6/2/26 Council Meeting — Recap

Chico Church of Christ. Welcome. Thank you, Mayor Reynolds. Thank you, Council, for the invitation. Will you bow with me? We begin, please. Heavenly Father, we praise you for your creative means and your ability to extend and sustain a life. Great designer, great orchestrator, great architect of what we call reality. We present ourselves before you today as leaders, citizens, servants. Lord, we care for your creation. We want to be good stewards of that which you've blessed us with. And as we do that, we're mindful. We're mindful of all the things that we're thankful for. We're thankful for the citizens of this community and this great nation that we live in. Although it's flawed in various ways, it's majestic in its own way, and we praise you for inviting us to be a part of it, especially today when we're reminded of this democracy and people voting, casting ballots.

Thank you. Thank you for sharing this with us. Lord, we're thankful for our first responders and those who put their lives on the line for all of the citizens of this great city. And we just ask your hedge of protection be around them. We ask that you be with our business leaders, our agricultural leaders, health care, education, retail, hospitality, the list goes on and on. Lord, we have people who serve and share their gifts in all kinds of ways. And we're so grateful for these people, these loved ones. And Lord, I pray for our council. I pray for a spirit of wisdom to be amongst them, a gentle heart, an open mind. We know that they care deeply for this city. And we ask that the decisions are made, benefit our citizens.

We ask that a spirit of civility be upon us and gentleness as it guides us through this meeting today. And it's in Christ's name I pray. Amen. All right. Thank you. Please rise for the Pledge of Obligions. Salute. And Pledge. I pledge to Jesus to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic of the Church's hands, all nations under God, and to the soul, and to the liberty of God. All right. Roll Call, Madam Clerk. Will you call our roll? Okay. Council Member Goldstein? Here. Here. Council Member Hawley? Here. Council Member O'Brien? Here. Council Member van Overbeek? Here. Council Member Winslow? Here. Vice Mayor Bennett? Here. Mayor Reynolds? Here. Speaker card announcement. Anyone wishing to address the council on any matters listed on the agenda should first complete a speaker card found at the back of the chamber.

Once your card is completed, turn it in to the city clerk and the speakers are taken in the order they are received. Once the first speaker begins, no additional speakers will be taken. Persons demonstrating rude, boisterous, speaking on matters outside the jurisdiction of the city council or engaged in otherwise disruptive behavior will be called to order. If such conduct continues, I may call a recess, request the removal of such persons from the council chambers, adjourn the meeting, or take other action as appropriate. Thank you. City Attorney Brian Jones, can you have our closed session announcement for us? Yes. Thank you. I'm happy to make that report. There were four items in closed session the council considered.

The first was city manager recruitment or public employment and direction was given to the executive search firm. From the council, labor negotiators also consulted with the council and direction was given to the negotiator with regard to the employee Organizations listed on the agenda. There were two existing litigation items. One was the Waddell case and direction was given to the city attorney. As well as also on the Schwab case, the direction was likewise, or there was an update given to council and consultation direction was given as well. That's my report. All right. Thank you very much. Consent agenda. All matters listed on the consent agenda are considered routine in nature and can therefore be enacted with one motion.

Are there any no votes or council disqualifications? I'm going to recuse myself, Mayor, from 2.3. All right. I'm going to register a no vote on 2.4. That's the budget. Okay. All right. Consider a motion to approve. I move to approve. So, that's the motion to approve. All right. I'll move to approve. Second. I'll move to approve. Second. I apologize. I'm having a hard time getting these. Take your time. All right. There we go. All right. That was a motion and a second. I'll move to approve. I'll move to approve. All right. That was a motion and a second. To approve the consent agenda with it noted that Council Member O'Brien recused himself on item 2.3 and a no vote on 2.4 on the budget from Council Member Winslow.

And that included an ordinance of the City Council of the City of Chico amending section 15.36.072 of the Chico Municipal Code relating to the collection of delinquent sewer fees. Final reading and adoption by reading of title only. So, let me record that motion. Council Member Goldstein? Yes. Council Member Hawley? Yes. Council Member O'Brien? Yes. Council Member van Overbeek? Yes. Council Member Winslow? Yes. Vice Mayor Bennett? Yes. Mayor Reynolds? Aye. The motion carried 7-0. All right. Public comment. Members may address the council at this time on any matter not already listed on the agenda and are within the jurisdictional authority. The council cannot take action at this meeting on these requests made under this section of the agenda.

How many speakers do we have? We have nine. All right. Three minutes each. All right. So, I'm going to call the first three because I think that works a little bit better. And if you could go ahead and line up in that middle aisle. And I believe that we were able to repair the microphone. So, make sure you lean into it. I wouldn't grab it really hard, but I don't think it will be making the popping sound or I hope not. So, the first three speakers, Ann Perry, Vic S., and JoAntha Guthrie. So, it's Ann Perry is first. Go ahead. And then Vic S., and then JoAntha Guthrie. Okay. Okay. Good evening, Mayor and Council Members. My name is Ann Perry. And I spoke at the City Council meeting on May 19th requesting that the Council look into the placement of trash barrels on Humboldt Road and Bruce Road.

So, I am following up tonight with the Council to see where you are in this process. I feel that this request should move forward in a positive way considering the fact that there are absolutely no trash receptacles in that very extensive area anywhere. And with the upcoming opening of the Enloe Cancer Center, the AM-PM Arco gas station, and also the bicycle park on Humboldt Road, there's going to be a very significant increase in pedestrian and vehicle traffic, I believe, in that area with those occurrences happening. I presently volunteer my time in picking up litter. I usually go out at least four days a week, and I focus on those areas. So, feel free to take a ride down the Bruce Road and Humboldt Road.

I think you'll see a vast improvement. I think it's an ongoing challenge for sure. And I think if there were trash receptacles strategically placed in the area, I think it would encourage individuals to dispose of their trash in a proper way. So, just kind of taking, I'd like to know for myself tonight, taking the pulse of the Council and the Mayor, like if you were to vote tonight on that, where would you stand? Anybody want to start? Unfortunately, this is your time to talk to us, but we're not supposed to address you back. But we definitely appreciate you bringing it back up. Okay. Well, I hope that it gets a positive vote. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Vic S., followed by JoAntha Guthrie, and then Angela Risden.

Hello. Nice to see everybody again. I have been here multiple times over two and a half years, and nothing still has been done. During that time, I want you to recall, remember when somebody went down Sheridan Avenue because they did not stop at the stop sign, and I had to pull over, and they hit my car, totaled it, and I had been here prior to that, indicating we need more safety on our streets. Period. In the Sunday paper, I was excited to read that requests this year include one new community service officer to operate the city's red light camera system. I was ecstatic when I read that. Yay! Finally! I walked my dog several times throughout the whole day on Sheridan Avenue and Palmetto. I've talked to numerous, numerous neighbors.

They all agree. Just the other day, this one car was going over 100 miles an hour. Police car was chasing them, but from what I understand, when you go into more of the residential areas, they can't follow just because of safety reasons as it is. I have this one young middle school student, wonderful kid. I talk to him every day when I walk my dog. He goes, you won't believe what happened. I saw this blue car going down the street, and he was throwing liquor bottles. They think possibly at the stop sign. This young kid went to pick up those broken bottles twice. Wonderful kid. Wonderful kid. I told him, I said, I'm so proud of you that I'm going to mention it. That's staff council. Once again, we need white stripes and speed bumps on Sheridan Avenue, folks.

