Welcome to our March 6 study session of our City Council. And I would like to open it up to non-agenda items and I do have some speakers. So if you would like to address us on a non-agenda item, please fill out a speaker card. Our first is Bradley Hertz. Welcome. Thank you very much Mayor, members of the council. My name is Bradley Hertz. I'm a partner at the Sutton Law firm and here as a legislative advocate for the Los Angeles Lob lobbyist association. This dovetails a little bit with matter A1, but it's more general in nature. And we believe the legislative advocacy ordinance has some real legal problems when you compare it with other local entities around the city and state and country in terms of being over broad, capturing too many people within its grasp, allowing for inadvertent errors which might lead to- Do you recognize this as on the agenda? You're talking about an item that is on the agenda. As I understand, I can come back on that. When I understood that's rather narrow aspect of the lobbyist ordinance to require re-registration for those existing lobbyists under the new law. This was more general comments if I could. No, absolutely. I just wanted to make, let you know that we are going to be addressing the ordinance in a moment. Thank you. So, generally speaking, we think that there are some unintended consequences with regard to the reach of the law, for example, indirect lobbying that where a person has no contact with a public official, let's say an associate at a law firm, they might have to register. Also the requirement to estimate fees in advance that may or may not be earned, we think, is a problem. And we've sent a note to the city attorney a letter with copies to the council members to express some of these concerns. We're hoping that in the implementation of the ordinance there will be a narrowing and a rule of reason that's brought to play to solve some of these problems. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, the Honorable Robert Tannenbaum, welcome. This is a non-agenda item tonight, but it's in part involved with what will happen tonight. And what I am concerned about, and what a lot of people concerned about with respect to this what's happened on the whole hillside issue. Is that. Sorry do you say something? I didn't. He said hillside. I'm sorry with respect to what's happened on the hillside is really brought to light an important issue and that is that a lot of us believe that Riches Washington, Gershawne, of which Larry Wiener is the important here representing us as the city attorney, as a conflict of interest. And that the conflict stems from the lawsuit that was filed by the developer in that case, the Hillside case, with respect to the trial of that, where the developer claims that the Hillside ordinance of 2016 and the interim ordinance are illegal, should not apply to them, and they're alleged, and their lawsuit, again, was supposed to be tried in July, that they have lowest millions and millions of dollars. Had they been given a buy-right, and these statutes not applied to them. Now, what's that issue here is the interpretation of two sections of the Beverly Hills Municipal Code, which are sections 10-3-2507 and 10-3-2503. and I would concern is that with Riches watching Gershaw and representing the city that they could very well sustain substantial damages themselves and liability from the city or otherwise, if in fact, the legal advice they gave with respect to the ordinance in 2016 as well as the interim ordinance was determined by the court not to be legal. And the reason I mention that is, the California rules are professional conduct, and I'll call it from California rule 3.310B, which states that a member shall not accept or continue representation of a client without providing written disclosure to the client where in sub four, the member has or had a legal business financial or professional interest in the subject matter of that. professional interest in the subject matter of that. Richard's watching Gershon has all four. If, again, if the court finds that the advice they gave was insufficient, notwithstanding whatever good faith they engage in, the notion that they have a conflict with respect to the manner in which they handle his case it would be nice for them Not nice for the city or the residents We're dealing with a very steep incline in the in as you know in the on hillside Would be good for rich's watch and not to remove any Potential liability by having a settlement of the case and or having the staff the influence to permit the development to take place. California Supreme Court has ruled on this issue and California Supreme Court has explained that. Excuse me? I didn't say anything. Okay. That's the primary purpose. You're expecting me to probably. Yeah. Well, that's because it was a three minute. That was a five minute. Exactly. So if you don't mind Mayors the primary the primary purpose To prevent situations in which an attorney Might compromise his or her representation of the client in order to advance the attorneys on financial personal interest That's the reason for the rule and In that case, it's Santa Clara County Council Attorney's Association V Woodside, decided in 1994 at 7 Cal 4, 525. Now. Mayor, if you don't mind, just, especially if you can. I'm going to finish right now, Lily. The point is this, what the city should do is retain independent council on this issue, on the issues dealing with the interpretation of those statutes that pertain to the development of the health side, and that would be the prudent thing to do. Rich's watching should recuse itself unless it gets a written consent from the city that the city is aware of this potential conflict of interest and You know that's something that you will best decide. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Steve mayor Welcome I'm going to go to the committee. Welcome. Thank you. Honorable Mayor, Vice Mayor and Council members, my name is Steve Mayor and I wish to address two subjects. The first is related to an article in this week's courier where in some planning commissioners planning commission members believe that is appropriate for a fellow commissioner to express a different opinion to council. In my experience, that sentiment is felt by virtually all commissioners on a variety of commissions. I believe that it would be useful and helpful to all commissioners if you could express your position. Do you want commissioners to express their urgent views to the council? As to the subject, I am the founder of the Concerned Citizens of Beverly Hills, Bell Air. We are the ones who filed a sequel action relative to the 1184-1193 Loma Linda Drive. One of our key motivations is filing the writ was trying to protect the neighborhood and the neighbors from what we perceived to be over development, not unlike like what was experienced on 332 to 336 North Ocursed. Other objectives included preserving the Habitat corridor and the Fire Safety. In this circumstance, we see the sequel legal process as a means by which to reach a resolution prior to ever seeing the inside of a courtroom. Our interest is not to stop development. We are hopeful that we most of the concerns that the neighbors have raised can be mitigated. And in our use of the sequel process, in this case, we feel an obligation to minimize the burden on all parties, specifically the city and the developer. For example, we found a way to save 100 hours of staff time in our public records who classed from the four city departments in the City Clerks office in the city clerk's office in the preparation of the administrative record. Several weeks ago we were approached by Peter Ostroff to lead the effort to have all parties engaged in neutral third party mediation. Neutral third party mediation is a process where an impartial party brings all sides to the table and tries to find a resolution often in a day. In this instance, the objective is to create a holistic settlement of all issues of all parties, including both existing legal actions as well as any future potential actions. We are obviously 100% behind this proposal, and as of early last week, we believe that we had most if and not all parties on board. We have submitted our list of proposed mediators, one of whom is Dr. Singh, who helped the city in the RSO. Even if the proposed mediation is not only a successful, concerned citizens remains committed to finding a solution before the entitlement process for Loma Linda returns to the City Council. We'll do whatever it takes to see that that happens. Thank you. Thank you very much. Mr. Ron Richards. Welcome. Hi. I wanted to clear up some issues that occurred this week with respect to timing of staff reports and hopefully you can give staff direction. So we avoid sort of the chaos that occurred. I will tell you as the weekend came in Monday and Tuesday, a lot of questions then got answered quickly and a lot of this subsided. But the reason why there was a lot of this misinformation and confusion was because there's typically a deadline to where the staff report has to be filed. It's usually Tuesday in the afternoon, sometimes it kicks over to Wednesday. But this week it was held and information was still being compiled until Friday afternoon. And it was until Thursday afternoon that, until the residents knew what was actually going to be on the agenda. So it exposed a real flaw in the way you get information, because typically you've benefited from hearing everybody's view and I think that's the goal is to have the residents tell you their views and to get you their experts and their information and what happened this week the ball was kind of held because the staff didn't know what was going to be on the agenda. They just sort of thought something was going to occur. Then a report came out late Wednesday night, which was totally different than what I believe they expected. And then what happened is there was mass confusion. And now you're left with all this wasted time tonight about things that you really aren't ripe. They're not, they're kind of issues that aren't, they're really advisory. And we're spending all these hours really to have you just get an update where you specifically have indicated on certain matters. You don't even want to hear them until they're by right. And so the remedy to this, and I have this on the agenda for the next Sunshine Task Force meeting, is that the staff needs to tell the residents in advance what they're going to request to be put on the agenda and then tell them when the cutoff is, they then get their letters in timely and then the staff report will be prepared on a due date But it shouldn't be like a moving target to where the subject matters are up in the air and the residents don't know that's what's unfair And then what happened is this week staff report for tonight's meeting you have no resident input And you know that I always get a letter in on time because you see it the reason why I don't have a letter and why a lot of the materials for tonight's meeting have no comment is simply because we didn't know what the agenda was going to be and that's not fair. That's not right because you're getting sort of a one side of view. Unless the council has taken a new position that they believe the staff is always right, which I doubt that's the position. Then you really got to have a format that allows residents to provide information to you. The system just broke down this week. And that's why you were getting BCC'd on emails about not getting questions answered. In the panic, I'm telling you from someone that works with the residents on a constant basis is because no one knew what you were going to actually be potentially voting on. And that's a very unnerving feeling to think you're getting things that could decide and affect hundreds of homes, but yet nothing's even coming on the agenda. So that's what I wanted to bring to your attention. The system somehow failed this week. And we shouldn't have it happen again and we need to come up with an immediate direction to staff to Give the residents a preview so you get timely input and that's the the basis of why came to the general session Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Thomas White Welcome Thank you and good afternoon Thomas White chairman of chairman of the Municipal League of Beverly Hills. As the council well knows, one week from tonight we have a town hall meeting which is co-sponsored by Beverly Hills North Homeowners Association, the Municipal League and the City of Beverly Hills. We want to make sure that the council and the staff and department heads, and in particular, our planning staff are well aware that they are invited to our town hall meeting. We really want to see them in here from them. And the Council knows that it is warmly welcomed. We'd appreciate your presence for the benefit of the public. And for the Council's benefit benefit I've provided a copy of the flyer that has been sent around and it's the title of our town hall is called protecting and safeguarding the integrity of our residential neighborhoods and is going to include discussions with the public as this is a town hall of the possibilities of strategic planning to ensure public safety, our residential quality of life, the cost of residents spending money to defend their property against over development over manionization, which is a long standing issue in the residential community, due process in public hearings and our city wide effort to enforce code compliant and residential and commercial development within the city. That is the standard. And of course, that's the long standing standard that the residential community wants to see embodied as the the rule of Beverly Hills and not the exception. So we hope you can join us We'll look forward to a robust discussion where all views will be heard the public is invited There's free parking and we will have refreshments and we look forward to seeing you there. Thank you and we will have refreshments and we look forward to seeing you there. Thank you. Thank you. Thomas, I just want to say to you what I mentioned to Mayor Tannenbaum, especially when you look at the title of this protecting and safeguarding the integrity of residential neighborhoods. You need to immerse yourself in what is working its way through the legislature now, a bill that this council is opposed called SB827, which would effectively allow up to eight story buildings throughout most of the city, including the residential neighborhoods, which I think would go against the notion of protecting and safeguarding the integrity. Yes, and it would take the control away from the city council where it belongs. I think that's extremely important. You can't underestimate the threat. And the League of Cities has actually said that our residents are, and all residents who oppose this, will need to actively get involved politically and try and stop this power graph. Thank you for that important reminder. It is indeed important. Thank you. Thank you. So I have my final speaker on items not on the agenda if there's anybody else who would like to address us Please fill out a card. Mr. Mark Elliott Welcome, thank you. Good afternoon. We're bossy vice mayor gold members of the city council. I'm here to talk about No calls no just cause of Xictions, 60-day notices and a like. I know the City Council when you pass the urgency ordinance a year ago, residential stability was among your highest priorities. The Council never addressed really in any detail, ending no just calls, evictions here in Beverly Hills, but we know other rent stabilized cities have ended that practice. And when I think about residential stability, I think about the 31-year- about the 31-year-long tenant on South Roxbury evicted with 60-days notice. So I think about the single mother on South Lasky evicted 60-days notice. And there are many more that I've heard about tenants reaching out to me. I also think about buildings and tower buildings like on Durant, empty for Airbnb using 60-day notices. So I requested information from the city about 60-day notices issued in 2017. Landlords, as you know, were required to provide those a week after they provided tenant. And I got back 19, but I've heard anecdotally about others. And when I looked at the code enforcement reports for those 19, I saw fees were not paid in at least a couple of the cases, which I've also heard about anecdotally. So my concern going forward is that I think the city, I think we have an under reported incident so 60 day notices, no just cause evictions. I don't think our city has an idea of how extensive the problem is. I'd like to ask that we think about how we begin to get a handle on that, how we start to identify using business records or the rental registry, and especially irregularities in the rental registry, sham tendencies that came after a six-day notice and the like, that we begin to identify where those might have happened. So if the city does not have those records now, we get them and then we can follow up with a landlord to might have improperly perhaps raised a rent after a 60 day notice. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you very much. Okay, is there anybody else that would like to address us on an item that's not on the council agenda? So we are ready to go into our agenda, Item one, recommendation by the Sunshine Task Force Committee regarding legislative advocacy registration, expanding notice for projects and amending hearing procedures. And may we have a report place? Good afternoon, Honorable Mayor, members of the City Council. I'm Lolly Enricas from the City Attorney's Office. I will be transmitting the recommendation by the Sunshine Task Force at its last meeting. There were three recommendations. The first recommendation was requiring legislative advocates who have registered and the 12 months prior to the effective date of the last ordinance that the Council adopted amending the legislative advocacy registration form. This was, this form was changed, as you know, to require legislative advocates to report compensation, as well as, well, indicate whether they are an expenditure lobbyist, and whether they have ever been sanctioned for violating the ordinance. So there was some concern by the Sunshine Task Force that those who have registered in the last 12 months didn't have to report such information. The second recommendation was to increase the period and distance of notice for projects from 10 to 20 days and from 500 feet to 1,000 feet. This would have the advantage of providing more notice and time to respond by the residents as well as reaching more residents. However, this may result in some delays in the hearing and there are some increased costs associated with the expanded notice. The third recommendation was to change the quasi-judicial public hearing procedures to provide for the opportunity for the residents public hearing procedures to provide for the opportunity for the residents and the public to rebut. So typically the way the hearings go is that the applicant has an opportunity to speak, then the public can respond, and then the applicant has the final world. The Sunshine Task Force recommended that the public in general be allowed to respond. So the way the hearing would go would be the applicant would speak and then the public, the applicant would have a chance to speak again and then the public again. And so in the interest of due process because the applicant must be allowed to speak on any new issues or evidence, we would ask the applicant if they feel that there were any new issues or evidence that were brought up that they should respond to. If the answer is yes, we would allow them to speak, and then the residents would have an opportunity to rebut again if the answer is no, then the council would then deliberate and make a decision. It should be noted that with regards to the noticing, the code provides for certain 100-foot and 300-foot radius noticing for certain types of projects reviewed by the Design Review Commission and the Community Development Department, as well as for resolutions of public convenience or necessity. These provisions were not changed since there was no discussion of that at the Sunshine Task Force meeting And That concludes my report Okay, thank you so before I get to the lay is on report. I'm gonna open it up to public comment We'd like to speak to us on this item. Please fill out a speaker card. Mr. Thomas White. Good afternoon again. Thomas White, Chairman and the Municipal League of Beverly Hills. As some of you know, I've been a member of this committee since its formation by then Mayor Marish. And I'm very, very proud to be part of it. I feel that this is the people's mechanism by which we can bring with the support of staff and with the support of the liaison committee. Ideas of merit to the council having gone through extensive discussion at our meetings and those meetings are open to everyone. I said I'm a member because I was asked to be on the initial group of people at Form the Mayors Committee but of course it's expanded since then and rightly so and every council member has had an opportunity to suggest members of the committee. We all come together in a mutually respectful way and we all have an opportunity, compliments of the great leadership of Mayor, Mayor Bossy to be heard and to have all of our views voiced regardless of which side of the issue we're on. So we have both consumer advocates, we have advocates for private business, and lobbyists who have indicated their preferences and we've listened. I think we've done a really good job at harmonizing on being responsive to the issues that have been brought before the committee. This measure was passed unanimously on a motion in the committee and I think it's an excellent step forward. I also would like to thank the city attorney for his openness and willingness to bring the public hearing process to a higher standard that supports due process, which I think is the essence of our democracy. I'm very appreciative of it. And with that, I hope the council will allow this to go forward and do so with pride because it really represents an important progress in our democratic process in the city of Beverly Hills. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Bradley Hertz. Welcome again. Thank you, Madam Mayor, members of the Council and staff, Bradley Hertz of the Sutton Law Firm on behalf of the Los Angeles Lobbyist Association. Before I spoke more generally about the new legislative advocacy ordinance, I understand the Sunshine Task Force recommendation is to require existing lobbyists to renew forms to provide new information. We don't have a problem with the concept of a new form, but the content of the new form we are troubled by. And that pertains to some of what I mentioned a few minutes ago, the requirement to estimate fees in advance that's unworkable in a lot of ways. A lot of lobbyists are paid monthly retainers. They may not know how much they're charging for particular tasks until afterwards. Most lobbyist ordinances require disclosure of the money afterwards when it is known as opposed to a prediction as to what may or may not come in in terms of the money. And similarly, the overreaching we think to apply to those who engage in what's defined as indirect lobbying, which may never result in a direct contact with a legislative member or official of the city. So we think the form needs to be reexamined and the ordinance itself needs to be reexamined. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. that is relating to the condominium conversions. I appreciate that staff was thorough in mentioning that that has a 10-day notice to tenants in a potential condominium conversion when a public report may be requested from the California Board of Real Estate. That's a consumer protection body, and that protects the buyers of real estate generally. The public report comes out, it includes environmental conditions, various disclosures, taxes fees. However, the protection of tenants, current tenants in the condominium conversion, that notices only 10 days. There are other noticing provisions as well. But as I read this paragraph, of course it occurred to me, well, why wouldn't that be 20 days as well if we were changing provisions? And just more broadly, because the city has relatively few tenant protections relative to other cities, perhaps this is an opportunity to look at the condominium conversion process as we regulated here in Beverly Hills and think about other ways that we can again support residential stability for residents who rent by making that condo conversion process at least more informative and perhaps a bit more advanced time, noticing time so that tenants should they decide not to purchase a unit have an ability to make alternate plans. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Steve Webb, honorable Steve Webb. Welcome. Madam Mayor, council members. I don't think at this point a decision should be made on any of these issues because we're doing things piecemeal and there's more to come. In particular, I'm looking at the March 15th proposed agenda by the same committee where they have all sorts of recommendations for other things that need to be added to the form. And doing this on a piecemeal basis creates confusion. As it is now, I have to go back and forth over two or three ordinances to figure out because there are some definitions in one ordinance that you have to go back to and other definitions in others. So I think having a complete package to look at at one time is important. I've sent you a letter on my one issue on the form which has to do with the disclosure of attorney's fees or estimated fees. The speaker to speakers ago pointed out to you that other jurisdictions only request the information once the matter is completed and you report. There's a legal reason for that because the California Supreme Court distinguished between requiring disclosure of attorney's fees before a matter has been completed and those that are completed after. And that was a Freedom for Information Act where the California Supreme Court said no you don't have to show Attorneys fees while the matter is still pending. So I think that has to be looked at further with respect to the issue of the order of dialogue, I think you're asking for an overly burdensome process. Every council I've appeared in front of and every council I've served on and every planning commission similarly has always bent over backwards to give everybody an opportunity to speak. But the fact of the matter is due process requires that the applicant have the last word, and so you're going to have this circle going back and on and on and on, which I think is unfortunately overly burdensome. And so I would just ask you to take a step back, take a deep breath, and dialogue amongst yourselves as to what it is exactly you want to accomplish. What's important that you and the community know? I mean, as things stand now, you're getting 25, 30 forms filed every day, staffs overwhelmed, commissioners are overwhelmed. So what's happening now is people aren't reading the forms. So that's the unintended consequence of the breadth of this. So I hope you will think hard as you usually do and look at all aspects of this. Thank you. Thank you. Judy Fenton Welcome Bossy vice mayor goal and city council members I am on the Sunshine Task Force and I don't think it was it was a total consensus I think the overall picture was a consensus but there are some things in here that I think I'd like was a total consensus. I think the overall picture was a consensus, but there are some things in here that I think I'd like to point out to you that I think is someone unfair. I think we're a forward thinking council and community, and I think to go back to have people re-register after a certain amount of time is just not right because when they filled their application out it wasn't on the application. So a year ago somebody was a lobbyist and they felt out an application and I'm not sure if they're a lobbyist today or not because we don't have a record of how many people are still lobbyists from which date to another and then to have them go back and fill out a new application with new requirements. My suggestion was and I think I brought that up at the Sunshine Committee that there should be a box to fill out on a new application that says this application may be in fact overturned by a City Council member and you may be required to fill out a new application during your term of advocacy. So at least they know when they sign their form that they may be asked to sign another form to have it. But I think going back that far, I'm not opposed, and I know that there was a lot of people that rushed to judgment before the 9th of February. I'm not opposed to going back 30 days, but I am opposed to going back a year. I think it just makes no sense at all. So I just wanted to just point that one thing out everything else I agree with, I just think that going back, I like to move forward, I don't wanna keep thinking about going back. So if you have to consider something that makes sense to you and there's obviously a lot of people who signed this advocacy forum right before the 9th of February. Maybe you go back 30 days, but a year I thought was too long. Thank you. Thank you. Are we Englander? Welcome. I may or members of the council, my name is Harvey England, I'm a resident of Beverly Hills. I've been a lobbyist to register at local state federal agencies for about 30 years. I'm a founder of Los Angeles lobbyist association where we've worked in a number of cities throughout Los Angeles County as well as the city of Los Angeles, in developing really good disclosure laws that give the kind of information that the council members, that commissioners and the public should have, and that's regarding fees, regarding client registrations, et cetera. However, this ordinance doesn't do that, and I'm hoping that before you amend a fatally flawed ordinance, you review the problems that you have in this ordinance. A great example, just one, is a person in my firm who has absolutely no contact with the Council, a Commissioner, or the staff who is doing research for me on issues relating to something in this city has to register as a lobbyist. And you know, if that person doesn't register as a lobbyist and has later found out to violate this law, you've got the city, has got the ability to stop that person from ever lobbying again in the city because you are so vague as to what the requirements are for when you violate this ordinance. Now, a lot of these issues have been enumerated in the letter that our council Jim Sutton sent to you and to the city attorney. I mean you have things like disqualification from future lobbying based on material violations but what is a material violation? You don't define it. What's an immaterial violation? You don't define it. There are a number of issues like that throughout the ordinance and so I suggest that before you add additional items to this ordinance, you go back and look at the problems that are in this ordinance. For example, labeling individuals who never contact city officials as lobbyists, imposing vague reporting obligations regarding estimates of future fees, something I have not seen in any jurisdiction anywhere in this country. Imposing potentially direct-cony in policies, our penalties for violating these reporting things. Interpretation of definitions need to be redone. That's number one issue, the second issue. I learned about the Sunshine Committee's reviewing the lobbyist ordinance through an article in the Beverly Hills Courier, and I came to that meeting that the Beverly Hills Courier talked about. And at that meeting, I said as a registered lobbyist, wouldn't have been appropriate that all registered lobbyists in the city of Beverly Hills, who registered here, received notifications of these meetings. And Mayor Bossa, you were shocked that we didn't and you directed staff to do that. We received notice of one additional meeting. Most of these meetings actually occurred and the vote on this actually occurred really during the holiday season. And that's the time when traditionally Beverly Hills has closed down and not had commission hearings, council hearings, etc. on important issues. And the registration of lobbyists is important. So there has not been sunshine on this issue. Thank you. Thank you. Marsha Hobbs. Welcome. Thank you very much. I've sat through most of these sunshine task force meetings. And it is possible that it's not a perfect ordinance yet, but I've been around here a long time more than a decade, quite a bit more than a decade unfortunately. And this is the first time I've ever seen a true attempt by a committee that was actually formed because of the concern of the council, that the residents and other people who are involved businesses, et cetera, owners be adequately informed about what's going on, about compensation. There have been some people who have signed up as lobbyists because I'm one of those boring people that reads every one of those forms who have been sanctioned in Los Angeles. So the list is quite critical. It needs to exist and it needs to exist as it is now. And it can be, you can redo the form, it's not a complicated form. Larry put together a really simple 45 second to fill in form. The distance for noticing residents, extending to a thousand feet is almost a no-brainer because of the size of the projects, etc. And that's something that's been avoided sadly in many cities including Beverly Hills. The actual suggestions to have the advocates go first at a council meeting. There have been many other things that have been discussed that nobody else has raised. So that the applicants would go first, the residents can hear it, they can then have a chance to respond, is ground breaking. An miracle that people would recognize that there are people impacted by all of these things that are happening that never have a chance to say another word and have actually in this council chamber been insulted by advocates for their interference. So I would find it hard to understand and the newspaper will of course continue to dig and to publish and To put in everything we can find So we're not going to stop but really it's not the role of the newspapers. It's our role to report Not to have to do what the city could do so much better and so much more effectively, which is to put it in place and fine tune it later. Thank you. Thank you. And by the way, I'm fascinated with the compensation. And I don't understand why people who are doing an excellent job as advocates would be insulted with somebody else knowing about their fees. Thank you. Mr. Mitch Dawson. Welcome. Thank you. Members, the number of years ago I had the privilege of being appointed to the Planning Commission of the city. I spent seven years on the Planning Commission one year beyond my term limits and I was extended. I was privileged to be extended. And during that time period, it worked quite well. There were numerous people that were on the planning commission during my time. And all our hearings were open and fair and reasonable. And the system worked well, in my opinion. What was to be done was done correctly. Everything was above boards. And the staff then and the staff now, and there are members of the staff that are here, do a great job. They still do. And they did then. I think, just real quick, that the issues now are over broad, should be reviewed and reconsidered. Thank you. Thank you. I have my final speaker card on this item. So if there's anyone else that wants to address us on this item, please fill out a card. Mr. Ron Richards. Thank you, and I request it. And it's, first of all, when Mr. Hertz got up here, he didn't identify himself as a lobbyist and this is what exemplifies his application came in why we were sitting here, which is good because then I know that his business is campaign lawyers and I know why he's lobbying against the ordinance. I will tell you out of all the things I've done in Beverly Hills, the Sunshine Task Force is one of the greatest things because you have everybody in the community that has an interest in getting more transparency and you come up with decisions and vice mayor Gold gold I look forward to you being on that committee because I think it's one of the best things we've ever done because it's all about fairness. The comment that you can't figure out the ordinance because it's changed is and gets better. I mean when I hear lawyers make that comment, I mean, I'm a lawyer. I could tell you that the Beverly Hills Municipal Code is not the most challenging code there is. And I'll help any lawyer I pledge right now to help all of you figure out the ordinance. If you don't understand it or need help, I'm happy to do it. I filed complaints against people that deserve it. And even last week we had people omitting material facts. A material omission would be you were sanctioned in a jurisdiction and didn't disclose it or you were lying about your employer. Things like that. How do we not know certain people were lobbyists? We wouldn't be able to figure out, you know, what campaigns they worked on or where their voice was coming from, who was throwing them a benefit. So, this is all important information just to know where you're getting the information. As far as the fees is concerned, it's important to know how much money is at stake. No one, you know, some of these things were unanimous. The comment that do process requires the applicant to have the last word, that's just mistaken. Larry researched that. That was a point we debated. Bob Tannenbaum asked him for authority