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Segment 1

Okay, as the city council members are rejoining us, I want to just make an announcement prior to convening our.
City council meeting, I want to welcome everyone to this meeting of the Berkeley city council to allow for full participation by all the members of the community and to ensure that important business is able to be completed.
We ask that all attendees conduct themselves in an orderly manner and respect the rights of others participating in this meeting.
Please be aware that the city council's rules of decorum prohibit the disruption of the orderly conduct of the city council meeting.
The summary of these rules is available in the 1 page handout on the table in the rear of the boardroom.
Disruptive behavior includes, but is not limited to shouting, making disruptive noises, creating, or participating in a physical disturbance speaking out of turn or in violation of applicable rules.
Preventing or attempting to prevent others who have the floor from speaking, preventing others from observing the meeting, entering into or remaining in an area of the meeting room that is not open to the public or approaching the council days without consent.
We ask that you observe these rules that all members of the public may observe and participate in tonight's meeting and we thank you for joining us tonight.
So, I'd now like to call to order the regular meeting of the Berkeley City Council for Tuesday, July 30th, 2024, and the 1st order of business is roll call the city clerk and please call the roll.
Okay, council member here.
Kaplan your Bartlett is currently absent.
Currently absent on present when graph present here.
Number present mayor present and I see council member present.
Thank you.
Okay.
Moving now to ceremonial matters.
I want to turn the floor over to our city auditor who would make it a presentation on the proposed audit plan for.
2025.
Okay, ma'am city audit.
Yes, okay.
You hear me now? Awesome.
Thank you so much and good evening.
And thanks for this opportunity to present our audit plan for fiscal year 2025.
This plan outlines the key areas of focus for my office for the coming year, including completing ongoing work, new audits and initiatives and our continued efforts to ensure transparency, accountability and effective governance.
Okay, this evening I will cover our audit selection process, our accomplishments from the previous plan year and planned audits and engagements for this year.
I'll also provide an update on the whistleblower program.
To develop our audit plan, we gather input from stakeholders to prioritize audits that address Berkeley's most critical needs.
We gather audit ideas from community members, elected officials, department staff and city management.
We assess past audits and Berkeley specific risks.
We analyze findings from other government audits to anticipate emerging issues.
When prioritizing audits, we take into consideration many factors, including perception of risk to the city identified by management, city council and community feedback.
Economic factors, like potential financial impact, organizational changes, such as management or information systems and the length of time since the last audit in an area.
We also consider staff capacity, where a small office have limited resources to conduct audits compared to larger cities.
Finally, we consider audits that can advance our values, including integrity, independence, impact and equity.
This approach ensures a comprehensive, responsive audit plan aligned with Berkeley's governance needs.
This plan builds on accomplishments from the previous year.
In fiscal 24, we released an audit of Measure FF.
Management agreed with our recommendations to strengthen reporting for Measure FF spending.
And improve internal processes for the hiring of retirees in the fire department.
We also made significant progress establishing our whistleblower program.
The council amended Berkeley's municipal code to authorize our office to establish this program.
We also contracted with a 3rd party hotline.
For confidential reporting on fraud, waste and abuse by city officials.
We also followed up on recommendations from previous audits to ensure departments stay accountable for their corrective action plans between September 22 and May 2024.
30 of our recommendations were fully implemented across 7 departments.
I really want to thank management for their efforts in completing these.
Audit recommendations as of July 2024, there are 62 open recommendations.
From 9 audits across 7 departments of those 6217 have already been part partly implemented.
In fiscal year, 25, we plan to initiate audits to continue work in the following areas, rent stabilization board, affordable housing.
Contracts following up on recommendations from previous audits.
Other short term projects as needed to deliver timely and relevant information and analysis to city council and the community.
Ongoing engagements and implementing the whistleblower program.
This plan may change based on evolving risks and staffing needs.
Although we have a plan for this coming year, community members are encouraged to contact our office with audit ideas, which we will consider.
Lastly, I'm happy to announce some important updates and establishing our whistleblower program.
This initiative reinforces our commitment to integrity and effective governance in Berkeley.
This program will make available round the clock hotline that will ensure that anyone can report fraud, waste and abuse anonymously, fostering a culture of accountability.
Additionally, city policy safeguards whistleblowers from retaliation, encouraging individuals to come forward without fear of repercussions.
We are currently preparing communication materials for city employees as part of the implementation phase and will launch to the public soon when the program is ready.
Under authority independence, state legislation grants authority to local auditors to establish these whistleblower programs and protects whistleblowers.
Council recently passed an ordinance to formalize our authority to investigate these whistleblower reports.
I want to thank council for their support in establishing this important service and to the city attorney's office and HR and their assistance with this initiative.
Finally, the city auditors independence is.
From city manager and council ensures an unbiased oversight and accountability and government.
Government operations by providing objective assessments of government programs.
The auditor plays a pivotal role in upholding public trust and transparency.
Thank you again for letting me come to the council meeting to discuss our audit plan for fiscal year 25 and thank you to counsel for supporting our mission to promote transparency and accountability through audits.
Thank you so very much Madam city auditor for your incredible work award winning work.
I will say, and presenting your audit plan and colleagues.
If you have any feedback for the city auditor, I encourage you to please contact the auditor directly.
I'm sure she'll welcome your, your comments and suggestions as she's developing our audit plan for for next year and we'll see you back shortly for the presentation on the restaurant inspection on it.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay, we'll proceed now to city manager comments of I can recognize our city manager to ask if she has any comments for the council public this evening.
Yes, thank you.
Mayor council and members of the community.
We've got some fun things for the city of Berkeley.
We want to ensure that our community is aware of national night out, which is scheduled for Tuesday, August 6 from 3 to 7 at next to grove park also at the waterfront open house at Marina mall.
So, swing by either of those activities for national night out, there'll be food activities and loads of information.
There will also be a Latin fest music in the park on Saturday, August 10th from 2 to 5 at James Kennedy park.
So, come out and groove to live musical performances, enjoy delicious food and dance the afternoon away.
It's a fiesta.
You don't want to miss.
Oh, my favorite Thursday, August 15 pop in roller skate party from 6 to 8 at growth park basketball courts.
So dust off those roller skates for a night of skating fun music and food.
And always a fun time movie in the park for our children, teenage mutant Ninja turtles Friday, August 16th at 815 at cedar rose park.
Cowabunga join us for a fun movie night under the stars, bring your blankets and chairs early for a prime spot.
That is awesome.
Have fun.
Berkeley.
Thank you.
Mayor.
Okay, thank you very much.
We'll now proceed to public comment on non agenda matters.
Persons will be selected to address matters not on tonight's city council agenda.
So, if you wish to speak to an item on the consent calendar, or on the action calendar, we will take your comments later on.
We get to those items, but this option to address anything is not on our agenda.
Tonight, we're going to select 5 speakers to address the council on non agenda matters here in person and then we'll go to the 1st, 5 raise hands on zoom.
So, and each speaker will be allotted 1 minute to address us on non agenda matters.
And I'll ask the city clerk to please read the 5 names.
Okay, for a non agenda public comment.
We have Tony.
Mr.
Bell, Russell Bates and.
Dan.
Okay, thank you.
If any of those individuals would like to come forward in no particular order.
Good evening.
Unfortunately.
A phase out of the golden duplex exemption.
Would create more uncertainty for owners than it solves.
I first saw these problems 6 years ago when I stopped renting the unit that I built in 1986.
The uncertainty lies in a legal gray area.
If an owner dies and the house passes to the trust.
Has the ownership changed if the so called compromise passes, can the executor.
Evict the sitting tenant in order to prepare the house for sale.
What if the tenant is a caregiver.
Who decides they want to stay on such questions would complicate the execution of the estate.
So, these are some of the very complicated legal things that I'd like to discuss with each and every 1 of you because I feel like I have a sort of Damocles over my head.
And I'd like to have it resolved so last Tuesday on July.
23rd, you voted to have stakeholder input on the missing middle.
And then there was discussion of a coming back before you in 2 months.
2 months is not possible to do the kind of stakeholder.
But input that's needed in this community, this is a major decision, the missing middle that could have far reaching consequences in the community.
We don't always see the consequences that might be coming forward.
And it merits a much more involved to meaningful stakeholder process.
Not just something that's.
2 months and when staff will most likely be on vacation council is on recess.
It involves a more prolonged process, and part of that process should also consider the impact on homeowners because whenever you have opportunities like this, you will have persons who exploit the most vulnerable homeowners of all.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Good evening.
It's always good when I hear you speak about Berkeley values, but it's now apparently include support for genocide and murder in Gaza.
It's unspeakable what's going on there now the most moral army in the world is raking Palestinian detainees.
That's the most moral army that you're supporting.
How dare you? How dare you? That's not Berkeley values.
That's values of.
I can't even think about abominations.
That's crazy that you can't even call for ceasefire.
Stop murdering 186,000 people dead buried missing.
How dare you? That's not a Berkeley value.
That's a fucked up stupid value.
Fuck you.
Okay, so the remaining.
The remaining speakers I have are Dan.
And bell, and I just want to reiterate what I said at the beginning of the meeting, which is asking that members of the public, please conduct themselves in an orderly manner, respect the rights of others participating in the meeting.
Disruptive behavior includes, but it's not limited to shouting, making disruptive noises, creating or participating in a physical disturbance, speaking out of turn or in violation of applicable rules.
Preventing or attempting to prevent others who have the floor from speaking, preventing others from observing the meeting, et cetera, et cetera.
So let's, let's proceed with a public comment and be respectful.
Have a respectful dialogue.
Please.
Let's not interrupt the meeting.
And Sir, you have the floor.
Okay.
I'd just like to speak.
I'd just like to speak to the scheduling of the last 2 meetings.
Well, the delay was not as bad this week as it was last week.
That is not really fair to constituents who are expecting to be able to come at 6 0T PM.
I would propose that if there are special meetings right before a regular meeting that the special meeting be paused for the regular meeting to take place and then resumed afterwards if possible.
And I would like to yield my remaining time to bill.
Hi, I'm bell I'd like to.
Yield that time in my time to Alana.
Thank you.
Good evening.
Council district 4.
I have been supporting an elder from people's park who has been housed in 1 of the home key motels.
And she has been consistently mistreated.
They're supposed to be trauma informed care.
It's actually trauma inducing care that is occurring from the staff.
Of the program that runs this motel along with the security for 24 hour.
24 7 security has been threatening her intimidating her.
She's feeling stuck in her room.
I brought her food.
She hadn't eaten all day and this is a problem.
So, we, how how great we're doing.
With our unhoused community and and getting a roof over their heads and that's appreciated, but then when they're traumatized when they're living in these programs, this is not.
Okay.
So, we need to do better.
We need to make sure they're getting trauma informed care.
There was a closed meeting yesterday about grants pass and how that's going to affect.
Our treatment of our in house community, and I don't think anything has been made public about that.
Is that correct? Has anything.
It may public no reportable action.
There's no reportable action.
Okay.
Well, I would encourage you all to consider.
This is the moment.
Everybody was saying we need to change.
This is the moment to do a safe stay encampment at golden gate fields.
This is the kindest, most compassionate thing for everybody.
Our unhoused neighbors, our house, neighbors, our businesses.
This where they'll have basic.
Services, and they will be able to be reliably found by their service providers until we can get them shelter for those who want shelter.
So, please, this is the moment to do that.
