 wrote a a letter to one of those neighbors stating it does not the egress routes do not meet those standards. We have two asks have central fire sheriff's office O3 encourage neighbors to set aside their fears and prepare for the inevitable evacuation. to test the sheriff O3 in central fire to consult with county council and respond to the NRG Firewise community board of directors in writing in support um of the community needs and good Samaritan laws that may apply that could protect our neighbors. Thank you. >> On a different level, uh my name is Deborah Morrison. I live on Stanley Avenue, three doors down from the corner of Soel Drive and Stanley Avenue. And that corner lot, parcel number 025 11124, is in process of planned development of multiple dwellings. I'm speaking for the two stately trees on the parcel, a mature redwood and a huge majestic oak. The oak thrives about 15 feet from the property line of the neighbor's tree yard. I request a visitation by your arborist to assess the obvious value in saving this tree and incorporating it into any construction plans. The redwood was inaccessible. The massive oak tree 1 foot up from the base measures 14 ft in circumference. I consider it a legacy or heritage tree. In addition to its huge canopy and stunning beauty, it's a tremendous carbon sink and provides habitat for a diversity of wildlife. Thank you for hearing and considering this input and thank you for your devoted service in the community. Thank you. >> Good morning. My name is Kuno Anselm. I'm here with the North Rodeo Gulch group as well uh to support them. I I don't think there's anything I can add to their uh very clear asks and information uh other than I've never been to a city council meeting in my life. Never been to a county supervisor's meeting in my life. And I just ask you to consider uh the seriousness of their requests based on the fact that the situation has motiv motivated me to give up my time and come here. And uh thank you for considering uh this very seriously. >> I'm Susan Tatsui Darcy. I'm the lead for the NRG Firewise, which is the North Rodeo Gulch, which is you just heard from everybody. I won't repeat everything that they just said, but I just had this really long conversation with the people who live on my road for the third egress route. We have two egress routes that have been approved. We're going to be running that on October 3rd with support and um and help from Central Fire and from the sheriff. So, we're really excited. This is the first time they're going to actually participate. So, they're going to watch us do this egress drill so that all of our 300 residents can actually evacuate safely hopefully through those two routes. But most of these people here are between Hidden Valley and Panza, which is 50% of our North Rodeo Gulch Firewise area. The egress routes are too far south for us. The best egress route for all of us is to go up my private road and exit through the 7th Day Adventist property which exits actually has enough space at the very top where we can house all 300 households. So we can have all the cars there and wait for the fire to pass through. This is what I got from Central Fire from Tony Aken and then after the fire goes we can go back down to North Gulch or we can exit through Old San Jose Road. That is ideal. As a firewise leader in my community, I feel it's really important that I open that up. I had a meeting with the neighbors. We have 11 neighbors up on our private road. Four of them have objected and um are making a really big deal about this, saying that they are afraid of liability and they're afraid of um the road being too narrow and um and uh and and I don't know, there's another third third reason. and I forget what it is, but my concern is that if there's a fire, the sheriff gets to choose where they get to evacuate. And I've told them that. And the problem with that is if the sheriff chooses that and the 300 residents are going to go up my private road and out to Old San Jose Road. >> Thank you. >> Oh, sorry. >> No worries. Thank you. >> So, anyone else in the room who's would like to speak on public comment? Seeing none, madame clerk, is there anyone on the phone? >> Yes, chair. >> Tim, your microphone is now available. >> Cool. Thank you so much for allowing me to speak today. >> Tim, I'm so sorry. I'm going to have you hold. We've had one additional speaker in person. >> I think you can go and um Mr. Heath is going to clarify with hers. >> Okay, Tim, I'm going to restart your clock. One moment, please. Okay. >> All right. You may begin your comment. >> Okay. Thank you so much again for allowing me allowing me to speak. Um, so interesting hearing all these comments here regarding roads and and fire and evacuation. Give you a little example. Again, I always contrast it with the incline village up in Tahoe. And you know, I'm I'm caught between Republicans and Democrats. you know, it's always, oh, I want to build affordable housing and, you know, and all this sort of stuff here. And then Republicans, they they don't care about the environment. They're just like, oh yeah, let's just smash and bash and do whatever we want. Me meanwhile, we have these roads and we have all these folks up there and, you know, they think they can evacuate from a wildland fire. It's laughable. No way. They're all going to die flat out. And they keep pumping people in there. and our roads and our infrastructure and our infrastructure during the wintertime. You know, now they can hardly plow the roads during the winter time. And another good example is Interstate 80. Okay, they used to have 20 rotaries to clear that road. At least 10 working all the time. Just a year or two ago, they're down to two. So, so think about that. Our whole economy and everything, our trucking industry could be wiped out because we cannot plow a road through the Sierra. Okay. So, you know, I don't know what to think about this. It's kind of a bummer looking at our country. You know, the priorities just aren't there for all of our well-being. I mean, you see Donald Trump's son, he took they took the money from Vladimir Putin while we're in these wars and our military veterans are being killed, you know, and Russia and Iran are both working together, you know. So, he takes the money and so you just got to think about that. Do you really think this White House is going to help all of you folks out when your roads collapse or a wildfire comes and kills all your citizens? So, these folks that are speaking about this, you know, they have some mighty good points. You might want to think about that. Okay. Thank you very much. >> Chair, I see no further speakers online. >> Thank you, Madam Clerk. I will now return to the board for comments and action on the consent agenda. I will start to my left with Supervisor Koig. >> Thank you, Chair. I want to begin by thanking all the North Rodeo Gulch residents who came to speak today. I really appreciate you raising this important issue to the board and certainly agree with you that we should make greater investments in North Rodeo Gulch. Um I did want to just respond to Mr. Jim Gilchrist, uh the 2028 date that you saw versus the 2027 uh date that I've shared with with your community about making repairs. So there are there are three slides there in the bottom two closest to SoCal Drive are funded and are on track for repair in 2027. That 2028 date is really just the date by which we would completely close out the project as in all the paperwork finished, but we do anticipate actually doing the construction in 2027. And I did confirm that with public works. Our um CDI director Matt Mashado is here. If you had any further questions, I'm sure he'd be happy to to answer those for you. But that third slide does remain unfunded as it happened in a in a year that was not declared a federal disaster. And so we haven't identified local funds to make that repair. And and yes, it it sort of doesn't make any sense when it comes to evacuation planning that you would fix two out of the three slip outs that are actually reducing the capacity of the road. we should fix all three and that does require more local funding to do that. So, uh I hope my my colleagues will will join me in making those kind of investments in the future. On item 21, the response to the grand jury reports, uh I wanted to particularly call out walking in the county of Santa Cruz. Is not for the faint of heart. Can vision zero help? And thank the grand jury for this report. Um and I want to point out again to the board that here's a place where uh yes, we have a vision zero plan. And yes, we have a safety action plan, but we need to actually invest in making those improvements if we're going to make our county a safer place to walk and bike. I heard just uh Monday, just yesterday about um a fatality that happened on SoCal Drive from a a biker as well as a serious injury to a youth biking through uh Capitol Village. Um so this remains an everpresent issue. it remains uh one of the highest um causes of life lost in our county is is uh road injuries. Um and it's not enough to just have a plan. We need to make those investments uh into making our community safer. Um and then on items 24, the Anene Cummings water line replacement project and item 50, the parks department agreement with Lewis Tree Service for 350,000 for the uh work around Moran Lake monarch butterfly habitat. Just wanted to thank the parks department for this timely work on both of these projects. Um particularly the the work around Moran Lake. Glad we're going to get in some significant work there before uh the winter comes around again and also thank the board for supporting the funding for that. And then on items 38 and 39, these are the agreements with housing matters for low barrier service and rich shelter services at the bridge house and live oak landing. This is a total of 52 beds that we are opening in the unincorporated county. I think this really demonstrates our commitment to work collaboratively uh with the cities and countywide to address the issue of homelessness and make sure uh that the county is doing our part uh in providing facilities in a midcount location that's highly accessible. So, thank you in particular to Housing for Health and the Behavioral Health Department for helping to get these two places operational. Thanks. >> Thank you, Supervisor Dura. Um, thank you. On item 20, the SEESAC Challenge Awards, just a quick congratulations um to all three programs and I'm glad we submitted these programs to SEESAC for recognition. Um, on item 21, grand jury, um, thank you for the report back to the grand jury. The grand jury is asking for CDI, uh, housing feasibility analysis, looking at what's actually likely to get built and whether county requirements are getting in the way. What would a report like that actually cost? Don't have to answer that now, but um, for behavioral health, the grand jury is asking for better cost and utilization data. Are we actually using any type of tool to manage and analyze that? Um, and so I I would like to know more about that. And I know it can be tricky depending on how what the need is, right? We can't really potentially guesstimate that year-over-year, but um I would like to know more about that if I could. And on fiscal year um 2526 and medical data with the new behavioral health services um the move to the BHSA reporting um give us will it give us that information or is the issue that we simply don't have the historical data and won't be able to recreate it. So, those were questions that I had. Um, on items 32, 33, and 34, uh, the DA victim services grant. And I just want to recognize the DA's office and the staff for doing this work. Um, very, very important services to our community, and I appreciate going after every dollar that we can to continue to help victims of crime. So, thank you. Item 35, the Fairground Community Resilience Center. Um, thank you to O3 for going after a $10 million um grant, which won't necessarily need a county match. Um, as we're heading into this El Nino year, um, having um a resilience center set up at the fairgrounds, I think, is a great idea. So, thanks Dave and team for going after that money. Again, echoing um Supervisor Koig on item 38 and 39, Bridge House and Live Oak Landing. Um I'm it's great to see both of these moving forward and um I think we are starting to make a dent um uh to get people housed. So, um, on the bridge house, it's, uh, specifically for transition age youth, and that's something that we've needed for a long time, extra beds for people to get them stable and into the community educational, uh, programs and workforce. So, congratulations on getting those both up and running. And, um, on item 45, the Santa Cruz Marathon. It looks like a great event for our county. More than 2,900 athletes and their families are coming here from all over the world. Not only a world-class event, but a real boost for our local economy, hotels, restaurants, local businesses, and thank you um to Dave Reid for helping um be the lead on this. Thank you. >> Thank you, Supervisor Hernandez. >> Thank you. I'll be brief. Um just items number 27, 30, and 35. I'm happy that to see some upgrades at Westridge. Uh I believe they're IT upgrades and so we really do need that there in Westridge both 150 and 500 and 30 uh measure Q. Um always happy to get new commissioners and I have uh a former uh county staff that is now going to be a measure Q commissioner Mariana Colby Urugo. So I'm happy for that. And number 35 the resilience resiliency center at the fairgrounds. you know, um, back in 23, we had several issues out there from water issues to Wi-Fi and just a lot of things that needed to be done in order to actually be a good functioning resiliency center for people there to live during the time of crisis of the floods. So, I'm happy that work is being done. It's a big amount of money that will hopefully resolve a lot of those issues that we had. Thank you. >> Thank you, Supervisor Cummings. >> Thank you, Chair. Um, item number 22. I just want to thank staff for all their hard work to get the repairs done uh from the fire that was at the McDermott station earlier this year. I do know that there are um members of the community who are still interested in knowing more about what happened and so look forward to following up with the sheriff's department to understand how that investigation is ongoing. Items number 38 through 40. I just want to thank HSD staff for all the work uh that they're doing to address homelessness and to helping us sustain up our various shelters throughout the community. Um, we know that this is something that people have wanted for a very long time and it's just great to see that we're continuing to make progress on that. Um, the addition disease recognition, I just want to thank members of the public for bringing this to my attention. I was not aware of that disease, but I've learned a lot more and um, look forward to helping to promote and support u members of the community who are affected by this. Um, and then um, yeah, that's it for me. Thank you. >> Thank you, Supervisor Cummings. Um I want to start off just by thanking everybody who came to speak with us this morning. Um and I appreciate those who are here for the first time. Um I would like to clarify that um during the oral communications is an opportunity for us to hear from you. Um but for items that are not on today's agenda, we're not able to deliberate or talk about them or make decisions about them. Um but we certainly are listening. We hear your perspective. we appreciate you being here and we can take that into our further discussions within our offices and with our county staff about how to move forward. So, thank you so much for being here. Um, as it relates to comments on the consent agenda, um, on item number 18, seven, um, well, there are many districts that are accepting candidates who had no opponent and the county gets to appoint them into that role. And so I I'm really grateful for the number of people who are stepping up into public service to run for office. Um seven of those districts are in my um district five and really appreciate all the leaders who are taking on um their uh civil service duties to serve our special districts. On item number 21, this is the responses to the various grand jury reports. I want to start off by thanking the grand jury for taking the time to review the areas that you did. I found the um reports very interesting and um thank you to the staff for drafting responses on our behalf to the grand jury report. Um I'm not recommending any modifications to the draft responses. Um but I will note that I have continued to hear some concern from constituents around the parking confusion at 701 Ocean. Um, and I appreciate the work that's gone into making that as clear as possible. Um, as well as I appreciate um, GSD director Kimberly Finley for speaking with my office on additional ways to improve that situation. Um, and I'm happy to take that discussion offline, but do appreciate that and um, want to acknowledge the feedback that we're continuing to hear from our residents. And then finally, like many of my colleagues um on items 38, 39, and 40, just really appreciative of the efforts to continue to serve our unhoused population and add beds to the pool of services available to people who are experiencing homelessness. Um I think that it's going to make a really big difference. So with that, I would accept a motion on the consent agenda. >> I'll move consent agenda. >> I'll second. We have a motion from Supervisor Hernandez and a second from Supervisor Dura. Any further comments? Seeing none, madam clerk, will you please call the role? >> Supervisor Cummings >> I. >> Hernandez >> I. >> Koenic >> I. >> Durpa >> I. >> And Martinez >> I. Motion passes 5 to zero. >> All right, that concludes our consent agenda and now we're moving on to the regular agenda which is item number seven. Consider ending the local prim primacy agency operated by environmental health and return primacy for qualifying small water systems back to the state water resources control board. We'll be receiving a presentation from the health services agency and environmental health. Welcome. >> Good morning. >> Can you hear me? Yeah. Okay. Great. Yes. Good morning, Connie Mono Parza, HSA uh director. Thank you so much uh for making time for this important agenda item. Um as we continue to experience fiscal challenges today and in the very very near future, our agency continues to be committed um to find opportunities where we can uh reduce costs. Uh with that said, uh we are here today for the purpose of asking our board of supervisors to consider uh the recommendation of ending the local primacy agency which is operated by our environmental health division uh and return primacy qualifying small water systems back to the state water uh resources control board. Um with that, I'm going to turn it over to our director um um Andistrator. >> Uh yeah, good morning board. Uh good morning, Chair Martinez, members of the board, uh CEO Coburn. In addition to, you know, my role as director in considering uh this course of action, I I also had the unique perspective of having served as a staff person in this program for about six years, a couple decades ago. Uh I I know firsthand the regulatory burden that small water systems have faced over the years. uh and and this burden is only increasing. Uh I I'm proud to uh proud of the work my team has done in service to these communities. Uh this sentiment was reflected in the survey responses as well as the positive state audits we've received over the years. However, the status quo seems to be unsustainable. Uh no additional support from the state seems to be on the horizon or coming our way. And this really leaves us with only one clear uh recommendation which we have before you today. Uh before I do turn it over to Sierra Ryan for our uh presentation, I I just like to acknowledge our two staff members currently, Nathan Salazar and Sean Abby. Uh both have done a wonderful job in this program. Uh I believe Nathan will be here for uh questions if you have them of more uh direct experience with the program. Uh and with that I'll bring up we'll bring up Sierra Ryan to do the presentation. >> The only other comment I want to make to add is uh we have learned that other counties um several which I think will be highlighted have done similarly. They have had financial pressures and other factors that is have them turn this program to the state. Uh so um you know our staff will comment on that and some of the information that we have. Thank you. All right, this is my first time in the new dis. All right, good morning supervisors. Uh, my name is Sierra Ryan. I'm the