and he said there is no authority. You can set up as long as everyone gets a voice, then it's, then it meets constitutional minimums. Judy Fenton agreed for 30 days, I had wanted a year the problem was a lot of people tried to run in their forms at the end a year We would want it longer actually, but a year was the overwhelming majority of the committee because we want people to refresh their forms It's illogical to say you want less information Let's look about what you're really to vote on. These are really simple things. There's just three things, and I'm speaking to Mr. Wonderlick, Friedman, and Gold, because you weren't there. The three things are the 20 days notice is so obvious. That was unanimous, by the way. Even Murray Fisher was very much in favor of that. Because what happened in the Logo Vista situation was that the planning commission packet comes out on the 10th day and the notice is sent out on the 10th day. So there is no public comment. Logo Vista started with the first staff report saying no public opposition and that was just a gross miscarriage of justice because over 100 residents opposed that project. So that's an easy one. The expansion to 1,000 feet, the applicant pays that cost, and it's a very small cost. And I don't know why you wouldn't want neighboring residents a little bit further up the street to know. Those were non-controversial. The only thing before you today that may be semi-controversial, but I urge you to let it go to a vote tonight is the issue of refreshing the ordinance to include the people. Everyone from the state bar to the Bureau of Engineers of the... Ron, I'd just like you to please read the comments. That's why I'd ask for two minutes, but I never go over time, but even Mayor Gold gives me two minutes extra from repatriation. If Mayor Gold gives you two... No, no, two plus three. No, no, three plus the two. That's why I asked for five minutes. So, but let me just focus on the last two things. The issue about the additional radius, that was non-controversial. And then the issue about refreshing the application, every professional in this room has to update their information from the state bar to any agency. And that's all we're asking is it's just to your back. And if a lobbyist is done with the lobbying, they just file a notice of termination, and then they don't have to update it. And the last thing about the rebuttal, the fact that no other, the fact that the argument that you're being asked is that the residents can't give a rebuttal is a complete miscarriage of procedural justice because Beverly Hills is better than everybody else. And the fact is, is that many times the applicant will give you a false, inaccurate argument and all this is doing is allowing the residents to rebut that argument. The applicant even gets a rebuttal. The only difference is the residents will get the last word. And you have to really ask yourself, is anybody up there? Are any of you, did any of you run for city council to be for anybody else other than the residents? That's what the Sunshine Task Force concluded that if anybody should get the last word, it should be the residents, not the lobbyist or the applicant. And that's really what you're voting on. Are you for the residents or are you for the lobbyists? It's a very simple vote. Thank you. Okay, this is my last speaker card, unless, okay. Debbie, Debbie Weiss. You'll be thrilled to know I have a new computer, so that nonsense is stopped. I think that the ability for the residents to rebut is critical. And I think it's also essential for due process to occur. The current process unfortunately allows ample opportunities for applicants who are stingy with the truth to present a false picture of a project. Placing the commissions or council members in an unfortunate position. Because while you're liberty in voting on the facts, some could be incorrect, while the residents stand by helpless to bring this statement to light. I myself have experienced this, and it does not uphold due process. How can we expect our decision-makers to make a correct decision if they do not have the complete and accurate data? The goal of public hearing is for the commission or council to make the best decision possible given information they have been given. While a great faith in our Council members ability to reach good decisions, I do not have great faith in the current process. I personally have witnessed numerous skewed facts to be presented, which has led to skewed deliberations and in my opinion skewed decisions as the opportunity to correct the record does not currently exist. All you have to do is watch the tape of 1260 log of VISTA to hear the collective gas of residents who are helpless to respond while the developers were presenting significant misleading information. Currently, we're at a severe disadvantage. Thank you. Thank you, and I have one other speaker card, Mayor Tannenbaum. And if there's anybody else, please fill out your card. Thank you. Welcome again. Thank you. I put down two on the same one. Yes. I caused a confusion. Anyway, look, the situation is this. The developer applicant does not have the absolute right to speak last, contrary to what has been going on. We know that from case law, at the meeting, the sunshine meeting, I asked Larry, what the authority was for that? What the statues were? He said they were not. He said, we have case law. We have that case. And the case stands for exactly the opposite preposition. And that case is clogged for the city of Hermosa Beach. Larry knows about this case, because his firm very caveably represented her most of each in the litigation. What it says is the following, and that's what's important about this. Because too many times residents are getting sandbagged not only by applicants, but by some staff people. And that is, residents get a chance to speak. Generally, you'll have a presentation on opening by the developer. The public comment period chance to speak. Generally you'll have a presentation on opening by the developer. The public comment period comes and goes and then developer then refutes in a summation what the residents have said. Similarly, the staff does the same thing. Instead of the staff making its presentation with respect to the fact so that the residents could respond, the residents sit back and public comment period has been closed and that's the end of it. That is not what the law is. The law is that the only time that the applicant has a chance to respond to the residents who are responding to the applicant is if they bring in new evidence. That is very unusual. What the residents are talking about is already basically part of the record, and they're responding both to staff and to what the developer has said. So they should have the chance once they go through the process is to get up again with a new argument in order to refute what has been inaccurately false narrative to you. That's what this is all about. It's that simple. These meetings will not drag on that way, because the second time one speaks, it has to be to a distinct point. In refutation, that was made either by a staff person or by a developer. That's what the law is. The only reason we've done it this way was to cover up the base that the applicant was denied the opportunity to rebut anything that was said by the residents, assuming it was newly discovered or discussed evidence. We're saying due process should apply absolutely to applicants, but also to the residents. And the way to do that is to hear what they have to say. Let the residents speak in public comment. The refutation portion goes to the developer. And then the residents have a chance to say, no, that's not it. That's not what number one we've said. And two, it's not the law, and it's not the way it should be applied. And that's what it comes down to. Thank you very much. Thank you. I have no other speaker cards. Is there anybody else in council chambers that would like to address us on this item? Okay, so I'll go to my colleague council member marriage anything you'd like to add on I would like to add that this is an ongoing process and when we see that certain things work or don't work We can add and that's good. It should be an evolutionary process. We've heard now for example That some people say some lobbyists say that they're used to reporting how much they get paid at the end of a project. That may be too late. For example, Mr. Hertz. And by the way, I just right now got your form. So thank you very much for that. Where it says that you're going to be earning up to $25,000 on this. I would like to know it might make sense afterwards to fill it in so we can compare. Again, there's nothing to that aside from getting good information. So that would be something I would think that we should add. I don't think, however, we should take it away because, as has been stated, it gives a sense about how important these issues are. So I think that everything that we have gone through has been well thought out by a very diverse group of people. And as Judy said, not everyone agreed on every specific issue, but there was broad agreement on most of the issues. And I certainly think that, for example, one of the most important points of giving the residents the last word, as Marsha Hobbs said, is groundbreaking and it's meant to be. It's meant to, in some way, level of playing field, even a little bit, that has not been level and is by its nature not level because of the role that money plays in politics. And I think it's about the least that we can do. I think I am supportive about all of the other measures. As a great American one said, Mitch Dawson mentioned that everything worked well and everybody trusted everybody, and that's good. But as a great American one said, trust but verify. And I think that's what we're doing here. So I'm prepared to move forward. I would actually having heard about the about filing the amounts of money that people are actually paid. Add that once the project is closed but aside from that I think we've done a very thorough job and I think that this is good work and I hope we can move forward. Thank you and I would like to add we did spend a lot of time on this item and it is something that can change over time but only change for the better. This is not meant to be a gacha or something to be defensive about. This is really about transparency. And for us knowing what is happening. And I think there's no reason for us not to share that information. And the items that are before us, as was mentioned, are very limited. And that is about bringing back the file a year in advance, the notice distance. And then having residents have the last word, which as was also pointed out, it was really a function of looking at if there's new evidence that come up, then absolutely will address that. But I feel that what's being proposed makes this ordinance stronger and better, and more open of a process and I also agree with Councilmember Marish at the end when a project is done that it would be appropriate to add what was estimated and what was the actual figure. So I wholeheartedly support it and I'm ready to move forward. And with that being said, I'll go to my colleagues for any question and direction. Thank you. I wholeheartedly endorse the objectives of this, but I also have some questions as to whether it's right with the specificity that it has now. I wasn't at the meetings and so I'll try to phrase this as questions for the liaison of the people who are at the meetings to see if these issues have been considered in what the thought process was. So one, I certainly think it's reasonable for the residents to be able to have the last word, But I have questions about the process for managing that. Is every single resident going to be able to speak again? Is every single resident going to be able to speak again? Will we hope to consolidate views that have spokespeople? But how would that be determined? There'll be different groups of residents. They might not agree on a spokesperson. They might not agree on the common points. If they're responding to new evidence, who determines if it's really new evidence or not? Will the mayor determine whether it's new evidence and cut it off? Will we have to vote to determine if it's new evidence and cut it off? Will we have to vote to determine if it's new evidence and cut it off if we conclude it's not new evidence? There was the issue of Sure should should should we go on a one because this is one yeah Every question that you're asking we did talk about so I'll let Larry address it So We didn't believe that it was appropriate for anyone, either the City Council or the City Attorney or City Manager for anyone to determine whether or not it was new evidence. So at the end of the residence rebuttal and I don't think they're, so excuse me, the end, you have the applicant, legislative advocates, residents, applicants rebuttal, residents rebuttal. At that point, you asked the applicant, do you think there was any new information raised? The applicant says yes, they believe there was new information. I don't want, we didn't want the city manager, the city attorney, the council to say no, we don't agree with you. Let the applicant present the new information or respond to the new information, excuse me, and then let the residents respond to that. And we'll repeat that process. If the residents do bring up new information, we'll ask the applicant again. Do you think that that was new information? The applicant says yes. He will be allowed to respond and he or she will be allowed to respond and then the residents will be allowed to respond to that. I mean, does that risk getting into a never ending cycle? Judges will cut people off. Judges in a court setting will say, I've heard that already, we don't have to hear that again. I don't know if we're allowed to do that. We don't usually do that. We usually listen to all the comments that people make. It was made clear that it only is if something new is brought up. If something rehashes something, then it would be up to the chair to say, wait a second, we've discussed that. And also with the support of the city attorney. That was the whole point. It needs to be something new. By law, you need to allow an applicant to address something new. And also with the support of the city attorney. That was the whole point. It needs to be something new. By law, you need to allow an applicant to address something they haven't addressed. But if they have, they do not necessarily need to get the last word. And does it say that in the ordinance that it allows for a process in which we'll determine whether or not something is new evidence? And if we determine that it's not Then at that point we can cut off the cycle In terms of cutting off the cycle. No, it doesn't address that. It's a policy not an ordinance, but No, I think we will it's up to the applicant to decide if they want if they believe that it's new evidence That we will not second-guess the applicant, he will be he or she will be entitled to present that. And then of course, the residents would be entitled to respond to that. I think to get to maybe some of your point, I think that the time given, and this is, of course, subject to the chair's discretion, but the time given can be much shorter. You know, we start out with three minutes. If you subject to the chair's discretion, but the time given can be much shorter. You know, we start out with three minutes. If you get to the third or fourth round, you could be down to something very short. And by the way, that's actually the way it works in formal debates. Normally, rebuttals are given less time than the initial statements. It was an answer to the question as to how many rebuttals there were going to be from? No, it could be, it could be, it was, let me put this way, it's up to the applicant. If the applicant thinks that there is new information to be presented, excuse me. If the applicant feels like they want to rebut, new information that was presented by the public, then we'll go another round. If the applicant feels like no, there was no new information, then the process will be stopped at that point and it will come to the council. I want to hear more information, but just like too many choices sometimes is not a good thing. Too much information, not too much information, but too many people speaking is also a deterrent for others to take part. Some of our meetings, some of the commission meetings go very long as it is. Not everybody could stick around, not everybody is the endurance to stick around. I'm not sure how we're going to manage the process of completely opening the floor again for another round of public comments to have. I mean, how did you deal with the issue of, will everybody get to speak again if they want to speak again of where we're not going to say what somebody is saying is not relevant so we're going to let them speak if they want to speak. How are we going to manage that process? Well ultimately we've seen you know depending on who sits in in the chair to my right it really is. That's one of the most important jobs of the mayor. And we've seen times where there have been maybe fewer speakers and meetings have gone on until two or whatever. And we've seen other times where someone runs a tight ship. I think we need to use common sense. If there is a rebuttal and a number of people want to speak, then you give them not three minutes. You give them maybe one minute because you're rebutting presumably a specific point. It could be even less than that if it's just one very narrow point. And I do not get the sense that people just want to hear the sounds of their own voices and do this at infinitum. Again, if an applicant continues to say, well, they brought up something new and they clearly didn't, I don't think that will be to the applicants at that. This is about new information, Bob. Primarily, but from my perspective, and again, it does depend on who is sitting in which chair doing what. But from my perspective, I feel that I never want people not to feel heard ever. And I'm not somebody that will cut somebody off unless within reason. But from my perspective, I think we are here to represent all the voices that come before us, not our own voice. We can't make our decision based on our own voice. We're an echo of everybody that's here. And I'm agreeing with that that I'm asking, how are we going to manage what could be on an early process? It's been suggested we can diminish the time period for a reputtle, get it down to a minute. But there could be some people who are saying very substantive responses to new information and one minute really is inadequate for them. In which case we do that now. We do that now. That's no different. I mean right now if we have a resident that has something important to say and they're in the middle of and it goes