Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisor 10/8/19

 

All right, Hi good morning, everybody and welcome to the October 8th, 2019 Board of Supervisors meeting. I’m going to call the meeting to order and ask the clerk to call the roll Clerk Good morning Supervisor Leopold John Here Friend Here: Clerk Caput Supervisor, McPherson Bruce Here Clerk And Chair Coonerty Hi here.

 

So I’m going to now ask you to join me in a moment of silence and the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge 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 All right.

 

Now we have a consideration of late additions to the agenda and additions and deletions to the consent and regular agendas Mr Palacios, do we have some late additions? Yes, we have a late addition.

 

Today, By 4 5 votes consider the addition of late item ID number 7929 to the consent agenda relating to the establishment of a technical advisory committee to participate in the County Counsel recruitment process, as outlined in the memorandum of the County Administrative Officer.

 

This is board memo 7928 and then there’s establishing a technical advisory committee to participate in the County Counsel.

 

Recruitment process Take related actions, as recommended by the Personnel Director Board memo printout 7929 Great.

 

So I’m going to ask for a motion to add this John.

 

I will make that motion to add this item to the agenda.

 

Second, A motion by Leopold and a second by Friend, All those in favor. Please say: aye Board Members Aye Opposed that passes unanimously.

 

I guess that becomes item number 41 on our consent agenda.

 

Are there any other additions or deletions On the regular agenda? We have a correction on the item number.

 

11.

 

The item should read public hearing to consider resolution amending the General Plan, Local Coastal Program, Public Safety Element, Conservation and Open Space Element and CEQA Notice of Exemption determination, Ordinance amending Santa Cruz County Code Chapters, 16 10 Geologic Hazards, 16 13 Floodplain Regulations, 16 20 Grading Regulations, And 16 22 Erosion Control Continue the Board of Supervisors public hearing to November 5 2019 and take related actions as outlined in the memorandum of the Planning Director And then on the consent agenda.

 

On number 19, we have additional materials revised attachment, and A replacement packet page 675.

 

That concludes the corrections to the agenda.

 

Great Now, I’m going to ask my fellow board members.

 

If they have any items, they’d like to remove from the consent agenda and put onto the regular agenda Yeah Mr Chair, I’d like to remove item number 37 from the consent agenda.

 

Okay, so we’ll take item number 37, which is accepted, and file a report on the proposed, affordable housing guidelines and make that item number. 9.

 

1.

 

Okay, We’re now moving on to item number five.

 

This is a public comment.

 

This is an opportunity for members of the public to speak to us about any items that are not on today:’s agenda but are within the purview of the Board of Supervisors, Also items that are on our consent agenda on our closed session agenda.

 

And if you cannot stay because you have to get to work or you have another obligation for a regular agenda item, this is also your opportunity to speak on those items, I ask you to please line up and we’ll do two minutes each Good Morning, gentlemen, I am the Right Reverend Joseph Eden, I’ll be taking less than two minutes.

 

I’d like to speak a parable to you.

 

Then one of the Pharisees, whose name was Gamaliel a teacher of the law and honored by all the people, rose and ordered them to take the apostles outside for a little while, Then he said to them.

 

Men of Israel take heed to yourselves and find out what is best for you to do about these men.

 

This is a parable Before these days rose, Thaddeus boasted himself to be a great man, and he failed Other men failed. So now I tell you keep away from these men and let them alone, for if this thought and this work is of men, it will fail and pass away.

 

But if it be of God, you cannot suppress it lest perchance, you find yourselves standing in opposition to God And they listened to him and they called those followers and scourged them and sent them away.

 

There are six parables in the Gospel of Matthew.

 

This parable is about Second Story Respite.

 

I rest my case.

 

Thank you, Ryan.

 

Thank you.

 

Good morning supervisors.

 

My name is Kristen Peterson and I know many of you from my work on the Capitola City Council, but today I’m here before you as the senior associate of government relations for the Silicon Valley, Leadership Group I’m here this morning to invite You to our 15th annual Applied Materials, Silicon Valley, Turkey, Trot, which was founded and is directed by our Silicon Valley, Leadership Group Foundation.

 

The goal that we have this year is Mission, One Million. As you know, there’s a tremendous need in our region, and our goal is to donate 1 million from this year.’s race alone to five regional, nonprofits that help local families in need.

 

One of those nonprofits is the Second Harvest Food Bank of Santa Cruz County To put our ambitious goal in perspective.

 

For the last five years, we’ve donated annually between 905,000 and 936,000 to five nonprofits.

 

We’d like to close the gap this year and reach one million.

 

One of the ways that we can accomplish.

 

This goal is, with your help, through our Sand: Hill Property Company’s Mayor 39’s Cup, Community Challenge, This rewards mayors, council members, city managers, and supervisors who participate and register in our race, either in person or through our remote runners category.

 

So if you celebrate Thanksgiving, you have a meal, you take a lap around the block with your family, your participation counts.

 

We’ll also be providing points for outreach from you and the board outreach is included in newsletters e, newsletters, and social media.

 

To your constituents, I will be leaving behind some points scoring sheets for you, as well as some flyers and some handouts for your reference.

 

I want to. Thank you all for your service to our community and I hope that you will join us for the Silicon Valley.

 

Turkey Trot Thank you.

 

Thank you so much And thank you for providing the remote option where you don’t have to run That’s, my favorite kind Hi.

 

My name is Tony Crane, Aptos resident here in objection to the peer respite program that was implemented in our neighborhood.

 

So last week many of the neighbors came in and expressed their objections as well.

 

But what was clear is that we are not opposed to the program itself.

 

We are not questioning whether it is effective or not, It is where it is and how it was implemented.

 

I’m going to read you the last sentence of an email from Pam Rogers Wyman to members of Encompass.

 

I know where you’re losing the ability to move into the neighborhood and not alert neighbors to the program by moving forward with the licensing process.

 

But we don’t have a choice. I picked this because you don’t have to know anything about it, to understand that that’s wrong It’s, unethical.

 

This is a week after the program the purchase closed, escrow They own the property.

 

They had not informed the Board of Supervisors.

 

They didn’t inform anybody about this program that was mandated to be eight beds, which means that it had to go through a public hearing level, and five permit reviews and they lied throughout.

 

To avoid that.

 

So we’ve been coming to you.

 

You have these emails.

 

This comes from an internal email, We’ve, given them all to you.

 

This is the least damning of them, but I chose it because you don’t have to know anything about it.

 

To understand that right, there is intent to deceive, So I’m just telling you now we’ve given you multiple options throughout these two years to do the right thing and you’ve chosen not to with all this information at your hand. So you have become complicit timer buzzes, Giving you fair warning and now take what you get.

 

Thank you Hello.

 

I’m Carol Williamson.

 

I’m here on behalf of all of the family members who have a loved one with a serious mental illness.

 

Parents, siblings, friends, and spouses, We appreciate so much every single bed that is available in our county to help our loved ones.

 

As you know, there’s an extreme shortage.

 

We should be increasing the number of beds in all types of levels of care and we cannot afford to lose anything Second Story has been phenomenal in its ability to help people get back on their feet.

 

I lost my son to suicide and I see the importance of finding connections the way that happens at Second Story.

 

People find each other, They avoid hospitalization homelessness, and jail, and families are grateful.

 

So I ask you to resolve the problems that have been occurring in the neighborhood and move forward. Keeping Second Story.

 

Thank you.

 

Thank you Good morning, my name:’s, Xaloc Cabanes.

 

I love Santa Cruz and I have the honor of working as the Chair of the Mental Health Advisory Board I’m joined by other members today and I’m here to talk about two things: One.

 

We got the tour of the South County facility that has just been opened.

 

It is beautiful.

 

Thank you.

 

Thank you for putting services in South County, making it a priority, and helping to end the stigma when it comes to accessing and being able to access behavioral health.

 

In that vein, we also wrote a letter and I can’t stay to the end, but the very end, J of your agenda.

 

We submitted a letter and basically addressed the Oh now I’m blanking Great Wording The wording to the Strategic Strategic plan. You guys rock thank you And the wording.

 

Your strategic plan is inclusive.

 

It’s equitable.

 

It’s awesome.

 

But when it comes to the behavioral health piece, it says to support residents and lessen community impacts through increased access to integrated mental health, substance use disorder, and healthcare services, And we’d like to see that changed to support residents and improve community impacts.

 

It’s more inclusive and equitable, and in line with the rest of your strategic plan, Thank you.

 

So much and again, Santa Cruz is awesome.

 

Chairman Coonerty supervisors, Gary Richard Arnold.

 

What I continue to see is the movement Building a parallel government.

 

I was at the last AMBAG meeting. I was the only one to attend out of 13 cities in three counties.

 

There was no TV coverage and the local newspaper is shockingly terrible about it.

 

The other thing that the newspapers don’t mention is this parallel government, that building is pushed by a couple of networks.

 

One is California Forward and CALCOG, and there are also numerous fifth columnists dispersed throughout the network, including this county building itself.

 

These are interns and so-called fellows who influence your decision rather than the voters.

 

One of the national parallel governments is the Atlantic Council.

 

Stephen Hadley is one of the vice presidents, together with Leon Panetta.

 

As a director, Stephen Hadley is a member of a secret society called Quill and Dagger with a dagger through the head, and this also includes Eric Swalwell.

 

He also belongs to that same society as part of Adam Schiff,’s intelligence committee.

 

Also, there’s a fun page article about Adam Schiff,’s, gay lover, claims of abuse. We don’t hear that in our local newspaper.

 

Nor do we hear about the American Report headline CIA assets killed in China after Leon Panetta takes over CIA New York Times says the damage to the American intelligence was described as crippling and of historic proportions.

 

Leon Panetta is the co-founder of California Forward, and you maintain two monuments to this communist espionage agent.

 

You are under the Panetta machine and you propose continually supporting these parallel governments that are involved in this so-called coup.

 

It turns out that Adam Smith -‘s, the fellow who went to Ukraine, also came from the Atlantic Union.

 

You’ll have more details in the information I have here for you, Hello, Board of Supervisors.

 

Thank you very much for hearing me.

 

I am very grateful for Second Story, Respite House being a part of the Santa Cruz County community.

 

This community would not be the same without Second Story, because it has a whole lot to offer to each person that steps into this place.

 

Second Story may seem like just another mental health facility, but the truth of the matter is, that it is unique in that it is peer-run, unlike other mental facilities. I cannot express how safely I feel while being here, I can confidently say that I am very pleased with how this place has helped me to live such a life of gratitude.

 

I believe that this community needs more places like Second Story because then people can see that one is not alone within the community and the mental health stigma can be overcome with the help of others who are going through the same or similar situations while Being at Second Story as a former guest, it’s not just a place of physical healing, but it’s also a place where people can get emotional healing too, and it’s also a place where people can feel safe and be able to be part of a community that they never thought would have existed in their life As a former guest.

 

I’m very grateful for Second Story and I’m honored to be a part of the community here.

 

Thank you very much Board of Supervisors.

 

Thank you for the opportunity to speak and thank you for all the work you are doing to combat climate change Exhibit number one.

 

Is this wonderful quilt that was made by students on September 20th? As you can see, they are very aware and very concerned about the problem, and we owe it to them to do a lot of everything possible Further to that.

 

We started collecting signatures on that day and in the last since September 20th, we’ve collected 465 signatures At the top.

 

It says I support zero carbon emissions by 2030 reduced vehicle emissions, limited single-use, plastic, facilitated food, waste reduction, and take other steps as needed, And we’d like to be talking to staff about various detailed ideas.

 

There are 465 signatures in here, which I will pass on to somebody.

 

Yes, I just wanted to say that we face a possible shutdown of our electricity because of the dry conditions high winds, and the fire risk in the Santa Cruz Mountains. All of us in Santa Cruz County will be potentially impacted by the climate chaos.

 

We depend on government officials to enact new policies to limit emissions and our continuing acceleration toward uncontrolled warming Extinction.

 

Rebellion is on the streets.

 

Santa Cruz Climate Action Network is promoting Zero Carbon 2030.

 

A campaign for sustainable transportation is working to change the use of single-occupancy vehicles.

 

We are depending on you to change policies.

 

These policies involve transportation, land use, electrification of buildings, and an end to a single use.

 

Plastics and support of regenerative agriculture to absorb carbon, The clock is ticking.

 

Our time is running out.

 

Humanity has never been in this situation before. Thank you.

 

Thank you, And hopefully you all are aware of items 23 and 24 on our agenda today, where the county is committing to being carbon neutral by 2030, and then we’re trying to establish a Climate Action Manager here at the county to help move those items Forward Woman In Plaid Shirt – Thank you for that.

 

My name is Carol Long.

 

I’m also with the Climate Action Network, and I’ve been arranging meetings with individual supervisors and would like to have one with Supervisor McPherson and with Supervisor Friend and Supervisor Caput.

 

Mr Coonerty and Leopold have already met with us.

 

We have specific things that we want to ask of you and suggestions that we want to make, And we think it would be fruitful to have face-to-face meetings About half a dozen of us come because it requires several of us to cover our subjects.

 

So I have a message to you, Mr. McPherson, to try to get a meeting, and I hope that you will oblige us – and I hope also that Mr. Friend will meet with us as well.

 

And I do want to point out that county operations being being carbon neutral by 2030 is a very good thing, but that we would like the entire county, not just the operations of the government to become carbon neutral by 2030.

 

Thank you, Board.

 

Chair Brent Adams of the Warming Center Program, I want to talk about Watsonville Warming Center. Maybe you know why the warming center came into being because we have had traditionally a cap of a hundred shelter beds in Santa Cruz at the armory, then a different regime of control with Associations, Faith Communities, Homeless, and Services Centers, and now, finally, Salvation Army.

 

We started last year in Santa Cruz, with a paltry 50 shelter beds and we didn’t open any more until March Warming Center doubled down and opened up twice ready for twice the number of nights For twice the number of people we stand ready.

 

Now We’ve completed our second year.

 

In Watsonville There was a Salvation Army, shelter there Again 30 beds, maxing out, when cold weather hits and we activate, we have 50 people All the people who don’t make it into Salvation Army.

 

They don’t even have a street activation team.

 

There We’ve been working without a hitch.

 

We are revolutionizing a shelter in Santa Cruz by instituting cleaning protocols and putting the highest priority on people with physical mobility.

 

If you don’t put a highest priority, they fall to the wayside and they become the lowest priority.

 

I want you to know that you’ve cut funding without a vote for Watsonville Warming Center.

 

This year We’re still going to try to operate it on our shoestring budget because it saves lives, and reduces hypothermia. But I was told by Rainy Mar former name that I shouldn’t be emailing you and that I should only be going through her, but I need to email, you and you need to look into the Watsonville Warming Center now because we have a desperate need in Watsonville.

 

For a warming center program, We’re completing our fifth year this year in Santa Cruz.

 

We are now focusing on the needs base.

 

As you know, the Homeless Services Center has changed its name to Housing Matters.

 

We were changing our name to Day and Night Services Center because we’re offering way more services than the Homeless Services Center has been offering for the last few years.

 

Look for your email from Brent Adams.

 

Okay, Thank you.

 

We need to talk about this Good morning.

 

My name is Becky Steinbruner.

 

I’m a resident of rural Aptos, and this morning spent the morning getting my family and home ready for a power shut-off and possible wildland fire. So I want to speak to you about that and ask you again to fund County Fire.

 

I think that maybe at your next meeting, you’ll be looking at the possibility of raising a new tax on rural residents, and I urge you to fund County Fire with the money that the county has 18 million a year rolled in here from the State Proposition 172 Money for Public Safety, County Fire gets zero, zero of the public safety money, 18 million, and you want to raise a tax and you sold Measure G last year on funding fire and zero of Measure.

 

G will go to fire at least to County Fire That’s wrong, and I’m asking you, in the face of a red flag, warning to fund County Fire using the money that is amply available to you now.

 

I also want to just protest on consent, agenda item 18 spending 90 000 for two new vehicles on the FIT program that did get funded with Measure G, That’s a pilot program and we’re buying two new vehicles.

 

For that, I don’t think that’s wise And I support a Climate Action Manager if they do a good job.

 

I’d like to see their job description and see what they would do.

 

Would it be just a de facto position to get grant money, or are they going to do something for our county to get it going? I hope they recommend replanting the trees around the county building that were cut down In my last few minutes here.

 

I want to just say next Thursday, in honor of the anniversary of the 30-year Loma Prieta earthquake, I’m going to be filing 90 binders, like this, with the Superior Court for the legal action against Oak Hill Creek Water.

 

This county only allows administrative records to be lodged in hard copy.

 

Thank you. That is incredible for an environmental county to require paper only 90 binders.

 

Thank you Yay.

 

Thank you, Becky.

 

My name is Monica McGuire.

 

I live in Corralitos now I’ve lived in Santa Cruz for 22 years and I was quite horrified to see that today,’s agenda packet is thousands of pages.

 

The hundreds of pages are bad enough difficult enough.

 

My heart goes out to every one of the people on staff and each of you for having to look at such a ridiculous amount of paperwork for, if not the smallest geographic county in the state.

 

We know that we are not large in numbers either and it’s ridiculous.

 

Also, I want to call attention to this incredible lineup of people we all just listened to again, Most of them saying, despite our knowledge, our gray hair proves our ability to say.

 

Please listen more to what we’re saying. Now.

 

We have only two minutes to speak.

 

Now.

 

We don’t have constituent meetings regularly where we can show up and give our help.

 

You need our help when there are so many issues here that make no sense.

 

The one I’m, choosing to speak on specifically today is the purchase of a Tek84 machine, Those machines that they have at the airports which, if you listen and talk to the people who work at the airports who run people through them, they used to say.

 

Oh, no, they’re perfectly safe.

 

We’ve been told they’re perfectly safe, all along, But now they’re not so sure because they’re all getting so sick.

 

I’m a true healthcare provider.

 

My husband is an MD with electrical engineering and bioengineering masters. He is one of the people right here who’s offered himself as most of these people are offering themselves to assist you.

 

This purchase for 200,000 is instead of asking people to pat down the people who go through the jail.

 

This kind of a machine is when you have millions of people going through and you’ve thrown away care about their health.

 

In the same way, this country is throwing away care about the idea that we are economically and ecologically combined.

 

We are not requiring that Becky Steinbruner, the heroine, who does everything she can for everyone in this county, has to file 90 binders of paperwork.

 

There are so many people in this room who have come and given you their time and care, You need it.

 

Please have more evening constituent meetings, Please do a better job of taking our help Ryan.