People, I walk my dog different times a day. You ought to see people in the middle, early, early morning. They don't stop at stop signs. They are speeding. They're going on the wrong side of the road. Drivers speeding down both streets on phones and cellular devices. Not stopping. Note two days in a row. Afternoon, I was explaining about that one kid. Once again, I encourage you, I encourage you. Please, please put out some red light cameras. I'd be a volunteer to help out any way that I can. Thank you very much. Have a great rest of the week, and I appreciate you listening to me. Thank you. JoAntha Guthrie, followed by Angela Riston, and then Sharon Johnson. Good evening, Mayor and Council.

My name is JoAntha Guthrie, and I am the new public sector manager for waste Management. I've been here since April, but I've been around the community for more than 20 years. My family is here, and we brought our kids here to swim in the creek, and I just loved it so much, I finally convinced my husband, who's from Arkansas, to move here. So, it was a long time coming and planning to get here, but I'm here, and I'm excited to be your point of contact for waste Management now. I have met some of you, and I hope to meet more of you in the future. My colleague, Doug Hipchin, is going to share some of the new stuff that we've been working on, and then talk about how we've been partnering with the city and city staff to help the city residents.

So, we look forward to working with you, and thank you for what you do. I worked in public sector for 25 years. Part of it was in solid waste. Part of it was in public works. So, as a former public sector staff person, I know how hard your jobs are, and I appreciate that you are willing to do them. So, thank you very much. JoAntha, can you connect with Ann Peery in the back there and talk about receptacles in that area that she mentioned? We're going to follow up. Beautiful. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, then. Angela Rizdin, Sharon Johnson, and Doug Hipkin. Good evening. Well, my name is Angela Rizdin. In early 2023, the Chico Area Interfaith Council received state grants from the California Department of Social Services to support a Stop the Hate program.

Various initiatives were followed, including short videos that were shown at Tinseltown and at the local TV station. We also had two very highly successful community dinners. One of the speakers at last year's dinner was the District Attorney Mike Ramsey. One of the key points that was made was the concept that when we see hate, including bullying, that we must be, instead of bystanders, we must be upstanders. And this was enforced by Mr. Ramsey when he stated, when we see something, we must do something. At the last Chico City Council meeting, I was left completely floored by the bullying and the lack of civil discourse that I witnessed from this dais. Now, I'm sure all of you city councilors are quite capable of standing up for yourselves.

And in fact, behind closed doors, you may call out the breakdown of decorum, as specified in your own rules 2.04.12, Rules of Decorum of Meetings. But by not standing up to the breakdown of civility in the moment, in public, you send the message that it's okay to behave that way. I have witnessed in this room many times the public does not follow those rules of decorum, and that there is a complete loss of civil discourse. And I don't need to tell you that there is an increase of uncivility behavior among elected officials, both state and federal. But we must change. If we are to effect change, I believe we must, and I believe we must. And it has to be here and begin at home, in Chico, in these chambers.

You must lead by example. Follow your own rules. And call out when a fellow counselor breaks the rules. And let the public bear witness to your example as an upstander. Thank you very much. Thank you. Sharon Johnson, followed by Doug Hipkin, and then Sam Barber. Good evening, Mayor and Councilmembers. My name is Sharon Johnson. I'm here representing the Chico Peace Alliance. The Chico Peace Alliance operates as a grassroots movement dedicated to nonviolent action. We serve as a flexible network, uniting local residents committed to addressing peace, social justice, and equality for local, national, and global scales. I want to thank you for this opportunity to address you. I'm here to talk about respect.

We are living in a time when polite exchanges are a rarity. A simple thank you and please seem to be a sign of weakness. Respect happens when we lend a listening ear to one another. Listening is a sign of confidence. As our country leaders send messages of disdain through mail, conversation, interviews, we of the Chico Peace Alliance ask that our elected officials proceed at all times with civility, respect, and goodwill by setting an example of importance of good manners. You as Councilmembers influence our city residents through the decorum you display at public meetings. How you address one another is viewed is very influencing. We, your community, understand your responsibilities are not easy, that sometimes you're working at the edge of your own nerves.

Please take into consideration that you respect all of us. Your professional behavior impacts all of us. Your behavior towards one another encourages either respect or disrespect. Please be aware of your behavior and I thank you for your respectful listening tonight. Thank you. Doug Hipkin followed by Sam Barber and then John Babcock. Good evening, Mayor and Councilmembers. My name is Doug Hipkin and I serve as the district manager for WM here in Chico. I want to start by saying that I've been in this area for more than 30 years and over that time I've seen Chico go through strong times and some challenging times. Because of that history, I want to sincerely say that I appreciate the direction the city is headed in right now.

And I want to thank the current council and the city leadership that my team and I have the opportunity to work with here every day. One example of that progress that I would like to share was the drop and dash event that we recently held here in Chico. WM and I were proud to sponsor the second half of that event last week. And through that effort, we removed a total of 19.58 tons of trash. That total does not include an almost full 53 foot trailer that collected used mattresses. That material was properly collected and managed helping prevent it from potentially being illegally dumped in our community. Events like this make a real difference, not only in cleanliness, but in protecting neighborhoods and public spaces that we all use.

I also want to recognize Charlene Durkin and her team in code enforcement. They were a pleasure to work with throughout this effort and their professionalism and collect coordination helped to make the event successful. Strong partnerships like this are what allow us to deliver meaningful results in Chico. WM remains fully staffed and committed to keeping Chico clean. We are proud to continue supporting the city's progress and work alongside local leadership to maintain positive momentum we are seeing across the community. Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you this evening. Thank you. And thank you, Doug, and waste Management for your efforts on that. That is significant. That amount of trash and garbage and mattresses, that is not going unnoticed.

So thank you for that and welcome, JoAntha. So our next speaker is Sam Barber, followed by John Babcock and then Matt Beshore. Hello. My first question would just be on the invocation, if it's really appropriate in like a government public body to be opening with a prayer. It kind of seems like a very blatant just disregard for the Constitution, their separation of church and state that applies to federal, local and state governments. I haven't seen any non-Christian person open with a prayer. And, you know, I respect everyone's right to, you know, worship whatever God they want, but we're not supposed to be playing religious favoritism when we're public servants. The second thing I'd like to touch on is, again, we need independent police oversight.

Michael Vincent was getting blowjobs in church parking lots on numerous occasions. And Billy Aldridge feels like two weeks off is an appropriate punishment for that. And I was thinking, well, what if I got caught in like a church parking lot with my partner having a good old time? What would happen to me? Well, I'd probably have to pay at least $1,000 of a fine if I could afford that. Most people make $40,000 a year here, so that's, you know, kind of a big deal. Am I going to pay rent? Am I going to afford food? That sort of thing. I'm six months in county jail and potential to be registered as a sex offender. So that's what would happen to a regular person. But if you have a blue uniform and a badge on, you get two weeks off and then that's it.

And then there's no further repercussions from there. And all the Republicans on the council reassure us that, oh, we're going to hold them accountable. We're going to do what it takes. We're going to stand up to this nonsense. You haven't. You've given them a hot stone massage every chance you get. Give them every weapon they want with no sort of recourse on this disgusting action, let alone talking about Michael Williams, who was a serial sexual misconduct kind of guy who he paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to while he was being investigated for serial sexual misconduct. He was a sexual predator. He belongs in prison. He does not belong. He doesn't deserve to get a $36,000 little bailout gift from the taxpayers because he was going to file a wrongful termination seat.

