May 12, 2026 Regular Meeting of the Mountain View City Council

Video

Agenda

• 1. CLOSED SESSION ANNOUNCEMENT (OPEN SESSION): City Attorney Logue announces closed session items and public comment is taken. (00:04:15)
• 2. CLOSED SESSION: The City Council recesses to closed session. (00:06:38)

Transcript

1. CLOSED SESSION ANNOUNCEMENT (OPEN SESSION)

[00:04:18] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: All right, good evening everyone. Thank you for joining us for our closed session. City Attorney Logue will make a closed session announcement and then we will welcome public comment on the items listed for closed session.

[00:04:32] City Attorney Jennifer Logue: Good evening, Mayor and Councilmembers. There are three items on this evening's closed session agenda. Item 2.1 is a conference with legal counsel regarding potential litigation arising from the Cuesta Park water main incident, pursuant to Government Code Section 54956.9 D2 and D4.

[00:04:53] City Attorney Jennifer Logue: Item 2.2 is a conference with real property negotiators pursuant to Government Code Section 54956.8. The address of the property under negotiation is 485 and 495 Clyde Avenue.

[00:05:09] City Attorney Jennifer Logue: The agency negotiators are Assistant City Manager Dawn Cameron, Community Services Director John Marchant, and Real Property Program Administrator Angela LaMonica. The negotiating party is Google Inc., and under negotiation are price and terms of lease.

[00:05:27] City Attorney Jennifer Logue: Item 2.3 is a conference with real property negotiators pursuant to Government Code Section 54956.8. The address of the property under negotiation is 975 Terra Bella Avenue.

[00:05:40] City Attorney Jennifer Logue: The agency negotiators are Real Property Program Administrator Angela LaMonica, Community Services Director John Marchant, and Public Works Director Jennifer Ng. The negotiating parties are Steve Nash and Ryan Dennis, and under negotiation are price and terms of purchase. Thank you.

[00:06:04] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. Would any member of the public joining us virtually or in person like to provide comment on the closed session items listed on tonight's agenda?

[00:06:15] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: If so, please click the raise hand button in Zoom or submit a speaker card to the City Clerk. We will take in-person speakers first. Each speaker will have three minutes.

[00:06:26] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Any speakers? Seeing none. We will now take virtual speakers. Seeing no virtual speakers.

2. CLOSED SESSION

[00:06:38] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: The council will now recess to the Plaza Conference Room for closed session and return to council chambers at the close to continue to regular session.

[00:06:48] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Um, oh, do I read this all out? Uh, 2.1, Conference with Legal Counsel pursuant to Government Code 54956.9 D2.

[00:06:57] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Oh, I don't have to. Great! Okay. So we will, we will see you in open session. Thank you all.

[01:47:16] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Okay everyone. I'm going to call the meeting to order. So... Okay. Good evening everyone. Welcome to the regular meeting of the Mountain View City Council of May 12th, 2026. Please join me in 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.

[01:47:54] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Okay. So now the City Clerk will take attendance by roll call.

[01:48:01] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Hicks

[01:48:02] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Here

[01:48:03] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Kamei

[01:48:04] Councilmember Ellen Kamei: Here

[01:48:06] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember McAlister

[01:48:07] Councilmember John McAlister: Here

[01:48:08] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Ramirez

[01:48:09] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Here

[01:48:09] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Showalter

[01:48:10] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Here

[01:48:10] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Vice Mayor Clark

[01:48:11] Vice Mayor Chris Clark: Here

[01:48:12] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Mayor Ramos

[01:48:12] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Here. Do we have a quorum?

[01:48:13] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Thank you.

[01:48:14] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: In recent weeks, the City along with a few of our neighboring elected decision-making bodies have been subjected to disruptive, racist verbal attacks by anonymous callers during virtual public comments. The City of Mountain View is fully committed to racial, religious, and cultural equity and justice as we strive to create a welcoming, safe, and inclusive community for all. The Council welcomes respectful, non-threatening public comments on matters within our jurisdictions. Comments deemed otherwise pursuant to the Council Code of Conduct and government code may be grounds for terminating a speaker's comment period. City Attorney Logue, do you have a closed session report?

[01:48:54] City Attorney Jennifer Logue: No final action was taken in closed session this evening. Thank you.

[01:48:59] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. We will now move on to Item 3, Presentations. Please note that these are presentations only. The City Council will not take any action. Public comment will occur after the presentation items. If you would like to speak on these items in person, please submit a blue speaker card to the City Clerk now. Alright, so now 3.1, the Affordable Housing Month Proclamation. We are happy to be joined this evening by Marvel Eng, Director of Housing Development with Charities Housing to accept this proclamation. Marvel, will you join me at the lectern?

[01:49:36] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Alright. So the proclamation reads: Whereas each year, May is designated as Affordable Housing Month, which is organized and led by SV@Home, and the regional theme for the Santa Clara County for 2026 is #AllInForHousing, to reflect what it truly takes to build a community everyone can afford to live in and beyond, and solving the housing crisis requires a commitment from many partners and organizations to produce affordable housing; and Whereas each year, thousands of Silicon Valley families and individuals struggle to find an affordable home in one of the most expensive housing markets in the nation, and affordable housing is an essential building block for stable families, resilient communities, and an opportunity for residents to thrive, making our community healthier, more inclusive, and prosperous; and Whereas increasing the supply of affordable housing in Mountain View is a top priority, and Charities Housing is an experienced nonprofit affordable housing developer and highly valued partner of the City; and Whereas Charities operates San Antonio Place, which includes studio apartments at deeply affordable levels for households earning between 15% to 45% of Area Median Income, and its project at 1265 Montecito is anticipated to be completed construction in the summer of 2026, is a key project as part of the Measure A funding Memorandum of Understanding between the City and the County, and will add 85 units of new affordable housing including rapid rehousing units; and Whereas Charities is undertaking a full affordable project at 57-67 East Evelyn Avenue, which is a key project in the City's affordable housing pipeline, is in the process of assembling the financing for the project, and will create up to 143 new affordable units once completed; Now, therefore, I, Emily Ann Ramos, Mayor of the City of Mountain View, along with my colleagues in the City Council, do hereby proclaim the month of May as Affordable Housing Month in the City of Mountain View and call upon members of our community and regional efforts led by SV@Home to continue supporting affordable housing and inclusive, diverse communities, to recognize successful efforts of the City and its dedication to community partners in delivering innovative housing solutions, and to present this proclamation to Charities Housing. Marvel, would you like to say a few words?

[01:52:20] Marvel Eng: Thank you, Mayor Ramos. So I'm Marvel Eng, the Director of Housing Development at Charities Housing. We are a mission-driven nonprofit affordable housing developer and we like to consider ourselves the local trusted partner. And the key word there is partner. You know, what we do requires a partner that is receptive and supportive of affordable housing and the City of Mountain View is just that. So I just want to thank the City, the City Council, the City staff for supporting affordable housing, supporting our work, especially on Montecito, which will be opening in this summer, uh, very soon. And we just, you know, the City has been committed to providing, uh, folks of all income levels an opportunity to live in what I've heard some people call the best city. And it's really just wonderful for their commitment and we're really excited to push forward on our site on East Evelyn Avenue. So thank you.

[01:53:19] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: I'll take a quick picture right over here.

[01:53:41] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Alright, our next proclamation is Item 3.2, Mental Health Awareness Month Proclamation. We are happy to be joined this evening by Eleanor Pace, Chief Officer of the Residential Programs and 24/7 Programs with Momentum for Health to accept this proclamation. Eleanor, will you join me at the lectern?

[01:54:05] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Alright. So the proclamation reads: Whereas mental health is essential to the overall health and well-being of individuals, families, communities, schools, and businesses; and Whereas one in five adults and one in six youth in the United States will experience a mental health condition at any given time, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness; and Whereas it is vital to encourage relatives, friends, coworkers, and community members to recognize the signs of mental health conditions and guide those in need to appropriate services and support; and Whereas education and raising awareness are effective ways to enable early response to mental health conditions and reduce the devastating impacts they can create on individuals and the community; and Whereas the City of Mountain View, with the guidance of the Council Youth Services Committee, continues to strengthen mental health resiliency for teens through such programs as the Teen Wellness Retreat, monthly wellness-focused workshops, wellness events supported by the Youth Advisory Committee, great job... and Whereas the City of Mountain View is dedicated to supporting the mental health, emotional well-being, and resilience of its workforce by providing employees with integrated wellness resources, including seminars and events, challenges and incentives, break stations with cognitive enrichment activities, enhanced employee assistance programs, comprehensive financial tools and education to reduce financial stress, and strengthen employees' sense of stability and control, as well as behavioral health benefits and virtual tools, flexible work practices, and fostering a culture that prioritizes mental, emotional, and overall well-being; and Whereas staff in collaboration with the Cities of Palo Alto and Los Altos worked with Momentum for Health to develop program enhancements to support Trust effectiveness in North County using funding received as a federal earmark; and Whereas the City of Mountain View continues to collaborate with and support community-based organizations and providers of mental health care and health care to promote mental health wellness, raise awareness, and support prevention and treatment efforts; and Whereas we call upon all residents, businesses, and schools in Mountain View to unite in support of a shared vision of improving access to high-quality mental health services and creating a community where everyone feels comfortable reaching out for help. Now, therefore, I, Emily Ann Ramos, Mayor of the City of Mountain View, along with my colleagues on the City Council, do hereby proclaim the month of May as Mental Health Awareness Month in the City of Mountain View. Eleanor, would you like to say a few words?

[01:57:00] Eleanor Pace: Thank you. On behalf of Momentum for Health, I am deeply honored and grateful to accept this proclamation from the City of Mountain View. This recognition affirms the hard work and dedication of everyone involved in our Trust program. Together we have made impactful strides in the community. I want to extend thanks to City officials, stakeholders, and community members that have supported this initiative and the collaboration to make it a reality. Momentum remains committed to helping communities thrive. We believe that responding in person during a crisis can help to keep people in the community while alleviating their current crisis and offering support and resources. Thank you again for this honor and let's continue working together to make a positive difference.

[01:57:58] Eleanor Pace: Can I get my trust team to come up?

[01:59:10] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Okay, would any member of the council like to say a few words? Seeing none, we will now take public comment for the presentation items. Would any member of the public joining us virtually or in person like to provide comment on the presentation items listed on the agenda? If so, please click the raise hand button on Zoom or submit a blue speaker card to the City Clerk. We will take in-person speakers first. Each speaker will have 3 minutes. No speakers. So now we will take virtual speakers. And seeing no speakers, so we will move on to our consent calendar item. Congratulations to all our proclamationees.

[01:59:46] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Alright, we will now move on to Item 4, Consent Calendar. Items on the consent calendar will be approved by one motion unless any member of the Council wishes to pull an item for individual consideration. If an item is pulled from the consent calendar, it will be considered separately following an approval of the balance of the consent calendar. If you would like to speak on these items or the next item, oral communications on non-agenda items, in person, please submit a blue speaker card to the City Clerk now. Would any member of the Council like to pull an item? I see Councilmember McAlister.

[02:00:24] Councilmember John McAlister: I'd like to comment on 4.4 and 4.6, but no pulling.

[02:00:32] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. Councilmember Showalter.

[02:00:36] Councilmember Pat Showalter: I would like to comment on 4.2, 4.4, and 4.7, but I don't wish to pull either one of them.

[02:00:45] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Okay. Alright. Um... We'll take, we'll take, uh, public comments on the consent calendar and then we will go back to... Oh... give me a sec. Okay, um... if, uh, there are no, uh... we'll go into public comment now. Did I already say we were going to public comment? Uh, okay, would any member of the public joining us virtually or in person like to provide public comment on these items? If so, please click the raise hand button in Zoom or submit a blue speaker card to the City Clerk. We will take in-person speakers first. Each speaker will have 3 minutes. I see none in person. Um, we will now take virtual speakers. So we will start with, uh, Bruce England.

[02:01:50] Bruce England (Public Speaker): Thank you, Mayor. Uh, I'll be very fast. Um, Bruce England, resident of Station Drive, speaking for Mountain View Coalition for Sustainable Planning and Green Spaces Mountain View. We submitted a letter, uh, unfortunately it was late because it takes us time to do what we need to do and the turnaround is fast as you know. Um, but we did submit it, I hope you had a chance to read it, or will look at it later if you need to. Um, but one thing that I think the letter, um, that particular letter and letters like it point out or illustrate is that sometimes the details in an agenda item or on the consent calendar is very specific for you, um, but we see all the different relationships from the community perspective that we think are worth pointing out. And I think that the letter does a very good job of doing that. It doesn't just repeat the things that we like, uh, about street maintenance but the things that the City ought to think about when they consider, uh, street maintenance. So I just wanted to highlight that. Thank you.