 

Thank you Monica And please take my notes.

 

Thank you for this 200.

 

000. Unnecessary expense.

 

Thank you.

 

Thank you.

 

Your time’s up Please come forward.

 

You can bend it down towards Yeah there Good morning, supervisors, I want to start by just acknowledging you all and also the staff and everyone in this room.

 

I mean I am inspired by this county and by the collaboration that is here the spirit of collaboration and I’m, also very inspired by the fact that people run for office when it’s such a hard position to be in.

 

I am Beth Love.

 

I am here with the Santa Cruz Climate Action Network and also with Eat for the Earth, and I want to address the board about the idea of carbon neutral by 2030, particularly, I want to focus on a class of emissions that is most likely to be Left out of county and city plans when climate action plans are made, and that is, consumption-based emissions, particularly around the food that we eat – And I know it’s a hard thing to wrestle with and to try to figure out how to decrease the emissions Related to the foods that we eat, but I know that it is possible and that there are jurisdictions that are taking measures, and I will be approaching all of you individually with my group Eat for the Earth to talk more about this.

 

Thank you.

 

Thank you. This will be our final speaker, Marilyn Garrett and wireless radiation has biological harmful effects period.

 

It’s not debatable related to all kinds of illnesses, neurological problems, heart problems And when you put up these cell towers and distribute the antenna systems and small cells in the public right of way, You can have one too.

 

Thank you.

 

Thank you.

 

You are endangering the public and you have been provided data over the years and now we have 5G coming And I gave you the DVD called 5G Apocalypse, The Extinction Event And it starts – and I’ve read this before.

 

But this is a minuscule amount of time compared to the millions of advertisements and hours.

 

Verizon has filled everybody’s minds with It’s important to understand what 5G is doing and what they say it.’s doing We’re, told on the IEEE Beamforming document that this technology cooks your eyes like eggs in World War II.

 

We all need to understand these are military weapons.

 

These are not solved frequencies.

 

If you know nothing more than that that’s, what you need to know It’s microwave radiation warfare That’s, what it is You were given a document called The International Appeal to Stop 5G on Earth and in Space. I urge you to attend what I said, we’re also having an event on the 20th at the Resource Center for Nonviolence Help to Stop 5G.

 

It’s on the 20th at 6, 30 and Dr Karl Maret is a featured speaker.

 

Thank you.

 

Thank you.

 

I’ll bring it back for board action on today.’s consent agenda.

 

These are items 13 through 41, with the additions and deletions that were made earlier.

 

I’d just like to comment on some.

 

They also already pulled the one 37.

 

I’d like to thank the Chair Coonerty for bringing this item forward regarding the Housing Authority’s preference for families.

 

If the Housing Authority agrees to implement this proposal, I’d be curious to see how big a difference it can make in getting homeless families placed in Section 8 vouchers. We can’t require a report back from the Housing Authority, but perhaps we could request a report about the policy if it’s implemented and just get a report back on what that includes and how it’s going to be implemented.

 

It has been mentioned.

 

Regarding the concerns about climate change and what’s happening, I would say that Santa Cruz County has been at the forefront of addressing these impacts of climate change for many years now, And these two items reaffirm leadership in this regard.

 

I look forward to hearing about the plans to establish a Climate Action Manager and I think it’s going to be a great position.

 

It’ll be a very proactive position because that’s the way we’re going to, make it to get the county to carbon neutrality well in advance of the state goals, and we are on our way to doing that.

 

As I speak.

 

On item number 31, they got a gun violence reduction program pilot program.

 

I want to thank the sheriff’s office for putting this item forward as a harm reduction effort to our community.

 

I support providing additional resources to ensure people who are prohibited from having firearms.

 

Don’t end up receiving them. It’s a really important goal that we have, and I want to thank the sheriff for that On item 33, the Smart Path for Homelessness.

 

I want to thank the Human Services Department for the progress report.

 

I’m glad that we have exceeded our assessment goals, but we have to acknowledge that we have to work on some referrals on actual placement.

 

There’s one line that really did strike me and it says, However, without an increase in the capacity of all housing program types and especially those that meet the needs of the most vulnerable persons experiencing homelessness.

 

Smart Path will be unable to refer the majority of persons who complete an assessment to a housing program.

 

This tells me not only do we need to continue our efforts to improve our coordination and governance in this matter for homeless services in our county, which we’re going to be discussing later today, but we need to increase housing units for the most vulnerable.

 

I think we all agree on that.

 

We know that This has to continue to be one of our most critical priorities, and I might mention that, as a member of the executive committee of the California State Association of Counties, we had our executive committee meeting at Aptos.

 

This last week the question was asked: what is the most important issue that’s facing you now And everyone raised their hand.

 

It was homelessness. It’s a huge problem.

 

It’s a very difficult one: to get your arms around to have a real final solution to it.

 

It’s going to, take a cooperative effort, and I’m, looking forward to seeing what we can do to ease this crisis that we have in this county and throughout this state.

 

Thank you, Chair.

 

Thank you Supervisor Leopold Good morning Chair Just a couple of items to comment on On item number 23 appreciate the work of my colleagues in recommending the county become a carbon-neutral institution by 2030.

 

I think this is an important first step Woman.

 

I can’t hear you Is your mic on?

 

Is it on It?’s, usually not in this spot.

 

So maybe I just need to get closer To item number 23, which is about making the county a carbon-neutral institution by 2030.

 

I think this is an important first step, and I appreciate the efforts of my colleagues to bring this to the fore on item number 24, which is directing the CAO to investigate establishing a Climate Action Manager. I want to thank my colleague Supervisor McPherson for his support and I hope we have the support of the entire board.

 

Our county has done a lot to reduce emissions.

 

We also have to start preparing for adaptation strategies because as good as we will be about reducing emissions and becoming carbon neutral, we know that the effects of climate change are real, that sea level rise will happen and we’ve seen the impacts of devastating fires And so what we can do to be prepared for the changing nature of the clime it’s gon na, be an important part of this job.

 

On item number 33 about the Smart Path to Housing and Health, we will be talking about the Focus Strategy report in a little bit more detail.

 

I appreciate getting this report and it’s clear that this is an important tool, but it’s not a silver bullet in the sense that it will solve our problems.

 

It helps us direct folks and make sure that we’re helping and prioritizing those most in need, and I appreciate the hard work of the staff to make that happen.

 

That’s all Okay Supervisor Friend.

 

Thank you Chair.

 

A couple of brief comments.

 

Again, on item 24, to echo what my colleagues said and also to add the fact that this did come forward, also as a suggestion from our Commission on the Environment who have been advocating for this, I think that that’s an important position for the county To have, especially in a pretty broad sense, We have an item later on in the agenda today that deals with sea level rise guidance and there’s a remarkable amount of damage that was done to local roads a few years ago, associated with climate change. The position can be pretty broad and I’m confident that it’s a role that will do well within our county from several planning perspectives.

 

I’d also like to thank the staff, specifically the Director of Public Works for his work.

 

Item number 38, which is the La Selva Beach Library project, is an item that had a lot of complexities to it, but has moved forward and stayed on time, and the community of La Selva and the library its office is closed.

 

Right now for the renovations for the community of La Selva, which just a few years ago, thought that they were going to lose the library altogether, That was saved.

 

Now we passed a measure, they can get a remodel, Their community center, slash library they view as a community center will be something that they have had a remarkable amount of input in, and I appreciate the county’s work to ensure that this happens Within just about the next six months, so thank you to the Deputy CAO Director of Public Works for the La Selva Beach Library project.

 

Thank you Just a couple of brief comments.

 

On item number 22.

 

This is the item.

 

I brought forward to ask the Housing Authority to give preferences when they come up with vouchers for families.

 

There are 59 unsheltered families. According to the Focus Strategies report representing 133 children.

 

The homelessness crisis that we’re facing can be overwhelming.

 

I believe, with some focused attention and working with organizations like the Housing Authority and nonprofit partners, we could end family homelessness in Santa Cruz County, As we all know.

 

Not only is that the correct moral thing to do, but given the data that shows that trauma experienced by children has lifelong health education and economic impacts, I believe this would be a good investment for our community and I’m hopeful that we can work With the Housing Authority to increase this preference On item number 23, that the carbon neutrality for the county as an institution by 2030.

 

I know we want to do more.

 

I was inspired last week watching the young people from across this county march and demand action from the older generations for their future and their children’s future.

 

This county has more than a hundred buildings, and 2,400 employees.

 

Several large institutions, If we can – and we’ve – already reduced it significantly.

 

But if we were able to get to zero that’s, the equivalent of tens of thousands of cars every year coming off our roads alone and we can work with our partners And it shows other institutions in this community that it can be done.

 

And it can be done in a way that benefits not only the environment but also the workers and residents And then also from an economic point of view. I believe that we will end up saving enormous amounts of money on our power and other costs by getting smart in how we deal with our emissions and reducing those by 2030.

 

If not sooner, then I appreciate my colleagues for bringing a Climate Action Manager position per the Commission on the Environment’s recommendation as a way to make sure we manage this going forward and do our part to address this global crisis. Is there action or is there a motion on the consent agenda? I will move the consent agenda as amended Second Motion by Leopold.

 

Second, by Friend, all those in favor, please say: Board Members Aye Opposed that passes unanimously.

 

We will now move on to item number seven.

 

This is a jurisdictional hearing to consider an appeal of application number 181132 to amend the Animal Services Master Plan, as outlined in the memorandum of the Planning Director Good morning.

 

Good morning, Good morning, board, Annette Olson of the Planning Department will be giving you the presentation, and she is the Co Principal Planner for Development Review in the Planning Department Good morning Supervisors.

 

This is the jurisdictional hearing for the appeal of the Planning Commission.’s decision to approve Is your.

 

Is that better Yeah John? Maybe we could also turn up the microphones today, Yeah, Okay, So I’ll start over.

 

This is the jurisdictional hearing for the appeal of the Planning Commission’s decision to approve an amendment to the Animal Services Master Plan That master plan was approved in April of 2007 and the amendment application before you proposes to modify that master plan to allow a Partial remodel of the main shelter building the conversion of an existing structure to a cat adoption center and the construction of a training building.

 

Those are the main elements of the application. A neighbor of We can’t hear her.

 

Is there any way to make it louder, Woman In Purple Shirt? This mic is on Ryan.

 

You may just have to speak up.

 

Okay, I’ll try A neighbor of the project.

 

Charles Tabor appealed one aspect of the amendment.

 

His appeal is focused on the proposed elimination of an original condition of approval of the master plan.

 

That condition is outside dog agility training and exercise areas shall be located a minimum of 50 feet from adjacent residential properties and fenced as necessary to reduce noise impacts to adjacent neighbors.

 

Mr Tabor would like to see this condition.

 

Retained and Animal Services proposes to eliminate it.

 

To allow one dog at a time to be exercised in that area For reference, Animal Services is located at the intersection of 7th Avenue and Rodriguez Street in Live Oak. It’s shown here outlined in red The appellant lives in Casa La Familia, which is a 23-unit townhouse for senior development, just north of Animal Services, and the buffer area is shown in red.

 

The appellant cites two Code sections in support of his appeal.

 

The first is the Animal Hospitals and Kennels Ordinance, and he cites in particular, subsection B, which says the actual enclosure in which animals are treated or maintained shall be at least 75 feet from any residence.

 

What’s notable is that the ordinance does not exclude all animals from being within 75 feet of residences.

 

Instead, it’s very specific, focusing on the actual enclosure for the treatment, meaning veterinary care and maintenance, meaning housing of animals.

 

The code is silent on outdoor exercise areas.

 

Had the intention been to exclude all animals from being within 75 feet of residences?

 

The Code would have simply said that This interpretation is supported by the Planning Commission’s, approval of the master plan in 2007.

 

The staff report specifically discusses the project’s compliance with this Code section at the same time that the site plan shows an exercise yard located about 50 feet from residences.

 

In addition, the 2007 master plan establishes a 50 foot, not a 75-foot buffer. This indicates that the Commission saw no code conflict in allowing exercise yards closer than 75 feet to residences.

 

More recently, at the August 28th hearing for the amendment, the Planning Commission exercised its discretion again to eliminate the buffer based upon the following six facts.

 

The original 50-foot buffer was not based on technical acoustical data.

 

It was not a recommendation of the acoustical engineer for the master plan and it was not a mitigation in the mitigated negative declaration.

 

The proposed use of the exercise yard is modest and supervised.

 

Animal Services proposes to exercise one dog accompanied by a volunteer at a time.

 

The volunteer would engage the dog in exercise clean up after the dog and supervise the dog.

 

At all times, Animal Services provided a letter from Carla Braden, a certified dog behaviorist, who has indicated that actively engaged dogs are typically not barking.

 

Dogs, Noise complaints usually come from backyard dogs that are left unattended for long periods and those dogs bark out of boredom and loneliness.

 

That would not be the case with the shelter dogs who would be actively engaged and accompanied by a volunteer Dogs are allowed in residential neighborhoods up to the property line. So the proposed use where one dog would be allowed to exercise adjacent to residential properties is analogous to a residential use but superior.

 

Given the oversight provided by a volunteer.

 

The Homeowners Association of Casa La Familia, where the appellant lives unanimously supports the elimination of the 50-foot buffer and provided a letter to that effect And six.

 

The property has been used for animal services for more than 60 years, and its use in that manner predates many of the residential uses in the area, including the construction of Casa La Familia.

 

The second Code section, the appellant cites – is the Noisy Animals ordinance, which prohibits a person from keeping noisy animals that unreasonably disturb a person with ordinary sensitivities.

 

This Code section is intended to provide recourse for noise complaints Based on the information from the dog behaviorist.

 

We do not anticipate that the dogs being exercised would bark If a dog did begin to bark.

 

It would be removed by the volunteer.

 

The Noisy Animals Code section also says that, when determining, if there has been a violation of the section, the use and character of the property where the animal is located shall be taken into consideration.

 

Given this, if a noise complaint were received, the property’s use as the county’s, animal shelter would be considered. In any case, noise complaints about the shelter are rare Code.

 

Enforcement has received two complaints in 11 years of shelter operation In determining whether or not to take jurisdiction of an appeal.

 

Your board must determine that one or more of the five grounds for taking jurisdiction exists.

 

In this case, the appellant asserts that two of the grounds exist In particular number one on this slide, that there was an error or abuse of discretion on the part of the Planning Commission, and number three, that the Planning Commission,’s decision was not supported by The presented and considered facts As detailed in the letter to you no substantiated evidence for error or abuse of discretion has been presented by the appellant.

 

The Planning Commission considered the facts presented, including the six facts.

 

I just reviewed and approved the application, Given this and based upon the administrative record before you, staff recommends that your board not take jurisdiction of application 181132.

 

Are there any questions? Seeing no questions? Well.

 

Sorry I’m inclined not to support the board taking on the appeal based on the criteria before us, but I want to express some concern about the proposal.

 

After the conditions of a permit after the agency was found to violate those conditions, could you explain when the process started to amend the master plan and include eliminating the 50-foot buffer, The application Board Member That’s? What I was wondering was applied for on June 21st, 2018, and at that time it included the request to remove the buffer.

 

Okay, did the staff misunderstand that the buffer had already been eliminated, or had it been eliminated? No, it had not been eliminated. It was a part of the original master plan and Animal Services, as a part of the amendment would like to remove that buffer area, Bruce.

 

Okay, thank you.

 

I’m going to ask now if the appellant would like to come forward to present their case.

 

Okay, seeing none I’ll now ask if there’s a member of the public who would like if members the public would like to come forward on this item.

 

Good morning, I am Eve: Roberson, President of the Board of Directors of Casa La Familia.

 

That’s the senior townhouses that are adjacent to the animal shelter.

 

Our board is very familiar with the proposed improvements for the animal shelter building next to our complex and on May 17th, 2019 voted unanimously to support them.

 

The board also supported the animal shelter being able to continue to use the 50 feet next to our property for its outdoor dog training and exercise program.

 

Jane Emhoff, one of our residents, whose unit is adjacent to the particular use, was ill today but wanted to very much to come to let you know that there have been no problems whatsoever with that use.

 

We appreciate that the animal shelter has been in operation for many years before our complex was developed 35 years ago, but they have always been good neighbors to us since then. In summary, as Board President of Casa La Familia and one of the closest neighbors to the animal shelter, we do believe that their proposed development will be a huge benefit for the many animals that the animal shelter rescues every day in our community.

 

But it will also be a welcome improvement for our neighborhood.

 

Thank you.

 

Thank you.

 

Is there anyone else that would like to speak to us today? Is there anyone else after Miss Garrett? Otherwise, this be our final speaker.

 

Animal shelters seem helpful in some ways, but I am not for this increased development and the reason for them that I can’t support.

 

The animal shelter is where I have a cat.

 

I love pets, but we were here a couple of years ago when you mandated that Animal Services put in these chips, radio, frequency ID chips in animals supposedly to locate them.

 

We came with pictures from a group called Chip Me, Not that shows cancer developing around these sites and there were even animals that had been euthanized that had chips in them, but they didn’t have the right kind of scanner to do it.

 

But the pictures were horrific, I believe in doing procedures and having policies that are not toxic and not harming people, but this industry with ID and radiofrequency ID and more microwaves and harming these animals. We held up these pictures and it’s ghastly.

 

The animals were fine before Even animals that had been injected with these devices died in the arms of their owners, So I don’t give money to the animal shelter and I’m, not in favor of this expansion.

 

Thank you, Okay.

 

That concludes public comment.

 

I’ll bring it back to the board for action, Not sure.

 

If we do, do we need to take any action, or if we just choose to not take the jurisdictional appeal, Jason?

 

Sorry, the motion would be to act on staff recommendation and not accept jurisdiction.

 

Yeah.

 

So I will make the motion to act on the staff recommendations and take no additional actions.

 

The animal shelter plays an important role in our community and the site at Jose and Rodriguez or 7th and Rodriguez, is an amazing community center spot where people gather and which so many people have been able to take advantage of adding to their family with great pets. I know our family has and this proposal, which will seek to do some remodeling and refurbishing of the space, will improve the corner in a way that it isn’t right now.

 

I look forward to seeing this completed and I don’t think we should take on this jurisdictional appeal, Zach.

 

Second, Okay, we have a motion and a second All, those in favor, please say: aye Board Members Aye Opposed that passes unanimously.

 

Thank you very much.

 

We’re now going to move on to item number eight, which is a public sale of surplus county-owned real estate, real property, commonly known as 641 34th Avenue, under the terms and conditions stipulated in the Board of Supervisors.