This is a guy who was using his position of power to leverage women into having intercourse with him. He used the murder of Desmond Phillips as a way to coerce a woman into having intercourse with him. Conveniently enough, he was not on the police report as someone who shot Desmond Phillips, but he felt it was appropriate to leverage that as a way to get a woman to have intercourse with him. So I'd really appreciate some independent oversight of the police, not people handpicked by the police department. I get a funny feeling they might not hold them accountable. The other piece I wanted to touch on briefly was Mr. van Overbeek has been consistently ageist and classist on numerous occasions and I think is really inappropriate and immature when he's bringing up other council members' age, but not wanting his own age out.

It just comes across as ageist and classist when he says, oh, if someone can't survive on the council paycheck, they don't deserve to serve. That just means, oh, you don't have money. You don't get to serve. You're not as good as I am. I know plenty of rich idiots. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. John Babcock and then Matt Beshore. Okay. We'll go to Matt Beshore. Good evening, council. I'm here because the other day I saw a story about the suggestion, the proposal by police chief Billy Aldridge to move the rangers from being the park rangers to the park rangers to the park rangers. Just general patrol, just general police department. That simultaneously came as a shock and not a shock to me. It came as a shock to me because I'll share some quotes from the September 5th, 2017 meeting that I attended.

And some of these are from people in the room today. First, there's an exchange between then, let's see, it was Sean Morgan. So he was the mayor at the time with police chief O'Brien at the time. Now, council member O'Brien. It's obvious to everyone, but some that if the park rangers fall under the department that any kind of willy nilly day, Sean Morgan is a funny way of saying things sometimes that you may decide to pull these officers out of the park and send them to wherever in the area in the city that you might need them. Can you speak to that? At which point, police chief O'Brien responded. I can the park rangers their beat will be our parks. We are not going to change that their beat will remain the park.

Renette Filmer. Essentially, there is not any difference in what they're doing except for the fact that they will be sworn officers. Police chief O'Brien. That is correct. At the time, let's see, assistant city manager Chris Constantine says, establishes a requirement that there's a difference that the services that they perform. If we move them to provide primarily patrol level services, which is what some of the concerns are, it would violate our agreement with the POA, which is what it would require them to be police officers and to be paid as such, which is not the intention of this program. Then, council member Mark Sorensen, now city manager Mark Sorensen, I don't see the rangers jobs changing from what they are today.

And he further went on to say, this misconception, this talking point out there that, oh my God, all of a sudden that because someone becomes a sworn officer, their old job is out the window. That's just not the case. You can see why maybe I was surprised to even hear the suggestion given the people are still in this room today that we're going to now strip the park rangers from our park. From that same meeting, I'll just paraphrase Randall Stone, the parks are the city's whipping boy. And they continue to be. We continue to take from the park and we continue to feed the never ending vacuum of our police department. Everyone wants more police. We can't afford it. Thank you. Thank you. And then our, is John Babcock here?

Would you like to speak? Okay. Then he is, we're, we're finished with public comment. All right. Thank you. Public hearings. We have a hearing on the abandonment and vacant portion of Eaton Road right away. And we have a report from Brendan Audubonny, our director of public works engineering. Yes. Good evening, mayor, vice mayor and city council members. Item 4.1 is requesting abandonment and vacation of a portion of our public right away along Eaton Road near Floral Avenue in order to accommodate proposed commercial development. And to address existing private improvements located along that existing public right away. So this would clean that up. We've coordinated with local utility companies and they have no conflicts with the abandonment.

And so our recommendation is for approval of this item. That concludes our report. All right. Are there council members that have questions for staff? Vice mayor Bennett. Move to approve. We have hold on. We got to open the public hearing. We have one. We have one. Chris Giampoli. Okay. Councilmember Hawley, I see your name in the queue. Was that? Okay. Sorry. I did want to skip you. I'm sorry. All right. We'll take our one speaker. Three minutes. Okay. 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. Thank you. Thank you. I was just coming in for questions. It doesn't seem there are any questions, so I'll go sit back down.

Okay. All right. We will close the public hearing. Vice Mayor Bennett. Is it okay? Move to approve. Second. Did you want to speak? No, but you hear the second? Okay. We have a motion. Motion by Vice Mayor Bennett in a second. Council Member. Council Member Goldstein. Council Member Goldstein. No. Okay. Yes. Council Member Hawley. Yes. Council Member O'Brien. Yes. Yes. Council Member van Overbeek. Yes. Council Member Winslow. Yes. Vice Mayor Bennett. Yes. Mayor Reynolds. Carry 7-0. All right. Hearing to consider the final annual engineers report and levy and collection system for 2026-2027. We have a report from Skylar Lipsky, our Director of Public Works Operations and Maintenance. Thank you, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council.

Item 4.2 is a hearing to consider the final annual engineers report and levy and collection of the 2026-27 assessments from the Hoosah Ranch and Obhill Neighborhood Park Landscaping and Lighting District 001-08. At its May 5th meeting, the City Council adopted resolutions approving the preliminary engineers report as well as scheduling tonight's public hearing to consider approval of the final report and proposed levy of $87.10 a parcel, which is a $1.04 increase from the 2025-26 assessment. Excuse me. And I should note that we were notified post-publishing by the county that we need to add one line to the end of Section 5 in the resolution that states that actual dollar amount per parcel levy.

So it will say the charges for fiscal year 2026-27 will be as follows, $87.10 per equivalent benefit unit. That concludes my report. Thank you. All right. Any questions? No. No. Okay. Open public hearing. How many speakers do we have? We do not have any. All right. We will close the public hearing. Take a motion. I'll move to approve with the amendment as per staff. Second. Okay. Council member Goldstein. Council member Hawley. Yes. Yes. Council member van Overbeek. Yes. Council member Winslow. Yes. Vice mayor Bennett. Aye. Mayor. Mayor Police Management Police Management Police Management Police Management Police Management Police Management Pollack. Councilmember Hawley? Yes. Councilmember O'Brien? Yes. Councilmember van Overbeek? Yes.

Councilmember Winslow? Yes. Vice Mayor Bennett? Yes. Mayor Reynolds? Aye. Carries 7-0. All right. Regular agenda 5.1, Internal Affairs Committee 518, recommendation regarding downtown revitalization and PBED parking proposal. We have Councilmember O'Brien as the chair. Sure. Thank you. Before you start, Mayor, I need to recuse myself. Okay. Yeah. Great. Thank you, Mayor. Just give a quick overview and turn it over to Director Auduboni and Mr. Alimi. I'm sure they've got some discussion points. But generally speaking, at our City Council meeting on May 5th, we directed this issue to come back or go back to Internal Affairs and was regarding a PBED parking proposal. and it kind of had some different iterations.

And at that Internal Affairs Committee meeting, Mr. Alimi came to what I think was an effort to find a compromise, to find some way to get this passed. And the compromise in a nutshell was to take advantage of our summer season and then run this through December of this year, provide two hours of free parking in the parking lots and long-term parking lots, not the street parking, and provide additional wayfinding signage to direct patrons to the parking lots to identify the free parking areas. And there was some determination that staff needed to make if the interaction of the kiosk would be required to park for free. So I'm going to turn this over first to Director Auduboni to provide the additional details and then to Mr. Alimi.