[02:02:55] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. April Webster.

[02:03:06] April Webster (Public Speaker): Hi, thank you. Um, I'd like to echo what, um, Bruce had to say, uh, about the letter that we submitted. Um, and I just wanted to maybe point out a few things from it. Um, first of all I want to emphasize, um, that pavement maintenance is not just a resurfacing program, um, it's also a recurring opportunity that we can use, um, in parallel to make our streets safer, more comfortable, and more climate resilient. Um, when the City repaves and restripes a street, it's deciding, well they're doing that, um, what street designs get carried forward, um, for another pavement cycle. So that means it's a really good moment to look for quick, low-cost safety improvements. This could be narrowing lanes, um, this is done just through striping, through paint where appropriate, um, buffered bike lanes and wider buffers could be decided and added in during that cycle, daylighting, um, at intersections, painted curb extensions to help things make safer, high visibility crosswalks, and then other sorts of paint and plastic treatments. These don't involve, um, digging up the street, it's not reconstruction, these are easy, quick, cheap things that could be done as they're going as our staff is going through the repavement project process. Um, I wanted to point out, I've worked with Caltrans on their District 4 Bicycle Advisory Committee for several years now, and um, as vice chair I get to see a lot of the projects early on and what's going through their cycle, and they've got a really useful model that they've introduced and this is evolved over the past several years, um, and to introduce outreach earlier and looking for opportunities earlier as well. And part of this was through SB 960. And so their pavement project is called the SHOPP, and what happens is their complete streets team, um, reviews those projects in what's called the initiation and scoping phase, before even detailed design begins. And so they go through and they look for opportunities in there to add in bike lanes, um, different sorts of crosswalks, even green infrastructure now. I was very surprised in this current cycle to see several of the Caltrans projects introducing GSI. Um, and so I feel like, you know, we don't need to copy Caltrans exactly, but those same sorts of principles of thinking about when we're doing this sort of work, there's so many things that we could tag onto it as well. And we should start to think about maybe putting together some sort of program like this for ourselves where we look at the active transportation plan, the biodiversity, etc., and look for opportunities to piggyback on resurfacing. Um, it takes up a good chunk of our city. Thank you so much.

[02:06:06] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. Um, that seems to have ended our virtual public comment. I will now bring this back to Council action and a note that a motion to approve the consent calendar should also include reading the title of the ordinances and resolutions attached to consent calendar items 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, 4.4, 4.5, and 4.7. Good luck to whoever does that.

[02:06:32] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Um, so, but before that, I'll let Councilmember McAlister speak on items 4.4 and 4.6.

[02:06:37] Councilmember John McAlister: Thank you, Mayor. Um, so, Mora Park when they came up, the Kennison Place as it's called, uh, there was a lot of concern about people having one entry and it going onto Sylvan, which has always been a, an area of concern for the neighbors because there's a lot of traffic there. And so to have that second opening, uh, availability to the residents there is really going to reduce the stress on Sylvan. And I do want to give a shout out to Debbie and Monty Kennison, because they were working also behind the scenes to try to get that second entry in there. And I, from the neighborhood, I appreciate their effort to get that done, and staff working on it to get that second entry, it made it a much better project and, uh, it's going to make a lot of people feel a little more relaxed about going in there. So that was a good outcome with the, the developer, the Kennisons, and staff to get that second entry. And 4.6, um, just glad that we are starting to get, take care of the streets. A lot of one of the big concerns that we've, I've heard over the last year was our streets are poor and anything that we can do to improve our streets and incorporate all the improvements that the residents want, ATP etc., is a great step going forward and I just hope someday we can get to Mayor Money and get that done sooner than later.

[02:08:10] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you, Councilmember McAlister. Councilmember Showalter.

[02:08:14] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Well, yeah, I would like to follow up on what, um, Councilmember McAlister said about, um, 4.4. I remember discussing this when we, um, were approving this project and, um, I was very upset with the fact that there was only one point of egress. I didn't think it was safe or livable, and we asked the developer and the staff to work together and members of the community as well, to to change that. And I'm, I'm really pleased to see that they did that. I think it will make for a, um, a far superior project. Um, I also wanted to mention 4.2, Renewal of the Downtown Parking Maintenance and Operation Assessment District Fiscal Year 2026. Um, uh, I'm hoping that the additional janitorial services will clean up the stairways of the parking garages and keep them clean. Um, parking in the parking garages is the first thing, um, you, you kind of store and and restaurant patrons see when they make a trip to downtown. And so it makes a good impression if the stairways are clean. So I'm glad we're moving forward on this and and thank you for that. And then, um, uh, 4.7, uh, Authorization to Convey a Portion of City-Owned Property, um, adjacent to 236 Castro Street. This is an instance where, um, it turned out that a building was built on top of, um, city land, just a little bit of it. And, um, I, uh, and we're now that theyre redoing this building, we're just going to, um, uh, and that's been discovered, um, we're we're going to sell a little bit of that land back to them as it should have been. And I just want to say in my career, um, I ran into numerous examples where the lot lines and the placement of buildings obviously were not understood by the owners. And it wasn't necessarily anybody's fault, it was just one of those things that happened. Um, so I think that selling this small portion of the parking lot that is already covered by the building to the building's owner is a great solution. Um, thanks for working this out and I appreciate the creativity and hopefully and the flexibility that this demonstrates. Um, so with that, I will make a motion to, I tried to make a motion and it wouldn't let me...

[02:10:46] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: You can do it verbally anyway since...

[02:10:48] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Okay, I, I move the, um, consent calendar.

[02:10:50] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Yes, but you do also have to read...

[02:10:52] Councilmember Pat Showalter: You want me to go ahead and read it before it's seconded?

[02:10:56] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Oh, yeah, actually, yeah, technically.

[02:10:59] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Okay, alright. I gotta take a breath, it's very long. Uh, um, we're gonna adopt the consent calendar, and we need to read item 4.1. Adopt an Ordinance of the City of Mountain View Amending Article V of Chapter 29 of the Mountain View City Code to Align it With State Law, Clarify Real Property Conveyance Tax Exemptions, and Make Other Clarifying Amendments, to be read in title only, further reading waived. Item 4.2. Adopt a Resolution of the City Council of the City of Mountain View Approving the Annual Engineer's Report for the Downtown Parking Maintenance and Operation Assessment District No. 2, and Approving the Levying of Assessments for Fiscal Year 2026-27, to be read in title only, further reading waived. Item 4.3. Adopt a Resolution of the City Council of the City of Mountain View Appropriating $8 Million in State Funds Received Pursuant to Senate Bill 129 for the Lot 12 Affordable Housing Project, to be read in title only, further reading waived. Item 4.4. Adopt a Resolution of the City Council of the City of Mountain View Approving a Final Map for Tract No. 10677, 309 Mora Parkway, Accepting Dedications, Making Findings as Required by Chapter 28 of the Mountain View City Code, and Authorizing Execution of an Improvement Agreement as a Condition to Final Map Approval, to be read in title only, further reading waived. Item 4.5. Adopt a Resolution of the City Council of the City of Mountain View Authorizing Temporary Closure from Public Access of Five Parking Spaces within Parking Lot No. 2 for 31 Consecutive Weeks, and Authorizing Temporary Closure from Public Access of Eight Parking Spaces within Parking Lot No. 2 for 12 Consecutive Days to Occur Prior to May 25th, 2029, to be read in title only, further reading waived. Item 4.7. Adopt a Resolution of the City Council of the City of Mountain View Finding that a Portion of City-Owned Property within the Bryant Street Parking Lot is Excess to the City's Needs, Declaring the Property to be Exempt Surplus Land Pursuant to the Surplus Land Act, and Authorizing its Conveyance, to be read in title only, further reading waived.

[02:13:25] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you, Councilmember Showalter. Do we have a second?

[02:13:29] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: You can say it verbally.

[02:13:30] Councilmember Alison Hicks: I second.

[02:13:31] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Seconded by Councilmember Hicks. City Clerk, would you mind doing the roll call vote?

[02:13:37] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Showalter?

[02:13:39] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Yes.

[02:13:40] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Hicks?

[02:13:41] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Yes.

[02:13:42] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Kamei?

[02:13:43] Councilmember Ellen Kamei: Yes.

[02:13:44] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember McAlister?

[02:13:45] Councilmember John McAlister: Yes.

[02:13:46] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Ramirez?

[02:13:47] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Yes.

[02:13:47] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Vice Mayor Clark?

[02:13:48] Vice Mayor Chris Clark: Yes.

[02:13:48] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Mayor Ramos?

[02:13:49] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Yes.

[02:13:50] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Motion carries unanimously.

[02:13:52] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. Now we will move on to Item 5, this is oral communications for public comment. This portion of the meeting is reserved for persons wishing to address the council on any matter not on the agenda. Speakers are allowed to speak on any topic within the city's council's subject matter jurisdiction for up to three minutes during this section. State law prohibits council from acting on non-agendized items. If you would like to speak on this item or the next item in person, please submit a blue speaker card to the City clerk now. Would any member of the public joining us virtually or in person like to provide comment on this item? If so, please click the raise hand button in Zoom or submit a blue speaker card to the City Clerk. We will take in-person speakers first. Each speaker will have 3 minutes. Alright, so our first speaker is Jack Powers.

[02:15:02] Jack Powers (Public Speaker): Good evening, Mayor Ramos and City Council members.

[02:15:06] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: If you could move the microphone to you?

[02:15:09] Jack Powers (Public Speaker): I'm sorry. Good evening everybody. My name is Jack Powers, uh, I've lived in the Mountain View community now for approximately 5 years. And, uh, I wanted to make a statement, uh, for the record about oversized vehicle parking and disability. So under the California Vehicle Code Section 22511.5, vehicles that properly display a valid disabled person placard or license plate are exempt from most local parking time limits in designated spaces. This same subject matter was a basis for Navarro versus City of Mountain View, that is, parking accommodations for disadvantaged or disabled peoples. The terms of that settlement, as far as I know, are still enforceable. My wife and I are both disabled. We have requested reasonable accommodation from the MVPD. We should not be selectively or excessively ticketed under Mountain View Code 19.72 for parking in excess of 72 hours. As you know, there are limited parking places, especially now, uh, for people who are forced to live in their vehicles. It is both dangerous and laborious to keep shuffling large vehicles around the streets, especially if you're disabled and trying to do it. I believe the Mayor's office and the Council should look into the possibility of licensing certain types of parking for the disabled and corresponding reasonable accommodations language consistent with Navarro versus City of Mountain View could be included. Also within certain places, city controlled lots and other designated areas such as leased land or other available parking areas, uh, maybe to license LLCs and or non-profits to lease empty lots, city controlled lots and other parking space usage and to manage those parking areas accordingly, and for this purpose while paying fees to the City instead of requiring grant funding. In any case, the disability placard exception can easily be incorporated into an amended section of MV Ordinance 19.72 that is consistent with the federal ADA provisions as well as the terms of the consent agreement. Thank you.

[02:18:11] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you.

[02:18:14] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Alright, our next speaker is Akemi Flynn.

[02:18:21] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: And I am seeing no other open public comment speakers, so turn in your blue card now if you want to speak. Alright, go ahead.

[02:18:25] Akemi Flynn (Public Speaker): Good evening Mayor and Councilmembers. My name is Akemi, I have been a 20 over 20 year member of the Mountain View community as a member of the Mountain View Buddhist Temple, so I'm glad to be here with you this evening. And I am also with the Immigrant Protection and Empowerment Network, which is a countywide collaborative cross-sector, and we are urging you to develop and adopt a policy to protect City property for City purposes, to prohibit civil immigration enforcement on City property. Join the many cities and counties that have done so, that offer a strong model for you. But I'm actually here also to read a message from Maria Marroquin from the Mountain View Day Worker Center, and Ruth Silver Taube from the Board of the Mountain View Day Worker Center, both who could not be here but wished to be here today. So here's the message from them: A growing number of jurisdictions are responding to out-of-control and brutal immigration enforcement by adopting ICE-free zones. These policies signal to immigrant communities that local government is on their side. Cities and counties have long exercised authority over their own property. We urge the City Council to use its power to protect immigrant communities like other cities and counties have done. Thank you.

[02:19:53] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. I see no other in person public comment. We will now take virtual speakers. And we have Tim McKenzie.

