September 3, 2019 Joint Special Meeting of Mountain View City Council and Shoreline Regional Park Community

Video

Transcript

[00:00:40] Mayor Lisa Matichak: We will call the meeting to order, and we will start with the pledge of allegiance.

[00:00:51] Unknown Speaker: Allegiance to the Platter of the United States America. And to the Republic, which stands one nation under God. Indivisible withine and justice.

[00:01:05] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Next, we have roll call, and if the city clerk would announce attendance?

[00:01:09] City Clerk: All council members are present.

[00:01:10] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Thank you. Thank you. First item is the consent calendar, and these items will be approved by one motion, unless any member of the council or audience wishes to read. the item for discussion. Do any council member wish to remove an item? Are there any members of the public who wish to remove an item? Okay, seeing none. We'll bring it back to council, and we have a motion by council member McAllister.

[00:01:44] Councilmember John McAlister: I move that we approve the consent calendar.

[00:01:47] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Thank you. And a second by council member Ramirez. And I don't see any further discussions, so we'll call the question. And that passes unanimously. Thank you. Next on the agenda is Oral Communications. 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 for up to three minutes during this section, and state law prohibits the council from acting on non agenda items. Is there anyone who wishes to address the council on an item that is not on the agenda tonight? Okay, seeing none, we'll close that portion of the meeting. And we will move on to items 7.1, which is use of unmanned aircraft systems, also known as drones, in support of city operations. And we will start with a staff presentation.

[00:02:57] Lieutenant Saul Jager: Good evening, everybody. Lieutenant Saul Jager with the police department. Several Mountain View City departments, public works, fire, and police are interested in using unmanned aircraft, systems are drones, drone technology, to enhance our operations, to work safer, and provide better and more efficient service with within each area, respective areas responsibility. Each department has developed or is in the process of developing department specific policies and procedures to be followed in conjunction with an overarching city council policy that we're going to be talking about tonight in a little more detail? On April 9th of this year, city council had a study session to discuss the use of unmanned aircraft systems. At this session, council directed staff to develop an overarching city council policy. governing the responsible use of UAS by city department. Additionally, the council directed staff to conduct community, informational campaigns through in person, and online opportunities. The proposed city council policy, which was reviewed and accepted by the council policy and procedures committee on August 27th, addresses questions and concerns about government use of UAS technology, especially related to how privacy will be maintained, and how the collected data and evidence will be retained and used. The protection of individual civil rights and the reasonable expectation of privacy remain key components of any decision to deploy a UAS. This policy is aligned with the ACLU recommended guidelines on government use of drone technology, which prohibits the following. I'm gonna read this from the script directly, conducting any business other than official city business, conducting random or proactive surveillance activities, targeting a person based solely on individual characteristics, and placing any weapons on the UAS system. those are all prohibited. Additionally, the policy addresses concerns regarding data collection and retention, specifically, all the data that's retained as public record will be collected and stored in compliance with an approved digital evidence management system. Data will be maintained in accordance with the city's records retention schedule, or as required for criminal or civil proceedings. Any unauthorized use, duplication, publication, or distribution of UAS, videos, and images is prohibited, and release of any recordings shall be made in compliance with any relevant public records act laws. Additionally, requests for deletion of accidental recordings shall be completed in accordance with current department policy. It's very similar to our officer warn camera policies. Also at the April 9th study session, council directed staff to conduct community outreach to hear and address any questions and or concerns that they may have. Staff conducted a public online informational campaign, seeking concerns and questions from the community. We published and produced, sorry, and published a podcast with an FAA representative as a guest on that podcast. Posted a public service announcement, raising awareness of a community information session, which was scheduled for the evening of August 15th at the police department, and we successfully conducted that information session, which was also live casted for those that were not able to attend in person. We received minimal feedback questions and or concerns throughout all of our outreach efforts. Oops, I'm behind on the slides. I'm sorry. So, UAS in closing, UAS technology has quickly become an invaluable tool for municipal governments throughout the country as well as many of our neighboring cities. This proposed city council policy ensures that UAS technology that's utilized by the city is deployed responsibly, holding the privacy and civil rights of our community at the forefront. So based on that, we recommend that the council adopt the city council policy as written on the use of unmanned aircraft systems. Thank you.

[00:06:59] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Thank you. Are there any questions from council members? Council member Hicks.

[00:07:12] Councilmember Alison Hicks: So, Steph answered most of my questions, but there, I have a couple of follow-up questions basically. based on those answers. So, I asked the number of drones, if there were any, if departments had any estimates for how many they wanted to purchase over the next year or two. And the answer was, the police were planning to and fire one. And I was just wondering whether we had a short turnaround time, this time for council questions, whether there were any other departments looking into purchase, such as public works, for example, or any other departments.

[00:07:52] Public Works Director Mike Weller: Mike Weller, public works director, we're kind of following police's lead on this. I think at 1st we may borrow their pilots and drones, just to kind of get a sense of how we're going to deploy them. I know we're going to do roof inspections and gutter inspections and things. You can imagine this building, it's pretty challenging. get up there and look. And then within a fairly short period of time, we will likely be requesting the purchase of one, it may not be quite as sophisticated as theirs, but we're kind of just following their lead on it and taking it a little slower than there.

[00:08:25] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Thank you. My one last question is, one of the answers that staff gave was for facial redaction, they would use the requirements of the current Public Records Act, but I'm not familiar with that. What exactly does that require?

[00:08:44] Unknown Speaker: I can address that question. The public records, for privacy interest, does not spell out exact components, such as facial images. It just provides the public agency with a balancing test. where the public agency has to balance the privacy interest versus the interest in disclosure. So something like a personal identity would be very similar to, say, a social security number or a personal phone number where we would the redaction in this case would be to blur the identity of the person.

[00:09:22] Councilmember Alison Hicks: So does that mean that faces will be redacted?

[00:09:26] Unknown Speaker: Yes, I mean, it's really a case by case basis if there's a huge crowd, say, at a concert and the faces aren't distinguishable. We'd have to look at that, but if there's a, you know, close-up of a person maybe standing in front of his or her home, then the test changes, it's case by case basis.

[00:09:47] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Okay, thank you.

[00:09:49] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Council member Ramirez?

[00:09:51] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Thank you, Mayor. A couple of questions. So first, I asked the question about code enforcement. It strikes me as a, this could be a very useful technology in that context. And unless I'm totally mistaken, code enforcement is housed within the city attorney's office right now, right? So if the city attorney's office for code enforcement purposes wanted to use this technology, they'd have to draft their own department policy. But would we, would the council then need to amend this policy? in order to permit departments that are currently not listed to use the technology?

[00:10:35] Lieutenant Saul Jager: Yeah, I can answer that. No, any department, the idea behind the city council overarching policy was that any department that's interested in using it has to develop their own mission specific and department specific policy, following the guidelines from the city council policy.

[00:10:50] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Okay, so this is not a white list then. There are examples listed here from some departments, but any other department, even if it's not listed in the policy, could develop its own set of guidelines and policies and use the technology.

[00:11:08] Lieutenant Saul Jager: Yes.

[00:11:08] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Okay. Got it. Thank you. And then the question about the contractors and 3rd parties. So if a city department, um, Kota City Department authorize, uh, a contractor or some other 3rd party to use this technology to conduct city business.

[00:11:32] Lieutenant Saul Jager: So as far as I know, no, they would need to work as a separate entity, which means they're going to fall under the part 107 rules, just like a subcontractor would.

[00:11:43] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: So for city business, the technology can only be used by city employees.

[00:11:50] Lieutenant Saul Jager: Right. So the intention of the policy is for city employees using the technology. If an outside vendor is going to use it for aerial photography or something like that, they're going to have to carry their own licensed pilots and that falls under the commercial use of part 107.

[00:12:07] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Right. So, and then that, so, just because I think I may be missing the point, but if a city department say public works is working with a contractor, some other 3rd party to conduct city business, they wouldn't be, they couldn't authorize that contractor to use the technology. We would have to get public works staff, for instance, to use the technology for city business.

[00:12:30] Lieutenant Saul Jager: Right. As far as I understand it, yes.

[00:12:32] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Okay, thank you.

[00:12:36] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Any other questions from the council? You have questions? Okay, seeing then, we'll open it up for public input, so if there's anyone who wants to address the council on this item. If you could come up to the microphone here and be sure to fill out a speaker card either before or after you speak and leave it with the city clerk. And it looks like there's not a huge crowd tonight to do that. So you can have 3 minutes. And you can fill that out after.

[00:14:09] Alex Nuñez: Thanks a lot, Alex Nunez. Uh, so, uh, with the UAS policy. Definitely drones, you know, very new and exciting technology, a lot of good uses that we can deploy them for, the fire department, police department, public works department. They did a good job at the community outreach. When we went to the police department. I think there's a lot of legitimate uses for this drone technology. But, you know, obviously, there are a lot of concerns that residents have relating in particular to things like privacy and also the operational use for, you know, safe, and also for lack of better terms, not annoying use of drones, which can be noisy, sound like bees. Um, so there's a couple of, um, you know, policy concerns and, you know, they typically fall into 3 buckets. One is the operations and the use case. So, you know, when, why, who, where all those questions about how and where UAS systems can be deployed and what they can be used for. You know, in particular privacy, what protections are going to be given to citizens who don't want to get cut up inadvertently in some kind of surveillance dragnet, and information security and governance around, you know, protecting the data that is collected. I did have a chance to review the city council policy. I, you know, checked with a bunch of our neighbors and friends, and a few conclusions that we came up with, you know, or kind of came to after review, is that the current policy for operational controls is very broad and then restrictive, we'll get into Y, and for privacy safeguards. It's almost completely lacking in privacy safeguards. And the reason why is because part 107, which, as has been referenced is the rule that, you know, places restrictions and, you know, licensing requirements on this utilization of this technology, you know, they go over things like, you know, daylight operations, line of sight, um, you know, no weapons, things like that, operation over human beings. However, you know, that law or rule does go to great lengths to say that any of these provisions can be waived at any time, uh, after going through the appropriate waiver process. So as you can see, all of the, um, you know, restrictions, uh, basically can be waived. So the rule itself says, while we do restrict the use, we can actually let you waive all of them. So the proposed language in the current council policy, where it says all UAS operations will be conducted in accordance with current FAA rules. Well, all of those rules can be waived, and that just leaves department policy. So, you know, yeah. And as far as privacy goes. Again, part 107 goes to great lengths to say that this rule does not include privacy regulations. It says that the FAA's mission does not include regulating privacy, and, you know, when I looked at the council policy here, it says that training will be conducted according to the current FAA rules and regulations. So the civil liberties will be conducted according to the FAA rules and regulations, which the FAA says that it does not regulate privacy. So, yeah, what we are asking is that the council take this back to the community, kind of like a privacy visioning plan, so that the community can drive this.

[00:17:13] Alex Nuñez: Thank you.

[00:17:14] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Thank you. So anyone else who wishes to address the council on this topic? Okay, seeing none will close the public input portion. Are there any questions or comments from council members? Vice Mayor Abbe Coca?

[00:17:40] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Thank you, hey, actually, sorry you pressed the motion button, but I'll leave it on in case there's not too much comment. The CPPC, the council procedure, policy and procedures committee reviewed this policy. We did look at it as a council before. I think it's a good start. It's new and new technology is always take time to figure out, I'd say. So, you know, I think we should go ahead and move forward with this with, and there's always the room for changes if needed. So once we get this up and running and see how things go, if there's a need for any amendments, we can go ahead and do that. But, um, I think it's fine and I will be supporting the motion. Thank you.

[00:18:33] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Council member Hicks.