 

Resolution 193, 2019, and Planning Commission Resolution number 2019 04 and take related actions, as recommended by the Deputy CAO Director of Public Works.

 

Mr. Cary, Thank you good morning, Chair and board.

 

My name is Travis Cary, Director of Capital Projects and I’m representing real property.

 

Today on this surplus sale, this item is a surplus sale of county-owned property at 641, 34th Avenue in Live Oak APN 03207520 and it’s a follow-up to your last action on this sale, which was on September 10th, 2019.

 

So the sale is a process, and I just want to note that all the required determinations have been made by the Planning Commission, including the secret determination and also the general plan, consistency determination, as required by state code, and the public notice completed. That was authorized at your last board meeting for this item has been completed also consistent with state code.

 

I also want to note that the sale any potential sale is subject to considerable restrictions which are outlined in the Planning Commission Resolution 201904, which was included in the bid packet and also in your last action.

 

So there are seven recommendations for this item.

 

So the first five are the open, sale, and then six and seven are follow-up actions, And so the first item would be to open the public sale and then you direct staff to open the bids which I have in front of me here.

 

After that, I’ll announce the results of the bids that were submitted in writing, and then you can call for oral bids if there are any additional bids from folks who are here today.

 

Any oral bid needs to exceed the written bid by an additional 5 and then, depending on the result, throughout the sale.

 

You have options.

 

You can accept the highest qualified, written, or oral bid or reject all bids and withdraw the sale.

 

If you’re not happy with the bids or the conditions of the sale And then you would close the public sale of surplus county property as action number five, I would recommend perhaps before closing the sale at that point, just scratch into your board.

 

Hearing public comment on the item before that And then action six after you close the sale is to authorize the Deputy CAO and Director of Public Works to negotiate a final agreement for sale And then action seven has to do with the proceeds and your authorizing A use of those for restoration activities on other liability settlement properties – Ryan Great. So let’s open the bids, we’ve received one written bid.

 

This morning The bid is from Price and Makina Fulcher.

 

Their address is 685 34th Avenue in Santa Cruz, and the bid amount is 50 001 which is 1 above the minimum bid set by your board of 50 000.

 

They have acknowledged review and receipt of all of the restrictions that will be required to be followed on the property and they’ve also submitted the minimum security deposit in the amount of 2 500 in a cashier’s check made out to the County of Santa Cruz and the bid form is, is fully signed by the bidder.

 

My opinion is that this is a qualified bid for the property.

 

Okay, so now that we have confirmed the highest bid we’ll open it up for oral bids.

 

The oral bid would need to exceed 5 higher than the written bid.

 

Are there any oral bids today, Seeing none? I will close the oral bids Now.

 

I will open up public comment on this item.

 

Why Why oh, why, oh, why is county public property listed as surplus and sold? Can you put it in a nutshell And 50 000 in Santa Cruz County to sell any piece of land seems very low. It just seems to me what belongs to the county or the public keeps getting sold, and I see this on many agendas. It’s very perplexing to me and since I’m bringing it up there, probably also other members of the public who wonder, Perhaps you could explain more.

 

Thank you Hi.

 

I know there.

 

39’s probably been a lot of work that’s gone into this, and I get that.

 

But we were just talking about affordable housing that there’s not a lot of stock out there and you own a county building that could be turned into like shared housing and different rooms and all that kind of stuff.

 

So just wondering why it’s being sold as it is Thanks, Ryan.

 

Thank you.

 

Monica McGuire, Three people asking the same question.

 

Hopefully, this is a time when you can and would answer a question.

 

It doesn’t make any sense. It’s impossible to have gone through everything in the agenda today to have time to look into this or figure out what I would say besides, but 50,000 really for Santa Cruz property, with all the talk of needed, other housing, and assets with the county.

 

In arrears, Please explain more and give us a better explanation about all of the things that keep coming up every chance you get Just to repeat, we understand the Brown Act.

 

You can’t always answer on the spot when it looks like it changes your agenda item, but with so many people coming in and saying that they’ve been here time after time asking that you look at something and still not Getting answers to it, it makes no sense and we would like to hear more.

 

Those of us who take our time to come.

 

Thank you.

 

Do you want to briefly explain this item to the members, and the public? Yes, thank you.

 

This is the fourth public meeting on this item and the first two were at the Planning Commission to make their determinations of sequence and general plan consistency.

 

The Planning Commission set very stringent development restrictions on the site.

 

So it is not a buildable piece of property, It cannot be used for any housing development or any other kind of development.

 

The restrictions include significant use. Restrictions on development restrict storage uses.

 

It also requires maintenance of emergency flood control use for the county.

 

There will be multiple environmental protections set by the Planning Department.

 

There are also sensitive habitat restoration requirements for any work to occur on the property, and that also includes future bridge improvements that will be restricted and required: environmental, remediation, And the grant deed.

 

If the county does perfect, the sale will include a conservation easement on the property which covers the entire property, and the county will retain flood control and access easements for its required flood maintenance on the property, there also be conditions subsequent which will allow the County to take back the property if the restrictions are not met by the owner Ryan.

 

Thank you So, for these reasons, it’s not a developable piece, and that has a very pronounced effect on the value, Absolutely all right.

 

Well, we close public comment and we’ll bring it back to the board for deliberation and action Chair.

 

This property was flooded out many times, which is why there isn’t a home there.

 

This seems like a sale could benefit other ways to the county.

 

I particularly like this final action about authorizing the Department of Public Works to utilize. The sale proceeds to fund the required restoration of other real properties obtained through liability settlements.

 

This is helpful.

 

The county has very little funds to do this kind of work and I would make the motion of the recommended actions Zach.

 

Second, Okay, we have a motion by Leopold and a second by Friend, All those are in favor.

 

Please say: aye Board Members Aye Opposed that passes unanimously.

 

Thank you for your work on this.

 

We’re now going to move on to item number nine, which is considered an ordinance repealing chapter 7, 12 and 8 12 of the Santa Cruz County Code and amending chapters 2, 31, 2, 33, 3, 16, 5, 16, 5, 35, 7, 16, 7, 42, 7, 54.

 

7: 56, 7, 95, 8, 55, 8, 57, 9, 42, 9, 43, 9, 44, 10, 22 and 10, 24 of the Santa Cruz County Code to correct typographical errors, address organizational issues, align the code, changes with state law, delete unnecessary material and make additional miscellaneous changes and schedule.

 

The ordinance for final adoption on October 22nd, 2019, as outlined in a memorandum of the County Counsel, Mr Heath Good morning, board Jason Heath for County Counsel’s Office.

 

This is the 10th ordinance in a series of ordinances to update the County Code, move to gender-neutral language address typos, and the like. We’re, looking at several titles in this iteration, two, three, five, seven, nine, and 10.

 

There are a couple of chapters that we’re recommending.

 

Deletion of That would be chapter 7, 12 and chapter 8 12 because they’re not necessary to have in the Code any longer, and I’m happy to answer any questions.

 

Ryan.

 

Okay, are there any questions? No, I’ll just say that getting rid of chapters 8 and 12 may be the only reference to bongs in the County Code, so that’ll be a change All right.

 

Is there any public comment on this item? Seeing none.

 

I’ll bring it back to the board for deliberation and action.

 

I would move the recommended action, Bruce.

 

Second, All right.

 

We got a motion by Leopold and a second by McPherson, All those in favor, please say: aye Board Members Aye Opposed that passes unanimously. We’re now going to move on to item 9 1, which is the affordable housing guidelines.

 

This was pulled from the consent agenda by Supervisor McPherson.

 

Yes, thank you.

 

I think this is an important issue that we need to discuss, but I believe the public and the board would benefit from having a greater understanding of what we’re being asked to approve in this situation.

 

I do support the creation of a maintenance of affordable housing in our community and I wanted to see it happen as soon as possible.

 

I think we need more details and greater public input before we make significant changes to those guidelines.

 

I also noticed that there’s a lottery scheduled for Measure J, a Measure J home in Live Oak, that our staff was hoping to apply to these guidelines.

 

But I’d like to move to continue this to a future meeting as part of a regular agenda for a more detailed presentation, And my motion would include a deferral of the Live Oak measure.

 

J lottery until after the board has heard those guidelines.

 

John, I would second Okay, so we have a motion and a second, so I think, given that we will be having a greater public hearing, I’ll ask if there’s any public comment on continuing this item. Seeing none I’ll bring it back to the board for Well Chair.

 

If we ask staff, This is a major rewrite of a document and it’s hard because we don’t have the strikeout underline and strikeout like we usually see.

 

So any help with additional annotation would help review these two documents.

 

To make sure that we understand all the changes that are inside Clerk, Absolutely Okay, great Yeah, I want to make it clear.

 

I’m not sure that the changes shouldn’t be made.

 

I just think we have a further discussion.

 

Okay, so we have a motion and a second All, those in favor, please say: aye Board Members Aye Opposed that passes unanimously.

 

We will now take 20-minute mumbles closed, Oh actually, yeah.

 

Why don’t we, we’ll move into a closed session now and I’ll ask County Counsel.

 

If there’s going to, be any reportable action, Jason, No Okay, Board Member! We’ll! Try to get this done today. Welcome back everybody to the October 8th, 2019 meeting We’re now going to have our 10:30 scheduled item.

 

This is item number 10 to consider a study session on Focus Strategies,’ homeless baseline system assessment, and accept and file a report on Focus Strategies.

 

39.

 

Technical assistance, engagement, and direct the CAO’s office to return on or before February 2020, with a progress report, as outlined in a memorandum of the County Administrative Officer, we have Assistant CAO Elissa Benson here to present.

 

Thank you, Mr Chair.

 

Good morning, Chair and members of the board I’m Elissa Benson Assistant CAO and member of the county’s Homeless Services coordination team.

 

Here within the office of the CAO.

 

I will be providing an introduction and overview of the topic for your study session today, consideration of the first deliverable of our work with Focus Strategies, consulting The Santa Cruz County, homeless system, baseline assessment, and interim short-term recommendations.

 

We are excited to be here today at this first major milestone of the work which will continue through next spring Here at the table is Rayne Perez the county,’s Homeless, Services Coordinator and Kate, Bristol, Director of Consulting for Focus Strategies, and our principal consultant on The study, As you know, Focus Strategies is the firm we have engaged to support our in-depth.

 

Examination of our response to homelessness, countywide and to help us craft a comprehensive approach to improvement. Our study session format will be as follows.

 

Kate will be presenting the substantive content from the report in three parts.

 

The first is really about a systems approach.

 

We are starting with this to understand this as a best practice As a county and community.

 

We have been working on the issues of homelessness for a very long time and understanding how those efforts interact and integrate is an important starting place.

 

Understanding the value of a systems approach will be key in setting our shared vision and priorities as we move forward.

 

The second part of the study session materials will focus on the observations and findings from this qualitative assessment as completed in phase one.

 

We’ll then move on to the interim recommendations.

 

Kate will provide the Focus recommendations regarding immediate actions.

 

We can take today to make improvements in advance of the subsequent phases of work of the assessment. Regarding the interim recommendations, we will then have some brief comments from key county departments, the Human Services Department and Health Services Agency, as they are specifically noted in the recommendations and from some jurisdictional partners.

 

Rayne will present these in the recommendations at that point.

 

In the presentation From there, we will move to board discussion of the report and recommendations.

 

Our objective today is to garner your input and feedback on the phase, one report, and implementation of recommendations, as well as your thoughts in terms of moving forward through the subsequent phases of work.

 

Before we get to the substance of the study session, I’d like to provide some brief context as to what brought us to this point today, As detailed in the staff report, the board approved the contract for initiating this comprehensive work at its February 26th meeting.

 

In early 2019, While the county and cities in a myriad of community organizations and other government entities have been working on the issue of homelessness for many many years, the urgency and complexity of the problems have significantly increased.

 

The landscape has dramatically changed.

 

Demographics of the people experiencing homelessness are changing and, in some cases, increased complexity and acuity of health.

 

Related issues of those experiencing homelessness are making it more difficult to address their issues.

 

More children, transition, age, youth, and families are experiencing homelessness. In the face of housing, affordability, challenges, and the impacts of homelessness are felt community-wide, With a crisis here and across the state and country.

 

New funding and expectations are coming forward and we need to be able to make better cross-decisional cross-jurisdictional decisions and have appropriate operating frameworks to plan, execute, and monitor this work.

 

In light of the challenges and complexity, the board decided to step back and take a look at the big picture of how we’re responding or, as some might say, to slow down.

 

So we can go fast.

 

So, as we engage in today,’s material, I want to summarize the overall purpose of this technical assistance to put today’s work into context.

 

We are engaged in this work to achieve a shared vision based on a systems approach.

 

We want to invest funds strategically in programs that work.

 

We want to have a decision-making and governance structure that is effective and transparent, and we all want to actively use data to plan measure, and prove what we do in our effort to end homelessness in our community.

 

With that, I would like to introduce Kate Bristol to lead us through today.’s, materials, Welcome, Kate, Kate, Thank you, and I hope I am close enough to the mic for y 39.

 

All to hear me So thank you for inviting me here today to introduce Focus Strategies and the work we’ve been doing in your community. I’m looking forward to hearing your feedback and your questions about the report, but just to get ourselves oriented.

 

I’m going to try and as quickly as I can run through the main features and findings of the report.

 

So, just quickly about Focus Strategies.

 

Okay, this is What’s going on with my advancer Nope that’s not the right way to go forward.

 

So sorry, There we go.

 

I had the wrong arrow button, So we’re a West Coast-based consulting firm.

 

We have staff located around California in Oregon and Washington, and our firm only works on helping communities reduce homelessness.

 

We don’t do any other kinds of work, And our approach is that we believe in optimizing systems, the power of analytics, and expanded housing leads.

 

The way to ending homelessness one of the main things that we do is to help communities, use your local data to analyze what you’re doing, analyze your effectiveness, and inform change, and we’re very much around building on what works, and we know that when people experience homelessness fundamentally, the solution for them is to get back to housing.

 

So I want to start the presentation by talking a little about what it means to have a systems approach or to have a homelessness response system, which we talk about. Quite a bit in the report, So the goal of having a system is that you’re going to move from having what most places have now as kind of a loosely coordinated collection of programs and activities that address some homelessness.

 

To something that’s a strongly coordinated system that jointly addresses all homelessness for everyone, And I could just offer an analogy if you think about a school district if you’re a parent and you want to enroll your child in second grade.

 

Imagine if you had to go to each school and you get to the school and the teachers come out and talk to you about whether they’re going to feel, like they’re, the right people to teach your child And they say No go down To the next school And you go to the next one, Then you finally get to a school where they say Sure we’ll be happy to enroll your second grader, but we only have space in sixth grade.

 

Do you want that? So I think you don’t want your school system to work that way, but that is in a way kind of how homeless systems work.

 

So if you try to picture what it would be like if the homeless system ran more like the school system In a school system, you have a centralized district, They know how many students there are.

 

They know how many people will be enrolling.

 

They develop a plan to make sure you have enough schools and teachers.

 

There’s a policy for how you enroll children in schools based on some consistent system.

 

You might not have all the resources you want to have in your school system, but you have a structured decision-making process to decide how you’re going to spend the funds you do have to maximize results and you have metrics for deciding whether you are achieving the results you want.

 

So really that is the North Star. We’re trying to help you get to and think about how to address homelessness.

 

You want a data-informed system that has a structured way of deciding how funds are allocated to achieve an agreed-upon set of goals, so each person who experiences homelessness has an appropriate resource that might not be an ideal resource or even everything that they need but it gets them on that pathway to housing, And then you have a clear set of measures to figure out if your system is working and in some ways when you’re working on homelessness, the measures and objectives or the measures are easier to figure out than in a school system because deciding whether schools are effective, is complicated.

 

Deciding whether the homeless system is effective.

 

Isn’t that complicated because it’s about did people get from being unsheltered in housing.

 

So that’s my slightly lengthy analogy, but I hope it helps set up this idea of the system.’s approach.

 

So the reason you need a system is because individual programs cannot solve the problem as much as you have great individual programs with dedicated staff who are doing good work collectively If they’re not working together in a system you just aren’t going to, Be able to get there, You have limited resources, so you need joint decision making shaped by shared goals.

 

You need to know where all the funds are being invested, who’s being served, and what the results are, and have accountability for everyone in the system.

 

So when you do have a system, you’ll know you’re there.

 

When you have these shared objectives that all the stakeholders agree upon and then your resources are aligned to achieving those Your programs are designed so that they can get to those goals.

 

You’re setting and then you’re analyzing your data to understand whether objectives are being met and you can make adjustments as you go along. You’ll have a clear structure and process for making decisions that everyone understands And then each person who experiences homelessness will receive a timely and consistent response.

 

So I’m going to just say some of the same things, but not with a picture that gets a little bit more concrete about what we mean by a homeless crisis response system.

 

So this is an image that tries to show the fundamental objective of that.

 

As people are already experiencing homelessness or are on the brink of doing so, they’re in that red, sideways pyramid And the objective of your system is: everyone goes from red to green, and green means.

 

You’re in housing, And so this does not mean you have to build a new housing unit for every single person, but that you have to have a mixture of different strategies that include the use of your existing housing inventory, as well as looking at the size Of the existing inventory and scaling it up So in this system, as people approach your homeless system, they go through your coordinated entry, which is your Smart Path, is what you call it here.

 

You have a variety of different kinds of steps.

 

You can use it to help people get diverted or to prevent them from entering the system and getting back to housing through some fairly low-cost simple strategies.

 

And then the folks who have the greatest barriers to housing probably need some kind of intervention like rapid, rehousing, or permanent supportive housing.

 

And then you’ll notice.

 

There’s that yellow box at the bottom, which is your emergency, shelter, and other kinds of temporary settings that people can go to. This is a really important part of the system.

 

You have to have emergency interventions And I think the important thing about this is we like to use this picture just to illustrate that, as you’re thinking about a system, you have to think about both the yellow and the green.

 

And so what tends to happen, particularly in places where you have a lot of people living outside and you have a problem with very visible, unsheltered homelessness? There’s a lot of discussion about how much shelter we need and do we need more shelter or less shelter those are important conversations, but your shelter system needs to lead people to housing so make sure you connect all those things up.

 

Is essential, Otherwise, people will just cycle back and forth from unsheltered to shelter and back to unsheltered Okay.

 

So these are just a couple of key things you need to have in your system strategies to reduce what we call system inflow, which means, people are experiencing very extreme housing instability.