[02:20:04] Tim McKenzie (Public Speaker): Greetings all, Tim McKenzie, he/him, Monta Loma resident for a dozen years or so. I just, I wanted to thank the city for, uh, for having removed flock cameras. I a couple weeks ago I commented that there was still a flock camera just directly across the street from my house, and it is gone now. That's great, I hope that all of them are gone and there wasn't just the one that was near me after I commented in public. Um, my understanding was that the city was going to release a press release, uh, after having taken down the cameras. Maybe that already did happen and I missed it. Um, or maybe there are still some cameras up, but I would love to see that, uh, the actions Mountain View took, the integrity the city had, to sever ties with a company that completely, uh, flouted our contractual agreements, is a degree of bravery, boldness, and correct action that neighboring cities could learn from, and putting out a press release after taking the cameras down could help contribute to that. Um, so thank you for having at least some of them come down. I hope that they're all down, and uh, we should be shouting that from the mountain tops. And I also I would like to echo the previous speaker, I would love to see the city pass an ordinance as an ICE free zone to prohibit federal immigration enforcement from using city land, city property, anything that the city has the jurisdiction over, prohibit ICE from terrorizing our neighbors. Um, they, they have already murdered US citizens earlier this year, uh, they've murdered lots of people, and the the agency shouldn't exist. It was created, we should abolish ICE, but while it still exists, uh, Mountain View should do everything it can to remain a community for all and protect our neighbors. And setting up ICE free zones seems like a great way to do that. So I would like to add my voice to that.

[02:21:38] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. Next we have Bruce England.

[02:21:43] Bruce England: Thank you Mayor. Bruce England again, Whisman Station Drive, really quick this time. Just want to echo the comment also about establishing Mountain View as an ICE free zone. I think that's a great idea that was put forward. Thanks.

[02:21:59] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. I am seeing no other public comment. We will now move on to Item 6, Public Hearings. So we'll have 6.1, Repeal and reenact Article 10 Transportation Demand Management of Chapter 19 Motor Vehicles and Traffic of the Mountain View City Code to establish a Citywide TDM Program. Transportation Planner Ben Pacho... Did I do it right? It's Pacho or Paco? Pacho. Yay. And Assistant Public Works Director Allison Boyer will present the item. If you would like to speak on this item in person, please submit a blue speaker card to the City Clerk now. Alright, and I guess we'll now have the staff presentation.

[02:22:44] Allison Boyer: Great. Thank you. Good evening. My name is Allison Boyer. I am the Assistant Public Works Director. And with me tonight is Ben Pacho, Senior Transportation Planner. We also have our consultant team Steer joining us remotely. We're here tonight to discuss the draft Citywide Transportation Demand Management Ordinance or TDM. For background, City Council identified the development of a Transportation Demand Management Ordinance as a strategic priority for fiscal years 2023 to 2025. It was identified as a priority as a result of the city's 2030 General Plan, greenhouse gas reduction programs, Sustainability Action Plan, SAP 4, Precise Plans, as well as regional and state laws. To date, the city's approach to TDM spans a mix of project size and land uses.

[02:23:38] Allison Boyer: Over 27 entitled development projects in Mountain View have TDM requirements as part of their conditions of approvals. These current TDM requirements include different targets and measures. The proposed ordinance aligns with existing policies and standardizes TDM standards and monitoring requirements. It ensures consistency with the MTA handbook, VMT screening, and the city's greenhouse gas reduction program, while also standardizing trip reduction targets, the TDM planning process, and monitoring and enforcement provisions.

[02:24:16] Allison Boyer: Reviewing the project's workflow, staff is currently in the project phase focused on ordinance language seen here in blue. Over the course of the project, staff has engaged key stakeholders and advisory bodies to gain a broad understanding of current practice with TDM, as well as how requirements can be further streamlined and made more effective under the ordinance. Key insights were gathered from the Downtown Business Association and the TMA. One-on-one interviews were held with developers, employers, property managers, and community members. Collectively, the input gathered has been used to guide the direction of the project, including its vision and goals and the TDM framework.

[02:24:58] Allison Boyer: Staff presented the project vision and goals to B/PAC, EPC, and CTC in quarter four of 2023. Where members voiced their support for the project's objectives. In quarter one of 2025, staff returned to B/PAC and EPC to present the TDM policy framework and included trip production standards, reporting elements, and enforcement provisions. CTC and City Council reviewed and supported the proposed framework in quarter two and quarter three of 2025.

[02:25:30] Allison Boyer: Staff presented the TDM ordinance to EPC and CTC in quarter two of 2026. Comments from EPC and CTC included allowing residential projects to qualify for both unbundled and limited parking core strategies, which has been updated, and tearing the limited parking credit, which staff is working on and will be updated in the toolkit prior to the ordinance implementation. On May 5th, CTC voted unanimously to support the TDM ordinance and express support of its, of exemptions for patron driven uses and asked staff to continue to explore ways to incentivize TMA membership.

[02:26:11] Allison Boyer: The vision statement, which went to CTC on January 30th, 2024 states that the TDM ordinance will seek to reduce single occupancy vehicle trips for new development and increase use of multimodal transportation alternatives that are sustainable, equitable, effective, and respond to changing demands. The goal of the project is to increase the predictability and effectiveness of the city TDM requirements while improving sustainable mobility and equity.

[02:26:44] Allison Boyer: Tonight, staff is recommending the City Council adopt an ordinance of the City Council repealing and reenacting Chapter 19, Motor Vehicles and Traffic of Article 10, Transportation Demand Management of the City Code to establish a Citywide TDM program with modifications to Section 121, Definition 11, and Sections 124i and finding the amendments to be exempt from CEQA pursuant to CEQA Guidelines Section 15308.

[02:27:18] Allison Boyer: So a quick overview of the TDM. At a high level, the TDM seeks to streamline and implement TDM requirements across a project's lifespan, from the entitlement phase to the post-occupancy phase. The new TDM ordinance will apply to all new development, modifications, change of use, and expansions of existing sites that generate 200 or more net new average daily trips or ADT. This will apply across all land uses: residential, commercial, and mixed-use.

[02:27:50] Allison Boyer: There are however a couple exemptions for 100% affordable units, very small projects, which are single family developments of 12 units or fewer, multi-family residential developments of 20 units or fewer, or any office development that is 10,000 square feet or less, as well as patron driven projects that are less than 100,000 square feet. Projects will have to demonstrate a plan to reduce projected ADT by 20 to 50% through the use of approved TDM strategies and maintain program management and annual reporting post occupancy. The city will maintain records of annual project reports and any non-compliance may result in corrective action and or fines assessed by the city.

[02:28:36] Allison Boyer: Trip production targets will be determined based by project size. Projects are divided into three categories. Small projects, which is 200 to 499 ADT. Medium projects, which is 500 to 999 ADT. And large projects, which is 1,000 ADT. Standard projects will be required to implement TDM strategies that reduce ADT to the following levels: 30, 40, and 50% respectively. TOD or transit oriented design projects and residential projects will have reduced target levels of 20, 30, and 40% respectively. These thresholds were informed by the city's existing precise plan targets, as well as case studies of similar TDM programs in San Francisco, San Mateo County, Redwood City, Sunnyvale, and the City of San Jose.

[02:29:32] Allison Boyer: Prior to entitlement, prospective applicants will be required to submit a TDM plan for city review. Specifics of the plan will then be included in the conditions of approval preceding adoption by council. TDM plans will be comprised of two types of strategies. Core strategies offer an array of flexible proven trip production strategies that applicants may select from to develop the project's TDM plan. And auxiliary measures, which when paired with core strategies, are complementary and more effective at reducing trips.

[02:30:07] Allison Boyer: Applicants will have access to the TDM Toolkit, which is designed to offer a menu of strategies that vary in scale and cost, allowing projects to create site-specific TDM plans fit for their purpose.

[02:30:22] Allison Boyer: Moving into the monitoring elements of the framework. This slide illustrates the various reporting activities the projects will be responsible for, which are again organized by project size. Small projects report out annually for three years, medium projects for 10, and large projects for 20. Additionally, residential and patron driven uses are exempt from additional project performance monitoring conducted through annual travel surveys and traffic counts. I will now pass it off to Ben to walk us through some more of the updates details.

[02:30:56] Ben Pacho: Thanks, Allison. Good evening, council. So, staff would like to note a few key updates, which have been incorporated into the TDM policy framework since last June's study session with council, based on the feedback we've received. Proposed changes include exemptions such as for patron driven uses, implementation of housing element action items, exemptions from site specific trip caps for residential and patron driven uses, updates to enforcement provisions, and optional TMA membership.

[02:31:24] Ben Pacho: For the first update, proposed patron driven uses that are less than net new 100,000 square feet will be exempted from the TDM program. These uses are categorized as non-residential and typically generate trips that are primarily by patrons or customers, rather than employees. Examples of such projects would include child care centers, restaurants, entertainment, medical, retail, including general merchandise and grocery, as well as other personal services. This exemption was incorporated into the framework recognizing the value of such uses that are neighborhood serving, and that patron end uses also support economic vitality by attracting and retaining high quality retail and other service oriented mixed uses.

[02:32:06] Ben Pacho: The next update relates to the city's housing element program, which went into effect in 2023. Provisions of the housing element required the city to adopt a TDM ordinance to help identify lower cost options for developers to meet TDM requirements. And to support this effort, the ordinance will allow residential parking reductions and exemptions for projects that enhance features of a TDM plan, which would achieve a higher level of trip reduction than the minimum requirement. To satisfy the enhanced TDM criteria, residential projects shall either one, exceed its ADT reduction target by at least 5%, or two, adopt one additional core strategy and two additional auxiliary strategies over the minimum required number from the toolkit. The enhanced TDM criteria presented here are really intended to incentivize higher levels of trip reduction and reduce parking demand, while also increasing mobility options for residential projects.

[02:33:01] Ben Pacho: The next update to the framework includes exemptions from monitoring and reporting requirements for residential and patron driven uses. Specifically, all residential and patron end uses will be exempted from meeting site specific trip caps and associated ADT reduction targets. The exemption also extends to the requirement to provide travel surveys and conduct traffic counts. The noted exemptions here reflect existing conditions and local and state regulations, which collectively seek to reduce financial costs and administrative burdens related to delivering more affordable housing and neighborhood serving uses. However, still required of these projects will be the requirement to adopt and implement a TDM plan and provide ongoing annual TDM reporting in accordance with project size.

[02:33:47] Ben Pacho: And moving ahead, the proposed ordinance seeks to align the enforcement provisions under code enforcement violations and administrative penalties of the city code. This approach aligns with neighboring jurisdictions on enforcement of TDM requirements, which codify violations under municipal code as the basis for assessing administrative citations for non-compliance. Some examples of non-compliance might include failure of a project to submit an annual TDM report or maintain an ongoing TDM plan as required. Additionally, updated enforcement provisions will consistently apply to all projects subject to the ordinance, rather than by specific project conditions of approval.

[02:34:26] Ben Pacho: For the next framework update, the proposed ordinance will not require projects of any size to join the TMA. For context, the TMA is a private non-profit membership organization, which is governed by a board of ten members. Under the ordinance, membership in the TMA will be optional and included in the TDM Toolkit as a way for projects to satisfy their TDM requirements and trip reduction goals by becoming a member. Some examples of services provided by the TMA that are included in the TDM Toolkit include the MVgo shuttle, which is a first, last mile service, guaranteed last mile incentive, midday mobility subsidies, and shuttle service expansion.

[02:35:05] Ben Pacho: While TMA membership would not be required, staff with the TMA will explore the process of establishing a property based assessment district or PBID following adoption of the ordinance. Similar to other jurisdictions including the city of Emeryville, the goal of establishing the PBID would be to provide a long-term and scalable approach to funding the TMA provided services. Most notably, a PBID would support growing membership in the TMA over time by clearly defining its governance structure and assessment of membership fees.

[02:35:37] Ben Pacho: Currently, staff is working with the project team to develop a cost estimation and implementation planning study as part of this work. This study will evaluate the range of city staff time and administrative resources required to administer the ordinance, including TDM plan review and ongoing monitoring reporting activities. The findings of this report will inform the basis of an annual TDM fee, which would be intended to recover a portion of the city's ongoing costs associated with implementing the ordinance. Following completion of this fee study, staff will draft a resolution for the City Council to review and adopt as part of the Master Fee Schedule.

[02:36:13] Ben Pacho: Once the TDM ordinance is in effect, its provisions including trip production standards and monitoring requirements will be codified in the city code. Additionally, the TDM Program Standards will be key guiding documents to implement the citywide TDM program. The TDM Program Standards will be an appendix to the MTA Handbook, which may be updated periodically to reflect changes in travel patterns, technological innovation, and TDM best practices.

[02:36:40] Ben Pacho: As for next steps, I'll pass it back to Allison.

[02:36:42] Allison Boyer: Thank you. We're here at City Council tonight for the first reading of this ordinance. The second reading is scheduled for May 26th. The ordinance will go into effect 30 days after adoption.