Yeah, thank you Councilmember O'Brien. So in follow-up to the discussion, yeah, the new proposal was presented for two-hour free parking lots, as Councilmember O'Brien mentioned. So we looked into that, evaluated its capabilities, what those logistics operationally would look like. So a couple notes or data points, I guess. Looking at July through December in 2025, the revenue amounts in those lots totaled approximately $65,000. So what that would mean in terms of a two-hour free parking is kind of hard to exactly determine. I would say the majority of the parking durations that we see in the lots is between one and two hours. And so in terms of the total fiscal impact, I would venture to guess somewhere in the $40,000 to $50,000 range.

We confirmed with our vendors that two-hour free parking is possible in lots. It would require interaction with the kiosk or the app. Essentially, you'd have to create a parking session, and two hours could be given for free. So we do have the capability of doing that. Some of the discussion, internal affairs with this concept, I believe was brought up by Sergeant Lefkowitz, was the impact of students with free parking in the lots. The higher utilization by students at Chico State could be a negative impact. Director Lipsky brought up a good point in terms of metrics. What are we looking for in terms of what are the outcomes we're looking for that could be measurable? One discussion was parking occupancy.

So we kind of looked into that. I think that might be a little misleading because of the student impact. It might be higher occupancy that doesn't necessarily correlate to increased patronage or sales in the downtown. In the past, we've looked at sales tax numbers for the downtown when we've done free parking programs that haven't necessarily seen positive impacts from a free parking program. Signage, we have been actively working on for the last couple months of doing that as well. We recognize there is confusion and a lack of wayfinding signage to public lots and stuff. So our team is working on that. I think that's definitely a prudent thing to do to improve accessibility and knowledge of where lots are and parking opportunities so that people can be patrons of downtown.

So from a staff perspective and from logistics, I think it's possible. And I believe we can implement it based on the council's direction. So if you have any other follow-up questions, I'm available. Council Member Goldstein. I do have some questions. Thank you. So first I wanted to know, initially, we were discussing this through summer because that's when the students are away. And so I was a little confused to see through December in this staff proposal. So I'd like to, I guess, first ask to staff or other internal affairs members why through December was mentioned. If anybody first would like to help clarify that. We can also discuss later. So I think we can ask Mr. Alimi when he's called up to answer some of those details.

That was a recommendation from PBID. Okay. Then my next question, more so for staff, is about the costs. You mentioned the costs of, you know, potential lost revenue in these spaces for this long period of time. I also am wondering if you can provide insight about the potential extra enforcement costs. Yeah. Possibly the police department could answer that a little bit better. What I do know is we have two parking enforcement officers. One that is primarily dedicated to the downtown. The other serves the other parking areas outside of the downtown parking district. Also serves a significant amount of vehicle abandonment services. And so managing additional parking during the summer was considered was going to require two enforcement officers full-time downtown.

So there are going to be other impacts and repercussions to that operation. In this scenario with free parking in lots, there would be additional enforcement, I think, to serve a two-hour free parking need to ensure that parking beyond that two-hour limit is being captured. And so that, you know, timely cycles through all the different parking zones are being done. So I don't know if Chief Payne. Yeah, and follow-up, I was unclear how this would differ from the previous proposal on that. But open to hearing from the Chief, of course. Or staff. Thank you, Council Member. We would have to look at the routes that the parking enforcement specialists take. I know that they have predetermined routes.

So I don't have the answer for you today. I can try to get that for you. But I know that we would have to alter those, and there are going to be ramifications to those outer areas where the second parking specialist currently focuses most of their time. Okay. So it sounds like there could be impacts to our enforcement, potentially higher costs, but we don't know what those are yet. Okay. That's good to know. Thank you. I'm done for now with questions. Council Member Winslow. Thank you. Yeah, so I sit on internal affairs to discuss this and also spoke with people from PBID before the meeting because, I mean, they had considered or had considered reproposing the same thing to internal affairs.

And I told them I'm not going to fly because I also didn't support it before. We do manage parking for a reason, and I would stick by that. But the reason why I saw this as good as a – not even just a compromise, just like it's a better proposal, because something that PBID had offered to sort of sweeten this deal, not just be asking for us to give up a bunch of revenue and give up Management of parking for the summer for longer, was they wanted to do a marketing campaign. And the way that I saw it was if you do, like, marketing for the parking spot that's already in front of the shop that everybody already knows exists, whether it's open or not, then you're just adding on to the confusion whenever the program stops.

While if you're advertising the lots, a lot of people don't know about the lots, and this is an opportunity for people to get accustomed to downtown. The experience of coming downtown is best if you park in one place and then you walk around. Also, if people are able to – even if we could guarantee the space is free and available in front of the shops, which we can't, then that would be getting them right to the door they want to get to and then right back into their car and out of downtown. And this is not the kind of environment we want to support. We want to have more of a symbiotic relationship between businesses downtown. And so parking in one place, then people walk around and they stop in different shops.

And so that's what I see as the benefit of it is we're basically accustoming more people to going and parking in the lots. And also why I don't see it as a negative that the kiosk interaction is necessary because kiosks are much less of a pain in the car if you're in a lot and not in – parking on the street where you kind of expect to be able to step out and run out. And so more people getting used to using it a little bit and seeing you can park for a longer time, relax. It also costs half the price when it's not free. It just makes a lot more sense to me, plus the way of finding signage on that. I will say as far as the duration of it, of course, giving up – I mean, people seeing themselves or people seeing themselves as giving up the two-hour free parking in the most convenient places where we don't – we see issues with that.

Prefer to make a compromise that stretches out longer. I don't necessarily remember agreeing to pushing out that far. I think that the financial impact, plus it's just the longer time period. And, again, we will get more data on how much this actually helps downtown businesses at all. I would probably prefer to keep it closer to the summer, even if it overlaps a little bit with the time students are there. So my piece. All right. How many speakers – oh, Council Member O'Brien. So I think it might be wise to bring up Mr. Alimi to provide the PBID perspective. Mayor? Yeah. How many speakers do we have? We have three, and David is the first one. Okay, perfect. Let's start with David. Okay. Good evening.

On behalf of the PBID Board, I want to thank and extend our appreciation and gratitude to the City Council members, members of the Internal Affairs, and the City staff for truly a collaborative discussion how to re-energize downtown Chico. I believe the Park and Go initiative that's proposed by PBID not only is a fabulous opportunity to re-energize downtown, but also it goes in a long way in terms of ensuring the extension of the PBID program once in sunsets, because we can tell our property owners who are somewhat on the verge because they put up some $500,000 a year, that, look, the city is also doing their part to support downtown. I think it goes a long way to strengthen that partnership.

I want to, in particular, thank Mayor Reynolds, Vice Mayor Bennett, and Council Member O'Brien for their unwavering support of downtown Chico. I want to recognize Council Member Winslow, who truly kept an open eye and open heart and had a dialogue, which really resulted in the new proposal that's behind you, before you. I think he had a lot of good points, and it's not exactly what PBID wanted, but we certainly do appreciate it and see the benefits that it will bring. I will strongly urge you not to undermine the program by requiring interaction with the kiosks. That really defeats the whole message of inviting citizens of Chico who do not come downtown for various reasons by telling them, come downtown, no worries, park and go, shop and dine, without having to think about anything else.