And I want to say, I am appalled that nobody besides council member Luna par has said anything about that young man from Berkeley City College who was brutalized by the settlers last week.
No, 1 became and many people testified about this young man.
Did you see his face? I sent the press release to all of you and none of you have said anything about it.
Where are you? I wish that you would open your eyes and your hearts to what's happening in Gaza right now.
Thank you.
Free Palestine.
Free Palestine right now.
Free.
Thank you.
Time.
Okay, we'll go to.
We'll go to speakers on zoom.
Yeah, 1 minute.
Because he should not be able to speak.
Can you hear me now? Yes, thank you.
Okay.
I'm here to urge people to vote no on regional measure for and I wonder Jesse, how could you support that? That bill and the last meeting that limits local authority.
I mean, this is going to ship approval of new housing to a regional board and no one's going to have any input.
I mean, there's 4 cities that are singled out to have direct money and then the rest of them don't have that privilege.
This is really the worst thing that ever happened for local governance.
Do we want to ship land use authority to the region? I don't think so.
Thank you.
Okay, thank you.
Our next speaker is Neelofar followed by former council member Davila.
Yes, good evening.
For your summer break, I have a rebuke and a warning to consider you all have chosen to ally yourselves with the political ideology of Zionism, whose horrific manifestations we've been witnessing in Israeli society and government.
I can't imagine decent human beings supporting a society whose overwhelming majority asks for the annihilation of the entire indigenous people of Palestine.
This majority believes the heinous behavior of the soldiers and armed gangs to be heroic and worth defending.
I have just a few examples.
Sodomizing Palestinian detainees, most of whom haven't been charged and discussing the issue at the Knesset, whether this is illegal or legal.
Keeping them in zip ties, I mean the prisoners, for so long that their limbs have to be amputated by medical students without anesthesia.
Snipers murdering babies and children with bullets to their head, which tells me that the intention is to make sure that the next generation would be totally wiped out.
Breaking the bones of detained children before releasing them.
Civilians plundering trucks meant to take food, clean water and medicine to the starving and sick people in Gaza.
And peeing on the corpses of Palestinians they have murdered or wounded.
Former Council Member Davila.
Former Councilor Davila, you should not be able to speak.
Thank you.
Free Palestine, free Palestine, free Palestine.
You just heard the last speaker talk about sexual assault to Palestinians that have been incarcerated without any or detained without any charges.
This has been happening for decades.
186,000 murdered by Israel, including babies shot in the head, shot in the arms, legs, disabled permanently.
How would you like that for your grandchildren, Sophie or the Marionette or Bartlett or Rashi or Humbert or Igor? Is that okay with you to just someone just come in and take over your home and kill you? Our next speaker is Vish followed by Clara H.
Vish, you should not be able to speak.
Yeah, I thank you.
I just want to address Council Member Nupara.
I want to thank you for, you know, serving with dignity, for having moral, having a moral compass that you abide by and for treating this position as a public servant and responding to your constituents and putting forward measures that respond to the needs of your constituents and what's important to us.
And I truly hope that that will not be corrupted.
In your time on the Council, you're a beacon of light.
I also want to just say free Palestine and I cede the rest of my time to Clara.
Okay.
And we'll go to Clara.
Hi there.
I too would like to thank Council Member Nupara for her time so far on the City Council.
I think she's been wonderful.
Her staff have been transparent.
They've been accountable to their constituents, which is much more than I can say for the rest of you who are truly bought and sold by the Israel lobby.
I think that you think that the people who come to these City Council meetings to talk about Palestine are not important, but they see this city and have love for this city far beyond what you could ever imagine.
Because the systems that murder Palestinian children that rape Palestinian men, that brutalize Palestinians' elders, disabled people, are the same systems that have people like Sonia Massey murdered by police.
It's the same system that put up two levels of containers in People's Park, one of the only public green spaces left.
It's the same system that allows your constituents to be brutalized by BPD.
Remember in 2017, Jesse, when you doxxed anti-fascist protesters? Thank you for your time.
You are complicit.
Okay.
Those were our 10 speakers on non-agenda matters.
We'll now proceed to the consent calendar, and we received an urgent item from the City Manager, the appointment of the Director of Health, Housing, and Welfare.
I move to accept this material for consideration.
Second.
Please call the roll.
Council Member Kessler-Wine? Yes.
Baplin? Yes.
Bartlett? Yes.
Trago? Aye.
Nguyen? Yes.
Langraff? Aye.
Gillespie? Yes.
All in favor? Aye.
The motion carries.
We'll now move to the appointment of the Director of Health, Housing and Community Services, and I'll read the recommendation to satisfy the requirements of State Law.
On the agenda, as an urgent item, the Council will adopt a resolution confirming the appointment of Scott Gilman as the Director of Health, Housing and Community Services to be effective August 4th, 2024, at an annual salary of $272,685.09, and congratulations, Mr.
Gilman.
Welcome to serving as Permanent Director of HHCS, and thanks for your interim service.
Okay, we received an urgent item from Council Member Bartlett entitled Funding to the Median Avenue Baptist Church in partnership with the City of Berkeley Young Adult Project for the National Night Out event on Tuesday, August 6th, 2024.
This is approved over relinquishment of Council Office budget funds, and this item is being submitted because of the need to take action arose after the agenda for this meeting was published, which would have been July 15th, 2024.
The urgency of this request is underscored by the fact that National Night Out, a national event on August 6th, 2024, is fast approaching, and in order for the Council to entertain this request and to allocate funds for this event, this item needs to be added to the agenda.
So I move to add this item to the agenda.
Second.
Okay, so the question is adding the urgent item from Council Member Bartlett to the agenda.
Please call the roll.
Council Member Kisarwani? Yes.
Chaplin? Yes.
Bartlett? Yes.
Trigub? Aye.
Council Member Gabbard? Yes.
Council Member Lebron? Yes.
Wengrab? Yes.
Munapara? Yes.
Humber? Yes.
And Mayor Arodeny? Yes.
So that item is on the consent calendar, and anyone can speak to it when we get to the consent calendar.
And on the consent calendar, I'm going to impose a five-minute speaking limitation for Council Members on the consent calendar.
So if you could set the clock for five minutes, please.
Thank you, Council Member Gabbard.
Thank you, Council Member Lebron.
So, in addition to the revised version of Item 15, a referral to the City Manager for an analysis of creating an enhanced infrastructure finance district in the Ashby-Bart area, that revised version reflects input from City staff, and that's in the Supplemental Package 2, so we'll be approving the revised version on consent tonight.
Thank you, Council Member Gabbard.
Thank you, Council Member Lebron.
Thank you very much.
I wanted to thank staff for the lease agreement, Item 10, for the Youth Musical Theater Company at Live Oak Park.
I wanted to thank staff for the lease agreement, Item 11, for the Youth Musical Theater Company at Live Oak Park.
I'm sorry, I'm opening it up to the public again.
So thank you to Scott Ferris and the Parks folks for that.
I would like to give $300 on Item 17, the Berkeley Student Cooperative, and thank Council Member Lunapara for that.
Thank you, Council Member Gabbard.
Thank you for including me on the item for the McGee Avenue Baptist Church.
And I think, let me double check.
That's it.
Thank you.
Thank you, Council Member Lunapara.
Thank you, Council Member Gabbard.
Thank you, Council Member Lebron.
With that, we are standing on Item 12.
I recognize that it is our city policy to acquire vehicles with the least environmental impact, but I think that we would be remiss to not address the function this vehicle is serving.
The prison industrial complex is one of the largest fossil fuels in the nation, users of fossil fuels in the nation, and I'm concerned that we are not discussing the inextricable interaction between climate change and the prison industrial complex.
So, I would like to take a moment to recognize the importance of this item.
It is my first item with a full group of co-sponsors, and I am so proud that it happened on this item.
It demonstrates that the Council recognizes the importance of the BSC and what it has offered to countless community members.
I am very grateful to Council Members who have already committed discretionary funds and those who plan to do so.
The BSC provides affordable housing to low income students and with an emphasis on community development and support.
And I want to give the biggest shout out and thank you to the BSC for reaching out and inviting me to the incredible community that it serves.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.

Segment 2

you have built.
Thank you.
I'm also very proud of item 16, which endorses the renewing immigration provisions of the Immigration Act of 1929, or Registry Bill, as well as the Northern California Coalition for Just Immigration Reform's three-day walk for a path to citizenship from San Jose to San Francisco on August 17th to 19th, 2024.
I want to thank the Mayor and Council Member Hahn for co-sponsoring this important item, and this resolution was brought to us by members of the Peace and Justice Committee who passed their own resolution, but because the march is happening before their resolution was due before the Council, they asked me to introduce this for tonight's meeting.
The bill updates the 1929 federal immigration law so that undocumented individuals may apply for legal permanent residency as long as they have lived in the country for at least seven years.
The march demonstrates our community's commitment to passing this crucial bill and other important immigration reforms, and our city's support for the bill and march helps us live up to our goal of being a welcoming city for all.
There's also another upcoming march that came to my attention too late to be included in tonight's agenda that I would nonetheless like to quickly highlight for everyone this evening.
At noon on August 4th, the Mewakona Ohlone Tribe will be embarking on the Trail of Truth, a journey on horseback from Crissy Field in San Francisco to Washington, D.C., to demand that the federal government restore their status as a federally recognized tribe.
I wish them all the best and intend to introduce a resolution in support of their demands of the federal government when we return after the August recess.
I finally would like to give $200 to Council Member Bartlett's discretionary item to fund the McGee Avenue Baptist Church.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
We'll go next to Councilor Trega.
Thank you.
I would like to first congratulate Director Scott Gilman on your appointment.
I wish to give $250 from my G-13 account towards funding to the McGee Avenue Baptist Church and give $250 for item 17, the Berkeley Student Cooperative Budget Funds to the General Fund for the purpose of repairing the glass skylights above Casa Zimbabwe.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Council Member Humber.
Thank you, Mr.
Mayor.
I'd like to, yeah, thank you, Council Member Trega for reminding me to congratulate Mr.
Gilman on his appointment.
I really look forward to working with him.
I'd like to contribute $250 to the urgent item sponsored by Council Member Bartlett for the McGee Avenue Baptist Church.
Number 17, I'd like to contribute $250 to help repair the skylights at the Casa Zimbabwe office discretionary fund.
And finally, I'd like to ask Council Member Lunapatra if I might serve as the final co-sponsor on item number 16 relative to the Immigration Act of 1929.
Yes, absolutely.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
That's all I have.
Vice Mayor Wenger.
Yes, thank you, Mayor.
I'd like to be recorded as donating $500 to Casa Zimbabwe to do some repairs on their building.
And I'd like to be recorded as giving $250 to the McGee Baptist Church for their National Night Out.
Thank you.
And Council Member Bartlett.
Thank you, Mr.
Mayor.
Thank you, everyone, for your contributions to the National Night Out at McGee Avenue.
It's a wonderful event.
Please come down.
Fun for the whole family.
A lot of fun.
And I'd like to contribute $200 to the Sky Repair at CZ.
That's my wife's alma mater.
I spent some time in the building.
Spent some time in there.
Thank you.
Council Member Taplin.
Thank you.
Chief Helfried at CZ, Chief Helfried at McGee Avenue Baptist.
Thank you.
Thank you.
And I'd like to be recorded as contributing $500 to item 17 to support the improvements at Casa Zimbabwe.
Thank you.