[00:18:36] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Um, so I see how this could be helpful to staff at the same time some members of the public have raised concerns to me, mostly regarding privacy, um, and the potential for mission creep. So, I would like to see a cap of some sort with a report back once that cap is reached, so that there wouldn't be, in particular, people have raised a concern of just really a large number of them, and so I would like some number at which we would automatically revisit this. Thank you.

[00:19:13] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Council member Ramirez?

[00:19:15] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Thank you. And thank you to the CPBC for taking a look at this and for staff for very quickly getting back to us on all the questions we submitted. I think the concern, so thank you for explaining the 3rd party issue in the event. So I trust city staff with the technology. I think I would be concerned if departments at some future date would have the ability to authorize non-city employees to use the technology to conduct city business if those contractors or 3rd parties were not also subject to the city's policies governing the use. And I, so it sound, if I understood, it sounds like right now, 3rd parties conducting city business would not be able to use the technology. So I'm comfortable with that. But if that does change, then I would like to see the policy come back to us just so we make sure that, you know, we I want those folks who are doing city business, whether or not they're employees to to adhere to our policies. And the other thing, just going back to the code enforcement thing, Um, I think that, so code enforcement, as I understand it, is almost entirely, it is private property, so we're going to be using this technology, presumably, in the event that the city attorney's office would like to use it, to take a look at the status of a given private property. And I think that's important enough to warrant inclusion explicitly in the policy. Or another way. So either to provide that as an example, because I think that's a big one. Or if the maker of the motion would be comfortable with this, maybe using this as the starting point and make it a white list, and then if other city departments discover a need for the technology, then it can come back to us and then we can authorize it. So if the city attorney's office said, yeah, this is actually really helpful for us when, you know, doing code enforcement work, you know, would you mind modifying the policy. So we can authorize that explicitly. So that would, those would be, um, 2 changes modifications that I would be interested in including if, I mean, I want to defer to the members of the CPBC, since you've looked at this more carefully than I have, but those were the 2 things that struck out. Thank you.

[00:21:52] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Thank you. Our city manager has.

[00:21:55] City Manager Dan Rich: Just to comment on both of those two things. First of all, on the second one in terms of code enforcement. Again, the policy is written, say these are examples, but are not limited too. So our understanding of the policy is any city department as long as they have their own. Having said that, you could certainly amend that sentence to be more explicit that other departments could be covered as well. I think I would recommend against having to come back to you every time a department wants to do something. Sometimes that might be time sensitive, and the whole point of having a citywide policy, is you're comfortable with the overall approach, and then each department has their own rules and operational guidelines. The 2nd point, I just want to clarify, there might have been a little bit of a misunderstanding. There may be situations where the city hires an outside company to do an inspection of a roof or something for us with a drone. In those cases, I think what Sergeant Jeager was saying is they would officially be covered under different rules, but we, as an organization, would still expect anyone doing work for us to follow the guidance of our policy.

[00:23:15] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Thank you. So, I just had a couple of comments. I am a member of the council policy procedure committee, and had the opportunity to ask quite a few questions there, and I felt like we had a good discussion. I just want to clarify that something we discussed there that sort of came up here. It's my understanding that, um, the part 107 rules. Um, the city cannot grant exceptions to those. You have to go back to the FAA, right?

[00:23:50] Unknown Speaker: Right. They're not something we can just say, oh, we don't want to follow that. We have to, unless they grant an exception.

[00:23:58] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Okay. Um, That's all I had. I will be supporting this. Um, I think the vice mayor is, uh,

[00:24:08] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Oh, yeah. I appreciate Council member Ramirez's suggestions. I'm actually comfortable with the way it is now. I think, again, we're starting this new program, and I would expect us to get some reports along the way of how things are going. And, you know, I guess I don't envision us having excessive drones out there right away. So, um, you know, I think as we, um, go administer the program, the longer we do and we get more data and, um, information as to how it's going, we could, you know, definitely revisit the policy if needed. But I think as it is right now, I feel comfortable with it. And I think it'll be a slow startup of the program rolling out. So with that, I will make a motion, and I believe I need to read. My motion is to adopt a resolution, adopting city council policy K23, use of unmanned aircraft systems.

[00:25:17] Mayor Lisa Matichak: So we have a motion by the vice mayor and a second by council member, McAllister. Council Ramirez, you had something?

[00:25:24] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: I don't want to belabor the point, but to the vice mayor's suggestion, if we could have a report back after some reasonable amount of time, on, I mean, I don't want to just like sort of make up on the fly what would be useful information, but I would be curious to know, if other departments begin using it. and sort of what the intended use. Um, Just, just because I, I, I mean, this is, I'm comfortable with this list. It's just, I feel like it would be hard to maintain some level of oversight if we're, you know, in a periodic report back once a year or something. We're not told, oh, you know, other departments are starting to use this technology and for this purpose. I think that it would be helpful for me just to get a sense of, of, you know, whether there's, I don't know if I mean, Mission Creep is one way of putting it, but that's not the intention here, but if it does become widespread across other departments not listed here, I would be, I'd appreciate that knowledge. Thank you.

[00:26:30] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Council member, Kamei.

[00:26:31] Councilmember Ellen Kamei: Great, thank you. So I think one of the things that I had mentioned when we first looked at this was taking a look at what the Santa Clara County had done with their surveillance technology and community safety ordinance, and I appreciated staff's community outreach, the public information campaign, both in person and online opportunities, the podcasts, social media, as well as the community informational session. I think that, um, extensive outreach was was done by staff, and I appreciate that. of that is outlined on page 8 of the staff report. And, um, also appreciate the consideration for the ACLU guidelines when, um, the ordinance I mentioned went forward to the county, the ACLU was heavily involved and gave a lot of input, and I think that that helps inform drone use policy going forward in other local jurisdictions. And I think that this policy actually does incorporate that. Um, I also support the um, idea of a report back. Just, I would just be interested in some sort of update. As Councilman Ramirez mentioned, I'm not prescriptive on what's included, but just would be kind of interested. So I'll be supporting the motion tonight. Thank you.

[00:27:42] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Council member Hicks.

[00:27:46] Councilmember Alison Hicks: So, I agree that, as you can tell, I'm a little hesitant about the policy, but I would be supporting it if it can include some sort of report back.

[00:27:57] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Vice Mayor Abbe Koka.

[00:27:58] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Thank you. So, um, in the interest of incorporate, I'd like to go ahead and incorporate in the motion a, um, report back in, let's say, a year's time. Is that enough time? Um, back to the council as to how the program is going. So if the 2nd or of the motion would agree to that amendment, I'd appreciate it.

[00:28:19] Mayor Lisa Matichak: I believe he did.

[00:28:21] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: And it can be a written report with statistics. I don't think it needs to be a council study session unless we get the report and then request a study session.

[00:28:29] Councilmember John McAlister: Sounds good. Yes.

[00:28:31] Unknown Speaker: Sounds good. Yes, written report? Yes.

[00:28:35] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Okay, so any other discussion on this? Okay, we'll call the question. That passes unanimously. Thank you very much. Thank you. Okay, up next is Item 8.1, which is Shoreline Boulevard, Transit Lane, and Utility Improvements, Projects 16 58. Project update and related items. And we will start with a staff presentation.

[00:29:45] Senior Civil Engineer Andy Chang: Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and council members. I'm Andy Chang, Senior Civil Engineer with Public Works. With me is Lisa Ao, principal civil engineer, as well as Mike Fuller, Public Works. I will give a presentation on an overview of Shoreline Boulevard Transit Lane and Utility Improvements Project 16 58. I will start with some background in context. This area of photo highlights the downtown transit center and the arterial leading into North Bay Shore. Anticipation of increased growth in North Bay Shore, 2 transportation studies were completed to plan for transportation infrastructure. The 1st study was done in 2013. It recommended, and the council approved a most shared target to decrease, single occupant vehicle use, and increased transit and active transportation for North Bay Shore. The second study in 2014 evaluated the Shoreline Corridor, and identified means for the last mile connection between North Bay Shore and the transit center. This light highlights a corridor study, and it's comprehensive program to implement a number of projects to improve mobility on shoreline corridor, for transit and active transportation, starting at the south. The city is currently working on a preliminary design of a new central expressway under crossing at the transit center, shown in Green on Sterling Road, and connecting through the 100 Moffat development, or new bike lanes. The interim phase of these bike lanes is currently in preliminary design. The stretch in blue between Montecito and Middlefield Road are protected by lanes, meaning that there is a raised buffer from adjacent traffic lane. This segment is in the early planning phase. The improvements between Middlefield Road and Pear Avenue are covered by the project we're presenting to you tonight. The improvements north of Pair Avenue, including the transit links extension to Space Parkway, will be constructed with a future Plymouthry Space Parkway realignment project. Now zoom into our project tonight. This diagram is an overview of our project limit on Shoreline. The project includes the transit lane between Middlefield Road and Pear Avenue, covering 5 intersections, with a total length of approximately 2 thirds of a mile. The project will also include pedestrian bicyclists, utility improvements, and additional turning links. We'll get into the detail of each one of these key design elements in the following slides. The transit lane on shoreline will serve both public and private bus shuttles. These photos are example of current and potential bus and shuttle operators that can use the transit lane. The current plan is to allow buses with 10 or more passenger capacity that is defined by California vehicle code section 233 to use the transit lane. This photo shows a dedicated transit lane in Sacramento and provides an example of what our transit laying on shoreline will look like. The lane will be 12 feet wide with 2 feet raised buffer on each side to separate the transit lane from all the vehicles. The lane opening in intersection will have red payment color with bus only markings to clearly distinguish it from general use lanes. Additionally, the land will also have transit signal and signage to direct bus traffic. This next flight shows the transit signage and signal mounted above the transit lane. The transit signals with direct bus drivers within the transit lane and inform general lane car drivers to keep out of the transit lane. This diagram shows the cross section of what shoreline a terra bella looks like. There are both median and curbside stops planned at Terabella and Pair Avenue along the transit corridor. This next slide is shown a plan view, as if you were looking down from above, at Shoreline and Terabella intersection. The area shaded in orange are the bus stops. There are two bus stops in the median that will serve buses, traveling within the transit lane. The curbside stop will serve buses traveling outside of the transit lane. This like is you... uh, our preliminary operation policy... for, as you will, for transit lane, for both us mentioned earlier, the lane will be serving both public and private buses with at least 10 passenger capacity. Transit may intern the next data transit lane at terminal points, at middle field road, and impaired avenue. The link will operate on weekdays. It will serve northbound from 6 AM to 2 PM, and between 2 to 3 PM, the link will be closed to clear our vehicles from the lane, to switch and switch direction of operation to southbound from 3 to 10 PM. And from 10 to 6 AM, the lanes again closed. The speed limit in the bus lane is the same as poster speed on shoreline is 35 miles per hour. Next, we'll get into our pedestrian and bicling improvement for the project. Our existing curb and sidewalk will be demolished, and the street will be widened with new sidewalks. The project will construct a protected intersection and middle field to enhance safety for both cyclists and pedestrians. Crosswalks within our, with shown in yellow within the 101 overpass will be enhanced to make pedestrians more visible to drivers for improved safety. The current bike lengths through our project limits are only 5 feet wide and without buffers. The project will construct protected by lanes with 2 feet raised buffer between Middlefield Road and Terabella, as shown in the solid green lines. The bike lane between Terabella and Pear will be improved to 6 feet wide, and enhanced with high visibility green bile lane markings at several locations. This slide shows the protected intersection at Middlefield Road. A protected intersection provides several benefits and increased safety for pedestrian and cyclists. It provides a physical protection for cyclists. Pedestrians waiting at the corners to cross the street. It reduces the crossing distance. as well as placing pedestrian cyclists ahead of vehicles. making them more visible to right turning vehicles. It provides also a dedicated bike crosswalk with a buffer distance from traffic lanes. The current water and Seward Mains on Shoreline Boulevard within our project limits were built in the late 50s and early 60s, for the utility improvements in a project, a new 16 inch water transmission main will be installed, as well as the existing sewer will be replaced by a larger 21 inch sewer main. The utility pipe installation and replacement will start at the middle field intersection and terminate before 101 overpass. These utility improvements are the initial work for a planned future project to install new and larger water and sewer pipes, crossing under 101 to provide increased service capability for anticipated growth in North Bay Shore. Another design alum in the project is the additional left turn lanes from both approaches on Middlefield Road to Shoreline Boulevard. This work is specified as a mitigation measure for the North Bay Shore precise plan and will be included and constructed by this project. This work will require demolishing portions of the middle field median and replaced by 2nd left turn lane to provide dual left turn pockets in each direction from middle field to Shoreline Boulevard. The 4th major design elements in our project is a dedicated right turn lane on Northbank Shoreline before Pear Avenue. Currently without this dedicated right turn lane, vehicles traveling Northbound Shoreline often have to wait and queue behind the right turning vehicles at Pear Avenue. With this additional lane, it ask capacity and remove the right turning vehicles from the through lengths, therefore improving the overall operation at the per intersection. Car turning right would have to yield to pedestrians and cyclists, proceeding north on Shoreline Boulevard. Because there's not, there's insufficient width on a 101 overpass to accommodate both the medium bus lane and the left turning lane. The last major design element in the project will eliminate the left turn pocket on northbound shoreline to Route 85. Vehicles coming from north of 101 will not be affected by this change and can still get to route 85 from shoreline 101 overpass. Vehicles coming from south of 101 will have to use Eastbound Middlefield Road to Northbound Moffi Boulevard to get to Route 85 is shown in this diagram. The reroute of these vehicles getting to 85 from Shoreline to Moffit necessitates the need to provide a longer left-term pocket at the Moffit at 85 on ramp. Construction of this work will be done by a separate project. This next slide shows the approximate locations of the 16 heritage trees propose to be removed. There are 12 heritage trees on shoreline, impacted by our street winding, 4 heritage trees on middle field impacted by the additional right left turn length. Excuse me. Staff presented these heritage trees, removal, and mitigation to the Parks and Recreation Commission in April in December of last year, and PRC recommends the council to approve the removal and mitigation of these 16 heritage trees. The replacement trees will be planted at various locations within our project limits. This next flight shows the additional right of way required for our project. These right away acquisition consists of up to 6 feet width loaned property frontage on 9 parcels. Staff has reached agreements with 6 property owners. The remaining properties are currently under the eminent domain proceeding with the court. Staff continues to attempt to reach agreement with these 3 property owners. But we anticipate obtaining court ordered order of possession by the end of the year. As part of the construction coordination effort, we will include these list of measures to minimize disruption. So there will be no length closure on shoreline in the P direction, as well as no length closures on any concert nights. If link closures are required, they're mostly taking place at night, and one traffic line will remain open in each direction. We will also make sure pedestrian and bicycles, bicyclists access as well as driveway access are maintained through our project corridor. Staff will notify and coordinate closely with residents and businesses to minimize inconvenience and disruption. This slide shows the various public outreach effort conducted throughout our project. We've had one community meeting, 2 transit operator meetings, as well as public noticing of all, project related council and commission meetings. We also had numerous individual meetings with residents and property owners about our project. With our project schedule and estimate are as follows, plans and specifications for our project are nearing completion. Staff is waiting for Cal Transpermit as well as PG&E completing their engineering plans to remove their utilities within our project limit. before staff can finalize our construction documents. And staff will come back and see council's approval of our plans and specifications later this fall. And upon counseled approval of tonight's item, staff will plan to remove trees for the project as fall to avoid bird nesting in the next spring. The overall construction is anticipated to start in early 2020 and finish by the end of 2021. The current estimated construction cost is at $12 million. And in conclusion of this presentation, staff recommends the council to approve the removal and mitigation for 16 heritage trees and replacement at 2 to one ratio with 24 inch box trees, as well as to amend Mark Thomas and company's contract to design the improvements in Moffit and 85 on ramp. Thank you. Staff is available for questions.