Hopefully, once they're here and they see how beautiful downtown is, then they are willing to pay, quote-unquote, the price of dealing with the kiosks and parking meters. But we have to sell them the concept first. In terms of the time extension, it is just not practical. We're late. We're already June. By the time we put our marketing campaign together, which is really the big play about this. It's not about free parking. It will take a month. By the time we run it and get the word out, you're already August and September, and you wasted some $50,000 worth of marketing. We want to be able to benefit from that through the end of the year. Happy to answer any questions. So, if I may, Mayor, can you talk a little bit about the marketing campaign?

So, the marketing campaign is I've had dialogue by our major media partners who I've had relationships with for some 45 years through my store. They are very much, I should say, concerned about downtown, and they love our downtown, and they keep asking what can they do to help. So, I proposed the idea to them. I said that PIVIT has approved a $5,000 budget, which basically will go to production of TV spots, radio spots, and newspaper, and for them to gift us public service announcements of getting the word out. And I estimate the commitment between the three sectors of media will be some $50,000. So, this is really not only a gift from the city to downtown, but also from our media partners to downtown, which basically would be a very positive message of, and then your packets, PIVIT packets, I think there's sample TV spots that I've included.

Basically, it tells them about the beauty of downtown, the specialty stores, the fine dining, the welcoming, clean and safe, and starts with that, and then ends with different members of the PIVIT Board of Business Owners inviting the general citizenship to come downtown, be our guest, park and go with no worries. Thank you, David. Yes. All right, thank you. Okay. Did you have a question? I do, yeah. I have a really niche question. Just looking at the attached PIVIT 2026 initiative with the Park and Go brand attached, that little logo does look like it was AI generated. Is there any appetite for PIVIT to maybe put a bid request out for a local artist to curate a logo for the Park and Go? Certainly.

We're open to any ideas that would enhance our ask. We have no problem with that. I know that's very micromanage-y, and I kind of hate that I brought it up, but it just, I had to say something. No, I happen to agree with that. I think logo is sort of a representation of what your ask is, and it would be nice to invest a small amount on that, yes. Thank you. All right. Okay, thank you. Okay, we have Anika Rodriguez followed by Jesse Horgan. Okay. Thank you guys so much for reconsidering this. I feel like we all came together on a great compromise, and everything David says I fully agree with, and I agree with you about the logo as well. But, yeah, I just want to say that I support this. I'm excited to get behind it.

One thing that wasn't mentioned is that we are geared up to team up with DCBA on social media aspect of this initiative, and we'll have a full push on that as well. So, thank you so much for your consideration. Thank you. Jesse Horgan is our last speaker. Good evening. I wanted to just add some things to this discussion about free parking downtown. The proposal for free parking should produce some defined outcomes. You should have some occupancy counts. If you put it into place, you should have occupancy counts through the free parking time to compare with your tax revenue receipts from your businesses during the period. You should understand how much congestion and circling is reduced or increased.

And you should once and for all understand how much impact parking fees have on your businesses. In the parking industry, people have been studying this for years and years. We understand that there is an exaggerated impact. People feel it's more impactful than it actually is when you look at the numbers. Free parking does not replace robust customer engagement and advertising programs. Businesses that are really engaged with their customers do not feel effects from parking fees or on street meters, etc. Free parking does not eliminate the need to improve the environment downtown, to improve safety, to improve lighting, to improve sidewalks, to make it a more fun place to hang out. There are some things that you should also consider.

Every transaction that is started, the city has to pay a transaction fee. So every time someone gets a free two-hour parking and then they leave, the city pays for their transaction to be processed. If you pull enforcement from other areas, you are reducing the service that that enforcement does in those other areas. So if you are having an LPR vehicle circle in the free lots to chalk the vehicles in that lot, digital chalking is what it's called, you don't have that service out in the community doing block driveway enforcement, abandoned car enforcement, etc. And so you lose revenue through enforcement and you lose service. So there are other costs to be considered besides just the lost revenue.

There's loss in service. There is loss in enforcement revenue. If you do this, it is a idea that is unproven. And so you should get some definite numbers out of it and understand what it costs you. And ask the city staff to quantify those things so that you get something for your investment. Thank you. And he was our last speaker. Councilmember Winslow. Jesse's always got good stuff to say about parking. You know, always very thought-provoking if you're thinking about parking. Mr. Hadpunny, could you respond to how much data could we get on this and how much of a burden would that be on us to try to collect that? You know, he mentioned occupancy count, which we kind of look at often anyway, but also congestion and circling.

Comes down to resources. And so, you know, right now we don't have a dedicated parking manager. So we have constraints in terms of our resources. I think in terms of data collection, it comes down to working with the police department on the consistency of the enforcement. Because at the end of the day, where a lot of the occupancy data, where the occupancy data will come from is from the license plate reader technology that's implemented in the vehicles that the parking enforcement officers drive. And so that's how we collect occupancy data is the frequency in which those loops are being done. And so it would be critical and important to ensure that we are making consistent loops, collecting that data on a regular basis.

What was the other question? Well, it was just those things. It was, yeah, occupancy count, congestion circling. What you're saying, all of that would be gathered. I guess the ALPR would not gather circling data because those are cars that are in motion. It's not going to. Yeah, that would be a little harder to define. That would come through traffic counts, likely, that would be compared to, like, any scientific experiment. You need a baseline of what is pre-whatever you're trying to study. And then you set up those same counts in a similar format and environment so that you can see the effects of before and after of whatever you're trying to implement. So I don't know that we necessarily have the – we could set up counters and do stuff like that because we have downtown traffic data.

So that could certainly be a metric that I believe wouldn't be too difficult, but it would take some cost to deploy those in the downtown and capture that data. But as a good experiment, we wouldn't need to do it every single day. We would take a sample of days that stand in for others and we could get some idea of what the impact of summertime. One more thing. So even if people get the two hours free on the kiosk, we would still pay a transaction fee to Visa or to the vendor? Yes, I believe so. To Visa and the vendor? Not Visa. It's the vendor. It's the vendor, yeah. The transaction. So the Visa fee is on top of that. We're talking about when you're running your card through it? If they've made a credit card transaction.

Right. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I just – I didn't realize that. We'll say. Well, I think something we should talk about. I'm interested in hearing other – you know, we've got council members on the queue, but about the duration of it, that's a conversation we've got to have. All right. Council Member Hawley? Just to that previous point, I thought we had talked about this two meetings ago that sales tax revenue would be an easy, measurable objective to use, right? Can we not pull that specifically from the downtown area? Yes. Of course, we only get quarterly data, so the quarters might not line up perfectly. Okay. It would be interesting to see how that would line up in the midst of the campaign, especially if we're talking about it going all the way through December of 2026 now.

Of course, we wouldn't get that data until roughly April of 2027. Okay. But we would still collect the data at some point so we could look back and say we hit our measurable objectives. I would like to get full council support on this, but any time we're taking a 40 to 50K hit in net revenue loss and digging our parking fund even deeper into the red, it's going to take a lot for me to get to a yes vote on that. So I think what concerned me most from this updated report, which I brought up last time, this was brought to the council, was the timing of it. All the way into December means that we're going to have a full university with potentially significantly lessened parking turnover where there's already 50 to 80 percent occupancy on certain blocks of Main and Broadway.