Any other Council Members wishing to be recognized on the consent calendar? Okay, if not, we'll take public comment on the consent calendar.
We'll go first to any speakers in person.
So anyone who would like to address an item on the consent calendar, please line up on this side of the room.
Okay, I believe someone from the co-op is going to be yielding time.
Awesome.
Okay, I should have two minutes.
Okay, thank you.
Hi, y'all.
I'm Cyn.
I've been here before.
I'm the current summer president for the BSC.
And I just wanted to share with y'all, you know, we already know that the BSC is a non-profit student housing organization.
But, you know, something that we haven't talked about has really been the scale too much.
So not only is CZ one of our largest units, but as we come up to our academic season, we're planning to hold and have the capacity to hold 1,300 low-income students.
And with 20 units ranging from large to small houses, themed houses, apartments, and graduate housing options, we really try to meet all needs of students.
And for 90 years, the BSC has been a place for folks to feel welcomed, host house events, feel a sense of ownership, and participate in the cooperative experience.
The BSC is still recovering from the widespread effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
This includes completing delayed maintenance projects on selected units, managing the exodus that came with remote learning, and navigating the impacts of COVID-19 rent moratorium in Berkeley of all of those who were heavily impacted.
Additionally, during the winter of 2023, Kingman Hall, a property owned by the BSC, incurred over $1 million of unforeseen recovery maintenance expenses as a result of the bomb cyclone storm.
The BSC's Casa Zimbabwe is in critical need of a skyline repair above the dining area.
The BSC maintenance department has estimated the cost of the total renovation being $6,000, so we thank you for your partnership in covering this cost.
The BSC is seeking support to reduce this expense, and BSC members are currently facing the impact of the dysfunction, water coming through when it rains, and ultimately this space is very special.
It's where members congregate on a daily basis for meals, to do homework, conduct meetings, and so much more.
And come fall and winter, the BSC is seeking partnership in this project, and we look forward to reporting the progress as we go along.
The space has rich history that definitely is worth knowing, so let me know if you'd like to learn a little bit more.
Thank you all for your time, and thank you for supporting our space and our community.
Thank you.
Good evening.
I believe we have another member yielding their time.
Thank you.
Good evening, Council Members.
My name is Christian Zamora, Vice President of External Affairs for the Berkeley Student Cooperative.
I have lived at Casa Zimbabwe for three years, and I just want to share a bit about the cooperative experience you can get at the BSC.
That first semester was a bit rough, adjusting to life 500 miles from home.
Eventually though, I found my group, my family.
I remember later on in that fall during finals week, myself, one of those friends, and a few other housemates were sitting in the common room, our main living and dining room, and the room with the skylights.
My friend had just finished his final, and his last final, I almost said final final, and was ready to celebrate, but I had one more the following morning.
It was our first semester of in-person college, so I thought to myself, you know, I was really ready to celebrate too.
So we celebrated, and we celebrated hard, so hard that we wound up dancing around the room and over the tables, belting out our best pirate accents as we sing sea shanties under the skylights and disco ball.
I'll spare you all the details of the morning after, but I did make it to my final and somehow managed to be in that class.
That's just one of a thousand stories that get made each day in one of our 20 units.
CZ's common space, like many other spaces in the BSC, are in need of repairs.
This item is a huge step in fostering further meaningful BSC and City Council relationships.
As is our, what we call members that live at CZ, I'm so excited to look up at those skylights again and know they are being taken care of.
Thank you again for considering and donating to this item.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I haven't lost my temper in a while.
Okay, item 11 having to do with the Catalyst Tax Component Grant Program.
I read into that today because I was curious about it.
Apparently it has something to do with teaching members of the local police department how to spot impaired drivers.
Now, apparently there's a lot of accidents in Berkeley, a lot of bicycles, accidents, car accidents, and there's a need to be able to tell who's impaired and who's not.
They're getting a lot of money to do that.
I could tell you just by looking at somebody myself.
But the point here is, there's a point that the Vice Mayor made earlier saying that the parks in Berkeley are the most democratic places in Berkeley.
And I thought, wow, what about Peoples Park? Peoples Park is not very democratic at all.
It's got walls put up around it now.
The APEC security is attacking people.
That's okay.
I'm done.
Thank you.
Hello, Ilana Auerbach.
I'm glad y'all are sitting here.
There's several council members missing as public comment is being made.
Oh, okay, they're coming back.
This is good.
I'd like to talk about item 12.
Our Berkeley Police Department budget is like north of $90 million.
Yeah, that's huge.
And the Police Accountability Board, just finally, after being delayed and delayed and delayed, they still haven't received all of the information they requested for the investigation about the racist anti-homeless texts.
Yeah, Rashi, it's terrible.
It's a bad reflection on what's happening in our police department.
And so the fact that, and what they also found is that they're making a lot of arrests that are unnecessary, that the former district attorney dropped for lots of different reasons.
And we know, CopWatch did an analysis of all this data, and we know, we called it purging the poor, because we know that lots of people are arrested, criminalizing poverty.
And so spending $340,000 to transport prisoners, we just need to decrease the number of people that we're arresting, because they're mostly poor people, free Palestine.
Y'all, please speak out about the genocide.
Thank you.
Our next speaker.
Good evening.
My name is Manuel De Paz, and I work at East Bay Sanctuary Covenant.
And tonight, I'm speaking on item 16, and I'm here to ask you to please pass this Berkeley Police Commissioner, our resolution.
Thanks to the Council Member, Alicia Lunapark, for bringing this into the consent agenda.
I just want to say that the North California Coalition for Adjusted Immigration Reform, which EDS is part of it, we sent 16 people to D.C.
as a delegation who are meeting with another 150-plus people in D.C.
to advocate for H.R.
1511 S.
2606, and also to support the work that we are having on August 17th to 19th.
So I want to ask you, please, to pass this resolution.
I know that it's very meaningful.
This is the right moment, and I think that we all now understand—can someone give me two minutes? Thank you.
I think that we all now understand that the suffering on the undocumented immigrants, you know, because they are left out of the political and economic system.
I think if we are able to pass these bills in Congress, 8.5 million undocumented immigrants will be—have a path to citizenship and to apply for their permanent residency.
I think that they deserve it because they are part of this society.
They have suffered so much.
You know, they are left out of the economical—economic system, and I think that passing this resolution, it's, you know, very meaningful for them and for us, and thank you for supporting us.
Good evening.
Well, I'd like to echo Council Member Lunapare's concerns about item 12, $340,000 for a prisoner transport vehicle.
Is Berkeley PD anticipating making mass arrests? I don't see the need for this.
The BPD also already has many vehicles, most of which these days are SUVs, which are pretty roomy inside in the backseat, I can say from experience.
And $340,000 is, you know, a lot of money, and that vehicle, best case, will mostly sit empty, just sitting around a parking lot, whereas $340,000 could be a lot of money to invest in much of the community, like the housing co-op, filmmakers, you know, etc.
There are a lot other better uses for $340,000 than a prisoner transport vehicle.
Next speaker, please.
Hi, good evening, Council Members.
My name is Alfred Tu.
I'm part of the Berkeley Student Co-op Alumni Association.
I want to thank everyone for supporting Council of Zimbabwe with their maintenance issues.
As you probably know, the pandemic was a tough time for the co-op, and even now they're still trying to recover fiscally, and so this really helps keep the houses safe and habitable.
And another thing you can also do to help the co-op is to let people know that there's still space available in the co-op, because filling those rooms will help bring in more revenue for the co-op to maintain the buildings.
So, in your newsletters, let people know, students, not just UC Berkeley, but at community colleges and other educational institutions, they can all apply and move in tomorrow.
Thank you.
Good evening.
Good evening, Council.
I'm from Palestine.
I've been a resident of District 1 for 30-something years.
I'm addressing the emergency consent items about donating city money to a church at a time where the Israeli occupation forces are destroying over 400 mosques, and I don't know how many churches, including the oldest church, 800-year-old church.
And it's unconscionable that we have this Council who will not even consider it.
Like, consensus on a genocide, that's a word I hear a lot, divisive.
Like, is there a pro-genocide constituency that you're trying to work with? That's what I would like to know, and I have heard no— Thank you for your comments.
That's not on the consent calendar.
We need to move to the next speaker.
Ms.
Mosvick, why don't you tie this up, sir? Please leave the podium.
We'll move to the next speaker.
Great, Palestine.
It's good to see Item 2 on the consent calendar.
Wright Institute does an excellent job, and the aging population is significant in Berkeley.
So it's good to see these mental health monies go there towards the counseling at the Wright Institute.
Congratulations to Scott Gilman.
He seems open and responsive, and we hope that continues because there's certainly a lot of challenges he has to take on as HHCS director.
We do have a homeless services system that we put a lot of money into it, but it has its fragmentation, especially in terms of the connections with mental health.
But then we have to acknowledge when the city does do something really responsive.
I heard today that Peter Radue had assisted a young woman on Harrison Avenue.
He's a young woman who has recently had a cesarean and provided one month's stay for her.
And just in conclusion, I want to repeat my earlier comments about the curb management plan.
Please let's fix the sidewalks and streets first.
They're deeply in need of repair.
Thank you.
Are there any other in-person speakers on the consent calendar? Hello.
My name is Janine, and I don't come to many of these meetings.
You guys keep saying that Palestine is not on the agenda, and I would beg to differ.
Palestine is what got me to these meetings.
Palestine is why I'm reading this agenda item.
Number 12, purchase order for national auto fleet to transport prisoners.
That's Palestine.
You're talking about spending money to transport prisoners when you're also talking about housing young people, when you're talking about indigenous rights, and you're talking in front of a Black Lives Matter flag.
That's Palestine.
Berkeley and Palestine are not separate.
What happens here is happening there.
And I am appalled that the city council has not called a ceasefire.
Thank you.
We need to move on.
Okay.
We'll go to George Litman.
Yes.
Thank you.
I'd like to brief comment if I have time on both item 3 and item 12.
At any rate, starting with number 3, I'm a former member and future member of the Human Welfare and Community Action Commission.
I want to thank the council for all the work that you've done leading up to this, which is the last phase of the revival of that commission.
And I think that you'll be doing this in two parts.
One is to appoint three people as public, that is, council appointees, and three as so-called private sector representatives.
These are all people who have provided a great deal of leadership to the commission.
I think this is a good move.
And I want to thank the staff for shepherding the new ordinance and also for the members of the commission for taking this up from one member to nine members.
So I think now we're poised to go back to full strength and do great things in service to the human needs of the low income and related communities.
So I hope you will pass that.
And the second one was the issue that Manuel DePaz spoke to.
I thank the council member Luna Parra for carrying this peace and justice initiative.
This is an aspect of Berkeley as a sanctuary community, and we're carrying forward that legacy that goes back even before the beginning of the peace and justice commission in 86, back to 1971 when we first became a sanctuary community.
And this is so important and is a really concrete aid to restoring or bringing human rights and immigrant rights to such a large and important sector of our community.
Thank you for that.
Okay.
Next speaker is Ella McGlone, followed by former Councilor Davila.
Hi.
I'm here in place of one of my immediate supervisors, Marcus Dinkins.
I'm in charge of the fleet for Berkeley PD.
I had a few questions.
Am I able to ask them now or should I wait? Is there another time for that? You can ask your questions, but we don't have a back and forth with speakers.
Okay.
I just wanted a resolution for number 12 and 13 for the jail prisoner transport vehicles and the parking enforcement vehicles.
