he [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] check one two check [Music] [Music] [Music] test [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] oh [Music] he [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] all right good afternoon everyone if we can start to quiet down we will will turn to Tony to take the role Jimenez present Torres present Cohen here Ortiz present
Davis dwan here candelis here Foley here vatra present K here mayem here give a COR great thank you well good afternoon welcome everyone I'm pleased to call to order this meeting of the San Jose City Council for the afternoon of March 19th if if you are able please stand and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation indice all right today's invocation will be given by San Jose Tao and co
uncil member Torres will tell more good afternoon and thank you mayor this will for sure wake everyone up for my third invocation this month I introduced the legendary San Jose Tao located in our iconic Japan Town San Jose Tao celebrates 51 years of captivating Global audiences and critics alike with powerful sounds of Tao which translates to Japanese drum so as Johnny Canales would say take it away San Jose Tao [Music] [Music] hey [Music] all [Music] hey [Music] [Music] he [Music] he [Music] [M
usic] he [Music] [Applause] thank you so much thank you Council Torres as he said I think we're very much ready for this meeting now all right we have a couple ceremonial items councilor Jimenez if you'd meet me at the podium we will recognize Michael Brio we have any fans of micro Brio you can make your way down please delay a little bit while everyone makes their way down difficult to follow uh San Jose Tao but let me give it a shot so one of those es good afternoon everyone my name is s Hill
menz council member district 2 I uh as you can see Michael has a lot of fans I'm going to say a few words about him that you may know and some that you may not know which I think is very important so I first want to thank PBC staff especially Martina Davis and Jared Ferguson and Ruth gule for helping us put together this commodation that we think is very well deserved uh Michael has a real passion for for community outreach and strong belief that good planning really begins and ends with the com
munity he began his career in 1996 as a planner to working at the strong neighborhoods Initiative Program and within three years he moved up to supervising the strong neighborhoods initiative team where he managed a multi-departmental group to develop 10 neighborhood Improvement plans that were driven by members of traditionally underrepresented community members later Michael managed the development of a award-winning Envision San Jose 2040 General plan which was adopted in 2011 Michaels also l
argely credited for the Urban Village concept which has attracted very positive attention for the professional planning commit community and most recently Michael played a role as as my office knows very well a crucial role in the development of the 2023 2031 housing element a Herculean undertaking to comply with many of the new challenging State uh requirements he and his team have work work diligently on that plan and closely with many stakeholders in our community over two years to develop ou
r very ambitious housing plan including 130 strategies and programs to be completed over the next eight years he's been a mentor to many in the PBC Department who I'm sure will greatly greatly miss him and I'm sure some of them are up here and also lastly I think this is the most important part of the Commendation which is not in the in the little uh plaque he's going to get but really what I acknowledge is we often see people toiling day and day out for the benefit of of our residents in the ci
ty of San Jose and we often don't know a lot about them and so I wanted to share a few things about Michael that you likely don't know and that I quite frankly didn't know uh so let me list off a few of those things that you may not know about Michael one which I think he could appreciate San Jose Tao I've learned that Michael's a professional drummer who has worked tirelessly to bring music to our community from playing gigs with San Jose Jazz his his jazz band at the deanza hotel to producing
Club crawls for the JazzFest to being a producer of the Left Coast Live that for three years brought up to 100 mu 100 musical acts uh a night downtown during the 3-day Festival Michael's wife's name is Reena and they met when she started working here as a San Jose planner and now she's actually the acting director of city of Santa clar planning department is she here oh she's here there you go there you go which is pretty awesome right so they're they're pretty much the Santa clar County Plannin
g power couple if you will they have a 12-year-old son named Booker who is a baseball fanatic which means that a lot of Michael's time once he's retired is going to be being a baseball dad and I'm sure taking him to many games he loves gardening especially with native plants and if you haven't noticed already he loves wearing vintage clothing he owns two sort of tied to that he owns two 1940 vintage cars and I sort of jumped ahead but in case you haven't noticed often times I've actually asked m
yself this as you come to the meeting I'm like this guy is sharply dressed different generation but but sharply dressed I very much appreciate that and he really brings some Splash and some color to our meeting um and the other thing that I didn't know about Michael is that he's not only a nerd but a train nerd um and so uh join me and giving him a round of applause and and thanking him for his work in this city of San Jose all these years thank you very much everybody um I I'll keep it short be
cause I'm sure a lot of you are waiting for the council to get going and I know that feeling but um I started here in September of of 1996 this was my first job that I got out of Berkeley with a brand new city and Regional planning degree um I if you would ask me back then what I be here today I would have said no no I probably would never thought of that but I have stayed um it's a great Community to work in I love the people I love the communities um I really uh valued my time working in stron
g neighbors initiative um and uh really San Jose is on The Cutting Edge of planning um you may not all know that but the work that we do when we go to planning conferences and talk to other planners we are generally way ahead of other communities throughout the United States so um I just want to thank you um I it's been a great place to work for and it's and I really want to say say I the Council here has been wonderful I think I feel like this is a city that while we have disagreements sometime
we're generally all rowing in the same direction and it's a good direction to row in so thank you very [Applause] much and we'll go ahead and present him with a commination mayor has it but let me just also say I forgot to mention this and I'm sure many of my colleagues can can attest to this is and I've experienced is that even if you don't always tell us what we want to hear as we're going down the road see seeking to do different things in the city we very much I very much appreciate I'm sur
e my colleagues share the sentiment very much appreciate your expertise your professionalism and the commitment you've brought to the residents in the city totally so thank you so [Applause] much [Music] St all right council member Torres please join me at the podium and we will recognize and Proclaim norus good afternoon everyone for the first time in a while we gather here at our city council to Proclaim March 19th as no rot day to celebrate the Persian Iranian new year worldwide and the Sprin
g Equinox no ruse has been celebrated for over 3,000 years and is rooted in the ancient Persian history to commemorate the onset of spring and the start of the traditional Persian New Year kicking off 13 days of Celebration norus promotes the values of Peace solidarity between families generations and communities to strengthen ties among people through mutual respect and ideals of good neighborhood neighborliness norus is celebrated by over 300 million people globally and is a symbolic opportuni
ty to reflect on the past and set intentions for the future celebrating norus together here at our city council reaffirms our City's passion and motivation to spread inclusivity and cultural Verity norus reminds us that we can all use a second to reflect on our interactions beliefs and opinions to see how we can create better relationships and be there for our friends families and neighbors with that said it is the greatest honor that I along with my colleagues on the San Jose City Council procl
aimed March 19th 2024 as noru day and accepting the combination today is amazing Persian leaders from the Iranian scholarship fund including one of my favorite leaders in our Valley and an Our County suzan thank you sorry that's okay I'm not as tall as Omar okay um all I want to say as we celebrate this joyous holiday that marks arrival of spring and new life we extend our gratitude to San Jose City council member Omar turus my favorite and his team ackn aning this peaceful celebration in partic
ular we would like to express our appreciation toward mayor Mayan and his team for their generous support as well as the SI San Jose City Council Members who endorse this Proclamation regardless of where you celebrate this festive festive occasion we hope you are blessed by the coming of the new year with Renewed Energy and health our sincerest hopes for a tranquil and thriving noru celebration extent to all inhabitant of Santa Clara County norus perus norus [Applause] mobarak welcome nice to me
et you you guys in the middle please come please thank you take care welcome San Jose look for to see great all right we're on to orders of the day does anyone on the council have any changes to the printed agenda not seeing any we will move on to the Clos session report hello mayor we do not have a report out of close session today great thank you on to the consent calendar are there any items that the council would like to pull from consent I was not made aware of any I don't see anybody chimi
ng in okay just before we entertain a motion on consent why don't I say a couple of things about the Run of show for today first let me say it's great to see a full chamber we love seeing such robust civic participation thank you for making the time to be here today today I assume most folks are here to weigh in on the budget but we will have many opport on on each of these items there'll be an opportunity for public comment so here's here's how this will work we will limit public comment today
to one minute per speaker because we have a lot of people who want to participate we you can participate in public comment by getting one of the cards the yellow cards down here by the comment box on either side we also have language translation for Tony Spanish Vietnamese is that and Mandarin I'm sorry and Mandarin and Mandarin please note on the comment card which item you want to speak on for example the budget message is item 3.3 one other note and I know there's going to be a lot of energy
and support in the room for the sake of hearing the clerk and moving efficiently we as a standard practice ask folks not to cheer or clap or make a lot of noise because then the next speaker can't hear that it's their turn you're welcome to use jazz hands to indicate your support but we want to make sure we hear from everyone um I think that's it Tony is there anything else about the process you want to note for folks um people using an interpreter get two minutes I'm sorry that's right those us
ing an interpreter will have two minutes so we have time for translation okay great so would love to entertain a motion on the consent calendar if we have one so moved second thank you second from Torres and let's oh let's go to public comment there are no cards for close session or for consent calendar consent no no comment cards for consent let's vote I need um it's not working for me if everybody could just vote orally okay just like say I or in favor I any opposed looks like that passes unan
imously thank you hopefully we can sort that out okay we're on to item 3.1 report of the city manager thank you mayor I do have a report today I'm pleased to share that we were awarded a $1 million cannabis Equity Grant from the California governor's office of business and economic development to embark on a new phase of the city's cannabis Equity Business Academy led by the office of Economic Development and cultural Affairs in partnership with the Enterprise foundation and Cal Asian this grant
will allow us to support the Cannabis Equity Business Academy graduates through grants so they can open their business or for paid fellowships for those wishing to pursue leadership management or employment in the industry we will also be able to provide legal and Regulatory assistance all of which support our attracting Investments and jobs and housing city council Focus area and helps us incrementally close racial inequities which is one of my foundational Focus areas for the past year 29 San
Jose residents and entrepreneurs have been participating in the city cannabis Equity Business Academy of the 29 participants 86% identify as Asian black africanamerican latino Native American or Pacific Islander this no cost inclusive program seeks to equalize the plain field in this complex regulated business sector by providing comprehensive entrepreneurship training within the Cannabis sector to those disproportionately affected by the regulations and discriminatory enforcement of historical
cannabis laws I'd like to thank the city manager's office of Economic Development and cultural Affairs and the office of administration policy and intergovernmental relations for helping with this grant we look forward to formally presenting this grant award to the city council for adoption during the May and the March 26 city council meeting not trying to jump ahead to May yet thank you great thanks for sharing that agenda for that is good news okay we are on to item 3.3 approval of the fiscal
year 2024 2025 mayor's March budget message as we get into this item I just want to share a couple of of quick thoughts U you know our our task last year was comparably easier because we had a surplus and we had the ability to identify number number of priorities we wanted to fund on a one-time basis this year unfortunately as we've seen revenues slow in a few cases even decline a little bit we have a tougher job ahead of us we know there are many many needs in the community there's the despera
te crisis of homelessness there's the need for affordable housing there's the need to adequately staff all of our departments from Public Safety to parks and libraries Main maintain our infrastructure we have many many competing needs and what I've tried to do in this budget message with the input and help from my budget Brown act and let me pause and thank them I want to I want to thank council member Davis council member Foley council member Cohen council member Torres all of whom gave input o
n this message is create a framework for balancing a budget which is the city manager's unenviable task in the coming months in a way that enables us to continue to provide critical city services while still making progress in the council's adopted Focus areas and minimizing the impact on the community as we close what is currently estimated to be about a $52 million structural shortfall it's not the same as a deficit it's a structural shortfall which means we're about $52 million below in terms
of the revenue Vue we have what we think we need or would like to have especially taking into account the need to more expeditiously move people out of our waterways into safer managed environments and to reduce discharged into the waterways so this is going to be a tougher conversation this year I confident that all of my colleagues and I will work together with the city manager and her team to strike an appropriate balance that seeks to continue to serve our entire community and meet all of t
he needs in our community but I don't want to sugarcoat it closing a $52 million shortfall will be hard and we will have to make some sacrifices and tradeoffs and that gets to the importance of hearing from the community which we're doing today and I want you to know that today is in many ways the beginning of the process not the end we will have budget Town Halls over the coming months we'll have budget study sessions here in chamber that will be publicly accessible and we'll be having an ongoi
ng dialogue over the next few months over which services are most critical which tradeoffs to make where we can cut because we will have to find that $52 Million worth of tradeoffs to close the gap that's currently projected and that of course could change but that's that's kind of the rough estimate at this moment so um I once again want to just thank my budget Brown act for their collaboration and support in putting together the message and uh I I trust that our city manager after this message
passes is going to do a great job of reading Us in on her thought process as she works with her team to bring forward a balanced budget that is in accordance with the direction we give today and and really seeks to meet the needs of the community with the finite resources that we have so I'm going to I'm going to pause there and turn to Tony and just as a reminder we do have a number of people who want to speak today which is a great thing we probably have on the order of a couple of hours of c
omments which is good will be one minute for those speaking in English two minutes for those with translation and again we'd ask folks to express their support without making a lot of noise cheering or clapping so that people can hear Tony and we can move through public comment uh efficiently together so Tony I'm going to turn it over to you I'd also like to ask one of the Spanish interpreters to come down um I have a significant number of speakers that need interpretation so I want to make sure
you've come on down um and I'm going to do them in sets of 10 English 10 Spanish to give the interpreters a Break um so I'm going to start I'm going to call several names if you hear your name go ahead and come on down first person in the microphone go to the microphone and then the other ones can sit in the reserve spaces in the in the front row and then as the ne first speaker you know their time is up then you can just get up and move to the mic um so I'm going to start with a few names Jeff
LaVine Bill Wallace Larry Ames and Larry Whitaker come on down hi I'm Jeff LaVine I'm going to keep my message short I know there's a a big deficit that we're facing but I'm encouraged by the mayor's attention to detail attacking the quality of life issues that we're all fully aware of and what I don't want to see happen in the council and my neighbors is people saying oh leave my little pot alone leave my little pot alone we all have to make sacrifices I understand that but I fully support the
mayor's effort and thoughtfulness in this and I urge the entire city council work constructively to to get a good solid budget that addresses our our major concerns thank you thank you next speaker uh good afternoon uh honorable mayor council members uh my name is uh Bill Wallace I'm a retired Union member and I support the fair food work ordinance that uh you're disc going to be discussing I believe to to create something uh when when read unregulated businesses tend to cut Corners with worker
s this happens with employee wages and benefits because it affects their bottom line and individual employees are the most vulnerable this is about dignity for workers employees in the fast food industry are vulnerable because they lack protection by or organized labor and they are the most vulnerable of society one employee does not have the same strength as 100 organized workers so I'm asking you to say yes in creating this ordinance and due to thank you next speaker hi I'm Larry Ames a longti
me Park and community Advocate I request that the city expand its polling on Parks to evaluate the community's priorities on how to best address the issues of infrastructure backlog and the Equitable and financial sustainability of the park system I hope you received the letters that we've sent you outlining some of our concerns the city has a $600 million backlog and commercializing the parks will not address the need of this magnitude and still meet the city's obligation to its Community to ma
intain M the quality of life great cities have great Parks please don't Pawn our crown jewels thank you thank you next speaker I'd also like to call down Chris Shay Susan Hayes or Victor sin both names are on that card um gianella ordones and Marissa Martinez go ahead hello Council my name is Larry Whitaker and I live in District 9ine I'm very concerned about homelessness blight mental illness crime and drug addiction I urge you to support the mayor's budget message which will help us get people
indoors faster please vote to pass the message thank you thank you next [Music] speaker hello um my name is Susan hayasa representing the Santa Clara Valley chapter of the ACLU of Northern California our chapter submitted written comments yesterday and I'd like to highlight three items one regarding unsheltered homelessness investment in subsidized permanent affordable housing social housing and services is the solution proposals that site jail or displace people for being unhoused or forcibly
segregating people into Mass shelters by threat of citation or jail time are not effective or just two before the city doubles the number of automatic license plate readers the public deserves transparent information about how the 2.7 million alpr detectors collected in the uh last 30 days are used and third we strongly urge the city to fund the expansion of the Trust Field response program to provide non-p police response to San Jose residents in Mental Health crisis thank you very much before
we go to the next speaker I just want to announce we have uh people in the Overflow rooms and I want them to know that we're on our way to bring speaker cards over to you so you will get an opportunity to speak thank you go ahead oh and also um Dana um Dana Anil and Jeff Buchanan okay good afternoon my name is Chris Jay and I serve as the vice president for government Affairs at the shark sport sports and entertainment as well as a board member on the venerable San Jose downtown Association in t
he recent budget letter the focus on downtown Gateway beautification is greatly appreciated on average year we welcome 1.5 million guests to the sap Center and the city estimates 1.7 million guests to sharks ice Tech CU ensuring those visitors from out of town as well as all of our San Jose residents have an enjoyable first impression of San Jose is critical to ensuring return trips to both iconic locations and to ensuring our hotel and restaurant Partners rooms and tables are filled and our dow
ntown is lifely this has been a phenomenal week with Nvidia and the conference and that would be wonderful to repeat over and over again we are painfully aware that while office residents are important to our downtown they alone will not be the savior of our City's future the focus on making San Jose's downt downtown a unique and interesting place to visit and live will continue to need our attention in this budget furthers that progress process while we've made Headway on the vendor issue in do
wntown we must Embrace thank you next speaker hello my name is Janella rones and I here on behalf of Silicon Valley Council of nonprofits a co-convenor of the nonprofit RAC Equity action leadership Coalition known as real this is the second year in a row that the mayor's budget message demand we hold off on real solutions to our housing crisis for temporary solutions sweeps tents and Congress shelters don't homelessness and offer minimal relief our dollars are limited and is imperative that they
are invested in permanent affordable housing we are concerned and surprised mayor will once again try to get measure e funds undermine the will of the voters and jeopardize affordable housing development that address the root of the problem our urgent need to improve Community safety is also now reflected in the mayor's budget message and disregards unanimous will of the council to invest more in alternative response and violence prevention these are public safety issues that fall under the jur
isdiction of the city we support items 2 4 and six in the memo for Council Members Ortiz jimenz and Candelas specifically their calls to project measure e funds sparing affordable housing changing house City distribute Park fees and investing in the success of trust thank you thank you next speaker hello my name is Mera Martinez and I a lifelong resident of San Jose I grew up in districts 5 and 8 and I currently live in District 3 um I'm with svcn and the real Coalition and I have worked in loca
l nonprofits and arts organizations the mayor's budget message does not reflect the urgent need to improve Community safety and invest in violence prevention we must not disinvest from measure e the city's only reliable source for funding new affordable housing it is the city's responsibility to ensure Public Safety and create permanent housing so we must protect measure e funds and invest in real solutions that will support our community not make it harder to live in San Jose additionally as an
artist and arts Advocate I believe the city must also support the Arts sector affordable housing violence prevention and support for the Arts is necessary in creating an equitable and welcoming City for our community to thrive in thank you thank you next speaker uh good morning may Council uh Jeffrey can of working Partnerships as we focus on homelessness let's not forget to think about root causes and not just symptoms I want to talk about an industry where one in N workers are in California u
h are homeless uh where one in nine homeless workers in California work in where 85% of workers experience wage theft where 93% of workers don't even know their rights on the job I'm talking about the 13,000 San Jose fast food workers uh workers who you hear from from today who have put their lives at risk to be able to ensure they can get a paycheck to keep a roof over their fam's heads but I want to talk about the root cause of fear uh I want to talk about fear of an industry that is fighting
hard to ensure that workers don't know their rights on the job that is hired you know four of the largest contract Lobby firms in the city that's brought corporate lobbyists that has formed a shady pact all that to try to scare you away from trying to think about working with workers to find Common Sense solutions to allow workers to know their rights that they don't don't have to have their wages stolen they don't have to face abuse that there are things that they can do I I hope this thank you