So that's my concern right now, but I really, really appreciate Council Member Winslow's diplomacy and trying to get some sort of compromise and increase the utilization of those underutilized 10-hour lots because that's something that's needed to be spoken about and addressed for a long time now. Council Member Goldstein. Thank you, Mayor. So my first follow-up question, I share a lot of Council Member Hawley's concerns. So my first question is whether maybe the PBID or DCBA could help collect some kind of data on their sales revenue to bring to us in a report with city staff. Let's say we ran this program through the summer for a couple of months and then had a report back in the fall showing these businesses had this increase in revenue.

We saw this parking utilization. Could maybe staff respond to that and, if necessary, one of our speakers? Would Ms. Rodriguez like to respond? Thank you. Because we're not like a mall setting, like the DCBA or PBID does not collect sales data, and I don't think it would be appropriate ask of them to ask the businesses to collect that data. I mean, if somebody wanted to volunteer data, they could always do that, but I don't think that's something that PBID or DCBA would be able to facilitate. I'm sorry to jump in, but is it a reasonable ask of PBID or DCBA to at least provide the city with quantifiable goals that would define success? Is that something you could answer, David? David? We're certainly going to use this period for multiple things, including training all the shoppers regarding downtown kiosks, wayfinding, and collecting data from our businesses in downtown, because certainly we want to make a case coming back to you that it worked and whether we should be looking at a more long-term plan for parking success.

We realize that this ask is very temporary to provide us opportunity to be able to make a case for what we should really do, and we're just as interested in the data as you are. We want to make sure that it works, and we will do everything we can by getting our merchants, our businesses, aside from the sales tax revenue, to give us any other kind of data they can. Maybe certain questionnaires, certain comments from shoppers, anything that can strengthen our case for having done the right thing to make the ask. So we're definitely open to also any other suggestions that the council may have. We're fully prepared to cooperate, and I'm a big fan of data. I'm an analyst by training, so I do definitely value that.

Always learning more things about Mr. Halini. Okay. Thank you for the response. I'm still feeling kind of uncertain, but I guess my next question is what our plan is for signage, which was also brought up in our direction to the Internal Affairs Committee. I've heard about media and, you know, like online and advertisements about, you know, getting people informed about our lots, but I'm wondering if we're also looking at any kind of physical signage, and maybe staff could respond first to that. Yeah, that's what we're looking at in terms of the wayfinding signage. One thing we're definitely lacking is wayfinding signage to certain parking lots, like the public parking lots you see in a lot of other cities.

So that is something we're evaluating. I think there's some low-hanging fruit to put up a couple signs on main thoroughfares to the primary lots and the parking structure. So we're looking into that, but I would guess those are pretty nominal costs just to get, like, some low-hanging fruit, bare minimum signage up on some of the main and Broadway type of thoroughfares. Okay, but would the city be paying for that or would the PBID? City. Yeah, that would come through our parking Management stuff. Okay, I just want to be clear about that because we're talking about what the PBID and DCBA can do for us in exchange for the city losing parking revenue for this. So I want to make sure that we're really, if we approve this, getting something out of it.

I'll just summarize my comments that I'm feeling very hesitant about this. I think the only way that I could support it is if we have a defined program that runs through summer to mid or late August as at least a trial period. I don't think I could support through December with all the unknowns and that we would need to make sure that we're collecting data and expecting quantifiable outcomes of this, whatever those might look like. Member O'Brien. Thank you, Mayor. So I do appreciate everyone's concerns on duration and revenue. Regarding the revenue, just a reminder that the intent of parking enforcement is not revenue, just like writing traffic citations is not about revenue. It's about coming to an outcome that's positive, whether it's reducing accidents, injuries, what have you.

That's the intent of a citation. And the intent of parking enforcement is to encourage circulation. That's the whole point of that, not to get money for the city. But I do understand the $50,000, $60,000, whatever that is, is a viable concern of everyone. I get that. But I do want to go back to what Mr. Alimi said, and I think he summed it up very succinctly when he said, this is a partnership. This is a partnership between our downtown and our city. Yes, there is some costs associated with this, but this is a partnership. They're willing to spend money. We're willing to lose money in the sense of not gaining some parking enforcement. But that's what this partnership is about, is our downtown.

And regarding the duration, here's my concern. I'm just wondering if the marketing effort, which is upwards of $50,000, like you said, David, or whatever that number is, would that be impacted by a truncated period of time where we run this free program? Can you speak to that? Sorry to put you on the spot again. Timing is very important. Having had a retail store for 47 years, I can have a successful sale the next day after running a campaign. It takes a while for the world to get out. It takes a while for people to absorb it. It takes a while for people to experience it, come in and tell their friends. By the time we run the program, we're going to be end of the summer. We won't have the benefit of all the marketing that we've done.

I really think it's important to give it a fair chance. And the only way we can give it a fair chance is if we run it through the end of the year, particularly if you're interested in collecting data. It takes a couple of months of just getting the word out there between radio, TV, newspaper, social media. It takes time to get the word out. It's not instantaneous. So asking for essentially what works out to be five months is a very short time. Two, three months of that is going to be the marketing campaign, and hopefully we'll see the major results thereafter. Of course, we're going to see some results during the campaign as well, but it is super important to give it a fair chance. One unrelated comment in terms of transaction costs to a kiosk, we are urging you not to require the interaction with the kiosk.

It really undermines the whole program. And if there's no interaction with the kiosk, there's no transaction fee either. So I'm not sure where that came from. So and then the data points you mentioned, it's important to have data when the students are gone, but it's also important to have data when the students are here. Is that correct? Absolutely. That would actually give us two sets of circumstances to compare as well, because we plan on collecting as much data as we can all the way through the program. As I'm sure the city will, based on the sales tax revenues compared to previous times. Right, right. Thank you, David. Council Member Bennett, or Vice Mayor Bennett, sorry. So I've heard quantifiable statistics or quantifiable outcome of this experiment, and it is an experiment.

I can't imagine how we could establish and put into practice any kind of quantifiable measurements for this experiment. I managed regional shopping centers for many, many years. And we always struggled with, was this promotional event a success? And we required tenants to provide us with their sales data monthly. So we were always looking at the numbers and determining, was it a successful marketing event, promotional event, or not? And we never, ever were quite certain we knew the outcome was beneficial. But we continued to do it. Every weekend we would try and have a promotional event to bring people into the shopping center. We do not have anything in place. These are private businesses. We do not have anything in place.

And I don't imagine how we could ever put anything in place to come up with quantifiable measurements. But I do support this because it is moving us in the right direction to support downtown Chico. It will cost some money. We'll see what the outcome is, a little bit of sales data or retail sales data next year, and then we can make some informed decisions. But as far as determining quantifiable outcome at this time, I don't think it's possible. But again, I do support it because it does indicate our belief and support in protection of the downtown Chico businesses. And I fully support this. Council Member Winslow? Yeah, I really appreciate that dose of realism, Vice Mayor Bennett, in terms of what our limitations are with the experimental nature of this.

It's quasi-experimental at best, but we can do our best to gather some sort of data. I like where we're at a lot better than where we were at before, considering throwing up to 100K out and not really having a good sense of what the long-term value would be of it. And to try to wrap this up in some way, well, of course, I'm happy to keep talking about this as long as we need to, but I'm seeing that issue of duration and timing as being at the core of where I'm not certain about. And frankly, I don't feel like running this until December is a really good idea just right now. That's a long time with the whole semester. There's a lot of things that will change over that amount of time, and we don't really know.