water resources program manager in environmental health. Um, one arm of the water resources program is what we call our drinking water program. um which includes the oversight of state small water systems and small public water systems uh which is what we will be discussing today. Um the small water systems the small public water systems are regulated through our local privacy agency which we will be referring to as our LPA. The county was delegated oops let me there we go. The county was delegated primacy to regulate these small water systems um that serve between 15 and 199 connections or over 25 people for more than 60 days a year. Um in 1994 the board of supervisors at the time did this to m maintain a working relationship with these small local water systems and to ensure them access um and responsiveness from their regulators. There is, as Connie mentioned, a declining trend in counties working as LPAs. Um, as recently as 2014, there were 36 counties that had LPAs. Um, and there are currently 25. Uh, Santa Cruz County returned oversight of our um, water systems that rely on surface water in 2017 to the state um, due to the increasing regulations and disproportionate time that they took. So there already have been some of our small water systems that have been transferred to the state water resources control board. Um and Monterey County last year returned primacy to the state ending their LPA. Um they had had 284 systems in their LPA around four times as many as we currently have. Uh we have 68 county regulated systems in this program that would be impacted if the LPA is terminated. And I will break that down a little more on the next slide. All right. So there are two overarching categories of water systems that are regulated by the LPA. Community water systems are those that serve residences and and households and communities. Uh many of them are located in the more remote parts of the state or of the county where there the large municipal water districts cannot reach them. Uh the other category is non-comm community systems. These are systems that rely on wells to preserve to uh serve drinking water to places like businesses, camps, wineries, schools, and other locations where large numbers of people including employees um students and the general public may be drinking this water. Um, as you can see from the map and the table, there is a somewhat even distribution of these non-comm community systems throughout the county, but um, significant divergence in where the community systems are located with most of them in district 2. All right. Um, there is going to be more information in this presentation than was in the packet um, just uh, based on some questions that we had received. Um so we have taken a really hard look at the program costs over the past year. Um as you can see the program costs have always exceeded the fees collected. Um in 1994 the board felt that utilizing some net county costs for this program was acceptable. Um historically as we heard the state did provide the LPAs with grant funding to offset some of these costs that come with the very low economy of scale um that this program experiences. The last grant ended in 2021 and we have been told by numerous people that there is no expectation that additional grant funds will be made available. The state does have many other priorities when it comes to drinking water um assist drinking water assistance funding. At this time we would need to double our current fees to cover the current project co program costs. Um however the program costs have increased in part due to increasing requirements on water systems. In 1994, the program had 75, so threequarters of a full-time employee or FTE, um which increased overtime to one FTE. In 2014, the drinking water program had to add a second um staff person, part-time staff person to the LPA um to its current level of 1.3 FTE. However, with the upcoming additional requirements uh that I will discuss on the next slide, uh we anticipate that um over the next five years, our staffing needs are going to increase to at least 1.75 FTE. So that number there for the estimated cost of the program um in 203031 is based on 1.75 FTE and a 3% inflation rate year-over-year um between now and then. Um, and if anything, I think this number is probably conservative. All right. So, to put that budget in perspective, I think it's also important to understand that these small systems are already paying significantly more than they would be if we were to return primacy to the state. Um, the division of drinking water fees, that's DDW, listed there. Um, they're charged by connection or customer. um usually with a minimum of fee for the smallest minimum fee for the smallest systems. I just told you that we would need to double our fees to eliminate just the current burden on net county cost. If we were to double our fees, a community water system serving 50 households would then be paying um $5,172. That is over seven and a half times higher than what they would pay the state for the same service. Um, and uh, that would only cover the cost of the program in the last fiscal year, not the anticipated increase of over $500,000, which I showed you on the previous slide. Some of the larger systems with a broader customer base can more easily spread out um, fee increases. But for smaller systems that do make up the vast majority of our LPA community systems, this is a very real affordability concern. So, as part of our due diligence when evaluating this program, we looked ahead to upcoming changes in the drinking water regulations through both um legislation and policy that are going to increase program costs over the next foreseeable future. Um the additional regulations on this list are significant. Um they are all also rolling out in the next five years. Um this is why we expect staff time to need to increase so much. the new requirements on the regulated community leads to new requirements on the regulators. Um many of these same issues are also outlined in the letter from the water advisory commission. So I think it's really important to rec recognize what these systems are going to be facing over the next few years. Um I also want to make it clear that the 1.75 FTE is still very lean. Um, in my conversations with state with um staff from the division of drinking water, the office that would be receiving the systems if we return them, they told me they would request right now two full-time employees to take over the program if we were to return primacy. So, you know, that that is a significant change from what we're able to offer. Um, and finally, I'd like to point out that um, we we provide the state water resources control board um, 120 days notice before returning primacy to allow them to request the staff and to allow us plenty of time to work with our systems and the state on the transition planning. All right, I'm going to speak a lot on this slide um, because this is a really important component. Um staff have been publicly discussing this topic for around seven months including a joint um meeting of our water advisory commission um and what we call the small water systems forum uh that took place in April. The forum includes all the managers and operators of the small systems that we regulate. We heard a lot of support at those meetings for maintaining the LPA. There is a fear that the state isn't local, won't be accessible, and that they will be less of a partner working with the systems to achieve compliance than we try to be. There was recognition of the friendliness and knowledge of our staff and concern that new regulators will not have this personal relationship. Um, the water advisory commission heard from these water systems and decided to write a letter supporting the LPA program in June, which is in the packet. So given the commission letter and what we heard from staff, we wanted to be confident that this transition would not be an undue burden before we recommended it to the board. Um, and so we did some additional research um, regarding the regulators not being local and knowledgeable. I do think it's really important for you to understand that the office that would take this program is based in Monterey. They have some staff that live in Santa Cruz County. This same office already regulates all the surface water systems in the county as well as all the systems with 200 or more connections. That means that around 240,000 of the 270,000 people living in the county, including most of you, including me, are drinking water from systems that are regulated by this same office in the state. They are already regulating systems from the Santa Cruz Mountains down to the Paharo Valley as well as along the coast. Um, regarding being accessible, I pose these concerns that we have been hearing to the county's treatment plant operations supervisor, um, Isaac. Uh, he's with CDI. So, he operates the Davenport water system, which is oper operated by the county. It's a surface water system that we returned to the state in 2017 when the LPA stopped regulating surface water systems. So Isaac was actually working um at that time and confirmed that that transition went smoothly and that their relationship with the Division of Drinking Water since then has been good. He says he has never struggled to get a hold of his point of contact and that they usually answer the phone right away and if not, they call back within a few hours. He says that he has been able to push back if he feels like um they are imposing regulations beyond what is required. Um and I do want to be um clear that by and large these regulations are the regulations. They these are not county ordinances that we have passed. These are state law. We are um we are implementing them here through the LPA, but they are the same regulations that the state would be implementing. there is not really a lot of discretion when it comes to drinking water and drinking water quality and drinking water supply. Um, another point about accessibility that I think it's really important to recognize is that the state has redundancy that we do not and are not likely to be able to have. There are only two people staffing the LPA. If one goes on leave for any reason, then the other person is responsible for everything, including reviewing drinking water reports. Um, we get lab reports on a monthly basis that we need to review. um issuing boil water notices and being responsive to problems. If that person is sick, we don't actually have a backup person for them. Um the state division of drinking water office that regulates Santa Cruz County has seven staff. Um and they are trying to hire would hire two more if they take on our LPA. And in that same building are two more districts each with six staff. So there is ample redundancy there in terms of accessibility. Um, another question that came up was wondering how this transition has gone in Monterey County since they returned primacy last year with um, vastly more systems than we have. So, Andrew spoke to Monterey County about that transition. >> Uh, yeah, I personally did contact Monterey County and talk to them about their experience. Uh, they basically reported similar to what uh, CDI's uh, Davenport experience was, which was a fairly smooth transition. they haven't been receiving complaints or reports of negative impacts from the their water uh systems uh in relation to this transition either. So uh you know at worst they say sometimes that the stage is a little more by the book and you know kind of rigid on some things but otherwise uh it's been it was a smooth transition for the for Monterey County. >> All right. Um so next I'm going to talk about um highlights from the survey that we did. Um, we sent it out to all of the water systems in the LPA asking each of them to respond only once. Um, and we did do follow-up notices and extended the deadline to try to increase responses. So, the full results are in the survey. I'm going to talk about just a couple or sorry, in the packet. So, I'm going to just talk about some of them. Um, so we we released this survey to all 68 systems and we got responses from 26 of them. So, as you can see, um, over 70% of the respondents like the LPA and would like to keep it. Um, which I think is a testament to the drinking water staff and to their great work and commitment over the over the years. Um, it gets a little more complicated when we talk about raising fees to close our current net county cost gap. We would need a 100% fee increase. Um, when you look over the next 5 years, we would need dramatically more if we wanted to continue to keep that gap closed. if that was our goal. Um while again 70% of the systems um are willing to increase over 70% of the systems are willing to increase their fees to keep the county as a regulator. Something that the water advisory commission noted in their letter is very unusual. Um only 23% were willing to pay what it would cost to close even the current gap, let alone the projected gap over the next five years. Um the next responses are also interesting. um systems would prefer more lead time. So like if we're going to be dramatically increasing costs to try to do it over years, I should say that we've already been doing this to some extent. We've increased since our grant ended in 2021, we've been increasing fees between four and 10% every year. Um but nobody wants to see a dramatic change overnight. That is hard to account for. Um, and lastly, we do see that the majority of systems who responded are still interested in maintaining the LPA knowing that DDW is less expensive, although we did not break down how much less expensive in the survey. Um, so I do advise some caution in reading these. Despite repeated efforts and personal relationships with the systems, 42 of the 68 systems did not respond to this survey. Um, while a slow but substantial fee increase is acceptable to the majority of respondents, that is only a quarter of the total systems. Um, I think that the systems that did not respond to this survey may be likely to make their opinions known if their fees end up being seven and a half times what they could be paying to the division of drinking water um for essentially the same service. So with all those considerations that we have presented and a great deal of thought and deliberations, it is the staff recommendation to return primacy to the state. Um again we have given this a lot of thought and it's not an easy recommendation to make. Uh we are very proud of this program but it's just become obvious that we cannot continue in the way that we have been going. Um, I want to be very clear that I and Andrew and Connie would absolutely never have brought this recommendation to the board if we thought that it would jeopardize public health or safety or compromise residents access to safe drinking water or to create a substantial and undue burden or vulner additional vulnerabilities to these systems. We do plan um or let me see uh to the point of local control uh which is something that we all value. I do believe for many years this program represented just that. Um however over the years our latitude um and our discretion has been greatly limited um to the point where the oversight by our state by our state regulators we are currently as an LPA regulated by the state. Um the regulations are so strong that there's really no independent control left. There's very little space for us to do things differently than DDW would. Um we do plan to continue ongoing collaboration with these systems. We we still have a representative of small water systems on our water advisory commission and we can continue to dedicate at least one water advisory commission a meeting a year to hearing from small systems as we have done for the last several years. Um and we could ask the state to present as well and talk about how things have been going in that transition. Um we will still be able to advocate for their needs and help them find funding and technical support as a partner rather than as a regulator. Um, so with that, I think I'm happy to take any questions. >> Thank you for the presentation. I imagine there will be questions from the board, but I think it may be useful to hear from the public if there's um anybody here who'd like to speak on this item. If you already spoke on the item, we definitely heard you and noted your your comments at that time. Welcome. We'll set the public public comment period for two minutes each. And please form a line behind this gentleman if you're here to speak on this item. Thank you. >> Good morning, supervisors. My name is Martin Mills. Um, first of all, I'd just like to thank you all for your service to our communities as well. Um, I know it's not easy because I do that as well. Um, I run Pure Source Water. It serves 77 homes in San in a, um, I've been doing that for about 12 years um, and helping my father for even longer than that. I'm also a licensed civil engineer. Um that's I actually how I make a living because the water business has to be supported by my engineering business. So um I wanted to point out that we are one of the systems that was um supporting this um the LPA continuing on and opposing this uh proposal to end it. And the reason is because we don't feel like it's the same service that we would get from the state. Um what we have seen from the state is a void in service. We've seen more regulations with without help. When we um tried to work with the safer program and give them our feedback about the new portals and things, it was miserable. We we had no support from them. No, it was hard to even get feedback from them. Um the state revolving fund program for getting funding has basically excluded small systems like ours because they just want us to be consolidated. Um so we don't feel like it's the same support. I have a sticker on my water bottle that says I love tap water. And the reason I do is because um it's affordable. Um we pay we charge about a penny a gallon for our water as opposed to a penny a liter. Um, so I ran the math and if you were to double the fees for our small system, that's going to amount to $2.67 per household. Um, that's 2 lers of water. That's nothing. Um, that's our our system could easily afford that and would benefit from the support that we would have um to our system by having local people who are willing to walk us through the new regulations and help us navigate that. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Becky Stein Bruner. I am a customer of the excellent system Mr. Mills and his wife Jennifer um manage and provide excellent clean water for our community. I want to support uh keeping local control for the reasons Mr. Mills cited, but also um I have great concern that the state will charge even more. I have a document here I will submit for your re review. It is a budget change proposal for the 2627 state budget. The state water resources control board requests $952,000 ongoing and 4.0 no permanent positions uh for from the safe drinking water account to regulate small water systems in Contraosta County and Kings County. Those two counties surrendered their local primacy agency. With a state budget the way it is, we have no guarantee that the state will actually fund this kind of work and the state's answer will be to consolidate small water systems to reduce their workload. That is not the answer that many of us in Santa Cruz County want to hear. I do not want to be part of SoCal Creek Water District, but that would be the state's answer. And SoCal Creek Water District does not want us unless we pay exorbitant amounts to upgrade our system, which no one can afford. I want to say that um Big Basin Water Company was under the state's jurisdiction. It was the county that stepped in as the hero in that instance. So, we need to keep our local control. In all many in many things, we are losing local control. Don't give this up. Do not give this up. I am willing to pay more for my water to help our system and others like it in the county keep local control. This is just another example of unfunded mandates, the effects of them. Thank you. >> Thank you, Becky. Seeing no one else in the room, madam clerk, is there anyone on the phone? >> Yes, there is, chair. >> Thank you. >> iPad MD2, your microphone's available. >> Adam Hullbrook. >> Thank you. My name is Adam Hullbrook. I'm sorry I wasn't able to set that up earlier. Um, I'm uh the D1 operator for Jarvis Mutual Water Company up in uh Santa Cruz Hills. Um, and I just want to uh speak on my desire um to maintain local control of our water systems. Um, being able to have um Nathan in particular uh most recently to help with our assistance when we've had issues with water has been immensely helpful. Um it's been a cooperative relationship that uh I appreciate and am concerned that if we when we trans if we transition to the state that becomes more of a controversial relationship where it's more of a penalized system as opposed to a system where we're trying to sort of all make good water choices and have healthy water for everybody. Um so I realize that there's a great financial increase to this. Um but I also think that there's probably likely increased financial cost that would be experienced by us with increased um cost from the state not initially but afterwards and then also through penalties that the state would uh increase. So my appreciation for everybody's time. Uh thank you >> Craig. Your microphone's now available. >> Okay. Thank you very much. Uh I'm a resident uh in the uh water district that uh Adam Hullbrook who just spoke uh runs and I wanted to add my support uh to what he said and what other people said recently and also to make a couple of other points. Uh, one is that I strongly suspect at least that this is a one-way trick, which is to say that once we surrender local control, there is no way of ever getting it back. Um, and that should be concerning for some of the reasons people have already raised, right? Uh, you know, this is being marketed to us as being something which is going to be cost-saving and so on. Uh but once local control has been surrendered, we have no guarantees that uh significant price increases now imposed by a state which you know has no no check upon it uh won't be coming down the line, right? There there'll be no recourse for us if the state starts to to charge us much much more. And the other thing that I think needs to be pointed out um is that water local water boards like ours uh are staffed by volunteers like Adam Hullbrook. Uh and I think it's important for those of us who live in these areas to try to minimize the burden on the local volunteers who run our systems. Um these people are I think from almost all small uh water districts like ours volunteering their time. Um and to ask them to deal with a large unresponsive impersonal state bureaucracy uh is just adding to the already substantial burden that they're carrying on all of our behalfs. uh and so maintaining local control I think is is one way to minimize uh the onus which uh rests on them. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> I see no further speakers online. Chair, >> thank you. I will now return to the board for questions and action on this item. And I'm going to start on my left with Supervisor Dura. Uh, thank you. Uh, I I'm not sure I have further questions. I feel pretty well briefed. Um, I understand the issues here. Uh, the the thing that makes me really hesitate is I have the most water systems in my area, 27 I think alto together. And I've heard from many of them, not all of them, but I've heard from many of them that they really do not want to make this change. So today I will be standing um with my small water districts and voting no on this. Um I don't know. Uh there is an appeal that is happening right now. San Andreas Mutual has a is in litigation with the state to stop some of these heavy heavyhanded regulations on Chrome 6 and other things. Um, and I almost feel like I I don't know if it would be prudent to table this until that comes out. That would that appeal was just um filed in I think July of 2026, but that might give some relief uh to our small water systems. And I don't know if that's neither here or nor there. Um >> here, let me go back. Um, so looking at the list of our considerations, hexavailent chromium standards compliance is one of them, but it is one of many. It's not really the one that's making or breaking what the next five years looks like. Um, the hexavalent chromium standards are extremely strict. The the state will have the strictest compliance standards in the whole world from my analysis. um >> they are very very conservative and this is a um a compound that is naturally occurring here. So it's it's not caused by industry like in the Aaron Brochovich movie. Um that was hexavalent chromium. That's sort of what brought this to people's attention. Um but I I don't really know that that changes anything. Either they will or they will not have to meet these standards. we will have to enforce the standards in the same way the state would. Um, delaying this decision just creates more uncertainty for us, for the state, and for the water systems. So, that, you know, I I can see where you're coming from. I don't know that I would recommend putting this off for that decision, especially given that this decision is it was made by the state. It was uh the state was sued. The state took many years to re-evaluate. They reinstated these regulations. They got sued again. They lost that lawsuit. And now we're in the appeal for that. So, if we are waiting based on the history of this, we might be waiting a very long time. >> Thank you. Um I you know, I will say that I've I just want to thank the staff um who have been working in this area for the county. um the survey and uh and the people who have talked to me directly really appreciate working with the county and you know we don't hear that a lot and uh in this line of work and um I just want to thank you and Nathan and um all the rest of the team for doing such a good job. Um, I think the the water systems in in our county feel very taken care of by you and would prefer to stay with you. So, anyway, thank you, >> Supervisor Koig. >> Yes, thank you, Chair. Uh, I wanted to thank the gentleman who manages the small water system for speaking about some of your firsthand experience and doing so. And of course when you describe that um and your work with the state, it sounded like uh you know sort of a Byzantine whatever Kafka-esque experience of um state a state division that um you know frankly is not unfamiliar to many of us who work here at the county. But uh Miss Ryan, your description of sort of the retoled office, you know, located in Monterey, close by, generously staffed uh was very different. And so are we talking about the same people, the same divisions? Maybe you could clarify that a little bit. >> No, the state water resources control board is a huge agency and it's got multiple arms. You might be familiar with the regional board which is an arm of that. It's based in San Los Abyspo. They oversee water rights. They oversee the state parts of the state water project and they oversee drinking water from many arms. Some of it is funding. That's um the safer program. um the uh state revolving fund is a funding arm and then there's the regulatory side the division of drinking water and then there are offices of that. So we're talking about that the local staff that are based in Monterey that are the division of drinking water district 5 that is different than the staff that are at the state developing these large portals developing these online tools and developing these policies that we all have to work for. So they are part of the same agency but they are not in any way the same group of people. >> Okay. Thank you. Um that that's helpful. That was my impression as well. And I recognize that that change is hard and you know we often prefer the devil we know rather than the devil we don't. Um it you know we're facing a situation here with just mounting state requirements. I mean, this county in general faces so many unfunded mandates and so we have an opportunity here to actually let the state deal with its own mandates. I'm inclined to do that. Um, and I mean, if it obviously it's always difficult to, you know, recreate a system once it's it's dismantled a little bit. I mean, but if we just, you know, heard horror stories from these small water systems whatever 5 years down the the road, I mean, we could always re-establish uh this division and take back authority, right? >> I believe theoretically, yes, we we could if if it was really failing and our systems were struggling, we could petition to get primacy again. >> Right. So, I mean, I'm inclined to move forward with the actions before us today. Um, given the assurances of of Miss Ryan that, um, this is a responsive and well staffed uh, division. Um, and, you know, ultimately will help to reduce county costs and allow us to invest that money uh, in other services for our public care. Thanks. >> Thank you. Further comments from my right. Do you have comments, Supervisor Cummings? >> Um, want to thank the staff for all their work on this. Um, I have fewer um of these um water facilities in my district. Um, and I haven't heard anybody complain about this transition. Um, I do want to sympathize for all the folks who don't want to see this change. Um, personally, um, you know, one of the things that's been really frustrating is all the unfunded mandates that have been coming from the state. And in a time when we are really going to be pressed to figure out how we're going to save costs, this does seem like an area where, you know, we will likely not see service interruptions and at the same time we can have some cost savings. And so I'm hopeful that this will be a smooth transition. I think it would be good for us to get an update >> um maybe 6 months from now on how the transition is going. Um but I'm inclined today to support staff's recommendation. >> Thank you. Um I'll just start off by saying that um the feedback that we're receiving is completely um a result of your good work. Um, so I want to acknowledge that the um, county staff that we have have been, you know, great partners, responsive, knowledgeable, and so I hope you see this as a a compliment to your department. Um, and with that, I I guess I would like to hear you elaborate a little bit further. If we were to move forward with the recommended actions, um, how might the local county leverage as expertise if if there was a need for some technical assistance? Is that something that the county might be able to offer? >> We will still have a drinking water program because we still have to regulate our state small water systems. Um I still participate um at the state level on the drought response inter agency partnership which is all about identifying drought response long-term planning and support for systems. So um and then certainly when if if things are really challenging for water system and for you know these are our constituents we can step up absolutely um in kind of an as needed basis as we did with big basin water company which was not one of our regulated systems but which we did intervene with as much as we possibly could. Um we maintain an excellent relationship with the division of drinking water. we can reach out to them at any time if we have questions or concerns, if we're hearing things, if we see things that they don't see. Um, so I I'd say yes, you know, our intention is very much to still be available especially during this transition period um and for several years because we do have a history with these systems. >> And would there be some kind of formal role between you and the state? Do you you know meet with them regularly? Is there a way that you could be that type of liaison? >> Uh, we certainly could meet with them regularly. Again, they are just in Monterey. They're they have always been very responsive to us. Um, we talk to them about other issues as well. Um, so absolutely, we could we could set up internal annual meetings with them. I I do think having them come present annually to the water advisory commission is um something that they would be willing to do um to talk about how things have been going. So I I have no intention of losing this relationship with the systems or with the state. You know, these systems are still integral to our groundwater sustainability agencies um to our we we still issue well permits for them. So we h we have many arms that are related to them. It's just this one piece that we would be returning. And if um any of our constituents in our districts have concerns or are having trouble getting a hold of the state um and they contact us, would we be able to direct that to you to help Sure. make that connection? >> Yeah, absolutely. >> Okay. Thank you. Um I'll say that I also am inclined to support the staff recommendations that you're bringing before us today. Um, you know, throughout our budget hearing process back in June, we started to identify areas that our county was subsidizing non-mandated services. And we're recognizing with some of the structural challenges that our county is facing that we need to find sources of sustainable long-term funding or support or resources for those mandates that um either aren't funded or there are um alternative sources for them. So this this matches with the direction that the board gave the CEO's office and the departments as it relates to finding cost savings. Um, these are difficult decisions and if we had all the resources, we would love to continue to offer this at the local level. Um, but at this time I'm I'm supportive of the staff recommendations. Any further comments from the board? Um, and I'd accept a motion. >> I'll move item number seven. >> I'll second the recommended actions. So, we have a motion from Supervisor Hernandez, a second from Supervisor Koig. Any further discussion? Madam clerk, will you please call the role? >> Supervisor Cummings, >> I. >> Hernandez, >> I. >> Koig, >> I. >> Durpa, >> no. >> And Martinez, >> I. Motion passes 4 to one. >> Thank you for your good work. >> You. We'll now be moving on to item number eight, which is to conduct a study session on conflict criminal defense, provide input on the proposed process for conflict res representation beginning July 1st, 2027, and take related actions. >> All right. >> Morning board. >> Morning board. Uh it's Fen Stafford, Deputy County Executive Officer. I'm joined this morning by Gina D. Martini Coutins, senior administrative analyst in our office. We are beginning a deliberate planning process for conflict defense services starting July 1st, 2027. Uh that's when our current contract expires. Gina and I are going to walk you through why the uh review is needed, how we propose to evaluate the options, and the path to a recommendation. So first we'll provide a little bit of history and context that brought us to this point. Uh we'll describe the range of viable conflict models and how we propose to compare those. And then the intended result today is uh approval of the evaluation process with a recommendation to return in December. Overall, the state is responsible for providing indigent defense services. Uh, and it's a responsibility that they've delegated to the county. It might be one of the original unfunded mandates. uh dates back a long time outside over the past you know we've been contracting for these services since the since the 70s uh and really started to look at it seriously about 10 years ago. We conducted a, you know, it included um included several reviews over over that time, identifying recurring concerns with the way that we were contracting for for these services across our model and resulted in the 2020 sixth amendment center report that was issued. Uh as a result of that of that report, the county and the board at that time responded by establishing the institutional public defenders office which was created in 2022. And the idea was with that 2020 assessment and the and the transition, the intent was always to include the conflict indigent defense services as as part of that um as part of that continuing overhaul. And so during the um budget hearings, the board asked staff to um to come back and communicate a little better earlier and um and be able to return to the board with different options of how we might consider uh a new model to not do it as hastily as as was proposed. Today's study session is really beginning that public process with a recommendation to for us to complete an analysis and return in December or January uh with a recommendation for you all that uh schedule preserves approximately 6 months to implement the selected model before the current contract expires. And so again, today the board is simply deciding and providing guidance on how that recommendation will be developed. Uh not which model will be implemented. Uh we're really talking about the process that will establish what information we need to make a decision, how we want to gather it, uh which standards will apply and whose perspectives we're going to be seeking out. And we have informed the the current conflict firm and met with them uh and the superior court about this process and what to expect. Um and you know we expect that the um the current holder of the contract page firm will uh compete to provide the service and you know we want to emphasize that nothing has been predetermined in that regard. And so with uh with that, I'll turn it over to my colleague, Miss D. Martini Coons to walk you a little bit through the process. Thank you, Sven. Good morning, board. Gina D. Martini Coons, senior administrative analyst in the county executive office. As Mr. Stafford said in his introduction, I'm going to walk through how we propose to evaluate the potential options and what we need to understand before making a recommendation. Counties in California provide conflict defense representation through either contracted or internal models. Contracted models include private firms, which is what Santa Cruz County uses for first tier conflicts, or in instances when the primary office cannot represent a client. Managed assigned counsel or a managed council program is another model that refers to what we call here in Santa Cruz our criminal defense conflict panel of attorneys. In Santa Cruz, this model is used for instances when the primary office and the private firm are conflicted on a case. They are private attorneys contracted with the with the county to provide independent counsel to ser to to clients. County Council currently manages our panel and some counties run an all panel model for conflicts with a contractor managing the attorneys and any support or disciplinary interdisciplinary staff. Um, counties with managed council include Sacramento and Santa Clara, which uses a panel model for second and third tier conflicts. Other counties use institutional or internal models such as an alternate defender office or division. These are either a separate county department or an ethically walled off division under the primary public defender. Counties with either an office or an internal division include Santa Clara, Stannis Loss, Contraosta, Towami, Mendescino, Elorado, Solano, San Diego, and Los Angeles. Some counties use a walled off employee to manage their panel attorneys, also known as a countyrun managed assigned council program. The upcoming expiration of the current contract provides the county an opportunity to examine how to provide these services to ensure consistent representation and access to related services uh across the county's public defense system. In accordance with the county's purchasing policy and best public procurement practices, staff recommends publishing a request for proposal or an RFP to provide a fair and open opportunity for providers to respond and describe how they will provide these services that the county seeks. The lenses here will be used to evaluate the responses to the RFP. The val evaluation panel for the proposals is crossf functional and independent meaning that the members are subject matter experts in the fields represented here and that the member providing conflict defense expertise will come from outside Santa Cruz County. effective representation to the evaluation. Um, effective representation refers to the evaluation category examining the qualifications and experience of attorneys and support staff providing these services. the ability to provide early contact and continuous representation and the capaci and the capacity for representation, immigration advisement, investigation, research, litigation, mitigation strategies, law and motion support and oversight. The interdisciplinary services category intends to evaluate the quality and effectiveness of the proposed interdisciplinary model including the integration of legal representation with investigation, administration ad and advocacy including deflection, diversion, mitigation and immigration advisement as well as linkage and navigation to benefits, treatment and other supportive services. Prioritization of of improved client outcomes refers to the extent to which the proposed service model demonstrates a client- centered approach, including reducing unnecessary system involvement and promoting client stability and community safety. And then I've grouped the last two circles there together um for organizational stability and fiscal responsibility, accountability and workload management and