 

What are your strategies to prevent them from actually falling into homelessness and going to be outside or going to a shelter? So there are different approaches for that which include prevention and diversion which I’ll talk about a little bit further on also do you have public systems that are discharging people into homelessness, and can you do anything to reduce that? The second thing you need are different emergency interventions that you deploy like outreach emergency shelter and transitional housing.

 

These have to be very high functioning and they have to have strong success rates that then move people forward to housing And then the final thing is, you need housing, So you need those exits so that people can exit homelessness to a housing solution And again that Could include subsidies and services that you use to get people to the housing you have as well as expanding the supply of affordable housing.

 

The other side of the coin, in addition to those sort of programmatic elements, are the infrastructure elements.

 

So I talked about having a system like a school district.

 

You need leadership and governance, that guides system level, planning, and decision-making and gets everybody rowing in the same direction. You need planning policy, data, and evaluation capacity so that you know what results you want.

 

Getting for your investments, So in addition to just having data – and you do have an HMIS system here, so you have data, but you have to then have the ability to analyze and use the data to shape policy and planning And then staffing capacity to support the System change and implementation of shared policies is critical.

 

I would just say one reason in a lot of places.

 

We work we find there is data, but there isn’t anyone to analyze it.

 

Data can’t analyze itself.

 

The strategies can’t develop themselves.

 

The policies can’t be written by themselves.

 

You need staff to be able to do that.

 

So now I’m just going to shift quickly to talk a little bit about our scope, which Elissa already reviewed.

 

So this is just a graphic of the different steps We got started in March with the research for this baseline assessment. It was finalized in August That’s the orange square And presenting it today.

 

The next piece of work is already underway, which is we’re, doing some quantitative analysis of your system, and we expect to have results of that to present in December, I would say that just to kind of review, the overall result we’re, striving Towards is that, at the end of this engagement, you’ll have the design for a systematic and coordinated response that’s informed by data and then implemented through a new action plan? Okay, next, Okay! So now I’m just going to quickly give an overview of what we learned about your homeless response system, and this is a very quick summary of what’s in the report.

 

So you all received a copy of the report.

 

It summarizes our initial observations about the current response to homelessness here and, as I mentioned it’s just the first step of a phased scope of work, identifies strengths and challenges, and then what we were asked to do as part of moving slowly to move fast.

 

We still want to also move fast, so we were asked to sort of share some initial thoughts about some preliminary action steps you could take right now, while the rest of the analytic work is taking place.

 

I just want to emphasize one other thing about the report, which is it’s largely based on qualitative information.

 

So we interviewed a lot of people.

 

We did focus groups, we looked at the materials you have and then sort of a deep dive into the data that you have is happening now that’ll be in the next deliverable Okay.

 

So this is a very rolled-up summary of the things that we found in the areas we assessed.

 

I want to just emphasize that the scope of this was not to focus on any particular jurisdiction, so we weren’t looking at what’s the county doing. What are the different cities doing, but looking at the whole geography of your community and all the different efforts that are underway So in the next set of slides? I’m going to give a quick overview of the findings in each of these six areas.

 

So the first one was leadership and governance, and for most of these topics, I think you’ll find that the report says we found a lot of strengths to build on and other areas that we feel like would be important to work on.

 

So your primary governance structure right now, I think everyone knows – is the HAP, which is a really good forum for information sharing, and coordinating work.

 

It’s HUD-compliant.

 

It coordinates a lot of the work that’s happening in the community.

 

I think there was a recognition a few years ago that you needed to move towards something more integrated and that pulls in more stakeholders and more funding sources.

 

So there was some work done on governance, and redesign that didn’t get finished.

 

We feel like it.’s important that that kind of gets rebooted and restarted and that that gets brought a little further along, particularly about roles, decision-making processes, funding priorities in particular, And then the last thing I would just say on this topic is like many many Places in California, there’s, I think, been a struggle to figure out what are the respective roles of cities and counties, And so one of the things that you need to have moving forward is some agreement about those jurisdictional roles and responsibilities.

 

Cities and counties have different kinds of funding streams and different kinds of responsibilities, but everyone has a role to play, So it’s important that it be collaborative and collaborative in that everyone agrees.

 

What are all the rules are and everyone’s working together? Okay, reducing inflow.

 

I think this is a really important piece for your community.

 

We found that this is probably the least developed area so far, So the kinds of things you can use to prevent people from becoming unsheltered include what’s called diversion or problem-solving and targeted prevention.

 

To make these effective, they have to be targeted and deployed systematically, And so we feel like this is an area where you could make some impact by scaling up some of the initial things that are already underway.

 

Similarly, regarding efforts to reduce institutional discharge, I think some conversations are happening at the county, but not kind of a systematic strategy.

 

Yet Emergency response, I think sorry, this is an area.

 

I think that takes a lot of the focus in the community, and this is understandable because you have a lot of people living outside your emergency response or your front-end activities.

 

The most important thing about the emergency response is that, in addition to responding to the emergency, they have to be thoughtfully and intentionally connected to how you’re going to get people from the emergency interventions and into housing.

 

So we looked at everything through that lens, So you have a lot of outreach efforts, but not all of the outreach efforts are equipped.

 

Not all the outreach teams are equipped to help people with any kind of housing resource. You have a little bit of drop-in and day services.

 

You have a decent amount of shelter, It seems to be a little bit more located in the North.

 

We found that the shelters have some services that help people move to housing.

 

We feel like these could be systematized and scaled up so that they’re more effective.

 

And then you are planning to build navigation centers, which are a best practice in terms of particularly focusing on people who are living outside.

 

And so when I say a nav center, what I’m talking about is a shelter that has low barriers, meaning that people who traditionally sometimes can’t access shelters because of the entry requirements can get in.

 

They’re focused on housing and related services and they’re open year-round and accessible 24/7.

 

You also have a safe parking program which has just been implemented That’s another promising practice, particularly if it can link people to housing options.

 

And then you have your encampment response, which I just wanted to talk about for one minute.

 

So I think it’s just important to acknowledge that we heard a lot about the encampment issue. It’s something that is a big focus of community dialogue media and political discussion.

 

I think that we found it again.

 

This is not in any way uncommon.

 

The response is largely focused on the immediate public, health and public safety issues, which is understandable.

 

You need to focus on those things It doesn’t yet seem to be connected to an overall strategy, for how are you going to reduce unsheltered homelessness And to reduce unsheltered homelessness? Again, you have to have a way you’re going to get people from outside into housing which could include that they go to a temporary shelter or some kind of a navigation center along the way.

 

You also need a strategy to reduce inflow so that you’re not continuing to have new people coming from being housed into being unsheltered.

 

Okay, just a couple more.

 

So most communities have housing programs that are targeted to homeless people.

 

You all have the kind of typical array of things we would expect to see, including some transitional housing.

 

Although those are shrinking down and the supply of rapid rehousing has been going up, You also have a fair amount of permanent supportive housing. None of this we feel like is probably at scale yet and as part of the second part of our work, we’ll be helping you think about what is the right size for those interventions, But this is a place where you have some strength that You can build up on And then the last topic or the second to last topic is affordable housing.

 

So, fundamentally you have to get people to housing.

 

As I said before, you, don’t have to build new units for everyone, but the analytic work that we’re engaging with now will help you think about how you size that goal.

 

So how much progress can you make with the housing inventory you’ve got And then what is the gap? And what do you need to think of in terms of setting goals for increasing inventory? We know this is a huge challenge.

 

We put a couple of challenges up here on the slide Again, I don’t think Santa Cruz County is in any different place than most places in California, where it’s very hard to build, affordable housing.

 

I think there’s been some historical, low growth, and no growth policies that have played a role.

 

The loss of redevelopment has impacted, affordable, housing everywhere And, of course, there are sort of community acceptance issues.

 

So this is going to, be a really important piece of your overall strategy moving forward And then the last thing is just to talk about coordinated entry, which is called Smart Path here.

 

This is an important system component that’s in place and is doing some really important things to make sure the people with the highest needs get prioritized in the housing you’ve got.

 

It definitely could use some restructuring to get it to be a little bit more efficient and spend less time with people just sitting on lists waiting for things that they’re not going to get, And then, as I mentioned already, there are some issues around Data and evaluation capacity and the ability to use the data you’ve got to understand the results you’re getting from the investments you’re, making. Okay, so for the last couple of slides, I just want to quickly talk about our recommendations.

 

Again, I just want to reiterate this is not all the recommendations that’ll come out of this engagement.

 

These are the short-term recommendations we were asked to make just so that you all could keep moving forward with some action steps, while we’re doing the rest of the work I’m, just going to skip over the summary of findings.

 

I already talked about them, So we made three recommendations that are sort of more about thinking about your programmatic interventions.

 

One is to implement a system-wide diversion practice to reduce inflow and connect that to rethinking how the Smart Path Coordinated Entry system works.

 

We think if we could get some diversion practice implemented system-wide, that would help slow down the rate at which people are entering homelessness.

 

The second, as I mentioned, we feel like your shelters, are already doing some good work to help move people from shelter to housing.

 

But this is an area where you could do some focused work right away, particularly since the navigation, and centers aren’t going to come online in the short term, but you can really make your existing shelters more like navigation, and centers And again that’ll Speed the rate at which people exit to housing rather than just cycling, back to homelessness And then the last recommendation is to take a look at the outreach efforts.

 

You’ve got and figure it out.

 

If you can coordinate them a little better and standardize what they do and have more of that outreach work, be around getting people to housing solutions And then our fourth recommendation was around governance, which is to relaunch the work on governance. That was already started and was partially completed As part of our engagement.

 

We can facilitate that discussion.

 

We feel like some of the key questions you need to ask are about resources.

 

What kinds of resources would be pulled under this governance structure? What purview would it have and then what kind of staffing is needed to implement it? We’re, hoping at the end of that you’ll have an agreement on the new structure and protocols and procedures around decision making, setting funding priorities, implementing funding priorities.

 

Okay, so I just want to close with some next steps and some thank yous.

 

So first I just wanted to thank particularly Rayne and Elissa, and the staff there for all the work they’ve been doing to help us gather and analyze the information we’ve gotten so far, introducing us to key stakeholders and keeping things on track.

 

We also have a project advisory group that’s met a couple of times and has been helpful.

 

Some of the folks from that group, I think, are in the audience here today.

 

So the next step is once we’ve heard your feedback.

 

Today we’re going to finalize and release the Short-Term Action Plan around implementing the initial recommendations We’ll be getting started, helping with the implementation of those recommendations, and then, as I mentioned, the SWAP is the tool that we use to do the data Analysis work That is already well underway, and so we’ll be back fairly soon, with the results of that. So I think now we’re gon na.

 

Have some folks speak.

 

Thank you, Kate, for the presentation, we have perspectives on the implementation of these interim recommendations from some of our key partners.

 

We’d like to invite Mimi Hall, Director of the Health Services Agency, and Ellen Timberlake, the Director of the Human Services Department, With the city of Santa Cruz.

 

We have Ron Prince, I believe we have Fred Keeley, expecting Fred Keeley and then I’m going to speak at the end on behalf of kind of the South County Steering Committee and city of Watsonville All right Good afternoon, Chair Ooh morning, Chair Coonerty and honorable Board of Supervisors, Mimi Hall from the Health Services Agency, I act as the director.

 

First of all, I wanted to offer both my congratulations and my thanks to all of the members of the Homeless Action Partnership, our community stakeholders, and the staff of the CAO’s office for recognizing the importance of planning for meaningful outcomes and supporting the work of Focus Strategies towards that end, The formality and comprehensiveness of the work of local jurisdictions when it comes to addressing homelessness vary greatly, and so does the effectiveness – And I feel like this effort that we’re coming together on as a unified effort, is something that’S going to help us organize around this issue that can often be very paralyzing for local jurisdictions.

 

The Health Services Agency fully supports this opportunity for all of us to come together as a unified system and, most importantly, we’re very excited from a public health perspective to be using shared methods for assessing needs, prioritizing our services evaluating their effectiveness, collecting data and Measuring our outcomes, As you can see from the report, the Health Services Agency will be the lead convener in the interim recommendation.

 

Number three, which is around coordinating and standardizing outreach efforts, and we’re pleased to leverage our community partnerships as well as the work we’re already doing in this area, to create a uniform strategy for the county.

 

So thank you.

 

Good morning, Chair Coonerty members of the board I’m Ellen Timberlake, the Director of the Human Services Department. I want to echo Mimi’s thanks to the CAO’s office to our community partners and stakeholders, and I also want to take the moment to applaud your board for the wisdom of your support of a systems approach to tackling a topic.

 

I think Supervisor McPherson you mentioned earlier this morning, a meeting at the CSEC level, where every single community is recognizing this as a top priority.

 

We are not alone, but I think that your board’s decision to support an approach that focuses on shared results that focuses on a real value for community engagement and listening to stakeholders, and that is, data-driven is very, very smart, Slowing down to go fast.

 

Having a wonderful consultant with the expertise that Focus Strategy has to help us understand how to do that in a very complex arena and then pushing us not to go too slow is going to lead to better outcomes in this community.

 

So I applaud you on that, As Mimi mentioned.

 

We are also tasked with leading one of the short-term recommendations in the report and that’s the implementation of a systems-wide diversion strategy, As you know, and also on the consent agenda.

 

This morning, the Human Services Department assumed the leadership role of Coordinated Entry or Smart Path in October of last year, our report this morning gave you a little bit of the results, and I think you’ll, also see.

 

That report echoed some of the findings from Smart Path.

 

I’m sorry about Focus Strategies concerning the lessons learned.

 

I want you to know that the work on diversion is not just beginning. Today, Our team began working on diversion and recognizing that as a critical, missing piece of our strategy back in the spring we invited LA and the LA Family Housing Program to come up and train us on diversion and to open that up to our partners.

 

So that we could begin that dialogue Just yesterday with the help of Focus Strategies, we were looking at the communities of San Francisco and Tacoma, so that will also be a very critical part of our process not to make this up as we go.

 

We know that there are a lot of communities that are doing this already, so we very much intend to learn from them In the diversion approach.

 

We will also be continuing to look at developing policies and procedures implementing conversational guides so that we can try to put in a jury of standardization across our community so that we’re not doing the left and the right hand knows how we’re operating.

 

This And also a critical part of diversion is coming up with flexible funding options that allow for us to take folks who are either just coming into homelessness or are one step away.

 

Allow us to create the opportunities necessary to keep them from becoming homeless And, of course, we’ll be focusing and continuing training.

 

So we’re very excited to come back to you in February with what our recommendations are to implement this critical component of the system And, as a part of that and sort of an inextricable component of this will be this notion of dynamic prioritization, because I Think you can see both in our report and Focus Strategies’findings that the way the system is set up right now for Coordinated Entry too many people sit and are prioritized as having high priority, but don’t have the housing so dynamic.

 

Prioritization is about how we begin to make sure that the inventory that we have is quickly made available to those that are highest in need and that we use the diversion component to make sure that, folks, who don’t need to be on a waiting list get resolution quickly, So I want to say one more time how excited we are to be a part of the process to extend my thanks to Focus Strategy and really to recognize your board for the wisdom of starting with systems.

 

Thank you, Ryan.

 

Thank you. Good morning I’m Ron Prince, I’m a special projects advisor for the city of Santa Cruz’s city manager,’s office and Chair community and members of the board.

 

Thanks for inviting me to say just a couple of words, I’ve got some very general comments, So for the last several months I’ve been working on this issue for the city of Santa Cruz, trying to understand more fully the impacts of homelessness in Our community and trying to understand how effective our current response is, And, as you know, we’re in a very reactionary mode daily where we’re dealing with going to medical calls trying to support the River Street shelter trying to respond to Customers,’ and citizens 39.

 

Requests for public safety concerns, So it’s just a daily, a lot of work and a lot of reactionary work that isn’t bearing a lot of fruit other than just dealing with the day-to-day issues related to homelessness, And so I have To say, in the last several months I’ve been working on this.

 

This particular effort with Focus Strategies is probably the most encouraging thing.

 

I’ve heard and certainly gives some hope that we’re going to be able to get some serious traction on coordinating our efforts, All the local governments and nonprofits that are working on this.

 

I think Focus Strategies is going to help us connect the dots on all the resources and efforts that are going into this project.

 

It’s something that we’re going to have to be working on for years.

 

So I wanted to just be able to impart the city’s commitment to this process.

 

One of the manifestations of that is going to be we’re recommending next month to add some staffing that’ll be used to focus exclusively on this project and into the future, help with the coordination and the governance aspects, and be a real serious Partner at the highest level, it can be So I just wanted to thank the leadership of the board and certainly county staff, who has been directing this effort.

 

I know we’re early in the process, but I think in the next several months we’re going to get a feeling that we’ll be able to get a handle on, not only because of the data that’s going to be collected But also get a better idea of, as I said earlier, how to connect the dots with all the people that are working on this and all the organizations that are working on this county-wide. So I wanted to just render my support and thanks because this is very, very important work.

 

So thank you.

 

I’m not seeing Mr Keeley in the room, so I will speak to the South County perspective, which is we’ve had the South County Homeless.

 

Steering Committee meetings since 2016, We’ve implemented a day services program down there and a retold winter shelter program, and yet there’s still a lot of work to do, and there’s great interest in taking a look at working on this issue.

 

More regionally, and not here,’s, what we’re gon na work on Watsonville in Watsonville, we’re gon na work on Santa Cruz in Santa Cruz.

 

But could not the same solutions be applied across the community And I think that this moment with Focus Strategies where we’re.

 

Looking at this through a systems lens and thinking about when we implement that we implement across the system, It is very important, and keeping an eye on the equity element between North and South County is an important piece of this as well.

 

So having spoken with members of the South County Homeless, Steering Committee in the city of Watsonville Tamara Vitas, they just want to express their support for this work and that it’s very important not only for those of us in North County but for them as Well, so, thank you, Rayne.

 

Okay, with that, I think we’re ready for your questions and comments.

 

Kate. Is there anything you wanted to add Kate? No, I think that’s good.

 

Thank you.

 

I’m just going to jump right in with questions.

 

I think one I appreciate the work and I think it’s important I’m glad to hear that we have partnerships across both the county departments and both North and South County cities.

 

One of my easy questions is whether it’d be worth it to have this sort of presentation done to this City Council in Santa Cruz and Watsonville so that elected officials are also thinking through it.

 

What will these strategies be and they can have buy-in going forward?

 

So I don’t know whether that’s well, I don’t know the contractual implications of that, but I think it’d be worthwhile for us to to coordinate that.

 

The second part of my question is about that.