past three minutes but they have a very important comment or few more comments. We let them speak. I really don't believe I have yet in my years I you know I was talked about from Mitch Dawson, his years on the Planning Commission. My years on the Planning Commission, my years on the City Council, I don't think generally most people that come before us are here just to hear themself speak. They're here because they took the time to share their experience and I think we have to take the time to hear it. I see, I also have some questions about the 20 days instead of 10 days and like to see how you dealt with those issues. In some cases, I also have some questions about the 20, I'm looking at them which is why I'm not speaking directly into the microphone. The 20 days instead of 10 days, in some, that would mean jumping over a scheduled meeting. Some commissions meet only once a month. If the 20 days wouldn't hit the schedule, it might be two months until we're hearing those things. There's also a benefit to the public from doing things in a timely fashion. Was it necessary to go to 20 days? Some lesser time period or was it necessary to have that to be an all-encompassing 20 days without regard to the schedule of the particular body that would be hearing the issue? Try, I think 20 days, 10 days is a joke, I would say, and I think a lot of people felt that. 20 days is also not a tremendous amount of time compared to the way things tend to work at City Hall where things can take a long time. I just think that double, you know, it could have been even longer than that, but I think that doubling it was what we felt. And I think there was pretty much unanimity on this. Yeah, there was no issue on that. I tend to agree also with Mark Elliott that the issue for displacement should be 20 days. I mean, for your example, which we've seen in other situations, when you travel, often you're traveling more than 10 days. You'll miss a notice. And I think this is a really about capturing for people to know when there's something they need to know about. And often as you've seen yourself, you might travel for two weeks and you will have missed it. So this really captures the ability to hopefully not miss somebody knowing what's happening at City Hall. And if in some situations it means that a particular commission needs to meet twice a month they will. But what does that mean? Let's say specifically for us if there's something that we want to accomplish according to our schedule but in the relative hurry and it would mean pushing things out an additional meeting cycle. My perspective is that if we put something on the agenda too early and people aren't noticed and they don't have the ability, we've seen it. I mean, I see, actually I see people in the audience when we had a metro issue with Spago way back when they didn't know about it and we ended up not acting because they didn't know about it. So to me, that's a perfect example of if people don't have the ability to be noticed and have the time to formulate their opinions and do their analysis, then when we have the public hearing, chances are we're not going to act because we haven't given them the opportunity to form their opinion. One more question on this point in our report. And then Mark Elliott just raised one more instance of this. There were very specific, very specific provisions that have different noticing periods. And so I'm wondering if this should be in some instances more inclusive, possibly in other instances less inclusive, to revisit all of the instances in which there are other specific noticing requirements other than the ones being addressed here. I think our goal was to err on the side of giving more or not less notice. I'm not quite sure. It may, Larry, is it a state law as to why we were not able to extend on the matter that Markelli had addressed. So we didn't extend any matters that were not 500 feet. That was number one. And then number two, yes, I believe that the subdivision map act is preemptive in that regard. But we can certainly go back and look at that. That would be the only reason. Yeah, because our goal is more noticing. We want more not less. Absolutely. And then the last question I'll ask about. Is a radius for a noticing distance really the best measure? If we're talking about something that happens in a particular streetway, more than a thousand feet might be greatly impacted area. And we do that. We've done block face and exactly. Okay, so if I can, like the opportunity to mold a little bit and to hear the rest of the discussion and come back with my feeling is to Although I endorse the objectives whether or not I feel like it's ready to go forward without some additional consideration by the sunshine Task force about some of the issues that are being raised. Okay, thank you. Councilmember Friedman, questions and direction. Yes, thank you. In general, I support the objectives. I like Councilmember Wunderlich have some concerns as to whether or not those objectives are going to, well, they'll be met, but whether or not they're going to come at a price that is too high. In terms of the process, so the applicant, Larry, the applicant would present, then the residents would then have the opportunity to discuss it? So actually it's the applicant legislative advocates and then the residents. But yes, I'm not sure where the question is going, but there's legislative advocates in there before between the applicant and the public. OK, so it's really the public that will have the comments. So is it the public or the residents or both that have the last word? Well, the public. We don't distinguish here between the public and the residents, so it's the public that has the last word. So theoretically, if a applicant had support from residents or the public, they would also have that opportunity to be the last ones heard, right? Correct. And is that going to, could there be game playing based upon that theory? I think that, you know, it's an obvious answer. Yes, I think there could be. Well, yes. The process that we discussed, that is the applicant legislative advocate resident, applicant rebut, resident rebut, et cetera, that's limited to only quasi judicial hearings? Correct. And that would be which the Council and the Planning Commission, would those be the only two that would be effective to or would also be design review design review architectural I believe cultural heritage although I'd have to look at that and I think that might be it although I could be no There's potentially there's the traffic commission. I think they deal with Traffic parking commission deals with test cab licenses Excuse me? Velae permits. Was there any discussion for the layas on it? Was there any discussion about having any community meetings as some other jurisdictions have rather than, not rather than, but prior to those issues actually coming to either the council or to one of those commissions. So again, I think we're losing sight of what's before us today. We already have an ordinance in place. There were three votes for that. We're talking about three amendments to the ordinance. And I'm going to go back to Councilmember Wendellick once he's ready to form his opinion. What we're looking for direction today is about the refiling of the legislative advocate. If they did it February 9th, 2017, you know, to go back a year. The notice of 10 to 20 days or 500 to 2,000 feet, and then the third element of the process of when we have meetings. That's all that's before us. We already have an ordinance in place. Some of what was brought up earlier about the estimate of fees and such. That's part of our ordinance. That's not being addressed. Really what's ahead of us today is about changing when the refiling, the notice, distance, and days, and the process of running a meeting. That's it. So in terms of community meetings and all that, no. That's not what's before us. But you can talk about it. Yeah, you can talk about it. But in terms of what we've done and what's before us. But you can talk about it. Yeah, you can talk about it. But in terms of what we've done and what's before us, these are the three items that I would like direction on today, specifically, and anything else you want to look to do in the future, of course. And you can absolutely come to the Sunshine Task Force. It's open to the public. Okay, and that's a good question. In terms of noticing of the meetings of the Sunshine Task Force. It's open to the public. That's a good question. In terms of noticing of the meetings of the Sunshine Task Force, was that noticed in the newspapers? Was there a mailing to all residents in our community? How would people have found out about those meetings? What is our process for task force? I'm not sure and I don't think we have the city clerk here to address that. I believe it's a posted agenda on the website and in the proper locations. There is also a notification list as I understand that the city clerk has kept from meetings and participation and I believe they do an e-bloss associated with that. And also, I sign in, notification people can sign in on the website and they get notified when a meeting is set and a agenda is posted. Okay, so there wasn't a posting in a newspaper about the Sunshine Task Force discussing these issues. Barsha? Yeah, they do. Well, did the sit. Marsha, can you come to the podium because it's or whoever wants to address it? They could speak to what happens in the courier. I was asking about whether the city put a formal- I'm trying to tell you. Well, thank you. Go ahead. I'm sorry to interrupt you. There is a notification that comes out from Lordis. For those of us who are signed up on the notification. There are other people who sign up who regularly opt in to the city's notification process That's a separate notice so now I get I personally get two notifications There's a notification that comes out a month in advance that says save the date For anybody who's on any of those lists twice it comes out twice So now we have four notifications a month in advance and a week in advance. So that means I think there's probably a couple hundred people on that list. And then we always write an article about it. I always notify the public. There's a constant email chain and no one ever suggested that we have a town hall meeting for the Sunshine Tessers. That's unworkable. No one's ever complained, by the way, at any of this Tessers, where there's such a huge cross-section of lobbyists, lawyers, and people that they didn't get noticed. I mean, that's never been an issue. Well, my concern is the residents, not everybody who is intimately involved in a process is whether or not, because I believe that the residents are going to be affected somewhat adversely by parts of this, because of the timing, it's going to cost some residents who want to have projects cost them more money for noticing. It's going to delay them potentially by a meeting or so. Do you think by changing noticing for more time to notice is a problem? Well, I just think that I think that there is going to be a negative aspect of that. That is that project starting to get delivered. Do you see that it's positive? Do you see that it's positive? Because what ends up happening less, we saw this happen. I'll go this. Please, please sit down, Robert. Thank you. We saw this happen actually, as I said, I'm looking here at Spago where you had businesses and residents that weren't, that didn't get the notice in time. By giving more time, it allows people not only to get the notice, but allows them to have the time to analyze. If you just get something and you want to either like it or not like it, you need some time to analyze it as well as get the analysis. And I totally agree with that, but there is a negative to it also in terms of cost and time. In general, I agree with it. I don't have any problems quite frankly with number one or two, but I just want to point out the fact that I don't think that everything has been provided to our community in terms of looking at this, I think that that is something that should be done. Now as far as the last one, which Councilmember Wonderluck did speak about, I think that potentially there's going to be unintended consequences by meetings going on. I think that there could be game playing by people in terms of wanting to get the last word in. And I'm concerned with that. That's the one that I really have a problem with. As far as one and two, I'm okay with it. I'm going to reserve judgment on number three. I want to hear what does that. Okay, so in terms of one and two, you would support the refiling. Yeah, I don't... And you would support the notice from 10 to 20 days and 500 to a thousand feet? Yeah, reluctantly, I would support the 10 to 20 days. I think that is going to be a negative in some aspects, but I think overall that it is a positive. And the 500 to a thousand feet and the refiling. Those are the, I don't have a problem. Okay, thank you. Council member Mayor, is there anything else you want to add? Okay, vice mayor. Questions and direction. So, maybe the city manager, I don't know who can address this. Can you walk me through the process of just in terms of the timing? Maybe Susan. In terms of getting a project seen by the architectural commission or the RDC. Mr. Hertz, could you sit down please? Yes, and then if I'm able to be read down. Please sit down. Sit down. Sit down. Thank you Just walk through it. So what is the current timing what what I'm looking for is if we were to extend the noticing out if we Double that what would be the impact on a relatively simple project that in terms of timing. From the time the applicant files to the time they get approved, what would that do in terms of timing? It very much depends on whether it's something that goes to the Planning Commission or if it goes to Design Review, Architectural Commission, Cultural Heritage Commission, and so forth. For those projects, there's a set time and I'll have Ryan speak to more of the design ones. But for larger projects, one of the requirements is that we have a complete set of plans. So there's a lot of work that has gone into a submittal to begin with. And while it is very important for the neighbors to be engaged, I think the way to have them engage at the earliest possible moment is to have that before an application is submitted on those larger projects, because then we can get the input from the residents that can be included in a staff report. Noticing a hearing, a lot has happened before a hearing is noticed, and the input would be better earlier in the process. Is that what West Hollywood does? Yes. Yes. In West Hollywood for a larger project that needed to go to planning commission and some that eventually would go to city council then it was a requirement that before an applicant submitted at all within 30 days before semiddle, they had to have a community, a neighborhood meeting. And so the neighbors get to see very early on that a project is coming forward. And then that input has very much influenced how the project evolves and what is actually submitted and through the process. I think that's- That's what you guys consider. We've talked about that. I think that's- Does that's any best considered? We've talked about that. I mean, we've talked about that. Why wouldn't that be a more- I think both. Well, why wouldn't that be just in terms of what we're talking about? If the goal is to get resident input early and to not have as big an impact on timing. Why wouldn't we do that first? Well, I mean, we could set a threshold. It doesn't mean everybody's house. But I'm just saying in general, for the things that are likely to be impactful, which we want in- I think both. I think we've talked about that. Well, we do both and it'll be endless. But I'm just curious in terms of your conversations if as an alternative to kind of what we're talking about here, if that doesn't solve the problem at an earlier stage. So an applicant actually has an opportunity to go back and do what people want. Do you mean as an alternative to extending from 10 to 20 days? Well, it's an alternative to sort of the construct that we've got here certainly in terms of the last piece, which is the hearing piece. Well, I mean, that's when a decision is made and so I think we felt really again that is when the residents whoever they may be for against should have the opportunity. I don't think the hearing piece has anything to do with the free part. Well, but you're sort of having the debate after the fact. It's what I have heard from residents and I agree it's they you know when the staff report comes out here have to respond. Really what we want is the resident's input before the staff report is written. That's the critical time. Right. And that is. That's why we do that. I mean why not the I mean I just seems to me that we're not doing this in a way that's going to be the most effective to get the most input at a time where it's going to do the most good. And what I would say to you, Julian, is I think we do both. And I agree with you. I was in the meetings with some residents that felt that they didn't have the information beforehand. So I think it, and to me, it's actually smart for any, any applicant knows it's better and that's quite, kind of, obviously, why we have lobbyists here because they are doing that. The differences now they have to sign up. They meet with the residents in advance to get a feel for what will go or not go and where the fight is in the game. That's exactly what is happening. So I agree with you. I think it helps in advance for the residents and the applicant to know where the conflicts are, where the agreements are. I do think some of that's already happening, but I think we could do a better job of that. But I also think that is not in the, to then not have a longer distance in terms of noticing. I think both of them would work. And I don't see that it's gonna slow down the process. I actually think it's going to make the process better because when it finally does get to council or get to the Planning Commission, all of the issues, most of the issues hopefully will have been worked out in advance. So I also want to make sure that we respond to your timing issue on the commission. Yeah, yeah. And so that's part of it too because in this timing and conceptually I don't have a problem with more time, but if you kind of do the math, it means we'll never be able to consider the same thing at two consecutive council meetings. Because we meet two weeks apart. So if you set a 20-day limit, and we really want a second reading for some reason, at the next meeting, we can't do that based on this ordinance. And there have been times over the course of this last year, where we have wanted to get that second reading at the next reading. And so this would preclude us from doing that. I don't think we'll let