um before the next speaker begins um I'm going to call another 10 speakers the um this set requires an a Spanish interpreter um Carla kok um the last name is Munoz and it looks like the first name starts with a z but I can't read the handwriting um Vicente mayoral and urina Guzman go ahead hello my name is Dana elneil I'm a resident of district 7 I'm also here on behalf of sbcn and the real Coalition for the second year in a row the mayor's budget message demands we sacrifice real solutions to
our housing crisis in favor of old ideas such as sweeps tents and congregant shelters that we sto doing for a reason because they don't end homelessness and they offer minimal relief we have to treat our limited dog to invest in permanent housing as a precious resource and we are concerned and surprised that the mayor would once again try to gut measure e and undermine the will of the voters the mayor's budget message does not reflect our urgent need to improve Community safety or the unanimous
will of the council to invest more in alternative response and violence prevention these are public safety issues that fall under the city's jurisdiction the budget should include funding to add an additional trust the safety and well-being of residents is the responsibility of San Jose you can't say the city should spend money on police and then argue Community safety isn't your job we essentially have one trust team for the entire city and the data shows that isn't enough thank you thank you n
ext speaker and make sure you alternate like pause okay wait is her mic on wait is her mic on good afternoon members of the council my name is Carla koyok I am the leader a community leader uh with Luna and I am here to raise my voice for almost 13,000 workers in the fast food industry here in the city of San Jose and I am here in support of creating a law a work law for just a just work law for the fast food workers uh for years we have been fighting to receive basic benefits in any kind of job
for every worker I'm sorry [Music] corre the time has come uh for um the priority to be made for the workers that are firstline workers for the fast food industry we are most uh most of us are um women and people of color and daily we are facing in uh work instability and conditions insecure working conditions thank you next speaker sorry sorry Tony can we just get the translation of that last last no she just what she just spoke we should at least hear the end of it could you mind translating
the final piece thank you okay no problem thank you uh we believe we firmly believe that the just law for workers in the fast food industry can be a a force of transformation a guarantee for workers who will know their rights and they will also know training as well as time off paid San has the opportunity to be a leader in the in empowering these workers in the fast food industry good afternoon members of the council my name is Sada Muno I am a community leader with Luna and this afternoon uh p
lease join me with the 13,000 fast food workers that are fighting for the just uh workers the for the law for just workers of fast food industry aside from the multi-million dollar uh gains that the industry makes the cooks and the cashiers have to bear irregular working hours uh that they rob their salaries sexual harassment and other uh generalization in this workplace okay it is of very of the highest importance for the council to pass the just work law for fast food workers to assure that ea
ch each worker will be protected and their rights will be uh respected as well as that they feel like if they are valued thank you thank you good afternoon members of the council my name is urina GMI and I am a community organizer with Luna this afternoon I'm here in support of the 13,000 workers in the fast food industry so to assure that as of today that they can go ahead and have work rights guaranteed and creating the new law of just work law for fast food workers daily my um work co-workers
suffer uh harassment and being uh fired because without having the opportunity of being able to defend themselves without knowing their rights and against their employers once you can go ahead and uh guarantee the workers that they will know their rights their trainings and as well receiving time off paid San Jose can have the opportunity to be the leader of empowerment of these workers in the Fast Food Industries the majority of the lives and together with their families and the communities pl
ease follow us in our fight again to be able to guarantee a labor a labor environment full of dignity and security thank you thank you thank you next speaker I'd also like to call down Laura Herrero Ramona Martinez and ariceli penol Loa okay good afternoon members of the council my name is vienta mayoral I am a community leader with Luna and we are here calling out to the city council of sanos to defend our our security and our well-beings for the workers that are here I am here to support in he
lping to create uh the fair law for work workers in the fast food industry as well as uh this would be to support them as the priorities and the in talking about the and this is in regards to the uh budget of this year for years the workers in the fast food industry have suffered discrimination and work violence it the time has come for the city of San Jose to take responsibility in protecting more than thir the more than the 13,000 human beings that are on the front line uh we imagine a city in
which all of us independently in while working in our occupation have access to basic work rights and the information necessary to be able to empower us in our workplace also we continue to fight together to for the work Justice for All of of us because we all deserve this thank you thank you next [Music] speaker I'd also like to call down Liliana Montoya Maria Herrera and janith Molina uh good afternoon my name is Roma uh Roma um Ramona Martinez and uh good afternoon Council I very happy to be
here with you today I have worked in the fast food industry for the past 17 years you don't oh I'm very happy that the people that uh were before me that they have been recognized okay and this is why uh you know for in the I work in the fast food and also I would I am requesting that you as well recognize me as a person and to value my rights since at times at work we do not get all the information and sometimes if we do receive the information it's in English and we do not understand it and t
his is why today I request that you please value US and give us the rights for training and to give us a a better job because we are marginalized people and we as well are humans and we deserve to be valued thank you next speaker no time m uh good afternoon council members uh my name is Elana Toya and I come here before you uh in regards to making history what I mean uh it's I feel like I'm a symbol like uh I speak of a um Nelson Mandela I think of South Africa in which he did not give up even t
hough he was in jail for 27 years this is like something that was in made into history and I am here hoping that you can also make history in supporting us in our work that one minute is is up uh thank you very much next speaker I'd also like to call down Carmen Torres James khani Andre Padia and Claudia Romero [Music] [Music] [Music] uh good afternoon council members my name is Maria ernandez and I'm a fast food oh um my name is Maria errera and I'm a fast food worker my complaint as well as My
worry is that uh I have to work and uh sometimes I'm sick and I don't get PID time off if I take time off and maybe when I'm starting to get better they call me to come back to work full-time and sometimes I have to go into cold places and stuff like that so that that is my uh what I'm hoping for is that that be addressed and that is my complaint and my worry thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon my name is Carin Torres and I represent zyen Services immigrant rights and education netw
orks we have for 36 years been an advocate for the Immigrant Community Helping Empower them to to help themselves siren urges you to support the fast food fair work ordinance despite existing wage protections many workers remain unaware of their rout of their rights and lack the ability to advocate for themselves many of the constituents you represent include immigrant and migrant workers and refugees implementing this ordinance will take a significant step towards empowering workers and ensurin
g tangible benefit benefits for our community siren stands with the thousands of fast food workers in support of the fast food fairw work ordinance thank you thank you next speaker hello members of the council uh my name is Andre Padia and I am a fast food worker and I'm in support of the fast food for work ordinance I believe deserve I I believe that we deserve to be respected and empowered for our hard work too often we are mistreated and neglected by managers and corporate members the fast fo
od for work ordinance will Empower us to be treated with respect and ensure that we uh every worker is valued if we have the power to ensure fast workers can have a healthier life I believe we should do everything in our power to make this possible with the support of you council members we can make this possible the lives of 133,000 fast food workers can be vastly improved by this ordinance and also the communities let's Empower us the workers because we are the roots of this Society thank you
thank you next speaker I'd ALS also like to call Kayla Gomez Lucilla Ortiz Isabelle Olas kuaga um to come on down um I'll also call Hector Hernandez and Gabriel manrique and if your if your name has been called you can come and sit in this first row that says reserved that is reserved for the people who have been called hello uh my name is Isabelle olaga um I'm from the California Nurses Association I'm here today to say we are disappointed we're disappointed that this city council can hear what
our fast food workers are going through and yet you still lack the courage to support them why because it's not a popular vote maybe because they don't speak English as well as a lot of people do San Jose is a Union City and all workers from firefighters to janitors from nurses and fast food workers should be supported and have their rights protected thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon council members uh my name is Gabriel manrique Community organizers with Luna we support items 2 f
our and six in the memo from Council Members Ortiz Jimenez and Candelas in particular their calls to protect measy funds for sporing affordable housing changing the way the cities distributes part fees and investing in trust we have to treat or Limited to invest in permanent housing as a precious resource and we are concerned that mayor will once again try to plan their measure and sabotage the will of the borders in addition We join in support of the more than 30,000 fat workers to ensure that
their labor rights are guaranteed from now on and the creation of that fast food fair work ordinance by ensuring workers know their rights training and pay time off San Jose has the opportunity to lead and empowering fast food workers and improving their lives along with their families and communities we will continue Contin fighting to guarantee identified and safe work environment and for affordable housing thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon council members uh my name is Hector He
rnandez I'm a community leader with Luna I'm here today support the creation of the fast food work or audience sorry about that fast food workers are a vital um contributor to the city's labor labor for sorry and economy they play a crucial role in serving meals to tens of thousand of people uh driving the profits of the billion dollar fast food sector however Frontline fast food workers who are disor wom and people cter often grappled with job disabilities and unsafe working conditions despite
these and the despite the industry's billion dollar profits cook cooks and cashiers Endor erratic hours wage death sexual harassment and other perverse work overplace issues we firmly believe that the fast food workers um for work ordance can be a transformative Force by guaranteeing workers know the right uh the right training and pay time off S has opportunity to lead the empowered fast food workers and improving their lives and alongside their families thank you next speaker I'm going to call
um dilia espa Angelica Garcia and Cynthia Martinez good afternoon Council my name is Luc Ortiz I am the political director at Silicon Valley rising and I'm here also to stand in support of fast food workers and ask you to please add them into the budget message um you know it's funny that we're here on women's History Month um you know with taking up this issue a lot of people celebrate by going to happy hours or doing honorariums and stuff like that and celebrating of wom's when in reality wha
t we're talking about is the people that are represented here the fast food workers who literally put their lives at risk every day on the job and so it's really important for us to actually stand up and do what's right history shows that what's right is not always what's popular but we must take I believe that government's job is to protect those who are most vulnerable and your job today is to do that with the fast food workers who are here pleading for you to for them to have the basic rights
and so I hope you do what's right even if it's not always what's popular thank you thank you next speaker and we'll need The Interpreter um hello my name is Cynthia Martinez I want to ask everyone who supports loer rights training for fast food workers to please stand up for a moment can you please stand up I want to ask everyone who supports are right to earn a few days of paid time off to spend with her families to stand up please stand up [Music] I want to ask the city council hearing for th
ese Lobby L that we should be learning about our rights what do you think about our buses that not want us to know about our rights why do you think they're taking you every day to say no not to tell workers about their [Music] rights why do you think they don't want us to know what to do about a w St why do you think they don't want us to know what you turn the mic back on your time is up just finish this translation food C okay your time is up next [Applause] speaker go ahead ma'am it's your o
pportunity to [Music] speak gracias good afternoon my name is deia sp I'm a fast food worker and I've been that for the past 3 years I'm here uh to support the new law that we are asking for you to go ahead and pass because there's a lot of Injustice a lot of violence and this is what I'm here to support this afternoon thank you sorry I'd also like to call down Mabel oron do rayen Pamela Mayha and diania sasio and while we wait for them to come down I'd also like to call yudi Castro Ramona Marti
nez and Jose carasco again you can um if you heard your name please come sit in the front row where it says reserved first person the microphone begins speaking thank you go ahead [Music] [Music] good good afternoon good afternoon my name is donina seaso and I work in the at McDonald's at the plant in San Jose the only thing that I am questing is that you please put security at my work because I work at night and we would like for you all to please help us uh you know to the whole entire Council
thank you thank you next speaker [Music] uh good afternoon my name is uh Mel or and I am a worker of fast [Music] food today I am here as a voice for everybody and we I would like to say that we all need our jobs but we also need our employers to respect [Music] us this this is why I'm asking today for you to support [Music] us and to go ahead and be able to uh give us the the the power because for our rights as workers and more than anything as people muchas thank you so much thank you next sp
eaker good uh my name is Jose carasco and I work for uh the Carl junr Industries yes uh yes and I'm hoping that you go ahead and support the law because so that we can go ahead and have our worker rights as we know them and to have a set schedule and so that they don't take our hours away because if they have a set schedule and also if they don't don't take our hours away this means that we will not have less vacation time or sick time I hope that you keep in mind all those workers that feed man
y people gracias thank you thank you next speaker I'd also like to Call Tuan van um axis Condominiums Jose Paredes and Marcelo Tel [Music] spe okay uh good afternoon my name is uh Yuri kro and I work at Subway I'm a fast food worker and today I'm here requesting your support for the fast food industry for the rights for the workers and also for us to have more security thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon mayor and Council I'm here today representing the access condominium community i
n strong support of the March budget message we understand the budget shortfall presents challenges but we need to continue focusing on the basics ending Street homelessness reducing crime enhancing Public Safety both real and perceived reducing blight and streamlining City process C es that hinder uh enhancing the city's vibrancy we applaud the council's collaboration and support of these goals and we are seeing results however there is much more that needs to be done we encourage you to keep t
he Back to Basics initiatives moving forward evening evening even excuse me in these challenging times thank you thank you next speaker yeah good afternoon mayor vice mayor and council members my name is to Van I'm a resident of District N9 I live in Branham and Chavis neighborhood over 30 years and I am very concerned about homelessness in our city I see people live on the streets nearby The Creeks under over passes and all the places as well so I'm here today to ask you to support the mayor bu
dget message which will help us to get people in the faster so please vote to pass the message thank you thank you next speaker I'd also like to call down Carlos Oberon Austina jeu and Raul balum good afternoon cancer my name is Marcelo and I'm working for fat food liover 30 years and uh we never see the Hy workers to be get a better better benefits and I I think it's a time to guys can approve to have you ask to know their all we approvals we need to do and and out for workers like vacations li
ke sickly days so I'm here to support those workers thank you thank you next thank you next speaker [Music] okay good afternoon um my name is Austina I work at UH Taco Bell and I would like uh to know more regards to my rights as well as and and for my co-workers as well as as for you as well and for no more uh abuse for the workers in the fast food industry as well as more security thank you thank you next speaker isul good afternoon good afternoon my name is UMAS [Music] UMAS uh thank you for
allowing us to be here and um I would like for you to support us here with the fast food industry and I would only like to know you know in regards to our rights as fast food workers to know our rights like the managers for them to give us like uh information in regards to our rights as fast food workers managers [Music] because many of us many of the managers the store managers do not tell us about our rights and so like if we have an accident or if we cut a finger or something like that thank
you thank you next speaker good afternoon my name is Jose Paredes and I work for the McDonald's franchise at work uh we are facing a lot of abuses because we do not know our rights our employers do not want us to know about our rights because they do not want to be responsible for their workers um so support the fast food workers not the [Music] lobbyists support the fast food workers and uh please the training for the workers and their rights and their time off paid thank you I'd also like to c
all oisa Patty me men ly wait hold on hold on hold on hold on oisa Patty me melin and Tamara Chavez or Nicole Balo both names are on the card okay go ahead sir good afternoon my name is Carlos I'm a fast food worker and I'm here to request your support for us to be able to have training in regards to to our rights so that we can know them better thank you thank you next speaker hello mayor and councel I'm AA posi advocacy coordinator at asian-americans for Community involvement and also a member
of the real Coalition while we appreciate the city's efforts to address the housing crisis the proposed Solutions of sweeps tents and congregate shelters offer minimal relief and do not address the root causes of homelessness as an organization that provides health behavior health and wellness services to vulnerable communities we understand the direct link between housing and health outcomes we believe that everyone deserves a safe and stable place to call home and that and that investing in p
ermanent affordable housing is a long-term solution that addresses the root causes of the issue therefore we urge you to consider investing in permanent affordable housing as a key component of the city's strategy to end homelessness and improve the health outcomes of our communities thank you next speaker go ahead Mike good afternoon mayor and members of city council my name is Magna and I'm with the Asian law Alliance I'm also a member of the real coalition I'm here to speak against the effort
s to divert funding from permanent Housing Solutions to short-term Solutions temporary shelters encampment sweeps at the expense of permanent housing projects will not address the core issues of the housing and homelessness crisis and we need a comprehensive approach to address housing instability and the growing population of the unhoused um and we also need to be fully committed to permanent Housing Solutions and ensuring we have enough affordable housing options for community members and fami
lies in San Jose which is why we're asking the city to preserve our measure e funds for permanent Solutions and not temporary measures thank you thank you next speaker I'm also going to call down um R ralda alkazar Evelyn salorio and baldio Franco go ahead thank you good afternoon my name is Tamar Chavez and I'm the regional director at path Santa Clara County this Council and mayor relent L focus on ending homelessness is historic you have added life-saving interm shelter beds with succeed when
staff by skilled professionals trained in trauma informed care the proposed enhancements to homelessness prevention like targeted financial assistance or family reunification will protect people from Ever enduring homelessness and we can say for firsthand experience that our neighbors living in unsheltered along the rivers need more support to leave the dangerous conditions there the success of all these proposals however is completely dependent on the avail ility of permanent housing the balan
ce investments in measure E help San Jose become the largest city in California to actually decrease homelessness in 2023 now more than ever we need to prioritize all available dollars for affordable and permanent Supportive Housing we are committed to working with you all on strategies to strengthened Partnerships with the county reduce the costs of constructing permanent housing and raise new Revenue so we can overcome this crisis sustainably for you thank you next speaker Ral aluz good aftern
oon my name is romalda Casa Cruz and I'm here to uh let you know a little bit of what US fast food workers are going through at our jobs [Music] and my um I work at Wendy's and I've been working there since like about six I started working there six years ago and since I've worked there I would just like to let you know that my rights as a worker have been ran over I've been a victim of of uh wage um theft and I cannot take uh my uh I cannot take my days or my my sick hours because they won't pa
y them and um also uh they we don't have days off like to be able to take care of my husband my husband got extremely ill and I was not able to take care of him nor at my house or at the hospital uh and I also believe that the time has come for our rights that they um they put people that are outside of the company not in the same fast food industry and they come um like external trainings and they go ahead and train Us in regards to our rights thank you thank you next speaker also Rosa Vasquez
Fernando KU kubis and Martha [Music] Hernandez hello my name is Evelyn and I work in the fast food industry I come here for to request that you respect us on our days [Music] off [Music] and for I also request for them for you to please give us more security for us for the days that because there our lives are in danger gracias thank you thank you next speaker I'd also like to call Juan Gutierrez and Laura Reyes [Music] hello my name is H Rosa Vasquez and I work for McDonald's for 23 years uh we
do not have a a week of vacation and I'm here because we need your help to help us so that we can get a week of vacation thank you thank you next speaker [Music] hola hello my name is Laura laa Reyes and I work for Burger King and in Burger King there have been many unpleasant things that have happened because we do not know uh our own rights I I was not able to know how to be able to defend myself uh they had me working for many hours while I was having a miscarriage this is why I am here uh f
or you to support us with our rights and so that we know how to defend [Music] ourselves because for them our lives are not important but for our children they are [Music] uh this is why I'm here in hopes that I may be able to count on your support that they give us trainings to all of the workers so that we know how to defend ourselves and not to have to go through um unfortunate desired things thank you thank you okay I don't see anybody queued up so I'm going to call some more names Esmeralda
varelis from destination home Maria Maldonado Richard Tien George from Mont Vista HOA I can't pronounce your last name so if if I said any of your names please come up to the microphone because I'm calling names but I'm not seeing a lot of movement and Tony as folks are coming down would you also mind just repeating for those in the wing room that they will have an opportunity to participate and how that will work I know we've had some new people join in the wing thank you um so if you're in th
e wing room I have a bunch of speaker cards that you've already turned in um so you will get called and then um we're going back periodically and checking for additional speaker cards um I'll I will be getting to you great and then um as people sometimes when people speak in the main room they leave and Security will start bringing people over from the wing into the council chambers as we get room okay thank you hello esala velas with destination home we are deeply concerned at the possibility o
f diverting measy funding dedicated to affordable housing production the lack of affordable housing options is a serious threat to our community 70,000 families in our community can afford to pay rent and this is is a primary factor driving more of our neighbors into homelessness every day we appreciate the council's interest in adding more shelter options but a narrow focus on expanding shelter alone will not give us the results we wish to make meaningful change and progress we need a multiface