 

Go fast part of the go slow to go fast, So what I didn’t understand is come February and the report back for the implementation of these first initial strategies around diversion and coordination is in February.

 

We’re gon na be talking about what we’re gon na be doing, and then what’s the timeline from there. So when do we start actualizing this in our programs on the ground?

 

I think it sounds like Miss.

 

Timberlake will be heading up at least the diversion part, but then sort of like who does it by when? How trying to understand our part of that.

 

So I’ll take that.

 

I think it’s going to vary a little bit by which particular recommendation It’s, not going to be in perfect lockstep, but we are prepared.

 

We’ve started some of it already.

 

We’re prepared to start the rest of it pretty quickly, and I think that what we’re hoping is that between now and the next 90 days, end of 90 days that’s, when we’re going na, do the planning for implementation and That we would be able to start implementing some of these practices about the first of the year.

 

We probably won’t have a lot of data to report back to you in February on how that’s going.

 

I think we’ll need a little more time for these programs to be in place before we can tell you how effective they are, but we do hope to have some or potentially all of them in place early next year, That’s great news and Then, in terms of what metrics will we be using to understand whether these things are in place, The performance measurement piece of the work is also underway, and I think that by the time we are implementing these things, we will have a clearer idea of Which metrics we’ll be using to measure those successes, And I don’t know if you want to add anything further to that Kate.

 

I think there are some kind of commonly recognized important measures that you’re going to want to use. For example, if you start implementing this workaround making your shelters more housing-focused, we would want to just see the rate at which people exit shelter to permanent housing go up So right now we’re analyzing to figure out where your baseline is And we should know that pretty soon We can look at it by intervention type and then from there you can sort of try to figure out.

 

Where do you want to get to in six months or where do you want to get to in a year? Where do you want to get to in five years, Yeah, Okay, great And then my my final question – and this goes to your experience with other communities – is, it seems to me we can make some pretty big impacts by better coordinating and better investing more in prevention.

 

As you said, and more diversion, and especially in the subpopulations, I think in South County, we can have some really good impacts on families in vets.

 

I have a feeling that the most challenging subset of our population that are causing the most impact and that, when we talk about homelessness, most of the community is also thinking about it.

 

Homelessness will be one of the most challenging to They won’t be served by the prevention side because they’ve been chronically homeless for a long time.

 

They may not be as open to shelter or diversion possibilities, and if we’re trying to build public support for increased funding or programs, they’re gon na wan na know what we’re gon na do with that particular population, And when I look At your strategies, those seem to be the least likely to benefit.

 

So what have other communities done to show the community that not only are they helping exit more people, but they’re, also reducing extra community impacts, So I just will say so.

 

First of all, the preliminary recommendations are only kind of a subset of the eventual things We want to recommend how you’re going to get to an overall system, So there isn’t everything in there.

 

I think that you need yet So homelessness among single adults is the single biggest challenge.

 

You’re correct. It’s easier to solve homelessness for families and veterans because there are more resources.

 

This is sort of just an evolving, emerging area.

 

I think, for many many years the belief has been you have to have permanent support If someone’s a single adult who’s outside and chronically homeless and has a disability, they have to have permanent supportive housing, which is a very expensive intervention.

 

A lot of communities are now looking at whether some of those individuals can get housed with lower-intensity interventions such as rapid rehousing, which are more short-term rent subsidies, But I wouldn’t say that anyone has figured it out.

 

I think you’re going to need it again.

 

I appreciate that you’re going to need to figure out some strategies and show some success in reducing the visibility of unsheltered homelessness and the reality of unsheltered homelessness, which I think is going well.

 

Be about a combination of changing what your outreach strategies are about, getting some shelters in place that people will go to because they offer them things that they need and want, which is about sort of the navigation, shelter strategy.

 

And then what are the housing interventions you deploy, that people need and want and will take advantage of? Some people will not go to a shelter, but you can offer them housing resources while they’re unsheltered.

 

So I think it’s going to be a mix of those kinds of things And one of the things I’m, hoping that the action plan can get you to because we are doing this.

 

Analytical work is just to sort of think of these things. A little more in a quantifiable way, this is roughly how many people we think you have.

 

This is about how much progress you can make with diversion.

 

This is about how much more you could do by scaling up your rapid rehousing and here’s your housing gap.

 

So I think you need to kind of think about it in those terms and we’re hoping that that will be in the final deliverables Right, and I think that’s exactly right And I’m looking forward to seeing those strategies.

 

I think one of my concerns is that, for that particular subset population, it’s going, be very expensive interventions with mixed results, And so the inclination’s gon na be let’s spend a lot more where we can have relatively less money and Have immediate results, but if we don’t show the community that we have fewer people sleeping in parks or in doorways or on Coral Street or other places, then a lot of this future investment.

 

We’re going to put that future investment in jeopardy and political support.

 

Okay, Supervisor, McPherson Yeah, I think two words stand out to me – transparency and coordination That has been reiterated in how the system operates.

 

Who makes the decisions on how effective we are at collectively addressing the problem, I do agree with the consultant’s assessment about the need to change the governance model.

 

We need to more clearly lay out what roles people are playing and build the systems, we have some existing JPAs that we could learn a lot from that have become reality here.

 

One thing was mentioned earlier: there was a discussion with other countries. What the state is looking at and they’re looking at a regional approach or it looks like they want to go to that.

 

Maybe it’s just trying to be simpler, to get a few regions rather than 58 counties or something.

 

But I think we go outside the county and try to it’s going to be difficult enough to get the cities and the county on the same page.

 

How do you feel about it? Do you think the state is moving toward a broader implementation process with the regional government? I think that we need to focus on what we’re doing here.

 

I don’t have any inside information.

 

I have heard that they want in the next round of what used to be HEAP is now going to be called HAP.

 

They are going to have some guidelines around how they want the governance to work.

 

I do not know whether they’re going to recommend sort of at the county or the bigger regional level.

 

I don’t know if you might know more.

 

I agree with you that I think it’s hard enough to coordinate across a county with multiple cities in it. It feels like a big thing to bite off to then try and do multi-county coordination.

 

I can see the point, though, particularly if you think about some parts of California, like the Bay Area, for example, where there’s a lot of movement, People, aren 39, t necessarily experiencing homelessness in one place, all the time They move around, and so thinking about It kind of across multiple counties.

 

It makes sense in that sense, but I just think sort of in terms of the feasibility of getting started somewhere.

 

It makes sense to start at the county level.

 

The one thing that I’ve heard about is the idea of having a more regional Homeless Management Information System HMIS, so that we can, when someone moves across the county line from Santa Clara to Santa Cruz, we can still see.

 

Oh, you’re enrolled in this program over there.

 

I can see that you have a case manager that you’re working within Sunnyvale.

 

It’s not a hard wall between systems, So there is great interest in having regional and or possibly statewide.

 

Hmis, accessibility, Okay To Miss Bristol.

 

Thank you for your work and your presentation. Are there any elements of this in Santa Cruz County that are different from some of the other communities you’ve dealt with, I would say just so: we’ve only done our first pass of learning about your community.

 

I would say that most of the challenges you’re struggling with, I think, are common across a lot of places.

 

Every community kind of has its own unique.

 

Every community context is different.

 

I think that you There are some places we have worked where there is a much smaller problem of unsheltered people living, particularly in the downtown core.

 

I mean you have that as a significant challenge that not every community shares, but I think for the most part, the need to pull the pieces together into a system with shared measures objectives, and strategies is a pretty common challenge that everyone’s facing Yeah, maybe this is more directed to local, but what do you see in receiving this report? What role can we play in fixing the effectiveness of the issues identified in the report? For instance, it doesn’t seem like we have a wide acceptance right at this point of a navigation center, which I think is critical, but I mean if that’s, what we should do if you decide that’s what we should do.

 

Is that something we should look at or are those the kind of issues that you’ll be addressing? I’m sure.

 

As part of this, I would say yes, We’re working to do more robust messaging about the key issues that we’re facing and I think, even amongst our you know, small circle of jurisdictional partners and providers.

 

There’s been a lot of debate and discussion about what is a navigation center.

 

The state has recently come out with a definition that I think we can at least use as an anchor around which to build what it is that we think a navigation center would need in addition to that basic definition, but it’s a really low barrier. 24.

 

7, with resources that help get people into housing.

 

So when we know that we don’t have a site yet at which to provide a navigation center that’s, why we’re thinking so industriously about how we can do navigation absent a building and that’s, wherein we’re.

 

Thinking about the housing focus, services, and shelters, I think that educating and informing about what a navigation center is and making sure we’re consistently telling that same story to everyone is important, and I think that we’ll be continuing to do that.

 

As we’re implementing these things, The eventual system redesign would impact or interact with the core.

 

How do you see that taking place or how important is it? It is already taking place, So the Focus Strategies has been in close communication with the core consultants.

 

We are looking at the performance measures together and looking at the recommended systems, measures that are part of a typical homeless system, but also looking at the key indicators in the core suite of wellness outcomes.

 

And we want to make sure that they are aligned and that will probably come into play when we enter into future contracts.

 

For example, when we’re trying to do results-based accountability and looking at how are the contracts we’re implementing, getting us to the outcomes that we want, So we’re, definitely marrying the two as much as we’re able to, And there’s so much bandwidth, and this is a huge huge issue and getting the cities and counties together on the same page is gon na be difficult enough.

 

But is there any reason why the County Office of Education or the school districts it seems like they could play an important part with some input or I don’t know if that’s in coming to a resolution on this issue, Do school districts normally Get involved in this at all So school districts. They have a responsibility to keep track of the number of families that are experiencing homelessness by the other definition.

 

The school system, the definition of homelessness, and the federal definitions are different, so school districts know a lot, particularly about how families that are precariously housed and potentially on the verge of homelessness, So they’re.

 

I think, really good potential partners for this expanded diversion practice.

 

Where you can engage with families who may not be unsheltered but are close to losing their housing and try and help do kind of a strengths-based process of helping them identify a housing solution.

 

So I think that’s a good place that they would fit into this systems work we’re doing.

 

I would also add that, although I don’t know that they were key interviews for Focus Strategies, they are very involved in our homeless system.

 

They attend all our Homeless Action Partnership meetings and the County Office of Education is a sub-recipient through the Community Action Board for one of our youth homeless demonstration projects.

 

They are part of the Youth Homeless Response Team, which is a co-project between the County Office of Education and CAB.

 

They originally were going to each submit separate applications through the Youth Homeless, Demonstration Project grant process, and when they discovered that they wanted to do essentially the same thing.

 

They decided to come together and put in a joint application, and that has been working very well Michael Painter who heads up the alternative, ed, and the homeless services aspects of the County Office of Education is very involved. Thank you that’s good to know.

 

I think you’ve explained somewhat this question.

 

What are the next phases of work on the action plan? Is it the quantitative analysis that have talked about in December? Is that what’s the next page to this discussion here? Yes, so I think the companion to this baseline assessment, which is largely qualitative as we’ll, have these analytic results soon and we’ll be able to understand where dollars are being invested and the results you’re getting And then we actually can Use we’re going to be using that to do some modeling work so that we can really kind of help you think about what would be the pros and con of different kinds of changes you wan na make, and what would the actual results of that Look like so, I think, between the work we’ve done so far, and the analytic work and some of these initial implementation steps we’re talking about.

 

We’ll be working with the key stakeholders, the HAP, and some other folks to talk about that.

 

A little more over the next few months And that will roll into an overall system strategy and the action plan.

 

So yes, I think that’s, maybe a long way of saying the quantitative and the qualitative together will underpin the action plan that will help you all About tailoring strategies.

 

Too.

 

I mean there are subsets, as we’ve heard about, and the one I hear about is addressed.

 

Those with behavioral health needs or mental health needs The projection or the estimate is that’s a quarter to a third of the homeless out there.

 

That’s, what I hear time and again Is that about right that you hear consistently that are in that I mean that’s treating people in a couple, different ways, homelessness and then just a personal behavioral way too. Is that estimate correct here that probably a fourth-third of Rayne? I think it’s about a third.

 

It varies from one year to another, but I think that number is about right, Bruce.

 

Okay, thank you.

 

Go ahead, Supervisor Leopold.

 

Well! Thank you Chair.

 

Thank you for the presentation and appreciate the work that’s being done to look at this systematically.

 

I think it does help A couple of years ago, when the community participated in the creation of the all-in report.

 

That was very helpful because it got people starting to focus on these pieces and although each jurisdiction adopted that plan, the action plan, wasn’t created out of it strongly enough that we could see great movement, And I saw pretty quickly afterward that some jurisdictions Were trying to think about what they should do around homelessness, With that we’re, referring to the report that they had just adopted, And so I appreciate Mr. Prince being here and the commitment the city has made to focus on this because I think that the Partnership, we know that when we work in partnership that we can accomplish a lot more than when we just try to do it alone, I also just want to acknowledge – I see Monica Martinez and Phil Kramer here Monica when she was head of the group.

 

We now call Housing Matters and now Phil when he first started with the 180 180 Campaign and has continued with Housing Matters.

 

They helped me understand the importance of eliminating homelessness, not just simply providing support for people with homelessness or people experiencing homelessness the goal of that initial effort in the 180 180 now the 180 2020 campaign was to start reducing our numbers and categories. The persistence of homelessness among veterans is gnawing, And the fact that we can’t seem to get it down below 130 or something like that when the resources are out there.

 

When someone could come in today, who’s a veteran and could get support to be in a hotel, probably tonight it’s perplexing, and it means that we need to look at things a little bit differently, because simply having the support, doesn’t mean that we can get a positive solution, I like the focus on targeted prevention, because that’s, the one thing when I saw in the Homeless Point in Time Census this year.

 

I think the last census we saw about 43 of the people who were in the count had been homeless for a year or less This year the number was 11 And there was another 30 plus percent that had been homeless for one to four years And so To me that’s, it seems to me our best shot, is to prevent someone from being homeless and then our second best shot is to help them, while they’re newly homeless, because the longer they stay out, the harder it is, and it also builds up additional issues To live outside is a rough life.

 

If you have to self-medicate or you start dealing with problems of mental health, it becomes a steeper hill to climb.

 

So focusing on targeted prevention seems to me to be critical.

 

If we’re, really going to bend the curve in some way – And I appreciate the remarks about my colleagues about the partnership with the schools – I know in the Live Oak School District – there’s a large amount of families who are housing insecure and for Our efforts to be focused there to make sure that they don’t end up in the census.

 

Let’s say becomes critically important.

 

I know we’re also using our resources to help ameliorate that in some way We will have before us in a couple weeks, a project to build 57 units of a family, affordable housing as a way of trying to provide a stock of housing.

 

That people could live in and that families could live in that are close to schools and other services.

 

I also like the data-driven approach. There’s a lot about this, that you don’t say it in here, but it’s a collective impact process right, Which was we want to get all on the same page.

 

We want to have clearly defined goals.

 

We want to use data to drive our decisions and metrics to measure our success and there’s a lot of that going on, but focusing on us will hopefully sharpen our response in some way.

 

So again, we can look at making a dent in the size of the homeless population.

 

I would say that I was to see that we didn’t grow in population last census or at least stayed the same because.

 

You could say it was statistically in the margin of error, but when we look at neighboring jurisdictions that saw 30-40 increases.

 

That tells me we have some hopeful sprouts.

 

It means we do have to reach some scale to make a difference.

 

I also think data is important and one thing that I didn’t see here, which I had hoped that we see in future reports is data on the unincorporated area.

 

There is data about the city of Santa Cruz and the city of Watsonville, but half the population lives in the unincorporated area. We all experience issues of homelessness, both in the families in our neighborhoods in our schools, and in what we see on the streets And I don’t want our efforts to miss out on the needs of Live Oak SoCal, Aptos Felton, wherever that is.

 

I think that’s critically important as well, And when we look at data, we should be looking at it at all the different parts of the county, not simply the cities.

 

It may be easier to find there, but that’s, part of the challenge, is to find ways to track that.

 

I think that if we can get all of our jurisdictions on the same page, and we can look at these short-term efforts to build on the long-term, efforts that will help us in making a difference we’re going to have to come up.

 

Our board has been thinking about innovative housing strategies to figure out how to do that.

 

How to lower the barriers to people building different kinds of housing to think differently about the kind of housing development that we have in the county, which I think is critically important.

 

And I hope that this effort continues to work with all of our partners.

 

Not just in the jurisdictions, but also with our community-based partners’cause.

 

They play a key role.

 

I would stress that I think the governance piece is important. The remarks here about the HEAP CESH funds were disturbing because we don’t it’s, not too often we get money from the state to make a difference, and if we aren’t using it as effectively as possible, then we’re Missing an opportunity – And so I think that’s a challenge for us on the board and all the City Councils to work out this governance structure as quickly as possible to ensure that when there is money that’s coming in for our county, that we make The best decisions possible and not just try to make everyone happy, So thank you for the work, Rayne.

 

Thank you, Ryan Supervisor Friend.

 

Thank you Chair and again.

 

Thank you for the presentation.

 

I don’t want to go over what my colleagues have already talked about, but I wanted to add sort of an internal look.

 

That builds a little bit on a point that Supervisor Leopold had made, which is that he’d brought up the housing component, and I recognize the comment that we don’t need to build a new unit for every individual that we’re talking about.

 

However, with an integrated systems approach, I think it also requires an integrated look at all the policies that the county has, And there are a lot of people that aren’t sitting in here from departments associated with economic development or planning, for example, And What the interrelationship between those policies are and the root causes of what we’re talking about are because everything seems to be presented to us in a vacuum, even this project that has coordinated components with Dientus and others.

 

That is a great project coming forward from Supervisor Leopold.’s.

 

District realistically should be also talked about in the context of this.

 

This isn’t about just integrating service providers in the community. But what is our long-term planning component to build adequate housing When we have people, specifically in portions of my district in the lower income range on the southern portion of the district? What are the job opportunities there And we talk about equity of services? But what about equity of access or prevention in general associated with what county policies are associated with that? That conversation never happens? I haven’t quite figured out why.

 

But if we’re in a strategic planning world – and we’re trying to break down barriers, then we don’t need to just integrate the outside world.

 

In with some of these concepts, We need to integrate the inside world and what we’re doing outside And that’s beyond the scope of what you’re talking about, but I think it’ll still hit a wall.

 

It’s ultimately going to hit a wall when we don’t have those things, And until we break that down internally, then we’re still going to end up in this component.

 

In other words, we’re going to know what the solution is, but we never actually built to provide it, it’s great to have the information, but it ends up to the end.

 

User ends up being pointless because they don’t have their lives.