[00:43:40] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Thank you. Are there any questions from council members? Council member Clark?

[00:43:46] Councilmember Chris Clark: Thank you for the presentation. I had... just saying a couple short questions. The, um, the, um, the nighttime construction periods. Does that include the water and sewer main work too, or just the lane construction, or the bus lane construction?

[00:44:03] Staff Presenter: It includes the utility work. And utility work will only be constructed at night.

[00:44:08] Councilmember Chris Clark: Okay. Related to the utilities and the timeline. I know PG&E has created numerous delays on other large projects. Are we at the phase where we're sort of confident that they won't create, like, a year-long delay or something like that or not yet?

[00:44:29] Public Works Director Fuller: Actually, my Fuller Public Works striker. That's part of the reason we're not approving plans and specs tonight. actually. That's one of the things we've been a little nervous about, particularly after McKelvie, there was a substantial delay there. PG&E's work here is significant. And they have been working with us closely on designing their improvements. I don't know of any particular red flags with them delaying us, but we do need to carefully write our construction documents so that if there is a delay, assuming it's not substantial. We don't open ourselves up to significant claims from our contractor. And also, I'd like a little more assurance that, um, barring some significant disaster, They are going to be out there when they say they're going to be out there. We're planning to, um, have a kind of a higher level meeting with them than we have been at the project level. And I'm going to try and get a little more comfort about that before we approve plans and specs. No guarantees, but we're going to do all we can to mitigate that.

[00:45:34] Councilmember Chris Clark: Okay. And then the diagram on slide 16 with the Route 85 Access. So I just want, but for our sake and the general public's sake, because the 1st thing that everyone screams at me about with this is that they think that if you're coming out of North Bay Shore, you will no longer be able to get on 85 there. And that's not the case. They will still be able to get on 85. It's just if you are going northbound like you're going into North Bay Shore, you won't be able to make that weird left turn movement. You'll still be able to get on one on one, just not 85 there.

[00:46:03] Staff Presenter: That's correct.

[00:46:04] Councilmember Chris Clark: Okay. And then the last thing is, if we hopefully this won't happen, but if we do end up with issues initially with unauthorized vehicles in the bus lane, I assume we could do something like, you know, Stanford has like pneumatic bollards and things like that, that vehicles can trigger,

[00:46:26] Public Works Director Fuller: I don't think we'd want to start with that, but there are, I think, things like that that we could do if it ends up being an issue other than just writing tickets. Yes, we've talked about a relatively low barrier to start with, so a bus could drive over it, but a Prius would get hung up on it, and then we could do something more sophisticated than that. So I think I think we're going to play it by year. Fortunately, it's straight. Visibility is good. It's a well-lit street. So it's not, I mean, the hazards are relatively low, but we will be keeping a very close eye on it. There are probably a lot of operational adjustments. We will make, you know, as we move along like that, but we will look at options if we need to. And actually, that's part of the reason we left a gap between the northbound and the southbound, so there's no immediate transfer and so on. So we can certainly make operational adjustments if we do have any issues.

[00:47:16] Councilmember Chris Clark: Yeah, I guess you're right. There are things short of pneumatic ballers. those giant bubbles in Texas that prevent people from...

[00:47:23] Public Works Director Fuller: Yeah, mountable barriers. There's a lot of things we could probably look at. It's not a terribly common thing, but there are some similar improvements out there.

[00:47:31] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Thank you. Council member McAllister.

[00:47:37] Councilmember John McAlister: Concerning the transit lane operations. How is concerts gonna be able, will concerts be able to use this middle lane, or will it be closed, and how has that been considered?

[00:47:48] Staff Presenter: So we've had the preliminary discussion with PD, as far as utilizing our transit lay in the future. We haven't had the opportunity to approach the live nation, or there are subcontractors who's performing the traffic, um, um, traffic control during cultural nights. And it's a discussion that will take place. So, and that's where we are today, but it's a discussion that will take place to be able to know what the full extent of our busing operation is in terms of supporting concerts.

[00:48:26] Councilmember John McAlister: Then also, when you did your slide 12 and 11, was there any consideration of incorporating that with our new pedestrian bridge? When you were doing the protective lines there and so forth. So are you planning to put a route in there? How's that going to work out?

[00:48:46] Staff Presenter: So would this project, our protected by length starts at middle field, and it ends at Terabella, with the new pedestrian and bike overcrossing, it will pick up, it will pick up at Terabella, takes those protected by length, take them off the street, and onto the future, a bike and pet bridge.

[00:49:08] Councilmember John McAlister: So is that future on the bridge or the new bridge?

[00:49:12] Public Works Director Fuller: It's a future, future, future bridge over 101.

[00:49:16] Councilmember John McAlister: Okay. Okay. Okay. And then the... The size of the utility main, so forth. Do they continue that the new size south of middle field, or is that something that will also be incorporated as time comes along, upgraded?

[00:49:41] Staff Presenter: Can you repeat that question again?

[00:49:42] Councilmember John McAlister: On slide 13, you have these new water mains and sewer main. On the south side of Middlefield. Are they teeing up to the same size, or will those eventually also have to be upgraded too?

[00:49:58] Staff Presenter: The sewer, actually, the sewer main gets larger here north of middle field, so the sewer mains are coming east and west, middle field and northward on shoreline. So they're not getting larger south of Middlefield. It's just getting larger north of Middlefield to collect the other 3 sewer mains coming to this intersection. And the water main is also not expanding in size for the same reason.

[00:50:25] Councilmember John McAlister: On the right of way acquisition. About three or four years ago, we had an estimated cost, around $33 million, for right of acquisition. Are these acquisitions costs within line of that budget that was proposed back then?

[00:50:43] Public Works Director Fuller: The right away acquisition for this project?

[00:50:46] Councilmember John McAlister: Well, yeah, 'cause the shoreline that we were talking about then going over to get the bike lanes and so forth was part... Does our real property program administration administrator have a rough estimate of the right away cost?

[00:51:00] Public Works Director Fuller: It's nowhere near that, actually, for this project. I think you may be including the Plymouth Space Pro.

[00:51:06] Councilmember John McAlister: Yeah, the total was 33 million. I was just wondering, are these in the in line with the projected budget?

[00:51:13] Public Works Director Fuller: Yes, I believe they are.

[00:51:15] Real Property Program Administrator Dennis Drennan: Dennis, Drennan, real property program administrator, council approved a project, appropriated funding for the acquisition, and we're well under that appropriated amount in our acquisitions, even with eminent domain. We expect to be well within budget.

[00:51:33] Councilmember John McAlister: Okay, and that would include the properties on the north side of 101, also?

[00:51:38] Real Property Program Administrator Dennis Drennan: No, at this point, we don't have any project approved for north of 101. Everything we're acquiring right now is just between Metal Field and 101. And then we've acquired the right away for Plymouth Space Park. And I think that's a separate project. And I think the one, the one project where we might have higher than estimated costs, I'm not sure yet, is the VTA bus yard for the offer emperor alignment. still working with VTA on that. We are stranding a piece of property, and I will be coming back to council with that. I think that is the one that we may or may not be within our original estimate on that one.

[00:52:18] Councilmember John McAlister: And the last question was, you had in here estimated cost of 12 million, and you have, is the correct, uh, saying that you have total funding for 13 million, so the thing will be fully funded project, or is that supposed to be the cost on page 13. It says total funding of 13 million, but a project cost of 12.

[00:52:38] Staff Presenter: So that is correct. Our current estimated construction cost is $12 million in our construction project funding is at $13 million.

[00:52:47] Councilmember John McAlister: Okay, thank you.

[00:52:49] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Vice mayor Obikoga?