ted approach that includes both shelter and permanent housing we cannot continue to pit one need against the other let's come up with the balance plan that advances both strategies and start exploring how we can raise new Revenue to address both of this community needs thank you good afternoon my name is Maria Maldonado and it's an honor to be here today more than nine years organizing fast food workers um the horrors I have heard about W St sexual harassment retaliation too many times workers i
n fast food don't have a place to speak up about this in injustices out of fear of being ignored or was retaliates against them workers need a safe place to learn about their rights and learn how to hold employers who break the law accountable most of the stories I hear are about bosses who value profits more than safety of their workers like Lara just mentioned today you don't just see workers you see children you see families to being affected when workers can take P time off or I refuse to ta
ke sick days these workers and their families deserve better they work hard and they deserve dignity and safety at work San Jose can be an example for how we treat and protect fast food workers it's time to leave your time is up thank you next speaker next speaker I'd also like to call Oscar and wascar cast um hi there my name is Rich T and I'm a franchise owner uh of two McDonald's restaurants uh one of them in San Jose district one came from Vietnam with nothing with my parents and saved and m
y dream was to be a business owner um we you know ever since day one a year and a half ago we've increased uh uh our labor by 21% and added jobs rewards bonuses and this year uh January and April it's going to be another 18% think about that that's that's 39% of Labor increase um it makes no sense for San Jose to add additional duplicate ordinances and and you know just regulations please protect the locally owned sose restaurants and vote no on any new uh mandates thank you thank you next speak
er George shich mon Vista HOA we support mayor Mayan's budget message and thank Dev Davis for her work on that budget monov vista's 750 residents face the latus Creek in Midtown district 6 every day we see homeless activity including Petty criminal activity as homeless enter our property stealing our water electricity packages and decorative items on the porches this winter we had to close our free library because the homeless were stealing the books and using them for kindling residents met wit
h mentally ill homeless who acost us with a bat expose themselves to women we don't feel safe as a result we now spend $10,000 a month on security guards and repairs to our property caused by illegal activities increasing the already High Cost of Living for our residents please support the budget thank you next speaker he me is it on yeah all right hello everyone my name is osano um I'm deeply concerned about redirecting measure e funds away from preservation and new developments of affordable h
ousing we know that uh oh I believe that managing the problem through this interim housing it helps for a short time we're just going to be here stuck again it's going to cost more money than we have lighter down the line after those 10 years so I do see that we should be addressing the root cause of this problem and I also see the home the program U home away or bus when we bust houseless folks outside say what's going to happen when they do when they go back home are they going to get the serv
ices that they're really going to need because we don't have the funds to maintain it here so we're not it just seems that this is a little uh a little not really thought out fully when we're thinking about addressing the houselessness problem we addressing about the issues that we have right now and we should be leading the country when it comes to addressing these problems because we can thank you next speaker good afternoon Council my name is wascar Castro with the working Partnerships USA uh
we are deeply concerned that yet again the mayor's March March budget message uh proposes to shift measure e funds away from affordable housing production our community is facing a severe affordable housing crisis as we all know the exorbitant cost of housing in our city has left approximately 70,000 families red burden and struggling to Simply get by our insufficient supply of affordable housing and a housing landscape that creates grave housing insecurity for renters lays the ground for vario
us impacts including increased homelessness we cannot lose sight of that without opportunities for permanently affordable sources of housing temporary solutions will be just that we urge Council to protect affordable housing funding in this year's budget and to collaborate in a genuine pragmatic manner to develop a real plan for funding and sustaining a comprehensive approach to our housing and homelessness crisis thank you very much thank you I have Josie Mooney um the last name looks like Krau
ss Mike Krauss maybe so Josie Mooney Mike Krauss Bob Brownstein Joanna Garcia Malik a Regis so first person to the microphone please come up everybody else please sit in the front row no well good after coun councilman and mayor my name is Mike Krauss and I'm the president of the penitencia neighborhood association um penitencia neighborhood association is located in North San Jose consists of approximately uh about 872 households there I'm here to voice our support for the mayor's Matt M Matt m
an's March budget Pro uh message for the fiscal year 2425 um in its entirety uh as a you know as budget trying to trying to find any budget it's difficult whether it's for a home for a for a city and you have to make hard choices the priority issues identified in the memorandum are consistent with the priorities that PNA uh wants thank you very much thank you next speaker also Edgar Hern andz Juan Garcia and Beatrice Avala hello my name is Joanna and I'm here today to support fast food workers b
ecause like many of you I also depend on fast food working parents busy students a lot of us in this community but hearing the stories of workers facing not knowing what to do on their job when they're feeling ill feeling like they're forced to stay in the job I cannot continue supporting the industry if it's going to look like this I really hope that San Jose can be the leader to improve this industry and make this job a good job for not only the parents and young adults that work in the field
but also the families that depend on them thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon my name is Josie Mooney I am the deputy executive director of SEIU 10:1 we represent about 60,000 workers in Northern California including here in the city of San Jose I've had the opportunity to sit down with some of you in the last few months and I very much appreciate those of you who have taken a stand for justice for the fast food workers here I can't tell you enough how important it is that you listen
to the voices of the workers and know in your heart that they speak the truth about the conditions in which they currently work it is simply unacceptable I have a story like Lara's except my story ended completely differently she had a Carriage at work because the boss refused to let her leave thank you your time is up thank you next speaker next [Music] speaker good afternoon in a tough budget year you can't give residents everything that they want but you can give us the truth interim housing
is neither physically or organizationally designed for the long term without substantial construction of long-term affordable units sose will not be creating emergency interim housing but rather permanent deteriorating shelters and if the city balances its budget assuming other organizations will finance our permanent deteriorating shelters then we will be budgeting using Phantom revenues and that is fiscal irresponsibility finally city leaders should not support an industry disinformation camp
aign against a fast food workers ordinance that in fact is neither costly or unfair or damaging to small businesses give us thank you next speaker oh is Juan Antonio Garcia uh hello my name is Juan Antonio Garcia I work in fast food here in San Jose and I'm here to request uh your support for fast food [Music] workers for uh I was recently injured on the work at work on my back and I had to continue working like that my employers don't care when we're injured on the job and this is why we're ask
ing for support thank you thank you next [Music] speaker hello my name is Beatrice AIA I am a fast food worker and I am here because we need to learn earn our rights as fast food workers gracias thank you thank you next speaker I'd also like to call down Ava Lopez amilda aroyo Lords Mahia and filberto Sanchez go ahead um hi I'm Malik reges I work for fast food and I'm here asking um and to help us with our um know our rights and our laws and safer work environments for everyone who works fast fo
od thank you thank you next speaker uh [Music] good afternoon good afternoon good afternoon my name is IMA Tes and I'm sorry uh my name is IMA aroyo and I've worked for McDonald's for the past 18 years we are fighting for them to respect our rights because we get sick and we don't get paid for when we are sick and so when we try to speak to the managers what they do is they take away our hours yeah thank you that's all thank thank you thank you next [Music] speaker darly um via mizar please come
on down too good afternoon my name is l Mahia and I've worked in the fast food industry for since about 20 years I would like for you to focus as well and seeing uh the restaurants uh the fast food restaurants uh in [Music] um because right now we are in a position in which um our rights they're not [Music] valid thank you we would like for you to uh please focus on us fast food workers because we feel forgotten thank you and have a good week good good afternoon sorry next speaker also Janet Co
kaano and Abby win Ashley win sorry come on down good afternoon my name is Guadalupe Sanchez I work in the fast food for about 20 years and I'm requesting for your uh support thank you thank you so much thank you next speaker good afternoon my name is Anna Lopez I work in McDonald's and I come before you so that you through you I we will be able to be supported because so that there will no longer be any discrimination because what we want is for them to respect our rights and we do not want th
em to take any more hours away from us much thank you so much thank you next speaker Ted zafiris come on down and rathi and Allison [Music] Ling okay uh good afternoon my name is yth uh goana I have worked at McDonald's for 11 years I come before you because I represent my co-workers as well as all the workers uh for all the rights that we would like um as you know we work there but um we would like for there to be work uh with time off paid a 401k for for our old age and security at our work be
cause I work and during the day as well as the night uh thank you so much may God bless all of you and if you could please take um notice to the issue at hand thank you graci thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon my name is B Sanchez I work for Jack in the Box Enterprises and I'm here requesting your for you to support our law so that they can go ahead and recognize our rights and to give us paid time off uh what's most important here is that they respect our rights uh in my case my mo
ther passed [Music] away the supervisor wasn't allowing me to leave so I left and and she fired me because of that and so I asked her to pay me my sick time off because I've been working at Jack In The Box for 20 years uh and you know I've never had any uh sick time off paid that they chose I ask you please to please take notice of what of the issue at hand because they do not value our rights and I do know that you can thank you so much yes you can thank you next speaker good afternoon mayor an
d council members I am Ashley WN from Asian law Alliance I'm here to support the fast food fairw workk ordinance while there has been claims by the fast food industry that the ordinance would negatively impact small mom and pop businesses the law exclusively targets companies with over 30 establishments which clearly do not fit the mom and pop business model we need you as our local representatives to stand with work ERS who are your constituents who voted for you and who put your trust to prote
ct them if our goal is genuine economic revital reducing wealth inequality homelessness prevention and neighborhood Prosperity we must prioritize the empowerment of our working people and not falsely use small local businesses as a scap goat to not meet the needs of fast food workers thank you so much for your time and consideration thank you next speaker also come on down Emily Anne Ramos and Manuel Salazar good afternoon mayor and council members my name is Ted zeris and I am here to strongly
oppos the costly restaurant ordinance I'm a franchisee of a national restaurant chain I'm a local business owner and I own and operate two stores in San Jose with about 50 total employees I follow all state and local laws I'm not a multi-millionaire but on the contrary uh I have been struggling to stay in business um I have operated in San Jose since 2020 and since opening I have been operating at a loss and I'm scared I won't survive in San Jose especially with fast act coming in a couple weeks
as a franchisee of a large franchise Corporation I am the small business owner I am responsible for all my loans I'm responsible for all my leases I have personal guarante all those thank you next speaker good afternoon Allison singani with Silicon Valley at home uh in the mayor's budget message he tells us that city has invested 256 $6 million between measure e and other sources to support the creation of more than 1500 affordable and permanent Supportive Housing units since 2020 that is a one
-time investment of just $165,000 of City money per affordable home and these are permanent full apartments with kitchens bathrooms and in many cases multiple bedrooms serving individuals and families in our communities for decades to come the latest emergency interim shelters are 200,000 to 20 $50,000 simply to build and that does not count the ongoing operating costs each of these affordable homes leverages state federal and private funds to bring hundreds of millions of dollars of investment
into San Jose and will continue to be an asset serving our communities for decades to come please preserve the city's measure e dollars for permanent affordable housing thank you thank you next speaker okay good afternoon honorable mayor and council members I'm a renter in San Jose and would like to bring your attention to increasing rent burden in our community the lack of affordable housing options is a serious threat to our community 70,000 families in our community are rent burdened and it i
s the primary factor driving displacement and pushing more of our neighbors into homelessness every day we all agree that we must act with urgency to bring bring our neighbors in from the streets and into permanent homes however we are deeply concerned that the proposed priorities in the mayor's budget message are neither fully reflective of the needs of the city nor sustainable over time we ask that you continue your commitment to addressing the crisis of homelessness and displacement by mainta
ining measur e spending plan that supports both the provision of shelter and the creation of homes people can per uh permanently afford rather than putting solution against one another we must seek new thank you next speaker I would also like to call down Regina Celestine Williams and Javier Hernandez go ahead go ahead oh okay great uh good afternoon Mr Mayor Madame vice mayor and council members my name is Emily Anne Ramos with SB at home and the housing this working group and the real Coalitio
n so coming down your policy pipeline is a tenant preference policy it is a very good policy that targets new affordable housing for those in our communities and those who are at most risk of displacement however by diverting funds that we need to develop the affordable housing uh we weaken the efficacy of this policy so as we look at addressing the homeless as we look at uh addressing homelessness in our community we must do more than just manage it we must work to bring people out of homelessn
ess by creating more affordable housing and preventing our families from going into homelessness by investing in preservation and anti-displacement policies homelessness is a housing problem every analysis shows that the rate of homelessness are a reflection of high and unaffordable rents and not the rates of addiction or mental illness or even poverty um thank you so much for your time thank you next speaker also Brian Hol come on down harsh guy and Catherine Aro good afternoon council members
in the face of challenging Financial conditions securing funding for residential developments has become notably difficult prioritizing streamlining of approval processes for housing projects meeting objective standards coupled with initiatives to lessen fees and taxes and expedite building permits has become crucial additionally enhancing the Urban Village planning process achieving blanket SQL clearances uh for these are commendable actions towards creating more conductive environment for deve
lopment with all that said uh it is critical to acknowledge that market rate housing alone will not sufficiently address the depth of affordability needed for a community while luxury apartments filtering may have offered some relief over time this approach will take decades to trickle down to lower rent levels therefore it is clear that market rate developments alone cannot meet the reg demand for housing that working people can afford today this is where the city's inclusionary housing ordinan
ce plays a pivotal role despite adding marginal cost into development it remains our most efficient tool ensuring that lower middle income renters can access affordable housing options thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon mayor and council members my name is Javier and I I I am a IHSS provider in San Jose City District 4 represented by counil member David hen I'm here with my brothers and sisters from SE IU 2015 representing California's long-term care workers to ask for your support
and protecting workers by including the fast food fair work orance and the budget has care workers we know what what it's like to work long and difficult hours and we know people working in the fast food industry often thank you your time is up also come on down Olivia Ortiz Aurora Solis marel picato and osar um Oscar Polo go ahead hello everyone my name is Harsh Raj guy I own three fast food restaurants in the city of San Jose uh my father came to this country 30 years ago and started in a Burg
er King kitchen uh most of the operators that you're going to meet here today are immigrants and people of color men and women of people uh of color uh I just wanted to say that we're not billionaires and we're not a corporate Lobby we're small business owners um first of all I also want to say that my livelihood and my success is dependent on the people that work for me all these amazing people in purple shirts they work for us and and their well-being is important to us because without them we
wouldn't be successful and I wouldn't be able to put food on the table for my for my children as you know the state has passed a $20 minimum wage in order for our business to survive we're going to have to take price increases and cut hours uh that affects low-income people 20% of our sales in San Jose come from EBT SNAP for people who don't have access to kitchens we're going to have to replace people with computers and artificial intelligence in order to keep our business alive so I'm I'm I'm
asking you guys to uh keep this out of our city uh we've got a lot of headwinds coming for our business and I want to make sure that we keep jobs for thank you next speaker good after afternoon members of the council my name is Aurora Solis I live in district 7 and I am a community uh leader with Vos activos and I am here to ask that you assign measure e money the way it was assigned from the beginning this money was originally assigned for affordable housing it is not a secret that an affordab
le housing is needed in fact there are 70,000 families in our community that are rent burden and it is the primary factor driving displacement and more of our neighbors into homelessness every day however it is important to stress that housing is needed for families I kindly ask you that you leave affordable housing funds alone for this year and the years to come thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon my name is Olivia Ortiz um and I'm here to share my concerns we're deeply concerned th
at the mayor's March budget message once again proposed to shift Master E funding away from affordable housing production the lack of affordable housing optional is a serious threat to our community 70,000 families in our community are rent burdened and it is a primary factor driving displ and more of our neighbors into homelessness every day we appreciate the city the council interest in adding more shelters options in the city but our narrow focus on expanding shelters alone will not yeld resu
lts we must continue to build affordable housing as well instead of feeding one need against the other let's come up with a balanc plan that Advan both the Charities and start spting how are we can we can raise new Revenue to address both of the dire Community needs please protect affordable housing funding in this year's budget and let come together to develop a a real plan for the funding and sustaining a comprehensive approach to our housing thank you next speaker i' also I'm going to call a
few more names Stephanie Nino Guadalupe Sanchez um Morelia oranus go ahead great thank you good afternoon my name is Regina celestin Williams and I am a D3 resident for almost 10 years and the executive director of SV at home we appreciate all of the work that the city has done to provide shelter to those living unhoused this is a shared moral commitment but must be placed in our community context a providing more affordable housing has been in the top three priorities in the city's Focus area s
urvey for years this is noted in the council member from Ortiz candelis and Himes um what they didn't say is that providing affordable housing which has been left out is a much higher priority for San Jose's lower income residents and residents who are black latinx Vietnamese compared to other wealthier residents in the city these are our communities suffering under rent birth overcrowding and at risk of displacement and ending up un thank you next speaker okay I'm gonna I don't see anybody in t
he front row so I'm going to continue calling names I know a bunch of people just left um ulisa Jesus Solario John hail Hansa and last name is CH H us Chow from Burger King go ahead good afternoon my name is uh Mariela aranes and I have worked at McDonald's for 26 years here in San Jose I am here requesting your support uh for us to receive training to be able to know our rights because just like I myself and my other co-workers we do not know our rights [Music] um also um because we are request
ing that they do not take our hours away at work because this has been happening a lot they've been taking our my hours away in my case I think that one cannot survive just working 10 to 12 hours a week it's not enough money to be able to do that time is up next speaker good afternoon my name is juliea and I work inos uh I would like to please ask you urgently to please support um surveillance for us as fast food workers uh I've heard something in regards to the owners of the franchises that you
know they're not millionaires right uh but us here as workers what what we would like we would like respect security and more positive possibilities because that that's what we want to be secure that is all and I I'm hoping for every each and one of your support thank you thank you next speaker uh good afternoon my name is Jesus Oro and I'm a fast food worker and what I have experienced in my life is that there has been a lot of abuse of the workers in the fast food uh and there's a lot of uh s
alary wage theft and um they don't want to pay us for our days of of six days and I thank you very much for your support thank you thank you next speaker also come on down Jorge Airi um Joe I I can't read the last name it starts with an m m a r so Joe m are something um again Jorge Airi and Tina Lano or maybe it's Jim Lano sorry go ahead hi my name is John Haley I'm a franchise at burgar King and I own one bugar king and I've been in business over 20 years in my time we hire miners from 16 train
them local and became a doctor became engineer by having this restaurant ordinance we already could not afford $20 we're going to close and please vote no if you have we have following the rule everybody should call Labor Department um whatever we have you could not have sexual harassment policy we have they should follow that by having another law it's not good uh it's not a good business to close small business like us and I'm an immigrant I start from Africa and I have only work at the resta
urant cook and then became a franchisee so by working hard by following thank you next speaker I think that may have been Juan Lano on that that last name that I called go ahead hi my name is ala chow and I own the Burger King I'm individual small individual person I work in fast food for last 36 years and I worked 17 years as a cook dishwasher everything and become a franchisee saving a money now if we pass this law again we're going to have burden I have four Burger King and I had to close one
this year because I can't afford anymore and if you guys going to add up the more burden on us we will be closing all the stores soon so I really appreciate your help to Keep Us Alive and do that and I had found $100,000 in my Burger King somebody left it and I turned into the police on 5 years ago on my birthday I just want to bring it this to you guys that's honest person I am and we like we like to consider us to be survived thank you thank you next speaker also Elma Hernandez come on down a
nd Alysa Serano uh hello uh my name's and I uh I'm a district manager at a local uh with the local franchisee here in the here in San Jose uh I just want to strongly oppose my uh the opp opposition to the costly uh restaurant ordinance uh working in quick Quicks service for the past 20 years it's uh giv me the opportunity to build up and uh build a career with them uh and even become Partners you know um I mean as it it's been for the past three four years we've been struggling to make profits a