And also like to say that I believe we would need the funding definitely for number 12 and 13, and it would definitely be good in the long run because we won't have to replace the entire car for a number 12.
Thank you.
That's all I need to say.
Okay.
We'll go to former Councilor Davila.
So I agree with a previous speaker that stated Palestine is on the agenda.
And it has brought a lot of people to the meeting.
And do we need to..
I haven't looked at your agenda since I don't have to, but we don't need to..
I don't know about the funding of more vehicles for the police to transport people to jail, but we do need to free Palestine and end the murders by Israel.
And it's really, really, really disappointing and sad that our government and sadly that our government in Berkeley and in the country and many around the world support Zionism and hatred and bigotry towards a group of people, mainly Palestinians.
But I don't know how you differentiate hate because if you hate one group, you're hating someone else and you're hating yourself.
Okay.
That completes public comment on the consent calendar.
I move adoption of consent calendar as amended.
Second.
Okay.
Let's call the roll and approve in the consent calendar.
Council Member Kastorwani? Yes.
Kaplan? Yes.
Bartlett? Yes.
Trago? Aye.
Khan? Is absent.
We'll hold the roll and confirm it.
Wengraff? Yes.
Lunapara? Yes.
Humbert? Yes.
And Mayor Errington? Yes.
Okay.
Okay.
The consent calendar is approved.
We'll let Council Member Han report her vote when she gets back.
We're going to go briefly to item 18, Berkeley restaurant inspections.
This is the presentation of the city auditor's audit report.
And then after, we'll go to the ZAB appeal.
And colleagues, I'm going to impose a five-minute speaking limitation on this item as well.
But I'm happy to give you my five minutes if you need additional time.
Okay.
And I want to now turn it over to our city auditor, Jenny Wong, to present on item 18.
Good evening.
Thank you so much.
Great.
So thank you so much for having me and my team here today.
On July 10th, my office released an audit of the environmental health division's food safety and inspections program.
Today, in this presentation, we will go over why we did this audit.
Our objectives, findings, and recommendations will review those and management's response.
So why did we do this audit? Every year in the U.S., foodborne diseases cause an estimated 48 million people to get sick, 128,000 to be hospitalized, and 3,000 to die.
We therefore looked at food inspections because they play an important role in ensuring food safety for all those who dine in Berkeley.
Our objectives were to determine whether the division met its inspection targets, whether the program was adequately funded and staffed, and how well the program informed the public about food safety.
So what did we find? Our first finding was that the division was significantly behind on inspections in 2023, increasing health risk.
Let's look at that in a little more detail.
The division did not meet its baseline of conducting at least one inspection per year.
This graph shows that in 2023, Berkeley had the second highest percentage of uninspected food facilities compared to other jurisdictions.
Berkeley did not inspect 45 percent of food facilities last year, which is better than San Francisco's 51 percent, but worse than Alameda, where only 3 percent of facilities were not inspected.
When you look at the facilities that make up those that were not inspected in 2023, restaurants make up the largest group of facilities not inspected, with 193 restaurants, or 46 percent.
The division also did not meet its inspection targets for food facility inspections.
So those last slides we looked at were at the baseline of one inspection per year, but many of the food facilities require more than one inspection per year.
In fact, Berkeley's policy is to conduct between one to three inspections per year, depending on the risk level of that facility, and that is based on food preparation, complexity, and population served.
Now let's turn to look at food foreign illness complaints.
So the division also did not meet its targets for responding to complaints of alleged food-borne illnesses.
The graph here shows that the division responded to only six out of 23 such complaints.
I believe that's 26 percent within the target of one business day.
All right, now let's go to our second finding, and that is the division did not track spending and left critical positions vacant.
We found the division did not separately track food inspection program revenues and spending and couldn't provide this information to the audit team for fiscal years 2019 to 2023.
As a result, we could not.

Segment 3

Um, we did not they could not determine the revenues and whether they fell short covered or exceeded the cost of the food inspection program.
This lack of tracking differs from other jurisdictions, like Alameda county and the city of Pasadena, where officials stated that program revenues covered most program costs.
We also found that short staffing prevented inspectors from meeting their inspection targets and the city did not consistently recruit to fill the critical.
Vacancies between fiscal years, 2019 and 2023 total vacant positions in the division overall.
So that includes restaurant inspections and other inspections.
Those vacant positions increase from 1 to 5 out of 13 total budgeted positions.
The timeline here shows 2 vacancies specifically related to the food inspection program, a food inspector and supervisor role.
The city recruited for these important positions in 2019, but no candidates were hired.
They did not recruit again through the end of fiscal year 2023.
so that's 4 years.
Our 3rd finding was that public information about food safety was limited.
Online inspection data was incomplete.
And not fully accessible to the public, the open data portal did not include all facilities inspected in 2023 and did not clearly match inspection reports.
It was also missing some state code requirements for information posted online.
In the written response division proposed disabling the online food inspection data because of these issues.
But, as we stated in our response to the division, this goes against the purpose of the recommendation, which is to provide the public with more complete and accessible information on food inspections.
We also found that Berkeley's public information was limited compared to other jurisdictions.
For example, Alameda County has an online search tool that allows users to look up facilities and view details about recent inspections.
Finally, we note that Berkeley does not use placards to inform the public about food inspections.
Placards are common in other jurisdictions, such as Alameda, San Francisco, Los Angeles counties, and the city of Pasadena.
These examples on the slide show the range of different placarding models used.
And I'll note that if once Berkeley does go about implementing this type of program, that it would be important to engage the public, engage the restaurant community around.
The type of program that's best fit and I do want to note that.
It's important to really make sure we stabilize.
And perform at a much better level before taking on this type of program.
So, we recommended the division develop a plan to improve inspection coverage and quickly respond to alleged foodborne illness complaints.
Track program spending, take steps to address staffing needs and improve data management and reporting on program performance.
We also recommend making online food inspection information more accessible and complete.
And develop a plan to start using placards in Berkeley once they're able to staff up.
The division agreed or partially agreed with our audit findings, conclusions and recommendations.
To highlight a few points from the division's response, the division stated that they plan to prioritize high risk facility inspections and adjust inspection targets to account for inspection workload.
I want to note that it's important to ensure that the current staff are not going to be overloaded.
They also noted to retrain staff on response time for foodborne illness complaints and began recruitment for the supervisor role.
We were glad to see that the, they opened a recruitment for the supervisor role this month.
The division provided a response to our audit.
Which included some new information and partial agreement with 1 of our recommendations.
We responded to correct the facts and provide context to our findings.
All of this is included in the full report.
Finally, we'd like to thank the environmental health division for their cooperation on this audit.
I also want to thank my staff for their efforts on this audit.
I'm here with Caitlin Palmer, our amazing audit manager and we're joined online by Pauline Miller.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much.
Let's open up for questions and discussion from the council.
We'll go 1st to vice mayor Weingraf.
Thank you very much for the report.
Thank you very much for the audit.
I have a few questions.
How long was the division aware.
Of these issues of non inspection.
I think that's probably a better question for the division.
To answer, but we received some complaints about this program.
That's 1 of the reasons why we initiated this audit.
I don't know if anyone from the division is.
Or department is available to answer your questions.
City manager is yes.
Council member vice mayor Weingraf Scott Gilman is on and he can be responsive to your question.
Scott.
Yes, welcome.
Thank you.
And thank you all for the kind comments.
The, you know, the department has been through a massive leadership change.
I became aware of it when I started at the interim role, which was the audit was already.
Happening and so as soon as we found out what was going on, we started implementing a bunch of corrective action and I can go through that in more detail if you want, but but exactly when and who know who knew it would really be the previous administration before I arrived.
You know, it could give you, I could find out, but that's when we really started going after this.
You know, sort of an all hands on deck way to get it fixed.
Thank you.
So do you as the director of the department now and congratulations.
Thank you.
Do you consider these positions to be essential? I do, and we've filled 1 of them and offer is out.
We hope the individual will start in August.
And I believe, according to HR, everything's moving along nicely.
We also have opened the recruitment for the supervisor position that was part of what happened.
And so we prioritize that and in addition, we're looking for additional contract resources through our state association, some temporary restaurant inspectors to come in for a short period of time to help us get completely caught up.
Okay, thank you for that.
I don't know whether this is question for you or for the auditor, but I'm curious to know if the inspections attract and if those, the results of the inspections are publicly available.
Yes, I could answer that the part of the reason why staff fell behind my understanding is the database that they're tracked in.
Is beyond its useful life.
It has had basically some malfunctions to put it any other way that the owner, or the company that manages that software is sunsetting it.
So, part of our plan of correction is getting a new software system that will track everything and all of the components of that that we need, including the permits regarding posting of the audits.
We were, we were struggled over this question, because as the auditor stated, it is a step backwards and transparency.
The problem that we ran into is.
We're not required to post the audits, but if we do, if we do post the audits, they have to meet state criteria and we felt well, we know that our audits that were posted did not meet that criteria.
So, we're working quickly to get that fixed with it.
And as soon as that happens, and we can post audits that are clear and not confusing to the public, we'll get them right back up.
And where are they available on what on the website? Yes.
On the website of through through the city and then environmental health.
Environmental health.
Okay.
And 1 last question.
Are we conducting a fee study to see how our inspection fees compare with other jurisdictions? I believe there's been some work done on that.
Nothing formal has been presented.
It is part of what we need to address though.
There is an expectation across the state that that.
Environmental health would generate enough fees to cover.
The cost of operating the program, and we know that we're not there.
So we do have to evaluate fees.
And we're looking at what other neighboring jurisdictions are charging.
Exactly.
Yes.
And when can we expect to get that information? I would give us about a few months.
I'm, I'm seeing.
I'm helping me, and I asked him to jump in and if I got stuck in any technical issues, I think, you know, we mentioned.
Yes, Peter, please.
Uh, thank you.
Um, uh, director Gilman and council member.
We are underway with a fee study right now.
Comprehensive fee study.
Working with a consultant, um, and crossing the, um, coming close to crossing the finish line.
We anticipate having that done by the end of this fiscal year so that we can have, um.
A full fee update report before the council.
Um, by the end of this fiscal year, typically, you know, as you know, those are done closer to the budget adoption in the springtime and we anticipate being ready for the next time that happens.
Great, thank you so much.
Absolutely.
Council member trigger.
Uh, thank you so much.
Uh, madam auditor and, uh.
I do also have some questions.
Um, the divisions response says that they're closing the backlog of inspections.
Um, and I'm not clear what this means in terms of making sure facilities are inspected on an annual basis.
Uh, in addition to recommendations about stabilizing the inspections, the auditor also recommends the division develop and report on performance metrics.
Will it be feasible to provide the council, but the percentage of food facilities inspected on an annual basis? Yes, yes, absolutely.
I can say that.
You know, just to just to answer the question completely council member.
We will have 100% of inspections for.
2023 and 2024 complete by the end of this year, we prioritize high risk facilities of which we have over 500 in the city.
Those will be complete by October with the remaining inspections complete by the end of this year.
Thank you.
Can the division explain if all food facilities in Berkeley will have been inspected? Well, I guess so you said it will happen.
Um.
What about 2025 and, uh, given.
That, um, it's if I understood correctly, madam auditor from your report, typically inspections may happen 1 to 3 times a year.
Um, what what does that.
Look like, in terms of clearing the backlog, how meaningful is that like that inspection by that point will be will be completely cleaned up, caught up and we'll have learned a lot.