[00:52:50] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Thank you, just a couple of questions. Um, regarding the operation hours, uh, 6 a.m. to 2 a.m. PM, 5 3 p.m. to 10 p.m. North on South Island. Um, I guess it seems long. Is there a reason for that amount of time? Is it really congested until 2 o'clock?

[00:53:16] Public Works Director Fuller: So the reality of, is it really congested northbound at 2 p.m.? Yes. We don't believe so, but I think, given that we have the capability of using this lane, our current operation policy is use it, maximize it's used for buses. But as you know, that we are not opening it in the middle of the night knowing that there will be no congestion at all. So that's our current operation policy and it can evolve over time. It's need and warrants.

[00:53:48] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: How will you decide, um, when uh, changes need to be made, there are many questions and counsel questions about HOV, using it as an HOV, and, um, I mean, I think way down the road, I was thinking this would be like a potential for AVs and, um, maybe in our AGT, but how will you determine when we need to make some operational changes?

[00:54:13] Public Works Director Fuller: Well, we're, um, as you know, closely monitoring the vehicle trips in and out of the North Bay Shore. We're closely monitoring the mode splits. And I think that'll be a very important piece of data. And we're also working on automated guideway transit and part of that is a conversation about dedicated lanes. Right now we're working on grades separated, but, you know, some automated vehicle technology may come out of that. So we're keeping an eye on this from several different standpoints, and I think any significant change would evolve as council discusses those different items. I don't think anything's going to, you know, pop out and surprise us because we are looking at this from from several different standpoints. And we would certainly come to council, obviously, if we're proposing any kind of fundamental change and justify that and have a conversation about that.

[00:55:13] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: And then are there future plans to extend it to this as a to El Caminos on Shoreline?

[00:55:22] Public Works Director Fuller: No, there are no current plans to do that. The Shoreline Corridor study ended it here so that you could pick up traffic off of Middlefield Road. Another reason to pick it up here was there was a two-way left turn lane, so there was no, um, landscape median to pull out, at least not between Terobella and Middlefield, um, to look at extending it south. We'd have to do a study, to look at the right away constraints, and other impacts, and then we would have to pull up. the landscape medium. We could do that in the future. But we haven't done that yet. So we have to look at what bus service will be along El Camino in the future.

[00:56:05] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Yeah. And then the other question was, I was trying to remember a long time ago, the galaxy, far, far away. protected cycle track. So where are we on this, the cycle track? And I remember some, maybe it was just me, but some part of the cycle track being on one side, is that still happening? directions, yeah.

[00:56:29] Public Works Director Fuller: Yes, one side, both directions instead of on both sides. Yeah, the cycle tracks, I think all the cycle tracks we have planned or within North Bay Shore itself.

[00:56:42] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: What about the one from the transit center going down Sterling up shoreline?

[00:56:48] Public Works Director Fuller: That is bike lanes on Sterling. We have a brief, um...

[00:56:53] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: I have this recollection of a cycle track from the transit center to North Bay Shore going, yeah, through Sterling, upshoreline, and then the bridge to Terabella and over. And this was back in 2013 or 14 maybe. So they have changed, but.

[00:57:10] Public Works Director Fuller: Well, there is a bit of a cycle track through the 100 Moffatt development where we close the Steerlin on ramp.

[00:57:15] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Okay.

[00:57:16] City Staff: Then we get onto Steerland, and I think the current plan is to remove parking on one side to make room for bike lanes.

[00:57:24] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Got it.

[00:57:24] City Staff: And to do anything more than that would require taking more parking, moving curbs and some other things. It's also a fairly low volume street. So we thought bike lanes would be sufficient there. And then north of there it is protected bike lanes. As you see here. cycle track, too. You know, there's a bit of a gap between Montecito and middle field. We have projects north and south of there, and I think it's in the five-year CIP, but I don't think there were any dedicated cycle tracks south of 101 on shoreline, except for, you know, briefly through 100 Moffatt. Then there's going to be the underpass under central and the tracks and so on. But nothing along the roadway itself.

[00:58:02] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: I just recall it going upshoreline, and then crossing middle field, onto middle field, and Terabella over the bridge.

[00:58:10] City Staff: They do the, um, we do have 2 way on the west side of Shoreline at Terabella. So there you cross and we have 2 way bike traffic to get over the bridge.

[00:58:25] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Okay.

[00:58:26] City Staff: And then it drops down on the other side of shoreline at the gateway site and that is 2 way as well. So there is a short section, but it's Terabella North.

[00:58:34] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Okay. I had pictured that being the entire route would be a cycle track.

[00:58:39] Public Works Director Fuller: No.

[00:58:40] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Can that happen or is it just that we don't have enough right away to make that happen?

[00:58:44] City Staff: Um, we would have to do a lot more right away than we're doing now, more tree impacts. It would be a significant impact, which is why we wound up with a protected, protected bike lane.

[00:58:57] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Okay. Thank you.

[00:58:59] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Council member Hicks.

[00:59:02] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Council member, well, I have two questions, council member, at Bekoga touched on one, so I can make it more brief. Um, the, uh, most number of questions I got from the public were on, um, observations that there were maybe not a lot of buses going on shoreline right now. and whether there was adaptability in the future. And I actually, I asked both staff and had a brief conversation with, um, representatives from Google, and they said that they would, they would have, when Caltrane was electrified, and the lane was in, they did anticipate, um, more, uh, employees using that route, as it was faster, and that they had been talking to public works about that. So, if that and other ways that they might adapt their current buses and, you know, other transportation enabling things like paying for Caltrans. But if you, since that was the major thing people ask me, I don't know if you have any additional comments on adaptability in the future.

[01:00:11] City Staff: Yeah, there are a relatively limited number of buses that travel the entire corridor. I think, what is that number? Andy? What we have currently at 16 in the morning? That was only during the peak one hour period. And that's the number of buses traveling the entire corridor from end to end. And 16 may not sound like a lot, but if you've got 25 people in them, it's 400 people and that translates into a lot of cars. So it's still moving a lot of people. And I think what we envision is, as we build infrastructure like this, then as we extend it to, um, to space park, um, as we make improvements at the downtown transit center, to encourage more shuttles, as Caltrain service improves, then the companies will adapt to the infrastructure they have, um, available to them and that number will rise.

[01:01:06] Councilmember Alison Hicks: That does confirm what they told me. Thank you. The 2nd question is that I'm wondering, because there's going to be, you know, a good amount of disruption in the neighborhood and more pavement, whether we can do better than the 2 to one tree replacement ratio. I think that more trees could really be an asset to that corridor and to the neighborhood. And I'm wondering whether there's a way of fitting Lorian.

[01:01:32] City Staff: Currently, based on the constraint on our project footprint, there's very limited space available to plant trees already. We're taking available spaces on the outside, in the median, north of 101, mostly in front of computer history museum, as you know, there's much wider planting areas. South of 101. We're already confronted with very limited footprints to build our project. So we are maximizing our available spaces. But if it is a desire of the council to do more replacement ratio. We potentially can work with community services to identify areas of our project site, to plant trees.

[01:02:18] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Yeah, I would really appreciate that. Two to one is a round number, which makes me wonder, you know, if there aren't, if there aren't places where a few more could be placed. So thank you for that answer.

[01:02:32] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Any other questions from council members?

[01:02:35] Unknown Speaker: So I had the opportunity to meet with staff last week, and I appreciated that meeting. Um, I had lots of questions, um, questions that folks, uh, who live here and ask me, and I feel like I got a much better, um, appreciation for everything that has gone into planning this. I was not on the council when this all came about, and so it was good for me to hear all that firsthand from the folks who've been working on this for years. And I do feel much more comfortable with it. I just have a couple more questions left. And I was wondering, in the modeling, we did, did we look at preempt, did we model preemptive signaling for the buses?

[01:03:20] City Staff: We do have pre-ented modeling. But that is not a model where we build our project around because we do know that with the preemptive signaling, it would really disrupt the intersection signals for other modes of travels. But we do have preemptive modeling in our project.

[01:03:43] Unknown Speaker: Okay. And then, I think somebody sent in this question, but I didn't get to read the answer. Do we expect any of the buses that currently use Ringdorf or San Antonio to perhaps switch and use shoreline instead because of the bus lane?

[01:04:05] City Staff: To my knowledge, if those are buses that are, um, part of the Google buses that are utilizing Rensdorf and, um, San Antonio, um, they potentially, um, will have shift their traffic operations, uh, based on our available infrastructure, um, but as far as firm numbers, uh, staff doesn't have any uh, available information, but we do have, in our outreach, speaking to various transit operators and they're supportive for the

[01:04:33] City Staff: And then I think there's a correlation between having a reliable bus service that doesn't really delay then and with increased ridership. And with increased ridership, obviously there will be more services.

[01:04:49] Unknown Speaker: Right. Okay. Thank you.

[01:04:52] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Any other questions? Okay, well, open this up for public comment. So if there's any members of the audience who wish to address the council on this topic. Um, please, you know, the 1st one come up to the microphone. Be sure to fill out a blue card and leave it with our city clerk either before or after you speak. And if it's been a while since you've been here, we have at the end of the 3 minutes a chime.

[01:05:17] Ken Kirschner: My name's Ken Kirschner. I'm with a Mountain View Silicon Valley Bite Coalition team. And I want to compliment the staff on the design for protected bike lanes, and it seems like you guys have done an excellent job here. I had a couple of questions about expanding this effort to protected lanes on Terabella and pair, and whether that was a consideration. And, um, 2nd question is whether a larger bike network that would extend into the southbound commute shed for employees that live nearby, um, and whether that could be provided as a safe route to work for the North Shore, North Bay Shore employee base. Thank you.

[01:06:07] Mayor Lisa Matichak: So we, um, yeah, thanks. Next, please.

[01:06:15] Karen Moore: Council members and staff. It's been a while since I've been here. A lot of new faces. My name is Karen Moore. I'm one of the small business owners in the North Bay Shore. We have a Pilates and physical therapy studio. Um, I'm really hopeful about this project because traffic continues to be a real danger to and threat to our business. And I also have some real concerns. And in particular, I'm looking at the staff report and on page 12. There's something that's I just would love some clarification on it. It says 2 lanes on Shoreline Boulevard will remain open and accessible to traffic in the peak direction. Um, So my question is, will the outbound lanes also be 2 lanes? Are we talking 4 lanes total or 2 because if there is any small little glitch in the system, the gridlock that happens in North Bay Shore is incredible. And we lose clients, they turn around, they can't they can't make their sessions. So I'll just ask my questions and if you could clarify that. And so the idea is, will all construction happen in the evening because there is definitely traffic throughout the day. The commuting hours are not sort of that small window and people are coming in and leaving. So if something goes down to a one lane, it will impact the outbound lanes as well. With that said, I just want to make a comment that the light synchronization on shoreline could be improved. There are sometimes where it's just gridlock because things are backed up from further down shoreline, and if they could, there could be a smoother system of making sure that the greens move people along. Otherwise, the off-ramp is just backed up onto highway one. Highway 101. Um, and I guess those are my key questions is just that during construction, our businesses aren't going to be so really impacted. So thank you.

[01:08:19] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Before you leave, council member, McAllister has a question.

[01:08:23] Councilmember John McAlister: Have a question for you.

[01:08:26] Karen Moore: Hello.

[01:08:27] Councilmember John McAlister: Hey, so, with the construction of Charles Finis and other projects before, we've asked if the business owners had an opportunity to get updates on the construction. You would recommended that, that has anybody followed up and given you any kind of construction, impacts that affect...

[01:08:47] Karen Moore: You know, I haven't. That was my other question of, I know that you outreach to the property owners, but we're the businesses that are renting. And so I actually haven't. I've signed up for any alert that comes out of the city of Mountain View just so I can try to stay on top of it, but the reality is, I haven't heard about this project for a couple years, I think, since I last came out here. So, um, So yeah, I better outreach would be helpful.