nd uh we're basically working for the banks landlords and the franchises so adding these extra costs is going to it's instead of bringing more jobs is going to help us it's going to close our down the businesses so uh please uh vote no on this measure it's not going to help anybody out thank you I just wanted to announce um I'm getting questions from the public on when they'll be called I don't know I have 74 more names to call um so just keep an ear out for your name I'm only calling people one
time um so if you hear your name come and sit in the front row and the next speaker can go ahead oh damn okay good afternoon my name is Juan an Lano and I'm I'm here with the South Bay Community Land Trust I strongly oppose the mayor's budget due to its short-term vision and no viable solutions for a low-income Community the mayor solution to addressing our housing crisis is to house our unhoused community in what is essentially a quick build prison this has not addressed the root cause of the
issue we need to protect our measure e funds and invest in preservation and the creation of affordable housing thank you hello city council my name is Alysa Serrano I'm a San Jose resident South bake Community Land Trust board member and representative for midpen housing a bay area and Coastal Regional affordable developer service provider and property manager midpen San Jose portfolio includes 14 properties with a 2003 unit project VTA Capital station in the pipeline this project is in partners
hip with VTA and Santa Clara County Office of Supportive Housing and will provide 20 203 affordable rental homes including 50 psh units and 50 units for extremely low-income households addressing a critical need for the community city funding is crucial for projects like this to leverage federal and state funding diverting measure e Revenue entirely to interim solutions could delay or scrap uh vital affordable developments I support the advocacy efforts of the San Jose preservation collaborative
focused on keeping residents housed in existing units the p line for these future preservation projects like Community Land Trust could also be inject thank you next speaker I'm also going to call down Daniela B Tony lamb Don copen and Kishon Kumar Go ahead hi my name is delar herandez I'm an organizer with South Bay Kress and a board member at Luna I'm also a District 5 resident I'm here to urge the city council to to support the fast food fairwork ordinance and a realign one of the mayor's Fo
cus areas in the budget proposal to better match the community's priorities despite the mayor's proposal the critical need for providing more affordable housing can no longer be overlooked the mayor's suggestion to redirect measure e funds away from affordable housing contradicts the community's demands for more affordable housing options with 70,000 ramp burden families in our Community the lack of affordable housing remains a serious threat contributing to displacement and homelessness by incr
easing measure e housing funds rather than reducing them we can take realistic step forward step forwards um towards addressing our housing challenges thank you thank you next speaker hi my name is Tony lamb and I'm a 40 43-year resident of San Jose and a refugee Vietnamese immigrant I live in District 4 and I'm a product of the Eastside Union School District through hard work and dedication and my love for the San Jose Community I'm living a dream of being an entrepreneur and a business owner a
nd not reporting to a corporate boss I own and operate two restaurants in San Jose and have two other businesses headquarters in San Jose my businesses provide over 60 jobs for the city as a proud local restaurant owner I'm pleased to be part of the fabric of our San Jose Community not only do we provide a place for families and friends to share a meal we provide jobs pay taxes and boost our local economy we're also local support local charities sports leagues and other community organization pl
ease don't chase more local restaurant out of town you will not only hurt us but you will hurt the whole Community we do not have unlimited funds and are trying to make a living ourselves thank you next speaker how's it going my name is uh kishan Kumar and I own and operate eight restaurants in San Jose I'm here to ENC urge the council members to please vote no on the costly uh restaurant ordinance as a local restaurant owner I value my employees and I try to do everything in my power to do righ
t by them but this costly restaurant ordinance goes too far if this ordinance passes I'll be forced to cut back employee hours or shut down my restaurants altogether which hurts us all and with the fast act coming up it makes no sense for the San Jose City Council to pass this ordinance that would hurt local restaurant owners when the new Statewide fast food Council was created to address these exact issues and when fast food workers are benefiting from the upcoming fast act with a 20 hour a $20
per hour minimum wage so please vote no on the uh costly restaurant ordinance thanks thank you next speaker I'm also come on down deepik Kumar sanjer Kumar and Lanny Lonnie Ballard good afternoon thank you everybody um I'm Don copen I'm the CEO of the San Jose Public Library foundation and I'm here to thank you for your investment in the library these last five years you can see the effort that you have put in and led for the education digital programs that have literally helped hundreds of tho
usands of people every single year to enhance their education and their Workforce opportunities it's critical at this time that you continue your support for these Suite of programs as well as for the libraries leadership in digital equity and empowerment together they both help the long-term improvements of our residents to be able to get out of homelessness to be able to secure Ure better and and better paying wages it is essential that the library remains well funded so that it can remain one
of the top programs in City departments as thank you next speaker hi my name is danela Valdivia and I'm a San Jose Native and I'm here to talk in support of fast food workers I can tell you from my own experience that working in the fast food industry is tough but I can guarantee you that every single day a San Jose fast food worker is not taking their breaks is getting retaliated against and has no way or has no idea how to navigate this situation the majority of fast food workers do not know
about their benefits such as sick pay paid family leave and a whole bunch of other benefits because they are being denied the right to know and understand their labor rights I urge city council to make the fast food work law part of the city's budget and priorities thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon my name is Brian H and I own two Vitality bows in San Jose I started the restaurants after my son died of a food allergy he was 18y old just graduated from high school and just celebrate
d 18th birthday we we went to a restaurant didn't know there was p there and he went aniflex and he died so we opened these two restaurants in his memories to have a safe place for people with food allergies to eat and also to be able to give back to the community and we we create I treat my workers well but the $20 is going to cause me to lay off shut down and basically cut hours and so I want to vote no against this ordinance because it's hard enough to run it I have my wife my sons my daughte
r-in-law everybody working in there so we can make it last so hope you can vote no thank you thank you next speaker that was really sad Council people how are you uh my name's jeeve Kumar I'm a franchisee here in uh San Jose uh I'm going to go no with this costly restaurant ordinance uh I come from an immigrant family my grandfather immigrated here $40 in his pocket brought us for kids one of whom was my father we have been working my whole life and to finally create something where we are able
to employ over 280 employees out of that 13,000 we do the best we can with rising cost of goods rising cost of Labor uh it makes it tough to do business out here but by adding this it's only going to hurt us more um we treat our employees good follow every law that we can and we hope that by doing these things somehow the good that we do is reciprocated and you pass this it just won't so please vote no thank you next speaker good afternoon my name is deac Kumar and I'm a uh restaurant operator i
n the San Jose area for the past 15 years um I feel like we've touched multiple youths uh lives and troubled individuals and kind of help them find their way by giving them an opportunity to work with us and make something out of their lives and I think the costly uh business ordinance is going to kind of cut cut back on certain things and cause us to have higher prices and maybe cut back on the opportunities and given jobs so that's all I have to say thank you okay I'd also like to call down An
na Rivera Miriam TKO Daisy Gomez and Jose oon ahead sorry oh God can I start yeah thank you uh hello my name is Robert G most of you know who I am if not knowing me personally you know what I stand for so I want to stand up here and talk about all the things that are going on I do want to say that I uh support the memo written by uh candelis Ortiz and him men and I don't know if thought has signed on on it but I appreciate him as well but my question to all of you and I know I'm not going to get
an answer is how many people lining up does it take in order for you to change your minds we have people that are coming here and spending a great deal of their time and I know you guys do too but the point is that we're trying to get a a message across and we don't actually know how effective that is so we think we need some feedback from all of you to let us know when we're actually able to influence your decisions because otherwise there's no point in this there's no point in in providing a
circus for people to come in here and parade themselves next speaker just going to remind folks please do not applaud or share between just so we can hear our speakers go ahead Serge at Sacred Heart a young man named Derek came to the Welcome Center at Sacred Heart Community Service and told them that he was thinking about suicide and wanted to wanted transport to a Mental Health Urgent Care Sacred Heart can't transport folks so the worker called 911 911 and asked for emergency services emphasiz
ing that a Eric was calm not an immediate danger to himself or others and specifically said that we did not need police presence just an ambulance instead of an ambulance six armed officers showed up one of the six officers began began actively provoking Eric and trying to get a rise out of him a Sacred Heart worker had to ask one of the older police officers to stop his coworker from escalating the situation and luckily he was willing en thank you next speaker Felix Gomez Ramsey Teo Nichols and
Adriana pentes good afternoon my name is median Balco and I'm a fast food organizer here in San Jose and a lot of times on the daily I I hear at work that the workers uh lack uh information in regards to their rights how they suffer at work how they suffer and um discrimination as well as when they rob their wages because they do not know their rights the um and when um people do try to participate and they try to raise their voices then they get um repercussions and it's just not right that th
ey take repercussions against the people that are trying to speak up uh all they're asking for is a little bit of dignity to know their rights and pay time off so that they can spend time with their families your time the fast food industry is the industry that has the least am amount of benefits and I believe that you should not forget about the fast food industry thank you thank you next [Music] speaker good afternoon to each one of you I work in McDonald's and as well as Carl's Jr uh my name
is desie Gomez and not too long ago I was fired from Carl jors just because I knew my rights they would make me work during my breaks they made me work more than the rest of the other and then when I would request help they would deny it to me discrimination simply because I do not know the English language when I was fired they did not give me the opportunity to defend myself and as well up to now I still do not know the reason why I was fired I hope that this that has happened to me will not h
appen to other people and this is the reason why I raise my voice I hope to God that uh our voices are heard and that you and we are supported as well as being trained in relation in in regards to our knowing our rights also to that we not receive repercussions for by our employers because we res we deserve respect your time is up um next speaker also Sarah Julian Roma Dawson Greg Miller and Josephina agar come on down go ahead thank you thank you uh good afternoon um members of the council my n
ame is rames Nichols I am with SEIU Local 1021 serving as vice president of politics I am also a proud uh resident of district 6 where I live in the union household uh I'm here to support the hundreds of fast food workers who have been coming here over the last few months to ask that you support them in what they are showing us are solutions to the problems they're facing right and and whether that's by way of the budget or an ordinance I think the opportunities in front of us to hear them out l
ike we like they've been telling us what needs to be done to improve their economic and job security uh and I'll share that as a a union worker coming from a nonprofit where we help people who are homeless and I know that's the main theme of the budget this is up there with affordable housing right Economic Security is one of the reasons why people fall into homelessness we're hearing from thousands here who are at risk of that who are living paycheck to paycheck the opportunity thank you next s
peaker good afternoon my name is Sarah Julian um I'm the recording Secretary of Unite Here Local 19 the hospitality workers union and as part of the labor movement and representing Unite Here we urge the city council to vote in favor um of creating this law by adding one-time funding to the city's budget to study developing a fast food fair worker ordinance this is common sense to ensure workers know their rights and can have the tools to make their workplaces safe we have all heard heartbreakin
g stories today from fast food workers and we need you as our local representatives to stand with the workers we who are your constituents who voted for you who put our trust in you to protect us this law pertains to companies with over 30 establishments and so we call on you to do the right thing to support workers thank you next speaker my name is Greg Miller and I'm U active with Cal uh the uh South Bay Community Land Trust and I'm calling on you to not reduce measure e funding for permanent
affordable housing um using that money for specifically for housing we need to use that money specifically for housing preservation which is the most cost-effective way to create permanent affordable house housing and prevent homelessness we need a balanced approach help the homeless but also use our funds to create new more affordable housing also I call on you uh for to have basic respect for our neighbors who work hard for inadequate pay and unsafe conditions fast food workers should be educa
ted in their language about their rights and should be able to take pay time off when they become ill thank you thank you next speaker I'd also like to call down Marisol Romero Marisella Fuentes Jeremy baru and Deb St Julian good afternoon Josephina Yad I'm the executive director of the South Bay Community Land Trust the first and only Community Land Trust in San Jose and Santa Clara County I won't repeat all the wonderful statements that have already been made about uh preserving the measure e
funding for the preservation of affordable housing uh but I do want to remind you that this the our organization and other Ali organizations went to the state to challenge the adoption of the housing element because it stepped away from the commitment that was made originally to keep those measure e funds for preservation then Corrections were made and we saw the corrections and so we wrote a letter to the state and said okay we can live with these Corrections so to now divert funds is to step a
way again from those commitments in the housing element so we're hoping that we don't have to go back to take up this fight because we will do it it's not a threat it's a promise because we really thank you next speaker good afternoon mayor City Council Members my name is Maris Fuentes and I'm here to represent the cup weather Collective today I come before city council to advocate for the prioritization of economic Mobility strategies as part of the budget process particularly for residents of
East San Jose within the collective we're dedicated to fostering economic empowerment through various initiatives just this month we celebrated the graduation of our third cohort in the jobs to grow program training 36 committee members this this program equips residents with skills and knowledge to start their own business in food service and child care through initiatives like these we create tangible opportunities for community members to provide for their families and contribute Local Econom
ic growth we commend the city of San Jose for selecting Mayfair and our po way neighborhood as one of the demonstration sites for the children and youth master plan this plan holds the promise of offering comprehensive support in grance from Cradle to grave insurance all San Jose youth thank you next speaker good afternoon mayor and City Council Members my name is m Romo and I represent the ca Collective uh based out of the mayford community in Eastside San Jose today I'm here to Echo the voices
of countless families in our community who are grappling with the pressing issue of housing housing is the number one concern we hear from amilies and we are eagerly anticipating the passage of the local preference tenant policy in San Jose however for this policy to truly make a difference we need to ensure ongoing support for the development of affordable housing affordable housing isn't just a quick fix it's a long-term solution to the housing crisis facing our families funding for emergency
interm housing is important as well but cannot be the only strategy we need to invest in long-term Sustainable Solutions like production and preservation of affordable housing it provides stability and security and ensuring that everyone in our community has a place to call home I urge the council to prioritize the development of affordable housing units let's not delay action that could help families in need by investing in affordable housing we can build a stronger more inclusive community fo
r all thank you next speaker I'm also Kim gupt Brandon Dawkins misss ran Mendoza and David null come on down thank you good afternoon mayor and Council Jeremy baru director of policy and organizing with Amigos the Guadalupe Center for justice and empowerment and we are also part of the C pu Collective as an organization that operates interm Housing Programs we urge the council take to take a balanced approach to allocating measure e funds to address the housing crisis with that we are particular
ly interested in the council to consider the first two provisions of the Ortiz Candelas and jenez memo funding for emergency interm housing is important as well but cannot be the only strategy at Amigos de Guadalupe we have seen how transformative it is for families who are able to transfer from interim and into permanent housing in addition Amigo supports the creation of the fast food fair work ordinance we firmly believe that the ordinance can be a transformative Force by guaranteeing workers
nor your rights trainings safe and secure workplaces and paid time off San Jose has the opportunity thank you next speaker behind me are 600 signatures of San josian who signed a petition requesting that you our Representatives act to match the right responder to Mental Health crisis by funding an additional trust team for San Jose 600 with along with these 00 people we support council members Cales uh himis I live in his district yay happy to be represented and Ortiz says MBA requests to expand
trust and call on you our representatives and the representatives of these 600 folks to support this MBA request as well thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon honorable mayor and city council I'm Dave noell longtime resident of District 9 and president of aricon neighborhood association I urge you to support mayor Mayan's budget message especially his proposals addressing homelessness blight and Public Safety they will feed a virtuous cycle that will help us afford things tomorrow tha
t we can't afford today I read the entire message and I'm generally very supportive of all the proposals and priorities contained in it however I'm hesitant on the park ballot measure due to insufficient information and I urge you to hold a study session on it before initiating any polling even if that would delay the election regarding homelessness we need to take bold action to do the greatest good for the greatest number of people as quickly as possible please be open to controversial ideas s
uch as safe sleeping sites and reallocating some measure e funds also please expedite the emergency interim housing that's in the pipeline and taking much longer to build than initially promised thank you thank you next speaker go ahead Hi how are you good afternoon mayor city council my name is m r mendosa and the wel commit manager at Amigos lupz Center for justice and empowerment as an organization that provides in housing for a community we urge the council to take a uh balanced approach to
allocate measure e funding uh to provide inter housing to support our house community and perserve funding for future affordable housing at the same time I know that's hard to do but while investing in inter housing it's important that we need to ensure and go in support for preservation and development of affordable housing to support our long-term families because of this I urge you please uh to support the first two provisions and the memo of Ortiz Candelas and gimenez to continue address hou
sing crisis to a balanc approach let's not delay the action that could help families in need and additionals Amigos the Guadalupe supports the creation of the fast food worker ordinance through this important piece of legis thank you next speaker also ra Ravi patac Suzanne Magno Kathy fuks Oberstar and Lilia Gaspar go ahead good evening mayor city council uh my name is Brandon Dawkins I am the vice president of organizing Fest y local 1021 there are 13 ,000 fast food workers here in the city of
San Jose 13,000 fast food workers who work day and day serving the community 13,000 fast food workers that have gone through sexual harassment wage theft and other issues that are in the restaurants in the city of San Jose what we've heard so far was talking points that the ordinance will be very expensive and it will be costly to the fact that these businesses will move out of San Jose I beg to different because what's wrong with workers knowing their rights what's wrong with workers having pay
time off so they could be educated on their rights on the job because they need to know their rights they need to know how to protect themselves on their jobs they need to understand when they are being taken advantage of and with this ordinance that thank you next speaker guys I just I want to remind folks please let's continue so we can hear from everyone thank you hi I'm Ravi Pak mayor city mayor and I'm city manager and vice mayor and City Council Members I'm here to support uh mayor's um b
udget message however I'm sure you have done your diligence to make sure that we are safe here in San Jose I've been here since 96 and uh um I've seen things change and I'm sure you will take care of the affordable housing um do the diligence whatever is needed thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon mayor and city council my name is Kathy fuches sostar from the baker West neighborhood in District 1 I here to support the March budget message the mayor submitted in coll collaboration with
the council members Omar Torres David Cohen Dev Davis and Pam Foley this message is a vision for this year's budget process despite the city's budget shortfall it should help address the major issues impacting our residents I strongly encourage the city council to adopt the mayor's March budget message and the entirity and urge the council to stay focus on ending Street Homeless reducing crime and cleaning up our city the community is counting on you for the basic right so that we our city can
strive in all the coming years I fully support the mayor and his collaboration on this budget I am especially proud of the regular communication that the mayor and his team provides to the city residents thank you next speaker hi my name is Suzanne I'm from District 3 hello and I'm on an HOA Board of my community and I'm here to ask you to please approve mayor Matt's budget budget plan as a board member and Resident I see the effects of homelessness every day in our community we live near Orchar
d Park which is along Coyote Creek my main concern as a homeowner is that we will have to pay the penalty and increase taxes if we do do not clean up these Creeks a $60,000 fine per toxin found in our Waters per day this is absurd and that has come to this and it would cost about $29 million plus if we find one toxin per day for a whole year the creek bias was abated 3 to six months ago but everyone came back many people have voiced their desire for funding for long-term housing and I'm good wit
h that but it's up to you thank you next speaker um I'd also like to call down Sandra Asher Heidi King Philip Hines and Peggy Elway good afternoon my name is Kim guptil and I'm a D6 resident and a member of showing up at for racial Justice at Sacred Heart I invite our council members and the mayor to imagine a city where trained professionals and peers respond to people having a mental health or substance abuse or substance use crisis these San Jose receive care they don't die as they do and dis
proportionately people of color do when the cops show up I think the cops agree we keep hearing we don't have enough police in San Jose the 90 911 call analysis makes it clear that have plenty of police and but they're spending their time responding to situations that can and should be handled more by more appropriately by other responders take welfare checks there's like 20,000 of them a year they got rid of those imagine the time they'd have this is just common sense you don't have to give in
to the fear mongering that's coming from the high thank you next speaker good afternoon mayor and city council my name is Linda Gaspar I'm a resident from D7 I'd like to express my strong support for the March B budget message the mayor submitted in the collaboration with the council members of Omar Torres David Cohen de Dev Davis and Pam FY this collaboration produced a thoughtful and focused vision for the year budget process which will help the city tackle the majority issues impacting our re