We could find out halfway through that we're really getting no benefit out of this. We're seeing no indication there's any benefit. And I don't like the idea that we're just pouring some money down the drain because our parking fund is in the red. And we'd like to turn that around in the long run and not just sink money out of it. So two considerations I've had about the timing. One is that I don't think that it's necessary that we make this only while students are not around. In fact, there's some quasi-experimental value in extending it a little bit at a time until when students are there. So like to the end of September, if that's realistic to get the marketing campaign going and get some benefit out of it running until September, I think that would be appropriate.

Otherwise, and I think we should consider this, as much as I'm as impatient as anybody, that this might be something better for next summer because we're having this conversation too late. It's June already. We can think more about how we're going to try to develop the data out of it. And also there would be some benefit to this not being now but being next year. And I'll present this as like a total hypothetical. Say there's a tent outside, like a green tent, and that some people don't like the fact that the tent is there and they tell their people that downtown isn't good to go to because of that. If we were to find not a very good result out of this, I can see a lot of people coming back and saying that this wasn't a very good experiment because there were still tents downtown.

We really needed the tents to go away for people to come back downtown. I could just see it right now. I can literally see it right now. And in that way, I could see value in us just putting this off until next summer. We don't need to do a $50,000 to $100,000 experiment right now when next summer we're going to have new circumstances where we can actually guarantee that some standard of cleanliness is going to be maintained and that that excuse would be eliminated and we would really narrow down the impact of charging for parking. So those are two things. We're going until September or doing it next year where I'm at with it. I think that's funny. I feel like you read my mind running it to summer 27 is exactly what I wrote down as a motion I was going to make.

So if that's made by any of the council members, I'll for sure register a yes vote on that. Council Member Goldstein. Oh, gosh. A lot to respond to checking my notes. So I had another question for staff from something that was brought up. Could you reiterate why we have to include that card fee? It's, what, $0.35 also? What do you mean by the fee? The transaction fee, sorry. Yeah, what about it? I guess how that works and why it seems like kiosks are, you're going to have to have some interaction with the kiosk for this program, right? That was brought up by our speaker, Halimi, as, you know, basically that he would prefer that we don't have interaction with the kiosk. And that would solve our problems, but we have to have some kind of kiosk interaction, correct?

In the two-hour free parking scenario, yes. In another scenario where it's just free parking in the lots, in theory, you could get away from knowing. That would be the only scenario where there's zero kiosk interaction is to just make it free all the time, and then you just don't do enforcement or don't do anything and just let it kind of be. Oh, that would be interesting. Yeah, low turnover. Okay, well, okay, thank you for the clarification on that. Okay, yeah, responding to a couple of things, I could support pushing this back. I'll reiterate that I believe the city should be making sure that we're using our funds responsibly, that we're not throwing parking fund dollars at this program without knowing what we're going to get out of it, or at least having a good idea that it's going to have a positive impact and not a negative one.

I'm open to a trial period, open to other ideas, but I also want to state that I'm concerned. We're not being given a lot of information and being asked to give up money for this unknown benefit, and I'm seeing some of the same folks, whether on the council or in the community, who opposed the previously discussed downtown revitalization project for supposedly similar reasons, promote this project while being against other initiatives such as that one. And we were told we were rushing into approving that long-term project that had been studied with two years of outreach, but we're being pushed into approving this program right now for summer without a lot of research. So I feel very uneasy for many reasons, and I'd be more likely to support an initiative like this.

If it felt, A, like a true partnership and not that we're seeing this political divide pushing for either free parking or long-term planning, I would like for us to be able to consider both. So I'm not against this in theory. I just am uneasy with it. And I will consider voting yes if we're looking at a data-driven short-term period or considering it for next summer. Thanks. Council Member O'Brien. Yes, Mayor, I'd like to, again, I keep putting you on the spot, David, but what does it look like to PBID regarding, you know, truncating this to essentially running to the end of September? What does that do to the proposal? Well, I guess the honest answer is it would be better than nothing, but I don't think it would be as effective.

As I said, just the timing of the marketing and reaping the benefit from it will be, as I said, like me advertising a sale at my store, and just when the word gets out and stops it, the sale is over. I mean, you have to give ample chance to people to really absorb that invitation and come and experience our beautiful downtown, so hopefully we can get them coming back. So my only concern would be just the timing of how long it takes to get the word out and be able to fully give that, again, for lack of a better word, that's shutting the arms to downtown and waiting until next year really defeats the whole purpose of it's now that we need help. I mean, there were talks about waiting until January when the settlement is over, but we need help now.

I mean, I don't want to really portray downtown in a negative light, but look at the number of businesses who have gone out, the number of businesses who are having a hard time. We can't wait any longer. We really need to give that care now, and that's what the message is going to be from you, that you care as well. I hate going back to the kiosk thing, but I thought Jesse made it clear that you can do electronic chalking. That has nothing to do with the kiosk. It doesn't need to be interaction with the kiosk, and therefore there would be no transaction. Thank you. All right, and you answered my second question, David, so thank you. Would council be amenable, because I can kind of tell where this is going, to run it through September with an option to run it through the end of the year if we think it's worthwhile?

That's what I was going to recommend or suggest it with. Maybe we can, as part of the motion, agendize a report to come back in August, so we could re-look at things in August, looking, you know, so prior to September. So approve it through September with it to come back to council at August, because by the time they get this going in sales tax quarters, or July, August, September, so you're not even going to, I guess if we get it going by the end of the month, then we would have a quarter, but that's really not much. But in order to keep it moving forward, I think that that could be a good compromise to have it come back with whatever data we can get by August. So I think I get, you know, we don't want to be like, we're at a meeting, we need to make a decision whether tomorrow we extend this or whether we don't, but also downtown is a completely different world when students are around.

So if we're trying to make a decision about that world when we're still in the summer world of downtown, then I fear that we won't have a good basis for making that decision. So, I mean, I will say that why I would be amenable to, you know, this as a proposal, I don't see myself probably wanting to extend it further because I, but still, I mean, we can have the discussion, of course. It's just a way to get it moving forward. So hopefully, and I saw some agreement over here. Clarification, so we're looking at potentially having this go through September, and does that align with the sales tax quarter? Is it through September? Okay. July through September is a full quarter. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, that could be good.

Yeah. And then a report back. So, Council Member Winslow, you were suggesting the report back. Of course, the city or nobody will have those numbers until 2027, but as a business owner, you will know what your numbers are and could probably report, if they chose to, to PBID or that information. Just a timing question. If we're saying this is definitely going to go through the end of September, then talking about it in the first meeting of September means that there's been at least a couple weeks that students have been around where you can see if there's been a total collapse of our entire system by then. Better than in August, I think. So maybe second meeting of September is the first week?

Well, I hate this. That's where we're, like, so far up where it's like we're making a decision for, like, the next week. So I think the first meeting of September probably makes sense. Okay. Yeah, if you being on internal affairs support that, I could see supporting it. All right. Council Member O'Brien, can you make that motion? Yes, I will make that motion as stated. As bargained. How's that? Okay. The motion is to run this park and go, although I prefer to call it park and walk, but, you know, this program through the end of September, and we'll discuss the first meeting of September, whether we extend it. Exactly. Yeah. And let me just make a comment, not to include in the motion, but about the kiosk interaction, because our staff is telling us that we need the kiosk interaction.