cost. These will evaluate whether the infrastructure is in place to track and report the required data and maintain educational and licensing requirements. The cases that cases are assigned according to qualifications and experience and whether case loads impact effective representation. That the courts and cases are covered in the event of attorney absences and to what extent the provider will be able will be available in person to clients who are out of custody. And last but not least, the cost. The cost of services and whether the cost can be accounted for. The RFP is only one source of data for us to use in the system evaluation process. It will tell us about available providers, the cost for their services, and whether their approaches are complimentary to the services and philosophy of the institutional model and programming that the county has invested in since 2022. We will also compare the other models implemented in c in counties across California through these lenses and me and how they can be measured through these lenses. Researching these models includes reaching out to their staff, reading available documentation and reports and consulting with the office of the state public defender. Beyond the evaluation criteria, we will need to identify what it would take to implement any of the models that may be appropriate and determine whether the model is sustainable for the county in terms of fiscal stability and determine whether the model is sustainable for the county. Oh, sorry, in terms of fiscal stability and alignment with board priorities and the strategic plan. It is important to note that this process and the resulting recommendation does not preclude evaluating the performance of the recommended model and making a new recommendation in the future based on information gleaned from the ongoing evaluation. Mr. Stafford will describe the path forward from today to July 1 of next year. >> All right. Thanks, Gina. the um you know the next step is really to get us to you know a smooth transition for July 1st 2027. So we want to gather evidence through the RFP do some research into other county models and be able to provide the board with enough information to make uh reasonable determination uh in the winter. So we'll again do you know good and modest amount of staff work to compare those options using the criteria that that Gina described and we'll return to board return to the board in December January with a recommendation that leaves us time to implement the board's direction without disrupting services. And so what we're asking for today is guidance and approval on the proposed process for developing the recommendation authorizing us to release the RFP and allow staff to make the necessary you know non-substantial adjustments and direct staff to evaluate the feasibility and sustainability of all these models and return in December with with results and recommendation. And again, the goal is really effective, consistent representation that's uninterrupted for people who rely on these services. Um, and today's a great opportunity to provide uh provide input and guidance on how we want that to be conducted in the county and we're happy to have questions on the proposed process, timeline, criteria, and recommended actions. Thank you. >> Thank you. I appreciate the presentation. And at this time, I would like to hear from the public on this item. So, if you are here to speak on this item, I'm going to ask that you please form a line in front of us. Seeing just a couple of you, I'd like to set the public comment period for two minutes each. Thank you. Welcome. Good morning. Good morning, board of supervisors and staff. My name is Ann Ray Angel, and I work currently at the current alternate defenders office, Paige Dudley. I'm asking you today not to approve the process as presented by staff. I don't think the RFP process as has been presented is fair. I've reviewed it at length. It appears to me that it it comes to a basically an ending that is predetermined to choose the public defender model. Um even the language here in the presentation indicates that I wrote down a couple of uh it's things that were said smooth transition to the new model um changing from one system to another. So the idea is already to change the system and not keep us doing the job that we have been doing for years and years and years. I wasn't there the whole time, but it still continued. And the job that does prioritize client outcomes, that does provide investigations, ancillary services, um, client centered thinking, access to the office. Um, I'm trying to list all the things that were desired and I approve all of those desirable things. I think they're great. It's what we've been doing all of these years. So, in order to keep the or or what's I'm trying to remember what Sven's words were, but to interrupt representation the least would be to keep our contract in place, to continue letting us do the work that we're doing. As far as I know, there have been no complaints about the work that we're doing from probation, from the courts, from the clients. I hear all the time, we all do, about the work that we're doing. So, until there's a complaint, until there's a problem, it seems to me that we should, you should not be approving this RFP. It is unfair and it appears to me as though it's a setup to just get what is desired rather than a true process. Good morning, Madame Chair, fellow supervisors, staff. Uh my name is Mitchell Page. I have the firm that's in question under discussion here. Um my problem with this um proposal to you is that the details uh requested in the RFP fundamentally misunderstand what we're offering as an alternative in terms of recordkeeping reporting. Um it might seem trivial from your perspective but the pace at which we work precludes doing a scrupulous job on that. And the truth is that people who do it in whatever office they're in are guessing at best because they just don't keep that kind of track. There are programs they've been offered to us that can figure out what we're working on on our computer for the time we're at our computer, but that is not nearly all the work. It doesn't even it's not even the most substantial part of it. So, um I'm I have trouble understanding the need for counting because none of these numbers uh are really useful and the way they've been used in the past has simply been to misrepresent innocently I hope um the nature of the work we do because they're comparing to the main office and the workloads are different. We used to have a co-equal conflicts firm and if we compared to that firm that would be fair but to the main firm it is not. The case loads are fundamentally different. I've suggested a few times to look into that a little deeper but we haven't gotten any more detail than that. Um I have trouble understanding why the uh why it would be interesting to see how many cases we have. I don't know why it would be a problem if I had 20 lawyers all working half-time if we did the job cheaper than it can be done otherwise. And the nature of this work lends itself to people having some time off, having a break from the intensity. >> This week I had someone who was near quitting. >> Thank you. >> Because of the stress of the work. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. Your two minutes is up. Thank you. Good morning. I'm Nikki Pennaker. I've worked for Mitchell Page for over 25 years. As an alternate defender for Santa Cruz, I think um I'm asking the the board to not accept this proposed RFP. I believe it's overly ownorous and designed to make it impossible for us to form a an actual um you know, response that would be acceptable. um it's just seems to be resultoriented. Our intention is to respond to the RFP with uh as our nonprofit which has been formed for a while now with a wonderful board of of um professionals from our community and to continue our work and serve our clients as we have since 1978. Um I think that changing the model really will have a negative impact on the clients. Uh there's going to be either uh it's either going to be way more expensive for a fully staffed alternate defender office under the public defender uh Miss Rogers or it's going to be understaffed and there's going to be more conflicts of interest and more cases going to panel attorneys. Panel attorneys do not have the infrastructure and the staff that we do to provide the holistic services that the county says that they, you know, want and that we want to have our clients have. So there's going to be more people receiving less services than the people that are served by the public defenders office. So this just doesn't make any sense to me. We're asking the uh the board to make this a fair process so we have a a chance to continue the work that we love to do that we are committed to doing serving the clients that um are very important to us. RFP. >> Oh yes. And there was an RFP from a couple of years ago that was very reasonable. And I think you you know all these 73 pages of changes from 20 pages is designed to ensure that the public defender model is what ends up um being the result. >> Thank you. >> Further comments in the room. Seeing none, madam clerk, is there anyone on the phone? >> I see no speakers online. >> Thank you. I will now return to the board for questions, discussion, and action on this item. Start with Supervisor Cummings. >> Thank you, Chair, and uh thank you to the staff for the presentation on this item. Um, so I'm wondering if you all can explain a little bit um about the differences between this current RFP and the previous RFP because um looking through it. I agree that it does seem like it's already kind of skewed in a different direction. Seems much more complicated. So I'm just wondering if you can speak to kind of some of the differences and how you landed on those differences. Yeah, the difference I mean one of the differences in this RFP from the previous RFP was there was I mean there's been a significant evolution in the way that um the way that these contracts and best practices around them have developed with a lot of guidance from the office of the state public defender and a lot of that has been incorporated and I would you know I would also add in the you know, whether it's the previous RFP or this RFP, um, it is ultimately up to the respondents to provide their put their best foot forward and and give us a proposal that they think is within their scope to deliver and that addresses as much of the RFP as as is possible. And so, okay. Um, next question I have, um, you mentioned or it was mentioned something about, you know, recommendations would be outside of the county in terms of, I guess that's related to who'd be reviewing these RFPs. And so, I'm just wondering who would be reviewing the applications that come in. >> You want to talk about that? Um, so I have worked across the county of Santa Cruz to identify individuals who work with the public defender in the course of work and that can speak to the importance and the delivery of interdisciplinary services um because that's often these interdisciplinary services are also often interacting with the other services the other systems not just services but systems that people who are involved in the criminal legal system are impacted by usually for everyone person that might be criminal legal system there's multiple intersecting systems upon that single individual not to mention their families and anyone outside um I've also asked um for someone within Santa Cruz County with lived experience to participate on the evaluation panel to speak so that we have that representation um that perspective represented when we talk about um client- centered results who better to speak to that than someone who has come out successfully through that process. And then finally, um the I've reached out to another county who has an indigent defense representation role and I've asked them to participate um with CEO Coburn's facilitation and they they've agreed. Um I in speaking with the purchasing and logistics manager, I was actually advised not to share the the panel individuals to avoid um any advocacy or influence on them. I think today it's really supposed to be about the process. It's supposed to be we are accountable to these processes. So that's where I was trying to go when I put together the panel and make sure that it was neutral and that it could speak to financial responsibility and client outcomes and interdisciplinary services. >> Yeah. And I guess what I was trying to get at is understanding, you know, like who these individuals are in terms of like their experience. So like are they judges? Are they lawyers? Are they That's where I was trying to get at because I'm trying to better understand in terms of who's going to be reviewing these applications for these services like who are we talking about, right? because judges are the ones who are going to be working most closely with the attorneys when the attorneys are going to court with their cases. And so it would seem as if the lawyers, the judges would have some interest in what this new program is going to be. And so I don't know if there's any engagement since we don't know who's on that's why I'm trying to get more information about who is this panel, who's going to be reviewing, you know, which of these programs we're going to be initially selecting. So it includes an accountant, somebody who's familiar with intersecting services, like I said, um other important systems like the medical administrative activities since that is a really important um cost recovery mechanism that is available to public defense providers with the use of interdisciplinary services. Um we have talked to um the courts and the request from the courts was actually to contact CEO Sasha Morgan and presiding judge um Vanluen for the court's formal opinion and and the recommendation from OSPD and I believe also from the sixth amendment center report is that um public defense be free of political influence and that would include putting for example example, a district attorney on the evaluation panel or the judge on or a judge on an evaluation panel. It's really about what does the community need? what as you know as identified by all of these reports from the grand jury to the sixth amendment center and how we can describe that system and how we think it can be delivered and what information can we gain either from by collecting responses or not either from but including both collecting responses as well as looking at what other counties do and what they do successfully and how they manage costs and provide those services. Does that help clarify my response >> somewhat? Yes. >> All right. Thank you, Supervisor. >> Um, so I'm not going to drag this out much longer, but I have some concerns with the fact that, you know, we're having this first study session today. We're supposed to be getting, you know, a report back on different models in December. And then yet at the same time, we're moving forward with an RFP process. um it's hard for me to reconcile how we're going through a process and yet at the same time we're sitting on RFP that kind of has already predetermined what the outcome is going to be since we aren't going to have enough time to evaluate the different models before moving forward with the RFP process. So um and I also share some concerns um the comments that I've received um on this is that the prize the process has seemed biased. it hasn't seemed fair and and I think I feel that um you know what will be good is for us to go through these series of study sessions to discuss you know what we want to do what are going to be the cost of the different programs and whether at this point in time we should move forward with this because um I will agree you know the fact that we were saying transition by July mean to me it sounds like the decision's already been made that we're going to we're going to transition to a new program when the reality is we as a board have not made that decision yet and so personally Personally, I'd be much more comfortable with with um you know, the fact that we had the study session. We direct the county executive office to return on or before December 15th, 2026 with the recommendation for the model of the various options of models to provide conflict conflict criminal defense representation. Um and that we maintain the current RFP process. And that's a motion that I'm going to make right now because I don't think that we should be moving into a new RFP process when we don't even know what our options are. Can I jump in? Um, so I would so we are at a point where at a minimum we have to do an RFP based on it's been some time since we've done the last one and so we need a competitive process to figure out if we're going to continue to contract. Um, we've run into problems in the past, including with the grand jury, when we spent years just giving soul source agreements to our main firm and our conflict firm. And so, at a minimum, if nothing else, we need to issue and release the RFP today so that we can find out what it would cost and what the services would be provided to continue contracting. What we're advising is that we want to give the board all the information available in terms of the different avenues we could go down with uh first tier conflict services. Um we have not made a decision. we are in a um a really significant financial situation as you know and so if it ends up being that continuing to contract with a firm is the best option based on cost based on other factors um we'll be willing to go down and recommend that road but I think the board deserves all the information we can possibly provide to you to make the best decision >> and and I will say I don't disagree agree with you on that and that's exactly why I'd like to have more information come back and that we maintain whatever the current RFP process is that's been used that we maintain that process and we move forward with what's previously been used instead of what's the new process that's before us so that we can have more information in December to figure out what that next transition is going to be. um I don't feel like we have that information today. And you've mentioned that RFPs have been issued in the past and so whatever the past RFP process has been, I'm much more comfortable with moving forward with that process, not something new which is before us today and continuing to get more information so that we can, you know, if we're going to transition, we can have that discussion, but we don't have all that information here today. >> Yeah. So, regarding the RFP, every time we do an RFP, it's updated based on best practice and information. The last RFP we did is not based on current practice that is recommended across the state of California in terms of how to structure your contracts for these services. So this work is constantly evolving and um we've been working to incorporate those practices into this RFP process. I would not recommend going back to the last RFP we issued. Um we you know what we've put forward today is our recommended RFP and obviously whoever um the last time we did this um the page and Dudley firm was the only respondent to that RFP. I imagine that might very likely be the case again with the current RFP and we just want to see what information um the current firm and or other firms put forward so that we can get the best product coming out of this RFP process and um they are asked to provide as much of what we're asking for as possible and so that we can just see what that is. I'm gonna ask actually Paige and Dudley if they can make some provide some comments and feedback on this. >> Thank you. So, if I may >> before before we do that, I'm I'm hoping we can hear questions from the rest of the board before we call anybody else up. Thank you. Have a seat. Thank you. Um >> I'll just let me just say I that I hear the concern and I have a motion that I've made. If the board wants to go on that route, great. If we don't, you know, we can vote. But I'm going to stick with my motion because I feel that we have the we're moving into a changing landscape. I understand that. But I don't feel that we have enough information here today. Um especially since we're supposed to get, you know, recommendations coming back to us in December about what new models could be. I don't feel like, you know, deciding on a new RFP process before we have the information makes sense. And I think that, you know, if we have to go with the new with an RFP process, let's use the old one. It's not perfect. We can come back in a year. we can do it again, but we'll have the information by this time next year or even within the next few months on what a new process can look like and we can