Larry address it. So if I think that if you're going to, if you've given the 20-day notice and then you want to continue the discussion at the next meeting and you want to notice it, I think you've done the 20-day notice so you don't only have to do a 10-day notice for the continued meeting. And what about for a second reading? You don't have to notice a second reading and I don't believe that the ordinance would compel you to notice the second reading. It's really just the public hearing that's at issue. I'd have a public hearing at the second reading. Somebody pulls it. Yeah, I mean, again, if you've given the 28 notice. All right. Can you walk, just kind of walk me through the timing. What does that look like? I think for the different commissions that we serve that are the ones that tend to have the public notice requirements, is the Planning Commission, Design Review Commission for single family homes and architectural commission for Multifamily and Commercial. The Planning Commission, they meet twice a month and I think that the added timing is probably less impactful to the Planning Commission, one because of the frequency at which they meet, but two because Planning Commission projects have a pretty substantial lead time in terms of staff review, prep analysis of information and I don't think there is a large impact there. Although, of course, everything is deadline driven and applicants want their projects to move forward. I think the commissions where it's potentially more impactful is to the design review commission and the architectural commission. Those commissions meet once a month and going back, I think gosh, probably four or five years ago now we had the mayor's task force on government efficiency. And one of the criticisms that we got was that people had to submit their project and then wait essentially a month to be heard. We had about a month lead time if you submitted your application a month before the meeting then you would get on the next one. Through that process we reduced it down to where we really have about a two to and a half week lead time and what this does is it allows people that are moving forward with their houses or their storefront remodels. It allows them to know that they can be on that meeting that month and not wait for the next meeting to come around. If there's an extension of 20 days, it would likely mean I can guarantee that we wouldn't be able to meet that two week to two and a half weeks at middle deadline because that wouldn't provide the notice. It would then move the hearing to the next meeting. So I think for projects that are more sensitive in terms of carrying costs such as single-family homes and potentially retail tenant improvements, those could be more impacted. Thank you. Okay. So just to summarize where I'm sitting at the moment, hey, I do think that we need to, and that's obviously not going to happen today, but I think we need to think of something like West Hollywood does and design that so that we can answer questions earlier in the process. Second, the business about 20 days, I would be willing to consider if there was some threshold. I'm not sure we want to capture every single family home and and and delay people who are or are more minor modifications to whatever they're doing. I think that certainly in the commercial area it might cost them money time as money. So I wouldn't be adverse to 20 20 days but maybe not for everything. Maybe for things that are more impactful. In terms of how we notice, I don't have a problem, although I guess the staff report says you can triple the cost by going from 500 to 1,000 feet. I don't know what the cost is, so I don't know if that's significant or not. But it was pretty minimal. Could you have that number? I remember us talking about it. Do you know what that number was or? It was very minimal. Do you have that number or Ryan? It was a matter of who's paying for it. Somebody's paying for it. I mean, it's good for your business but it's bad for the person paying for it. The cost that we charge per mailed notice is a dollar and 30 cents per mailed notice. That's intended to cover postage, stationery, what not. So Ryan, on average, what does that come to? I would say on average, for projects that are south of Santa, sorry, south of Santa Monica Boulevard, we're probably looking at somewhere between 500 and 1,000 notices, generally, but the closer you are to multifamily properties, the more you pick up because it's not just the property owners, it's the occupants as well. We just did a sample calculation for a property down on South Beverly Drive. We did the existing 500 foot radius. That was, I think it's in the staff report, but it was just shy of 300 properties, not including occupants, but 300 properties. We expanded that to the 1000 foot, and it was, I think, just about 900 properties. So it's, because the radius goes out, it's an exponentially increase. It was about $400 up to about $1200. No, I would say it would probably be a lot more than that because again, we're only talking properties. When I use those numbers, we're not talking occupants. We probably, and notice, on average, or mail out about 500 to 1,000 pieces of mail right now. That would per project. That would probably go up to, I would guess, about 1500 to 4000 pieces of mail per project. So go from about 1500 bucks to $4,000. A little more than that because it's a dollar 30 per piece of mail. All right, probably live with that. And I find the last piece also, I just want to walk through the hearing piece. So right now the applicant gets, we have a staff report. The staff report lasts 10 or 15 minutes. The applicant gets 15 minutes. So we're up to a half hour. After the applicant, if there's a lobby law advocate there, they get some time. Say there's nothing, so we're still at a half hour. We have 50 people in the audience, which is not unusual. At three minutes each, we're now at another 150 minutes, which is two and a half hours. So we've already spent three hours at it. And at three hours we still haven't had the council talk about it at all. And if we go through another round of that, we're going to add another two and a half hours. So we're going to be at five hours with one single round for a meeting that starts at 730. And that's assuming everybody wants to speak and why wouldn't they? I think that's cumbersome. I think that the only way I see that actually working, and I'm not sure that even this works, is if you limit how much people, how much time people talk, and that's not the point. The point is to get more information, not less. And so I don't know how you really don't know how you manage that. Are we going to have a two-hour cutoff to conversation? Three-hour cutoff? We'll deal with an issue for three hours. We don't get done with it. We'll come back another time and do it. Otherwise, we're not going to get anything done for any of the... Maybe we should start at 2.30 in the afternoon. Maybe if we have something that's going to be... We do start at 2.30 in the afternoon. Well, but I mean, with this issue, because at 2 two thirty in the afternoon. We've got ten hours to talk about whatever we want to talk about. Maybe longer. But I just don't know that the timing works. So I don't know how you guys thought you were going to manage that, but I have some indigestion over that. And candidly, we've had meetings that have gone to two in the morning. I honestly don't think we've done our best work at two o'clock in the morning. So unless we can manage our time you know and unless we can manage our time I have a lot of concern about this. I think the idea is the right idea but you know does does everybody get a minute to talk? I mean how do you do it? In Los Angeles everybody gets a minute. I don't know what you can say in a minute. Not anything substantive. No, I just want to say, Julian, I mean, you know, pretty soon you'll be mayor. It's up to how you run a meeting and to do it in a way that's fair. And I think that you have the, I trust everyone. That's why he doesn't want to do it. No, I trust. It's the land on me to do. I trust everyone who is sitting out here to be able to do it in a fair way that achieves the objectives, but also as said, the objective of leveling the playing field, which is something that, as Marcia said, and I like the fact that she used that word, I think it is groundbreaking, and I think it's about time. So I get that, and I don't disagree. I'm just trying to understand the practical implications. Why don't you try it? Please no clapping. So you're not there yet. I'm not there yet. Okay. Are you there in terms of the filing a year in advance? Yeah, I think that's a little bit burdensome, but I could probably live with it. Okay. It's a concept that people will file on, what is this, once for a project? Yeah, I think that absent a change in the description or some sort of change in the form, the concept is that they will file once per the project until they're done with the project then they need to file a notice of termination. So as a matter of a public record, and well I don't mind opining on these, I actually didn't vote in support of this ordinance in the first place. So I don't know how you're going to bring it back because I really do think that the ordinance is overbroad and I don't think the terms are well defined and I have issues with some of the things that were brought up today. In terms of making the, in changing the ordinance as we sit here today, these are the things I would agree to but the likelihood is that I won't vote for the ordinance tonight because I can't support the base elements of the ordinance. Okay. the ordinance tonight because I can't support the base elements of the ordinance. Okay, so let's go back to councilmember wonderlick to see if where you stand and go from there. I agree with the refiling requirement. I agree with the 500 feet to 1000 feet. Let me ask another question about the 10 days to the 20 days. Dr. Gold suggested a test something that would let the Minimus projects, maybe not the Minimus, less impactful projects go forward without that change so that they're not subject to a delay. Did you discuss the possibility of that? No, we didn't get into that. We didn't, we felt as said that the benefits were always in favor of more rather than less time. So it wasn't something that anybody brought up and I don't think we considered. And I think it would be also hard to figure out what that threshold would be necessary. And I do support Dr. Gold's suggestion of a different pathway so that there's notice even earlier in the process that we get input before the staff reports come out. And I don't know. Could we give direction to try to move forward for a process for that as well? Yeah. This is something we talked about in the Sunshine Task Force. So I think it is something that we do want to do. Yes, and at this point it has been on a voluntary basis by the applicant, so I would think if we want to memorialize it, we could include it as a requirement in the application process to move through that process. And we can make it a step in the process as part of the application. And then let me ask a legal question. process as part of the application. And then let me ask a legal question. As regards the managing the process for having another round of comments by the public, possibly followed by another round of comments by the applicants and so on. Sorry, can I just clarify? It's another potential round. You're just reversing the order. It's very correct me if I'm wrong, but if nothing new is brought up, there won't be another round. You're just reversing the order. It's, it, it, Larry correct me if I'm wrong, but if nothing new is brought up, there won't be another round. Right. And that's almost exactly my question. I understand that in California, you're not allowed to restrict public comment. We can restrict the length of time, but if somebody wants to say something, they're allowed to say it. Is an unambiguous that we can restrict it? I think in order to make this manageable, we have to be able to do at least two things. We have to try to focus it on new evidence. And if we reduce the length of time, I'd also, for subsequent rounds of speaking, I'd like to see us to be able to decide, well, some people you're saying substantive stuff that we're really interested in and would like to give you more time. And so those are my two legal questions. Is it legal for us to, for us, the mayor or the chair of a commission to make a determination that something is not new evidence and to say no, we're not going to hear that, even though it's public comment. And can the mayor or a chair say it's a one minute time limit, but we're particularly interested in this and so you can keep going. So yeah, I don't think it's a matter of California law that you, I don't think it's a matter of California law that you can't restrict what people say. The chair is able to restrict to people who are talking about what is new evidence, just as they're able to restrict certain people from talking about something that's completely off topic on the agenda. But that said, I think that my advice has been, especially if you're talking about one minute which I'll get to in a moment, it rarely makes sense to interrupt someone to tell them that they're not speaking on point. You're going to take up more than the minute anyway by the time that you figure out that they are speaking off point. You interrupt them, they say, no, I'm speaking on point. I mean, that discussion is gonna take more than a minute. So my personal feeling is that it is rare that that becomes time saving. And then your question about, I'm sorry, could you repeat the second question again? If it's consistent with law that we have the ability to say something is not new evidence and we could say. So it's, yes, it's consistent with the law, I think, to say that for the reasons that I was just mentioning. Can you let someone go a little while longer when they're raising something substantive? I think that's consistent with the law as well. Okay, so with that, I do think it's a valid objective to let the residents be able to respond. It might be an unwieldy process. I think we can try it. We might want to make modifications down the road. And so with that, I would support it. Okay, so in terms of, you have a face, right? No, I'm just trying to figure out. So we have three things on the consent calendar tonight. We have the ordinance, which has the noticing, pretty much both the 10 to 20 days and the 300 feet to 500 feet. We have the legislative advocate filling out the form back a year. That's in the ordinance and then we have the policy, which is- So from what I've heard, the vice mayor is not gonna vote for it anyway because he didn't vote for the ordinance. So that's that. And then council member Friedman is probably not gonna vote for it anyway because he didn't vote for the ordinance. So that's that. And then Councilmember Friedman is probably not going to vote for it. I can't vote for it if the hearing part is part of it, which it sounds like it's going to be. Okay. So can we also have perhaps an additional training for commission chairs or something like that? That's definitely. Yes. Yes, that's definitely. These will be difficult things to manage. And I would need training also. I'm not saying it's because of the commission chairs, but these will be difficult issues to manage. Okay, so. I think we can still keep it on the agenda. Yeah, it sounds like there is a majority vote. I mean, obviously we'll hear tonight. But it sounds like there doesn't need to be any change to what is coming for you tonight. Okay. Yes. Yes. Okay. So let's move on. Thank you everybody who has been waiting here. We will go to item two North Cannon Drive Closure Feasibility Study. I'm going to do it. I know. Yes. No, she's for number three, too. Welcome. Good afternoon, Mayor Baudsi and members of the City Council. Last year, as you recall, when we were in negotiations for the Memoramdom of Agreement for the Purple Line AUR Section 2, Spago Citizens and other businesses on Cann Canon Drive raised the idea and concept of a sound wall to mitigate noise and dust from the subway station construction, which is really right at the center of Canon and Wilshire Drive. Wilshire Boulevard. As a result, included in the MOA was a feasibility study for a sound wall and essentially closing can and drive at Wilshire. This is essentially the first step is essentially a traffic study. So Sarah and Brandon Berg will provide an overview of the study. If the City Council occurs with moving forward with creating a cold sec and a sound wall. The next step would be to proceed with the sign. And I will go over. The first step is we've done a public outreach. The MLA required two public outreach meetings. We have done additional outreach. We had three community meetings, four meetings with stakeholders, including at Spogos and the government affairs commission. We went to the Traffic and Parking Commission with the notice meeting, the Traffic and Parking Commission recommended in favor of proceeding with the Canndrive closure. We also met with the City Council Lays on traffic and traffic and parking commission February 15th. They also concurred with moving forward. We've listed several comments that we've received from the public. We've addressed these with the fire and police department and also have explored them. We will further take these comments if we proceed with found design and make sure that they are fully incorporated. With that, I will turn it over to Sarah Brandenburg. Good afternoon, Sarah Brandenburg with Fair and Pears. So we conducted a transportation impact study to see what would happen during construction, to put in a temporary closure of North Cannon Drive at Wilshire Boulevard. So when we're doing this, we're looking at traffic operations in the morning, the midday, and the afternoon commute periods. We looked at travel patterns as they exist on the ground today, prior to the recent construction work that started. And also did a forecast horizon of year 2022, which accounts for all of the pending development projects in the area in addition to regional background growth. So we studied 15 intersections in the vicinity of the project. And we did a pretty extensive data collection effort to really capture the travel patterns along North Cannon Drive now. And so one thing to note about North Cannon, that is different from the parallel roads of Beverly and Crescent, is that North Cannon, when it reaches Wilshire, is somewhat discontinuous. So there's a little gap between the signals that serve north and south canon. So for example, if you're heading northbound on south canon, you're forced to make a right turn onto Wilshire. It's not a through intersection. And so what that results in is that the traffic