[02:36:55] Allison Boyer: Once adopted, implementation steps will include refinement of the TDM program standards and toolkit. Updating precise plans and city code to implement housing element action items and ordinance provisions. Present annual TDM fee resolution to council for review and adoption. Explore the feasibility of establishing a property based assessment district or PBID citywide. Integration with the city's permitting and entitlement processes. Establishment of ongoing monitoring and reporting systems, including identifying technology solutions and providers, and continued coordination with stakeholders and regional partners.

[02:37:37] Allison Boyer: And to confirm, staff is recommending the City Council adopt an ordinance of the City Council repealing and reenacting Chapter 19 Motor Vehicles and Traffic of Article 10 Transportation Demand Management of the City Code to establish a Citywide TDM Program with modifications to Section 121, Definition 11 and Section 124i and finding the amendments to be exempt from CEQA pursuant to CEQA guidance sections 15308.

[02:38:10] Allison Boyer: The staff recommended modifications to the ordinance can be seen on the slide here and include clarification for residential projects under the 200 ADT or smaller project threshold that would that would like to opt in to obtain the benefit of residential parking reductions or exemptions from parking requirements in accordance with the city's Housing Element. Thank you.

[02:38:40] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: All right. Thank you. Does any member of the council have questions? Oh. It's not a study session. We're introducing an ordinance. All right, but does anyone have a question? Councilmember Showalter.

[02:38:58] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Thank you. Okay, well I'd like to thank the staff for all the work involved in this, and, um, but I do still have some questions. It's a complicated thing. First, could you explain the status of the TMA at the moment? You talked about that a little bit, but one of the things that you didn't say, or if you did I didn't understand it, is essentially, what does it cost for somebody to join? And I know there's gonna be a study, but you must have a range. I mean, is it a dollar a unit? Is it a hundred dollars a unit? Is it a thousand dollars? I mean, I don't know. And also, what services would a project get for being a member?

[02:39:47] Ben Pacho: Thank you for the question, Councilmember. So, the TMA being a non-profit organization, the costs are really determined on a project-by-project basis. So it depends on the project size, the land use. And there are different tiers for the cost structure based on, for residential project as you suggested it's based on number of units, and for non-residential it's based on square footage. There are discounts provided for 100% affordable housing projects, they get a 75% discount for joining, and then for non-profit and non-governmental organizations or governmental organizations rather, for the city, we also get discounts for membership.

[02:40:35] Ben Pacho: So essentially how it works now is a project would be required under our Precise Plan to join the TMA. They would then enter into a discussion with the TMA to discuss what the cost applications are based on the project size and land use. And afterwards would be required to sign an NDA, or non-disclosure agreement, not to share their fees, because it is based on the specific project. And then the board, on a fiscal basis, approves the fee structure on an ongoing basis.

[02:41:20] Councilmember Pat Showalter: So we're not going to know what the range of this cost is for people before we pass this, we're just, that's not information that's available to us.

[02:41:30] Allison Boyer: So, just to clarify, the TMA is not a requirement of the TDM. So right now it is identified as a strategy, and there are benefits of the TMA membership such as the first and last mile, the shuttle service, guaranteed ride home, that will help you achieve core strategies, but membership in the TMA is not a requirement.

[02:42:01] Ben Pacho: It's difficult to say, Councilmember, what the specific cost would be associated for a project. It's not a general cost structure, it's based on the specific project, so.

[02:42:12] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Okay. Alright. Okay, so, um, another question is, what do transit passes cost? I understand, I remember in past times I've seen numbers about this and they've actually been pretty expensive, and there have been substantial discounts that you could get if you bought them in bulk. And I wondered if you had any information, that is a, you know, that is something that a lot of residential apartment buildings might want to use. Do you have any idea what they cost, and would the TMA assist in this?

[02:42:52] Ben Pacho: Thank you for the question, Councilmember. So certainly after adopting the ordinance, we would work with the TMA to understand what level of support they would provide in implementing the ordinance and the provisions, with potential to support distribution of transit passes. Certainly there are discounts to be realized at scale, that once you buy at an institutional level there are just more discounts. But we work with projects to understand what the level of burden would be for paying for a transit subsidy and we adjust that according to what they'd be able to provide.

[02:43:31] Ben Pacho: So there are certain instances with projects, existing projects that have recently gained occupancy, where we've developed a modified approach to providing transit level subsidy that was viable for the project that otherwise wouldn't have been if it weren't modified. I don't know if that answers your question.

[02:43:49] Councilmember Pat Showalter: So you don't have a figure, just...

[02:43:52] Allison Boyer: So in the toolkit each strategy has a rough dollar amount associated with it. So if we're looking at the toolkit, there is an estimated value for how much it would cost to implement that, and they range for low, medium, and high, again it's going to be based on the size of the project being developed, but there are dollar thresholds included in the toolkit of expected cost.

[02:44:22] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Okay. Um, and, and what would it be for transit passes? Is that in the toolkit?

[02:44:27] Ben Pacho: We suggest certain types of transit passes in the toolkit. One of them we previously required was the VTA Smart Pass. I don't believe that's in existence, it's kind of taken on a new form. So rather than being prescriptive on the type of transit passes that we're requiring, we're providing flexibility for the developer applicant to provide which passes they might want to do. So for example they might want to buy Clipper passes with a certain set subsidy, not specific to any one agency, but that they could use across various agencies. So the idea is to provide flexibility for the type of transit passes.

[02:45:01] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Right, it seems like there's a lot of, there's a lot of change going on in the pass system.

[02:45:06] Ben Pacho: And that's been a request from developers. Yeah.

[02:45:09] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Okay. Um, alright. Uh, then what is, what are you gonna do with the monitoring data that you collect?

[02:45:21] Ben Pacho: Thank you for the question. So, lots. Um, currently it's quite difficult, with TDM version 1.0 we're just not gathering a lot of data because there hasn't been a lot of compliance. So certainly when we implement an ordinance we'd have the kind of recourse to develop a more systematized approach to collect the data. So the idea is we'd be able to see, kind of zoom out at a citywide level how programs are performing, not just one-off on a site-by-site basis, but collectively what TDM strategies are working for different types of projects, what types of, you know, um, data they're collecting.

[02:46:01] Ben Pacho: So that's the idea is to kind of gain performance, see what's working, see what kinds of iterations need to be made to the TDM toolkit, whether certain strategies need to be phased out, some introduced, whether some of the language in the TDM program standards needs to be amended based on, you know, changing conditions. So the idea is that it's an evergreen toolkit and the data would allow us to kind of iterate on it.

[02:46:25] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Okay, so the data we might, we would monitor would change on, over time depending on what we found was useful.

[02:46:30] Ben Pacho: Absolutely.

[02:46:32] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Okay. And, um, also, I wondered about, you know, there's some land use, um, just basic land use things that are really important for, you know, for reducing traffic, right? Um, like getting residential near transit is a, is a big, and that's on the list, right, of things that they've done. So one, one thing though that I didn't see, or if I did I missed it, was remote work. And we, you know, we, we saw in the pandemic how, um, um, just in, you know, kind of overnight we, the traffic changed because there was this need to go to remote work. Well everybody isn't working remotely anymore, but I think some remote work is here to stay.

[02:47:23] Councilmember Pat Showalter: So, I wondered, is there anything included in this about things that incentivize remote work? Like for instance if an apartment building had, uh, conference rooms that you could, um, uh, use as an office, or things like that? Is any of that included?

[02:47:44] Ben Pacho: Thank you for the question. Uh, we've looked at this a lot and we've had existing data to draw on, especially in North Bayshore we've seen traffic volumes decrease especially with the advent of, of an adoption of remote work. So to that extent the toolkit does include a hybrid work option. So if a non-residential project were to adopt and implement it, um, they would, uh, see a potential decrease in average daily trips up to around 10%. So it's included in the TDM toolkit as a hybrid work model that projects can implement at a low cost, um, option.

[02:48:22] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Great. And I guess mixed use is sort of in the same category.

[02:48:26] Ben Pacho: Certainly, and that's the feedback that we received since EPC too is some of these kind of urban design characteristics is how can we incentivize certain developments to deliver certain mixed use elements and how could they achieve credit for that reduction in trips by implementing those types of mixed use projects. And that's something we're also looking at incorporating in the TDM toolkit. I think the toolkit as it's now is really primarily based on what we've implemented and what we've required in existing projects, which are more programmatic in nature, but with the feedback that we've received over the course of public hearings we certainly have taken the feedback to receive more kind of design based more land use characteristic type of strategies.

[02:49:07] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Okay, thank you very much.

[02:49:10] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you, Councilmember Showalter. Councilmember Hicks.

[02:49:14] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Thank you. Well, it was a, I'm on the Council Transportation Committee, so it was a pleasure to read the staff report a second time, very similar to two weeks ago or whatever it was. Um, you know one of the things I appreciated about it was the, these are questions not comments don't worry. Um, uh was the history of uh TDM kind of first it I guess it says in the 90s it was kind of very congestion reduction related and then decades later incorporating also greenhouse gas reduction.

[02:49:51] Councilmember Alison Hicks: What I'm thinking looking over the toolkit and the rest of the reading I've done on this is that it it originally applied to offices. Correct me if I'm wrong. Um, and so it's very commuter based. And now that we're applying it to uh other developments including mostly housing, I'm thinking, I'm wondering what additional tools you might think of adding to the toolkit. Because when I think of um because the tools because of the history of the program, the tools do seem very commuter based. And when I think of who lives in apartments, the last time I lived in one for example, um, you know it's a lot of families with children, a lot who have very different kinds take very different kinds of trips than the ones that commuters take to daycare to ball games, and also seniors who take different kinds of trips to say recreation, family, hospital.

[02:50:55] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Um, and so I'm wondering whether in communication with other model TDM programs you've been looking at in other cities, whether there are more uh for a diverse set of different kinds of users. Oh, also people who um travel a lot for work, you know, maybe handyman, uh gardener, etc. Like how you can meet their needs as well, not just the needs of commuters with the toolkit.

[02:51:29] Ben Pacho: Thank you for the question Councilmember. We've given this a lot of thought and I think yeah you're definitely on to something. It's an indictment of our transportation system that was certainly built around peak demand. And now that with hybrid work, we're just seeing trip generation happening outside of the peak a lot more so for different types of trips happening throughout the day. And so to the extent that we can service the gap, the midday gap and provide service kind of at a higher frequency to meet people's needs beyond just going to work, I think is an important note.

[02:52:02] Ben Pacho: So to the extent that the TMA provides a midday mobility incentive so when the MVgo shuttle stops working um after the morning peak and that and between the morning peak and afternoon peak there is an incentive that Mountain View uh residents or employees can use to get to where they need to go absent of the MVgo shuttle um working.

[02:52:25] Ben Pacho: But um for residential projects what we've seen is how to offset demand for single occupancy vehicle by providing um alternatives like on-site car share service um has been really successful. Um providing first last mile connections to transit so whether that's like what we discussed micro mobility bikeshare or scootershare which we're hoping to launch soon. Um it's also providing you know closures and direct transportation system for people to walk and bike to where they need to go. And it's includ it's also increasing uh residential density right so internalizing the trips that people would have otherwise made um by not needing to go as far because they live closer to their destination.

[02:53:11] Ben Pacho: So it's things like that it's both the programmatic and the design kind of features of a of a development. But um the idea is the toolkit would kind of incorporate the best of all strategies um that would be mutually supportive.

[02:53:26] Allison Boyer: Yeah, and that's something we heard from EPC as well, so we've started um adding that to the toolkit. We included things like a school carpool program as one of our strategies. Um, residential transportation information, um encouraging on-site amenities such as child care. So we'll continue to explore those and and add those as they, as we have more data.

[02:53:47] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Thank you, I'm glad you've been thinking about that. And all good answers. Um, can you also, it seems like the housing tools, like the big one is parking reduction it seems like. And can you explain a little more about how you see that working? Because I guess the thing that I see is when parking at apartments is reduced, there's, I guess in the literature they call it spill spillover effect. Am I getting it right? Thank you. Um, so how do you make sure that people don't just park on the street and then you count that as trip reduction when that hasn't really happened at all. Um, so that's one question.

[02:54:38] Ben Pacho: Thank you for the question. So we'd kind of touched on this a little bit at CTC but I think maybe using a kind of a case study, local case study would be a little bit illustrative. So we've had two affordable housing projects um that have gained occupancy, and one, or I should actually say both um had provided reduced parking or limited parking below the minimums require. And one had proved successful and um mitigating any spillover effects because they've had robust TDM programs.