Um, you know, in this process that we've gone forward, our plan is for the 1st quarter of 2025 to re, establish our targets.
Um, and so remember a lot of.
Of what we were measured against were internal targets that staff developed years ago.
So we need to update our targets for inspection so that we have multiple inspections for high risk facilities and at least 1 inspection a year for low risk facilities.
Um, and so our goal 1st quarter would be to begin those, uh, the rotation of multiple inspections per year for high risk facilities.
Exactly what those numbers will be yet.
I don't know.
It'll be based on what we learn over the next couple of months as we implement our plan of correction.
Okay, and can you speak to specifically what systems that the division intends to put in place to make sure inspections are conducted and facilities are not getting totally ignored.
We have had to, and we're in the process of building our own tracking system as a work around to the database.
We've actually started identifying resources to do that.
And quite frankly, there's 970 that we have to keep track of.
And so the database does a lot more for us, but because we can't rely on it, we have to, we have to build our own work around system and it'll track exactly what you mentioned there.
So that that will be reviewed with staff on a weekly basis and we know down to the day how many inspections we have to get done and down to the week so that we can honor our commitment in the in management's response of having everything cleaned up by the end of the year.
Okay, thank you.
What are the division's thoughts about its inspection targets? Uh, and, you know, what would you say, given the low level of basic coverage of 1 inspection a year as to the feasibility of conducting 3 inspections a year? It's the high risk facilities.
What kind of changes might need to be made to the targets to make them more achievable while still ensuring that Berkeley restaurants are getting regular inspections? You know, again, I have to say, we're going to base that based on what we learn over over the coming months.
We want to make sure that we're always protecting the public first.
We don't want to have so many inspections that were, you know, a nuisance to the operators.
And we also want to have the ability to really respond and focus, really focus on any problem areas or problem inspections that we have.
So, we don't necessarily want to create an artificial number of we're going to do 4 per year.
For example, if that really doesn't make any sense, perhaps leave leave us some room so that if we do have a problem restaurant, we have we have more ability to help them on their plans of correction to follow ups and then just ensure that that they're running a safe operation.
Okay, thank you.
So, there was, you know, I, in a past life, used to do assessments.
They were not as formal as audits, of course, but I rarely recall a time in my prior career that a department said that data was not available.
And then, you know, it was a discussion.
There were no surprises.
And then suddenly data somehow became available after a report was completed.
So, can you speak to what may have happened there? Sure, and you're right.
And I want to thank the auditor's office for talking this through.
And thank her staff.
It was a, it was a great process, a great learning process for all of us.
The auditor asked very specifically for the amount of revenue that this program tracked that historically the city has never tracked the revenue, the fee revenue that way it all came in together and all went to 1 big bucket.
We have since corrected that staff are actually trained, being trained this week on new ways to track revenue when it comes in.
So we can isolate this revenue.
So, so when the auditor's office asked us for the revenue, we couldn't produce it because it was not available.
When we were completing the management response, the city manager at the time felt strongly that the public knew that this department in total generated revenue.
So we included the total revenue that included inspections for other things, other sorts of fees from other departments and did a projection of what we thought was close to the amount of revenue that was that was generated.
It was basically an average for a few years.
So, it was really, it was really an effort to make sure that that we were transparent with the public and they knew that that we did, we do generate revenue in that department.
And from this point, going forward, we'll be able to tell you exactly how much revenue we generate specifically for the food inspections.
Okay, thank you.
And then I'm almost done and I might not even have need the full 5 minutes, but I.
My, so I wanted to dig into, I think it was a partial agreement with the recommendation and it had to do with turning off the public portal, which the auditor's report mentions that that is inimical to what the intent is around providing transparent information to members of the public.
Can you speak to that approach and any possible change in posture to ensure that the folks we represent are getting transparent data? Absolutely.
And so currently, the law or the code in California does not require that the audit reports are posted, but if they are posted, they have to meet certain criteria and they have to be easily understandable by the public, for lack of a better way to put it.
We were informed by the state that our website was very difficult in the way that the public would go in and access the reports.
It's very difficult to understand.
And I agree.
It's very, very difficult.
So.
Because it was a very difficult system to understand, and if we post them, we were not meeting the state code criteria for what elements had to be included in that report.
We couldn't, in good faith, keep on posting basically bad information.
So our goal is to quickly fix that.
Working with IT, come up with the best solution we can and get those posted as soon as possible.
Okay, thank you.
And I appreciate just your transparency as well.
And I acknowledge that, as you said, there was turnover in staff and I think my last question is just, we've been getting emails from members of the public, suggesting that this is budgeted time and it's public dollars and suggesting that we actually merge this service with Alameda County, which seems to be having a better track record of inspections.
And maybe this is not a question for tonight, but if you have any thoughts about, do you, just the approach and if that might be a higher and better use of dollars? Well, clearly the spotlight is on us to fix this and to exceed the public's expectations.
You know, if we're not able to pull that off by the end of the year, then I think my new job should be questioned.
We absolutely have to exceed public expectations as we go forward and improve this service.
And if we're able to do that and we're able to provide a good service for our citizens and our residents of the community, you know, make sure that everything is safe and people are happy and we're able to pay for it, then I think, you know, that's our answer.
But if we continue to have problems, then we absolutely have to have to look at all options at that point.
Well, thank you so much.
And certainly anything that I can do and we can do to ensure that you're set up for success.
Really appreciate the time.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I don't want to take away from the importance of this item, but we do have a ZAB appeal and we have people waiting for hours to testify on that.
So we have Munipar, Han, Bartlett, Keselwani, Humbert.
Yeah, so we're going to go to Keselwani now and just ask that people be mindful of the time.
Thank you very much, Mr.
Mayor.
Thank you, Madam City Auditor.
One question I had when Berkeleyside first reported about this was whether the county was performing better.
And I think this audit helps us to understand Berkeley's situation with restaurant inspections in relation to other jurisdictions and, you know, as Council Member Traeger brought up, the county is performing very well with just 3% not inspected in 2023 relative to our 45%.
I do want to just acknowledge, Mr.
Gilman, that you are really new in your position and you are taking a lot of steps to help us do better in terms of the number of inspections we are completing.
I do just want to also say that, for me, it's not just doing the inspections, as important as that is.
I also think it's really important to have a grading system, like some of the other cities, so that the public is aware that, yes, an inspection has taken place and this is how the restaurant or facility performed in that inspection.
I also think what you acknowledged about the database update and the new software system and being able to share those inspection reports in a way that meets state criteria and having a comprehensive fee study, I just want to acknowledge that it's not just doing the inspections.
It's a lot of other related important work.
And so I am still very interested in further exploring, not tonight, but further exploring whether we do want to take a closer look at partnering with the county to do this for us, because they have all the systems in place and this is a lot to ask of us as a relatively smaller city.
So, I wanted to say that at the outset, and then I wanted to ask you, related to the foodborne illness complaints, the audit shows that those were delayed, which I'm concerned about.
Is there a process or can there be a process to prioritize those types of complaints that require immediate attention? Yes, yes, absolutely.
That's being done.
I do want to say at this point, just because your question sort of bumped up against this is, our auditors, part of the problem that we've discovered are pulled into other sorts of duties while they're there, noise inspection, noise ordinance, tobacco, and in talking to other county directors, they call it the, while you're out there, phenomenon, and that's what we're trying to do.
And so, they get pulled from their original job.
So, we have to put a prioritization process around that as well.
Okay, thank you for that.
And I know that the division's response is that there has been a conditional offer for a registered environmental health specialist.
Are you able to provide an update on whether this person was ultimately hired and whether, if they have been hired, are they conducting the food inspections? Sure, yeah, I can work with with city manager on what were the appropriate time and how to do that.
But absolutely.
Yes.
Okay, so that person has been hired.
Oh, I'm sorry.
You asked me to do that.
Now that person has an offer out.
Oh, okay.
There is an offer.
Okay.
So we haven't made that higher yet.
Okay.
I just wanted to know where we're on that.
And then I just want to echo the points of my colleagues related to having this information available on an open data portal and overcoming some of those barriers.
And and I will leave it at that.
Thank you again auditing city auditor's office as well as the division for your attention to this serious issue.
Council member.
Thank you.
Thank you to the city auditor's office for this audit as well as congratulations to director Gilman on your new position.
I have a couple of questions, especially related around staffing and staff treatment.
Um, what steps is the division taking in addition to making sure that the city is.
Compliant to make sure that inspectors are supported and provided with clear and feasible workloads.
The audit shows that the inspector workload is already excessive and it would be helpful to know what the division is doing to address that.
Sure, so we've broken it down to how many inspections need to be done per day.
For the rest of the year, and so auditors will have an assigned number of audits that they need to do each week.
Our plan is then is to is to review the following week.
Whether those were done or not, what problems they ran into what can we learn? Are there, for example, if they show up and there's nobody available to let them in the building.
Do we need to learn from that and perhaps have a clerical person set up appointments? You know, that's just an example.
So, you know, this is this is our priority to get this right.
And so we're going to be supporting them and working very closely with them.
I told I told them, we're going to micromanage to make sure we get this right and support them because they have a huge, huge responsibility.
Thank you so much.
My 2nd question is the audit points out that the division has had ongoing understaffing and there's been a recent turnover in leadership and these factors can really affect employee morale, which can in turn affect operations as well.
What steps is the division taking, or will the division take to address employee morale? You know, that's an excellent question because we're finding that is an issue not only in this division, but across across the organization.
My plan is to listen to them and work with them.
Seeing this audit come out, obviously, many of them have been with us for many, many years and take their job very, very seriously.
And so this was extremely disheartening to the staff.
So working with them and supporting them with them.

Segment 4

They do have additional issues, though we have referrals for services and other things that we can always offer, but but I think really our job is to make sure that they have the resources and tools and training that they need and a reasonable number of of inspections to do each week.
Thank you so much.
I have 1 final question about recruitment for the registered environmental health position.
Do you know why it is so difficult.
To recruit for this position, and are there any ideas that the division has about pipelines or ways to encourage folks to get into the field? You know, it's a, it's a, it's definitely a statewide issue and counties that lose staff, you know, are the counties that have the higher numbers.
Actually, it's a national issue.
There was just something in the national news today about this exact topic.
So it is a problem.
We're considering a training program as part of our, our management response as a trainee program as a pipeline to bring to bring folks in to get their hours that they need for the test.
We haven't we haven't nailed that down yet, but investigating that and seeing if that's a possibility is is 1 of our action items that we've that we flagged.
We appreciate it.
Thank you so much.
Councilmember Bartlett.
Thank you.
Mr.
Mayor.
Thank you.
Madam.
C auditor for your excellent and eye opening report.
Had no idea.
And Mr.
Gilman and Mr.
Gilman, congratulations.
You have walked into this, but you didn't know how deep the issues are that you've inherited.
But thank you for your, your resolute attention because we're going to need it because clearly we have a significant liability now.
Right? So, you know, much of what I was going to talk about sort of hint, sort of related to counselor counselor when a powers comes as well, but looking at the, at the timeline in the report, it's clear to see it dovetails with the pandemic.
Which much of the staffing crisis in this city and every city and every organization, private and public has occurred.
So it looks as if we're rebounding.
To try to get workers in it's the kind of job you can't do by zoom.
So you got to come in.
That's not very much fun nowadays.
So, I guess if we were able to.
Produce certain internal.