volumes tend to be a little bit lower on North Cannon than on the parallel roads. And it's primarily serving local access trips. There's a lot of on-street parking, valet operations that serve local businesses, parking structures along the block. And when we're talking about closing North Cannon, the only change, which is a significant change, but the only change that that means is that you will not be able to turn on to North Cannon from Wilshire Boulevard. Other than that, the operations along the block would maintain pretty much exactly as they are today. We would not be affecting any of the other intersections or any of the other on-street parking. I'll show you the exact block of North Cannon between Clifton and Wilshire and how we would redesign that, but otherwise along North Cannon it would operate the same as it does today. So, when we did the impact analysis, we looked at the change in traffic flows and operations in comparison to the city's significant thresholds, which are very stringent, right? We're allowed to have up to a 2% change in our volume to capacity ratio and we're dealing in these congested areas. And so I think as we would expect under construction conditions, we did find four intersections immediately adjacent to the closure that would exceed that 2% threshold. So we went forward and looked at what could we do to better accommodate traffic flows with this North Can enclosure in place. The first thing would be to provide advanced detour signage. This would be particularly helpful and beneficial early on in the the adjacent intersections on Canon are operating as efficiently as they can. So for example, if we're adding additional cars to a left turn movement, make sure that we're extending the green time for those vehicles trying to make the left with the closure. Third, to install a traffic signal at the intersection of Clifton and North Crescent. If you envision the block of North Crescent between Wilshire and Santa Monica, this is the only intersection right now that does not have a traffic signal. So putting a signal in here would be consistent with the traffic control along the corridor overall and would just help to maintain flows with the cannon closure as more people are using both the block of Clifton between North Crescent and Canon and also Crescent. An additional improvement options that have come up as we've met with a various stakeholder groups is taking a closer look at how potentially we could restripe North Clifton so that when we're putting in the new signal or looking at the new design of the intersection at Canon and Clifton that we're putting in the new signal or looking at the new design of the intersection at Canon and Clifton that we're really maximizing the capacity there. Right now on Clifton we have one traveling in each direction and parking on both sides and so we could take a look at just how we can better operate that block of Clifton in the final design. The idea of converting the one-way roads of Dayton and Brighton to two-way has also come up. To take that full two-way conversion, all the way to Wilshire would be very challenging because you'd basically be reconstructing the intersections at Wilshire. However, kind of a narrower idea behind that is you just look at the block of those roads directly between canon and crescent, and potentially could look at opening that up to two way. It's really something, again, that I'd recommend looking at in the design phase because it affects signal operations and timings and could be an extensive amount of work for a temporary closure. And then monitoring. So, the idea behind doing the North Cannon closure in this new cul-de-sac would be that early on in construction when we're doing the piling and deck this new cul-de-sac would be that early on in construction when we're doing the piling and decking and the initial hauling phase of the project. What we have learned at the Wilshire-Lacianniga station in looking at Gale, which Gale is a very similar location as North Cannon. Gale has been closed about 150 days in the first year of construction at Wilshire and La Siena Ga. And so the closure is really most beneficial very early on in the project when we're doing piling a decking and then remembering that at the end of the project we will come back and do the decking over again. So we can monitor the closure, see how it's working early on when the cannon would be closed for many days, whether or not this semi-permanent cul-de-sac is in place, and then it could be removed for the subsequent stages of the project or remain in place if it's working well and serving its intended purposes. We looked at just a very initial design concept for the block of cannon between Clifton and Wilshire, and really just to say if we were to close this and proceed with design, just high level, how could it work? We had three different concepts that were in the staff report. I'm just sharing one today. The slide up here shows how we could really maximize the amount of parking that's provided on North Cannon. And so you see at the end of the block there, as you would be driving, for example, southbound on North Cannon approaching, we'll show you, enter this cold-assack design. You could park in the median. This concept shows 15 parking spaces in the median. And then the kind of the eastern block in front of the restaurants there would operate the same as it does today, which is with valet operations to serve those restaurants. So if really the study we did for the North Cannon closure is a more detailed look at construction handling with the purple line construction. Metro has already prepared a final environmental impact report. It found that there would be significant and unavoidable impacts due to construction traffic. It envisioned two or defined two mitigation measures that are both in the spirit of this North Cannon closure, specifically stating that Metro would work with local jurisdictions during the design phase to identify the final street closures, temporary traffic signals, and so forth that should be in place to accommodate local traffic needs. So if the council would elects to proceed with the North Cannon dry closure and proceed into the design phase, you can consider finding that the project is within the scope of the final EIR already prepared by Metro. Staff would then file a notice of determination in reliance on that final EIR. So again, the next steps if you elect to proceed forward is that this spring, we would dig into the design concepts meet with the stakeholder groups. The summer we would come back to council with our final design recommendation and this fall it would be implemented prior to the piling and decking phase beginning. Based on the feedback we've received during the stakeholder meetings the staff recommendation is to proceed with the design and construction of the North Cannon Drive semi-perman closure during construction and to file the notice of determination. Thank you. Stay close and before I go to the layasons, I will open this up to public comment. And if you would like to address us on this item please fill out a speaker card if you haven't done so already. Mr. Bob Foster. Welcome. Robert Foster, President of Coldwanker. We have business locations on North Cannon. One at 301 and one at 66. North Cannon. one at 301 and one at 66, North Cannon. Third Spyro. Our one 66 location is probably the most impacted by this construction is going on. And just wanted to let the council know that we are in favor of the cul-de-sac and the closure of the street. Thank you very much. Wonderful Barbara Lazaroff. Welcome. Thanks for your patience, everybody. Thank you. Hello, Mayor Boss and council members. We are also just to underscore it. We are also in favor of the cul-de-sac, looking at the impact from pollut you know, pollutants, noise pollutants, and potentially vibrational issues, and the fact that the left turning lane will be closed for a long, long time, and that the process of building is going to be quite extended. We are very much impacted as well as a citizen, as is montage, everybody will speak. We are very concerned about the construction issues as I've commented before. We want to also commend the traffic commission for doing an excellent study. And we really feel that as an owner, as a 30 year resident of Beverly Hills, as a designer, I think that as building the original building, I think that this is the most feasible way of handling the ongoing issues, handling it from a sound standpoint, the pollution standpoint, and also for the people entering Beverly Hills, for the visitors, for the people that live there, I think that it will be a way to re-educate traffic flow. And if you just have a situation where you have a closure and it opens up again, you have a closure, I think it becomes very confusing. I think between Google and Ways and other means of being able to educate the public, this is the most attractive way and the most inclusive way, protective way of dealing with this long term project. Thank you very much. Thank you. Tracy Spillane. Welcome. Council members, thank you so much for having us. I'm going to echo what Barbara Lazaroff just said with regards to the operation as the boots on ground within the operation and what happens on Canaan Drive. In meeting with the city and with Metro, We feel this is the best way to mitigate what is going to be an uncomfortable situation for drivers no matter what, and to help them in re-education in how to find businesses, and to move around Beverly Hills. And greatly appreciate your support. Thank you. Tom Dunlap. Welcome. I think this is the first time I haven't wanted to be number one, but I'm number one on the spot on the map. I actually managed the Beverly Hills office for Cold War banker. I am in full support of the closure in the cul-de-sac. As you know of the last three weeks, construction has begun by the utility companies. My office actually sits on the sidewalk, the mirror, or the window. And the disruption is quite apparent. I think just coming in and going out, the utility is taking the plates off, putting them back down. That ongoing process when it was mentioned that the wall could potentially come down and go back up. I would just support 300% having the cold asack, a nice sound barrier, and just mitigating the dust and noise. Thank you. Thank you. Carrie Hardnick? Welcome. I may your council. I'm Carrie Hartwick, co-owner of citizen restaurant and I just want to tell you that citizen is in full support of the closure and I really want to thank the city metro and everyone involved in the time and the consideration that they've given because take away all the anxiety of eight years of construction, the thought that's gone into this is given hope that we can sustain, especially a business where our calling card is our wide open patio. This seems like something that it could be very beneficial for our area during something that absolutely impacts our business. Thank you. Thank you. Beth Stein. Welcome. Thank you. Honorable Mayor and Vice Mayor and City Council members, I just want to hold hardedly concur with my partners at Cobalt Banker and the Vice President and Chief Operating Officer for the company as well as Barbara and Tracy. And Mr. Hardwick, we have been impacted, a tremendous thing will continue to be impacted by the noise, by the traffic flow, by the, it'll be pretty much unbearable. So we wholeheartedly support sound wall, call to sack, the additional parking. I think it will be a great thing for the able to start to start to be able to start to start to be able to start to start to be able to start to start to be able to start to start to be able to start to start to be able to start to start to be able to start to start to be able to start to start to be able to start to be able to start to be able to start to start to be able to start to be able to start to be Bosse, Vice Mayor Gold, Council members. I'm appearing on behalf of Beverly Hills luxury hotel LLC owner of the montage, Beverly Hills and also on behalf of montage hotels. Some kind of wearing two hats for this. I think the cul-de-sac is the best of the, a number of bad options. I don't think there are any good options here, but I think under the circumstances, this is probably the best thing we can do. Nonetheless, like everything, I think it requires an incredible amount of scrutiny and analysis. First and foremost, really would like to minimize this disruption as much as possible. But as I just experienced today when I was going to the hotel, traveling from Beverly, making a ride on Wilshire, I had to go all the way to Rexford to get to the hotel. And then I had to cut back through Clifton, and when I was exiting the hotel today, I couldn't get out of the motor court. So I'm really worried about these traffic circulation issues, and that takes me to the, one of the first issues I have, and that's with what I think Farron Pierce has proposed with the parking in the center. Normally right now on South Cannon, there are two lanes going southbound, and on North Cannon there are two lanes going northbound. If you remove one lane northbound, one lane southbound in order to provide parking, you're gonna create gridlock. I don't know how many have been in shopping malls where the drive aisle is only wide enough for one car, and that car is waiting to take a parking space. You will create around that cul-de-sac, which is gonna generate a lot of traffic, you will shut down the whole street. So the idea of removing any lanes, and I know there will be further analysis and design, but I'm reacting to what was in the Ferron Peer's report and what you saw on your screen. I think that is a prescription for disaster. I know how critical parking is and street parking, but you cannot remove any lanes. You gotta have two lanes. And how many times has someone been on Canon or Beverly and someone is trying to parallel park and they're taking up too much space and they just shut down the whole street. So by all means, do not reduce the number of lanes. Another critical criteria to all this and was in the Fair and Pair Report is the detour, the wayfinding, that's gonna be critical. People will learn it, but there are always new people coming and people will get frustrated and whether you're a Spago citizen, the montage, when people say the traffic is a problem, they avoid it. It's a huge avoidance reaction. So wayfinding will be critical to the educational process. In addition to that, the aesthetics. I know the aesthetics are gonna be discussed down the road, but this is Beverly Hills. You look at this portion of Canon, which has really been beautified with first Spago, and then the montage and the gardens, and obviously citizen, what they've been able to to do is critical that this is done right and it's worthy of Beverly Hills. Last thing I heard the sound is the duration. I know it was either two years starting with the piling or could go to six years. Obviously for all of these businesses that are going to be impacted and we're going to be seriously impacted less is more in this case. So we got to find a way to limit this but also to make it work. Thank you. Thank you. Jay, Jay, just one second. Jay, what's your suggestion? Do you have a suggestion if that parking was removed just to have two lanes and what would the I wouldn't have any parking there. I realized it's 20 spaces but at least in that one configuration it's just going to make a bad situation worse so I would recommend no parking. Don't forget there are valet operations that citizen and Spago. If you have two if you have two lanes going how are they going to how are they going to do a turnaround? No, no, no, you still have them circulating around, right? You have two lanes, well, you're going south down. You have a U-turn right now. No, no, you have, the only way you can exit cannon by going south is that you're two lanes on the right going southbound do a U-turn and become two lanes going northbound. That's how it's configured, right? I'm arguing or advocating keep the two lanes flowing on both sides like you have it today. Thank you. I think we're going to have to take a closer look at the design and then we'll bring that back. Yeah, what fear and peers are saying is you're going to have one lane flowing to one lane. You've got to have two lanes flowing all the way around. I would ask that we analyze that with the traffic. Thank you. I do have one more speaker card. Gina Raphael, welcome. Thank you for your patience. Thank you. I wanted to say I just heard today about the light going in on Croscent. As many of you know, my daughter was hit a year and a half ago in the crosswalk. To this day, she still doesn't have teeth left in her front teeth and has temporary teeth. And I understand that this isn't the first time that this has happened so I'm very hopeful with these changes that you can impact that light as well. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. Is there anybody else in the council chambers that wants to address us on this item? Okay so I'll go to a lay's on council member Friedman and vice mayor Gold. Yeah this one was pretty easy. There was general agreement, if not total agreement that we should have. It closed, I think the answer to Mr. Newman's suggestion about two to six years. I think we're going to analyze it after the piling and decking is done on the first phase. And come back and see whether or not it should be opened up or whether or not everybody is pleased with it the way it is. So hopefully that will answer that question. In terms of the parking that is a design question that we did discuss, fair and peerers does have to come back with it and we'll see what happens. There was a concern to have parking in that area so that it could be accessible, but that is something we'll look at again in the future. Yes, you want to add vice mayor? Only to say that traffic trucking and parking, I see our chair here, did a great job with this, it had been very well vetted, and by the time, I think fair and fair is a great job with it too. By the time we saw it, it was, as you saw it tonight, pretty clear opinion that this is what we ought to do. So it made our job pretty easy. Thank you. So I'll go to my colleagues questions and direction. Councilmember Wonderland. We did hear several times that this is the best option for what's a bad situation. So I endorsed it. I also think maybe it's an opportunity. I see one of our options were allowing for a plaza. And so this is an opportunity to experiment with places that will be car-free and I would advocate for us thinking about what we might be able to best do with that space. Take advantage of it. Wonderful. Anything else you'd like to best do with that space, take advantage of it. Wonderful. Anything else you'd like to add? No, nothing, right? That's remember Marish? Well, being a fan of the Beach Boys, I hope that they're going to be good vibrations next to the wall of sound there. So I'm in favor of it. And I do also think we should explore other options. But actually, a cool assack could end up being something that people quite like, I'm guessing. So I'm in favor of the recommendation. OK. I see one other question. Just to make clear, pedestrians will be able to get through, right? OK. Thank you. Want to add a beach boy song? Vice mayor anything else you wanna add? Okay, and I too support it. And I'm really happy that there were, we got to yes, that you were able to work together so well because I do remember quite some time ago, we didn't get there and it's really, really great to see that. So thank you for everybody who worked really hard, commission, everybody at Spago,ago MTA and all the other businesses The montage citizen and co-walt banker. It's great to have gotten T.S. So thank you for that So let's go to item three and That is a public information graphics reconstruction of the Metro Purple line extension project section two or day of station May we have a report, please? Good afternoon, Mayor Bossy and Council Members, Robert Welch with Public Works. And I'm going to present along with our consultant, Shook Kelly, the public information graphics associated with section two of the Purple Line Extension, the aesthetics program. So we'll go through a quick overview of section two where we're at the process that's brought us to this point for the final concept that's before you today for your consideration, and then a recommendation. So as we know, Section 2 extends from La Sienauga through Beverly Hills to Century City, and it includes our station at RaDale. The station box shown here extends from approximately Beverly, a little past canon. It includes two staging areas, one at the north east corner of Canon and Wilshire, and the other at the southwest corner of Reaves and Wilshire, which is going to be the future station entrance for the station. So currently the schedule, we've completed the SEE Phase 1 work. We've completed geotechnical boring along Wilshire and we are in the process as you've heard and well aware of the third party utility relocation, the gas and AT&T relocation that's going on currently. We have an item before you this evening for additional geotechnical borings for seismic investigation that if approved would start in March. And then we have in the future if when we bring it forward to City Council for consideration, we have potential demolition of the ACE gallery staging yard at Reeves and these are Metro's proposed dates if everything gets approved accordingly in June and then the design build activities to follow in the fall once they receive approval. And there's a photo there of decking activities at La Siena Guestation to give you an idea of what we're gonna be dealing with at Radeo. So as part of the AMOA, or part of the approval of the AUR permit in November, the MLA required that we go out and get a design firm to design a construction mitigation program for the aesthetics and to mitigate the visual and aesthetic impacts of the construction activities. These aesthetics are to incorporate public information and graphics and help patrons and residents move through the business triangle. Qualifications were submitted by two firms for consideration, Shook Kelly and March Studio. Shook Kelly was selected based on their qualifications to prepare this concept before you. They looked at the construction elements associated with the construction, the K rail, the sound wall, the wayfinding, the fencing, and the light poles. And there's a photo here of the Gale yard, which you can see examples of all these construction elements that we have to deal with and aesthetically enhance for Section 2. And they were to consider in that, in the development of these concepts, safety, maintenance, constructability, and the experience for pedestrians and vehicular traffic as well. So we were required to go out and perform two stakeholder meetings. We've actually done multiple community meetings and stakeholder meetings. The stakeholder meetings focused with the business community. During each one of these steps, we received input from both the community and the stakeholders and we revisited the concepts that were developed and incorporated as much of those comments and feedback as much as possible, including a stakeholder meeting that was held on March 1st, where there's representatives here from various businesses that were in attendance and they were in support of the concept before you today. We also went to the AdHoc Committee, the Metro AdHoc Committee on February 12th, and at that time provided a presentation for the concepts that we currently had at that time. And on the right-hand side, you can see a list of feedback that we've received and through those various stakeholder meetings and modifications to the concepts. We've incorporated a lot of these concepts. Some of these concepts are feedback that we received in our last meeting dealing with future design elements. I can incorporate design contests for local students and artists and making sure that there is maintenance and redesign options in the future. So at this time I'd like to hand over the presentation to Kevin Kelly, who's going to go through our final design concept for your consideration. Welcome. Good afternoon, your Honorable Mayor and City Council. I'm going to give you a little background just quickly on how we approach the project. I'm an architect and most of the time you think of architects, you think of bureaucetics, but our firm focuses on how environment affects behavior and perception. We work with companies like Whole Foods and Harley Davidson, Gelsons, Arc Light. And one of the things we also work with cities, I should have said about 20 cities across the United States. And we spend a lot of time looking at what makes people anxious when they're in environments. One of the things we look at in particular is line behavior, whether it's lining up with cars or as people walk. And generally when we're in those type of situations that humans, we don't have a lot of time to contemplate aesthetics as much as we're really trying to reduce friction and tension. And so our firm spends a lot of time trying to do that. We actually find that there's no limit to how fast we can make something people will still be frustrated. But what we can do is to provide them some visual interest and some visual blocks and to try to reduce the sense of visual anxiety or visual chaos. So without belaboring the point, there's a whole kind of science to looking at how people walk through places or how they drive through places. So the two primary issues we're really trying to represent and looking at these designs is how does it affect the behavior of people and more importantly, how does it reflect on the perception of the Beverly Hills brand or what we would call a place brand. Our goal in the job is to reduce that anxiety as best we can. We will not get rid of it entirely. It's impossible to get rid of it entirely. We can just only kind of passify people as they move through. And so I do want to thank the city for all the input. They've provided us. It's been really excellent to work with them in the stakeholders like Barbara Lazaroff and Jane Newman and many others that we've worked with. The base of where we started was really kind of looking at what do people expect in Beverly Hills? What do they expect when they come here? While all constituencies are important, we were looking at a lot of the guests that come here and they expect an iconic symbolic Beverly Hills. We can't tell them everything, but we can give them certain moments. And so we started with the very well-known icons. While it doesn't include all the icons, we looked at the stairs, the beautiful palm trees, the fashion, the flowers. We looked at a variety of elements to kind of draw our inspiration from. We took, this is an example of pedestrian zone, which doesn't happen everywhere, but happens in certain situations where you have a large staging sound wall on one side and a pedestrian wall on the other. And when you generally try to put humans into a narrow, long space, we don't like it. We don't like alleyways, we don't like tunnels. We don't like things that are narrow like that. And one way to break that up is to provide perspective and scale. So on the right hand side, you'll see a diamond pattern. That's about 12 foot tall. And on the left side, you'll see a variety of materials, plants, and visuals, whether those are graphics or photographs that interchange. The images right now are just placeholders. The next phase of this project will be to get specific. But through the input of the community and the stakeholders we're looking at a variety of contemporary images, some historical images, and some graphic elements. You'd be surprised at how much just an image can actually make people forget how frustrated they are in trying to get through in the disruptions of their day. Again, it doesn't solve it entirely, it just helps it. This is a view of a large staging wall, which is about 20 to 24 feet tall, as you can see. And the visual grid is there as well, the diamond pattern. You will see a variety of things happening. There's kind of what we call a 60 foot gaze, what you'd see from the car. There's a six foot gaze when you're up close, and there's even a six inch gaze that we're trying to look at. You have to be careful not to bias it any one way, because ideally you want people to walk in this area, walk or shop, cars don't shop. So we do want people to see it from the car, but we really want them to see it up close. And so we're trying to deal with that as best we can while at the same time factoring a lot of safety and logistic factors. We're also trying to deal with weigh finding, which is a big factor. You'll see that people are dealing with as they just want to get to their destination. So we're trying to help them as best we can. Generally in this weigh finding less is more. So if you give too much information, you overwhelm people. So we are trying to reduce that. Through the input of the stakeholders, we settled in on a color scheme, our direction at least, which is kind of a blue-to-green, aquamarine color that we're looking at. We had several other options, but this is the one that the consensus felt was the best. You'll see the K-rail is treated as well, so we're trying to treat that. I can tell you from my 25 years of working in this business, anytime humans, our consumers particularly see construction, our retail sales go down by 30% anytime they see it, because of perception of safety. And what we have to do is try to reduce that perception, and so paint can go a long way to making people not look at nails. This is driving down the car what we call the automotive barrier and the automotive barrier we are trying to treat with a level of visual interest as well not too much so we're trying to just create a little bit of pattern. There's only so much can happen we have milliseconds to try to get impact. We are trying to have the Beverly Hills brand out there when and where possible. You will see blade signs in that as well. Those blade signs have addresses in them that we would use to help locate people. As you know, we can't use logos. So we aren't going to be using any logos, but we will try to help people through landmarks. There are palm trees and other aspects that pull from the brand discussions we've had. This is the wayfinding signage system that we're looking at. Again, I talked about less as more, so we're not trying to overcommunicate what can help people as a sense of visual harmony. When it looks like you have your act together, when all the fonts and all the scales and sizes make sense, that actually reduces anxiety and people. And so we are trying to keep some consistency in that and again not overwhelm people. If we have the opportunity, we are going to try to dress up some of the light poles and we're looking at options on this. It all depends on how the construction goes. But if we can introduce some wood material and some plantings, it would really help us. So we have a variety of options there. Just something as subtle as that can help people look at that for a second and not look at the undesirable aspects that are involved in construction. I'll stop there. The only thing I would just reiterate is that we are trying to reduce that sense of anxiety people have. So after City Council direction today steps forward is we would continue to work with the stakeholders through a final design process as this is the concept we move into a final design complete that design and implement it in time for the first K-rail installation which we anticipate in mid-April timeframe associated with the AUR. We put that in the M-O-A for the AUR because we knew that the K-rail was going to be installed in that timeframe, so we're hoping to move forward with a design concept that we can have implemented for that application. We are in negotiations with Metro on the design build MOA which includes also the maintenance and replacement and redesign aspects of this program. We are negotiating currently two times per year, possible redesign and changing out these graphics. And through those redesign efforts, we would then also work with the stakeholders in that process. And of course, and come back to City Council on those recommendations. So with that we would like your direction on the recommended concept to move forward with public information graphics program into final design. Thank you. Anybody in council chambers? I guess. Thank you. Barbara Lazaroff. As I was rough again, Spago and ASID designer, aesthetics matter to me so I've gone to most of the meetings or all of the meetings. I'd like to say that we two were heard. So I'd like to once again reiterate that we were heard. There's no question that fiscally we're going to be impacted. Every business will be impacted. People have a choice to travel where they wish and dine where they wish, stay where they want to stay in terms of a hotel or purchase, you know, a boutique. It's going to impact the businesses on the street and in Beverly Hills, in that area. However, we want to make it as aesthetically pleasing as possible. I think that Shook and Kelly did a very good job. I think that it was very nice that we had very strong input on the colors and themes. And I had prepared some documents. I had spoken verbally to a number of people from the city in Metro. And I think they heard us in terms of wanting to make sure that all the graphics were clean, anything that was torn, anything that had graffiti, or anything that was in misuse would be repaired. And that should definitely be in the MOA. And we want that to be absolutely stated such. I think the idea of having community involvement in projects, I mean, Jay brought that up as well up from the montage. I think all of these things are important to get the community involved in the city and make them know that they're a part of this in a difficult time for a very long time. And actually try to make it fun. We can use those walkways and everything else to advertise different events to speak about the seasons. I think we talked about the amount of candlelight per walkway. Very important that people don't feel that it's dangerous and feel that it's somehow, I don't say inviting, but not that they're being uninvited to walk down a narrow corridor like that. So I think that all of the participants worked very hard on this and I want to thank everybody that was involved. Metro City, the company, Shukit Kelly, and so thank you very much. Thank you very much. Is there anybody else in council chambers? Jay, I see you're here. Do you want to add anything? Okay, thank you. So with that being said, I'll just go to my colleague council member Marish since we were the laya's on. Is there anything you want to add? No. Okay, so I'll just go to my colleagues, questions and direction council member. Very interesting presentation. I enjoyed it. The psychology of design and your thought process to try to incorporate that. Have you thought about the possibility of having some sort of art installation, you know, for some section of it, maybe a rotating art installation? So, yes, we did. We heard the stakeholders' interest in some art installation. We were also talking with the stakeholders about if and when, if the cul-de-sac option would be approved and move forward that looking at that area for an art installation versus like the K rail or the fencing, but we do have the ability to redesign or negotiating that, so that's definitely on the table. We do have some- The next Instagram moment. Yes. We do have some opportunities here, so we should try to take advantage of it. And, you know, I think you've done a good job and I support what you've done. Thank you, Council Member Friedman. Robert could you go back to the slide that you have on Gail? So I look at what's on Gail and I look at the conceptual canon, and it looks, you know, really much, much better. I'm really pleased with that, and hopefully it will come out that way. What is planning on terms of that wall? What is talked about on the wall? On the Canon wall? Yes. So we would develop an installation similar to what we're doing here. We would come forward as part of the overall design for the wall to talk, propose that concept at that time. In terms of the barrier on the computer that you're showing, there's no designs on the part that's right adjacent to Lane 2 of the Westbound traffic. Is that by design? So there actually are banners located on the adjacent to, I guess it's a little mini-cooper, you can see a banner there. So there are banners proposed along that fencing on that fencing. But not to the extent. Not to the extent. And the reason for that is, is there a safety reason for that? Or there's no safety reason for installing some banners adjacent to where that tan screening. Now there is where the fencing is blank due to pedestrian, like pedestrian, turning, and visual impacts. Personally, I would like to see something not necessarily graphics, but maybe more than just the blank screen that makes it look like a construction site, which it is. But personally, I'd like to see something more vibrant than that but other than that I think it's really good. Thank you Councillor over. Did you want to say something Barbara? Cold asuck wall is going to be a great potential for art and on the interior and on the exterior. And we haven't gotten there yet with the meetings, but I'm hoping that we can all utilize that as a true form of expressing art. Even though you don't feel it's an art project. I do. I do believe that it has the potential to really elevate the city during a difficult time during construction and make