all vote on that at that point in time. But right now, we're it's kind of like we're going to create a new process. We're putting out a new RFP and we don't have all the information here. So, that's why I'm going to continue to >> We have a motion on the floor. Is there a second? >> Could you repeat the motion, please? >> Yeah. The motion is um to act the county executive officer to return honor before December 15, 2026 with a recommendation for the model to provide conflict criminal defense representation and then um to maintain the current RFP process and and issue the RFP. >> I'll second. >> We have a motion from Supervisor Cummings and a second from Supervisor Koig. >> Supervisor Koig. >> Yeah. Um thank you. Yeah. And I second for the for the sake of discussion I I you know generally agree that um I'm not the the RP before us feels and the process outline does feel like a little bit of a predetermined outcome and um you know particularly the valuation metrics included in the RFP. I mean, it's just basically asking for a lot more overhead uh and bureaucracy. And frankly, what I appreciate about the page firm is that they provide high quality representation with any of that, right? I mean, we are not known for cost efficiency in the county. Uh, hence the item we just looked at before where we gave up a function because we could not provide it cost-effectively. And yes, we do have a significant problem with the public defenders office and our budget there. I mean, we $1.6 million from reserves. I mean, we are on borrowed time with just the current spending for this department. Um, when when I my first year in office, 2122, uh, fiscal year, the budget for the public defender was $14 million. and it's up to $21 million. Now, it's a 44% increase. So, excuse me if I'm a little bit hesitant to just jump in to more county provided defense services because that feels pretty expensive. And what my question for you is, where are we seeing $7 million of savings elsewhere in the system? How are we actually quantifying that this model is superior? I mean, I know you maybe don't can't answer that today, but that's what I'd like to see in the evaluation because for me that it's really about the bottom line. Um, efficacy as well, but I mean, we've got to solve this $1.6 million budget gap first and foremost. And I mean, I understand that, you know, staff feels like the best way to do that was with the alternative public defenders office, but as I said during budget hearings, there was, I think, some pretty significant um oversight or miscalculation in terms of how that solution was presented. I mean, we're basically talking about having half as many lawyers provide alternative public defense, and we were not accounting for all the cases that the page firm is currently doing, and we were not accounting for the cost of those cases then going to the more expensive panel for tertiary public defense. And so unless we're looking at the whole cost of meeting the current demand, we're not actually uh adequately calculating um the the cost of providing these services and any savings that would be involved. So that's the that's what needs to be included in any um in any analysis. Um so I I am inclined uh you know the one one area where it also I'd like to see addressed is you know it seems like what that we can do internally is this medical administrative activities billing right and so I know this came up during uh during budget hearings the question of well is there some way to also recoup some of those costs uh through contract public defense Um, so that's a question I'd pose first to staff and then yeah, I would also be happy to hear from the page firm uh if the chair allows. >> Yeah, we've been we've been working with a lot of our different partners on trying to find ways that we can utilize MA funding and bring in additional funding to the county. uh similar with the with the main firm where you know that's covering 50 to 60% of those of those costs. We think there's a significant portion of the page firm activities or any conflict provider activities that might be able to draw down some additional revenue with MA. I think we all are in agreement with doing a more um comprehensive review of the public defense system in general. One of the key pieces in terms of being able to evaluate that I think is getting data from the RFP in addition to being able to do a more comprehensive and maybe satisfactory review for all for you all of uh what an alternate defender office might look like, what a panel only model might look like and be able to bring back a comparison across all three of those three of those options. Um I think the you know we're working a lot on on faith and hearsay that a good job is being done and we don't have um you know the if the it's just it can't be the case that it might not be we might not be able to measure it completely but we can measure something and I'm open to a conversation of um of what that is, how we determine whether a firm or a system is uh efficient and able to provide that service. Um but we can't just say that you know the you know the work is so intense that it precludes us from trying to do so. >> Sir, I'm gonna ask you to sit down please. Um >> okay. and and I'm going to say why at this time the board is considering a process for purchasing a service. So we are talking about a procurement process which is heavily audited and regulated. We have a contract with a provider. That contract as I understand ends at the end of this fiscal year and we're having a discussion about procurement. It would be inappropriate for a somebody we are paying to deliver services to be the sixth member of the board at this time to engage in this dialogue about how to go about a purchasing process. We are we need to figure out collectively how we want to procure our contracts. And so that's why I'm asking you to sit down at this time. Um I would like to hear a little bit more about our procurement process. I'm coming from this from the lens of somebody who did contracting with the county for over a decade and I'm very familiar with the way the county from various departments issues RFPs the transparency required the regulatory requirements um our own financial pro policies and procedures that we must follow for procurement. So I'm wondering if either um CEO Coburn or Mr. Heath might speak to those processes. >> Yeah. Um I'm happy. So we have a purchasing policy that governs how we procure services. And so um we're required to contract out uh services every four years. Um and so we are at that point um with the last time we entered the new contract, it was a sole source. Um, and so we need to bid these out. And so our office has been working with our purchasing manager and general services to draft the RFP. There's a timeline in the RFP as to what's going to take place and there's an opportunity for biders to ask questions to submit their proposals. um the the grading of the proposals is clearly identified in the RFP as to um the criteria and the weights and all of that. And then the scores would be contabulated and um there would be a determination as to uh which respondent would potentially be awarded the RFP. And so we would bring that back to the board. And so all of that is um very defined and um is intended to provide um neutrality and come back with with a a recommendation um based on the process. So I hope that help answers your questions, Super Chair Martinez. Um um Gina might have additional um input or provide additional um information depending on if you have additional questions. >> Thank you. and and for purposes of conversation um and process, would this be the appropriate time if any colleagues wanted to propose um scope modifications to the RFP or some suggestions for the staff to go back and look at related to the language in the RFP? Is that part of the question today before us? Yeah, I mean if you um wanted to give us some suggestions about how to retool the RFP and then we as staff would come back and bring um it sounds like this RFP may not be the one you want to approve today and have us release but um we can rework it and bring we would need to bring back the actual RFP that we intend to release on a subsequent agenda. I will say that these timelines take time and we're running out of time. So, we need to issue an RFP pretty soon in order to complete the process. And then if contracting is the way that we continue to want to proceed, we then need to negotiate the contract and bring the contract back to the board for approval before the services end at the end of this fiscal year. So, we are going to have to get going on a retoled RFP if that's the way that the board wants us to proceed. >> Thank you. And um one of the things that I noticed in the RFP that's a significant change is the free the fee structure. Can you speak a little bit further to that about how how that was designed? >> I'm going to refer to um Gina and Sven. >> Yes. So the current contract um allows for a flat rate on the first of every month regardless of the hours worked regardless of the extent to the services provided. Um the same structure was applied um or incorporated into the previous contract model with the former private u primary defender before it became an institutional um institutional model. And um repeatedly through multiple grand jury reports, the lack of transparency when you pay a flat fee, and the argument again that's made in the Sixth Amendment Center report, is that a flat fee um introduces a systemwide economic conflict between the financial interests of the representatives and the um the client's legal interests. And that's not to say that's not to say that one party or one firm is doing one thing or not. I think that we have had multiple conversations with the page firm who speak at length about the time that they spent with clients at length about the time worked at the length that they go to to manage both their work life work and life balance. That's something that everyone deserves to have. and as county employees, as county staff, as good fiscal stewards, um particularly when legislation's been introduced at the state level suggesting that flat fees are won't even be legal in the coming years. We have a responsibility to look at a structure regardless of whether it's a contract with a new entity with panel with whatever the case may be compared to how other counties are doing it to make sure that it's the best the best process and the best information the best structure. Um and to the point about using language about whether we're transitioning to a new firm or not. The Page Firm has also been very open about the hard work that they've put into establishing a nonprofit to provide more transparency to do that work that we're asking for to have the capabilities for reporting. And so even with a new entity with whatever the page firm becomes in their nonprofit, that's still a transition. That's a new contract that's setting up a new vendor in our system that's negotiating a new set of terms and conditions. Um, and I think I'd like to reiterate Nicole's timeline as well or the Nicole's points about the timeline as well. Um, even releasing an RFP now to get the information that we can and before we even negotiate anything to come back with to the board with what the results of the RFP are compared to some of these other models that are available. um that gives us the rest of you know January through June to make sure that if it's the new new page firm if it's another f if it's any other kind of model that while budget season is going on from January through June and hearings we are also making sure that the contract negotiations are continuing appropriately um so I hope that answers your questions about the transparency and fee structure Thank you. I appreciate that. Um, and just a couple more questions just about the best practices. Um, during the budget hearings, we heard a lot about case loads. Where are we do we have a predetermined case load size or where are we getting that information? So when we review RFP, an RFP or other proposals, what's guiding that best practice? >> Right now the main um body of work that is kind of the only body of work is the national public defense workload study um which is something like Mr. Paige has it now. I think it's something like 120 pages. It was on my seat on my first day at the county to familiarize myself. 180. I was off by 60 pages. And um I think that like I said, everyone deserves a good work life balance. And I don't know, I can't say to what end those work those workload recommendations are reasonable. I think we've heard that even the primary office would need something like 30 more attorneys and that's not feasible. We know that that's not feasible. Um and so we have some we have some hard questions to ask and some hard questions to answer. And um we're and again we'll also be working with the office of the state public defender that I know is doing work to rightsize some of these case loads or recommendations according to the case loads that are um distributed in California. >> Thank you. Um, >> can I just interject for one second because page five of the RFP has the number of case loads by annual number of cases by type for a total of 847. >> And that's based on actuals. That's the that's so we're basing the actual history or what we anticipate the workload to be based on the actual history. And that's not to say things could go change going forward, but thank you for pointing that out. >> Thank you. So, um, given what I understand about the timeline that we're hoping to stay on and, um, I I what I hear is a commitment that we're not making a decision today about the type of the model that we are agreeing upon. Um, I would like to keep us on the proposed timeline from the staff and I would like to propose an substitute motion that moves the recommended actions and asks that staff incorporate any additional feedback from the board today in retooling the RFP process and bringing it back as as soon as you feel like you And so you can stay on the timeline. Is there a second? Seeing none, that motion dies. We go back to the original motion. Um, can you repeat that for the sake of discussion? >> Yes. So essentially item number three in the recommended actions direct the county executive office to return honor before December 15th, 2026 with a recommendation for the model to provide conflict criminal defense representation and to um issue the most recent RFP that had been previously released. So that'll keep us on time. All it's saying is we're not going to issue the RFP that's been recommended. Since there is an urgency around time, whatever the previous RFP was, we can move forward with issuing that and that will keep us moving on time. And and the thing too is that this is going to come back to us again in a year. I mean, I think when we get through all the different changes that going to be recommended, when we land on a model, when we land on a new RFP, I think that will be an opportunity for us to move forward. But at this point in time, there's obviously some serious concern. There's concerns around bias. And you know if we want to move forward then my recommendation would be that we just reuse the previous RFP and we continue moving forward. >> I I have some concerns about just the both legal or ethical issues with the existing the the past RFP. I know the RFPs are revised based on changes in state law, changes in best practice, changes in our fiscal policies. >> Um tell tell us why. >> So we will have to take a look at that RFP. We're going to have to update it based on current law policies and we will put it have to put it on the next agenda to release it. So, we're not going to be able to just release it on our own. So, we will bring it. We'll have to work it. Um, we'll try to get it on either the next meeting in September or the first meeting in October, but we will have to do um prepare and bring a new RFP to the board that to make sure it reflects all of the legal frameworks we have to work within. >> So, that's different than what the motion is suggesting. Well, ju just to just to jump in, um I think it's really important for your board not to just say we don't like this RFP, but to provide staff with guidance on what you do want to see in the RFP because staff is going to be bringing back a new RFP for you to consider potentially as early as the next meeting. And if they don't have guidance from your board on that issue, then we could potentially be in the same situation that we're in right now. Let me just ask maybe you all can help me answer this question. Um what are the legal changes that have occurred between the last RFP process and this RFP process at the state level? I mean because that's sounds like the concern is whether it's going to be if the documents the RFP process is going to be legal. Um, I think there's a lot of well-intended other um, aspects of the RFP process of the indigent defense care, but you know, what I'm trying to get to is is based on the previous RFP process and now, what legal changes have been made so that those can be incorporated and then we can come back and make a decision on that next RFP. Um, so I'm just wondering if you all know. Yeah, I mean I don't think we'll we're able to answer that off the top of our heads right now. Um, we can obviously bring that back and and put it in the staff report as as we bring that back to you all. And I think as as Mr. Heath pointed out, if there are other pieces of the RFP that are, you know, recommended policy pieces that we do have control over, it'd be good to have guidance from from the board on the direction you all want there. On that point, I would >> I was just going to weigh in just on the legal aspects or whatever. Um, so there there's there's been a movement over the last few years towards the elimination of flat fee contracts and um, you know, that has been um, it's not quite there yet at the state level, but staff has to anticipate what the world looks like or may look like in a year or two years. Um, and so that's to answer your question on what's changed. Nothing has officially absolutely changed yet, but there has been a movement not only in the flat fee issue, but on a lot of the other holistic aspects of representation that um, everything is trending in the direction that staff has put together in this RFP that is in front of you right now. You could still say, "Hey, we don't care and we don't and we don't and we don't like it and we're not going to play." But but we need but but that's what we really need is is something to come back that your board can engage with and will engage with so that we can just operationalize it and move to the next uh the next phase. >> And just as a response, you know, I feel like we're going to be getting more information about these different services and aspects of these services through this process, right? I mean, we're going to get a report back in December and so we'll know more and we'll be able to make a decision on the direction we want to go in. The reason why I'm saying we should just move forward with what the previous RP was is because of the urgency that everybody's just saying that we have to do something now. Obviously, we're not all in agreement with the current what's presented before us. And so, my recommendation is that if you all need to make, you know, minor legal changes or, you know, whatever legal changes to the RP that was issued before and bring that back, that sounds to fine to me. Um, but I'm trying to keep us on track with moving forward and also trying to balance the changes that we're hearing at the state that haven't been implemented yet. So, it's not like we're doing anything illegal with the, you know, pre RFP process. And as we continue to learn more and engage with the community, we can sell in on what's going to be the best model. Then we can move forward with drafting what the new RFP could look like and what the new services could look like. I'm just trying to keep us on track for, you know, we have some concerns. Obviously, we're not all in agreement and want to keep the RFP moving. >> Yeah. I can't speak to whether I I I do not believe that there is anything flatly illegal about the previous RFP, but it doesn't sound to me like your board is educated enough about the previous RFP or have information about what the previous RFP looked like for you today to just say, "Hey, issue that RFP." >> The only reason why I'm making that recommendation is because it's something we've used in the past. So, there's precedent that's been set. We can have that conversation at the next meeting, but I'm trying to keep us moving on track. Um, and so that's why I'm I'm recommending that that be a process. It's one