 

Aren’t impacted for the better, So that’s more for you and Mr. Palacios 39, cause that it’s a top-level thing.

 

But I think that there needs to be more players on the table And even the recent PPIC study that showed our poverty rate in this county.

 

When I spoke to the researchers and said Isolated the one variable, they said Well, it’s, really housing costs and what people earn.

 

Well, then, from a policymaker’s perspective. That means that if I could do something to reduce the housing costs or increase wages for that average workforce, I might have a greater impact than even some of the systems discussions you’re having.

 

But that’s, actually not even what’s being discussed here today, And how that integrates in is important for us, as policymakers cause.

 

We need to change.

 

We need to flip this page for the next 15 or 20 years And a lot of the decisions we make feel like they’re episodic, or they’re unique just to an individual situation, And so whenever this does sort of continue to wind it way back to the board the degree by which other policies, and not just 30 000 foot view we need more housing, but I mean very specific when we’re, identifying components of housing and type of housing and unit size should be directly coordinated.

 

In these discussions, also on the economic development side, Thank you Great now we’re going to open up for members, the public to speak to us.

 

If you’re interested in speaking, please come forward.

 

I see two, Please come up Hi.

 

My name is Serge Kagno.

 

I was up before as part of the county’s Mental Health Advisory Board.

 

We have a letter for you. I also Stepping Up Santa Cruz.

 

Do a lot of advocacy for the homeless and trying to connect people with services.

 

I made a resource directory trying to get people access to the services that are available.

 

I’m on the Smart Path Steering Committee and I’m on the city:’s Community Advisory Committee on Homelessness.

 

I’d like to echo what a few people have said: Ellen Timberlake’s.

 

Thank you to Focus Strategies for coming and helping out and for all of the work of all the different departments coming together to try to solve this Ron.

 

Prince’s.

 

The feeling of being encouraged where we are and where we’re going Supervisor McPherson your earlier comments about affordable housing and needing that for this whole process.

 

I have three things: four things Yeah.

 

I appreciate and encourage the unbiased experts in research that are being brought into our county how we have this struggle of community perception and how the value of actually getting outcomes comes from that kind of research. So I hope that we continue taking that into account.

 

I’d like to say that for the comments about mental health and getting people into shelters and stuff compassionate individualized, the outreach that Health Services is going to be spearheading.

 

That kind of thing of getting people into the navigation centers and changing into the shelters people don’t want to, be in them because of some of the rules and some of the setup.

 

So I want you to understand that we can change our system to get some people off the streets.

 

We have people in the different in Live Oak and in Aptos, who are in unincorporated areas and don’t want to come downtown.

 

Don’t have bus passes There,’s no services for anybody in those areas.

 

There are some showers that the churches have done and stuff like that.

 

Timer buzzing Sorry Go ahead and give us the next two points, but briefly, please Yeah so trying to get some services, because I know the people who are living in Nisene, Marks and stuff like that, and those trying to get them connected is hard.

 

But it’s that outreach kind of I have a pair of socks.

 

How can I help you today And then in a month, maybe the person is willing to talk about CalFresh or something There’s a recommendation for case management in the shelters, and I would ask and suggest for the Salvation Army programs some funding for North County. They don’t have case management, so people are there and I see them and I’ve seen them for years and they don’t move on.

 

They just leave the shelter at some point and then come back at some point.

 

And then I ask for your help about citing because I’m on the city’s Advisory Committee and we have our challenges within the city.

 

But we also need there needs to be more services, even if they’re smaller in many places, And that doesn’t have to have a negative community impact if it’s designed well.

 

If the community gets to come in and gets to see hey, this is our plan for your community.

 

This is our setup Hey.

 

Why is this smoking next to my house? Oh okay, we’ll move it over here.

 

If they get to say what their needs are, then the program has a much better ability to not impact them negatively.

 

Thank you That’s.

 

It is thanks to Board Chair Brent Adams of the Warming Center Program and also we have the Day and Night storage program and laundry service. We’re changing our name on the heels of realizing that Homeless Services Center’s turning heel and maybe turning away from the basic needs of experienced homelessness towards Housing Matters.

 

We’re changing our name to Day and Night Services Center.

 

We’ve already been offering way more services to the person experiencing homelessness on the street than the Homeless Services Center has for a while.

 

I know it.’s really difficult with HUD Continuum of Care.

 

District Ours is the HAP.

 

The paradigm is the talking point.

 

Shelter doesn’t end homelessness.

 

Housing.

 

Does That’s kind of a no-brainer, but we’re.

 

Not you can see out there. It’s a path to nowhere.

 

Smart Path, this vision, we’re, not building any housing.

 

So you’re kind of in a locked up system here, No matter what we do here, we’re, never gon na get people into housing at the numbers we have to.

 

We have to as a community like many other communities.

 

Yes, half of our focus is on permanent support, housing, and other types of housing, but you also have to focus on the people on the street.

 

We’ve already served more than 600 people with storage.

 

I want you to grok What does that mean for the people in your district and definitely in a downtown core? No longer do people have to carry their things there.

 

It’s been a complete transformation of homelessness, Laundry storage, and then all the things that they get, They get hygiene and all kinds of stuff.

 

I want you to stop by our facility where we’re, transforming homelessness, Also with the warming center different things like that.

 

Now we’re not getting a penny of government money this season, but what’s true, is for everything you’re doing here. Very quickly, the navigation center in San Francisco, kind of was a bust At 90 days, and by 30 days they were putting people back on the street ’cause they didn’t have enough housing That’s pretty much all I have.

 

I just want you to focus no matter what you’re doing here: homeless, services for people who live on the street, Let’s double down on that and double back to serve people where they are.

 

Thank you, Okay.

 

That concludes public comment.

 

I’ll bring it back to the board for action.

 

I would move the recommended actions Second Motion by Leopold, second, by McPherson, with appreciation for county staff and the work and Focus Strategies for their partnership and both cities for their collaboration on this All those in favor, please say: aye Board Members Aye Opposed that passes unanimously.

 

So we will return at 1:30 for our scheduled item 11, which is a public hearing to consider a General Plan: Local Coastal Program, Public Safety, Element Conservation, and Open Space Element at 1:30.

 

Thank you group chattering Good afternoon, Good afternoon, everybody We are back for our 1:30 scheduled item.

 

This is a public hearing to consider a resolution amending the General Plan and Local Coastal Program, Public Safety Element, Conservation and Open Space Element, and CEQA Notice of Exemption determination.

 

An ordinance amending the Santa Cruz County Code chapters, 16 10 Geological Hazards, 16 13 Flood, Plain Regulation, 16, 20 Grading Regulations, and 16 22 Erosion Control and schedule the ordinances for final adoption on October 22nd, 2019 and take related actions as outlined in a memorandum of the Planning Director, We have the planning director here to introduce the item: Blonde Woman Planning director’s here and I’m gon na turn it right over to David Carlson, who’s the lead planner on this effort, Perfect, Okay, good afternoon. This project is before the board because an update of the safety element is required by state law and it’s also triggered by the recent update of our housing element.

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The existing safety element contains policies that apply to development projects in the coastal areas of the county and other areas that are subject to hazards from earthquakes, landslides, fires, floods, and coastal erosions, And the policies are implemented by regulations in the County Code.

 

A little background on this project, it was considered by the Planning Commission back in 2015 but was continued at that time for us to complete some additional work on the airport, land use, and sea level rise.

 

The Coastal Commission, Sea Level Rise Policy Guidance document was also an important source for a model policy language, And these policies must ultimately be certified by the Coastal Commission.

 

As part of an amendment to our local coastal plan, The environmental review in 2018 determined there would be no environmental impacts from the proposed amendments compared to our existing policies.

 

Several public hearings and informational meetings occurred in 2018 and 2019 and on March 13th, 2019 the Planning Commission adopted a resolution recommending that the Board of Supervisors approve the proposed amendments.

 

Between March and October of this year, county staff has had several meetings with coastal property owners representatives and Coastal Commission staff, and the staff alternative that’s in your packet grew out of these discussions and is supported by the Coastal Property Owners Association we’re hoping it’ll be supported by the Coastal Commission staff and ultimately, the Coastal Commission.

 

Several sections of the safety element would be amended and a couple of new sections on climate change and environmental justice would be added.

 

Air quality policies would be moved to the safety element And four related chapters of the County Code would implement the policies of the amended safety element.

 

The introduction would be revised to provide information about the requirements of state planning law to update the safety elementary concerning flooding, fires, and climate change, and include information from the Climate Action Strategy and the Local Hazard Mitigation Plan. The seismic hazards section would be amended to add some clarifying language regarding technical reports and additional information on seismic hazards.

 

The policy regarding recording a notice of geologic hazard on the property deed would be renamed and includes additional requirements for owners to accept risk release the county from liability and agree to waive claims against the county in connection with the county.

 

Issuing a permit And proposed amendments to Santa Cruz County Codes – Chapter 16, 10 Geologic Hazards would also be necessary to implement the proposed amendments.

 

A new section would be added that addresses climate change and incorporates, by reference the Local Hazard Mitigation Plan and the Climate Action Strategy.

 

In the future, updates of these plans and amendments would address slope stability again.

 

Adding clarifying language regarding technical reports and including the updated requirements regarding the recording, a notice of geologic hazard on the property, and deed And again, amendments to Chapter 16, 10 Geologic Hazards would implement those changes as well.

 

There would be significant revisions to the section on coastal bluffs and beaches addressing sea level rise, And we’ll address that a little bit later in the presentation, There will be updates to the grading and erosion control policies which would lower the amount of land clearing Allowed without a permit from one acre to a quarter, acre and clarify the definition of certain types of grading activities, including cannabis activities And again the policies would be reflected in updates of the grading and erosion control, ordinances, chapter 16, 20 and 16 22 of the County Code, The flood hazard policies would be updated to account for sea level rise by requiring elevation of certain structures above the minimum required flood elevations, And the amendments would create a separate flood hazard, ordinance, updating and clarifying and consolidating all of the flood requirements into one standalone Ordinance based on FEMA and the state model ordinance Fire hazard policies would be updated to be consistent with existing state law and the county fire code.

 

Extensive background information is added to the introduction of this section, and new policies are added regarding creating and maintaining defensible space for fire protection around structures.

 

The amendments would also remove a lot of detailed information from some of the policies because the same information is already included in the fire code, which gets updated on a regular cycle, And a recent update to state planning laws will require safety.

 

Elements to now include environmental justice policies addressing disadvantaged communities. The updates to this section are just a start to including these in the safety element in a more extensive update and addressing environmental justice provisions, as planned in the sustainability update, which the Planning Department is currently working on.

 

One example, however, in the proposed amendments, is a policy addressing the hazard of wood smoke in the San Lorenzo Valley by supporting financial assistance programs for a phaseout of wood stoves, these types of policies, including them, will help the county seek.

 

Grant funding to address.

 

Some of these environmental justice issues So moving on to the main event, the proposed amendments to the coastal, bluffs and beaches, a section of the safety element which is intended to address climate change and sea level rise For the coast, climate change, and sea level rise means higher Tides and inundation of coastal areas more intense and more frequent wave impacts and storm surges and accelerated erosion of coastal bluffs and beaches.

 

This represents a risk to coastal development and to existing beaches and public access to the coast.

 

The state also recognizes the issue and requires local communities to address these types of climate change impacts in local general plans, the state Coastal Commission has guided sea level rise policy development Because this amendment must be certified by the Coastal Commission.

 

We’ve tried to align our policies as much as possible with the Coastal Commission.’s.

 

Sea Level Rise Policy Guidance document.

 

The overall objective remains the same as the current objective in the safety element, and that is to reduce and minimize risks to life, property, and public infrastructure from coastal hazards, including projected hazards due to sea level, rise, wave run-up an,d coastal erosion and to minimize impacts On coastal resources from development, Section 6, 4 of the Public Safety Element amendments begins with a set of guiding principles that recognize the diverse nature of the coastal areas of the county, including different geologic conditions and different patterns of development.

 

While there are basic requirements for coastal bluff setbacks and beach-level development, the policies are written to allow for a project to be evaluated based on the specific characteristics of the site. The policy approach treats urban areas differently compared to rural areas by recognizing that allowing carefully planned development in urban coastal areas can help achieve better outcomes for the coast.

 

The proposed staff alternative further breaks down the urban areas geographically to find shoreline management areas that would be subject to future planning efforts.

 

So, as I mentioned previously, for the most part, the policies are consistent with nearly all the model policy language in the Coastal Commission guidance document.

 

However, there are two key issues where differences remain, one is the amount of construction to modify an existing house that defines the difference between existing development and new development.

 

If the modifications are minor, the house may still be considered an existing structure.

 

If the modifications are major, the house may be considered a new development.

 

The threshold is important because the new development is subject to these policies, while existing development is not Second, if the project does qualify as new development and the site is protected by an existing shoreline or coastal bluff.

 

Armoring structure’s continued reliance on the existing armoring must be addressed, And so the existing definition of development activities or new development to evaluate geologic hazards is found in Santa Cruz County Code 16, 10 and it’s the same as the proposed definition on The left, except the current threshold is 65 structural modifications and we are proposing to lower that to 50, which is more consistent with the Coastal Act.

 

The county currently uses different thresholds for structures on coastal bluffs and beaches because we need to use FEMA’s.

 

50. Evaluation method for development and designated flood zones and at beach level, There’s actually a long list in the definition of development activities in the code, but these are the most relevant parts that apply to most projects.

 

So if the project meets or exceeds any of these thresholds on the left, it’s subject to geologic, review and meeting the requirements consistent with these policies.

 

If the project does not meet the threshold generally, it’s not subject to geologic review.

 

So the coastal commission definition on the right represents a much lower threshold because the 50 calculation applies independently to each part of the structure, foundation, walls, or roof.

 

While the county definition applies to the structure as a whole the Coastal Commission definition counts.

 

All past work done on the structure back to 1977, So the Coastal Commission definition means many.

 

More applications would be subject to geologic review and these policies compared to the county definition, And it should be noted here that the staff alternative proposes to change that five-year rolling period to 20 years.

 

Consistent with the time horizon.

 

For this general plan update – These are the relevant Coastal Act policies regarding the construction of armoring – It’s allowed to protect existing structures, but it’s not allowed to protect new development.

 

However, there’s a third situation that’s not addressed here, and that is a modification of an existing structure resulting in new development where there is an existing permitted, armoring structure. The county has always allowed reliance on existing armoring structures where a structure is modified beyond the 50 thresholds, And the proposed amendments would continue this practice within the urban services line and the rural services line.

 

The Coastal Commission, however, interprets these two provisions of the Coastal Act in a way that does not allow reliance on existing armoring, And the proposed amendments would adopt this approach in the rural areas of the county.

 

This is an example of the hybrid approach that we’re proposing where we adopt the Coastal Commission’s, preferred approach in the rural areas of the county and maintain the county’s existing practice in urban areas, And so for comparison.

 

If we adopted the Coastal Commission’s preferred definition of new development and the policy interpretation of no reliance on existing armoring, this would represent a major change compared to past county practice and a major restriction on development within the urbanized area of the county.

 

Many more projects would be subject to geologic review under the Coastal Commission definition and without reliance on existing armoring.

 

New development would not be allowed on many more properties.

 

We think the county’s urban-rural hybrid approach is more reasonable and it includes a variety of additional provisions to address the risk of future sea level rise.

 

This slide shows the urbanized areas of the coast, including the cities of Santa Cruz and Capitola, and the small pockets of urbanized development along the south coast of the county outlined in green.

 

The urbanized areas are largely built out, making it very difficult to retreat in the face of sea level rise.

 

Rural areas are largely undeveloped with larger parcels that could accommodate retreat more easily, this image shows the extent of armoring in the urbanized areas compared to the rural areas and a couple of examples of improvements and fixes to existing armoring that improved conditions along the coast. You have the Pleasure Point seawall and then a repair of an armoring structure that was failing.

 

So this is the key policy where this rural-urban concept is reflected within the urban and rural services line where shoreline and coastal bluff armoring is common.

 

Allow the effect of existing shoreline and coastal bluff armoring to be considered when calculating coastal bluff erosion rates consistent with our existing practice.

 

However, in rural areas of the coast, where the shoreline and coastal bluff armoring is rare, do not allow it.

 

The effect of such an existing structure on the analysis of the coastal erosion rate Within the urban and rural services line requires evaluation of an existing shoreline and coastal bluff armoring structure that protects the homes that are proposed for redevelopment and require improvements to the armoring.

 

That would address impacts of the armoring on coastal resources In the rural areas of the county, where armoring is rare, again adopt a policy of no reliance on an existing armoring structure for new development.

 

The staff alternative that you have would go further and identify urban areas where armoring would be allowed as part of a shoreline protection exception area and not necessarily limited to protecting threatened structures, but as part of a proactive approach in a given area.

 

To achieve a larger outcome like increased public access and opening up beach and shoreline areas to public access, Existing policies addressing new armoring would also.

 

This is the existing policy that addresses new armoring.

 

It would also be modified to address existing shoreline and coastal bluff armoring And the policy language regarding existing armoring in 6. 4 25 would only apply again to new development.

 

The policy requires a re-evaluation of existing armoring to determine existing impacts.

 

If an armoring structure, doesn’t already have a monitoring, maintenance, and repair program MMRP must be established, The policy encourages the replacement of existing shoreline and coastal bluff armoring with a more modern type of armoring.

 

That would reduce impacts on coastal resources and thereby improve public access and recreation along the coast.

 

The existing policy requires mitigation of impacts on sand supply and recreational opportunities caused by the shoreline and coastal bluff armoring, and the amendments introduce a new option to satisfy this requirement involving payment of fees.

 

The preference would be that armoring would be physically upgraded to address identified impacts.

 

However, we understand this is not always feasible For new development.

 

This policy significantly expands the language in the notice of geologic coastal and flood hazards that we already require to be recorded on property deeds.

 

The language includes, but is not limited to acceptance of risk waiver of any liability claim against the county and indemnification of the county in connection with the permitted development.

 

The language also includes a list of future conditions that could develop in the future, as the sea level continues to rise and coastal properties become increasingly at risk and even damaged as a result. It does not state that these actions will take place but could take place based on future conditions on the ground while respecting the constitutional rights of property owners.

 

The amendments propose a series of new policies addressing future conditions under which a structure would have to be evaluated and possibly removed or relocated due to coastal hazards.

 

These policies do not mandate, the removal or relocation of structures.

 

They describe how the county would proceed in the future.