sidents despite the budget shortfall we encourage the city council to adapt adopt the major the mayor's March budget message in its enity urge to council to stay focused in ending the sheet the the street homelessness reducing crime cleaning up our city and speeding up permitting our community is counting on you to get the basics right so that we can all thrive in coming years thank you for representing my voice at the city hall thank you thank you next speaker Ryan Greener say his name his pare
nts worst nightmare came true last week when the Black autistic teen was shot by police when responding to a mental health crisis you have the power to change that in our community I stand with disability rights California when they say that quote we need alternatives to law enforcement including mobile crisis response teams that are staffed by mental health professionals and peers do you I stand with the ACLU who told you although the trust program is welld designed it cannot fulfill its promis
e until it is adequately funded and staffed do you I stand against robbing measure e funds and fting the will of the voters do you I stand with council members Ortiz yimz and candelis in particular their calls to fund trust and protect measure thank you your time next speaker good afternoon my name is Heidi King and I am a San Jose resident representing Serge show up for racial Justice today uh I'm here to ask you to support the Calis humanz and or memo which is asking for an MBA that estimate e
stimates the cost of a third trust team based in East San Jose to build a necessary capacity for Eastern Santa Clara County thank you thank you next speaker I'd also like to call down Derek from r ECS and Lori catcher go ahead sir hi hello I'm Phil Hines uh I'm a local voter and member of Serge at Sacred Heart um I'm here to say that I am in favor of the rights of fast food workers I am here in the favor of foring of uh funding long-term affordable housing but I'm also here to say this uh I am h
ere to urge the council to support support the memo proposed by members yenz Candelas and Ortiz to expand the funding to trust from the 911 report published a few weeks ago we are seeing that police are being involved in behavioral health issues in which they are not needed it is clear that the solution is alternative programs like trust which can alleviate the demand and Reliance on police to resolve mental health issues in which police are not required thank you thank you next speaker um I'm a
lso going to call down Jennifer Meyer uh Mary Katherine Hedges and Ruth silver tab go ahead I'm Peggy lwell from District 4 the way to end homelessness is to provide permanent affordable housing those measure e funds must be protected at all costs I know of no other way to make lasting change seeing encampments of of unhoused people may make people uncomfortable but it's not just a question of getting people out of sight but of having a stable solution for them and for all of the potentially hom
eless rent burdened people I also support the ordinance to protect fast food workers and their ability to access their rights I am also sure that many of them are in need of affordable housing too thank you next speaker hello council members and mayor Matt Mahan uh my name is Derek I'm with Sacred Heart Community Service Rex SOS uh and I am in support of the memo put out by uh council members Ortiz Jimenez and Candelas uh I believe that this memo provides Creative Solutions to trying times worke
rs are tenants many workers including some who work for the city are unhoused and all of our communities deserve to feel safe and actually be safe when we uh clock in when we clock out and to feel taken care of by our city leaders uh we need to feel like we belong the uh all of us in one way or another need uh the right responder to call when we uh thank you your time is up next speaker hi good afternoon uh my name is Lor catcher I'm a D6 resident if someone you care about experiences a mental h
ealth or addiction crisis what would your ideal response or help for that person be non-p police crisis response is important to me as a mom of a teen who struggles with her mental health as a volunteer and board member of neighborhood hands working with my unhoused neighbors and as a member of Serge the trust program was developed by families who lost loved ones at the hand of police when calling for mental health help we need the right responder for the need this is Public Safety and we alread
y have the right responder for these types of crises trust I ask that you support the candelis henz Ortiz memo thank you for that memo follow through on the reimagining public safety recommendation and P prioritize an additional Trust Field team for San Jose in this budget trust is public safety for all as is keeping people in their home thank you your time is up next speaker hello my name is Mary Ido um I live in District 3 and I'm here with Serge um I'm a retired physician and I worked a long
time with the chemical dependency program so I've seen um personally how harmful it can be for police to show up in a mental health crisis so I really urge you to support an additional trust team that's trusted response urgent support team um in San Jose thanks thank you next speaker um also I'd like to call down Sandra Munoz Jennifer Cortez and bran Brando dang go ahead okay um my name is Ruth silver to I'm here on behalf of the wage theft Coalition I'm also special Council to step forward Foun
dation we co-author a report that you've all seen that shows that workers uh fast food workers do not know their rights um and I'm here to request that you include in the budget a study of the wage theft ordinance we in San Jose are one of the few cities that does not have a paid sick leave that's at least eight days or 10 days I don't understand why these corporations and Wealthy fast food business owners in their lobbyists are afraid of fast food workers knowing their rights teaching workers t
heir rights will not bankrupt small businesses we hear this argument over and over and over whenever the minimum wage is raised the cost of these ideas are small the state's fast food Council legally cannot address the issues workers are asking for today the law thank you next speaker uh good afternoon Council my name is Katherine hedis I live here in District 3 a member of surge a national survey of sheriffs and police found that 21% of total law enforcement staff time was used to respond to ca
lls and transport individuals with mental illness in 2017 this is consistent with what we just learned in the 911 event report sending the right responder saves money and settl costs data on co-response shows that they're more costly and less effective than teams like trust trust goes out on hundreds of calls a month and that's like 100 times more than the I forget the acronym on trust works the city should support the MBA from candelis amus and Ortiz to follow through on the rep's recommendatio
ns I also support the fast food workers and affordable housing thank you thank you next [Music] speaker hi my name is Jen Meyer I live and work downtown I'm a member of Serge my uncle and my cousin both committed suicide and I have many other love ones who have struggled with mental illness addiction and suicidal adiation it is absurd on its face that the only crisis response option we have had for our loved ones is armed officers we finally have a program that treats those of us in mental distr
ess the way we would all want to be treated with dignity and compassion the trust program you have the power to expand appropriate response here in San Jose for all of us support the MBA request submitted by candelis Jimenez and Ortiz to expand trust here in San Jose it's the most frequently utilized program of all the response options San Jose gets four times as many calls as the other regions and your own city data says mental health situations are not criminal situations there are literally t
housands of calls that could be sent to more appropriate responders thanks thank you next speaker I'm also going to call down Sandy Perry Gloria with housing and fast food workers Andra Wilson Elva Wilson [Music] good afternoon my name is Sandra MOS and I've been living in San Jose for more than 20 years and according to my experience working and talking with my friends I believe that uh the fast food industry in San Jose has a very crucial um L uh very crucial work uh while serving food to doze
ns of thousands of people and um and creating um profits for a a fast food sector of millions of dollars [Music] however the worker the firstline workers of fast food um who are disproportionately women and people of color are facing conditions uh that are insecure the fast food uh workers for ordinance represents an opportunity to um revolutionize this industry and providing uh training for people to know their rights and uh free time that they deserve for parents and uh care workers and indivi
duals with with needs thank you thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon my name is Jennifer Cortez and I am here today as a lifelong San Jose Community member I am here asking you to please vote in favor of creating the fast food fair work law by adding one-time funding to the city's budget to study developing a fast food fair work ordinance our fast food worker population 8 of 10 which are people of color and seven of 10 which are women are susceptible to labor violations like wage thef
t sexual harassment discrimination all while dealing with unstable jobs and lack of paid time off we need to start viewing fast food workers as what they are mothers fathers head of household students people like you and me annual know your rights trainings and the ability to accumulate paytime off would be the first step towards acknowledging that there are people under our favorite fast food chains uniforms Not only would this set San Jose apart as one of the leading cities in this revolutioni
zing movement where fast food workers are being recognized as worthy of the same rights and benefit thank you next speaker good afternoon mayor and council members I'm Sandy Perry with South Bay Community Land Trust we're here today to call on the city council to elevate providing affordable housing to be one of the four key Focus areas in the budget as advocated by the residents of San Jose in the city's own survey and especially uh by the low income and people of color communities we cannot af
ford to violate our housing element that we only uh submitted and got adopted uh just a few months ago and we cannot rely on the market to build affordable hous housing because private developers will not build unless rents go up affordable housing requires political Leaders with the conscience and the vision to Advocate and allocate the resources necessary to make that happen and I hope and I'm claiming that that is you thank you very much thank you next speaker I'd also like to call down Tom W
ilson dza Gonzalez Andrea IO and Carol WN good afternoon my name is Elva Wilson I have been a resident of council District 5 for over 33 years and a resident of East San Jose for over 65 years I am here today supporting the mayor's budget me message in its entirety because I'm concerned with the excessive taxpayer cost and ineffective efforts the city has put into addressing our growing homeless crisis we have been trying to shelter thousands of homeless people with a Cadillac Solution on a Kia
budget tiny homes are an extremely expensive solution that the city cannot afford especially the projected budget shortfall taxpayers are no longer willing nor should we be expected to pay to build individual homes for every person that becomes homeless in our city especially for those of us on a government pension for these reasons I strong thank you next speaker hi my name is Tom Wilson I'm here to voice my support for mayor Mayan's 2024 25 budget recommendations in light of the projected 5-ye
ar $80 million shortfall I support the mayor's determination to efficiently address the city residents priorities homelessness housing and crime the mayor's recommendations clearly detail Innovative strategies for preventing and resolving homelessness at an affordable price adopting the successful policies of other cities like Reno and San Diego's safe sleeping sites is very compelling from a taxpayer's perspective as emergency housing should be inexpensive and temporary also piggybacking on the
city of mountain views cost effective safe parking program will ensure lower cost as well council members please join me in supporting mayor Mayan's goals and objectives for your time thank you next speaker hello mayor and council members my name is Ela Gonzalez I am a resident of District 4 and the organizing and policy manager with SOS Mayer I am here because I am concerned about the proposal to once again shift measure e funding away from affordable housing instead of pitting one need agains
t the other let's come up with a balance plan and that advances both strategies we appreciate that council's interested in adding more shelter option in our city but our narrow Focus for spending shelters alone will not yield the results as a person that have experienced homelessness I know that we don't need more shelters we need affordable housing where our families can feel safe and our kids can call home thank you have a really good evening thank you next speaker also Kathy Tran Christa dela
tor vasundhara and James Lee go ahead hello my name is Andrea poro with s's May friend the cisa collective we are deeply concerned about the proposal to once again shift the already limited resources in measure e away from affordable housing production and preservation we know we need comprehensive strategies and solutions to address the housing crisis yes this includes continued support for our most impacted community members but it cannot be the only strategy we appreciate the council's suppor
t for ten tenant preference Poli policy aimed at eliminating barriers to access affordable housing and keep families in the communities they call home the tenant preference policy will not have the level of impact that it can have if we are not also investing in building more affordable housing and preserving existing housing these strategies are homelessness prevention strategies we need long-term Sustainable Solutions thank you thank you next speaker hello Mar and Council my name is Kathy Tran
I live in District 3 and I'm with ifpte Local 21 we represent city workers here at San Jose who are proud to provide Public Services I'm here to urge support for the mayor and Council to adopt the Ortiz candelis and Jimenez memo we're concerned that the mayor's March message is prevent presenting a false choice of city services versus homelessness and we're concerned at the rhetoric regarding the shortfall is due to our employee contracts we shouldn't blame workers when the city is failing to r
ecruit and retain workers to provide services and our bargaining campaign was an opportunity to help the city with becoming an employer of choice we need more clarity on these short-term solutions for homelessness that don't include building long-term affordable housing additionally we're here in solidarity with fast food workers budgets are a statement of our values and San Jose should value protecting our most vulnerable workers thank you thank you next [Music] speaker good afternoon my name i
s chista delator and I am a representative with ifp Local 21 we represent nearly 1,000 city employees here at the city of Stan Jose from Librarians to Housing Development officers to Wastewater Engineers um our members help ensure our city can deliver quality timely services to our San Jose residents Rainer shine today we ask that you support the Ortiz candelis and men's memo um the Mater is currently pedaling a very dangerous rhetoric by falsely tying City deficits to the Equitable salary and b
enefit adjustments that city workers received last year adjustments that were desperately needed to fill our hundreds upon hundreds of vacancies um the impact of contract negotiations is extremely minimal compared to the short-term programs that the mayor wants to commit the city to do not attack the very employees that make your programs possible and help the city function effectively the city needs to do its due diligence and explore the long-term impacts of radical cuts to city services to in
vest in unproven short-term Solutions around housing we also stand today with our brothers and sisters here with seciu thank you next speaker I'd also like to call down twe Fang win and Sam Ho go ahead hi uh good afternoon uh my name is James and I'm here as a community member of San Jose born and raised uh I'm here here to urge city council to vote in favor of the fast food fair work ordinance as a person who loves to eat fast food and will continue to do so I know that these places are staffed
by people and not robots uh the people who serve us food don't deserve to be abused by poor management and we as a society have passed labor laws to protect its workers and it isn't fair for fast food workers to be taken advantage of just because they don't know their own rights I ask the city council to help help its workers fights for the rights that they already have thank you very much thank you for your time thank you next speaker respected mayor and the city council for many people interm
housing will just give enough time to get back to their feet we need emergency housing to end Street homelessness and to clear our waterways and we shouldn't lose the focus on ending Street homelessness reducing crime speeding up permitting and finally getting us to the basics budget I also support pestan safety in my neighborhood and I recommend having speed Safety camaras near schools by the vision zero action plan to bring more safety to the pedestrians thank you thank you next speaker good
afternoon thank you very much for the opportunity to speak here and thank you uh for the mayor's memo uh on the budget also the memo from some of the council members and the specifics there I support generally uh all that's been presented there and uh I think that it's important for us to remember that 10 years ago we passed measure a uh about almost 10 years ago and today we talk about the same topic the same passion and yet we have more people homeless on in our city and more people homeless i
n our County we haven't resolved that issue and I'm hoping that with your wisdom and your efforts energy please come together and hopefully we can be Innovative and not deal with the Rea reaction to homelessness affordable housing safety uh blight and jobs and housing so forth uh those are reaction reactive efforts that we taking hopefully we can focus on the proactive and how we get rid of that situation thank you next speaker okay I'm going to go ahead and call more names I have Steven Barry W
Jean hunt vivana Josh CeeLo babita Kumari good afternoon mayor City Council Members my name is Jean hunt and I like you have been here since about 2:00 and during this whole time I've only heard one person mention the idea that there is going to be a penalty that the city of San Jose has to pay if we don't handle the homelessness situation along our Creeks the mayor's budget message includes funds that will actually help handle that so I encourage you all to vote for that measure it is the thin
g that we need right now long-term housing is definitely something we have to put attention on but shortterm is what we need to address right now otherwise the city is going to pay more and all of us will suffer even further Cuts with in services so please vote Yes on his message thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon my name is Josh C and I'm the CEO of Bill Wilson Center thank you mayor vice mayor city council members for your ongoing commitment to ending homelessness in San Jose but
we need to remember shelters do not end homelessness temporary housing does not end homelessness emergency interim or transitional housing does not end homelessness the thing that ends homelessness is permanent affordable housing I know it's tough but we need a yes and solution there will be costs no matter what we do there always are but we have to stop kicking the can down the road and say we're going to solve this problem in the future we never will and 15 years from now we'll be having the s
ame conversation just all of us will look a lot older we need to commit to end homelessness and we must preserve our measure e dollars in order to do that and invest in permanent affordable housing thank you thank you next speaker also Richard Wong Stephen from USC hello everyone this wait hold on hold on let me just call a few more names um Stephen from um USC Amy Cody and Mitzy method go ahead perfect thank you thank you hi this is Bita Kumari the director of housing program at Will Wilson Cen
ter as we are all aware the issues of homelessness are acute and providing permanent housing for individual is crucial Beyond Selter it's about a stability dignity and well-being providing a stable housing gives individual and families a foundation to rebuild their lives this stability is crucial for accessing Health Care maintaining employment and pursuing education moreover permanent house housing Foster ense of belonging and encourages social connection enabling Community integration investin
g in permanent Housing Solutions and supportive services will break the cycle of homelessness it will promote human dignity Empower contribute to economic growth and create a more inclusive and resilient Community thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon mayor um in the council members my name is Richard wall I'm a former commissioner for District 3 um me and my partner are the earlier at the early pioneers of smart City uh smart city is a nonprofit Smart City USA causa is a nonprofit uh
501c3 that has uh Innova approaches to mitigate today social economic and political uh imbalances we are here we are here today to inspire our Citizen and Community to bring about better living situations the smart city concept is simply about collaborations and positive initiatives currently smart city causa is in uh collaboration with the Department of energy uh to catalyze Rapid clean economy while thank you next speaker hello mayor vice mayor and council members one of the most important thi
ngs I think I can say is thank you very much for your service you have very very difficult jobs you make very very difficult choices and I thank you want to thank you publicly also I want to say that service is really really important to all of us and I want to support the mayor's budget because I know that this mayor takes a very lot of time and a lot of care in making these decisions and they're very very difficult and so I thank you again I'd also like to be of service I'd like to say that th
ere is an opportunity for us to partner with with the Department of energy and US tech my little nonprofit that's geared towards teaching people to do Hightech and I would like to uh work with each and every one of you and I will be contacting you to uh partner and we can get some money from the Department of energy and bring it to the city thank you next speaker um also come on down Alex with sjda Gabby Chavez Lopez Emily hearnen and Cassandra mag go ahead good afternoon my name is Amy and I'm
here to support the March budget message focused on ending Street homelessness reducing crime and cleaning up our city we need to address homelessness with greater urgency and Equity while we build affordable housing we cannot leave the vast majority of our unhoused residents to languish for years without a safe and clean living environment my community suffers from retail theft car break-ins porch piracy and sides shows we need speed cameras and more police officers to respond to emergencies wo
rk with communities Patrol and deter crime I appreciate the mayor's informative emails Town Hall meetings neighborhood association support fall neighborhoods conference and volunteer cleanup events around our city I ask for continued support to keep residents informed and engaged thank you thank you next speaker hello mayor council um my name is Mitch method I am a lifelong San Jose resident um educator on the east side and I'm here to support mayor's mayor Mayan's um budget and his plan to addr
ess the homeless issue um it's I understand that we need need long-term housing um low income housing or affordable housing but what we really need to do right now is to address the problem of the unhoused it's if you've been down there into the encampments on a bike ride along guic Creek um we need to get people into places that are safe the encampments are not safe they're not sanitary they're they're not where anybody should be so we need to address that first and then I think we always need
to work on the affordable housing but I hope you support his message and give the mayor a chance Council to do what he needs to do to get this thing going thanks thank you next speaker also come on down Trista Balman Carl Lee and Andrew seagler go ahead good evening mayor and City Council Members my name is Cassandra mag I'm the assistant manager of public policy at West Valley Community Center services and in partnership with the real Coalition I am also someone with lived experience in homeles
sness at West Valley Community Services our dedicated Team Works tiously to empower individuals and families in need I'm here to emphasize the critical importance of treating our limited funds for permanent housing as precious resources as an organization deeply entrenched in the Frontline efforts to combat homelessness we understand the urgency of investing in Sustainable Solutions diverting funds away from initiatives aimed to at address addressing the root causes of homelessness is simply not
an option we must uphold the commitment made to the community and ensure that measure e funds are protected and utilize effectively to invest in permanent Housing Solutions thank you thank you next speaker hi my name is Emily hinden I live in uh district 6 and I'm a member of showing up for racial Justice and in my close to 12 years of service at the city of San Jose I managed health and wellness benefits so I'm very familiar with the need um for um important and access that's uh to mental heal
th benefits that are appropriate and compassionate for people in need so like our employees this is something I think all of the city of San Jose citizenry deserve and I know that um you know in defaulting to police is not a good solution if I had a member of my family having a mental health crisis I would not want someone showing up with a gun on in a uniform so if you've heard from the other speakers our current program support is not enough for all the current needs across San Jose so increas