year, so it's not like we won't be back here again in the future. >> Actually, >> actually, that's a point of clarification. Is it a one year or what was the contract proposed to >> the contract proposed in the current RFP that's before you is three years. um if we do an R the amount of work and time that goes into an RFP just to put something together that can be published for the ads to be run for questions and responses to be answered from different vendors and so on and so forth that investment is certainly um it worth more than a one-year contract unless there were some real justification for a one-year contract. Um and I think in this case when we're talking about the continuity of cases and the continuity of representation and the consistency of service across the entire system which might be between the institutional office all the way down to the tertiary panel um that one year what I wouldn't recommend all that to say I would not recommend an RFP for one year >> but I'm happy to have it be for two years. I mean, if that's going to be something we can you have conversations about as we go through this process, I mean, I think that we can land on something that's agreeable in terms of what those contracts can be. But so, right, I have um uh let's see, I have a little confusion about what we are proposing at this at this time. Um I think you know let me I I think the board is in agreement that we do need a new contract come 27. Is that accurate? And in order to do that we do need a procurement process. I think we're in agreement about that. So to get there, um I I think that we're likely in agreement that we would want the new prop RFP to include current best practices and purchasing standards in it. Is that correct or is that a jumping to a conclusion? It would be hard to say that we don't want best practices or our current p procurement standards in it. I think we haven't agreed on I mean this is part of the the challenge right is that we haven't even had an opportunity to go through what the different models are what are various options and while some there may be best practices yes that would be good to incorporate but it's also like what are those costs right we haven't had that discussion that's one why I was hoping that we get through these I mean the the you know having the staff come back in December to discuss the different models and the different models look like. I think that's going to really help us better understand what is the type of service that we want to adopt and that's going to help inform that next RFP process. Um what we do know is right now we have a system that works we do know that we're going to be making changes to that system but to issue but the RFP the way it stands right now seems like it's already transitioning us to what this new model will be and I think that's one of the big concerns that's come up. So that's why again trying to keep us I mean we can also just put off the RFP and have staff come back in the next meeting with what the previous RFP was what would look like to have it updated because that's what they're going to have to do anyway. So, >> I think I Well, I think um what I was looking forward to getting in December was information about the true costs and services delivered by our current vendor in a side by side with the other alternative models. And that's what we we've asked staff to come forward these other alternative models. They're going to do their homework. The our existing public defenders office or public defender isn't even in the room. Um, but that will be her homework, I assume. Um, we also have, you know, as as somebody who contracted with the county, I I RFP is not a dirty word. It's an opportunity to come forward with true costs, have an opportunity to have your true costs covered, to state what you're delivering so that way the county knows what they're purchasing, have improvements to the contract. You want to negotiate contracts because that's how improvements are made. And it raises the tide for everybody. It's a it's a process improvement. And so I rather than kind of assuming uh that what worked for them for the last three years would work for them again in December for the next three years, it's providing them an opportunity to come back with actually this is what we want for the next three years and we can hold that information side by side with the alternatives and that's where we have the discussion. So, we're just proposing a a um a process by which to get that information and have the real discussion in December. >> I don't I don't dis >> Oh, can I just let me just say I don't disagree and we we have an RFP before us. We're supposed to be deciding on that has a lot of the aspects of what a new program could look like already embedded within it. We haven't had a chance for we haven't had the opportunity to have the conversation. So, I don't disagree with you at all, but that's why if we have to move forward with an RFP, why I'm recommending we just move forward with the previous process and the previous RFP is because we haven't had a chance to have this conversation and we need to have that conversation before we we move forward with this whatever this new process is going to be. And the RFP before us has a lot of those aspects already baked into it, which is why I'm not comfortable with supporting it today. I just I just wanted to clarify that even if we weren't coming back to the board with um the full analysis of all the options available to the board um and if we were just issuing an RFP, we tried to issue or draft it based on what the program should look like given all the advancements in the public defense. And so um that so this is our you know our wish list of things we'd like to see in a contractor. If contractors aren't able to provide these things um we'll see that through the proposals and then we're able to contract for whatever we're um whatever level of service we're we're able to get. So, I just wanted to make it clear that um this could stand on its own absent anything else we were going to look at, but we wanted to have all of the information available. Um, so I I mean it sounds like you want us to go back to a slight a slim down version of uh sending out this RFP, which we can do. Um, I want to also make clear that some of the things we're asking for in here, like the um itemizing of ours is to help us with the medical claiming. So, that's an aspect that wasn't in the previous RFP that that I I would think we would like to continue to include in a slim down version. So, that's just an example of a change we made that I think you as a board want to have in there and that I know the firm is already doing. >> Thank you. Um, Supervisor Koig. >> Thank you, Chair. So based on this discussion, I mean, it sounds like one way or another, we need the CEO's office to retool this RFP and bring it back to us. Um, you know, I I see the the merit of the argument that um, you know, we need to track hours in order to to integrate better with um, medical billing and it sounds like those are things that um, you know, the page firm and probably other respondents to the RFP are already doing. So I mean given this I'd be comfortable with the motion that uh our chair made which is basically directing the CEO's office to come back with a con with a revised RFP. Uh I think just with the understanding that that um with that RFP would place a greater emphasis maybe in terms of weight on effective representation and price um and maybe generally be slimmed down a little bit um right to try to to emphasize those qualities. I mean it doesn't mean that the respondent can't discuss to at any length or brevity the other things that we've asked. I mean as you said it's sort of uh we're putting out there what we think we need uh or would like to have and you know ultimately the responses are the responses. So um I think if the chair is comfortable with that as a friendly amendment um would be and you want to >> how about a new motion because it died then. All right. Very well. Then uh I will move um let's say here um I will move uh that recommended action three that the uh directing the county executive officer to return on or before December 15, 2026 with a recommendation for the model to provide conflict criminal defense representation beginning July 1, 2027. uh and the additional direction for the CEO's office to uh revise the RFP and bring it back for board approval as soon as practable practicable uh with an increased emphasis on uh effective representation and price uh and less overall requirements. >> Second. So we have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? Yeah, I have some comments and questions. >> Thanks, Supervisor Derpa. >> Sorry to belabor this, but I haven't spoken yet on this. Um, we are spending in this county a tremendous amount of money on people that commit crime. And while I understand the whole holistic defense model, I do, and I appreciate it, it's very, very expensive. I talked to um one of the social workers in that group a couple of months ago and I asked her to tell me about a case and she told me um how she had worked for three weeks trying to find placement for somebody who um had started multiple fires in our county. three weeks worth of her work at whatever her hourly is to find placement for somebody who starts fires. I understand uh the reasons why holistic defense is a good thing. I do. But when the fiscal situation, the fiscal cliff that we are facing, it the the the nicities of trying to provide services to many many people in all directions. We need to really look at that and determine can we afford it? I don't think we can at this point. And so to ask a contracted public defender agency to provide the same level of service in terms of an entire social work team and navigation of immigration and all of the other things to people who have committed crimes who are already being we're paying out on them from law enforcement, from the district attorney's office, from multiple contracts um to help people get on their medical so that then you know I mean it is staggering how much each one of these people uh cost to this county I do have and and I was not happy with any of this backup. Some of it seemed to be AI gibberish honestly and some of it was absolutely what what these people came in here and told you at the microphone is exactly how I felt when I was reading and I was like this is already completely preconceived because we have staff has or CEO's office I don't know who has an agenda to wall off in the public defenders office. So unless you can meet this very strict criteria of all these things that we want to see happen, you are not going to get awarded the contract. That was very insulting. The other thing that I found insulting um was the chart that showed like um how many hours of time it was going to take to um choose a new model. Right? So 300 hours of Gina's time, 40 hours of Spven's time, and 15 hours of Nicole's time. That's 355 hours. So, I calculated it based on your salaries, $23,738. And I know from talking with Mitchell Page that he's forgoing his salary to make it work for his firm. I I don't know if that's true still, but that was what you had told me before is that you have either taken no salary or you're taking a half salary. And yet here we are as a county spending 23,738 to do the work of choosing a new model. We know what models work and what models don't. The other thing I I heard what you said, Gina, but I I would like to ask a question about it. the the DA's office, our district attorney knows a lot about panel cases, um, alternative public defender and our public defender. They know how many cases go to each one and what the outcomes are. They have a tremendous amount of data. Why? I I don't understand. Maybe it's a best practice. I'm not sure, but why can't they be part of the decision-making process around what model that we choose? Because they're completely excluded, I noticed on that thing. The other thing I'll say is that still to this day, I just had breakfast with a retired judge a couple weeks ago thanking me for my support of uh the Mitchell Page Group because they are excellent. Not only that, I will say and maybe I'm running into a biased situation here. So Jason, maybe you can help with the thing I'm going to say next is that in my personal experience, I have brought many people that I as a social worker that I was helping to to the Mitchell Page firm in the past to have their records expuned so they could go on field trips with their kids at school, their disabled children at school. and they helped these people at no charge. The people that I would present to them and hand off, they're doing holistic defense. They're already doing it. I know it because I've seen it and they did it at no charge. So, thank you. Um, the other thing is of the 58 counties in California, we were given a list of nine counties that are using um, I think the walled off version of public defense. Most of them are giant counties that have a tremendous amount of revenue. We're not that. We're not that. There were I think two counties are small. Toalami and Menescino. I'm not sure how they're pulling it off because I don't think they have a lot of revenue. But they um but maybe they only have one or two people working there. I don't know. But I'm not sure that we can afford that anyway. And so I would and that's one of the reasons I this did not feel like a study session today. I'll just say that like I need to know more and that and I don't know if it we can meet uh you can meet separately with all of us to help explain or get some feedback. Um but I I would like to know about what what the other models are and if they're um appropriate pertinent if they would work here in our tiny tiny county. I can't imagine putting more people on our payroll is going to save any money with the benefits and the kalpers. it is not cost uh effective to do that to add more staff on the county side. So, um that is I think the end. Sorry, I'm not I don't think I asked that many questions, but that that's the end of what I wanted to say. Um thank you for hearing our concerns and I look forward to um moving this forward. Thank you. >> So, we have a motion and a second. Do you have further discussion on the motion on the floor? >> Madam Clerk, will you please call the role? >> Supervisor Cummings >> I. >> Hernandez >> I. >> Bonig >> I. >> Dura. >> And Martinez >> I. Motion passes five to zero. >> What do we have next here? >> Let me reach out to you. I think we can get through number nine. I'm going to call item number nine, which is to consider accepting a report on the certification of the Metro Initiative petition sufficiency and if certified, select one of the options per elections code section 9118 and take related actions. >> Oh, we got here already. Welcome. Good morning. >> Good morning, Chair Martinez and members of the board. My name is David Brown. I'm an analyst in the county executive office. And with me today is our county clerk and register our voters, Trisha Weber. And we're here to present the item in front of you, which is the self the in regard to the self-sufficiency and certification of the metro initiative petition. Metro is an acronym for modern efficient transit wrership and operations. The recommended actions for this item are to accept a report on the certification of the Metro Initiative petition and direct staff to return to the board within 30 days of the necessary resolution with the necessary resolution and related documents to call the election pursuant to elections code section 1405 and submit the the Metro Initiative to the voters pursuant to elections code section 9118. In February 2026, the proponents of the Metro Initiative published a notice of intention to circulate an initiative petition and satisfied preliminary legal requirements to begin collecting those signatures. This initiative uh ordinance would establish a 1/ half of 1% sales tax beginning April 1st, 2027. The objective of the tax is to maintain and improve bus and paratransit services, expand routes, increase and increase par um paratransit services, and oh sorry, increase wrership, support free and reduce free fee programs, and provide additional transit related services. On August 4th, the Santa Cruz County Metro Initiative petition was submitted to the county clerk registar of voters department for an examination of the 15,473 signatures that were gathered. The county clerk registar of voters has deemed the petition sufficient with 11,377 valid signatures. The board of supervisors is the authorizing body responsible for taking the actions on petitions meeting sufficiency requirements. And because this tax is or before this in because this initiative is a tax measure, the board must submit the initiative to voters. To re reiterate today's item, ask the board to accept the sufficiency report and direct staff to return within 30 days with the necessary resolution and related documents to call the election and place the measures on the ballot at the next election permitted by law. uh our county clerk register of voters Trish Weber is present to answer questions regarding the petition examination and the sufficiency report. Thank you. >> Thank you. I will now go out to the public to see if there's anyone who's here to speak on this item. Seeing none, madam clerk, is there anyone on the phone? >> I see no speakers online. Chair, >> thank you. I'll return to the board for discussion and action. Supervisor Cummings, >> I'll move the recommended action. To clarify, I think you have to specify which of the two options you're preferring. Have a chance. >> So to act accept a report on the certification of Metro Initiative petition and direct staff to return to board within 30 days with the necessary resolution related documents to call the election pursuant to election code section 1405 and submit the Metro Initiative to the voters pursuant to election code section 9118. Second. Are you suggesting the recommended action 2A over 2B? >> No, chair. Um, it's based on the on the revised uh papers that were that were uh submitted uh late yesterday. >> Oh, gotcha. Okay. Thank you. Uh, so we have a motion from Supervisor Cummings and a second from Supervisor Hernandez. Further discussion, >> Supervisor Conig? So, I was actually a proponent on this initiative. So, I think I feel that I should at least abstain, if not recuse myself and maybe even walk out of the room at this point. Um, but um so I'm not going to say anything. >> Okay. Um I'll just comment. I just want to congratulate the Metro friends of Metro for getting the signatures gathered to bring this before us today and I'm supportive of the recommended actions. Further discussion. Madam clerk, will you please call the role? >> Supervisor Durpa >> I. >> Hernandez >> I. >> Cummings >> I. >> And Martinez >> I. Motion passes. Four in favor and one abstain. Is that correct? >> One not present. Thank you. I think we should probably break for close session. >> Okay. At this time, we will recess for close session and we will return at 1:00. Is there anything reportable from close session? >> No. >> Thank you. >> Recording stopped. Welcome back everybody. Um, as a reminder, we had nothing reportable from close session. Correct. >> Correct. >> Thank you. So, we'll now open with item number 10, which is to hold a public hearing to consider approving in concept an ordinance of the board of supervisors of the county of Santa Cruz granting a planned unit development as allowed by the Santa Cruz County code relating to the establishment of developmental standards for applications number 251276. Um there are three APNS associated and adopting a negative declaration pursuant to the California Environmental Quality Act and take related actions. Welcome. >> Uh good afternoon. Uh thank you for having me. Evan Dipmars, development review planner with CDI Planning. Um this is an application uh the application under review today is a proposal for a six lot single family subdivision which includes a planned unit development or PUD approval. Uh the recommended action includes the adoption of a negative declaration in accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act or SQA. So the reason this project is before your board today is uh primarily the PUD aspect of the project. Normally board approval would not be required for residential projects of less than 20 units. Uh however this project's planned unit development if adopted would grant the uh project specific development standards that differ from the underlying R16 zoning standards. Uh these standards are adopted by ordinance which are subject to board approval. Before I go any further into the approval mechanisms, I'm going to just provide an overview