[02:55:13] Ben Pacho: So the demand that would have came for additional parking was then offset by the alternatives that were provided by the developer, right? By providing transit passes or rideshare subsidies or connections to the Mountain View community shuttle or MVgo shuttle. So it helped mitigate the demand for parking that just wasn't built out.

[02:55:35] Ben Pacho: And then you had another affordable housing project that did indeed have spillover effects and unfortunately at that time it was an earlier iteration of TDM requirements. So we didn't catch that project in requiring TDM. And so they kind of had to retrofit a TDM program after the fact to kind of mitigate that impact, and what they'd seen after implementing some TDM measures was a mitigation of those spillover effects.

[02:56:04] Ben Pacho: So the idea is like we can certainly implement kind of these parking strategies and see how they work and certainly with the data we could understand what effects would happen, you know, with um curb utilization studies, on-site parking occupancy counts, and to see kind of where the demands happen and then shift people accordingly. But um absent of that I think it's an important strategy but it's overall what we're doing at a citywide level to address parking and I think there's other strategies that are kind of um in the offing as well that we're considering at a city level that are kind of beyond what we're working on here which is I think the residential parking program, we also have the downtown parking strategy. So it's kind of seeing how all of those would kind of complement each other.

[02:56:47] Allison Boyer: If I could jump in a second. So really the common thread between the EVs and the TDM is the reduction in greenhouse gases, right? So the TDM, really while we're focused on elimination or reduction of single occupancy vehicles, one of the side benefits is a reduction in greenhouse gases. Similarly, our policy with respect to EVs is focused on greenhouse gases. So that's where they they kind of, to use your word, intersect.

[02:57:15] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Right, I'm trying to see how our various policies intersect. And, but I think the rest of it will be for comments. So thank you very much.

[02:57:26] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you Councilmember Hicks. Do we have any other questions from council? No other questions from my colleagues. We will now move on to public comment. Would any member of the public on the line or in person like to provide public comment on this item? If so, please turn in a blue speaker card or click the raise hand button in Zoom or press star 9 on your phone. A timer will be displayed on your screen, each speaker will have 3 minutes. So we have first up, Robert Cox.

[02:58:00] Robert Cox: Can you hear me? You can. Okay, thank you Mayor Ramos, Vice Mayor Clark, and members of the City Council for making me able to comment on this. I think Transportation Demand Management, the policy that we have before us is great because it will help expand things citywide and also it will help streamline the approval of projects because we'll already have something in place rather than having to do this every time something comes up. So that's really good.

[02:58:29] Robert Cox: The one concern that I do have is over the core strategies. Most of them look really good. On the other hand, there is a few of them, in particular the market rate residential parking pricing, unbundled parking costs, and limited parking supply strategies, that would be great if it actually reduced the number of cars that people own who live, say, like in a residential project.

[02:58:54] Robert Cox: But what I'm concerned about is the case, like for instance, let's take where I live in the downtown, right? We have basically free parking almost everywhere throughout the downtown. And so then what happens is that, you know, somebody could just decide, well I don't want to pay for an expensive parking space inside my development, I'm just gonna park it on the street. So it hasn't done anything to reduce greenhouse gases, but it has had a negative side effect when that happens. And that is that we have less parking, you know, available for people who need to patronize our businesses.

[02:59:24] Robert Cox: Which we studied at Livable Mountain View, and we found out that about 75% of the people end up coming from outside of Mountain View to patronize our downtown, and they're usually coming in cars. And if they don't have a place to park, that's not good. We're seeing a lot of challenges lately with projects that are happening now or will happen hopefully soon in the future, good projects like the Lot 12 project for affordable housing or the hotel project on Lot 4. And you know, we're not immediately replacing the parking when these projects are happening, so parking supply is decreasing, and that's leading to things like double parking, because people can't find an easy spot, or parking too close to an intersection or a crosswalk, now that we have the daylighting law, or just parking in the red areas because people get frustrated they just can't find a place to park.

[03:00:16] Robert Cox: So you know, I really want us to look hard at this. I appreciate the answers back from staff on the affordable housing projects. On the other hand, I would say that, you know, affordable housing projects aren't typical of market rate projects, where often people in affordable housing have a more flexible or reduced work schedule and so it's easier for them to take advantage of these alternate methods. When, as Councilmember Hicks mentioned, I mean, when two adults in the household are working and then you add kids on top of that, that's a lot, that's really where you get into the place where, you know, I mean people just don't have the extra time to use those extra methods. So please look carefully at those other things. Thank you.

[03:01:04] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. Next is Alexander Amoroso, followed by James Cuzmall, followed by Kevin Ma.

[03:01:12] Alexander Amoroso: Evening Council. Thank you. I'll be as brief as possible with this. Just to kind of echo what has been said before...

[03:06:38] Public Speaker: I also am in total support of this measure as well. I just have a couple of thoughts and questions for consideration for the council and the staff to put in mind. So there was a lot of discussion, and also I'll open this up with my biggest concern is traffic, 'cause I live over there on El Camino Real out by the Americana, and I feel that the traffic over there has just gotten worse. So, and I'm also a big public transportation guy.

[03:07:08] Public Speaker: So if there could be options or a strategy to expand public transportation, for example, there's a lot of talk about the community shuttle. So with the new housing projects coming into play, maybe we could borrow a strategy that other cities have used where they build more bus stops closer to where these new projects have been built. So folks who can't drive or do not own a car can utilize that public transportation there. And that could also reduce the effects of more motorists driving personal vehicles. So that's just one consideration as well.

[03:07:38] Public Speaker: Um, also, like you know, there was a conversation about rideshare. And the encouraging rideshare is great, but I was also kind of asking the question, is there possibly a city-managed rideshare project in mind that could be utilized? 'Cause I know San Francisco had tried to prototype that. Something to consider as well. And I will end with the environmental consideration because we were talking about greenhouse gas reductions.

[03:08:08] Public Speaker: And I would say that the best form of greenhouse gas reductions and preventions of environmental disaster is to not forget what makes Mountain View great is our greenery and our protections of our natural habitat. So while we are pursuing these public transportation and motor projects, we need to also make sure that we are protecting landscape, we are protecting the green spots on our roads. And also, even if it eventually leads to expansion of those green spots, that will also help with managing the greenhouse effect. So that's all. Thank you very much.

[03:08:43] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. Next we have James Kuzmall, followed by Kevin Ma. And then we'll go on to virtual public comment.

[03:08:53] James Kuzmall: Alright. Thank you. I am James Kuzmall. I am speaking on behalf of Mountain View YIMBY today. Uh, we do support the TDM ordinance, and we want to emphasize that like the goal of this TDM ordinance is to do good planning. We need to provide more housing. We're in a housing crisis. We have RHNA goals. And this is how we make sure that when we do this new housing, when we build more office space, more retail space, that people are able to travel in a sustainable way.

[03:09:18] James Kuzmall: Um, and, but that also means we need to make sure the TDM ordinance does not substantially disincentivize new housing given that very housing crisis. Um, especially since new density, to a point that was mentioned, I can't remember if by staff or by um, council, that more density means it's easier for more people to have destinations near where they live. So that is itself a reduction in vehicle miles traveled.

[03:09:48] James Kuzmall: Um, we do appreciate the incorporation of feedback from the EPC and which included some of the comments we made in our letters, including some reductions in the necessary ADT targets, as well as some additional core strategies for residential projects, since historically residential projects have not been part of this, and the original toolkit was much more office-focused.

[03:10:18] James Kuzmall: Um, we do want to be careful going forwards about the exact required ADT thresholds because we are concerned that they will end up being unrealistic for a residential project to meet, while given the toolkit and given the budgets they have. But that is something we would hope to monitor and see how that works out.

[03:10:38] James Kuzmall: Um, with that said, the low-cost programs like parking reduction are outstanding. They are very well supported by existing evidence from places that have done this and have seen reduced car ownership rates and reduced trip rates. So it's great to see that. Um, we do hope, as the toolkit calls out, it will be great if the city can also work on better managing the curb space when these projects happen so that those programs are even more effective.

[03:11:03] James Kuzmall: But even without that, they will help, and we do also see that even when there's not parking reduction, there is spillover onto streets. Um, and to to one of the questions that Councilmember Hicks mentioned about uh children, I do hope to see that some of the TMA funding helps to improve the community shuttle that has been so well used by some of our middle and high school students.

[03:11:23] James Kuzmall: Um, and oh, one one comment we did have in our letter was it would be great if the parking reductions can be made available to small projects that don't even have to comply with the TDM ordinance, since there is that enhanced TDM threshold. If a small project can opt in and potentially get that option for parking reduction, that would be outstanding for our future sustainability and for the viability of small projects. And we look forward to seeing how this program evolves. Thank you.

[03:11:48] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. Next we have Kevin Ma, followed by Katie Patrick.

[03:11:53] Kevin Ma: Evening Council, uh speaking in individual capacity. I support many things that James just mentioned. I'll just emphasize a few points. In the housing element, it specifies you should be looking at the costs of these regulations on the impact of housing. As of right now, it's not really there. Right now, we specify, you know, rough ranges of how costly there is, but as Pat's question mentioned, you know, some of these details are under NDA, which basically means no one knows until they actually happen.

[03:12:18] Kevin Ma: So I would wish that as the regulations get administratively approved, I would look into further impact modeling about how much do these actually cost to an actual development we can imagine. Because it's in the housing element in part because parking is expensive, and we do we do want to make sure that housing can be made more affordable, especially given the economic climate we're in.

[03:12:43] Kevin Ma: And that does require that the regulations be reasonable and with methodology. Methodology also matters because there's some fuzziness with the numbers that will be impactful because as mentioned also, we're facing a time of ministerial approvals, which means they have to be reasonable to the average person.

[03:13:03] Kevin Ma: For making active grand use, you know, just a 2% ADT reduction is a little bit arbitrary. And there's just not a lot of data inside the materials that demonstrate why 2% was chosen, and which seems kind of arbitrary to a lot of people. And that does need to be made up front for a developer who has to look through these new regulations to see how they can match to the 20, 30, 40%, which I do agree with staff was a good idea to reduce it for all residential.

[03:13:33] Kevin Ma: Um, to answer a point from Councilmember Hicks, unbundled parking doesn't mean they don't have parking, it just means that when you have the unit, you have to get the parking separately. So that means if there is an EV charging spot, you do have to, you know, separately rent that out. So that is an option, though as mentioned from staff, EVs are separate from the TDM goals 'cause it's still a trip by car.

[03:13:58] Kevin Ma: And I do I do wish that um we do monitor the outcome of this so that we can determine, you know, how impactful these strategies really are in reality. And to the bigger broader point, how much parking demand do developments really have? Because the only official answer is the ITE Trip Generation Manual, which for a lot of people is an abomination of statistics. And I do wish that we do have some local data we can rely on. Thank you.

[03:14:48] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. Next we have Katie Patrick before we go on to virtual comments.

[03:14:53] Katie Patrick: Hi, I am here to represent one of these rare breeds of people who does not own a car. And I also live in an older multi-family building. I have a child and I have a dog, and I manage to survive putting my small child and my dog on my bike. And it is remarkably difficult to get my bike down the stairs, down the elevator, and out the door.

[03:15:18] Katie Patrick: It's so hard, in fact, that I despite probably not being the best parent getting my child my small child to do it as well. We have to carry the bike, pull this heavy door open, hold it open with one foot, then get the bike out, and then kick it again before it closes on us. And then do that again when you get in and then when you get out.

[03:15:43] Katie Patrick: And then the front door um to the building, we have to then do it again. So it's three times. It's impossibly difficult. The only reason I do it is because I'm a bicycle die-hard. And there has to be a way to enforce multi-family buildings to build secure bike storage.

[03:16:03] Katie Patrick: So we don't need to go through this. And I'd love to see that um incorporated into the plan. I understand that we do have bike storage in for new developments, but why is it so hard to enforce existing multi-buildings like where I live to just put in a shed so I can lock my bike in there and not have it stolen?

[03:16:23] Katie Patrick: Uh, so people like me who want to go car-free, we we can do it. It's literally impossible to live a car-free life if you live in a building like mine. Well, maybe not literally impossible, but almost completely impossible to just get your bike in and out of the building unless we can get property developers or the property owners to just sacrifice just one parking space and put in a shed.

[03:16:43] Katie Patrick: It should hardly cost anything. It should not be any financial barrier at all. It's just a uh I don't know where exactly you fit it into the the the policy process to enforce these things on existing buildings, but through my lived experience, this would make a huge difference to my daily ability to live car-free.

[03:17:03] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. Now we will go to virtual public comment. Um, Karen Berky.