Training protocols, sort of working with the, the, the junior college working with the local job training groups in Berkeley is the.
Is the training rigorous, or is it or is amenable to community members who just want to get a leg up and get a good job? It's a little bit, it's a little bit more than that.
The specific requirements for licensing, I'd have to defer to to Ron Torres, our director there.
I, I do know that there's a number of hours that have to be completed along with educational requirements.
And so intern hours, and so that's why we're looking seriously at a trainee program.
And so when we evaluate all of that, your comments could definitely, we can incorporate that into our thinking.
Is there is there.
Other ways, other other skill sets or other individuals that could.
Even take some of the load for the, for the licensed registered inspectors.
Right, because, you know, we do so much inspection overall, right? We're together this morning, right? Is that today? That today or yesterday, we were just together yesterday talking about the sweet and beverage, right? No, the checkout spent a day hour 9 now.
And testing how how we're going to how we're going to enforce the new rules moving the, the, the.
Ultra sweet candies and things away from the front of these little stores, how we're going to inspect it.
Right? So it seems as if there is room to sort of align.
Duties and have multiple multiple.
Inspector powers, right? So maybe we need to kind of.
We talked before in your interview, maybe move beyond the silos, right? And get people created a new universal inspector.
Right and so robots can do this.
Yeah.
Okay.
That's my idea.
Yeah, we have to be thank you.
Thank you.
And I just want to say 1 of the things we have to do is prioritize these sorts of inspections, at least in the short run to make sure we get caught up.
And so, but, yeah, we'll take your comments to her for sure.
Thank you.
Yes, thank you.
I will keep my comments brief.
A lot of the questions that that I was thinking of, and a lot of the topics have already been covered, but I do want to thank auditor Wong for her incredible work on this report and all the other excellent reports that we received from your office.
This is obviously a critical function of government, ensuring public health and I'm really heartened to hear that our new director, Mr.
Gilman is really focusing on getting this right.
I'd like to see if we couldn't get something formal toward the end of the year early next year in terms of another report on this from the city manager or or Mr.
Gilman.
I'd like to see.
You know, after it's all cleared up what the lessons that have been learned are, and hopefully they can be reported to us.
I'm going to sift through this very quickly.
I like the idea of maybe working with Berkeley community college and other of the colleges to see if we can't work with them to set up a training program.
I realize that's not short term, but long term that might help.
It might help clear up some of the, some of the staffing shortages.
Anyway, thank you city auditor Wong and I look forward to future updates.
I just want to.
Thank the city auditor for and her entire office for a really, really important report.
Obviously, I think we were all committed and clearly our health and human services department is committed to correcting this, but it's just, it's an issue of significant.
Public concern a lot of people go to restaurants and we need to make sure that our restaurants have been inspected.
I appreciate all the commitments and I, I believe the sincerity and the urgency of of the director's commitments here tonight.
I would second the desire to have some follow up report.
So I guess I would ask the.
The city manager to somehow record that we would like to hear.
An update, maybe in November or December to understand if we've been able to meet the goals and I very strongly support the idea of having a.
A rating system, I have to say in New York City has a great 1.
And people really do choose their restaurant space in part on those scores and the competition to have a good score means that everybody is in tip top shape, even in that very large city.
So, I just want to thank everyone involved.
I look forward to seeing the progress and we have to keep we have to make sure that when people dine in Berkeley.
They're safe.
It's not more complicated than that.
Thank you.
Okay, I move the auditor's recommendation, but the change the 1st report back date December 2024.
2nd.
Okay, motion and 2nd.
Yes.
Yes, I believe that our report asked for the.
Report back in January of 2025.
Yes, so we're saying December is that a problem? No, no, no.
Okay.
Great.
That's the motion.
Okay.
Okay.
Public comment on this item.
We'd like to speak on this item.
See, no in person speakers are going to zoom speakers.
Esther brass chorn.
Esther brass chorn.
No.
Okay.
Miss table.
You want to speak counselor? You want to speak on this item? Yes, I do want to speak and you should give people time.
To get up answer the question, you don't know when.
You're going to have public comments sometimes you have it before.
Sometimes you have it after.
So who knows? Anyway.
I didn't hear the report all of it, but, oh.
Maybe listen, maybe I won't, but it's kind of disturbing how y'all giggle and talk and.
Play around when people are giving reports and could you please make public comment? Yeah.
Inspections.
It's interesting 1 time we had an inspection.
We're not a restaurant.
We're a tenant.
In the building, and the inspector completely chose to ignore that the wall heaters.
In my unit, and the 1 across the hall did not have any.
I could look into their unit.
They could look into mine.
There was no.
Wall in between and the inspector I had to tell him.
About that, so I just hope that they do a good job.
I know Frank darling is a good.
Inspector appreciate his work.
And, you know, I just want to know that want you to know that sometimes they're not always doing the best that they should be doing.
So, I hope that they'll be doing a really good job.
And taking the recommendations, if there were some, I know.
There's been many that I heard her say before earlier, but 62 recommendations, 17 have been done.
Blah, blah, blah, so you need to take these things into consideration, get things done expediently.
And do better and free Palestine and, um, thank you.
Let's go the next speaker.
Thank you.
Hi, Ilana district for thank you.
So the auditor, 1 of the best, most reliably diligent, conscientious departments in our city.
So, thank you.
Thank you for always doing just stellar work and shining a light on everything that needs to be exposed.
I'm really concerned and congratulations.
Mr.
Gilman, Dr.
Gilman, or the director of health, housing and community services, he mentioned the lack of and thank you council member for bringing up.
How are these people feeling and what the director said was that it's not only his department, but it's city wide and we've been hearing this for months and months and months from our city staff and employees that morale as well.
And what's the plan? I understand he just stepped into a lot as you said, council member Bartlett, but he needs support.
How are we going to support our city staff? And our city workers, and we need and I'd ask the interim city manager, is there a plan because we have known for months and months and maybe years.
That this is an issue, and we have low morale and there's no cohesion and the more what we can do is a holistic approach to bringing our staff.
The different departments together and uplifting them and creating some more trust and some more.
Camaraderie we can do that and then we'll draw more people and magnetize more people.
They'll enjoy their work more.
They'll be more productive.
You will attract more people to work for our city.
So.
What's happening with that? That's what I want.
Does anybody have a plan for that? I would ask that somebody thinks about this because it's not rocket science.
This has been done in organizations and governmental cities all over.
So, we can do this here too.
Thank you.
Are there any other in person speakers? If so, please line up on the side of the room.
And the raised hands on zoom, are you wishing to speak on item 18, the audit report on Berkeley restaurant inspections? If so, please keep your hand raised or lower your hand at this time.
Oh, I'm still short.
Okay.
Thank you very much.
I really appreciate all of you and I appreciate.
The topic, because again, as you've probably heard, I've done construction for centuries and I heard mentioned that we need.
Resources tools and training.
These are fundamental foundational things and so supporting ourselves with the information and the transparency and the accountability is essential because again, I've brought up that when it comes to inspections and construction, if it's legitimate.
And I don't do something correctly, it's over and I have personally witnessed.
A lot of things not.
Okay.
I've witnessed and still I'm witnessing a lot of safety and risk issues in our buildings, especially those that house elders.
Right and then, of course, the shelters, et cetera, et cetera.
So I just want to present myself as a real.
Supporter of this collaboration, cooperation and support.
Because when the morale goes down and or someone that does a God awful job gets a raise and someone that busts their butt to do it, right.
Doesn't get acknowledgement if we can't tell the difference between a stake in a bone, we're sort of in trouble.
So, thank you for the.
Willingness to consider that if you're going to do it, do it right and that we can prevent harm rather than be in the ceaseless, infinite damage control spiral of chasing our tails.
We're wasting so much so much by ineffective.
Um, wasteful practices, so I know that we can do this and I really, really appreciate all of you.
Thank you.
All right, next speaker please.
Hi, everyone thanks again.
Um, Janine, um, I want to sort of 2nd and come off of this idea and this thread of interest.
I want to re, imagine this thread going about of what.
Council member from district 7 said about the morale, the accessibility of this job and this gentleman who gave a wonderful presentation.
What they have to support this.
Group of people that we all know are super important.
Right so I think I just want to uplift the idea of looking at a holistic approach to how we bring in and fill in the gaps of the city of the management of the people that are keeping our city running.
The people who make it safe for our constituents that you guys all care about so much, but those people, I mean, something that's coming up for me right now, as I'm listening to you folks is that how do we bring in people? Who are not just trying to get their contracts fixed.
This is not just a, like a inspectors issue.
I mean, I come to school board meetings.
We have teachers trying to get their contracts fixed.
And there's a mental health crisis across this country.
And there's a labor crisis, and these are labor questions, and I'm just would offer that thinking about the labor and the conditions that these people are living within.
And I'm just trying to think about this, not just 1 problem at a time as if it's isolated, but last week, you kept the board meeting started late because you were talking about middle housing.
Remember, you guys were talking about this big address item 18.
So, you're talking about housing, you're talking about material conditions of a group of people that you need to build up and uplift that have no moral.
So, I'm just wondering if you could comment from zoom on item 18.
This is on the restaurant inspection audit.
Esther brass churn do you wish to speak on 18? Followed by the call I do I just unmuted.
Hi, good evening.
Good evening.
So many, many years ago, I was a member of the board of directors of the department of food safety, health inspections in Berkeley and also thank the council for your detailed questions to encourage improvement.
I hope the division will follow the recommendations of the auditor's office.
It's really important for our health and safety.
Thank you.
Thank you call with a number 2, 1, 1, please.
Press star 6 to mute.
I had a friend, she work with the inspector and Berkeley restaurants, and she told me, if you see what I see, you will never go out to eat in restaurants in Berkeley.
True story.
It is very serious issue.
You heard about many people dying from food poisoning certain bacteria a few weeks ago.
Actually, I think it was last week.
It is really important for people to know exactly what they're putting in their mouth and support all of the restaurants from Berkeley.
But beyond that, I want to talk a bit about the global warming.
We are in very, very bad shape.
A couple of days ago was the hottest day on Earth.
Also, we have how do we deal with individuals global warming number 1 stop eating meat.
Actually, farms are a big producer of methane gas.
Methane gas is 90 times as effective as carbon dioxide.
And the way the animals, I stopped eating meat period.
Stop eating meat.
Don't use your conditioning, don't use heating, and reduce your energy to lowest level possible.
Thank you and have a good night.
Jet is our last speaker.
Jet, please unmute yourself.
Jet, are you there? Yes, yes, I just wanted to have a quick mention on.
I understand this is about inspection of the restaurants and so forth and food safety and all of that, but I did have 1 issue because I ran into somebody and the fat apples people, they've been waiting for an inspector to inspect their hood for their evacuation.
And if you have ever put a hood in your home for evacuation at your oven, you can imagine the restaurant and the fire system and everything and the cost and it's sitting there for months and months and not getting inspected and they really need that hood inspected.
So they can get back under operation or be crushed.
And I just wanted to say that.
Thank you.
No additional speakers.
The motion is to approve the recommendation, but the change the initial report back to December 2024.
We're now going to go to item 19, the appeal for 2610 street before we proceed with that item.
I'd like to make an announcement that I will be recusing myself on this matter.
Under the Levine act government code section 84308 subsection C individuals who've received contributions from a party to a land use proceeding need to recuse themselves from participating in that in that matter so I'm recusing myself and with that counselor taplin.