[01:09:13] Councilmember John McAlister: Are you also getting updates on the concerts because that also affects.

[01:09:17] Karen Moore: Yes, thank you. And that has been better. But still, we cancel. We close our business a lot, especially the popular concerts. We just had to, in advance shutdown, but I do think that this last concert season was much better than the previous ones. So, and yes, we do get all the updates.

[01:09:37] Councilmember John McAlister: That's great. And when Google has their conferences or updates, that shoreline, do they impact the businesses or do you get updates also on those?

[01:09:47] Karen Moore: We do get updates, and yes, they do impact the business.

[01:09:51] Councilmember John McAlister: Thank you.

[01:09:52] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Thank you. Thank you. Thanks, please.

[01:09:59] Max Beckmanhorned: Hello? My name is Max Beckmanhorned, I'm a Mountain View resident. I'd like to say that I am speaking as a private citizen. I am not speaking on behalf of the league. Um, I am an employee of Microsoft, and for years, when Microsoft was up in North Bayshire. I took, I took a shuttle to and from the Mountain View Transit Center, both private shuttles, that Microsoft ran, as well as the MV Go shuttle, once it once it became available. So I think the one comment in general. Most of this looks really great to me. I really appreciate having the transit link. Um, the, the one comment I wanted to make was that, again, on concert days, because specifically the mountain, the Caltrain shuttle runs on a loop, that they drop people off the Caltrain shuttle and then have to go back north to, um, to get back into North Bay Shore, that those were always the days we would have a very disrupted schedule, um, with, you know, many fewer pickups because it took the buses so long to get back north. into North Bay Shore to collect us, that the way out was actually very easy, but the way back up, they were caught in the same concert traffic. So I'd suggest, as we sort of update the preliminary rules of operation, that on concert days, we actually keep the lane northbound the whole day for on concert days so that to sort of optimize that time better. Thank you. Thank you.

[01:11:28] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Next, please.

[01:11:31] Joel Dane: I'm Joel Dane, I'm a representative of the shadows apartments at Shoreline and Middlefield. I have some concerns on the council report. It says on page three that the average time savings, and the northbound PM Peak, be four and a half minutes, or one and a half minutes net depending on how you read this stuff. And in the evening peak, the average time savings are less than one minute. That means what it says. It sounds like the project will not convince anybody to shift from SOV to transit. I have another question on the, uh... far soy bust lanes... bus stops at Terabella. The council report says the existing curbside bus stops will remain in use, but the, uh, design shot on the diagram, those have been eliminated and replaced with curbside bus stops, which will maximize disruption by blocking cross traffic. That's for the Dutch intersection at Middlefield and Shoreline, I expect this to be a killer... because they will be blocking the, uh... bike there, the bike, and people making right turns will no longer be able to use the bike lane to do it. And, uh, people here are used to right on red, and they're not used to queuing up to wait for a green light to make a right turn. And the opportunity is there for them to bypass, the traffic light, by cutting through the Arco gas station. which they do in great numbers. And without even bothering to slow down sometimes. Some boys guy is gonna figure out that they can cut through the shadows parking lot to bypass the traffic light. And if the cue gets too long, it'll extend back to San Pierre, and instead of making the right turn at shoreline, they'll make it on to San Pierre and cut through residential streets. That's bad, traffic engineering. I frankly don't understand why they have this dedicated right turn lane at Pear Avenue, because people turning right at Pear, can make a right unread, and they're not getting in the way of anybody else. Thank you.

[01:14:39] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Is there anyone else who wishes to address the council on this topic? Okay, seeing none, we'll close the public input portion, and, um, Are there any additional questions or comments from council members? Vice Mayor, Albaykoga?

[01:14:56] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Thank you. Um, some of our members of the poke had questions, I, sorry, I can't remember them all, but staff remember, so could we get... Oh. Do you want to open up reopen? Do we open up public comment again?

[01:15:14] City Attorney Krishan Chopra: Uh, yes, it's the mayor's discretion. if you'd like to.

[01:15:19] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Sure. So you have three minutes? Be sure to fill out a card. Thanks. Could you speak into the microphone?

[01:15:29] Public Speaker: So, I live in, I'm a private resident, and I live in Sterling Estate, um, neighborhood by Terabella, and I share this with a few, at least, you know, not maybe not the majority, but definitely the people that we talk, that the neighbors that live in that Sterling Estate neighborhood, uh, we're not in favor so much of the, this project, and specifically, we are using that Terabella shorelined intersection. So, that affects us with the closure of the 85. And, I mean, one of the benefits living next to a highway is having a quick access to a highway. So, losing that and going all the way on middle field, the way it is already difficult to get out from the neighborhood, the U-turn, go all the way to Moffat, and have that left to Moffat, is not ideal already. So, that's number one. So there is definitely traffic time in the morning, 100%. And by the time, uh, later in the day, even 10, after, what, maybe 11, maybe sooner, but there's zero traffic, so having that raised bus line, and not be able to use, whatever is available right now, the way it is right now, it's, it's not great. So we are helping maybe one thing, and not helping something else, and making it worse for the future, I think. Um, yes, I think, I think that's it. I'm nervous. Thank you.

[01:17:13] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Okay, well, close public and put it in.

[01:17:17] Unknown Speaker: Um, so, uh, the vice mayor was asking about some of the questions, so some of them were, um, a clarification, on, uh, construction, uh, and number of lanes.

[01:17:28] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Yes.

[01:17:28] City Staff: Yeah, the 2 lanes, and then, I believe, from the bike coalition. It was about more protected bike lanes, southbound, from the intersections, Terabella and Middle... Oh, pair. Okay.

[01:17:45] Unknown Speaker: Yes, so to clarify, knowing the progressive, back up on shoreline, northbound in the morning, um, and southbound in the afternoon, uh, where the report says that 2 main 2 lanes will remain open and accessible to traffic in the peak direction. It really is meant to say that during the peak direction. There's no lane closed. I think the report was written considering south of when the 2 length was referenced, it was referenced, there are 2 lengths south of 101. So when we have to maintain 2 lanes open in the peak direction, it's equated to no length closures. in the peak direction throughout the day.

[01:18:27] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Okay, great. Construction hours are evenings only. Is that correct? Is there opportunity to be able to, for example, in the morning, if there's a limited opportunity to work in the southbound direction where there's very light traffic, and it is necessary to take one lane,

[01:18:49] Unknown Speaker: that could be a scenario where a contractor might approach the city, and then our city will determine the feasibility of allowing them to close lanes in the off peak direction.

[01:19:02] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Got it. Okay, great. And then protected bike lane. I'm sorry, intersections that pair and middlefield? Terabella. sorry.

[01:19:12] Unknown Speaker: So, I think, as we have previously described, this particular project will construct protected bike lane between Middlefield to Terabella, and the future 101 pedant bike overcrossing will basically pick up the protected bike lane at Terabella, and take them over the 101 over on the new bridge and land them at Pear Avenue.

[01:19:36] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Great. Great. Thank you. So, just some comments. Other than that, thank you to staff for working on this. I guess, yeah, as my questions earlier, I recall this has been an ongoing project for some time. Um, I guess I look at this as, um, you know, a project for the future as well. So, um, I know that we've received concerns about the number of buses and, you know, in relation to single occupancy vehicles using mainly Shoreline Boulevard, but, um, This is really looking to the future and the hope of having more, um, folks use transit by making transit, more convenient. So, you know, the mindset. And I, you know, I totally get it and I'm trying to be more conscious of myself about using alternative modes of transportation, but it's been, you know, until now, so easy to get in the car and drive wherever. And with congestion, it's become more challenging. But, and I remember from my VTA days when we looked at this part of the idea of trying to change the make a, you know, a mind shift to getting folks to consider transit was to make it easier for transit, to move, to use transit, to ride transit, to get to where you want to go, on transit. And, you know, 4 minutes, one minute, 4 minutes doesn't seem like a lot. But I remember studies back in the day, and this was mostly about with light rail, but even that one or 2 minutes really made a difference for to get people to think about using transit. And so, I look at this as one of those projects. You know, I look forward to. I mean, my hope is that down on the road, we do have a robust transit system. I know we're studying the shuttle, our community shuttle, and how we can maybe consolidate with all the other shuttles. I mean, my dream or my vision is to have one shuttle system in the city that goes everywhere, um, in the Mountain View, Mountain View is not very big. within, you know, 10 minute headways I'd be happy with. And if perhaps if that were to happen, then people would really get out of their cars and use this system. So to me, this is one part, you know, creating infrastructure to hopefully enable something like that to happen down the road. So that and definitely, you know, we want to encourage more folks to bike. Um, yeah, not quite, hoping maybe down the road, we'll get that cycle track, but, um, protected by planes are very, um, are important. So for those reasons, I will be supporting this. Although I guess where today we're just approving the amendment to the contract and the heritage trees. And I would say yes to the 56 folks using the 85 ramp from, which, frankly, I had no idea we had that. I usually get a middle field in Moffat. So, um, you know, um, but we do have other options and in the big picture, I hope that we can move towards a more transit friendly community.

[01:23:05] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Thanks. Council member McAllister.

[01:23:10] Councilmember John McAlister: I was so glad to hear the Vice Mayor was glad to invest in new technology along this particular route. That was refreshing. Thank you, Vice Mayor. The question, I had one question that was a follow up on the table on the council questions. On the table 7, table one. Were you able to break out under transit? I gather you're referring most of that transit as corporate shuttles. Were you able to break out public transit on that table?

[01:23:45] Unknown Speaker: These are data gated from our planners when they did the gateway studies, monitoring, to my knowledge. I don't have those breakdown of whether it's public or private or which code or these trends that are coming in. These are overall number for the North Bay shore split.

[01:24:03] Councilmember John McAlister: Okay, because I remember it's like, at one time it was around 2% was our, or less for VTA coming through there.

[01:24:09] Unknown Speaker: Yeah, council member McAllister. We actually do have that data. I apologize, Martin Elkire from Community Development, pulled that out and forwarded it to me, and there it sat. So, um, actually, I'll uh, I'll send you that information tomorrow, if you'll permit, apologize for that.

[01:24:23] Councilmember John McAlister: Okay, I just want to confirm that it was pretty much what it was. So, you know, we did start this in 2013. And there were some good points by Joel and Albert and William about Terabella wasn't really on the table for development. So as we morphed this project together, Are we looking at the increased density that's going to be off of Terabella on either side and how that would affect this particular transit lane? Was that incorporated?

[01:24:53] Unknown Speaker: I actually was approached by the developers who are working on the residential development at the shoreline and Terabella corner of that development. I think they're excited about this project, and I do believe that they have planned to heavily use our as it becomes available.

[01:25:17] Councilmember John McAlister: Well, that's one project, but I mean, there's been quite a few that have been coming up to us. So I was just wondering, had that been, are you planning for the numbers you're using or for the EIR or preliminary one? Was that was back in 2013 and a half, we updated to the potential development of the Terabella area?

[01:25:36] Unknown Speaker: No, we didn't do any reanalysis of, you know, the actual like design of the transit lane because of the land use changes in Terabella, the environmental document for this. I believe was the North Basial Precise Plan environmental document. I think we recognize, though, that as redevelopment occurs around it, and there are other opportunities to use the lane, we will adapt to that. But there are a lot of moving targets. right now with land use changes and developments, and we haven't stopped and, you know, stopped design of a project like this necessarily, and continue to have the design evolved. But I think the operation of it, we can certainly be flexible and accommodate additional uses as land use changes occur.

[01:26:31] Councilmember John McAlister: Our study of the HET. potentially replace that you know, right of way?