[03:17:08] Karen Berky: Hi. Um, so I'm going to echo a little bit of what others have said, um but I'm going to come from someone who has to have a car. I have two young children. Um, and I think any of these programs, if you renew this TDM and and and add any of these new additional things, um the constant problem I hear from other people that live in other neighborhoods or that live in other condo complexes or apartment complexes is that there's never enough parking.

[03:17:33] Karen Berky: And the spillover into the street, as others have mentioned, happens a lot. I think that it's a massive barrier to a lot of people, especially when you have below-market rate housing, which let's be frank, that really doesn't actually save people very much money when people still don't make enough money and the below-market rate is still so incredibly high and it's not really that affordable at all.

[03:18:03] Karen Berky: To then force them to pay separately for parking is ridiculous. And so people are going to be pinching their pennies and figuring out how the heck do I not pay whatever the heck it is per month even if it's reduced. They're going to park on the street, where it's free. So then you get the complaints from all the people visiting the area or that are parking just to come to a business nearby, and then there's no parking. And so then you have all these double parking and all these other problems.

[03:18:33] Karen Berky: So if we're trying to consider families with children, which I'm sorry, you still need a car. Almost everyone needs a freaking car around here. You can't get around to doctor's appointments and all these other things without a car.

[03:18:48] Karen Berky: So I think that any new builds of affordable housing and anything like that that's included in this, the parking in the building should be garage parking underneath the complex or on the site and it should be free for one car each unit. One car each unit should have a free spot included with their rent for any builds that the city does at all, and there should be incentivizing things for existing buildings that are going to get converted or that are owned by private owners to provide one free spot and tell them they'll get I don't know do something to help incentivize them to do that as one car spot per unit.

[03:19:23] Karen Berky: So that we can try to mitigate how much parking problems we have, because you can't make everyone be car-free. Some people might, but not everyone can. So it's like, we need to balance that with our green emissions problems we have, but also face the reality of what families like mine face every day, which is that parking is a huge, massive factor. So if you could please consider that um when you're talking about parking reduction, that would be great. Thank you.

[03:19:58] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. And that seems to end public comment. I will now bring this item back for council questions and deliberation. Please note that a motion to approve the recommendation should also include the reading uh reading the title of the ordinance attached to the report. Councilmember Ramirez.

[03:20:13] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Thank you Mayor. That will only be true until we approve the charter modernization, which will mean we will no longer have to read uh the ordinance uh into the record. Um, I'm going to um move to approve the staff recommendations, including introduce an ordinance of the City Council of the City of Mountain View, repealing and reenacting Article 10 of Chapter 19 of the Mountain View City Code to establish a new Transportation Demand Management program with modifications to Section 121, Definition 11, and Section 124, is that I or L? I, thank you. Uh, and finding the amendments to be exempt from CEQA, uh, pursuant to CEQA Guidelines Section 15308, uh, to be read in title only, further reading waived, and set a second reading for May 26th, 2026. I hope I integrated the the two um uh prompts here uh accurately.

[03:20:53] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Uh first I want to share my appreciation to to staff for uh working on this uh ordinance. I know it was a long time coming. I really appreciate uh the thoughtful deliberations from the EPC and the CTC, uh and also uh the comments from from the public.

[03:21:13] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Um, I've I've uh spent a lot of time talking with staff and I feel very comfortable in my understanding of uh the ordinance and the program. Um, I'm really grateful uh for the long list of uh thoughtful core strategies, which I think that this TDM ordinance is not going to solve all of the city's problems, but by including core strategies like active ground floor uses and amenities, and active transportation gap closure improvements, we provide an incentive to developers to voluntarily - I mean, voluntarily, they get to pick from these, right? But to select from this menu uh options that help achieve community goals, right?

[03:21:53] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: We want mixed-use development, which is increasingly hard to require because of the erosion of local control. Uh, and we want things like uh investment in transportation uh that we may not be able to require in certain circumstances, but some developers may voluntarily elect to do so to meet their TDM obligations, um uh but also to provide a benefit to their future residents, or in some cases, right, to um uh future employees.

[03:22:23] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Uh, so I think there's there's a if anything I would say, you know, for for each of those a few percentage points higher higher would be great because it would more likely incentivize the selection of those particular strategies. But I think most importantly, um staff has been very clear that this is a living document. Um, I'm really glad that these aren't hard-coded into the ordinance, meaning that we have to, you know, go back to EPC and Council every single time we need to amend a core strategy.

[03:22:58] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Uh, the uh the TDM uh toolkit uh will will be continuously updated as you uh receive the data um that we'll be collecting and monitoring. Um, it it's it's just a much more robust program than what we've been able to uh uh deploy on a, you know, case-by-case or site-by-site uh circumstance.

[03:23:23] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: So this is uh I think a a very strong foundation for future work. I'm very happy with where it's landed. Uh, it includes core strategies that I think will achieve other goals um uh that sometimes the council has struggled with in land use review. Um, and it allows um staff to uh update it um with, you know, the flexibility that you need um as you learn more, right? To adjust these numbers, to add new strategies, um uh to to make sure that we're uh implementing a robust TDM program that achieves the goals that we've set out.

[03:23:58] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: So uh with that, I'm happy to uh move to approve the the uh staff recommendations and I'm very eager to to see how it plays out over the next, you know, 10, 15 years. Thank you.

[03:24:13] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you Councilmember Ramirez. Uh, Councilmember Showalter.

[03:24:18] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Yeah, I'd just like to follow up on a few things that Councilmember Ramirez said. First of all, um, I really was very pleased with your answer, Mr. Paco, about what you're gonna do with the monitoring. I think that monitoring for monitoring sake is a waste of everybody's time and money. But monitoring so that you learn how the system works and you improve the system is really valuable.

[03:24:48] Councilmember Pat Showalter: So that made me feel, you know, it's it's, you know, it's just really a good practice. Um, following along with that, there is this big kind of open-ended question here of what on earth is this going to cost? So I really think that as much as is possible, we should include the cost of running this program in the monitoring. And I, you know, certainly leave it to you to figure out how to do that.

[03:25:18] Councilmember Pat Showalter: But um, we don't want this program to be a deterrent to anyone building housing. We want it to make our housing better. And I think that this is um kind of part and parcel of the the sort of statewide um push that we have to make objective standards for things.

[03:25:43] Councilmember Pat Showalter: And you know, that's we're writing down lots of um ideas that people can go to and we can go to and um uh to make, you know, to be transparent. But it's really good that it's a living document because um applying this so broadly is um is very different from what we've done before.

[03:26:08] Councilmember Pat Showalter: I mean, in the past we've done it in the North Bayshore area primarily, and that is much in a sense, you know, those those um uh companies and and their needs for transportation are much more standardized and and they're different than the residential needs. So you know, we're going to have to um kind of uh work through that. It's not not going to be a simple task.

[03:26:38] Councilmember Pat Showalter: And um, another thing I wanted to bring up along with cost is that the cost to the City of Mountain View of evaluating this is not going to be free. Um, we are going to have to make sure that that staff time, um both the skill and and the money to do it, is in the budget.

[03:27:03] Councilmember Pat Showalter: And I'd just like to bring that up. I think it's, you know, it's been my experience if it it's not somebody's job to do something, it doesn't get done. I think it's going to be important that it's assigned to somebody. So I just I just want to mention that. And um, I would also say that uh, you know, we collect data um typically on an annual basis because um that's uh that just works well. People think in calendar times.

[03:27:38] Councilmember Pat Showalter: But in terms of really learning from data, uh it's often more episodic. And in this case, I think the episodes will be uh the development of some big uh projects that get finished and are utilizing it.

[03:27:58] Councilmember Pat Showalter: So it will be interesting to see whether, you know, you think the first big evaluation of this should be after three years or five years or five projects or whatever. But but I think that, you know, there should be um thought, and and uh uh engineering thought into when that is the appropriate time uh to and then when you do that, it'll also be time to say, okay, well maybe the monitoring um program that we have had to date isn't isn't quite right anymore and we'll change it. So um, with that, I uh I would uh like to say thank you and uh look forward to supporting this.

[03:28:53] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you Councilmember Showalter. Councilmember Hicks.

[03:28:58] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Yes, so I wanted to echo what Councilmember Showalter said. I I this is a program that I will happily be I will happily be supporting the motion and the program and I I uh thank you for all your work on it.

[03:29:18] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Um, I um I guess the things that I want to call attention to are um first, I'm really happy that it's evergreen. Um, and just kind of the things that I mentioned in my line of questioning. I think the uh elements of the toolkit that can that we can focus on because it has this commuter history is um some of the the uh some of the travel needs of um of people who are not commuters. Uh people in their other aspects of their life.

[03:29:58] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Whether it's um you know, whether it's shuffling children around, um or whether it's uh I have a young adult who's looking for their first job, you know, and a car can expand that search, you know, probably a hundredfold, to be honest with you.

[03:30:18] Councilmember Alison Hicks: I take care of a a senior parent uh who lives in Walnut Creek, I don't get to choose where she lives, and I can't take the Amigo Shuttle to go visit her. Um, and I've checked out how what it would take to take mass transit or a bike and it would be five hours both ways, so a ten-hour trip, and then once I get there I would have to do her errands.

[03:30:38] Councilmember Alison Hicks: So there are many people who um, you know, who who still need to use cars. And so I want to be mindful of the various needs and not too punitive. I I uh remember when I first moved from my the suburban neighborhood I grew up in into the Bay Area and was thrilled at the abundance of transit options that I had without without a car.

[03:31:08] Councilmember Alison Hicks: And that's kind of the flavor that I would like this this our TDM program to take on, that it's not punitive, that it understands the various needs that people have. Um, and that it that it tries to address I know you can't address all of those needs, but that we have an ever-expanding toolkit that um meets the needs of the diversity of people that we that we have living in our community.

[03:31:43] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Let me see if I had any last notes after that. Oh, Clipper cards. I would love it if you worked on, I think Councilmember Showalter brought this up, but also senior Clipper cards and which are very difficult to get and change people's habits once they get them.

[03:32:08] Councilmember Alison Hicks: And also any sort of pro discount programs for um I stopped using mass transit a lot when I had kids and we're I was transporting their friends around because bringing six kids on a you know on a uh on light rail ends up costing you a lot of money. So anything that can reduce the price and incentivize um those kinds of out-of-car trips, I would really appreciate. Thank you.

[03:32:43] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you Councilmember Hicks. Are you wanting to speak Councilmember McAlister?

[03:32:48] Councilmember John McAlister: Yeah.

[03:32:50] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Okay, I'm just gonna let you go. Go ahead Councilmember McAlister.

[03:32:53] Councilmember John McAlister: Yeah, so uh, Mr. Councilmember Ramirez, I support your motion. Keep it simple and we go forward. Thank you.

[03:33:03] Councilmember John McAlister: Um, I support TDM. I support the project. But I always have that cautionary tale, and you're starting to grin so you know where I'm going with this. But um, 2014, uh, when the uh North Bayshore was booming and the cars were coming and traffic was going down 85, and we had to come up with solutions 'cause people were taking the trains and we had all these people trying to get from the train station to their area.

[03:33:38] Councilmember John McAlister: Uh, we came up with a TDM for North Bayshore, and that was easy to monitor because there was only three entrances into the area, and so we were able to check them and help them implement their one of the best transit systems that you can think of for businesses.

[03:33:58] Councilmember John McAlister: Google had their bus systems that went throughout the Bay Area. Intuit had their bus systems going throughout the area. And so they took over the private busing where the public couldn't do it. VTA didn't reach out to the areas. Light rail is light rail, very uh slow. Caltrain was coming along and doing pretty good. And now they had a shuttle to the North Bayshore.

[03:34:23] Councilmember John McAlister: So we we got to the point where it was starting to work, and then COVID came, and then jobs went to uh isolated. So it was it took a hit.

[03:34:38] Councilmember John McAlister: And it was interesting, and so I sort of call this a concept, uh not a a plan, 'cause a concept a plan means that you're actually gonna get something done. And you got a lot of great tools in this thing, and you got a lot of ideas. But unless you have enforcement, you may have someone to do it, but unless you have somebody to enforce it and penalize them and make put some meat into this uh plan, it's not going to work.

[03:35:13] Councilmember John McAlister: And one when we had our CTC, I asked one of the city staff, I says, "Has anybody been fined?" and they said no. So from 2014 to 2026, that's like 12 years, it's it's a I'm always concerned about we put in these regulations, we put in this good intent, but there's no meat to it, no enforcement, and nothing really gets accomplished.

[03:35:43] Councilmember John McAlister: And so I know staff time is very precious to us now, and so I hope with all these strategies everybody says "This is good, da da da," unless there's enforcement, you got to hold somebody's feet to the fire.

[03:35:58] Councilmember John McAlister: And I mentioned the last time we were talking about a great plan, and we don't want it So somebody said "Oh, we gotta have someone to be in charge of this." Well, that's good, but those people that are in charge got about five other plans that they're working on.