ing this availability of trust teams will help our community and especially those members experiencing mental health um crisis so I urge you all to support this memo that was um penned by council members Ortiz candel thank you next speaker good evening mayor council members my name is Andrew seagler and I'm with uh Sergeant Sacred Heart and I'm a district three voter um I want to thank council members candales Jimenez and Ortiz for their memo and I support it it's a it's a it's a it's a hung Din
ger especially the the instructions to look into funding another trust team um in San Jose in light of the recent report on 91 911 events um tens of thousands of calls could be my eyes are gone tens of thousands calls can be whisked away to uh alternative response this is a matter of public safety I'm also in support of the measure ease staying for permanent affordable housing and also for fast food workers to get updated on their rights um what I don't understand about the mayor's budget messag
e is why we're going after 100 backfill police officers uh when we didn't do it last year go for a smaller Target like 10 thank you I'd also like to call down David hindle Sandra Weber Woody Deo and minan Tran thank you hello my name is Trista Bowman I'm the directing attorney of housing at the law Foundation of Silicon Valley as well as a real Coalition member we've heard talk about changing the Status Quo but it's important that we understand targeted encampment sweeps with nothing but the pos
sibility of a temporary alternative is the status quo the mayor's budget message is not a new vision for a community struggling with hundreds of evictions filed every month and more people entering into homelessness each year than are housed instead it is a repackaged punitive strategy that has failed for years years in city after City to achieve the goals we all share the goals to end homelessness and preserve our public spaces the failure of sweeps into shelter policies is well documented the
latest proof comes from a recent study of LA's similar plan which was found to be in the words of one La council member a complete and total failure it didn't reduce the number of people living outside but it did waste a lot of money and time San Jose can do better but not if we repeat the same mistakes that other cities have made thank you next speaker mayor and uh council members the housing affordability and availability issue is obviously interconnected with homelessness and it's also one of
the biggest issues we have in this country right now I want to thank the uh council member Cohen Foley Davis and Torres um and mayor Mayhan for collaborating on the budget message I think that gives us the best path forward um I see the proposal the message as a multi-year approach to solving that problem with rationalism and I also believe all of you brought very different perspective in solutions to this answer um in addition I think in the the other thing I want to highlight in The Proposal
is uh streamlining and speeding up the uh permitting process thank you thank you next speaker uh good afternoon council members who are still here uh in this time my name's David heindell I live in District 10 in this time of dis declining funds I often reflect on Governor Brown's comment infinite wants and infinite needs that's the problem that you have to deal with here especially giving the most difficult task of balancing it with less money than you had the year before uh I believe the mayor
's budget message as written in collaboration with council members Torres Cohen Davis and Foley is a balanced solution in these difficult times and as I read it the council member Ortiz candelis and am menz memo addresses a couple of spec specific items but does not uh deal with the entirety of the challenges that city manager who is not here is about to embark on I therefore urge you to support the mayor's budget message as written in its retir without thank you next speaker mayor and uh city c
ouncil my name is sandre Weber and I'm a resident of D6 um mayor your town hall the other day on homelessness was surgical practical and Visionary Sant as man a mandate to by the state to clear encampments along its waterways these at risk folk living in San Jose need a safe space to reset and quick build communities provide a solution to this emergency we encourage the city council to adopt the mayor's March budget message in its entirety and urge the council to stay focused on ending Street ho
melessness reducing crime cleaning up our city and speeding up the permitting process thanks to council members Torres Cohen Davis and Foley for working collaboratively with the mayor to put together this year's March budget thank you next speaker I also like to call down before you speak sherro Lynn um Duke Cabella Sabel I can't pronounce it Sab follow sorry um Poncho Guero and W Jean hunt go ahead good afternoon mayor council's members and everyone my name is min Tran I live on in District 7th
uh corner of uh Story Road and uh work on uh Toy Road I uh I'm here to support the mayor um budget message and I urge all of you do whatever you can to uh approve the budget and uh I urge that uh keep our Waterway clean and safe I'm a fisherman also and I whenever I eat the fish I think about how dirty our Creek our area where the homeless people just you know put all the trash in the uh in the creek and I I I support I strongly support the uh the budget uh in March and uh thank you for your co
nsideration thank you next speaker hello my name is dul I'm 22 and I'm a Community member and St statistically I am more likely to be houseless than rent my own place it's hard to focus on school a career when I'm too busy working to pay to have a roof over my head measure e funds should be used for affordable housing and prevent homelessness the council had an opportunity this year to help prevent homelessness with Copa but tanked it maybe that should be brought brought back in addition I suppo
rt and you should to the fast food worker rights people who work tirelessly should be able to afford literally just deliverable life and they should be aware of what their rights are and use them 13,000 workers in the city that need to be protected stop putting franchise owners and profit over the lives of people stop this modern-day slavery thank you thank you next speaker good afternoon mayor and members of the council my name is Bono Gada and have the honor of working at Sacred Heart Communit
y Service and uh and I just wanted to and I also uh co-c convene the real Coalition so uh to reinforce some things that you already heard is like providing a permanent affordable home is the only solution to homelessness and keeping people in their homes is the only way to prevent homelessness so the need for us to be able to make sure that we're putting these Investments that we've actually secured uh because of uh because of the efforts of organization like ours four years ago we walked called
messaged um thousands and thousands of Voters to pass measure e and we want to partner with you again to try to make sure we create additional funding streams to look for permanent solutions to homelessness and be able to provide these resources that needs to be critical and at the Forefront of our imaginations I also want to speak as the as the author of the reimagining report and we really need to invest in alternative systems such as the trust program we talked about it we presented this rep
ort to you uh years three years ago two and a half years ago we need to invest in it now thank you thank you next speaker I'd also like to call Anna Marie Russo Sig Jacobson and Nora Larson my name is shat Lynn I'm with human agenda and I just want to touch on three things very quickly so first of all measure e funds should go for for long-term you know permanent solutions for housing let's deal with the firm the housing crisis and and the the homelessness crisis uh the the fast food workers nee
d to be protected a lot of them are undocumented so so there there have been they have always been left out of a lot of the a lot of the protections that appli to other workers generally so we need to to prioritize that um and and and then and the trust program I urge you to fully fund the trust program and and instead of funding police that we can actually save money in a time of a budget crunch by by having please focus on crime and let the trust program take care of mental illness thank you t
hank you next speaker good evening everyone I'm Anna Maria Russo and I'm not just a district member I'm a city I'm a member of the city of San Jose and proud of it I'd like to express my strong support of mayor's the mayor's budget please please please please approve it this this collaboration produced a thoughtful focused vision for this year's budget process which will help the City tackle major issues impacting our residents and I am a resident and I have been my whole life and I'm very old d
espite so let's get that shortfall under control and let's support the mayor thank you thank you next speaker and also Nicole boas come on down hi my name is Sig Jacobson and I'm a member of showing up for racial Justice I believe you all try to treat others the way that you want to be treated and the trust program treats those of us with mental health or substance abuse crises the way we would want to be treated with dignity and compassion so I'm here to ask that you support the candelis jimenz
Ortiz memo to fund a third trust team in San Jose the report that you received two weeks ago makes clear that avoral health is a large category of police interactions and these could be diverted to more appropriate responders and we have those responders in the trust program please follow through on the reimagining public safety recommendation and prioritize funding for the additional Trust Field team in this next budget trust is public safety for all of us as is keeping people in their homes t
hrough permanent affordable housing and as an measure e thank you thank you next speaker my name is Nora Larson I live in District 3 and I'm a member of showing up for racial Justice at Sacred Heart I'm a teacher and I have plenty of loved ones students friends and family members who have struggled with mental illness and addiction because of this I'm grateful that we have non-p police crisis response programs like Trust if I ever needed to call for uh for one of my loved ones I would absolutely
want a mental health professional a peer supporter and a first aid responder to be the people on the line and come in person if needed these are the right responders the People Best equipped to provide care these are the people I would trust with my loved ones lives tragically as you know before trust existed members of our community called for care for their loved ones and instead of providing care armed police killed their family members in October the Mercury News released an investigative r
eport that found that 70% thank you your time next speaker your time is up okay I I've called all cards I don't see anybody else coming forward so back to counil thank you Tony I okay okay thank you Tony just want to make sure we didn't miss anybody um thank you all for taking the time to be here and sharing your opinions I think that was about three hours of public comment which um is very impressive um everybody's experiences whatever side of an issue you might be on are certainly valid and I
think we really benefit from hearing the breadth of experiences and opinions that we heard here tonight so I just want to thank you all for taking the time to be here just very briefly in [Music] Spanish I also I just want to thank my team and and the city manager and her team for helping us bring forward this budget message uh Stephen kee's in my office my budget director who's ay assisted by Keith Herzberg and McKenzie MOS and the rest of our policy team did a tremendous amount of work over th
e last few months to bring forward this message and that was really only possible because of the uh collaboration we had from uh the city manager Jennifer Maguire assistant city manager Lee Wilcox uh the city's budget director Jim Shannon and um the different departments and uh members of the administration who helped us understand their needs and the tradeoffs and learnings as we go year to year so this was um supported by a lot of um this process was supported by a lot of input from from vario
us folks and then once again as I said at the beginning I just want to thank my colleagues who were in the budget Brown act who gave really thoughtful feedback along the way and that again includes council member Cohen council member Foley council member Davis council member Torres I'm not going to say too much more I I do want to offer a couple of quick Reflections based on all the public comment and then we'll get into Council deliberation I I do want to make very clear on affordable housing t
hat San Jose is going to continue to invest in affordable housing in fact we just recently issued a notice of new funding for $50 million new dollars that we're putting into affordable housing we're also applying to the state for tens of millions of dollars in ha funding for more affordable housing um and and we're going to we're going to continue to invest I think what is challenging at the moment and we're going to have to navigate as a council is continuing to have an all of the above approac
h in which we invest in affordable housing as well as many other needs including prevention and interim housing and safe parking at a time when overall revenues are slowing down Revenue growth is slowing down and measure e in particular is actually declined quite a bit from over 100 million a couple of years ago to under 50 million today so that is a difficult moment to be in of course these things are cyclical measure e revenues will go up again and that'll be wonderful we have more dollars to
expend across all those strategies and I'm confident that City revenues will grow at a faster rate at some point but this year and next year are are looking to be tough and so it's the the trade-offs won't be easy but I do want folks to know that no one is intentionally trying to pit people against one another I I'm confident that this Council listening to all of you and working with the city manager and her team are going to make trade-offs that allow us to continue to take an all the above app
roach but also recognize the Urgent crisis of thousands of people literally living and dying on our streets and the fact that we have obligations under the Clean Water Act that we do have to be responsive to so it's not an easy task and I I don't want that to sound like kicking the can but I want you to know that I'm committ to an all of the above approach and while we won't be able to do it at the same rate as we have in recent years at least this year and next we will continue to deploy your f
unds taxpayer dollars into building new affordable housing in addition to all of the other strategies that we're balancing here of prevention and emergency shelter and the many other needs Beyond housing and homelessness that we have as a city so I just I wanted to clarify that so no one was left with the wrong impression um also just note for the record that measure e talks about in the ballot language both affordable housing and Sheltering the homeless so I do want people to just have that con
text um and then on the uh on the trust team appreciate the advocacy and I know we have some recent Council direction to collaborate with the county there's also Direction in the measure and I support my colleague's uh memo that points to wanting to continue to look at the cost of that service in collaborating with the county to better serve or create alternative respons response models in collaboration with the county very much agree with with going in that direction um so appreciate all the co
mments again I'm going to I I know virtually all of my colleagues have hands up so I'm eager to have them weigh in I'm going to turn first to council member Davis thank you and I want to thank everyone who came out to speak um for public comment today as is your right in our representative democracy so thank you for exercising your right today um I I appreciate you all sharing your stories and your lives with us and I I just want to say that my heart goes out to those of you who shared stories t
oday who who have suffered illness and other trials um I I can I can relate to some of those things regarding the fast food issue um I know you all know that there's a new state law that goes into effect on April 1st and and so I just want to address that I think before we do anything as a city in this area I think we need to see how that law is implemented and how the industry changes as a result and that's going to take time so I don't want you to think that our um our lack of action direct ac
tion on this on this issue today means that this issue is is not going to be covered because it is but in the meantime I did want to also make sure that everyone knows that Santa Clara County has a retail food worker survey that they they have partnered with the University of uh California Berkeley um their labor occupational health program to con to conduct a survey to document the issues facing retail food workers and I hope that you will all go to the Santa clar County website and fill out th
at survey because I think that will be good information for us as well as for the county so please do um partake in that survey regarding the budget itself this budget presents uh the most challenges that we've faced in San Jose in over a decade and um that together with the rejection of our storm storm water permit and our projected budget deficits for this year and the next few years um really presents a lot of challenges for us and and frankly it puts the the city managers one team ethos um t
o the test it will be to put to the test for staff um not just prns housing and Public Works will have to uh take a piece of the homelessness issue as they have been and work together but also our uh Environmental Services Department our department of transportation and pbce as well as frankly I think all other departments will need to work together to tackle this homelessness issue and so something has changed over last year for all of those who came to talk about measure e the rejection of the
storm water permit really requires us to intensify our focus on homelessness and frankly unfortunately interim solutions to get people out of the creeks and that will come at a cost obviously um I expect staff will be clear with us in the coming months about what work will need to be delayed as a result of this increase um of focus and intensity focus on homelessness um I want to get to I'm going to get to a motion and it will include the mayor's March budget message and most of um council memb
ers Jimenez Ortiz and kandel's memo but I do want to address something else and this goes along with the one team issue um number nine of that of that memo I I really have to say couple of things about it first of all this recommendation is not appropriate to assign to the city manager and I think it's really important that we as a [Music] council frankly refrain from any pot shots at each other um and and I at the same time I know where this came from I think it's indicative of the state of the
relationships on this Council um some with each other and and also with the mayor and it's it's not good and I wouldn't normally drag this out on the deis um but unfortunately we don't have the opportunity to have these discussions when um when something is put in a memo we can't have discussions back there in the Green Room about stuff like this so uh I just want to say we we have even tougher discussions coming forward with us um this year and and in June it's going to be even more difficult
than today is going to be and I really hope that that everyone on this Council thinks very thinks very seriously about how we can work well together and what each of your roles is and I'm including myself each of our roles is in in working Better Together um so that's all I'm going to say about that I'm going to I'm going to make the motion now and and I am going to be very specific about well I have one other thing there was a um a part of the March budget message in page five that talks about
um you know obviously we're going to have to pay for our uh pay for our deficits in some way and one of the ISS one of the items was uh listed as number three reducing or eliminating current services including the consideration of budget reductions for mayor and city council offices I think number nine from from the uh jenz Ortiz candelis memo may have come from a frustration from that although it wasn't directly related to that in the in the memo and I know that there are a couple of us myself
included who are leaving office and that um payouts as are are teams our staff members leave is a particular hardship on our last year's budget and that that can cause issues in our last year in office and that if we are um if our budgets are cut that would produce an even greater hardship for those specific Council budgets so Jim can you talk about um what what we can do about specifically about payouts um for our Council Office budget our budgeted staff that that may or may not be um included
in your reduction um think for the question counil M can can I ask you to repeat just the beginning context of that question again just to make sure I get it I get it right I think I was looking at page five and I wasn't clearly listening to your to your your your full question yeah I think um so the there was was an action that was taken by the council um many years ago I can't remember if it was 2017 or 2018 I think it was 2017 about splitting when you're in your last year of office our our bu
dgets are in the half year start in the half year and our terms start at the beginning of the year and so there was a I think well-meaning um attempt to ensure that the outgoing council member and the incoming council member for the same office Had parody in their budgets I think over time we have learned that that parity actually disadvantages the outgoing staff um and the outgoing budget year for a staff for a council member because of the need to pay out accumulated um leave when Council when
Council staff leave in that last year yes okay thank you for for um making sure I was paying attention there so yes so there is um a city council policy it's one of the policies under 1-8 d88 that talks about the the transition year for mayor and Council budgets and effectively what happens as part of the budget process is that um you know there is when we when we develop the the base budget the AL the allocation for the each Council offices for the first half of the year for those in transitio
n and the second half of the year are split in half right so you have equal amounts in both the first six months and the second six months and then the amount that would get re re-budget or carried over let's say at the end of this fiscal year for this next uh for the 2425 budget that would be effectively split in in uh split in half also so any remaining funding that would be re-budget would also be split in in half I think where I think where you're you're getting at is that split in half um t
he council members budget has to consider the fact that the vacation payouts for staff uh need to be factored in is part of that half that that goes to the first six six months and so um for those employees that leave City service that vacation payout is a is a cost if those city employees remain with the next council member or they get a job with the ad Administration that cost doesn't appear because the vacation is not paid out it just continues with the employee so um so I know there's been c
onversations about um you know if there was an exemption potentially so that Council policy could be be modified in in some way by by by the council to sort of take that vacation um estimated amount out of the amount that gets re re re-budget that gets split so that vacation payout just stays in the first six months that's something that certainly the council could direct and we could come back with amendment to that policy okay do I need to add that to my motion to direct you please okay so I I
will move the mayor's March budget message as well as um the direction for staff to come back with uh a way to handle the issue as you've as you've discussed for outgoing council members and then in terms of the himis Ortiz and candelis memo and I know I'm out of time but I'm making the motion um for uh recommendations one and two I'd like to replace that with in alignment with the direction in the March budget message direct the city manager to number one include the proposed budget in the pro
posed budget an analysis of the impact of the real allocation of any measure e revenue for the provision of essential services to our unhoused residents and meet storm water permit requirements include including the city's impact of the city's including the impact of the city's ability to issue new noas for affordable housing and the impact if any on NOA weight listed projects and other projects in the pipeline and two proposed propose alternative scenarios that would lessen the impact on fundin
g for permanent affordable housing and then I'll move item number three which I assume will be added to the report on the park ballot measure which is requested in the March budget message I would like to move number four on a go forward basis so that any current uh Parks budgets for district offices do not get um do not get reallocated since they have already been budgeted for various things and then um I will move number five and number six I would like to strike based in East Santa Clara Coun
ty and just make this a cost estimate because I would like the trust team to go to be able to go anywhere it is needed at the time that it is called um number seven I will also move that and I assume that any relevant cost estimates can be brought forward um as part of the analysis to implement AB 2339 um which I know may occur after the budget process and um I will move number eight as well this this can go through by the way number eight can go through an info memo or through um the CED commit
tee great thank you council member Davis appreciate that thoughtful motion and you laying that out so clearly second council member fley um there's really helpful I've taken notes I'm sure Tony has we'll see if any uh clarifications needed as we get into to the rest of the conversation uh council member Foley thank you and uh thank you to council member Davis for laying that out so clearly and articulately and making your arguments and statements both about the comments that came to us from the
public thank you all for being here but particularly as those relate to the fast food proposal the storm water permit and other issues that are coming before Council uh I want to thank all of the members of the public who uh came here and spoke to us today this is just the beginning of the budget process as the mayor said earlier we have a lot of work ahead for us and this is just an authorization to staff really to the city manager and her team to come back nut with numbers and make DEC make uh