 

Under certain conditions, if structures become unsafe or dangerous due to coastal hazards And lastly, a policy that encourages a more comprehensive, modern approach to coastal protection rather than property-by-property measures is proposed.

 

The policy would encourage the county to seek grant funds to develop one or more shoreline management plans to guide these efforts.

 

It’s, envisioned these plans would address specific areas of the urbanized coastline that have similar characteristics, such as the lagoons between the harbor and Pleasure.

 

Point and the South County beaches, The plans may accommodate upgraded and even additional shoreline armoring as appropriate to open up the beach and improve public access.

 

It would also include triggers for when other adaptation responses become necessary, For example, when armoring is no longer a feasible option.

 

The staff alternative goes further and designates the Opal Cliffs area as an area where armoring would be allowed and identifies the area between the harbor and Pleasure Point as the priority for the development of a shoreline management plan, so now just a summary of the Staff alternative, which includes identifying the geographic areas where shoreline management plans would be a priority and then all other areas outside of these priority areas would be allowed. One 50 modifications unless a future shoreline management plan would allow additional development In the shoreline protection exception area along Opal, Cliff’s armoring would be allowed.

 

The alternative also clarifies that the term of a monitoring, maintenance, and repair program for an armoring structure would be 20 years and that extension beyond the 20 years may require additional mitigation actions to be taken.

 

The alternative identifies the area between Harbor and SoCal Point as the priority because this area is limited in terms of beach area and public access and could benefit from a more comprehensive approach that would increase beach area and public access to the coast.

 

And so our recommendation today is to open the public hearing and consider both the Planning Commission,’s and the staff’s alternative proposals regarding coastal bluffs and beaches provide direction, and refer to the Planning Commission’s meeting of November 13th for its review and recommendation.

 

We’re asking for November 13th now to allow us a little more time to address some of the comments that we’ve received and prepare the Planning Commission staff report Number three provides direction regarding the board’s desired content for any of the Other proposed amendments for other parts of the safety element and then continue this public hearing to December 10th to consider the Planning Commission’s recommendation and to consider taking action on the proposed amendments.

 

And that concludes the staff presentation All right.

 

Let’s open up for questions.

 

The information on the screen, then, is inaccurate.

 

You’re just talking about continuing the public hearing to December 10th Yeah I didn’t have time to upgrade that slide.

 

I apologize for that Sure Sure happy to ask. Thank you for the presentation.

 

This is pretty difficult work because trying to think there are a lot of things.

 

This board thinking about development in the county than it.’s been done for decades.

 

We talked earlier this morning about housing policy and homeless services, trying to do things differently, Trying to think about what the future of our coastline looks like with sea level rise and the impacts of climate change is not easy because we have estimates, but we don’t have enough of all the facts to know, But we have values that are important and we have this guidance document from the Coastal Commission and I went down to the Coastal Commission in July as a part of a panel to try to engage them in understanding That local situations are gon na be different and a one size fits all effort.

 

Statewide was probably not going to work, And I appreciate the work that has been done to try to bring some specificity to this, about where things would be allowed.

 

What kind of work still needs to be done, they would start to work on building what triggers are going to be in place? I think that that is all helpful.

 

It’s helpful for the public, whether you are a property owner or not.

 

A surfer to know what some of these pieces are going to, look like and prepare for effects or understand when life is going to change differently than it is now or how we allow coastal development.

 

I have a couple of questions that I want to ask.

 

Most of them are on the coastal development piece, but there was one piece I just wanted to ask about the grading changes You mentioned grading changes around cannabis and I’m wondering: did you review that with the Cannabis Licensing Office? Yes, As you might recall, these amendments were drafted quite a while ago and, while the cannabis regulations were being drafted, they were being kind of made consistent with the proposal here Great. So yes, I would just encourage that, as it goes through this process of coming back just check in with them Sure We have new staff over there and it’d be nice to get this right if we’re going to go through this whole process.

 

Regarding the coastal development pieces, we’ve had lots of different concerns that have been discussed. There have been concerns about the people who have permits existing permits and what happens under this new regimen it’s my understanding that the entitlement that someone has with their existing permit stays it’s really if it’s, gon na, be new construction Redevelopment or a replacement that accurate, David, Yes, there needs to be a trigger for the county to impose, But if received a permit – and I have some kind of armoring structure – and maybe I have a maintenance requirement – that doesn’t change David No And it only gets triggered if it’s going to be considered new development of greater than 50 greater.

 

Exactly Geologic review is triggered by that definition of new development.

 

It seems to me it would be helpful to have a more clear statement, and maybe when we are at the end of this, I’ll suggest some language that we could put in there.

 

I know that what we see here is not final, and so it would be good to, as we do this think about language that brings clarity to it.

 

There have also been concerns raised about the indemnification clause and how that gets written and everything else In letters from some of the property owners they’ve referred to some San Diego cases.

 

I’m not sure what you know about that, whether this part of it could use some refinement.

 

I’m not familiar with that case that’s referred to And that’s part of the reason why we’re asking for a little more time here.

 

So maybe we can do some of that research and look into that comment.

 

I think that there is an interest in the Coastal Commission. I can tell you there’s an interest from this supervisor, maybe the entire board about finding ways to increase beach access and increase the size of our beaches right?

 

This is one of the concerns raised by armoring structures.

 

Nothing in this talks about trying to incentivize people to change the kind of protection structures they have.

 

I mean on the many of the pictures you showed in the Live Oak Pleasure Point area our rocks, our riprap.

 

They take up a lot of space and I know that when the county put in the seawall at Pleasure Point and removed all the riprap.

 

Suddenly we had a lot more beach that we all get to enjoy than we did beforehand.

 

And I’d like to see us have trade some tools to incentivize the removal of that riprap and if it means a vertical structure that’s a win for everybody involved Yeah.

 

I think that it could be an incentive to get property owners to support the development of a shoreline management plan because the staff alternative tries to make it more clear that if you’re designated, you achieve designation as a shoreline protection exception area.

 

That means that we have a near-to-mid-term vision of that.

 

The shoreline’s going to be protected, hopefully with a modern seawall that’s consistent throughout the exception area. As we’ve stated, the priority for the development of a shoreline management plan would be from 7th Avenue to about the SoCal point And there’s a variety of conditions there.

 

But it might be that that effort would result in some or all of that area being deemed a shoreline exception area with the opportunity to then implement a project that would take up riprap expose more beach, provide greater public access stairways or what have you? We hope that the property owners along that stretch will want to participate in the shoreline management plan effort so that we can all figure out which areas should be protected or what other strategies might be appropriate along that area.

 

Sure – and I know that we’re starting to see some – let’s say more innovative access ways in which the commissioners will take a look at it.

 

There was an armoring structure right down at Pleasure Point put in recently that increased access through a platform area stairs down to the beach that didn’t exist before Is this kind of what you’re thinking in places like Opal Cliffs, or something like that?

 

Yes, so, under the staff alternative, we made it even clearer than the Planning Commission recommended.

 

It was in there too, but we tried to emphasize and make it more clear that the Opal Cliffs area would be considered a shoreline protection, exception area, And the reason being most of that area.

 

Doesn’t have a whole broad beach anyway.

 

A lot of it is inundated much of the year.

 

Secondly, it’s one line of homes and then it’s Opal Cliffs Drive, which is a critical public access route between the harbor and the city of Capitola, And so it’s already predominantly urbanized.

 

There are a lot of various conditions and materials that could be cleaned up and improved, exposed more beach, incorporated public access, stairways platforms, and what you just mentioned, and that is the idea that hopefully, the property owners will work together and define a project that includes All those benefits I wan na ask about sand and surf a little bit. There’s a piece in here about sand mitigation fees.

 

I’ve heard a lot of concerns around the community about what that means, the value or nonvalue of it, and the costs.

 

I recently heard a presentation by Gary Griggs a noted coastal geologist from UCSC that says that most of the sand, at least in North County, really comes from the San Lorenzo River and not, the cliffs face that make up the shoreline and the eastern Live Oak.

 

Pleasure Point et cetera, So what are we talking about here with a sand mitigation fee? I mean what would be a cost of a house on 24th Avenue that would be looking to do something?

 

It’s kind of hard for me to understand that.

 

Well, here,’s, the concept, and 90 of the sand in the littoral system is coming out of the San Lorenzo River.

 

It’s estimated at 10.

 

It’s supplied by erosion of coastal bluffs.

 

So there is a sand content in the coastal bluff that, as it erodes, becomes part of the beach.

 

If you armor that coastal bluff, you cut off that sand supply. So the idea is, as a mitigation for the construction of an armoring structure, to have a professional engineer or geologist examine that coastal bluff to determine the sand.

 

Content with actual site, specific sampling, and based on the erosion rate over a defined period determine the amount of sand that would have ended up on the beach had that bluff not been armored That’s the sand mitigation fee.

 

There’s an established methodology, It’s a mathematical equation to do that, a calculation that is used by the Coastal Commission.

 

The Coastal Commission’s been imposing this requirement as mitigation.

 

It’s called out in the Coastal Act regarding new armoring that you must mitigate for sand supply.

 

It’s been upheld by the courts so, however small it is a mitigation that we need to apply to these projects, But it’s a single property, as I say, on 24th Avenue, What might be the range at which people might be expected to Pay, I know that the science hasn’t been done, but there must be some kind of calculation that you, ‘ve, been thought of Right right for the urbanized section of the coast in the Live Oak Opal Cliffs area, you’re, probably looking at for A typical 50-foot wide lot, you’re, probably looking at somewhere in the range of 10, 000 plus or minus.

 

I think the one I’m recalling was less.

 

It was maybe 8,000.

 

The other piece is about the surf.

 

There’s a lot of concern about armoring and its effect on surf. I know when the county built the seawall at Pleasure Point.

 

There was a tremendous amount of measurement that was done both before and after the structure was built to assess some of those pieces And, depending on who you talk to the science was, I would say, at the very least, was at the very worst was unclear about Whether it had any meaningful effect on the surf, If you talk to surfers there,’s a diversity of opinion, And I respect that One of the things that I first heard about from Jack – O’Neill.

 

But now it seems like there’s some research, that’s been done about the shape of vertical structures and the idea of placing some kind of curve into that.

 

So when the water comes up and pulls up the sand, it deposits it back generally where it came from rather than pushing it out into the sea, And it also helps with the impact caused when the wave hits the wall you get, the ripple effect Back but when you have a curved portion, it has less impact on the incoming waves And it would be, I think, helpful, to sort of as we go through this process to look at designs or some of that engineering.

 

I know that Dave Revell, the coastal geologist working with the city and a lot of other communities has done some work on this because to me it’s an interesting idea: Jack kept on taking physics classes in his 80s, and we had several conversations Where he was looking for ways in which to minimize the impact on the surf And that’s, where he first talked about it, but now it appears there’s, also some science behind it.

 

That deals with the question of whether we have a shoreline exception zone, and ways in which to protect the surf, which is critical not only because some of us might like to surf, but it’s a huge part of our economy And protecting the surf becomes important For the long term, livelihood of the Pleasure Point area and other points where people like to surf because that’s why they wan na go there.

 

I think that’s all the questions I have Now.

 

I look forward to hearing the discussion from the public and I may want to come back after that Ryan Supervisor Friend.

 

Thank you Chair.

 

I agree with my colleague’s, points that he raised and there are some additional questions I had. Although I’m looking forward to hearing some of the public input on this Significant amount of work and time has already been put into this, and I appreciate the modifications that have already come through both the Planning Commission and your work with organizations within my District and Supervisor Leopold’s district.

 

To make this a more balanced and appropriate document, You’ve done good work on it.

 

There are some questions I had and just sort of I do feel like even in reading through the alternatives, analysis or not, the alternatives.

 

Analysis, the staff alternative that I want to ensure that there isn’t something left to future staff interpretation that is expected of us from today: votes or moving forward votes Because when we’ve met with members of the community, I’ve had wonderful conversations with both of you, some of the feedback I’ve gotten – is that well we don’t read it that way.

 

This is what we believe it to say, and I think that we should just then state it, so it doesn’t equivocally, say something.

 

So there’s complete clarity for somebody coming in moving forward, And that also is understood by location.

 

There’s a lot of clarity now for areas in the Opal, Cliffs, or Pleasure Point area, but there are areas within my district, where conditions are unique as well such as Pajaro Dunes.

 

Specifically, They have a geo out there that I think, makes sense to have a recognition of what applies to them and what doesn’t apply to them, And I think that, to the degree that we can provide that level of specificity, I recognize that the Pajaro Dunes Associations wrote a letter asking for additional desire to meet with them, and I think that that makes sense, but I’d like to see very specific things considered by the Planning Commission in regards to what applies and doesn’t apply to Pajaro Dunes.

 

The reality is, is that they’re on a dune.

 

The reality is, is that they haven’t had any sand loss. The reality is that the conditions there are fundamentally different than areas up the coast, and I want to ensure that there’s clarity for the residents of the dunes moving forward.

 

In regards to that, I do have a question in regards to sort of check-ins.

 

You mentioned in the alternative that this is meant to be an adaptive document that, although it’s a 20-year, looks like there will be check-ins.

 

Will there be periodic specific check-ins that would modify the document if some of the conditions that we’re anticipating within our mean aren’t met by Blonde Woman To the safety element policies themselves? Correct, Certainly, I mean I think at this point.

 

We’re using what we see is appropriate for the 20-year projections, but at any time, if some of the underlying assumptions shift, then we can always amend the safety element again.

 

Should we build that in specifically, or is meaning that at a five-year or 10-year point, should there be a look back at the document to say the conditions that were estimated to be in existence at this point are 75 of what they thought it would Be And what I wan na ensure is that we’re not, we could be wrong either way.

 

Right I mean we could be creating a document that doesn’t recognize the amount of rise, that’s occurring to the negative side or the positive side, And I feel like that, if it’s truly an adaptive document, then there should be Timelines built in to go back into the document to potentially modify the document to reflect the conditions on the ground.

 

We tried to put in a policy that says that, as we administer, these policies and coastal development permits we would use sort of the middle of the range of the best available science.

 

I think we can continue to have as a principle that we change the number in terms of projected sea level rise as appropriate without formally needing to amend the document.

 

But we could – or we could include, report backs in terms of status reports In terms of the coastal development permits that are issued themselves. We have within that package of conditions, would be a requirement for monitoring maintenance and repair programs that would have a 20-year life associated mitigations and conditions of approval associated with that, with the expectation that, before the expiration of that 20-year term, we take a look at The MMRP again and look at actual conditions on the ground at that time see what the coastal impacts are at that time and have another round of mitigation.

 

If you will, Maybe there’s another 20 years, So that’s part of the adaptive response.

 

That would be associated with the coastal development permits themselves, And so that’s, one of the reasons frankly for a policy that would go into effect in 2020, And we know that sea level rise at some point is going to make it infeasible impractical to keep Shoreline protection structures, 80 years 100 years, however many decades.

 

Hence It’s, going to be practically economically infeasible for them to go there.

 

So what we’re looking at in this document, which is a general plan safety element with a kind of a time horizon of 2040, is we’re looking at the near to mid-term and trying to articulate an approach that is practical and makes sense For now, but one of the things about letting someone do things to their homes, go over 50 of major structural components or value or addition.

 

Or what have you is that, then we establish a relationship with them.

 

Now they’ve got something they want.

 

An ability to get a coastal development permit to improve their home or replace it, or what have you? We have conditions of approval.

 

We have the notice that’s recorded on deeds.

 

We have sand mitigation fees, and recreation impact fees – Hopefully, we’ve done projects in a manner that has improved public access, exposed, more beaches, et cetera, et cetera. So the package of benefits for the public comes along with conferring a benefit to the property owner, So that’s adaptive because when we have those conditions of approval, then we get the 20-year check-ins and if there is bluff erosion that gets within 15 feet then they’re required to hire a geologist contact, the building official Coastal Commission executive director, and we all go out there and say: Okay, given this hazard that’s now even closer to your structure, what is an appropriate response? Do we need to take off part of the structure? Do we need to vacate part of the structure? What needs to happen here? So we think that this.

 

In summary, it’s a long answer.

 

I know, but in summary, there are a lot of different aspects of this, that we consider to be an adaptive approach for the interim between 2020 and such time that it becomes impossible to keep protecting certain areas of the coast.

 

I mean at a minimum.

 

The reportbacks would make sense at timed intervals.

 

I think that the future board should have the flexibility to reopen the discussion if conditions aren’t either way what we didn’t anticipate.

 

We don’t want a document that has inflexibility in an uncertain situation, Getting back to some issues specific to my district that I had specific questions on,’s revetments and built that are associated with a homeowner’s.

 

Association on Beach Drive the Beach Islands, which is the HOA, is functionally for that and other purposes, but that’s one of the main purposes, And then there’s a district that handles the dunes.

 

If you’re an individual, then that is, is remodeling your home and goes above the 50 threshold.

 

What’s your expectation in regards to looking at how those revetments are done outside of your property? Well, we do have a clause in that policy. 6.

 

4: 25 addresses armoring structure that talks about re-evaluating an existing structure.

 

But what does that clause say in the case of a geologic hazard abatement district that has a plan of control to maintain and repair that structure?

 

We would not require an individual owner to reevaluate that structure.

 

If it’s already happening as an HOA or a geologic hazard abatement district project, Okay, then similar to, I think, Supervisor, Leopold.’s point I think, to the degree that we specify the individual areas that currently, at the time of adoption, have that that would make sense so that they can feel that sense of understanding that it doesn’t in essence apply to the individual homeowner.

 

In either of the dunes – and it also wouldn’t apply to the individual homeowner in the case of the Beach Island, the Rio del Mar Island homeowners, either When it comes back time for a motion, I think one of the things I would like to see Is the Planning Commission consider whether the sand mitigation fees even make sense of the dunes at all? The whole point of this is, if you’re, actually removing sand from the actions taken by your development and when you’re in an area that hasn’t shown it for the last 60 years.

 

I think that it’s valuable to have that kind of look, but that level of specificity, I think, would make sense for both the Beach Island and the dunes specifically, since they have unique situations set up for the revetment protections.

 

I think the individuals would be concerned.

 

The last question I have, but I think you’ve answered this question to me directly, but I think that it makes sense to answer it in public If your home were to be destroyed due to an act outside of sea level rise even by an act Of somebody else, meaning your neighbor’s, home catches, fire and your home burns down.

 

Somebody through arson burns your home down and therefore you need more than a 50 rebuild the way I read. This would mean that if you’re within certain areas of my district, you would have to rebuild, according to potentially even an eight to 10 foot up.