[03:36:13] Councilmember John McAlister: And I believe in public transit. I believe that the city should really develop its internal transit system. I've always been pushing our MVGO. We can't rely on VTA. They have no money. They're hurting like the dickens.

[03:36:28] Councilmember John McAlister: And so when you say "Oh, we can take out the cars," people rely on cars, as you say. There's not a lot of the big jobs around here if you put it in there.

[03:36:43] Councilmember John McAlister: So we can't rely on VTA, and we can't rely on people not parking their cars. And that's another concern I have, is you know, they need their cars. And so and I also believe in the quality of life, and if you don't take the car, you say, "Oh, you don't need a car," then they're parking on the street.

[03:37:03] Councilmember John McAlister: So bottom line, see what you can do, start with the first person you get is the enforcement, and figure out who's going to do it. And don't if you go to Public Works and say "You're going to be doing it," great, but follow through on it.

[03:37:18] Councilmember John McAlister: And so I hope it becomes from a concept to a implementation to a working model because it does have a lot of great things in it for it. And so that's my uh word to the wise.

[03:37:33] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you Councilmember McAlister. Thank you staff for your work on this. Um, I have been recently attempting, since I live alone and am a single Pringle with no spawn of my own, to try to take more public transit and not be as reliant on my car. I understand that it is more difficult than I anticipated, and um I love that we are taking steps one to to to find ways to make that easier for people structurally.

[03:38:13] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Um, that's kind of like the hope with some of these TDMs. Um, some of my colleagues know that I've been complaining about them when I try like recently I tried to do a Costco trip um by taking public transit only. That's that's an adventure. Um, but thank you for your work on this, and I hope that it will help bring our car trips down as a community and in return give us a better clean air and a better environment um moving forward. So thank you so much, and we are ready for the roll call vote. City Clerk.

[03:38:58] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Ramirez?

[03:39:00] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Yes.

[03:39:02] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Vice Mayor Clark?

[03:39:04] Vice Mayor Chris Clark: Yes.

[03:39:06] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Hicks?

[03:39:08] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Yes.

[03:39:10] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Kamei?

[03:39:12] Councilmember Ellen Kamei: Yes.

[03:39:14] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember McAlister?

[03:39:16] Councilmember John McAlister: Yes.

[03:39:18] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Showalter?

[03:39:20] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Yes.

[03:39:22] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Mayor Ramos?

[03:39:24] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Yes. Motion carries unanimously. Thank you. Um, with that, I am going to do a 10-minute break. Um, it is currently 8:38, we'll uh reconvene at 8:48.

[03:55:39] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: All right you guys, we're gonna start to get started. All right. We're gonna move on to item 6.2, Code Amendment to Chapter 36, Zoning Below Market Rate Housing Program, First Reading. Housing Specialist II Anna Reinoso and Affordable Housing Manager Julie Barnard will present the item. If you would like to speak on this item in person, please submit a blue speaker card to the City Clerk now. Go ahead.

[03:56:08] Anna Reinoso: Good evening Mayor, Vice Mayor and Council members. My name is Anna Reinoso, Housing Specialist II, and this evening I'm joined by Affordable Housing Manager Julie Barnard, Housing Director Wayne Chen and joining us virtually is Darren Smith with Economic Planning Systems. This evening we will be presenting ordinance amendments to the Below Market Rate, also referred to as BMR program.

[03:56:32] Anna Reinoso: This evening we will be reviewing some background, the amendments and sharing an updated recommendation. The BMR program refers to inclusionary units that are integrated within market rate developments, not projects that are 100% affordable housing. The city has a 15% BMR requirement for rental and ownership projects and a 25% requirement for townhome and row home projects. Residential projects that create more than seven units provide on-site integrated BMR units at different AMI levels.

[03:57:10] Anna Reinoso: Developers may pursue an alternative compliance in place of providing on-site BMR units. Currently this is achieved through land dedication, off-site unit delivery and in-lieu fees. The city's housing element program 1.9 requires two reviews of the BMR program in the 8-year cycle under five criteria as presented to council in December 2023 and November 2025.

[03:57:42] Anna Reinoso: We have approached the BMR ordinance modifications in two phases. In phase 1 completed in February 2025, council approved the initial set of cleanup items. Council's review of phase 2 follow-up items occurred this past November. Council approved staff recommendations and made two friendly amendments. The first related to the graduated fee exemption which will be discussed later.

[03:58:09] Anna Reinoso: The second amendment directed staff to evaluate the feasibility of including in the administrative guidelines staff discretion to grant an extension of delivery for alternative compliance options of up to six months if the developer is working in good faith.

[03:58:29] Anna Reinoso: As part of the phase 2 on March 4th 2026, staff presented to EPC the BMR amendments approved by council in November 2025. EPC supported staff's recommendation with two modifications to the alternative means of compliance. The first modification adds a provision to ensure development partners with alternative compliance proposals meet appropriate qualifications and standards. These will be discussed in a few moments.

[03:59:03] Anna Reinoso: The second modification asked staff to conduct additional evaluation to ensure off-site alternative compliance proposals do not contribute to the geographic concentration of lower-income households. After the EPC meeting, staff further evaluated the HCD opportunity maps and other maps and determined the recommended map would address EPC concerns about overconcentration. Therefore staff recommends keeping the recommended map.

[03:59:34] Anna Reinoso: In December of 2023, council directed staff to study options to improve the physical accessibility of BMR units. In November 2025, based on the analysis completed, council approved the staff recommendation to require 15% of BMR units or a minimum of one unit to be accessible. Since then, there have been no changes to this amendment.

[04:00:01] Anna Reinoso: Amendment 2 establishes updated requirements for an applicant proposing alternative means of compliance. Since November there have been no changes to the general requirements applicable to all alternative means of compliance proposals. The requirements shown were approved by council in November 2025. As such, we will address new items which are indicated in red boxes. The housing element opportunity site has been added to the location requirements. All other requirements for land dedication remain unchanged since November.

[04:00:40] Anna Reinoso: To align the location requirements for land dedication, the addition of a housing element opportunity site has been added to the location requirement for off-site development. EPC provided input to ensure that partner qualifications do not undermine the delivery or quality of affordable housing. Based on staff analysis, staff is recommending minimum threshold requirements if an applicant chooses to work with a partner to deliver alternative compliance via off-site unit delivery.

[04:01:17] Anna Reinoso: Alternative compliance for acquisition and preservation has no changes except the addition of a partner threshold requirement in the event the applicant proposes to partner with a third party for this option. And now I will hand it over to Affordable Housing Manager Julie Barnard for the remaining portion.

[04:01:37] Julie Barnard: Good evening. For the third amendment, staff recommend using the California Construction Cost Index as the appropriate escalator index and some other revisions to the fee as discussed in November of 2025. The fourth amendment addresses the remaining cleanup items that were not incorporated into the February 2025 update. These include clarifying the weighted average for the AMI limits and updating the administering department from CDD to Housing.

[04:02:07] Julie Barnard: Staff recommends no changes to the November 2025 council direction for this fifth amendment which includes removing the HOA reserve fund. Amendment number six relates to the graduated fee reduction. Staff initially introduced a graduated fee reduction schedule which was presented in November 2025. To recap, projects up to six units currently pay the in-lieu fee. Once a project reaches seven units, a full unit, BMR unit must be delivered.

[04:02:40] Julie Barnard: During the prior council review, staff recommended incorporating a graduated fee reduction for small projects, meaning that the more units a developer builds, up to a maximum of six, the lower the per-unit fee. The intent of this initiative is to incentivize developers of small projects to maximize the development potential of their sites and also to further housing element goal 2.2, pilot ADU and SB9 financial incentives programs.

[04:03:09] Julie Barnard: At the November 2025 city council meeting, council passed a motion to recommend that staff analyze two actions. The first action was to analyze adjusting the graduated fee reduction to work proportionally with the maximum number of units physically possible for a project. In order to determine how to calculate this, staff recommends using the base densities under the general plan and zoning designations as well as the provisions in SB 684 to establish the maximum legally allowed density.

[04:03:44] Julie Barnard: The graduated fee reduction would then be scaled proportional to the number of units that are legally allowed. This approach retains the original intent of the greater the density the lesser the fee, but also customizes the approach to site-specific densities. The table compares two scenarios. The first being a project with a legally allowable maximum density of six units and the second with four. As you see here, the graduated fee reduction scales accordingly with the number of units that could have been built.

[04:04:17] Julie Barnard: To illustrate, if the developer has a site with a maximum density of six units and opts to develop only four units, they would get a 60% reduction versus paying no fees if they would have maximized the density. So therefore staff recommends using the legally allowed development density to calculate the number of units that are physically possible for a project and then scaling the fee reduction schedule accordingly.

[04:04:44] Julie Barnard: The second action was to evaluate the feasibility of incorporating the graduated fee reduction with maximizing the development potential of small sites up to 10 units and return to council with options. Council directed staff to review projects of up to 10 units because there are state laws that allow by-right subdivisions of up to 10 units under SB 684. Staff conducted a preliminary evaluation and have determined that additional analysis is needed.

[04:05:14] Julie Barnard: We propose doing this through the low and middle income homeownership strategy, since projects of up to 10 units are often oriented towards ownership models, and then returning to council with options also in the 2028 BMR review. The final amendment amends the ordinance to allow updates to the BMR program guidelines to occur administratively, rather than requiring a council resolution as currently written. Staff recommends no changes to the November 2025 council direction for this amendment.

[04:05:48] Julie Barnard: In November of 2025, council directed staff to evaluate relocating the BMR ordinance from the zoning code to the housing chapter of the municipal code. The intent is to better align the ordinance with the housing department's administration of the program and consolidate it with other housing-related ordinances, such as the TRAO and the MHRSO. Staff initially recommended retaining the ordinance in chapter 36, as we could not determine how the change would impact the BMR program.

[04:06:19] Julie Barnard: Since the EPC hearing in March, staff has conducted that the relocation is feasible and would help streamline future updates. Staff therefore recommends relocation with the amendment anticipated to return to council before the end of 2026. As a reminder, these are the seven general topics of modifications to the ordinance that council are considering this evening.

[04:06:45] Julie Barnard: If the recommendation is approved, the ordinance second reading will occur on consent on June 9th, with the ordinance becoming effective 30 days thereafter. So finally, staff recommends that city council introduce an ordinance amending chapter 36 as it relates to the BMR program and the proposed amendments presented tonight, and to set a second reading for June 9th, 2026, and also to approve relocating the BMR program provision from chapter 36 to 46. With that concludes staff's presentation. We're available for questions, and we can turn it back to the mayor.

[04:07:26] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. Does any member of the council have questions? Going once, going twice. All right, we will now go to, oh wait.

[04:07:39] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Sorry, I was having trouble getting the screen to change here. Yeah, I asked this question, and you answered it a little bit in your presentation, but I'm gonna ask it again just to make sure that I understand it. And that is, can you please explain the timing of the delivery of the alternative site affordable housing, and the possible flexibility, and who determines it?

[04:08:10] Anna Reinoso: Right. Um, I may also ask Director Chen just to verify my understanding of what we've discussed. But currently the, what we presented to you in November was that the certificates of occupancy needed to occur concurrently. You requested a six-month extension. Staff did their due diligence, we've all decided that yes, we agree, six months isn't enough. As written, it would allow, rather than the certificates of occupancy occurring concurrently, providing the off-site project was under construction or about to be under construction, that would meet the requirements.

[04:08:55] Anna Reinoso: There is another provision that the approval body at the time would have the discretion to extend the timing. Like, we're in concurrence that we wouldn't want to hold back a project that's about to be constructed or about to be delivered because they're just a few months or even, you know, a year from construction commencing. But we do want some kind of accountability to make sure that the units are delivered.

[04:09:20] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Okay, and so the approval body would be the housing staff?

[04:09:24] Anna Reinoso: Right.

[04:09:25] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Okay. All right, well thank you, that's clear.

[04:09:29] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Any other questions from my colleagues? Seeing none, we're gonna move on to public comment. Would any member of the public on the line or in person like to provide comment on this item? If so, please turn in a blue speaker card or click the raise hand button in Zoom or press star nine on your phone. A timer will be displayed on the screen. Each speaker will have three minutes. I see no in-person public... oh! Okay, so they just popped up magically. All right, Robert Cox, followed by Alexander Amoroso, followed by Kevin Ma.

[04:10:11] Robert Cox (Public Speaker): Mayor Ramos, Vice Mayor Clark, and members of the City Council. I'm here to say, make a comment and not say anything negative, believe it or not. In particular, I just wanted to call out, you know, as I wrote in the letter about amendment two, add requirements for alternative means of compliance. I think this is really great.