Yes, I will also be recusing myself under the same provision.
Thank you.
So I'm going to hand it over to vice mayor Wayne graph, who will be chairing this public hearing on this matter.
This public hearing.
Thank you.
Have a nice evening.
Okay, 1st.
I'd like to thank everybody for your patience.
Waiting excuse me, could you please.
Control yourself I want to thank everybody for your patience waiting.
It's been a long time.
So, thank you before we open the public hearing.
I'd like to know if my colleagues have ex parte disclosures.
And we'll go down the line Igor.
On July 29th, which was yesterday.
I spoke with Tim Frank.
And he said that the substance of the conversation was limited to my understanding that the Alameda county building trades has a particular viewpoint.
And you have you turned your paperwork into the clerk.
Thank you.
Madam vice mayor.
I have no disclosures.
Council member.
I have no disclosures.
Council member Bartlett.
Okay, I've submitted my disclosures to the clerk council member.
Nothing to discuss council member Luna path.
I submitted my disclosures to the clerk.
Thank you.
Thank you.
So this is the way it's going to go.
We will have a staff report and then.
The council members will have an opportunity to ask clarifying questions.
No comments or anything, but clarifying questions.
And in this particular case, the applicant and the appellant are the same.
It's a unique situation, but the applicant appellant will have 5 minutes.
Then the opposition will have 5 minutes.
How many people in the audience would like to speak.
So, a quick count, let's say 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8.
910 okay, it's a little more than 10 and so.
You'll each have 1 minute to speak.
However.
If you can organize yourselves, you can give your minute.
To another person, and they can have, they can accumulate up to 4 minutes.
No more, so you can figure out if you want to speak for 1 minute, or if you want to organize yourselves and have somebody represent you.
With up to 4 minutes.
Okay.
With that, we'll open the public hearing.
And are you presenting on this matter on the appeal of 2610 street administrative use permit? Zp2023-0031.
Yes, thank you.
I'm going to share my screen.
Can you see my screen? Yes.
Okay, thank you.
Good evening.
My name is Nelu Karimzadehgan.
And the project before you is at 2610 street.
This is the appeal of ZAP denial of administrative use permit numbers, Zp2023-0031.
In this presentation, I will go to, I will go over the project background and information.
The project timeline, some of the relevant ordinance definitions.
The appeal points and staff recommendations.
The project is located in the mixed use light industrial district, also known as Mealy.
It's between Parker and Carlton streets and 10th and 9th streets.
It's to the west of San Pablo Avenue and to the south of Dwight Way.
This is the fantasy records building.
It was originally built as a 2 story building.
And used as a recording company and later expanded to film production.
That was in 1971.
In 1980, there was an addition, which resulted in a 7 story building.
And the building was used as film post production and a 4th recording studio was added.
This was known as Salsanne's Media Center.
In 2004, fantasy records was sold to Concord Records and in 2007, building and studios were sold to Wareham Development.
The AUP before you is.
To change the use of 3 tenant spaces, a little under 10,000 square feet from media production to research and development.
Resulting in a total of about 30,000 square feet of research and development at the site and to create up to 9 tenant spaces.
The 1st floor plan, as you can see on the screen, we have the existing 1st floor plan and the proposed 1st floor plan on the right.
The green is for research and development.
The magenta is media production and the former fantasy recording studios is shown with a dash.
Blue line, as you can see on the left side where I'm pointing out this magenta area, which is about 6500 square feet is currently media production and that's proposed to change to research and development on the right.
Where I'm pointing under this AUP moving on to the 2nd floor, we see that this area that I'm pointing out to purple about 3200 square feet.
It's currently media production and under this AUP is proposed to be research and development.
In the district, up to 20,000 square feet of research and development is permitted with a buy right over the counter zoning certificates.
To establish over 20,000 square feet of research and development, an AUP is required.
As you can see in this timeline.
A zoning certificate was approved to change about 20,000 square feet from media production to research and development.
The AUP before you was received in March of last year.
And that was to change about 10,000 additional 10,000 square feet of media production to research and development.
This AUP was approved by the zoning officer in the November of last year and was appealed by the members of the public in December of last year.
Because they thought that the use must be considered Artcraft Studio, which is a protected use and not media production, which is not a protected use.
This decision went to ZAB.
On April 25th, 2024, this year, and ZAB denied the AUP based on their interpretation of.
The definitions, the uses established at the site, the history of the uses established at the site and West Berkeley plan intents.
Media production in the ordinance is defined as commercial arts and arts related business services, including audio and film recording.
And editing studios and services, some examples include film and video production, motion picture, radio and television broadcasts and et cetera.
Artcraft Studio is an establishment engaged in the creation of art and craft that requires artistic skills.
Some examples include woodworkers, potters, ceramicists, photographers, filmmakers, sculptors.

Segment 5

copters, video artists, and et cetera.
ArtCraft Studio is considered a protected non-industrial use in this district, provided that it was legally established as of July 6th, 1989 and exists as a single standalone use or combined with residential use in a live work unit.
According to city records, uses that were established prior to the cutoff date of July 6th, 1989 for establishing a protected use meet the definition of media production.
If there has been any ArtCraft Studio uses established at the site, they have not existed as a single standalone use or combined with residential use in a live work unit.
Therefore, the existing uses of the building are not protected uses.
In summary, ArtCraft Studio uses are studio spaces for art production, performing art instruction, and rehearsal studios.
Media production use is commercial arts and arts-related business services involving various media types.
Even though there are overlapping aspects of creative work that are included in the definition of media production and ArtCraft Studio, the established use as of July 6th, 1989 and the existing film production use meets the media production definition.
Since a number of other uses have shared the building with the existing use, it would not have been a single standalone use.
Appeal point 1, the existing established use meets the media production definition.
Staff agrees with the applicant appellant point and notes that the established use as of July 6th, 1989 was media production, which is not a protected non-industrial use.
The long existing film and video production use is consistent with the current definition of media production.
The Salzans Film Center was a commercial arts business service consisting of several recording and editing studios and office spaces for the purpose of producing various forms of media, including music and film.
Appeal point 2, Appendix B to the West Berkeley area plan distinguishes the film, video, and record production companies located at the fantasy building from the identified ArtCraft Studios in West Berkeley.
Staff agrees with the applicant appellant and notes that despite the overlap of artistic work in both uses, the West Berkeley plan considers two separate categories for media production and ArtCraft Studio.
West Berkeley plan was adopted in 1993 and zoning ordinance was amended in 1999 to implement the West Berkeley plan and include provisions for protected uses.
West Berkeley plan explicitly identifies the building in question as falling in the category of media production.
As you can see in this figure, figure 1 for cultural resources of West Berkeley, it notes that in addition to ArtCraft Studios, there are also film, video, and record production companies in West Berkeley at the fantasy building and in other locations.
Staff recommends that the City Council hold a public hearing and at the conclusion of the hearing do one of the following options.
A, uphold the appeal and reverse the Zoning Adjustment Board decision, thereby approving the AUP or B, deny the appeal and affirm the Zoning Adjustment Board decision, thereby denying administrative use permit.
The City Council also can continue or remand this item to ZAP.
This concludes my presentation.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much, Lilo.
Okay, questions from the Council? Yes, Cecilia.
Thank you.
I have one quick question for staff.
This space that for the permit that we're currently discussing, how long has it been vacant without any tenants? According to the applicant, since 2018.
Thank you.
That's my only question.
Any other questions? No? Yes, Council Member Bartlett.
Thank you.
This question is for staff as well.
What is the tenant occupancy? You mean in the entire building? Yeah, in the building, particularly among the the implicated class as well.
The filming? Well, I think when the applicant comes up, he could answer that.
Sure.
Council Member Chaygo.
Yeah, this is not a question, but it has since the beginning of the hearing come to my attention that I have another ex parte to disclose.
That was a call that came into our office, and so a member of my staff took the call.
That was also yesterday, July 29, with our buck.
I will make a written note as a supplement to my other ex parte.
Thank you.
Okay, no further questions.
Okay, is there somebody here representing LAM? Yes, please come forward.
You have five minutes to make your presentation.
Okay, we're being overshared here.
Okay, can I move it? Good evening, Chris Barlow, Wareham Development.
Staff's done a very comprehensive job.
I can abbreviate my presentation because some of it would be duplicative.
Here is an aerial shot of the building.
The annex section, which is the lower one with the brown roof, is the original recording studio that was built in 1971.
The tower section of building, which as Neelu mentioned, was added in 1980, is really the subject of what we're discussing here today.
The film post-production center that was built for the Zantz company.
Okay, now we're not moving, Judy.
You perhaps stop the clock, please.
Is that possible? Go to the next slide.
Okay, is it this one? Thank you.
I apologize.
Okay.
This is moving far too quickly.
Here we are.
This is the recording studio space.
I just want to point out one thing.
The bottom left-hand corner there, you'll notice is also media production.
That is the former Studio C.
That is still remaining as media production.
For those who are familiar with the building, that is the building where the Foley work, which was the sound work associated with the Foley project, was built.
which was the sound work associated with films was done.
The special effects are special tanks in there where they drop watermelons, etc.
Let's move on.
This is the interior of the recording studio space so that people can actually see what is inside there.
You can see the recording studio on the top left.
What was the control room before the control console was taken out and the lobby area underneath there.
This is the second floor space.
And that was a storage area that was built specifically for the storage of original tapes and original vinyl masters.
You can actually see in the background there, there was a Halon gas suppression system in there.
This was never an occupied space by the prior uses.
Okay.
What's going on in the building? And I think this will come to Council Member Bartlett's question shortly.
We have a mix in here of large media production tenants, a large number of small media production tenants, seven not-for-profits.
You can read who those companies are there.
The multiple tenants that make up the small media production are the community.
They are the heartbeat of that building.
This is the group of independent filmmakers represented here who were brought into the building by Saul as kindred spirits.
And when we purchased the building in 2007, they entered into leases with us.
They formed their own community.
Each of them has an individual lease, but they are separate, as you see, from the larger media production companies, which are Avid and Cuckoo Studios there.
And we have the childcare facility, which was with Disney and Pixar.
You'll notice there that there are 25 tenants in media production.
To answer Council Member Bartlett's question, here we have a breakdown of the spaces.
Large offices, small offices, and the small offices are the ones that typically are used by the media production companies.
There are 37 of those available in the building.
And there's a vacancy there in the tower on the, my floor, you'll see on the sixth floor, there are 37 of those offices, 26 are vacant.
There are 31 small offices on the fourth floor where four are vacant.
The vacancy area that I've shown in green is the subject of the AUP.
Here is the sixth floor.
Everything that's in purple is leased out.
Everything that's in white is a vacant office.
I share this to let you know there is plenty of room in the building right now for this group of media production companies.
In fact, there's enough room there for an 80% expansion.
What do these spaces look like? They look like offices because they are small offices.
On the upper floors there, you can see them.
They've got very nice views.
Part of the things we've done in the building in support of this community is we've entered into shorter term leases with the companies because they like to be very flexible.
We've made available to them the split theater there which is available for their mixing, et cetera.
And we rent that out in a very conservative rate.
And we also set up with the city and the Zantz company early on, the Berkey Film Foundation shortly after we took over the building.
The organizations you see there are those that have been supported by our organization in the media sector.
This is a section of what a studio looks like in terms of its height.
I appear to have been defeated by the technology.
If I might have another 15 seconds, I will wrap.