of the proposed development um that you're considering for approval. So, the project site is located between Soill Drive and Thurber Lane uh or I'm sorry, um is located between Mission Drive and Thurber Lane just north of Soill Drive. Uh in this image here, Dominican Hospital is just outside of the image on the left. Uh, Soell Drive is on the bottom part of the image. Uh, Winkl Park uh, is over to the right. And then the project site is at the top of the image. In the project uh, site is outlined in red. Um, it's actually comprised of three parcels which are indicated by the the black lines there. Uh, there's one parcel that currently has corridor on Mission Drive on the left. corridor access lot from Mission Drive or from Thurber Lane and then a traditional lot which would also take from Thurber Lane. The all three of these parcels are zoned R1 conventionally correlate with 6,000 square foot single family lots. The general plan uh for this neighborhood is urban low density uh which prescribes a density range of 4 to 10 dwelling units per acre. Uh this is a street level view of the site at Mission Drive. Uh 3522 Mission Drive on the left side of the image is not associated with the project. Um but one of the six lots would uh take access from the corridor there on the right that's that's shown by the gate. Um and then at the other end of the site on Thurber Lane, um you can see that even though there are three parcels um on the site, visually uh in appearance, this is just one vacant lot. Um and this imagery, it's not readily apparent from from the images I have here, but the development pattern surrounding this project site is single family in nature. um except at lower Mission Drive which transitions to more multifamily and uh medical type use at Dominican Hospital. So getting back to the proposed project, those three lots would be reconfigured and subdivided to create six single family lots that and that's shown here on the top image. One lot would take access from Mission Drive with a corridor or flag lot configuration and five lots would take access from Thurber Lane. Uh the bottom left shows a conceptual rendering of what the project would look like viewed from Thurber Lane and then the image on the right kind of gives a representation of the architectural style and elevations at the front of the home. Um each of the six homes proposed under this project uh would be 2400 square foot uh four bedroomedroom units with a twocar garage. Um, as I previously mentioned, uh, the R16 zoning is associated typically with 6,000 square foot lots and a cor the correlating general plan density, uh, anticipated at the site would be 3 to eight units. Uh, the project is proposing a density within that range at six units. Um, but the lots would be smaller than 6,000 square feet and that is where the PUD begins coming into play. So what this slide is showing here is a chart with uh all of the traditional R16 uh development standards and then the proposed development standards proposed as part of the PUD. And the PUD is a development tool that is offered by uh county code chapter 1830. and its purpose is to allow for plan developments that would um not otherwise conform with county code but would uh accomplish the county's uh goals and policies. And a PUD will establish uh specific site standards or even uses um and uh it it will deviate from the normal R16 standards. This proposed PUD doesn't include any um deviation from residential use. it would strictly allow single family residential development. Uh the lots would be quite a bit smaller than the 6,000 square foot minimum. Uh you can see in the um first row there that some of them um dip down as small as 4200 square ft. Um and the actual building areas are are further reduced um when you deduct the shared driveway that goes across the bottom of the site. Um these smaller lots are also associated with reduced setbacks and the resulting development 2400 foot single family dwellings has a proportionally higher F because of that and so that's in the third uh from the bottom row. Some of these uh lots include 64% F when we would normally see 50% F and that's primarily related to the proportion of the home to the parcel size. Uh because otherwise the homes are just 2400 square foot dwellings. Um a PUD is it discretionary approval subject to conditions and required findings. um foremost being a finding of significant neighborhood benefit. Um and the county code does not specify exactly what that specific neighborhood benefit is, but it does give some examples which include enhanced resource protection, uh exceptional public amenities, design excellence, affordable housing, job creation, public viewshed preservation or superior mixeduse development, etc. Um so uh the point here being that the code is not explicit in what the significant public benefit is but it does require the approval to include a finding that the project um where it deviates from normal standards does have some public benefit. So the public benefit that we're um identifying in this project is two parts. Um the first is uh emergency vehicle access that would provide um access between Mission and uh Mission Drive and Thurber Lane. Uh presently there's no through access at the upper Mission Drive portion. Um and this was just an opportunity to provide fire access uh should it be needed to get between these two neighborhoods. Um it is strictly for emergency access only. It's not a public access. It's not for these residents to use. it is just going to be locked for emermergency access. Um the second uh opportunity uh the second community benefit provided by this project um is identified as the creation of three additional dwelling units. This site is currently approved for three single family dwellings. Um and on the same site area um we're uh accomplishing three additional dwelling units to be developed here. And so the community benefit there is the creation of single family uh lots and additional housing. So I didn't receive any correspondence um on the from the neighbors between the planning commission hearing and today's meeting or really on the project altogether. Um we do did have some neighbors participate in the planning commission process um requesting uh some clarity on the project and requesting some additional measures to be incorporated. Um one of those included some fencing allow around the uh south side of the project site for privacy because there is a little bit of a grade difference between these properties. Um so that uh recommendation or that request was included in the recommendation by the planning commission. Um and then the other um the other that was uh requested was to provide some additional um native landscaping in the landscaping plan. So the final landscaping plan um is conditioned as part of this PUD to include uh a higher percentage of native variety landscaping uh that would be suitable for the site. Um, so we don't typically see PUDS for smaller scale development as I would characterize this project. Um, and a lot of the larger projects we've been seeing as of late, um, would tend to use alternative development tools such as density bonus. Um, but the PUD does offer the upside of discretionary review, which is the ability to approve a project that doesn't perfectly fit into our normal development standards. Um and so we've evaluated this project as being compatible with the neighborhood, largely consistent with um the normal standards that we would have for single family development uh with just some deviation from um from the prescribed and adopted code. Um where it deviates for road access um it doesn't reduce the actual traveled rideway. So the road is has a full width rideway. um it meets the fire turnaround requirements. So um again, even where we're compromising from from our adopted standards, uh we don't have any concerns about the public safety aspect of this development. Um the planning commission I think saw the benefits of this project and at the July 22nd uh meeting they did adopt this uh voted to pass a resolution recommending your board approve the project and that was uh passed unanimously at the planning commission. Their resolution is the last attachment in the item 10 packet. Um but that recommendation is reflected here on this slide today which has these uh these six uh recommended actions which include holding a public hearing to consider this application to adopt um a resolution uh recommending a negative declaration pursuant to the California Environmental Quality Act. Approving in concept the ordinance that would uh grant the development standards under the PUD. approve the devel uh tenative subdivision map and site development permit for this application. Schedule this ordinance for a second reading and final adoption on September 29th and to direct the clerk of the board to publish the notice of proposed ordinance summary in a newspaper for general circulation. Um like I said, I didn't receive very much correspondence um but from any of the neighborhood uh officially. I did receive a phone call from one neighbor in support of the project yesterday. Um, and I um believe that there are some at least one neighbor here who was hoping to speak today, but other than that, there really hasn't been any other correspondence. There was a piece of correspondence attached to this board item that was relating to a separate and off-site project. Um, so um that's also been addressed. the correspondence that was sub the written correspondence received for that was related to a different project. So um that concludes my presentation. We are um recommending the actions on the slide and I'm available for questions. >> Thank you. We will now open the public hearing and we'll start by hearing from the public on this item. If you're here to speak on this item, please um step up to the microphone and we'll set the p public comment period at two minutes each. >> Yeah. Hello, my name is James Ying Whitman. I have a I guess a kind of supposed vast construction background. I started in 1988. Looking at this design, it seems really pretty straightforward. And the developers are really fortunate that the neighbors didn't put in a lot of negative input, having gone through this situation many times in my life as a general contractor. That can be quite frustrating. And I just I'm going to make some design observations. I'm wondering why with the fire access why the roads weren't connected. And I can see that there's that turnaround between either buildings three or four or two or three. I'm wondering if that couldn't be changed, but it I just think that you're fortunate that it's going to be an easy process. So, congratulations because that is not always the case in this community. >> Thank you. Is there any further public comment in the room? >> I'm Federica Welch. I live on Angela and uh yeah, none of us were happy that this is happening because this field has been empty for our house was built in the mid60s and I've been there since 93. So I have enjoyed privacy. With that said, however, I do appreci appreciate that you are very open and you are very understanding in our feelings about having all these houses built behind our house. Um, I would like to reiterate, um, my concerns were, of course, for privacy because there's they're going to be twostory homes and ours is only a onestory. They're going to be looking right into my bedroom. Um, but they assured us that there's going to be up to 8 ft uh, privacy and retaining walls. So, that is good. I'll buy blinds. Um, the water drainage also was a concern. Um we've been flooded for years because of the empty lot. No houses there to stop the water from going into our foundation of our house. Um they also they also told me that uh the new owners will alternate every year as to who the contact person would be for us to complain if something goes wrong. Um, with that said, Manu, I enjoy your emails. They're very informative and um, I did not know how to pronounce your name. I've been pronouncing it Manu, like Mana, the singer. But anyways, with that said, thank you so much for all of your hard work in and getting Santa Cruz the way that it should be. Thank you. Thank you for being here. Further comments in the room? Seeing none, Madam Clerk, is there anyone on the phone? >> I see no speakers online. Chair, >> thank you. I'll now close the public comment and return to the board for discussion and action. Supervisor Koig. >> Uh, thank you, Chair. Thank you to everyone who spoke today. Um, I just want to appreciate the project before us. Uh, appreciate the developer, Mr. Atri Matura who is here proposing a a project that is I think generally pretty uh in line with the existing community. I mean certainly compared to some of the other projects we've seen. I mean this if I if I count the row of homes on both sides there's five uh there's in this case there's one existing home. So we're talking about sort of a 7 to5 ratio. That's it's a lot better than maybe like I don't know say 54 to uh three that we've seen in other cases. So, um, thank you for proposing a a project that is, I think, consistent with the neighborhood feel here, that, uh, is going to provide middle inome infill housing, uh, and that generally fits within our general plan, um, for the county and meets our goals of encouraging infill housing. Um and ultimately of course taking on paying all the uh all the fees, the development impact fees, affordable for affordable housing, transportation, schools, parks, and every child care, everything else that's going to continue to make Santa Cruz a wonderful place to live. Uh so with that, I'm happy to move the recommended actions. >> I'll second. >> Thank you. We have a motion from Supervisor Koig and a second from Supervisor Dura. Any further discussion? Supervisor Cummings. >> Thank you, Chair. Um, one quick question. Um, I'm just curious if any of these will be a measure J unit. >> Uh, no, that none none of them are. Uh, our inclusionary housing requirements don't come into play until development of more than seven units. So, in on a project like this, they'll pay affordable housing impact fees um commensurate to the square footage of the house. Okay. >> Thank you. Supervisor Hernandez. >> So, I imagine the public comment mentioned about drainage. I'm I'm assuming that that'll be resolved once the uh development happens, right? The drainage that goes back into their backyards from the empty lot, >> right? Yeah. There's a the whole neighborhood is on a small slope and so all of the uphill properties do have to mitigate, you know, their on-site drainage. This project does include uh essentially taking the water from the UPS slope portions and they're going to have a big uh some drainage infrastructure and a retention um by retention area down at the bottom near um Thurber Lane. >> Thank you. We have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? Seeing none, um thank you for bringing this project forward. It looks like a really beautiful project. Look forward to seeing the progress. Madam clerk, will you please call the role? >> Supervisor Cummings, >> I. >> Hernandez, >> I. >> Koenic, >> I. >> Dura, >> I. >> And Martinez, >> I. Motion passes 5 to zero. We'll now move on to item number 11, which is to consider directing staff to work with the third district to draft a ballot measure and associated ordinance to regulate development of artificial intelligence data centers and high intensity computing facilities and take related actions. Supervisor Cummings. >> All right. Thank you, Chair, and thanks for the introduction. Uh Justin Cummings, third district county supervisor, if you can go to the next slide. Great. So, um, as was just mentioned, the what I'm asking the board today is, uh, to direct staff to work with my office to draft ballot language for the March 2028 election to express opposition to AI data centers and high-intensity computing facilities, require majority voter approval before any general plan amendments, allow zoning, permitting, or construction or operation of these facilities in unincorporated Santa Cruz County, and to return to the board with this language by the second meeting in February 2027 for final ballot placement decision. Next slide. So just to provide a little bit of background, um AI data centers, these are specialized facilities that house um IT infrastructure to train and deploy AI applications. They can range from very small facilities um well 10,000 square feet. And there can be certain areas where you might have a large site with multiple small facilities or a very large facility that can be on the order of acres. Um we also have highintensity computing facilities. So for example, quantum computing facilities that are also starting to come online and are raising similar questions of concern around um their impact on local resources and um the communities that surround them. And what we've seen across the country is that there's been a number of these AI data centers that have popped up where people have had people in the community have had um very little notification. They're not aware of what is actually coming into their neighborhoods until it's too late. Next slide. So some of the impacts that have been experienced by communities that have AI data centers um one is that they require a ton of electricity um some on the order of you know thousands of megawatts which are comparable to small cities um they have a high need for water for cooling uh which can have impact on water availability in communities. Again they can take up large footprints um that are incompatible with agriculture open space and just proximity to housing. um they have a lot of truck traffic that come in that can create a lot of noise um radiation from the uh the facilities um there's also been um issues around CO2 emissions from the facilities and air pollution around communities where they occur. Next slide. So, a couple of examples, there was one AI data center that was built down in Canton, Mississippi. And after this data center had been built, residents reported having lung issues, difficulty breathing, and construction dust um settled on their homes and and caused issues for them. And then in Stanton Springs, Georgia, after Meta created a 7750 million data center, neighbors water um slowly started drying up um due to the high amount of water draw and sediment buildup within the groundwater. Next slide. So, why Santa Cruz County? Um, we are a county that um is prided on our protection of the environment. We're an agricultural community. We have a lot of um ecosystems and habitats here that are unique to California. And when these facilities have come into other communities, they've had significant negative impacts on their environment. And so, um we think that this is compatible with much of the sentiments that people feel in Santa Cruz around land use. Next slide. So in the past uh we have taken these similar actions. Um for example um in 1986 measure A was passed by roughly 80% of the voters and what it allows for is for is that in order for there to be any land use change to support offshore oil or gas um it has to go to a vote of the people. We right now will have another opportunity to update that um ordinance back and it's going to be on the ballot. is measure D and that's going to expand um the u the regulations to include any facilities to support offshore seabed mining will now if it's approved uh we'll have to take a vote of the people um and what we're asking for is we're not having an outright ban right now on data centers but it's taken to the voters to see whether or not future changes future land use decisions around AI data centers should the people vote on that or should that be a decision made by the board and I will say that um you you know, Monterey Park down in LA, they became the first city where their residents voted uh to ban AI data centers. And Menescino County actually just passed a moratorium on new data centers um on September 2nd, 2026. Next slide. So, the ask today is for the board to um direct staff to work with the D3 office on ballot and ordinance language, return to the board with recommendations, including any additional actions identified through the research that we'll conduct. Um, and this supports our strategic plan goals around environmental stewardship, safe and sustainable community, civic engagement, and infrastructure and resource management. I'm happy to take any questions. >> Thank you. Um, with this item, I'm going to start by going to the public to see if there's any public comment and then I'll return to the board for questions and discussion. Is there anyone here who'd like to speak on this item? Welcome. Yeah, I think that this was a pretty good brief presentation and the stuff I heard