[04:10:34] Robert Cox (Public Speaker): And the reason I do is I remember when I was on the EPC and we talked about the idea that, okay we have these BMR requirements but we're gonna need to have an alternative because who knows, somebody might be able to propose something better. Well that's true, and yet I'm thinking in the back of my mind, how easy is it gonna be to evaluate that it's actually of greater use than what the standard would be. And I've seen cases where proposals have come into the council kind of like at the last minute and staff really hasn't had a chance to evaluate it, and then council I feel sometimes ends up making decisions in the dark about whether it's really better or really not. But adding new requirements, particularly ones when you have an affordable housing developer that's partnering with a market rate developer, and that affordable housing developer has to have real credibility like no bankruptcies, no outstanding criminal indictments or whatever, you know, it really is gonna make it happen. So thank you for making those changes, and I look forward to your voting yes.

[04:11:40] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Next we have Alexander Amoroso, followed by Kevin Ma.

[04:11:42] Alexander Amoroso (Public Speaker): Evening again Council. Much like the previous note, this is all in support for this measure. Just a couple notes for consideration to take into mind. So as much as I do support affordable housing because in my opinion in one of the wealthiest areas, countries, states in the world, people who are not housed is a crime. So I very much support more affordable housing to be built. However, there is something to be taken into consideration to not take our eye off the ball when it comes to just housing period, because a lot of the problems we do see when it comes to building up more and more affordable housing is that I'm tracking that this is gonna be another one of those projects where people of a certain income are only gonna be allowed to apply as opposed to having more general housing where lower, middle, high class can apply to live here. So making sure that we don't bottleneck that market of housing and make sure that we are still working on those projects.

[04:12:50] Alexander Amoroso (Public Speaker): And also something of consideration for this housing project is an expansion on what I've seen here in the city, which is profession housing. So much like what we see over on Shoreline where you have that housing for teachers and professionals, maybe we can also have some housing for tradesmen and service-based employees. So we're also bringing essential workers to the city, but also providing housing for that, which is a whole other separate market away from the general housing issue. So again, just something to consider, add to this project. I completely support it and the only thing to do is make it better. Thank you.

[04:13:30] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. Kevin Ma.

[04:13:34] Kevin Ma (Public Speaker): Evening again Council. I would like to comment regarding the letter that David sent in for Mountain View YIMBY. I would like to echo the point about, I do believe that we should consider doing the 10-unit fee exemption now rather than waiting one and a half years. There's an opportunity cost for delay, which is especially bad given there's basically no small unit development in the city at this point. You know, the last condo project 918 Rich is probably not going to move ahead at this point given it's been two years and it's practically near expiry. So I do believe that we should jump start the ability for small developers like some that have come before you or before EPC to see if they can get some kind of fee exemption just because at this point for those kind of projects, the affordable housing fee or the BMR in-lieu is one of the biggest impediments the city itself has posed.

[04:14:22] Kevin Ma (Public Speaker): And that may be a thing to also consider for the 2028 BMR review, is just whether we do need to recalculate the inclusionary zoning requirements we do set. For example, San Francisco does check their checks every three years, and they at this point probably have a lower inclusionary zoning requirement than we do, which is interesting. So I do wish to see these changes to go ahead because there are other changes that do impact developers such as the equal to 100% AMI, but we do need to recalculate the fees and our regulations given economic conditions. Thank you.

[04:14:55] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. We will move on to virtual speakers. Karen Berky.

[04:15:02] Karen Berky (Public Speaker): Hi. So, I don't know as much about this very, very specifics of this BMR program, but what I will tell you is that there was a lot of discussion about new developments that would have BMR housing. I wanna know if we are ever going to make existing units in other apartment complexes or condo complexes force them to start providing more BMR or affordable housing units, because all these projects are going to get mired in permits and the building and all these things, and it's gonna take years, and we need housing right now.

[04:15:48] Karen Berky (Public Speaker): I'm unfortunately in an apartment that, of course, we are at the six units or less. So not only are we not protected by the Rental Stabilization Act whatsoever that was passed shortly before we moved here in 2020 or 2018 I'd say. And we also, you know, even if they built something this, that small that's new, it still looks like it's not, like there's a way for them to get around it. That's the part that I'm annoyed with. The California Apartment Association has a lot of influence probably now, and also in the past over the housing developments that are approved in this city.

[04:16:30] Karen Berky (Public Speaker): And I really would like to see a bigger push from our council with this measure and others like it to push for more, higher percentages of below market rate and affordable housing. Because our apartment, if our landlady who's just a random homeowner that owns this property, if she decided to raise the rent on us and jack it up, we would be screwed. We live in the Monta Loma neighborhood. Other equivalent housing is $500 to $1,000 to $2,000 more a month, and we are a one-income household with two children. There is no way that I, we can do that. So I urge you council to pass this measure, and just try to think if there's a way to include it, if you can have staff look at it, of how can you get more BMR units added that aren't dependent on something having to be built. Why do people have to wait more time than we've already had to wait? We shouldn't have to. There are already existing units, and I know that now that the condos are exempt from that rent stabilization act, guess what was built on Middlefield and Rock Street all around me. They tore down those really old apartment complexes that were more affordable, and now they're all condos that are for sale. There's no BMR, there's no affordable, there's no nothing. So, there has to be more done for the existing units. Thank you.

[04:18:00] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you. I see no other public comment. I will now bring the item back for council questions and deliberation. Please note that a motion to approve the recommendation should also include reading the title of the ordinance attached to the report. For now. All right, Councilmember Ramirez.

[04:18:18] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Thank you Mayor. I'm happy to move the staff recommendations including introduce an ordinance of the city council of the city of Mountain View amending chapter 36, zoning, article 14, division 2, residential development below market rate housing program of the Mountain View city code to modify the below market rate housing program and add section 36.40.32 governing graduated fee reduction for small projects and finding that these code amendments are not subject to the California Environmental Quality Act to be read in title only, further reading waived, and set a second reading for June 9th, 2026.

[04:18:55] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Ordinarily I, you probably know me as a meddler, I like to make little changes. I'm not doing that tonight for either of these ordinances because staff did great work. I do have a couple of quick comments. First, I had forgotten to say in the previous item, but fortunately Councilmember Showalter mentioned it, the inclusion of objective standards is a great improvement in a lot of the ordinances that we are now bringing to council for approval.

[04:19:24] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: I asked a question about how we would approve projects under a ministerial or administrative approval process using an alternative compliance option. And staff provided a very helpful response, and I think that's in part because of this concerted effort to introduce objective standards in all of our regulations, which make our regulations more robust, more defensible, more in line with state law. And this is tremendous progress.

[04:19:53] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: I also am very happy with the staff recommendation to return later to take this program out of the zoning ordinance and include it in the housing ordinance that we're beginning to flesh out, to make it easier to amend in the future. This is, you know, phase two of this work, but it's not the end of the work that we're doing on the BMR program update. So I'm very excited for additional work that I know staff will be doing over the next few years.

[04:20:24] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: And I wanna acknowledge, I should have done this also for the previous item, just as our transportation planning staff are heavily impacted and we don't have enough people, that's also true for housing. And I just wanna express my appreciation to director Wayne Chen and also your team. I wish we could keep all of you forever. I know that's not gonna happen, but for as long as we're able to benefit from your work, you're doing phenomenal work in the city of Mountain View and I just wanna express my gratitude and my support for the work that you are doing. Thank you.

[04:20:59] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you Councilmember Ramirez. Councilmember Showalter.

[04:21:02] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Well, ditto what Councilmember Ramirez said, particularly about the objective standards. I think that that this is also a way that under the state laws that have been enacted, that we, we continue to exert local control. And one of the things that we do locally is really create a community, a good community through our planning, and this is a way we're doing that. So I'm delighted to see it.

[04:21:36] Councilmember Pat Showalter: I've been working on BMR stuff since the 90s when I was on the planning commission. And it's one of the things that I'm really proud of because there's been a, there's been a lot of good done by the BMR funds that we have collected over the years and utilized to make quite a bit of affordable housing. So I'm really proud of this program, but it's, it's good too that it's not a static program. It needs to change with the times. And so this is an opportunity for us to update it appropriately, and I, you know, I'm really supportive of that.

[04:22:15] Councilmember Pat Showalter: At the same time, I think that it's important to continue to monitor how this is working or to monitor how this is working. It's been going on for a long time and we're making an important change here, and I think that in the next three to five years we should monitor this program and see how it's working and come back with an evaluation of is it doing what we want to do.

[04:22:49] Councilmember Pat Showalter: So that is the only suggestion that I would like to make to this is that we, you know, we include a monitoring of the program so that we can, you know, we can judge its effectiveness, and that would be things like, you know, how many people were helped by the program, how much it costs, how many units we produced. I don't think it's necessarily information that we don't have, but I'm not sure we've ever evaluated, you know, who do we help and how much do we help. So I would really like us to kind of plan to do that the next time we do an evaluation.

[04:23:32] Councilmember Pat Showalter: And then the other thing is, it seems like it's part of the program is it's really important to make clear guidelines, and I understand that that's, you know, that's part of this. So that is excellent. Thank you very much.

[04:23:45] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you Councilmember Showalter. I believe we have a motion by Councilmember Ramirez, and a second by Councilmember Showalter. I believe Councilmember Ramirez, you still have to read the items that, uh... did you already read it? He did already read it. I must have blanked out on that. But we are ready for a vote. City Clerk?

[04:24:07] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Ramirez?

[04:24:08] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Yes.

[04:24:08] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Showalter?

[04:24:09] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Yes.

[04:24:10] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Hicks?

[04:24:11] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Yes.

[04:24:11] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember Kamei?

[04:24:12] Councilmember Ellen Kamei: Yes.

[04:24:13] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Councilmember McAlister?

[04:24:14] Councilmember John McAlister: Yes.

[04:24:15] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Vice Mayor Clark?

[04:24:16] Vice Mayor Chris Clark: Yes.

[04:24:16] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Mayor Ramos?

[04:24:17] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Yes.

[04:24:18] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Motion carries unanimously.

[04:24:20] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Yay! Good votes today you guys. All right, we are now moving on to item 7, Council, Staff and Committee Reports. Do we have any Council, Staff and Committee Reports? I'm seeing none. Oh, sorry, Councilmember Showalter.

[04:24:39] Councilmember Pat Showalter: Just a quick one. I want to share that I attended Stanford's sustainability forum on April 29th and April, and May 1st. And it was, the first day of it was the sustainability summit of the Doerr School, and it was, it's kind of as the Doerr school of sustainability was founded seven years ago, and this was kind of a celebration of that founding and description of what it does. And I was just blown away. It really is a very comprehensive and powerful program on so many levels. And I look forward to us, you know, I knew that we do have some fellows from Stanford and we do some research from time to time, but this was just really a wonderful thing to be able to take part in, and one of the advantages of kind of living here.

[04:25:48] Councilmember Pat Showalter: So um, and then the one on Friday was about data centers, and how, what their impact will be and particularly on power. So that was in line with my representation of Mountain View on Silicon Valley Clean Energy. Thanks.

[04:26:08] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you Councilmember Showalter. Vice Mayor Clark.

[04:26:11] Vice Mayor Chris Clark: Very briefly, I am also required to report that I attended the data center summit at Stanford on May 1st, Friday May 1st.

[04:26:20] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Oh. Cool. All right, I'll just mention briefly April 30th we had CNC, a grant meeting reception, so those recommendations will be coming toward you all very quickly. Then on May 1st there was the Questa neighborhood meeting to talk about, when we met with the residents about the water main incident. May 2nd I did opening remarks for the multicultural festival, and was joined by Councilmember Kamei as well with her lovely children running around learning culture. And then May 6th we had a CPPC meeting. May 7th I was actually a judge for the Los Altos Mountain View Community Foundation event, they awarded a united effort with a $25,000 check for their work, and their theme was live where you work and how do we do that. And then on May 8th I introduced Congressman Liccardo for the Leadership Mountain View graduation. I see a hand from Councilmember Kamei.

[04:27:28] Councilmember Ellen Kamei: Thanks Mayor. I completely forgot that I needed to report that I attended our council transportation committee meeting last Tuesday May 5th, and then I attended one day of the two-day Making Democracy Work and Welcoming Cities convening at Stanford. It was great to see members of our staff there talking about what we can do to be a welcoming city. Thank you.

[04:27:57] Mayor Emily Ann Ramos: Thank you Councilmember Kamei. And with that, the next city council meeting will be held on May 24th. This meeting is adjourned at 9:29 p.m. which is the earliest I've ever adjourned a meeting. Woo-hoo!

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