[01:26:38] Unknown Speaker: Yeah, I think there are two scenarios there. One, one of the things we talked about was using this corridor for some kind of an elevated system, which could go over the top of it, and you could have basically a 2 level system, bidirectional, you know, different opportunities there. I think another opportunity is if automated vehicle technology gets to the point where they could occupy this lane. We still have some at great intersections, so we'd have to, the technology would have to be able to deal with that. But I think there's an automated vehicle scenario in the lane as well. So, um, we've always seen this as a corridor that will adapt to technology. And right now the technology is, we have a lot of shuttles stuck in traffic.

[01:27:24] Councilmember John McAlister: So when you were thinking about autonomous vehicles. Were you talking autonomous buses?

[01:27:28] Unknown Speaker: Oh, potentially, yeah.

[01:27:29] Councilmember John McAlister: Okay, versus a single autonomous V?

[01:27:32] Unknown Speaker: Yeah, no, I think we want to move a lot of people in as few vehicles as possible in a lane like this. And so, yeah, I would envision buses. We're not there yet, obviously, but again, we can adapt the corridor.

[01:27:44] Councilmember John McAlister: Okay, and so I did get, we all got some letters from uh, Constantial Lake Jules over. So we'll have time to maybe digest a lot of his questions and would those possibly be used in future modification or tweaks of this particular project or just be able to answer his questions.

[01:28:03] Unknown Speaker: I'd be happy to answer additional questions. I think...

[01:28:07] Councilmember John McAlister: Oh, no, not tonight, but just off.

[01:28:09] Unknown Speaker: Yeah, I think in terms of this project, our next step is to come back with plans and specs. But I think in the future as we adapt the uses of this lane, that'll certainly be a robust public conversation.

[01:28:22] Councilmember John McAlister: Yeah, I echo the vice mayor's comments that we are building for the future. And yes, in the near time, this could be somewhat inconvenient for some of our residents, but we do need to acquire right away. We're doing that pretty much with VTA that we're looking at, right of ways, so important to get our transit system, our public transit, so that people can get on it, move quickly, and take advantage of what we have out there and reduce congestion. So I look forward to those too.

[01:28:54] Mayor Lisa Matichak: I have a follow up question, but you continued on. So I guess I'll ask it separately. Council member Ramirez.

[01:29:02] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Thank you. First, so thank you again for responding to the large number of questions that we submitted. And I understand you also met with a couple of residents who are concerned about this. So thank you very much for taking the time to respond to their concerns. I have a couple of questions based on some of the operational questions that have come up. So if, for instance, as the response to one of the written questions indicates, if the conditions warrant, let's say there isn't as much demand, you know, bust usage of the lane as we anticipate, we wanted to repurpose it as an HOV lane, would that have to come back to council? How would we, you know, at what point would staff be comfortable determining whether this would be a viable lane for HOV purposes?

[01:30:04] Mike: I think a change like that would come back to council. I think that's a significant change. And I think we would do some pretty sophisticated modeling. to see the impacts to other lanes, the traffic signal operation. I mean, a lot of, um, carpool vehicles is a different operational scenario than a relatively small number of buses, a relatively small number of buses is pretty simple. They don't need a long queue jump at the end to get back into regular traffic and so on. I see a carpool lane being a lot more complicated. And I think we'd have to do a lot of study to be comfortable recommending that. And I think we would come back to council.

[01:30:47] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Thank you. And then similarly, Max's question about if I understood it correctly during concert season or concert evenings, you know, using the lane to help facilitate the flow for shuttles that have a sort of a circular route. Is that something that staff has already looked at? Is that what did you think of that recommendation?

[01:31:15] Unknown Speaker: That recommendation? So again, I think our operation currently, our setup simple so that we can actually, once we have the bus name built, we can monitor, test it, and just see how over the operation, how it meets our performance expectations, and I think as time goes on, there's definitely a potential for expanding services as the needs come up. And just as Mike had mentioned that there has to be some studies looking at how it may impact the overall operation of other vehicle users and how you may. potentially diminish more inconvenience. And so those are things that we will definitely look into as we carry out our project into sort of the operational phase. Currently, we have our design to build a project. We're 2 years out in completing the project, but we do want to have this opportunity to have our preliminary operation in place. And as we putting into service, we can actually expand as the knee comes up.

[01:32:18] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Thank you. And then I'm confident you've already met with all of the bus and shuttle operators who would likely use this lane to get a sense of their needs and everything. okay, that's good. And I think that's everything I have on this. So I agree with the vice mayor and council member McAllister. This is a forward looking project as we anticipate a potentially dramatic increase in Caltrain ridership, I think, connecting the transit center in downtown to North Bay Shore becomes increasingly important. And this is, I think, a very, this is an essential project, long-term to help facilitate that connection. So thank you for your years of work on this.

[01:33:21] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Council member command.

[01:33:24] Councilmember Ellen Kamei: Great. Thank you. The vice mayor beat me to seconding the motion. I tried to get him to move it along. Um, so, you know, in reading this, the staff report, it sounds like this will come back to council for us to do further discussion. So I don't have any questions at this point, um, that weren't already asked or answered and counsel questions. Actually, you know what? This would come back on the consent calendar.

[01:33:53] Unknown Speaker: Oh, it would. We can always pull that item if we want to discuss it.

[01:33:57] Unknown Speaker: Correct.

[01:33:58] Unknown Speaker: Right. Right. Okay. I'm learning.

[01:34:00] Unknown Speaker: All right. So, um, you know, I, I think... So, a few questions now.

[01:34:07] Unknown Speaker: Yeah, ask me now. Well, you know, I think that for me, one of the things that's important is finding ways to do mode share opportunities throughout the entire city. Um, and so I was happy when counsel looked at at the El Camino, real, and having bike lanes there, as an opportunity to make it more pedestrian and cycle friendly. Um, and I think everybody, um, up here as well as in the city is looking for alleviation of traffic congestion in onshoreline and in and out of North Bay Shore. And so I feel comfortable supporting it. I think that there are some important points to highlight. Um, council member McAllister mentioned how we were able to incorporate the Terabella, whether that's a visioning plan or a precise plan and how that development, particularly for me, the residential development component, um, can be integrated and what we're looking at on Shoreline. Um, how can, how are we going to make that integrate it into the community versus making it, um, something that's not ideal for the, for the community. Also, in, I think later on this year, we're going to be looking at scooters and other items for getting around. And so as we're looking at the last mile. If people are taking scooters, how can we incorporate that into this shoreline plan as well and making it, um, ability for mixed flow in terms of cycling and scooters. Should we should we go forward with that in the fall? I'd also like to take that into consideration. I thought the important points also were the noticing of the local small businesses. I think that it's important for them to be kept up to speed, as well as if, you know, community members want to sign up and get notifications. I think that that would be really important, especially for the for the residents, um, who live in that area. Thank you.

[01:36:09] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Council member Hicks.

[01:36:12] Councilmember Alison Hicks: So, I agree with, generally, what the rest of council has been saying. I will be supporting the motion as long as it, um, as long as we do what Mr. Chang had also recommended, look at additional places to place trees, make it not just a 2 to one ratio. And I agree with things that other things that the council has said that this is an important project for the future, and it's also important to continue to look and adapt to needs as Terabella develops and also as maybe unexpected things happen more, fewer buses, et cetera. But, yeah, additional trees are important to me. Thank you.

[01:36:56] Unknown Speaker: So, following up on Councilman McAllister's question.

[01:36:59] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Which question? Yes, regarding growth in the Terabella area. If a project, uh, or a precise plan EIR is done, uh, in the Cherabella area, will it take a look at the impact on this reversible lane?

[01:37:20] Unknown Speaker: I think it's part of the EIR process. It will consider the transit linking when they do their various assessments during the EIR process.

[01:37:31] Unknown Speaker: Okay. And even if it's not done as part of the EIR, I mean, if it's something you want to do as part of the actual, I mean, you know, the sequel has some constraints in what you do and you don't do to comply with sequel, I mean, if there's something broader that, you know, counsel's interested in looking at in terms of evaluating land use changes in Terabella, we don't have to be necessarily constrained by the sequel process.

[01:37:52] Unknown Speaker: Okay. Yeah, I think it's important. I appreciate the comments about the backup on middle field, since I'm often coming the same direction on middle field, and I'm usually turning left onto shoreline, but once in a while, I go right on shoreline. And yes, everyone is queued up in the bike lane. Which is kind of upsetting because that's a bike lane. It's not an extra lane for vehicles. And I could see where it's going to be a real change for folks. And I do imagine they are going to cut through the gas station. They do already. Um, and they're likely to cut through other places. So it'd be good if we really take a look at that to figure out how do we keep folks on middle field. as opposed to cutting through all the other opportunities where they could do that. Alex, it definitely backs up there.

[01:38:50] Mayor Lisa Matichak: So, I think most of the comments, I, uh, would echo, uh, we are looking at this for the future. I'm glad I had the opportunity to meet with staff to discuss this in great detail, because I do feel, as I said earlier, more comfortable with it. I appreciate the comment about more trees, and I would like to look for opportunities, whether they, you know, be right there or close by to add more trees. I also appreciate the comments about noticing. And, uh, I'm not sure how, is it possible to sign up for that, or do we just automatically notice everyone in North Bay Shore?

[01:39:33] Unknown Speaker: I think it is possible. So, for example, when we had our community outreach, residents and business that show up, actually, their numbers, contact our gathered, and when I do have public meetings like these, I do send them notifications.

[01:39:51] Mayor Lisa Matichak: So perhaps it's something that can be done independently. Or if it was, you know, you can have the dropdown online where you can pick all the things you want to be noticed about. I certainly feel like, you know, awareness of construction in the area might be a good one to add to that list. Staff can look into that. Great, thank you. Um, and... I think the one thing I want to emphasize is that, uh, I don't think the current plan is what will ultimately be the plan. Um, it sounds like we're going to continue to take a look at this and, um, look at modifications, other uses, different hours, all kinds of things because we're really trying to optimize this. And this is a great 1st start. But I think it's important to emphasize that we're going to be flexible and make sure we're getting the most out of this. because this is a huge project. So with that, it looks like we have a motion from council member Ramirez, but not sure what the motion is. Is it the staff recommendation? You often add other things. That's why I wasn't sure. Would it be helpful to explicitly include opportunities to increase the number of trees and then also the noticing enhancements, I guess.

[01:41:18] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Then I will include that. So, um, clarity emotions, as always. ideal.

[01:41:26] City Manager Dan Rich: On the tree's issue, currently worded requires a 2 to one, that would be the bare minimum. I think what staff would do is go beyond that, to the extent, and wherever possible. You can add it to the motion, but we will do that regardless. I would caution you to put something explicit in the motion about a certain number, something because we won't know until we're in the field and how many and where they would go. In terms of noticing, again, you can put that in the motion, if you want, but I think what staff will look at is ways to better inform the community or have a centralized place or sign up for all North Bay Shore related construction activities. So that doesn't have to be in the motion, but you can add it if you so choose.

[01:42:17] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: I don't intend to be prescriptive. So, as articulated by the city manager, the staff recommendation, and then, you know, if staff is able to add trees and that kind of thing, then I think that's our desire.

[01:42:32] Mayor Lisa Matichak: And we have a 2nd by the vice mayor. Any comments?

[01:42:37] Unknown Speaker: Unless you wanted to just say at a minimum ratio of 2.2 to one.

[01:42:43] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Okay, so we add the...

[01:42:47] Unknown Speaker: Yeah, and just to confirm, the motion includes the amendment of the contract.

[01:42:52] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: Okay, thank you. Right, so we just, um, tweak number one, to say, a minimum of a 2 to 1 ratio. of 24 boxes, and then the contract.

[01:43:04] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Okay. Any other discussion?