 

If you’re within the FEMA-mapped V Zone right Mm-hmm, Irrespective of what caused it correct?

 

Yes, the FEMA regulations require any repair of substantial damage which be any cause to comply with FEMA regulations which may require elevation of the rebuilt structure, And there would be no flexibility in your interpretation from the board perspective on addressing what the cause would be because of The FEMA standards Is the question: is there any flexibility in that regard, Because that would affect our participation in the National Flood Insurance Program? Potentially, So we don’t want to necessarily compromise that Yeah that’s.

 

What the question is, Because, in conversations with people that I’ve had in my district, one of the concerns has been well.

 

If the goal here is to recognize that sea level rise or wave action is what’s causing damage, then you would imagine or could cause future damage if something were to happen to my home outside of that, why would I be responsible for rebuilding My home, in a way that means that I could lose a floor.

 

For example, If I live in seascapes in certain locations as opposed to not, But to continue to participate in this process, that would be the answer that they would receive correctly.

 

Yes, Okay Ryan, For beach for For beach, yes, Correct, FEMA, flood zone level development.

 

Yes, Thank you! Chair Ryan Supervisor, McPherson Yeah, there’s not much coastline in Santa Rosa Valley group, laughing Yeah Just wait.

 

Blonde Woman.

 

We do have sandhills, though, But the San Lorenzo River plays an important role in this whole thing, as we know, so, I’ve got a piece of the pie. No, I’m very very concerned about this issue, and my point right now is well.

 

First of all, I wan to thank the county staff for doing this.

 

I know that two other counties have attempted to revise their plans and they withdrew those plans.

 

I think it was Marin and I can’t remember the other one and some serious issues would be faced in some of the coastal areas not too far from us up in Pacifica, in particular in San Mateo County.

 

But I guess my very good questions asked and I’m concerned about what we’re.

 

Projecting the sea level rise to be, and I think you have taken the staff into effect.

 

The concerns of the property owners, as well as the Coastal Commission itself, but there are a lot of different variables in sea level rise.

 

We can see right here.

 

I mean it’s three or four times differential.

 

Just one thing: we have some new environmental laws that I hope we can stick to in this state, regardless of what the federal government tries to do, What is the impact of all those to slow down the sea level rise if it has any impact at all? But I’d hope we don’t take a huge giant leap forward and say you’ve gotta, wipe out this for 10 feet or something when we see that in a hundred years, when we see that it’s only gone up three Inches in 15 years or something I hope we take a measured approach and I think we are that let’s check as we go along And, as you’ve done, respect the rights of property owners, but also the coastal protection issue and the sea level rise is that’s all part of it too, But I hope that we just take a measured approach in our estimates as we go along and I think that you will and have up to this point.

 

Okay, thank you.

 

I guess my brief comment.

 

So this started in 2015 and then it got tabled for a while Before that.

 

Actually, Before that, How many public hearings have you had on this David Five at the Planning, Commission, Ryan And then how many public events have you had A few more sort of informational meetings, stakeholder meetings, yeah? Okay, There were earlier rounds in the development of the document which occurred before 2015, with coastal engineers and architects and other coastal staff and other stakeholders.

 

So we’ve been working on this since about 2011 or 2012, Okay, and then how much assuming we go with the staff recommendation? How much time between now and when this is adopted and then maybe adopted by the Coastal Commission? Do you anticipate you’ll? Be spending on this Well, we would anticipate if we’re back here in December for the adoption of proposed amendments and then a second reading on that early next year January.

 

Thereabouts, we would be submitting the package to the Coastal Commission and then it’s in their hands we don’t have control over the timeline or the amount of time it takes them to prepare it for their commission, But it would likely be sometime In 2020, Okay, I mean – I think my part of this is an appreciation that you all have stood between.

 

Essentially the Coastal Commission and property owners on what all my colleagues have pointed out.

 

It can be sort of very challenging and difficult regulations in a changing environment.

 

I also think, given the amount of time and the other priorities, we’re talking about a very small section of homes that are, especially homeowners that are full-time. Residents of Santa Cruz we have fire emergencies, we have an affordable housing crisis, we have a homelessness crisis, We need to start dedicating staff time to those other things.

 

There’s only one of you and many many issues Whatever it is.

 

I think we need to make sure that at some point we give Coastal our last best and final offer sooner rather than later, and let them decide and then we need to move on to these other issues. .

 

This is taking an enormous amount of time and effort on issues that we’re, not spending on other housing issues that are pressing in this community, So hopefully, today and going forward, you will let us know what you need to sort of get this wrapped up And to Coastal sooner rather than later, so that we can focus on other things: Okay, now it’s an opportunity for members of the public to come forward and speak to us about this item Good afternoon my name is Steve Ray.

 

I’m President of the Coastal Property Owners Association of Greater Santa Cruz County, representing about 600 property owners And if you include the HOAs, we’re at well over a thousand members.

 

I’d like to speak to the item 7892.

 

Regarding the county’s proposed amendments to the local coastal plan and safety amendment.

 

We have submitted a letter of support.

 

We’re very much appreciative of the county, staff’s efforts to try to accommodate, or at least address our concerns in the document and with some additional changes to be made.

 

There are three remaining issues in the revised LCP that we request further clarification on, and that are written into the LCP. The terms and conditions of existing shoreline protection.

 

Armoring devices shall not be altered and the property owners shall be allowed to maintain the shoreline protection.

 

According to the terms of their initial permit, Existing shoreline protection shall be taken into consideration when calculating the useful life of the structures and the required setback for new permits or redevelopment permits.

 

The second issue is the language in the LCP used regarding the recordation of the hold harmless indemnification and waiver of liability Needs to be revised to specify the specific purpose and time or term for that liability release as under the San Diego court case.

 

Thirdly, the sand mitigation fees must be reasonable, based on hard science and estimates of the actual potential sand loss that occurs at the specific site.

 

Property owners should be offered may offer improved public access or a protection of beach erosion instead of these sand mitigation fees, lastly, we request a meeting with staff before this is presented back to the planning.

 

Commissioners.

 

Thank you.

 

Thank you, Steve, before you leave.

 

It would be really helpful if we could get the case. Regarding the San Diego case, If you could provide information about that case, I want to make sure they’re looking at the right thing.

 

So if you have the case name or any other, I’ll look back through the research.

 

It was an article that was published and it basically was pursuant to a ruling on their particular Yeah.

 

I just want to make sure they’re.

 

Looking at the right thing: Okay, Thank you.

 

Anyone else who wants to speak, please line up and come right forward.

 

Thank you, Chairman Coonerty supervisors.

 

My name is Jeff Raimundo.

 

I’m President of the Pajaro Dunes, North Association and speaking on behalf of both North and South.

 

Today We do appreciate the progress made on the planning document. Over the past year.

 

We’ve made a lot of progress.

 

The staff has been very cooperative in at least allowing us to meet with them and give them our point of view.

 

We truly appreciate that, and the document shows the attention they paid to it.

 

We do support the additional time to continue this review so that we can assess and finalize our points on it.

 

We recognize that it may some of these things that I’m going to point out may be addressed in the document already and several of the supervisors have already raised the issue with the planning staff.

 

But three things stand out to us that we would like to at least look more deeply and discuss with staff.

 

One is the adaptive localized approach that given the uncertainty in sea rise, modeling identified in the county’s own planning process.

 

We believe the LCP should provide flexibility and discretion to the staff, embrace adaptive approaches, and incorporate unique site conditions in the granting of waivers or the imposition of restrictions on development.

 

Secondly, on sand loss, we believe the document tends to presume that we have a lot of sand loss along the coast. Pajaro Dunes, we believe both photographic evidence and on-site demonstration show that we get inundated by sand to the frustration of some of the homeowners who are below the dune level and can’t see the ocean anymore.

 

We believe the existing shoreline protection, the permit, and renewal and approval of existing revetments should be presumed.

 

We believe it to be granted unless substantial changes in circumstances are identified.

 

That would necessitate additional permit review Again.

 

These things may be present there already In the short time we’ve, had it’s, just not clear to us.

 

So thank you very much.

 

Thank you, Hello.

 

My name is Ali.

 

I’m speaking on behalf of the Surfrider Foundation, Santa Cruz Chapter speaking on behalf of our thousands of members and supporters in the county.

 

We submitted a letter yesterday that outlines some of our concerns with the local coastal program update, and I hope that you will. All have a chance to review.

 

It sounds like some of you have, which is awesome.

 

I’d like to focus today on the shoreline armoring policies that the update proposes.

 

First and foremost, Surfrider is greatly concerned that the interest in the rights of the beach going public is not represented in the county’s proposed policy updates.

 

This update puts the rights of property owners clearly before the rights of the public trust Beaches belong to all Californians and maintaining natural processes that preserve lateral access along our beaches, as prescribed in the Coastal Act, should be the goal of sea level rise.

 

Adaptation planning Surfrider opposes seawalls for any new development and redevelopment.

 

This is because seawalls destroy beaches.

 

The only reason that pre-Coastal Act homes are allowed to use seawalls under the Coastal Act is because they were built before we knew better.

 

Now we know better No amount of mitigation for new development, relying on seawalls, including stairways and access or park.

 

Improvements will be adequate to mitigate if there are no beaches and waves to go to. It is well established that we meet sea level rise with seawalls.

 

We lose our erosion If the county moves forward with the plan as proposed.

 

Eventually, the waves of Santa Cruz will drown as the rising seas meet hard armoring and the bluffs are prevented from eroding, as they naturally would.

 

Santa Cruz County has a duty not only to its residents but also to the beach going public, including the thousands of surfers through the city and county who frequent Pleasure Point and other breaks adjacent to county land.

 

The county’s proposed update would allow for all development, including new development, to rely on the shoreline armory and incorrectly defines existing development.

 

It goes against every interpretation in a court ruling on the Coastal Act and is deeply and fundamentally flawed.

 

This is the future of our county and our coasts.

 

Please do not sacrifice the public beaches and waves for the interest of a vocal minority of homeowners.

 

Thank you for your time.

 

Looking forward to working with you on this. Thank you Good afternoon, Charlie Eadie consultant for Pajaro Dunes.

 

I just wanted to add a footnote to what Jeff Raimundo had to say.

 

First of all, I appreciate all the comments that the supervisors have made and you have anticipated some of the issues that we’re concerned with.

 

I’d like to ask Bruce to send a little more sand in general if he could from his district, but in any case what we really want to do, and we would hope in your motion.

 

You would direct staff to meet with Pajaro Dunes.

 

As Zach pointed out the situation, is very unique: It’s different than the rest of the coast, and the ordinance addresses in kind of a broad way how things are going to be reviewed in the future.

 

What we’d like to do with the staff is go through some hypotheticals.

 

If this happens, how will the regulations work If that happens, how the regulations work They’ve got about two miles of revetment around Pajaro Dunes Sand is increasing there.

 

So I think, by virtue of the process, if we can get together with the staff and go through this in detail, we’ll be able to tease out where there are gaps and where there might be a few refinements additions.

 

Whatever is needed, sort of along the spirit that Supervisor Friend mentioned in terms of clarity That’s, what we intend to do, And we’re, certainly not trying to hold anything up. We know Ryan.

 

Your point is well taken, but we think this can be accomplished within the time frame that has been proposed by the staff.

 

Thank you Good afternoon.

 

Cove Britton Matson Britton Architects recently appointed president of the non-profit, Pacific Coasts, Protection Association, 1800 in the mailer list, but we’re doing our membership drive.

 

We are focusing more on a technical aspect, a lot of this, and the existing laws and existing structure.

 

We don’t necessarily accept some of the basic premises of the guidance document We do accept and do believe that sea rise is occurring and it’s a threat not just for the ocean front, but inland, also Just for Supervisor McPherson.

 

One of the things proposed here is raising the FEMA level and the floodplain.

 

I believe there are a lot of homes in your area there.

 

How does that impact it Respectfully to planning staff? I’ve spoken with Gary Griggs extensively, numerous geologists engineers, and attorneys, including a retired.

 

Hopefully, you’ll give me a second more or a few seconds more. Regarding these things, including a past planning director who’s an attorney, including an attorney who was for the Coastal Commission, And many of the premises that you’re hearing as factual, we would disagree with.

 

But we need more than three minutes at a sitting to be able to explain why that is, And we need the warning to do it and we need the meetings with coastal staff to do it.

 

So I was part of the group that they met with us and they took none of our advice And all the professionals will tell you that.

 

So I want you for just one second consider a hypothetical Here, you’re protected by a levy.

 

You could call it a coastal protection structure.

 

The city of Santa Cruz is protected by that protection structure.

 

Right, It’s a levy.

 

So would you sign away your rights to identify anybody regarding that? You would probably question it and want your attorneys to assure you that you’re not doing something wrong.

 

Has that occurred Well? No, so far I haven’t found an attorney.

 

The indemnifications that they’re recommending are a good idea. Would you pay? Thank you, Cove Millions of dollars of sand mitigation fees, open, ended for having this revetment.

 

Would you do it So the idea that this is taking a long time? The reason is that we haven’t had the type of meetings to discuss those things.

 

Thank you.

 

Thank you.

 

Is there anyone else who’d like to speak? This will be our final speaker.

 

Thank you very much.

 

I’ll be brief.

 

My name is Anna DiBenedetto.

 

I’m an attorney.

 

I have several clients. I won’t mention any names, but most of the concerns that I’m getting from some of the coastal property owners have to do with the deed restrictions and the legal insurability and perhaps value impacts.

 

I’m wondering if the county has reached out to perhaps the Santa Cruz Association of Realtors mortgage lenders, or other professionals that might help take some of this work off their lap, so to speak so that they could get on to other things.

 

With respect to some of the legal issues, I think there are a lot of attorneys in town who practice in real property and land use.

 

I would be happy to brief, so to speak, some of the issues with respect to indemnity clauses and things of that nature that are being proposed as deed restrictions.

 

And so I would just suggest that perhaps county staff reach out to some of the local professionals in the community that might take some of the work on their plate and offer some valuable input.

 

Thank you Hi.

 

My name is Mike Kandel.

 

I’m a property owner on Pleasure, Point Drive, and have been for almost 33 years.

 

I’ve experienced three seawall failures in that time.

 

Two recently in the last 2, 1 2 years, for which I am now waiting for a follow-up. Coastal permit follow-up.

 

I have trouble understanding the sand mitigation fees.

 

I heard staff just say for a 50-foot wide lot: approximately 10,000.

 

I have a 50-foot wide lot and the paperwork that was just submitted.

 

My mitigation fee was 485 000 And the three failures have contributed in excess of 200 yards of sand back into the ocean, which I, in turn, was allowed to fill with concrete, I have the figures for the number of yards of concrete.

 

I poured to get less than what I started with because I wasn’t allowed to go out to where my property was originally, And I would just like to see that addressed a little bit more accurately.

 

As far as figures.

 

Thank you Thank you.

 

That concludes public comment.

 

I’ll bring it back to the board. I’ll just make one brief or semi-brief note, which is these sand mitigation figures are all driven by the Coastal Commission.

 

So the alternative is we come up with policies that are approved by the Coastal Commission or we don’t come up with policies that are approved by the Coastal Commission and each homeowner gets to go litigate and advocate to the Coastal Commission one at a time.

 

So these are not our policies are driven and to Mr Britton’s point I mean I’ve been on the City Council, where the Coastal Commission has dictated virtually all the policies in the city And many times I’ve disagreed with those, but at The end of the day they have jurisdiction and their decision is final, And so we’ve litigated.

 

We’ve appealed, we’ve worked, and this is a similar situation where it’s a county policy that has to need to meet Coastal Commission approval, And so, if you want to litigate with the Coastal Commission or engage with the Coastal Commission, please Feel free, but we have to figure out something that can be approved.

 

Moving forward, Supervisor Leopold.

 

Thank you Chair and thanks for your comments.

 

I know it can seem frustrating with all the things we have to do here at the county.

 

How long something like this take? Part of the reason it’s taken years is because the Coastal Commission has been wrestling with what their guidance documents are, and it would have been foolhardy to try to come up with something before their guidance came out And it’s taken several months.

 

In fact, Coastal Commission staff just told me last week that they had finally figured out what their own guidance meant and could offer some advice as to what ours could be.

 

So there are a lot of times when I’ve pushed hard on the planning staff, but I think on this one that taking just a little bit more time to get this right is as wise as we can be, given the impacts not only to Individual property owners, but when we talk about coastal access that’s critical, I’d like to try at a motion, See whether this captures everything It’s to approve the recommended actions, including coming back on December 10th and also to make any necessary Changes to the implementing ordinances, so they’re consistent with the general plan policies, as outlined in the revised staff recommendations. I’ll talk a little bit more about that at the end, but I also have some additional directions that we work with stakeholders and obtain and review litigation language, as a reference from the San Diego case regarding indemnification and determine if modifications to our language are necessary, Write something In there more clearly about that, new regulations are not going to affect the existing permit conditions that we explore the use of policy and ordinance tools to incentivize the removal of riprap along the coastline to increase access to the usable beach for the general public.

 

Explore language.

 

When defining conditions and parameters of coastal armoring structures and taking into account offshore resources such as, but not limited to surfing and sand mitigation, And also before it comes back to the board, to meet with the various stakeholders today, to answer questions and engage in a Useful dialogue that could help inform the final ordinance.

 

Oh one more thing: Have the Planning Commission look at the sand mitigation fees, especially in the South County, to ensure that they are actually necessary? I’ll second, and I believe that some of these things can be done outside of a motion including the specificity of the language for HOAs or geologic hazard abatement districts.

 

It’s already in there, but to specifically call out the areas that currently have it at the time of implementation.

 

I think would be useful for those areas, including the Beach Island and Pajaro Dunes, And again some sort of report back or check-in mechanism associated with this adaptive document.

 

Again, I don’t think it needs to be part of the motion, but just when you come back that can just be something that’s built into it.

 

I totally support that My suggestions about making necessary changes to the implementing ordinances we don’t have this all done in the final language the final language could help be clearer for everybody involved and I think specificity is what everybody needs.

 

Looking for Blonde Woman, So the motion is really to keep working on the staff alternate and refer that to the Planning Commission for their review and recommendation Correct.

 

They’ll have it on at their meeting on November 13th, And then this meeting be continued to December 10th, Correct That works. Okay, we have a motion and we have a second Any questions or comments All right, all those in favor, please say: aye Board Members Aye Opposed that passes unanimously.

 

Thank you for your work on this.

 

We will now adjourn to our next regularly scheduled meeting, which is October 22nd, to begin at nine, a.m. here in the board chambers.

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