when I wasn't in the room was pretty outstanding from you individuals and the stuff I heard when I was in the room earlier was pretty outstanding from you individuals particularly you definitely walk in a talk that is admirable but all of you today it's been pretty amazing. So the data centers, it's pretty kind of wild. Kind of ties into what caused me to publicly speak more than seven years ago. Why are we allowing military frequency weapons in civilian locations? So yeah, we have these centers that are going to do something with the data. You know, we have all of these many cell towers everywhere. This is the best military weapon I could find in 2023. still really love it. Um, but we're all kind of in this together and there seems like there's accurate information and there's a lot of misinformation with like let's say the water usage. I know flat out I worked for a client about 15 years ago that worked for Google installing um swamp coolers basically in data centers all over the world and so I don't know what to say about the water usage. I think there's some nefarious things going on. But, you know, to make the connection to China and people think that uh that's a communist country. No, it's a technocratic country and there's a distinct difference. There's a lot more cameras actually in the United States. So, do we really need all this surveillance? You know, there's new information out that youth are you're dramatically less vocabulary, much less verbal. Many of them are spending 70% of their days just looking into their phones and not really connecting with um life around them and each other. It's really quite harmful. So, I'm only here because I care and it was uh today was good you guys. Thank you. I appreciate it. >> Thank you. >> Hello. Uh Corey Ofor here. I work for ISD and spend most of my time pursuing responsible AI adoption efforts here at the county, but I'm coming to you today as a private individual to voice support for this item. Uh over the past several years, there have been good faith debates within many communities across the country about the merits of data centers. In the year 2026, um it's abundantly clear that the economic proposed benefits to these communities are vastly overstated. They are temporary and completely eclipsed by the externalities these facilities impose on the surrounding areas. I'm referring to the impacts to water quality, the increased utility costs, the noise pollution, and the many other subtle ways that people are being forced to subsidize big tech and didn't really have much say in the matter. The irony is that these aren't even profitable endeavors and I speculate they could be abandoned in the very near future um because they're just a part of a speculative investment loop that we call a bubble. Um this item would empower the people to have more of a say of what happens near the places that they live and work and go to school. And I think that that's a really powerful thing and a nice gesture that we are taking responsible AI adoption seriously here. To paraphrase the Wisconsin comedian and advocate Charlie Burns, opposition to data centers is the most bipartisan issue since beer. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. Any further comments in the room? Seeing none, Madam Clerk, is there anyone on the phone? >> I see no speakers online. Chair, >> thank you. I'll now return to the board for questions and discussion. Any comments? Supervisor Deserpa. >> Um, occasionally I watch a a program, I think it's out of Sacramento called Politics 360. I don't know if anybody ever has seen that. Um, but just last night's episode or maybe the night before. Um, I think it um what's his name? Rick Zurr. Uh, uh, he's a what is he? He's a senator, I think. Um anyway, he to his topic that he um was being interviewed on were I uh data centers and I apparently there's a bunch of legislation coming down from the state on the on this matter. Uh does it make sense to start working on this prior to whatever's coming down from the state? That's a question for Justin or for any staff. I mean I would say yes just because of the fact that um you know this would not preclude us being able to have an AI data center. It's going it's putting the question to the people if and when the land use decision land use changes need to be made to facilitate AI data centers do we allow that yes or no. And so if this goes to the voters and it fails it would mean that that decision will be made by the board. If it goes to the voters and it passes, then if there's a proposal for an AI data center, it would have to be it would go to a vote of the people to see whether or not we'd want to make the land use changes to allow for that to happen. So regardless of what the state decides, unless the state wants to take away our control, um which I think would then I don't know if Jason maybe you could weigh in on this, but if if we were to pass an ordinance and then the state comes and says similar to what they did with battery energy storage that local jurisdictions must allow these um would that what would that do to the ordinance if this were to pass? >> Yeah, it brings up preeemption concerns. Um, so it it's it's more of a we have to have to see it and I would have to see it and read it. Basically, sometimes the state when they adopt laws, they'll grandfather in um uh local jurisdictions legislative schemes like similar to what happened with the plastic bags would be a good example. Um but that's as much as I can tell you right now. Sometimes it sometimes it's preempted, sometimes it's not. >> Right. So, I mean, I think that moving forward right now, there wouldn't be any conflict with any of the state laws that are being decided on. >> That's true. >> Yeah. >> Supervisor Koig. >> Thank you, Chair. Um, thank you for bringing this proposal forward. Um, certainly, uh, data centers are large concern nationally. Um, are you aware of any specific proposal for Santa Cruz County that or you know or the possibility of one? >> If I if I was aware of any proposal, I would have probably brought forward a moratorum as well on this. Um, so no, I'm not aware of any particular proposal. However, there are areas of concern within the county and particularly in my district um where I could potentially see given the speed at which you know these data centers are coming in uh potential proposals. And so from my perspective it's trying to get ahead of the issue because if you know a purchase of a property have been made for this for the intent of creating a data center you it gets really hard to push back once the purchases have already been made and people start going down that route. So, this is an opportunity to kind of preempt uh any kind of proposal from coming into the county. >> Can you say anything more about areas that you think are have a high potential for data centers that you're concerned about? >> In particular, in my uh district, the the sex cement plant. >> Okay. Um I mean in my mind I do not see this as a high risk for our community. I mean think about for example the places where we are seeing hypers scale data centers go in. I mean Georgia for example they have a pretty radically different cost of land and cost of building situation than we do. Now of course closer to home there there are data centers going in uh around San Jose but they have radically different uh electricity infrastructure. And so I think that I I see this as a pretty low risk for our community because the cost of installing that infrastructure, the cost of building a data center here with local labor, uh the cost of the land, um is just extraordinarily high given that at the end of the day, you know, data center in Georgia can still provide uh utility to people here in Santa Cruz pretty much just as as well as as one that's actually here. So um in contrast I think that there might be some dare I say opportunity for smaller data centers. I mean what if UCSC wanted to build some kind of micro data center. I'd even heard of um had a NASA scientist approach me who was talking about a very interesting co-gener co-generation model uh where he proposed using a micro data center uh and of course what data centers produce in spades is heat uh and so he suggested using that heat as an input actually for recycling water or converting brackish water to fresh water through reverse osmosis technology uh that the the energy cost of that goes way down when you're dealing with hot water. So the idea would be to take the brackish water, heat it by running it through the data center uh and now all of a sudden you basically have free fresh water uh and then also using the you know waste heat from the data center to speed up um you know composting uh organics associated with a waste facility. So I mean there's actually all sorts of potentially compelling uses for micro data centers. And so I just I don't see a strong threat from this today. We have our staff has their work cut out for them with a lot of issues to deal with. And so I mean everything has a cost. There's nothing free. And so I I I'm reluctant to direct staff to dedicate time to I think what I would quantify as a pretty low threat and you know ultimately create impediments to potentially some uh good uses of um of data center technology in our community. >> Do you have any comments? >> Uh I have a couple questions. So, um, it sounds like there isn't one proposed at this time that we know of. That's correct, staff. Um, what, this is maybe another question for staff. If somebody wanted to establish a data center, um, am I, what would be the process? I understand it'd be pretty lengthy process. Good afternoon. Stephanie Hansen, assistant director. So, there's a a couple of zones where with some interpretation it may be possible to do this um under the code and that's in our public facility zones or our um industrial zones. So, that's a possibility. And um and one of those possibilities are that the planning director says this use is pretty similar to the other uses in this zone and has some discretion in the code to move it forward. We'd have to look more closely to say um to really know what the process would be. it has to go to the planning commission for a conditional use permit maybe or or the board in some of the um heavier cases especially where you're trying to do something that's kind of outside of what the zone is really for. Um so we you know if we ever got something like this in we would have them come in for a um a pre-development consultation really talk about what the process is. um if we sense um uh that there are environmental impacts and you saw some of the issues that um Supervisor Cummings uh brought up today, we would probably be looking at an EIR uh for that for that work. Um we don't have anything in the code that specifically regulates this. So, it's it's an interpretation if we were to um allow it in. Um and then after the EIR, we'd be looking at potentially permits or maybe a code change to to facilitate it one way or the other. It be a longer process for sure. >> I mean, in best case, how how much time would that take? and then in more likely >> um so hard to say always depends on where the applicant is in providing but anytime you need to go through an EIR you're talking about a year >> okay >> at a minimum >> thanks um and similar to supervisor Dura's question I've also heard um for example Congressperson Licardo talking about bringing something um some legislation to regulate data centers. Um, it's also obviously a topic of conversation at the state level. Um, how are you factoring in any of those changes into the timeliness of bringing this forward? Well, it's very I mean those types of regulatory changes are, you know, very well happening and there's conversations being had, but this really is saying that we want to give the people in our community the the decision when it comes to making land use changes to facilitate these data centers. So, you know, the and the other piece of it is that this isn't again an outright ban. What this is saying is that if and when that there's a time and there's a project that comes forward and it the people feel that's compatible with the community, then they just get they get to vote on making that decision. It doesn't come down to, you know, five individuals on the board, right? Um so regardless of where things go and if the technology improves over time and people want to vote to allow for AI data to come here, they get to make that decision. This isn't saying that you can never have a data center in Santa Cruz. It's really saying that the land use change to allow for the data centers has to be voted on by the people and in particular this is giving the voters the decision do they want to have that decision-making authority. We've already done it for onshore oil and gas and this would just be something similar to that effort. Um and it would still have to go to the voters for approval. So um partly why and I will say that I did meet with staff prior to putting this on the agenda. We did have conversations. Part of the reason why I'm not moving forward with a ban today is because um our CDI director had expressed that it would take a lot of time and it would take a lot of staff time in order to move forward with making the general plan amendments. This was this approach is um a comprom a huge compromise for me um just given our fiscal situation and really you know I would be likely working with probably some staff from IT probably a few folks from planning and then mostly with our county council to draft the language a lot of which has been done by other communities and we can pull from those communities to kind of pull something together but the fact that we have this eight hour rule in terms of working with staff I wanted to bring this forward to the board so I could see if the board is wanting us to use what probably won't be a whole lot of staff time to pull something together um that would then come back to us in February to determine if we want to put that on the ballot for 2028. Thanks. Um continuing with my questions, I mean I think first of all I want to acknowledge that um AI data centers as they stand today is not a very controversial topic and that I mean we can all acknowledge the environmental impact and um you know it's it's it's very timely and it's very present in media today. Um, where where I'm pausing is that it's an evolution. It's a technology that is evolving and the conversations that we're having today are different than the conversations we're having 5 years ago and different than what we'll be having perhaps in 5 10 15 years. And when we put together um something like um this ordinance change that um really changes the way land use decisions are made in a county that that u often could be forever. These are these are long-term decisions based on something that right now is very emerging and new and I don't and personally as a policy maker I don't feel like I know enough about data centers. Um I I would actually would be interested more in a study session to learn more about um where the technology is going. Uh it might even be too early to do that. I think that study session in a year from now might be different than it would be today even because the technology is evolving so quickly. Um, and so my my question is if if we wanted to move forward as you're suggesting with a ballot measure in 28, um, what what would be the latest timeline to make that decision to put it on there? Um, we we don't need to make that decision today, I understand. Um, do you have any sense of when that because even if even if we brought this forward in fall of 27, a year from now, this conversation could be very different because what we're learning about whether super I've heard the word micro center for the first time today or any other sort of um changing technology. Well, I can say I mean that's why the direction is having staff work with us so that we can come up with the appropriate definitions and you know be able to inform the board about you know why why we landed on the specific language that we're going to be recommending. So this is you know getting the direction from the board is going to allow us to actually have these opportunities to bring information back. Um it's going to we're going to you know go through informing how we landed on the ballot language, what it's intended to do, what it's intended not to do. I mean, but you know, in order for us to be able to work with staff and start moving ahead on this, that's why I'm bringing this forward today. It could be that we get to, you know, a um, you know, ballot item and the board doesn't like it and they decide they don't want to put on the ballot. Um, but I've heard from a number of people about this being a concern and people wanting us to do something about it before it's an issue for us. And so that's why I've been, you know, worked to bring this recommendation to the board today. Supervisor Koig. >> Yeah, thank you, Chair. I mean, I appreciate that you've outlined a path for us here that we could take action on. Um, particularly if there was an actual uh an actual threat. Um, I think that was the case with Monterey Park um in Los Angeles that there was actually like a four football field uh size data center proposed and then they mobilized pretty quickly in order to to stop that. And so I mean to your question I believe the last day you know which would be 88 days before the March 7th 2028 election it's actually like December 10th 2027. So um I'd be inclined to you particularly because you said it wouldn't take a ton of time. We could use some of the model ordinances etc in order to prepare something if if we needed to respond to particularly to an actual proposal. So, I'd be inclined to wait a little bit, see where some of the state and federal policy uh changes evolve over the over the coming months. Um, and sort of keep this one in our back pocket. >> Further comments. >> Do you want to make a motion perhaps? >> I mean, I'm going to move the recommended actions because that's kind of where I'm leaning. I mean, for bringing this forward. So, >> I um Well, I guess we have a motion. Do we have a second? >> Well, I'll second it. >> I um would say I feel similar. I think that um because we don't have a urgent need in this moment, um I'm I'm eager to learn more. Um, it would be helpful to ask staff or ISD at some point to come forward with further information so we can make informed land use decisions and policy decisions and determine whether or not that's something that is best suited to stay before the board or going to the voters is the route that we want to take. Um, but you know, uh, I guess it it's just, um, I don't feel like I have enough information to make that direction today. Can I say something? Um, thank you for bringing this idea forward. Um, I think uh right now it is sort of the um item dour um that people are looking at nationwide and I can understand people's sort of hysteria about wanting to make sure that this never happens. I mean, I feel in a similar way um you know, about the best facility going in in a populated area of hardworking, you know, Latino people um in very near very sensitive habitats, right? and we just had the whole Moss Landing fire and I sat through the Moss Landing Marine Lab um presentations where PhD after PhD came in front of a giant group of people and told us about all the harm they think that potentially is happening there with the heavy metals that they found everywhere in the Slooh. Um, so well I I I feel similar to Monica and Manu in that I just don't know enough about AI data centers or any data center um to make this sort of sweeping decision and because we have extra time I I would like to do some more research on it and you know potentially have a study session where we get all of the facts. I'd also like to know I know that in many communities um this is a serious economic development matter as well because there's money that is right I think there's money to be made for counties so um not that that is I mean our county has a very limited general fund and I understand that um there could be opportunity there is all I'm saying. So um so I think I would like to hear more about um AI data centers uh in a study session if we could bring that forward. >> So we have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? Madam clerk, will you call the role? Supervisor Dura? >> No. >> Koig, >> no. >> Hernandez, >> I. >> Cummings, >> I. >> And Martinez, >> no. Motion fails three to two. Any further discussion on this item? No. All right, that concludes our agenda today. So, we will adjourn our meeting and I believe our next meeting is 9:00 a.m. September 29th. Is that right? September 29th. Motion uh meeting adjourned. Seriously.