[01:43:08] Unknown Speaker: I will add, I forgot one other thing I wanted to say, and that was, um, I hope all these improvements to increase ridership on bicycles, because it's gone down. It used to be about 5 to 6% for a couple years, and for several years now, it's been 2 to 3%. So it's disappointing to see that number down.

[01:43:34] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Okay, anything else? Okay, well, call the question. And that motion passes unanimously. Thank you so much for your work on this one. Okay, up next is item 8.2, which is the proposed response to Santa Clara County Civil Grand Jury Report. The inquiry into governance of the Valley Transportation Agents Authority. And we will start with a staff presentation.

[01:44:16] Assistant Public Works Director Dawn Cameron: Good evening. I'm Don Cameron, Assistant Public Works director, and with me here is Mike Fuller, public works director. Yes. On June 18th, the Santa Clara County Civil Grand Jury released its report, inquiry into governance of the Valley Transportation Authority, otherwise known as VTA. Its primary conclusion was that the VTA board needs structural changes to protect the interest of taxpayers and meet the transportation needs of the county. The city is required to respond to one finding in 3 recommendations in the report by September 16th. The required response format is for findings the city is to agree, disagree, or partially disagree. For recommendations, there's one of four responses. The recommendation has been implemented. It will be implemented. Further analysis is required before implementation, or it will not be implemented because it's unreasonable or not warranted. As background to the grand jury's findings, here's a brief overview of the VTA board structure. The VTA board consists of appointed elected officials. There are 12 voting members. Five are from the city of San Jose City Council, two are county board of supervisors, one member representing four north county cities, and the current member representative is Council member John McAllister for the North County cities. One board director representing 5 West Valley cities, and one director representing 2 South County cities, and finally, 2 directors representing 3 cities in the central northeast area of the county. There are also up to three non voting members. These are the Santa Clara County representatives to the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, and these re representatives are one member from the city of San Jose, one county board of supervisors, and one non-San Jose City Council member appointed by the city's association. So the city was requested to finding number one in the grand jury report, which basically says, the VTA board suffers from a lack of experience, continuity, and leadership, that the directors have inadequate time to devote to VTA duties due to their city responsibilities or other local jurisdiction responsibilities. There is a lack of engagement by some directors. Key policy and funding decisions can be dominated by the county and city of San Jose, and there can be a tension between the director's duties to VTA and their duties to their local jurisdiction. Stats proposed response to this finding is to agree. Although there can be nuances to the level of agreement with each of these points, overall staff's observations are the VTA board is challenged by each of these factors. The grand jury also requested a city response to recommendation 1 C, which are connected to recommendations 1A and 1B. Recommendation 1A is that VTA should commission a study of the governance structure of successful large city transportation agencies, looking at factors such as the board size, the methods, the selection of board members, are they directly elected, appointed elected officials, non-elected officials, the whole range. The term, potential terms, board members, the director qualifications and how they represent their constituent communities. Recommendation one B is the county should do the same study. Recommendation one, C, is that each city should prepare a written report on VTA's governance structure looking at all of these same factors that the study in one, A, we'll look at, and provide this report to VTA and the county board of supervisors. Stats proposed response is that the city will not prepare the report as specified because it is unreasonable. Our primary concern, general concern with the grand jury's recommendations, is that it does not include a process for developing consensus on potential changes among the cities and the county for the VTA board. Also, having two separate studies and 15 individual city reports is an inefficient use of scarce resources. We feel that the most productive way to proceed would be for the city to provide input after the comparative study is completed and prior to developing consensus on any changes to the VTA board. In addition, we are recommended the city join with some of our neighboring cities in suggesting that an independent organization, such as the cities association, prepare a study. It can be in addition to VTA study and lead a collaborative process with the cities. This could take the place of each of the 15 cities, have to prepare their own individual reports. Finally, we suggest that the study parameters be broadened, the transit agency studied should also include those terms at agencies that serve multiple cities, not just large city transportation organizations. We also suggest they could look at board operational policies and procedures as another way to ensure how the voting is representing the needs in the entire county, such as what the voting thresholds could be for major decisions. The grand jury also is requiring responses to recommendations, one D and one E. Both of these recommendations propose changes to state enabling legislation for the VTA board. Our recommendation is that we respond that this requires further analysis before implementing. We feel it is premature to commit to proposing or supporting legislation prior to completing the studies and developing consensus on potential changes. And that concludes staff report and we'll be happy to answer any questions you have.

[01:50:31] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Thank you. Are there any questions from council members? Okay, saying no questions from council members. We'll open this up for public comment. Is there anyone who wishes to address the council on this item? Seeing none, we will close the public input portion and bring it back to council for discussion. Vice mayor Abbe Koga.

[01:51:07] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Thank you. So I read our letter response letter, and I think it's fine. I agree with the points that are made in light of the question that we were asked to respond to. Um, I guess for me, having been on the VTA board, having chaired the VTA board and this was, oh, gosh, 8 years ago, 7 years, 8 years ago. I was, and I know these grand jury reports have happened a couple of times with VTA. I joined back then after the last one happened and there was another Hayes, I think it was the Hayes report. And we had the recession and we had to close a $40000000 deficit. I guess I, to be honest, I'm shocked at these numbers. The Fairbox recovery back then was 14% and that was bad and now we're down to 7.6. So, you know, my question is what happened in the last 6 years or so. But I do agree with a lot of the challenges with the governance structure, and, um, you know, my feeling has been having served on that board, um, that, in light of the challenges with one city, having almost half the votes, um, including the county reps who end up usually one of them, at least, is from San Jose. I really have been, um, advocating when I can for a directly elected board, um, that divides up the county and also would just kind of divvy up San Jose. So I hope that these studies that are that we're recommending be done. Look at that. Um, and so for that, I will support what we, what we recommend, um, I was intrigued in um, the cities association doing the, one of the studies on, I'm on the board there now, and I would welcome, actually, that, that, um, opportunity. So, yes, so I think this is a good response. I will also say, though, and I don't know if this is the opportunity, but one thing that happened back in that was 2010, I believe it was, after the last report, was that there was a change in the county grouping of the city groupings. And back then, we were in a 6 city grouping with 3 representatives. It was Santa Clara, Sunnyvale, Mountain View, Los Altos, Los Altos Hills and Palo Alto. And they changed the grouping to the 4 we have now. We had 3 reps from that 6 city grouping. We then went to one rep for 4 cities. And we basically lost a seat to South County. And so Morgan Hill and Gilroy, now have had a rep for those two cities that came from the North County seat. I would like to, and at some point, I don't know if this is appropriate time, but I would like to look at, or suggest that we look at that. You know, the argument back then was that South County is where the growth is going to happen. I would argue that that has not happened. And we are, in fact, where we're growing. And so at a minimum, I would like to see us get that setback in North County. So, if nothing else changes, at least we should get our representation back. So, I would just add that and I don't know if this is the time to add it, but I hope that we can revisit that down the road. Thanks.

[01:54:55] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Other comments? Council member McAllister?

[01:55:01] Councilmember John McAlister: Thank you for those kind words. Everything you spoke was the truth. For the public, I am on the VTA board. I am also the chair of the ad hoc committee that is reviewing all these concerns from the grand jury, and more, because we were formed before the grand jury report came out to see how we could change the structure and make the process and policy making and the voting at the VTA fair and more productive. They are doing a study, or the ad hoc committee has recommended, whether we sent out an RFP to a company called RMS, who is the existing independent auditor for VTA. So a studying is in the works right now. And hopefully, a lot of these questions will be addressed. And a lot of the concerns will be taken care of. One thing that We had a discussion of our response. Some cities, if you have an opportunity to go beyond what the grand jury or the law allows you to do, and Palo Alto and Cupertino added more to it. So, I would always encourage more to our response, because it is going to a judge, even if it's possibly in a preamble, saying, you know, these are our concerns. But I have met with some other cities and we are encouraging them to be. I am encouraging them to be as vocal as possible. One proposal I'm talking to the, how the voting was done, the vice mayor, was that to change it from the cities, I think we have to go through a legislative, I think, but what we can do internally is potentially say, for certain amounts over such amount. You need three fourths of a vote, and therefore it sort of neutralizes or sort of balances the power base. And so those are some of the ideas we're talking about. But it was interesting that the VTA, I mean, the grand jury report came out with a lot of these things.

[01:57:19] Mayor Lisa Matichak: I appreciate staff report on this one. It's there's a lot of issues going on in here, and I think this is a start to a small reform of ETA because it needs it. Any other comments?

[01:57:42] Unknown Speaker: So, in response to the vice mayor, I think what happened. One of the things that happened, because we're seeing this across the country, is more people are taking the ride hailing companies, and it's having a huge impact on public transportation. So, uh, I believe I read in New York City riderships down 3 percentage points, not some a total of 3 percentage points. And I can imagine the same thing is happening here. So, um, did you have specific things you thought should be added? Um... When you said you perhaps we should be saying more?

[01:58:19] Councilmember John McAlister: I did discuss this with staff, and they did sort of, we did add some items to it. But depending on if we went with the letter of the law, saying, When you respond to a grand jury report, you are limited to agree, disagree, or partially, and that you have to put your responsible with some of that category, I think our city attorney could help me out or Don could help us out on that one. And ad hoc committee will definitely be adding more recommendations, but if the city manager has a comment on this one, I would...

[01:58:56] City Manager Dan Rich: Yeah, I mean, I was just gonna say, we, you know, we are legally bound to respond a certain way, we have sort of gone beyond that, and added a little bit of commentary in the follow up paragraphs. I think we do cover the concept of, you know, the kinds of things we want them to look at, including the super majority, but vice mayor's suggestion for directly elected. We don't address that explicitly, but that certainly would be the kind of reform and or the adjustment in the seatings. I think those are the kinds of things we'd be looking for in the options that come back. I think we could probably find a way to be more explicit, not prescriptive, that that's what we want, but these are the kinds of options we hope will be explored, if that's the wish of the council.

[01:59:44] Councilmember John McAlister: And in fact, just to note, that was part of the grand jury's recommendation one, A, is that the study will consider directly elected, as well as the continuing the appointed elected, and, as I said, the potential of appointed non elected officials. So, the grand jury report already specifies that they think all of these options should be explored and studied. Yeah, we were limited to only answering a few questions, or if you look at the grand jury, There was a lot more. responses required. Yeah, go ahead.

[02:00:23] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: So, would you suggest we include in the letter, the issue of, um, the seats, and North County regaining that, at least regaining that seat, if not? I mean, the argument is about population, and San Jose has half the seats because of their population, but it's not everywhere else is not based on population, and I think it just needs to be a fierce.

[02:00:51] City Manager Dan Rich: Yeah, I mean, just looking at this slide. I don't know the exact population of the two South County cities, but I'm pretty darn certain. It's about $100,000. It's less than the four cities in the North County. My suggestion would be not to be prescriptive that, you know, North County wants another seat, but that the seating arrangement should be examined as part of any reform effort.

[02:01:15] Councilmember John McAlister: I'd just like to comment that Palo Alto did go specifically, too. They needed to vote, you know, so they were being more prescriptive. One of the other items is, does the county really need two people, because San Jose incorporates a lot of what the county does, and so is that one too many seats for the county? I mean, so a lot of these issues are going to be looked at and discussed. But if the board, if the council wants to be more prescriptive, I would support any additional comments.

[02:01:46] Unknown Speaker: So what, if studies are done, would those come back to us for comment, or is this our one and only time?

[02:01:55] City Manager Dan Rich: Our recommendation would be the studies need to go back to all the cities, including us, for review and comment, and whether they bring them back or not, will be monitoring it, and we'll bring them back. One suggestion would be that we could add a sentence in the response, saying, we generally concur with the study parameters proposed by the grand jury, which should include these different possible methods of selecting the members, how the representation is determined. Palo Alto suggested other avenues besides population could also look at employment, sales tax revenue generation. So, a general sentence about, yes, we agree that all of these pieces should be examined as part of the study, I think, could easily be added.