suggestions and recommendations on how we're going to spend the minimum dollars that we have first I want to say thank you to Mayor Mayan for his thoughtful and collaborative approach to the budget process this year and for including me in his budget budget Brown act it's always an honor to be part of that and be part of the contributions made there I'm also grateful for the rest of the colleague my colleagues who participated in that budget message as well after reviewing the five-year budget
forecast with our budget director it's clear that we truly have tough times ahead and we need to be really careful and thoughtful about how we expend our our dollars to make sure that we preserve the services that our residents need and demand of us as a city council as we as we navigate challenging economic conditions it's crucial to find Opportunities to wisely allocate resources to preserve essential programs and services within our community prioritizing the preservation of these services in
our budget planning process is vital in sustaining the quality of life for all San Jose residents as stewards of the public trust it is the duty of us on the council to produce a fiscally responsible budget that delivers on the critical needs of our residents we need to continue to build upon the gains we've made in staff in up our police force ensuring we invest in recruitment so we can quickly fill vacant positions in critically needed areas we hear from our residents all the time about how w
e would love they would love to see more officers in the traffic enforcement unit as an example additionally as the chair of the vision zero task force Street safety is a top priority for me this budget message calls for funding to deploy automated automated speed enforcement cameras as well as funding for life-saving quick build infrastructure improvements on our most dangerous corridors these pre these improvements while some may disagree with them being placed in our on our streets they slow
down traffic they save lives we must also manage the impacts that homelessness has on our city services and housed residents while treating our unhoused residents with dignity and respect homelessness is one of the most vest vexing challenges facing our city this budget message calls for Ambitions and Creative Solutions to the to homelessness including investment in emergency interim housing which has proven effective in humanely getting folks off the streets and inside including completing comp
letion of the four eihs that the city council approved uh months ago that make sure that we improve complete those those that are in the pipeline which includes one in my district on Cherry Avenue and also helps with the storm water protection as it's on the guadal ope River lastly having a clean City that we can all be proud to call home is not only a matter matter of civic pride but also a key to attracting investments in San Jose the mayor's budget message builds upon our existing work to red
uce blight by proactively working to prevent white before it occurs I look forward to working with my colleagues as we go forward with the budget I support the budget message I support the motion that has been made obviously since I seconded it and um I just I don't have any questions at the moment uh but I may as my colleagues have things that they ask I may have things that I want to bring up and and follow up with more information so with that I'll just close and thank you for the opportunity
to speak thank you Council Foley let's go to council Torres great thank you and thank you all for being here today uh those were pretty powerful uh statements and I just want to let you all know that uh I I see you I hear you and I'm definitely uh with all of our folks from SEIU and our fast food workers so uh thank you uh mayor for allowing myself uh and our Bud uh budget Brown act to collaborate uh on the March budget message uh I know for many of my residents and local businesses there many
concerns are housing our unsheltered residents and the amount of blight in our city uh it is vital that we work to house our unsheltered residents as we look into the effectiveness of each housing model being proposed and while blight is an isore in our city we have we have included prevention language when it comes to tackling tagging in our city in the budget message for me it's important that we have intervention for our young adults to not have their lives ruined by our Criminal Justice Syst
em simply because they are crying for help prevention and intervention are important to me because many of the teen teenagers that I grew up with had their lives ruined in the early and mid 90s due to harsh s operations cracking down on graffiti and tagging and I definitely don't want that to happen to our youngsters again and with that uh I do want to include a bit more on the bud budget message and and I'm hoping that uh council member Davis and and Foley can agree uh to the language I'm going
to propose uh in number one I'm going to go over btim so uh bear with me in the MBA requested by the rules committee on March 6th to provide information on different housing and shelter models including analysis on the following elements which be which will be key to helping the council understand the relative relative relative effectiveness of each strategy one time and ongoing cost to the city for each model two the estimated time frame it takes to implement each model and three any data avai
lable on the likelihood of users of various proposed strategies access accessing stable housing and if how such outcomes May rely on the availab availability of other resources I.E Housing Voucher availability new permanent affordable housing Etc based on the outcomes of pre previous projects and then number two develop an MBA with an analysis of potential Revenue measures that the council could explore to help addressing housing and homelessness initiatives and other critical Community needs an
d also give me a second I also want to ensure that we include San Jose Y as a partner as mentioned on page 19 of the of the budget message when working with our youngsters who are caught tagging so that was I failed to include include that in the in the in the first score around but would you accept my my language yes I'm happy to accept that amendment is that okay with my secondary yes it is thank you great thank you and and with this language I'm looking for staff to do some analysis so the co
uncil is equipped with necessary data and info regarding the cost of various solutions to our unhoused crisis in addition it's time that we acknowledge the Gap in funds needed to fully address uh our housing crisis and I look forward to seeing some initial thinking of opportunities for our city to further generate Revenue through these various mechanisms so we can give our proposed Sol uh Solutions the resources needed to be fully effective I also want to thank council member Davis for her leade
rship in crafting this this motion and I think her bringing in ideas from uh my colleagues memos right we're going to have the tools necessary to make these affir mention tough decisions in the coming months so again thank you uh to council member Davis and council member fley as a seconder for accepting my my friendly amendments uh and I'm I yeld my time thank you great thank you councelor tus councelor Cohen yeah thank you uh mayor um and I want to thank everyone for being here as part of this
discussion today this is really important as part as we kick off this process to hear about people's priorities and and learn about their values and understand uh what we should be thinking about as we move forward this is the beginning of a process and not the end and your input is really important to us um I want to thank council member uh Davis for I think summing up very well and saying it very well about the trade-offs that we're facing and and and crafting a what I think is a comprehensiv
e motion based on the work that some of us did collectively as part of the uh Brown act group with on the mayor's budget message and also a lot of work that I know others have done in creating the other memo and and have been thinking as we move forward in this process um I want to also just you know kind of piggyback on something that was said about the difficult relationships that we have on the council I think it's important um just understand that I think the transition we had last year was
an unusual one given um the extreme level of known people on this Council all at the same time with a new mayor and two appointed members we didn't have the normal transition process and I don't think we ever we jumped right into a budget process right after we were done with the with the appointment process and never really had the opportunity to build the the teamwork and and and relationships that I think we need for for us to function well on the 18th floor as members of the city council so
um I think some of those frustrations continue to rise to the surface and we're hearing them and I think this gives us maybe a little bit of a boost to to work on some of that as we move forward so I I look forward to doing that um I do have a question for um Jim just to clarify for myself we in the the mention of that line in the in page five about cuts to Mayor and Council budget we made a one a cut to the mayor and Council budget during this fiscal year was that a current year cut with a rese
t of the budget or are those the new baselines moving move forward in our budget those were the new baselines so those were on ongoing reductions so we did make those cuts so I think we ought to be mindful of that as we move forward that we've we've taken a hit for our offices which I think was the right thing to do and I advocated for that um but we ought to be a little bit careful because we are still providing essential services in our offices as we uh we move forward um now the biggest chall
enge for me going forward will be this trade-off between how we fund indrum housing and how we continue to to address what I think is the most crucial challenge facing our city which is our shortage of affordable housing it's a long-term problem that is making our city unaffordable for our kids and people to live here and for and c and actually as has pointed out homelessness is based is caused by this housing problem and we need to continue to address it how we balance that is really important
and as you might recall it hasn't even been a year since we went through this process and and uh I fought really hard in last year's budget um to preserve as much a measur for affordable housing as possible and make sure we had money for NOA and I I'm I'm committed to trying to find all avenues to preserve as much uh as we can for affordable housing um having said that you know we we have um also as a council unanimously supported expanding our interim housing uh program and that leads to some o
bviously cost implications and then the need to make sure that we clean up our Creeks for the purpose of our storm water infrastructure but because it's the right thing to do for our environment as well um has uh obligates us to to find resources for that as well and we're going to have to continue to do both but um you know I always tell the story about the timeline on affordable housing while it's frustrating the truth of the matter is an affordable housing project that comes forward now and g
ets a NOA will open doors to Residents probably by about 2032 um and while it's important for us not to lose progress on that um we also have been continually telling folks to be patient uh with what they're seeing in their neighborhoods along the creeks near the schools and in their Parks um and we have to find a better balance to that um and and that's what we'll be doing in the next in the months ahead um as we move forward um I am looking forward to uh as a member of one of the three voting
members of the city on the uh abag board voting next month to support putting on the ballot a Regal housing bond which will uh I think be a really important um not just supplement but replacement for the fact for measure a which has now basically all been spent in Santa Clair County the good news about that bond is that there is money actually specifically earmarked in it for San Jose so San Jose will have control over a portion of the revenue raised by that Bond whether it's 10 billion or 20 bi
llion total for the Bay Area we will have resources there that we will have for San Jose um and I I look forward to um supporting that housing Bond and trying to provide dedicated resources that we can quickly begin to deploy for further development of affordable housing um in Santa Clair County in San Jose um we also need to keep seeking out Partnerships to help fund what we're doing the state has stepped up we have it in my district uh the Cerrone housing site the state has provided us the dol
lars for the units we will have to operate do some more infrastructure work and operate the site um we also have some philanthropic support that's coming in to help us with some of these sites the county will hopefully be helping with some funding every time we get some of these funding um this funding assistance that's reducing what we're going to have to spend in this year's budget so we're going to continue to work hard to try to find make sure we have that that outside funding coming in uh a
nd as mentioned by council member Torres a couple weeks ago as rules committee we asked staff to come back with a with an analysis of all the various types of interim Housing Solutions so that we have better information as we move forward and and decide how to most effectively spend the dollars both for Speed and for efficiency as we move forward so I think it's important for everyone to understand we're working hard on these problems but they're not easy um and then the last thing I just want t
o mention as we move forward is just the important to keep our eye on some of the other priorities we have as a city while these major priorities of cleanliness and homelessness and housing will always be our primary objective um I want to make sure we continue to preserve the progress we've made for our community improving our Park maintenance Opening Our libraries on Sundays supporting our digital Equity program planting trees especially in areas that are have been uh under that have a low Urb
an uh canopy um and providing other core services for our restaurants and sometimes when we have a budget message like we're approving today these things often fall through the cracks and seem to be seemingly are ignored while um underneath we're going to continue to try to make sure we fund those important services at least that'll be what I'm pushing for as we move forward and then the last thing is the um prioritization on our environmental goals we have AET a really really um uh aggressive o
bjectives of being carbon neutral by 2030 and I'm committed to making sure that we continue to invest in that the good news is that for the first time we now have uh reserves from San Jose clean energy that will allow us to invest in the clean energy transition so we're being helped right at the right time with additional funding that we can invest in some of these other initiatives on the environment so I'm looking forward to that discussion as well as part of this uh budget discussion uh so th
ose are the my comments and I look forward to supporting the motion on the floor great thank you appreciate those comments councilor con Council Ortiz thank you mayor um first off I just want to thank all of our um audience for coming out and having having your voice heard um I especially want to thank uh our fast food workers I want to let you know that your voice matters um and we may not be addressing that issue today um but um you know I'm committed to working with you and I just also want t
o say that you know if if your business uh requires paying poverty wages then maybe you shouldn't be in business and if your business requires you to provide minimum worker benefits then maybe you shouldn't be in business and if you know it doesn't impress me that somebody has 30 employees or 60 employees here in San Jose if your employees have to work two jobs just to pay the rent so I just want to put that into perspective um while I find Value thank you while I find Value in the various types
of interm housing programs and Services I cannot support funding them at the expense of permanent support of housing while both of our memb cite the annual community opinion survey our memo recognizes that affordable housing remains a priority for residents and provides direction to ensure there is still funding left for construction acquisition and preservation and it doesn't surprise me that residents are asking for affordable housing to be a priority as in the past three years affordable hou
sing has always remained in the top three according to the annual opinion survey this is especially important to carry with us as renters in San Jose must earn $45 an hour to afford the average monthly rent for a one-bedroom apartment and a minimum wage worker earning $17.55 an hour would have to work two and a half full-time jobs to afford living in a one-bedroom apartment here additionally 51.5% of renters pay more than 30% of their income for rent and about half 25.1% pay more than 50% of the
ir income for rent and furthermore the reality of rent burden is racially and ethnically disproportionate as 53% of all Hispanic renters and 54% of all black renters are rent burdened or severely rent burdened when we talk about building affordable housing we need to look beyond the numbers and recognize that these are desperately needed units for working families without them these rent burden families will be pushed out of the city of San Jose uh many of our fast food workers are are rent burd
en as the conversation on this topic continues I want to make myself clear um as we discuss the realation of of dollars we need to make sure that we maintain a strong pot of sustainable funding for our affordable housing here in the city of San Jose next I want to talk about trust so another priority for San Jose residence and is Public Safety and as referred in the annual survey and by residents of Eastside San Jose the County's investment in funding a trust team has demonstrated its worth as c
linicians and social workers serve as alternative First Responders addressing individuals experiencing a mental health crisis or substance abuse issue and re uh releasing pressure off our already challenged police and uh Sheriff departments while the results of this approach have been prom promising there are currently four trust teams that respond to North County South County and West Valley Cities and a Campbell team that responds to calls uh from San Jose however if there are not enough worke
rs on shift for North and South County the team who responds to San Jose will be deployed to those calls as well leaving San Jose with with no coverage so that's why we we mentioned east east east east County it really meant all of San Jose but I'm I still support the um the uh the motion but we're we're requesting this the CD manager to evaluate the funding of additional trust team uh trust team members with a sole responsibility uh of responding to our areas that are are uh under service so pa
rk impact fees that's another one of my priority and it shouldn't be a surprise um that Parks continue to be a top of mine for myself um and the residents of my district East San Jose for too long the funding mechanisms of the city have left eastside parks behind letting them fall into further disarray and in a way creating a call for blight and crime and truthfully I don't see any way out of this reality without a complete overhaul of our funding structures and an injection of capital to reduce
our massive backlog of deferred maintenance um to that end I'm glad we are um exploring a parked bonds conversation which I was grateful to be briefed the other day by leadership um and I hopefully that will come before us with greater conversation and consideration though without restructuring a funding we're going to find ourselves stuck bringing forward new assets with new no ways to uh maintain them and that's why I'm very interested in moving forward with this item as noted in the joint me
mo I have a few questions but I understand I'm out of time so I could wait uh for the next round council member you have the floor go ahead yeah you still have time then I will go I thought the red meant I'm I'm done okay um so the mayor's budget message included a lot of new proposals that to me needed a little bit more detail um on their costs I know that this is just the start of the budget process so some of these details are still to be determined but I hope that um the council understands
both the one time and ongoing cost of these proposals as we receive the proposed budget so's have a a question for the city manager uh can you share a little bit about how the information in regards to these proposals um included in the the bud budget message will be presented to the council um yes thank you council member Ortiz so when Once the council passes the March budget message in whatever format gets passed to us we will be going item by item and evaluating each one of these Direction ea
ch one of the individual directions and coming up with a proposal with detail for your consideration and and overall we'll bring you back a balance Budget on May 1st so there is a lot of room in here where it is directing me to explore a concept or things like that because our budget is extraordinarily tight there's other things that the that is that are not in here that the administration needs to bring forward for to avoid risk on something or some other things to sh up a department need in or
der to provide other essential basic core services to the organ to the community so um we will uh likely not be able to fund everything at the full value of or the full idea of what might be in here here because again our we're dealing with a a complex budget this year that's really extraordinarily tight but we will give you a full analysis for you to make your decisions also um this this mayor's memo calls for um us to give you some alternatives to things that items that might be presented in t
he proposed budget from the city manager myself and so we will provide you some Alternatives if uh some of the strategies that we put forth aren't acceptable so we'll give you a menu of some other ideas they will not be uh easy and they will just to be frank they will be painful um given my experience as being a the in Jim Shu as being the budget director during difficult budget times but we will do our our very best to provide you with the best Alternatives that we can think of to for your deci
sion- making is it is it possible to have like a one one space for all these different proposals so that council members and our staff can visit them and just see them all in one location yes exactly that's my thought process is that I'll probably attach to my transmitt memorandum a menu of other ideas that can be substituted out for any proposal that we bring forward in our balancing strategy great thank you um then I have a couple questions in regards to the home word bound program so I've nev
er heard of a program like this uh are we going to have like a set strategy of you know what how we could do this like how do we how do we know the cities that we're going to be sending these individuals to have resources and services already set up to receive them and like are we going to be liable if they end up on the street so yeah ju just to clarify this is something we already do in our system and uh there's actually a um a program area with destination home that works on family reunificat
ion so the only the only suggestion here is that the city manager explore making these resources available to the field Outreach team so that we don't have to wait to place someone in shelter to give them the ability to reconnect with family what we find is in a portion of the exits not the majority we can help someone with first and months last last month's rent or move in with a family member who may be struggling to pay the utilities and if we have flexible funding we can often help facilitat
e not often we can sometimes help facilitate family reunification which means we don't have to wait to build a brand new permanent affordable unit uh we've had I I'm forgetting the exact stat but just in the past year at the Guadalupe site I believe we've now had um certainly over five I think almost 10 exits that have actually been the family reunification path but it often requires a bus ticket a plane ticket first month's rent help with utilities something to help that family handle having a
family member come back home so it's a strategy we already deploy we don't want getting into an eih or converted motel or whatever it might be to be the barrier to being able to access those funds so the idea is we'd take a flexible pot of funding probably go to a third party provider light destination home and look at expanding that to field Outreach so we could offer that directly in the field without having to wait for somebody to get into shelter okay all right thank you uh then I have a que
stion for Jim Jim Shannon if we approve exploring a congregate shelter and new safe sleeping sites would prelim AR cost estimates show that these sites would bring us into a further def deficit thank you for the question so I think for the safe sleeping sites um those are going to be you know one of our strategies that we out outline to be able to address the storm water permit so finding a a place for folks to go who are along the creek so that's going to be part of that $25 million sort of pla
ceholder figure that we were talking about is safe sing sites are part of our part of our part of that um we're working on figuring out what that number should should should be and how you know feasible it is we do have Direction in the March message to accelerate that um to make sure we bring those online as soon as we can um I think for the analysis for the congregate shelter I think it was more of a um analysis of a cost estimate in terms of I don't think we have direction to to go and build
build those but that does need to be as as part of our analysis I think it's an MBA Lee is reminding me so that that cost will be brought forward as part of a manager budget addendum later in the process okay thank you and then uh and this is just a question but uh if the costs you know are um in this place where you know it would put at a at a further deficit could we possibly revisit some of the eihs and instead of doing the eih do these larger congregate shelters that would house more people
I mean I think that's a choice the council can certainly make so as as we you know bring forward the cost that's certainly a a choice okay all right all right um well that's that's on my questions for now thank you great thank you council member uh vice mayor K thank you so much um I'd like to thank everyone who came to participate uh graas uh and I'd like to thank my colleagues for um your thoughtful memos the mayor's uh budget message and all the work that goes into this this is just the begin