it, make it beautiful. It's just another aspect of being able to take something that is difficult and making something wonderful out of it. So we are hoping to do something artistic with it. Thank you. Anything else that you want to add, Councillor? Councillor Marraich? So, Les, you mentioned you wanted something more vibrant. Do you mean in terms of color scheme or what did you mean? Something, I mean, I'd like to take a look at it. I just think that a brand, what it looks like, a brown wall there, I think we could do better than that. Oh, there. But the one that we showed before. Oh, I think the graphics that are here are just beautiful. I just hope that they carry over to other areas. Can you please put that slide on with the kind, yeah, exact no, but this one, yeah. See, that's what I think we were looking at. The color is a kind of, we actually chose that. It's kind of a cyan kind of between green and blue. And those are very, I think, common colors as we heard. In fact, when you, I just looked it up on the Lusha color test, blue is passive and tranquility and calm and tenderness. And green is elasticity of will, passive, also self-esteem assertion. So I think these are very psychologically, very good colors and I think though on the inside of the wall facing the restaurants, there is an opportunity because that's a different kind of experience. You're gonna have more pedestrians there, although we do want pedestrians here and that calming influence is good. The closed-off coolness cul-de-sac will have more of a feel, you know, that kind of village-like feel, I guess. And so you got two sides and you have two things to work with. But I think in terms of the color scheme here, we think- I think this is wonderful. I don't know if we missed the boat on at Gail. I would have liked to see something more like that. I just don't want that to happen here but it certainly doesn't look like it will. Good. Okay. Thank you. So obviously supporting. Okay. Vice mayor. A little advance one slide. Maybe two slides. Well yeah. So is there any thought to or was it intentional that? First of all, I ought to say that I like this. I think it's really great. But in the theory that you can always add something, any thought is the goal to get everybody through this passage way quickly? Is there any reason not to create some interactivity in here? Perhaps some sort of electronic interactivity of some form shape or matter? I mean we control old Lucy films there or something like that. We have different areas and different conditions that that may be doable. But just like the J was talking about earlier about highways, there's kind of highways and side streets and residential areas. And in terms of the way people move, and so on a tight condition like this, we wouldn't want people stopping because it would jam everything up in a wider condition, which we might have. What we will have, there are opportunities to do that. have what we will have. There are opportunities to do that. If there's retail nearby, we really do want people to do window shopping behavior. And that's the ideal thing is to get them to shop slow, browse, experiment. Okay, I'm fine with it. I think it's fabulous. And again, a perfect example of everybody working together. And I'm very excited that we have Barbara Lazaroff working with us because there really isn't anybody that has better taste or eye for design than she does. So I think we're in great hands. And I'm thrilled that we have the businesses and MTA working together. I feel very confident with this. So thank you. Let's go to item four. And that is request for city co sponsorship for a celebration of the 70th anniversary of Israel's independence. And may we have a report please from public information manager to res costumant welcome. Thank you, good afternoon mayor and council members. This item before you is request for city support for an event to celebrate the 70th anniversary of Israel's independence. A volunteer group of citizens have formed a committee to produce the event which is currently scheduled to be held at the peninsula hotel on May 9th. This event is in keeping with the joint declaration with the state of Israel that was signed in 2015, which includes partnering on art and culture projects. The anniversary event is free and by invitation only because room capacity at this peninsula is 242 people. As part of the program the city will be formalizing the sister city agreement with the city of Hurtzlia, Israel. This committee is asking for city funding and in-kind services including design of the invitation and logo, production of a short video showing the relationship between the state of Israel and Beverly Hills over the years. Regarding the funding request, there has been a change from the fiscal impact statement on your staff report. The total projected budget is $27,255. The committee has received pledges of an additional $14,000 in donations for now a total of $17,500 in pledges. So if all that money is collected, that will reduce the city's contribution to less than $10,000. The committee is continuing to solicit donations. However, they ask that the city cover the final cost, not covered by donations up to the total of $27,255. So in your staff report, there are two options for making these payments. The first option involves the city entering into agreement with the Beverly Hills Sister City Association to manage the budget. With this option, donors would send checks to the city's charitable foundation and the foundation would make a donation to Sister Cities, which is a 501 C3 organization. And then the city's Sister Cities would make the payments to the hotel one C three organization. And then the city's sister cities would make the payments to the hotel and the other vendors. The second option involves the city paying the vendors directly. With this option, donors would also send checks to the city's charitable foundation. However, in this case, the city must set up a payment process for the various vendors following the city's purchasing regulations. So if the second option is chosen, where we pay the vendors directly, we're asking for the city council to waive the bidding requirement for obtaining the venue and enter into a contract without getting bids, if you agree that this would be in the city's best interest. And this committee members did look at other venues and could speak to that later if you have questions. We are also asking for our discretion for choosing the best payment process as we are still researching the most efficient way to manage these payments. So funding for this event, even up to the full amount, can be covered under current budget and would come from the City Council and administrative support budget. So I'm now available for questions and committee co-chairs, Sharona and Dizarre and Regina Raphael are also here in the House. Thank you. Thank you very much. Welcome, Sharon and Gina, and thank you for your patience. Hello, good afternoon. Thank you so much for this opportunity. We're so excited to be able to present this event and idea and show our partnership with Israel and all the great things that have happened between the two cities. So I don't know if you guys have any questions. Is there anything you want to add to the staff report or you just hear for questions? I have a list of sponsors of people who have pledged to give donations if this event does occur and I'm happy to share that with you if You're interested or yes, we'll see if there's any questions on that regard. Okay, so is there anybody else in the council chambers That wants to address us on this item. I don't have any speaker cards So I'll go to my colleagues for questions and direction council member wonderlick Um, I support this is a good thing for the city to be doing. Is the peninsula kicking in something for this? The peninsula has done a lot of in-kind cost analysis. If you look into your packet, you'll see that you have an estimated summary of charges. They've cut back significantly on their costs of what it would be. They've given us significant discounts as far as food and alcohol and AV as well as parking. So they're taking a leadership partnership role with this. Our city has an obvious connection with Israel and our community does and so it's something good for us to be doing. Thank you Councillor McAfreedman. Thank you and I also am supportive of this. It looks just a quick look at the peninsula. Contract it's about $5,700 worth of in kind contribution that they've made by reducing their cost. It's very nice that you're continuing to obtain sponsorships, which is always encouraged. And based on the budget that's been presented, I'm supportive of it. Thank you, Councilmember Rarish. Thank you, I'm very supportive and I'd love to see us in the future do more activities and engage in more activities with Herdsilia including cultural exchanges Having our kids go over there their kids come here I did have one quick question when it lists the other sister cities or friendly cities is Acapoco no longer in the picture Acapoco is a dormant sister city at this time Isn't Pudong also dormant? Yes. Okay. Those are our two dormant cities. Pudong is mentioned, but. The more active sister cities are can and hurtsily. Right. Right. And and hurtsily, although serving almost in a capacity of being a sister city is more of a friendly city. So this event will actually give us a great opportunity to do the actual signing of the paperwork. We're waiting to hear back from the mayor of Herzlia and to invite, they have been invited to attend this event and do the official signing. Will that conflict with their own celebrations in Israel? No. Yoom Hotsma Ud is, I think, April 17th. So it's about two weeks afterwards. Okay. I mean, if it's, I think he's still there, Moshe Fadlone, he's a great guy. He's a good guy and would be great to have him in Beverly Hills. You should. Ophrebell said you're her regards. And Ophrebell should come too. You should we should ask if if Moshe comes I saw for Purim he dressed up as Herzl so we should ask him to bring that costume. Thank you. Vice Mayor. Well I'm very supportive I actually think we need to thank these two ladies who work really hard to make this happen. It's been months in the planning and you've done great work and Teresa has been supportive of this all along so congratulations congratulations, I think it's a great thing. Wonderful. I completely agree. Thank you. And for those who are watching, how can they donate? I for one would like to donate as well, but for anybody else, how can they do that? Fantastic. We encourage anyone who is interested to participate and it should be a great community building event. So perhaps we could put something on our website or people should know how they can do that and where to do it. Thank you so much for the vision and for making this happen. Thank you so much. And we'll do our best to continue our fundraising efforts as well. I'm sure you're going to get there quickly. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, let's go to work. I'd like to get the council's approval to waive the bidding requirement and also to choose the payment process that we think is the most efficient if that's approved. Pardon? To waive the bidding process for the venue. Okay. No, that's not. Our procurement process, anything over $7,500 requires either a bidding process. It's an informal bidding process, but it was still required. I'm okay. Yes, you have it. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, let's go to item five, request for a one day free use of the Wallace Annoverg Center for the Performing Arts by the Farhanck Foundation. Maybe we have a staff report. Thank you. Good afternoon, mayor. Members of the council, whom I'm in, community outreach manager for the city. The item that is before you is a request from the Far Hang Foundation. They are requesting a one day free use of the Wallace-Annenberg Center for the performing arts for Sunday, September 29th. They would like to host a short film festival on that day and the request is for the use of the Bram Gullsmith Theatre and the outdoor terrace area for a reception. The date is currently available at the Wallace. They have a temporary hold on it for them right now. Should the council approve this request. On February 22nd, the proposal, the Farheng Foundation provided a proposal to the special events liaison committee for with Mayor Lilly Bossy and council member Lester Friedman. The liaison's approved the proposal for further consideration by the City Council. The event details are, again, the Farhan Foundation is a nonprofit, it is neither political nor religious. Beverly Hills residents are active within the organization. The foundation has conducted this annual film festival since 2008. The program itself is that the films are submitted from all over the world and they are judged by film experts. Top six short films will be showcased at this event and then they're judged and then the top three will be awarded. Winners are eligible for cash prizes and of course the films can be in any language but are subtitled in English. The event, of course, the reception can be in any language, but are subtitled in English. The event, of course, the reception will be in English as well. The event tickets, as they've done in previous times, they're going to, I believe, keep the event cost at $45. A ticket, it helps offset the cost for the program. There was a bit of a clarification I wanted to provide. From my previous presentations to you about our Wallace Agreement. In reviewing the contract further we received some clarification. Actually the city received 20 free dates during a calendar year as opposed to 15. The 15 dates are divided as such. The 15 dates are for city sponsored events for programs such as, again, the Farhan Foundation or Mazon, these are general events. And then there are five evening civic programs that can be allotted as well, but those are to be hosted by the city of Beverly Hills. For example, the Gospel event, that was one city evening event that was used. So you can now see that we've used two dates for general city sponsored events and one date so far for our calendar year. The agreement as I guess the spirit of the agreement has always been the free use of the facility is a public benefit from the city to the community and however ancillary costs are not included in the agreement. Fiscal impact at this time the request covered in the city's agreement is covered. The Far Hang Foundation will fund all ancillary costs no additional funding is being requested by the foundation. Next steps we are seeking your direction on whether to approve this request or not. Should it be approved, then the wallets will move forward in allowing the use of the two spaces for the Bram Goldsmith Theatre and outdoor terrace area. We also have with us members from the Far Hang. We have the Executive Director, Ali Resard Ardekani. He is with us today and also Nusheen Mishgadi, our active community member, who has also been working with the Far Hang Foundation. So, should you have any questions? They are also available to answer. Okay, thank you. Does anybody want to address us? Nusheen, do you want to say a few words? Since that being a opportunity. Hello again. Thank you for always being supportive of the community. I am looking forward that when I first approached, I'm trying to find out why are all the events outside the city, with all the residents we have within the city, why don't they felt that it may not be possible. So this possibility is giving the community a chance to participate more in the events that are presented. I know that when Wallace first started, I know it was one of the first generation management that they were trying to look into how we can bring a Persian community more involved with Wallace activities. This opens that door. Farhan got already had one event a couple of weeks ago at Wallace. They had that arrangement themselves directly, but this will just open up more opportunity for community members to participate. And I'm hoping more nonpersons will participate also to be more familiarized with the culture that we have. Thank you. Thank you. Stay close for questions. Councillor Member Freeman. Do you like to add anything? I had a question first of whom if I could. There was some question when we had the layers on I I believe, about the use of the outdoor terrace area. It's been resolved. So we do have use of the outdoor area. But should the council decide to look at the lease agreement again and provide specific details on what is what's allowed versus what's not. You can do that in the future. But the Wallace is going to honor our agreement. Okay. Um, comment? Yeah. Um, this is an excellent use of that space. Um, I don't think that we've utilized, come close to utilizing any of the times that we have there. And this is a community building event. I'm really happy to see that the cost of the event to the public is kept to a minimum. I think that's going to provide more inclusion. And I think as layasons, we were extremely supportive of it. Yes, absolutely. And the whole point of having these days from the Wallace and this partnership with the city was to provide for our residents to enjoy it. And this is truly a wonderful way to do that. So I'm full in support and I look forward to a longer relationship as well. Council member, let me just see if there's anybody in the council chambers. I don't see anybody but I'm going to ask who might want to address us on this item. So then I'll go to my colleagues for questions and direction. Council member wonder like. I agree. Excellent use. Great for the community. It looks very interesting. I'm looking forward to going. So I support. Thank you. Council, anything you want to add? Nothing. Councillor Mournish. Nothing to add. Councillor Mournish. So I I'm so supportive. I'm wondering if we can, because we do want to encourage our residents if we can maybe get a discount for the event. $45 is quite a bit for residents of the city. It's nothing that's going to change my vote one way or the other, but I think that would be a nice gesture to try and encourage our residents to attend. Did you want to address that? Is that a question or a statement? It's a suggestion. OK. Somebody want to address that suggestion. Afternoon, everyone. Yeah, that's something that I can review with our board of directors. This event is not a break-even event, so all the costs is not even covering the cost that we go out of pocket, but we can certainly review it. Thank you, Vice-Meghan. Thank you. I think it's a great idea. I think it's a good use of the theater and fully supportive of it. Wonderful. So you have unanimous support. And that is it for our agenda, and we will now adjourn to our closed session for items on our closed session agenda. Thank you.