[02:02:45] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Okay. I would like to add that. Especially in population, but also I was thinking employment growth as another factor.

[02:02:58] Mayor Lisa Matichak: So the maker of the motion would agree to those additional...

[02:03:02] Councilmember John McAlister: Oh, yes, absolutely. I mean... There's a project going on right now that is gonna be serving 1,700 people a day. And yet we continue to see... I just went down SR 85. I knew that occasionally in the morning, and you'll see traffic backed up. I get on Fremont all the way down to Highway 17. And there's thousands of people, and yet, we're not, here's just a preaching right now, but VTA is looking at adding for a residential, but they're not looking at where the jobs are going and all that increase in traffic. And so that's another direction that we need to make sure that the VT starts looking at is. And it could be one of the criteria. Again, employment, it says, we're going to be adding a 1000 close to over 100,000 people, along to 237 North Bay Shore, Corridor, and yet, we're not adding any transportation. Oh, excuse me, 237 is making an express lane, therefore, making the HOV lane become one, and then moving everybody to the other two lanes. But yeah, that is definitely a criteria that should be considered. Can you incorporate that in there? Along with the super majority one, please?

[02:04:13] City Manager Dan Rich: We'll incorporate whatever this council directs to your motion. Okay.

[02:04:19] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Okay, so, um, it was the staff recommendation plus a couple of editions. Consideration of employment centers. Super majority over a certain threshold of dollars. Have the cities have the opportunity to comment back to the grandeur. Actually, it's going to the judge, if I'm not mistaken, on the reports. The VTA report. And do you want something? Any studies done? And then we're looking at, and the city's association that was already in there, correct?

[02:04:53] City Manager Dan Rich: It was. Yeah. Other cities already mentioned that they would like to see, again, there was a, we've talked to some other cities, and they're interested in doing the city association. And some cities have also already offered to put some money towards that, too. So. So that's something that this council may want to consider down the road as city association may consider them, funding it. I think our official position would be VTA should fund the study, if, ultimately, the city's association does take it on, and it's deemed that the member agencies should contribute. We would certainly bring that to you.

[02:05:34] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Okay, any other comments? Is everyone clear on the motion? Do you want to... Is everyone clear on the motion?

[02:05:44] City Manager Dan Rich: Okay. Look, the staff is clear.

[02:05:46] Mayor Lisa Matichak: We'll call the question, then. I just want to make sure everybody understands the motion. That's important. It is. That's our parting... That passes unanimously. 3:00 a.m. yet. Okay. And when does that do?

[02:06:06] City Manager Dan Rich: It's September. It's due September 16th. Okay. So we'll make the revisions of the letter and have it ready for your signature.

[02:06:14] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Okay, great. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Reading should go. Okay, item nine. Council, staff, and committee reports. Vice Mayor Abikoga?

[02:06:31] Vice Mayor Margaret Abe-Koga: Thank you. So, um, I hope everyone had a great summer. But over the summer, as we all know, we had the unfortunate incident at the Gilroy Garlic Festival with the mass shootings, and then we continue to see more of those throughout the country. I've had, many residents come up to me. you know, what can we do? And, um, I did propose this during our goal setting. I didn't get quite good enough of a majority to look at this. But in light of the increased issues, concerns around safety and gun safety. I was, I wanted to ask all of you if, you would reconsider, and I'm happy to, you know, look at what we might have to take off our work plan to do it. But doing an overview of gun safety, measures, policies, that I know the state has some, I was mostly focused on Sunnyvale, because as a city, they've passed gun safety measures, and they've been tested in court and have been solid. But my hope was that maybe we could look at adopting similar policies around gun safety. The other issue that, um, or program that has come up, and I met, um, I saw the RDA, Rosen at the, um, uh, National Night Out event. There's a gun buyback program that happens at the county. And, um, they, I guess there's some talk about doing one of the days in North County. And so I was hoping that that's something that Maui Mountain View could participate in. But so just overall, in light of what's going on. I felt that it was important to ask you all if you would reconsider looking at gun safety measures as a priority for our city. Thanks.

[02:08:53] Unknown Speaker: Would that include vehicles too?

[02:08:58] City Manager Dan Rich: So the issue before you tonight is whether or not to agenda is a discussion on a future agenda to talk about it, in that item, we could get more clarity about what is or isn't included as part of it as well as the trade-offs and the workload implications of doing it. Just for the record, I believe Mountain View has participated in a regional gun bite back in the last year or two. or certainly open to doing it here, as well, if that's the county wide priority.

[02:09:31] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Yeah, so, um, I don't know, cancel my room, Ramirez, if you were going to comment on that, but before we, if we're going to move to another topic, I'd like to close off on this one first. So are there any comments about the vice mayors? proposal.

[02:09:46] Councilmember Lucas Ramirez: I personally do support it. Um, I would like to have the discussion and, um, look at trade-offs. So the motion to bring it back for us to discuss, I do support.

[02:10:01] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Council member Hicks, was yours on this topic?

[02:10:02] Councilmember Alison Hicks: Yes. Okay. Yeah, I would also support looking over our goals and seeing whether we can we can take something off and put this on.

[02:10:10] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Why don't we do a show of hands of how many are in support of that? Oh, did you have a comment on that? Okay, go ahead.

[02:10:20] Unknown Speaker: Sorry. Is the county? I mean, if we're gonna do this, I'd sort of like to see that other surrounding cities are doing something similar, so that we're all having the same rules, they're going into. So do we know if any other cities or the county is doing some kind of a review of the gun safety?

[02:10:42] City Manager Dan Rich: I'm not aware offhand. That's certainly something that, should this be reprioritized, that we would look at and report back to you?

[02:10:48] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Okay. No. Thank you. Council member Clark?

[02:10:52] Councilmember Chris Clark: Yeah, I was just gonna say two things. One would be, I would hope, as part of that agenda item discussion, we could talk about how the city's association might play into that. And then the other would be, I hesitate to do it before the end of the year, a little bit, since we've already sort of sorted art. I mean, if folks, I mean, I'm just one. So if you all feel that it's going to be more important than the things we're going to talk about before the end of the year, then that's fine, but I, having looked at the next few months calendar, I don't see anything on there that I think. I would push out, but that's just me.

[02:11:32] Unknown Speaker: You wanted to go to CPC first?

[02:11:35] Councilmember Chris Clark: Right I'm open to that. I just think it's going to be really tough to find a slot on the council calendar for a couple of hour discussion, and I guarantee you a lot of people will show up to talk about this, having been through this once before.

[02:11:53] City Manager Dan Rich: So, just a comment, and if the item for tonight is whether or not to bring back an agenda item on whether or not to discuss it, that we could certainly do before the end of the year, I think it's highly unlikely that we would bring back any analysis or recommendations before the end of the year, and whenever it comes back, even the first one, there will be workload implications that will have to, you know, other things will have to adjust. We would have to look at what the most likely candidates, depending on who would need to be involved in this.

[02:12:29] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Okay, any further comments on this? Okay, so, um, a show of hands of how many errands are supportive of bringing back as an agenda item, a discussion about whether or not we want to prioritize this.

[02:12:43] Unknown Speaker: Um, and at that time, would we talk about the implications of what could be, um, pushed out? Or would we wait until we have the discussion?

[02:12:53] City Manager Dan Rich: I think we could provide some preliminary. It really depends how big this project is, and we wouldn't know that until you've kind of scoped it out.

[02:13:01] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Okay. Okay, so all those in favor? Raise your hand. That looks like it's unanimous. Thank you. Great, thank you. Thank you for bringing that up. Okay, any other, um... items that council members... Okay. Um, so, I'll report that, uh, over the summer we had 2 meetings of the Santa Clara Santa Cruz, County Round Table on airplane noise, and we are working on our strategic plan in our work plan, and I'm part of a subcommittee. There's four of us. I'm sorry, it's an ad hoc committee, um, to edit those documents, uh, to bring back for consideration by the full body. And I did send out a summary of what's transpired. Airplane noises are really complex topic. And, um, it would be good to have another person, uh, kind of involved with this. Because I think we're going to be talking about this a long time. And I am meeting with council member Hicks. Actually, I am meeting with council member Hicks to go into detail about airplane noise. And then also, um, the cities association, um, actually, I'm on the board, and you're on the executive board. So, um, the, there's a transportation subcommittee of the board, and we had a call to talk about, actually, the response to the grand jury report. And we did decide that we want to look at what all the responses are from the different cities. And so, I feel like that would be a natural group to talk to about doing a study. But we did have a good conversation about the report. The grand jury report that is. And that's all I have online, so anything else? Okay, then... Uh, immediately following this session, we are going to have a closed session in the plaza conference room. And what we will do is have the announcement here, as well as take public input on any of the other items on that agenda. So if you want to do the announcement, our city...

[02:15:40] City Attorney Krishan Chopra: Yes, I will. It's kind of a long one tonight. The council will be meeting on closed session on four items. The first is conference with real property negotiator, government code 54956.8, the property, 1600 North Shoreline Boulevard, APN 116 dash 1070, 1616 North Shoreline Boulevard, APN 116 dash 1086, 1674 North Shoreline Boulevard, a portion, APN 116, 10, 085, 10, 15 Joaquin Road, a portion, APN 116, 10097. The agency negotiator is Dennis Drennan, real property, program administrator. The negotiating party is Google, LLC, under negotiation price in terms of payment for acquisition of real property. The second item is conference with real property negotiator, government code 54956.8, the property Gamble Way, a public street, no APN, agency negotiator, Dennis Drennan, real property program administrator. Negotiating party is Kevin Dinardi, the Dinardi Group, under negotiation, price in terms of payment, for the sale of real property. The third, conference with real property negotiator, government code, 54956.8, the property, portion of 711 Calderon Avenue, APN 15804001. Agency negotiator, Dennis Drennan, real property program administrator, the negotiating party, Julie Alice Whitman, and Carrie Thompson Weigel, trustees of the Weigel Marital Trust, UTA, dated April 6th, 1982. Under negotiation, price in terms of payment for the possible acquisition of real property. And the last is public employee appointment, California Government Code 54957, B1, titled position, city manager. So those are all four. If there's any public comment, we will take it now. And be sure to let us know which item you're talking about and fill out a blue card.

[02:18:05] Public Speaker: Will do, and I'll also fill out the one for the drones. Um, because I forgot to do that. So, yeah, I don't know exactly what's going to go on with item 11.2, but, you know, I, yeah, gamble way, you know, the residents who live there are predominantly Hispanic, and this does represent a pretty big displacement risk for them. Uh, low income people. The process has been a little bit rough for them. as the developer has been. Uh, you know, like they introduced an initial application, then they withdrew it, then they modified it, and it's just been, um, quite a burden on the residents. So, you know, I would only say, please keep that in mind as you discuss that item. Uh, and then, uh, for 11.4 Denridge, I'm gonna miss you. Thank you.

[02:18:52] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Is there anyone else who wishes to provide public comment on any of the closed session items? Okay, if not, we'll close the public input portion, and, um, we'll ask the city attorney if we expect any closed session report.

[02:19:10] City Attorney Krishan Chopra: I do not expect any reportable action.

[02:19:12] Mayor Lisa Matichak: Okay. Thank you. So, after a brief recess, we will reconvene in the Plaza conference room for the closed session, and then following the closed session, the city council will adjourn to the next city council meeting to be held on Tuesday, September 10, 2019, at 5:30 p.m. in the Plaza Conference room, 500 Castro Street, and the regular council meeting is adjourned.

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