I'm going to have to side with our staff on this. If people from the community, PBID, Chico State, can figure out a way to avoid that, I'm totally open to it, as I'm sure they are too. Council Member Hawley, did you have another comment? Just one more before we jump to a vote. While I'm skeptical of the methodology of this, I really appreciate the diplomacy of my peers and the fact that we got to a compromise, but I do think it will be important to have a comparison once the settlement is up. I concur with Council Member Winslow that that would probably help the perception and beautification of downtown, as well as holding some of the property owners accountable, who, for example, may have had their properties left under disrepair with windows open for years at a time.

I would love to see beautification in more ways than one on that front. All right. We have a motion. Do we have a second? Second. I'll second. All right. And so that also included the, which staff already said they're working on the wayfinding signs and- Oh, yes, wayfinding included, right? Yes. Yeah. And then it's to run through the end of September with a report to come back at the first meeting in September with whatever data we can gather. Exactly. I think I would specify July through September. July through September. Okay. For that quarter. Is that? Okay. All right. Council member Goldstein? Interested to see how this goes. Yes. Council member Hawley? Yes. Council member O'Brien? Yes. Council member van Overbeek is disqualified on this one.

Council member Winslow? We love free parking. Yes. Vice mayor Bennett? Yes. Mayor Reynolds? Aye. It passes. Six-zero with one recusal. All right. Confirmation of the fire chief. We have an report from Mark Sorensen, our city manager. Mr. Overbeek, a moment to come in.

All right. Mr. Sorensen. Okay. Thank you, Mayor and Council. The city charter states that the appointment of department heads is subject to confirmation by the city council. In order to meet this requirement, council is being presented with the employment agreement for the fire chief. For compliance with the government code, I'll state for the public record that the city of Chico is proposing to enter into an employment agreement with Wes Matroka as the fire chief and proposing to appoint Mr. Matroka with an annual salary of $200,000 per year. And with that, I am very pleased and honored to recommend to the city council that they confirm the appointment of Wes Matroka as the fire chief for the city of Chico.

All right. Any questions for Mr. Sorensen? No. All right. Do we have any speakers? We do not. All right. Consider our motion. I'll move to approve enthusiastically. Second, also enthusiastically, but a little bit more than Council Member O'Brien. Okay. Just a moment. All right. Council Member Goldstein? You guys are silly. Yes. Council Member Hawley? Yes. Council Member O'Brien? Yes. Council Member van Overbeek? I don't think my enthusiasm is second to anybody's. Yes. Okay. Thank you, Wes. Council Member Winslow? Yes. Vice Mayor Bennett? Yes. Mayor Reynolds? I'm super, super enthusiastic about the fact that we have somebody that is for the first time, I think it was since 1939 or something like that, that was promoted from within our own house and not somebody that was brought in from out of state or out of the area.

So super excited to have you come up through the ranks and have your leadership. Aye. Did I say aye? No, you didn't yet. Aye. So that's an enthusiastic 7-0. Just saying. All right. We have nothing after the posting of the agenda. The following reports and communications are provided for the Council's information. No action can be taken on the items under this section unless the Council agrees to include it on the subsequent agenda. City Manager's report? Nothing further. All right. Council Member request. According to, pursuant to APMP 1010, Council Members may verbally request an item to be agendized at a future meeting. After stating what the item would be, a majority of Council is needed in order for staff to agendize.

Do we have Council Member requests? Council Member Hawley? Council Member Hawley. Council Member Hawley. Thank you, Mayor Reynolds. As per allowable and tie votes, I would like to re-agendize the downtown revitalization option one that ended up in a 3-3 vote for our next meeting before the grant deadline. I'll second that. All right. We've got a motion and a second. All right. Just a second. We get a second in there. All right. And that's to re-agendize option one of the revitalization plan for the downtown area. Council Member Goldstein? Hope we can build on our ability to compromise here. Yes. Council Member Hawley? Yes. Council Member O'Brien? There'll be a time and place for this conversation that's not now, in my opinion.

No. Council Member van Overbeek? I have a question for the city attorney. Do I need to recuse myself on this one? Actually, you do. Yes. Okay, I recuse myself. Would you like me to leave, Debbie? You can stay there since it's already over. Thank you. Council Member, but I did put you in for recusal because of owning property in the area being discussed. Council Member Winslow? In the spirit of diplomacy, yes. Vice Mayor Bennett? No. Mayor Reynolds? No. Okay. It fails again with a 3-3 vote. Any other Council Member requests? Yeah, I got a couple. Council Member Winslow? Just a couple. Park-related things. One, we have a number of issues, have had, I would say, in the past, and maybe now, too, issues with the water quality in Big Chico Creek.

And I looked in some past history in the 90s of some efforts, very, like, broad-based collaborative efforts that led to a Big Chico Creek Watershed Alliance and that there were some real benefits that came out of that. And I think that something else is warranted. In any case, it's quite complicated because there's a lot of different factors. So I'd just like to have a discussion about water quality in Big Chico Creek. I'll second that. Okay. Just a second. Okay. Okay. Council Member Goldstein? Yes. Council Member Hawley? Yes. Council Member O'Brien? We can have that conversation. Yes. Council Member van Overbeek? Yeah. Given that the problems with water quality are happening outside of the jurisdiction of the city, I'm not sure how this applies to the city, but I'll vote yes.

Okay. Council Member Winslow? Yes. Vice Mayor Bennett? Yes. Mayor Reynolds? Aye. Carry 7-0. Got one more. So simpler. I want to agenda a discussion regarding parking and access to Upper Biddle Park. Quick clarification. Never mind. Parking and access. Okay. Cool. So a little more generally than parking. Great. Was that a second, Council Member Goldstein? Oh, second. Sorry. Okay. Just make sure. Thank you. Okay. Council Member Goldstein? Yes. Council Member Hawley? Yes. Council Member O'Brien? Yes. Council Member van Overbeek? Yes. Council Member Winslow? Yes. Vice Mayor Bennett? Yes. Mayor Reynolds? Aye. Carry 7-0. Anybody else? I have a quick question. I don't know if I need to agendize this.

Do we have a process to where we determine where we put receptacles throughout the community? Would that be a process? If we wanted to address putting something on Humboldt? Do we periodically run a report and look at high-need areas, or should I agendize something? Or if we wanted to talk about garbage, what do we need to do? If we want to talk trash, what do we got to do? If we want to talk trash, yeah, I can talk trash. So we have existing franchise agreements with both haulers. Within those franchise agreements are a number of receptacle locations that are identified that were established at the beginning of that franchise. As part of the franchising, the city is able to get services, such as servicing of all those public trash cans at no cost to the community.

So all of those are outlined in very, you know, quite detail in that franchise agreement. And both franchisees have been very flexible, good to work with. As long as we don't exceed basically the number of receptacles, then we're good. So we've removed a lot downtown. We've added some in other locations and kind of moved things around. I did want to point out, too, that the majority of old Humboldt is not in the city limits. Well, that's the other part. It will only go to, like, Marsh, I think, or, you know, a little bit past Marsh. Wasn't she was talking between, like, Notre Dame and Bruce, right? I thought that's what she referred to. Okay. Well, let's see what staff and waste Management can work out.

I don't want to go down a rabbit hole and spend a bunch of time and energy up here. And if we need to at a future meeting, then I will agendize that. But I would probably make it more like something to relook at all high-need areas because there might be some others that we're overseeing as well in other areas. Okay. I think that's it. No other council member requests? All right. Meeting's adjourned. We will adjourn to June 9th special meeting. Closed session at 4 p.m.