ning but with a 52.1 million structural shortfall it really requires intentional investments in our highest priorities and I know that during this whole process some things are going to fall off uh but you know we um need to continue to focus and you know take a look at uh some of the requirements especially as was mentioned by council member Davis uh the municipal storm water permit is critical and uh you know as is addressing housing and our unhoused population so we have to keep all of those
things in mind as well as doing the regular work of the city with our Municipal Services um I wanted to make a suggestion in terms of looking at uh closing the Gap uh and you know uh council member Cohen did mention that we had already cut last year and made that sort of permanent along the way last year we uh gave uh as a council me as council members $35,000 each in addition to the mayor's budget being cut 100,000 I would also take a look look at proportional percentage reduction if it's possi
ble as opposed to right now the mayor's budget reduce the essential Services by 33% that means that the the dollars available for doing stuff in the community has already been cut so I think that balancing that is something that I would ask to be at least considered and taken a look at um Revenue sources are always critical and we need necess we need a little bit of Silence so that we can hear everybody and he what I'm trying to get across um uh Revenue sources are always critical and we need to
look at the partnership possible to increasing funding opportunities uh and I really look forward to the staff's information and recommendation to address what's going to happen in terms of the measor P fundings I think we need to continue to address uh the challenges of the inhouse but also remember how important production preservation and protection are uh I think that it's important we have things in the pipeline that we move them forward as quickly quickly quickly as possible um you know I
think that in the past many suggestions have been brought forward even looking at locations uh you know Finding basic lowcost Solutions as we do that and as we continue to uh maybe dust off what the staff has looked at before I would really um caution on going uh to what is the cheapest in congregate shelters because it may sound good but may not necessarily be appropriate for uh you know uh a majority of the people or you know a number of people so I think that as we proceed I would say procee
d with caution I'm really delighted that um the uh city manager mentioned bringing forth Alternatives I look forward to to seeing that I also want to um address the the issue of oversized vehicles um and really have the city manager come back with um I think it was mentioned in the mayor's uh budget message in terms of looking at uh what cities like Mountain View have done the one thing that I hope to request and I'm looking at my neighbor here uh this issue of uh the vanl Lords is a huge concer
n for me because it is not yet a problem but we don't want a problem to even begin and I know that initially we heard about uh there are some who are taking advantage of those who are you know most vulnerable and are renting these RVs uh and I think that before things get out of hand I would respectfully request that um vanl Lords be uh taken a look at in terms of prohibiting you know you don't if if it doesn't start you know we can we can nip it in the bud now and I know it's not a problem yet
but because it has come up uh I think that we need to be mindful to at least as we're looking at uh these restrictions to uh take a look at that so I'm I'm asking just as I turn to the maker of the motion for your and make sure we have a Clarity on the friendly amendment I do want to note there's a section in the budget on vanl Lords right it is something we're aware is is potentially becoming an issue have heard of some instances um so I just want to clarify in addition to the direction in the
message what it is you're looking for and then we'll turn to the makeer of the motion so in the me in in your message you talk about buying out the leans I don't think we need to go there I think we prohibit van Lord's period in the city of San Jose and just just you know just initially make that out you know put it out there so that uh you know we we we create a situation where it is not legal to have VL Lords um I know it's new the direction I I assume would be to explore how we enforce that b
asically yes yes yes that is correct I would like to ask the city manager's office if they before I give you an answer um if if they think that this needs to be something that's in the needs to go through the budget process um I I think we could we have the direction in the March budget message to to look at that I think as we're going forward and looking at that proposal and see how that proposal will be structured we can think about the enforcement mechanisms to kind of think about that as we
put forward a new budget proposals I don't think we need any specific Direction based on this comment here I think that'll just be part of our okay part of our evaluation okay yeah and Ju Just to explain the logic behind it least we're trying to get Upstream because what we understand VL Lords are doing is basically buying them if we buy them and have them destroyed after they're in a junkyard then there's no supply of them at least locally for someone to become a vanl lord I think enforcement g
ets into a bunch of policy questions that are also legitimate but I'll leave it to the maker of the motion if they need to be it it doesn't sound like they need to be added at this time that might be something we could do through pis Fizz or through the rules committee I guess my issue here is that um it is isn't a big problem right now but I could see it becoming a bigger problem and so instead of waiting till it's a problem as you're looking at whether you're going to buy the leans or whatever
what is also the possibility of enforcing not having them to be begin with you know because I mean yeah you could buy the the the leans and and Destroy them but hey they could come from somewhere else people are and they they'll rent them right here so I just I just want to get it as part of the mix yeah totally very Val I think take a lot of exploration to figure out who we figure out who owns and and kind of what documentation may be available but let me turn to the maker of the motion though
ts on next steps here yeah Lee I I'd just like to ask kind of your thoughts on I I heard from Jim about looking at enforcement in terms of what kind of ordinance we would do we have those the resources for that where would that where would that fall what kind of um how would this get added into the budget process I guess yeah I think as we continue to explore this as part of the proposed budget if this is a a greater lift than what we anticipate obviously as Jim said we can build that into the p
roposed budget whether we propose it um or we list that as something that we're not able to fund and then again I would say around enforcement of it um we've discussed it as part of the execution team and the cabinets you know for the unhoused residents but also the increasing community safety and it could be a matter of bandwidth but we need to look at those policy options to the ordinance first which I think we have jump started some of that work so I'm I'm comfortable moving forward with Jim'
s okay comments yeah so I think it's kind of already in there but um if it makes more comfortable I'm happy to to uh make sure that it's in there make sure that it's in there yeah okay I'm I'm good with making sure that in there all right I'm I'm glad that we're making sure that it's in there that well I'm I'm actually a little confused I I know the what's in the budget and addresses the issue but it doesn't address the policy side of it and and I'm wondering if the budget action if that's the t
he vehicle for addressing the policy side which could be an ordinance it could be State legislation there's there could it could be something that the t& committee takes a look at I'm just wondering if sending it including it in the budget right now Beyond what's already included in the budget is what we need to do and if if Lee you're saying we're doing it already then then I'm fine too so Council M Foley one of the things that the message says is that their their suggestion is that we're going
to buy the leans so what I'm saying is that in addition to taking a look at these Alternatives also look at uh making it restricted so that it's not uh in the city of San Jose okay so you know I mean the the city manager said that she would bring back Alternatives I just want to make sure that this alternative makes its way to this doesn't just assume purchasing it right great I I'm for that I would accept that thank you thanks for the clarification yeah thank you so much and you know there's a
lot of other items in the in the in the message that I agree on especially in terms of improving Community safety attracting jobs and Investments you know I do want to highlight the uh Children and Youth master plan I'm delighted that there's going to be a pilot in terms of looking at uh the strategies essential to essential to address the needs of family and youth I think that we need to keep it you know sort of front and center um I also think that digital equity and empowerment has kind of t
aking a little bit of a back seat uh because they're doing well but let's not forget it and uh with that I I thank you so much thank you vice mayor appreciate that councilor Candelas thank you I I want to start by thanking all members of our community who came out to speak on the budget it's going too it's going on close to five hours now so thank you and gracias for everybody for being here um I also want to thank the mayor and my colleagues uh who helped craft the budget message and especially
to council member Davis uh for your leadership on this dis um and crafting a thoughtful uh motion uh which I will be supporting um I appreciate the effort put forth as we look to confront one of the most pressing challenges facing not just our community but the region and state that is the affordability and unsheltered homelessness crisis homelessness is is not just a political talking point it is a human tragedy that affects individuals and families in profound ways it robs people of their dig
nity their security and their hope for a better tomorrow and as leaders in our community it is our moral obligation to address the crisis with urgency and empathy a holistic approach to solving homelessness begins with recognizing that it is a multifaceted issue uh with complex underlying root causes as stated earlier in the latest annual survey our residents were asked about the quality of life in the city and to identify areas of improvement to make San Jose a better place to live and the top
three were addressing homeless issues providing more affordable housing and improving Public Safety to nobody's surprise while the budget message addresses the homeless issue headon um it does very little with regards to the creation of homeless uh the creation of homes people can actually afford building more housing is undoubtedly a critical step towards alleviating homelessness um as mentioned by many in the audience 70,000 families in our community are rent burdened and it is the primary fac
tor driving uh our neighbors into homelessness every single day look no single entity can solve this uh we we know that it's going to require a concerted and coordinated effort from all sectors of our community um especially given the fiscal Outlook that we have in the coming years but perhaps most importantly we must approach this issue with compassion and empathy we cannot continue the approach of pushing our unhoused neighbors out of sight and out of mind we must approach homelessness not as
a moral failing but as a symptom of a systemic failure and neglect we must resist the temptation to marginalize those experiencing homelessness and extend a handout of support it is not a matter matter of either or but more so a yes and approach our memo wants to make sure we continue funding affordable housing projects in the pipeline while we understand the difficult decisions that lie ahead uh given the deficit I want to urge keeping both ending homelessness and increasing the availability of
affordable housing as top priority as indicated by our residents we hope our memo allows for a discussion will full accounting of costs and the impact of our different approaches um emergency inter shelter is important but the costs of expanding these resources are unsustainable and will require significant tradeoffs without identifying an alternative Revenue Source I look forward to engaging in the conversations with my colleagues in the months ahead I think there's an opportunity to improve p
riority uh number three as stated by residents with regards to Public Safety uh the conversation on the critical nature of an additional trust team to help our overworked law enforcement officials uh who respond to calls that are outside of their scope frankly is something that needs our time and attention and uh as this Pro budget process rolls out I look I look forward to that conversation as well um another item I want to quickly touch on is uh the condition of our parks in the city prns does
n't have the the lawnmowers fully fully necessary to mow the city in fact I recently heard there was only three lawnmowers uh available for our entire city this is um this is a basic responsibility for our city to ensure that our parks are safe clean and enjoyable you know we we currently have a daunting challenge a deferred maintenance backlog of nearly half a billion dollars uh this backlog represents not just neglected infrastructure but deferred commitment to the health of our residents um I
think over time neglecting maintenance uh needs um will lead to uh irreversible damage um and and decline in quality of light frankly and so I think funding a sustainable funding mechanism for Park maintenance um is is critical now uh because we cannot continue to Kick the Can down the roads uh down the road burdening future generations with the consequences of our of our inaction that's fiscally irresponsible and I think that was the intent uh behind uh one of our recomend recommendations um t
hat we can't keep ignoring the issue and and I heard somebody earlier mention uh one of the things in the message well you know I I also appreciate the entrepreneur entrepreneurial intention of examining Parkland uh leases for commercial purposes I I've heard from folks in my district about the potential Equity issues this creates because not everyone can spend money to go to a park and that's why our parks are so critical uh we included questions regarding regarding adequate maintenance to the
park system and any potential polling that is forthcoming and I look forward to staff bringing bringing that back to us uh with data um um I want to thank the the speakers who came out from the fast food industry especially those workers who play a vital role in our city um I believe there's a pathway forward to empowering yourselves improving your lives alongside your families and ultimately our community and you know there's no one on this diets that disagrees and is not committed to fair trea
tment security and dignity for you all um with that I look forward to continuing the budget conversations uh in the coming weeks uh months ahead thank you mayor thank you council member Council batra thank you mayor thank you to all the residents fast food employees restaurant owners and others who came today and showed us the side of the life which some of these people have to live and the difficulties they're encountering at the same time I admire the California unions who brought attention to
these work ERS and their life and got something substantial past this last year where they managed to create um a special Council to address their safety their wages their health and as a result today when we haven't accepted the fact that we should really make this as a part of our budget it is not that we are not sympathetic to The Plight which has been presented here or the weight theft issues and we're not ignoring those we are with you but we understand that what your unions have been able
to get done it needs to be given a chance to that Council to really propose the things and if there are gaps San Jose Council will always be there to take care of you so I want to make that assurance that I'm very comfortable that I want to give a chance and Not Duplicate the work which your unions are managed to get done and so you should really patch yourself on the back and your unions for having taken your issue and gotten what you have gotten done now come to the budget I thank my colleagu
es for having presented a very wellth out very balanced budget in a very challenging environment and there is a lot in this budget there's 25 five pages of that and there are many items covered in there I'm just going to pick a couple of items to comment on I'll be supporting the motion which has been made uh by our colleague council member Davis and seconded by P for council member the homelessness or the four priorities which the mayor got last year those priorities stayed the same for this ye
ar but underneath a lot has changed whatever we learned from the last four last year's work we're trying to incorporate and mayor has presented those as ideas for refinement and to make sure that we expand our evaluations learn from other cities you have many examples in the budget stated there that we will be we deduce the cost he proposed the cost of a $1.2 million Apartments to a $100,000 interim housing we finding that that was a big reduction but even for that size with that reduction with
4600 unsheltered people it is still not addressing the full need so we had to find a way to reduce the cost and quick builds were quick builds but we need quicker builds so that's reflected in our budget so the learnings from what happened last year is very much as a part of it so I like this budget for that reason as well the other aspect we also learned about the homelessness it is inhumane for these people to be living there but there are other consequences of that to the people who are livin
g around them the neighborhoods where we are trying to build the interim housing those people's life is affected as well because they don't know what's going on there why these things are there and there have been some thoughts about that there's criminal activities going on around that so I like the fact that in this budget 25 page there's a multiple time a mention of enforcement enforcement may not mean that we want to go inside criminal homelessness is not crime we already stated that but the
re can be criminal activities happening in that area or around that we need to make sure that our city enforces all the rules and the regulations and the laws which we have available to make the life of these people who are living in inhuman conditions is safe and also the people who are around them also feel safe and they are allog together a better community so I like the fact that we are emphasizing that there's going to be enforcement and we the term which mayor used preserving the progress
when we clean up an area we are able to provide shelter to the people who are in the encampments we want to be able to keep that area clean and maybe a mile by mile Square by square we will be able to clean the whole city of San Jose and one day we'll be homelessness free and the blight free in that area so I like the fact that we are also adopting to the area of consideration that we will have no encampments or no returns to keep these areas free of these things want to comment on the de uh the
trust teams I've been always for the deescalation we talked about the police thing the deescalation whether it's a traffic stop or when it's a call to go to a domestic violence issue or anything and I think that 911 study which was done and then presented here identified the opportunities for alternate law enforcement so I'm totally supportive of the idea of having trust teams large enough big enough that we can take care of the volumes which are identified in the 911 analysis which can be alte
rnatively handled now when we do that one I think the other encouraging message in the budget is that we are not going to be trying to do everything alone yes we are capable of doing a lot but we cannot do it all alone so the efforts which are going to be made of trying to coordinate our activities with the county with the state and especially in the health area maybe from prop one when the money comes become available we'll be able to get more of mental health issues addressed from there so the
budget message is a good message I totally support it and all of these encouraging factors I mentioned they're a lot more and as a result um I want to say that thank you for producing such a budget mayor it's a second budget it's way better than the first one even and I think you had a lot of uh priorities captured and especially the lot of techical improvements in terms of the methods we are going to use learning from other cities and other experiences so congratulations on producing such a bu
dget and thanks to all the colleagues who worked with you on the brown act great thank you council member glad to hear your see an improvement appreciate that uh councilor danan thank you mayor um since I'm the last I get to take up 20 minutes just kidding um I just want to say thank you to to all of you who attend this meeting and council member Davis said it best we there's a law coming down from the state and we should let it play out it doesn't mean that we ignore or we don't care about you
um I work in many fast food u in my lifetime and and I know what it is um to be prejudiced against um to to expect to work um you know way over the amount of time and and not taking time off and especially with the economy that we have here in the Bay Area is extremely expensive to survive on and I just want to let you all know that we'll find a solution to make sure to work with our city staff with nonprofit organization to make sure that our uh fast food worker will be educate educated toward
their rights and and know how to protect themselves I'm going to get back to thank you the mayor and my colleagues uh for putting this um March budget message together and and and I specifically want to thank you the mayor stick to the the four basic that when you started out the four basic is is technically reducing the unhoused resident keeping our communi safe cleaning up our neighborhoods and bringing in investment to the city that's create jobs those are the four basic that we're we're tryi
ng to stay on point throughout you know for the next term until we reduce the amount of unhoused residents I'll tell you this council member uh batra and myself put together a memo when we talked about sprung up structures pre fabricated engineered structure to get our unhoused residents out of the coal to save their lives out of the heat give them the dignity and respect with wraparound Services the other choice is this last year we had 2011 unhoused resident die on the street that's inhumane a
nd I think it's important that we have to solve the unhoused residents because if we don't all the money that's going to go to affordable housing won't be there because we be spending so much money to try to resolve the unhoused residence for the last 20s something years we haven't resolve it so we have to think out of the box come with with new program and we were all on board I believe that we can reduce the amount of res unhoused residents and then bring back the sanctity and the laws that we
have right here in the city of San Jose the UNH house have affected every one of us the resident the visitor the businesses the school the parks every aspect of Our Lives that is one of the biggest key key to this city to bring in back job to bring in back investment making sure our residents is being feeling safe at least and I'm glad that we invest into our police department and our fire department by Recruitment and Retention in the police employees and also the fire department and to suppor
t the med30 program and the Pedic program as well by having police present the community policing to have the air support unit in the air to to help us catch the criminal which create faster response that will make our city safer now we have spent I I want to tell you this is the first I've been in this city about 42 years mayor Matt mayand is the first mayor I've seen out there out there cleaning the creek almost every week including myself taking time away from his kids and his wife to support
the community a lot of us council member are doing that as well and we spend enormous amount of time cleaning up our city but the main cause of all the garbage in our city come from our residents who illegally dumping and in the mayor budget message we do have a program that we're going to catch those people with cameras and enforcement and with all of your help with all the volunteers if each and every one of us pick up a piece of garbage every day day we reduce approximately 1 million pieces
per day and I think it's important that we all of us participate at the least and not last San Jose have been known as a bedroom community and why are we are the bedroom community because we don't have enough business investment to create enough jobs for the Cen right here we the only Metropolitan with anomaly where resident leaves in the morning to go work everywhere else and spent the money somewhere else versus right here in the city of San Jose and in order to get the business taxes in order
to get all the services including building more housing we need those investment and I will absolutely quickly support the motion from council member Davis and second by council member fully and I hope that we together will continue to fight for equal rights and equity in this San city of San Jose and I hope that you come with an intention to make this city better not only for yourself but for everyone else thank you thank you council member appreciate your words all right Tony let's vote motio
n passes unanimously great thank you Tony thank you all very much all right we have two remaining items we have a very short staff presentation on item 4.1 colleagues there is okay I'm sorry excuse me we need to continue our meeting and our business this evening I'd ask you to leave without disrupting the meeting thank you all right if I could have staff come down for item 4.1 I understand we have a short [Music] presentation what's that I don't know you want to take a break 15 all right we'll t
ake a five minute recess thank you [Music]
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