Okay.
May I just answer the question that came from Council Member Napera? You had asked when the studios were last leased out.
The last tenant in the..
When we purchased the building in 2007, there was a tenant in there, the Concord Music Group that you heard bought the Zantz company's record collection.
They moved out in 2008.
That was the last tenant in the building.
In 2008, the ownership of the building took over the operation of the studios and we operated them ourselves for 10 years thereafter.
So we got a license for the Fantasy Studios name from Concord Music Group.
We ran the studio at a significant loss, but I might add, for 10 years from 2008 to 2018 to try and keep it in operation.
Okay.
Are you representing the opposition? Okay.
Okay.
Hi, my name is Vivian Kleinman and I moved into the Fantasy Building in around 1986.
We're hearing a lot of reference to media production and the distinction between filmmakers and media production.
Let me explain that the fact is the filmmakers are artists.
We don't manufacture stuff.
We create films that give equal gravitas to the art of filmmaking and the subject matter.
Indeed, I recently received the Eureka Fellowship for Artists, an honor given to 12 visual artists, only two of whom are filmmakers.
My point, in the eyes of the world, filmmakers are artists.
To Ram's point about vacancy, for several years, I've had an office on that sixth floor that he said that Chris just referenced as being vacant.
I forget the number of offices he said are now vacant.
Two years ago, we were, prior to two years ago, it was full occupancy, mostly filmmakers.
We were forced to let go of our offices and some of us got shoehorned into the fourth floor space.
Some of us were given space in the annex on the second floor, where I am, and some people chose that moment to leave the building entirely.
We did not vacate the sixth floor voluntarily.
It was fully filled with primarily filmmakers like myself.
I think I'll stop there and let Rick take over.
Thank you very much.
Let's see if you have any questions.
I can't get there from here.
My name is Rick Auerbach, the staff of the West Berkeley Arts and Industry Council.
I was on the subcommittee of the Planning Commission, where with Berkeley City staff, we wrote the arts protections in 1989.
I'll respond to specific points made in Wareham's appeal letter.
I want to preface that by saying that Wareham contends that the core issue is one of classification, whether filmmaking should be defined as media production or arts and crafts use.
This is not the legal point at issue here.
The legal point is what was the intention of the drafters of the arts section of the protected uses zoning provisions.
That is what matters.
We can argue till the cows come home about whether filmmakers belong in arts and crafts or in media production.
But that actually legally doesn't matter.
And there are arguments to be made on all sides of that issue.
Almost all the definitions of filmmaking include the word arts.
That's why the Oscars are given from the Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Pacific USC Film School of the Art of Filmmaking.
It's always been considered an art.
And the inclusion of the word filmmakers by the drafters leaves no reasonable doubt that the intention of the city staff, who ultimately wrote those protections, was that filmmakers be a protected use such that when and where that activity took place in the space, that space would then be considered a protected art and craft studio.
Subsequently, in 2006 and 2011, the definition of art and craft studio in the glossary, which is the meat and potatoes of the protected use section, was brought by city council and referred to the Arts Commission twice, 2006 and 2011, to examine that list of artists and the whole definition and the protected uses and to see if that needed any updating.
I was called in as a consultant during both of those periods of times to the Arts Commission, and both times they affirmed that filmmakers belonged in that list of protected arts uses.
And additionally, the Appellant Wareham Corporation is attempting to retroactively place a named activity, filmmaking, a named protected activity, in the classification media production that didn't even exist in the Berkeley Municipal Code at the time that the arts protections were written.
That category was only installed, I think, quite some years later.
So this is not logical to be moving this in this way now.
Another issue continually brought up is one of business licenses.
That's it.
Your time is up.
Okay.
Because you shared up to five minutes with Ms.
Kleiman.
Okay, so there's a number of legal points I was trying to make.
We have to respond to Wareham, yeah.
We'll keep the public hearing open if we have questions.
Okay, thank you.
I can't really hear what you're saying, Susan.
Okay, I'm sorry.
We will keep the public hearing open and if anybody on the dais has questions, we will direct them to you.
I do have a question.
Yes, you go.
Thank you, Madam Vice Mayor.
Thank you, Wick.
I was curious when you said the Arts Commission affirmed the definition twice.
Did that go to council? Can you provide additional context on the nature of such an affirmation? Twice, the City Council asked the Arts Commission, both in 2006 and 2011, to take a look at the whole arts protections and the definition of our craft studio in the glossary of the zoning ordinance in order to make sure that the definition was keeping up with the times.
And, you know, so every part of that, every word, and that was examined by the Arts Commission at that point.
And then we added like the use of computers was allowed within our, you know, things that in 1989 weren't really prominent.
So we wanted to make sure specifically that artists that use computers in their work were also included in those protections.
And those updated definitions both times were passed by the City Council.
That was what came out of the Arts Commission and back to the council with the updated definitions.
And both times, the word filmmakers was left in and actually the term video artists was added.
Okay, thank you.
You said that you had two other points.
Could you concisely summarize them just in a minute or less, if possible? Sure, one of the points was the appellant talks a lot about, and the staff, you know, business licenses and such for Art and Craft Studio.
And so what we have to say about that is that almost all the filmmakers in the Fantasy Building, they have businesses license, business licenses that are for filmmakers or filmmaking.
But also it doesn't matter whether the existence of particular permits in the city records does not and cannot negate the actual use of a space by a renter or owner in determining a matter of legal occupancy or the definition.
So if a filmmaker was there making films, that by its nature means that that space was legally protected as an arts and crafts use, whether they had a business license or not.
And the ordinance doesn't specify anything about a business license also.
Thank you.
Thank you.
If you would like to speak now, please line up on the side of the room.
And excuse me, Vice Mayor.
Yes.
Hi, I just wanted to, I'm Samantha Updegrave, Zoning Officer.
And I wanted to provide a little more background on some of the ordinances that Council Member Trigu was asking about.
Is now an appropriate time? Yes, please.
Okay.
So changes did go back in 2011 to the City Council that were adopted by ordinance that did increase the definition of arts and crafts.
So as the speaker was saying, there was a prohibition on using computers.
Times changed a lot.
Those things were added in to make the definition more inclusive.
I would also point out that we have had a definition within the zoning ordinance from, I believe in the 1960s, that was called radio, television, or audio sound recording and broadcast studios.
So that had been in the code when the West Berkeley zoning amendments were adopted in 1999.
And it was in 2011 that that term changed to media production.
And given the definition.
So we did have both of those terms and there were changes made in 2011 through City Council ordinance.
Thank you very much.
I'm gonna go to the people on Zoom first.
We have two speakers on Zoom.
Deborah Sanderson.
Okay, can you hear me? Yes, I can.
Okay.
I wanna encourage the council to uphold this appeal and which would mean upholding the administrative use permit.
I was on ZAB and at that time, I voted the opposite direction.
But as I've reviewed all the materials, again, I think it's clearly media production, not a protected space for artists and crafts use.
If that were true, then the whole building would be protected space for arts and crafts use.
And that's not the intent of that type of use.
So, and in the past, I was there from 2003 through 2013.
We always went by the business license to determine if a use was established.
If people didn't get a business license, then they couldn't claim the protection no matter what they did in the space.
So, I think that the AUP should be approved, issued and the appeal upheld, which would mean the appeal by WEBAC would be denied.
Just because artistic activities happen in more than one use, doesn't mean that the best fit for that use is going to always be arts and crafts space.
So, thank you.
Thank you very much.
The next speaker is Sabira Kashi.
Hi, do you hear me? Yes, we can.
Yeah, I just would like to say that I actually worked in the building between 2008 to 2010.
And this building is like really a legendary like cultural heritage for the city of Berkeley.
Some of the most important movies of all times have been done in this building and continues to be like really like a cultural legacy.
And I think it's really important for the city of Berkeley to protect this building for filmmakers, documented filmmakers to produce the really high quality films that they have produced here and they continue to produce.
And it's very hard for filmmaking community right now with all the prices for independent filmmakers.
And I think it's very important for the city to protect filmmakers.
Thank you very much.
Kelly Hammergren.
Thank you.
I was there the evening that Zab took the vote on this and I would hope that you support Zab again tonight.
As we had discussion earlier today and over the weeks that I've attended council the arts are in trouble in Berkeley and filmmaking is an art.
It's not a media production.
And so I hope that you will support the filmmakers.
Thank you.
Thank you, Kelly.
Okay.
Now we'll go to speakers in the room.
First speaker, please.
Hello, my name is Eva Diaz and I would like to sit my time to Steve.
Thank you.
I'm Steven Most.
I've lived in Berkeley 27 years working as a documentary filmmaker often working with filmmakers in the fantasy building.
I wrote a book, Stories Make the World Reflections on Storytelling and the Art of the Documentary.
It has chapters about films made in Berkeley that were Academy Award Best Documentary Nominees.
They include Promises, Berkeley in the 60s and Freedom on My Mind.
And if anyone doubts that documentary filmmaking is an art I brought some books to give you.
So I think that you deny the appeal and affirm the zoning board's decision.
Thank you.
My name is Heather and I'm ceding my minutes to Maureen Gosling.
My name is Maureen Gosling and I'm a documentary.

Segment 6

filmmaker.
I've been working in film since 1972.
I've been working at the Fantasy Building since 1994, so that's 30 years.
The Berkeley filmmaking community, with its hub at the Saul Zantz Media Center Fantasy Studios, has created a legacy and made an outsized and significant contribution to the art of film in the United States and in the world.
Our interdependent community includes directors, editors, cinematographers, writers, graphic artists, composers, sound mixers, and much more.
The legacy includes dozens of Academy Award-winning and nominated dramatic films and documentaries, from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest to The Most Dangerous Man in America, Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers, at least a dozen Emmy Award and nominated films, such as Have You Heard from Johannesburg?, a seven-part series on the world anti-apartheid movement, and Sundance Film Festival winners, such as Daughter from Da Nang and Crip Camp.
Fantasy Studios and the Fantasy Film Center have been an integral part of the making of these films for narration, voiceover recording, film screenings, sound mixes, and much more.
In the time that I have been there, I have felt the art space being slowly chipped away, chipped away, chipped away, and then now it seems like that is happening again.
And it's really easy to sort of reach a stasis point and then chip away a little bit more, just take a little bit more of these people's space away.
And so it kind of feels like that right now, and I really appreciate what Sabra said.
She sort of said it in a very beautiful and succinct way.
Thank you.
Hello.
Hello, I'm Claire Schoen.
I'm a resident of Berkeley.
I worked at the Saul Zantz Film Center, known as the Fantasy Building, for 18 years when Saul owned the building.
By supporting our work, keeping our rents low, he created a thriving and productive arts community where award-winning, socially relevant films were created.
When Wareham bought the building, it was clear from the beginning that they wanted us all out.
My rent was doubled, then it was tripled.
They refused to talk to us as a group, but instead tried to divide us, picking us off one by one.
I felt driven out, and I left.
But others stayed, and I'm really grateful to them.
We need this community.
They provide jobs, they mentor new talent, they create meaningful art, and they're part of Berkeley's history.
The idea that the filmmakers in this building are not artists is absurd.
Please do not let Wareham destroy this independent film community.
Thank you.
I have a person ceding a minute to me, if that's all right.
What a long night.
I'm just tired.
I'm very tired.
Thank you for your continued attention.
I'll try to be succinct here.
My name is Jacob Bloomfield-Misrach.
I own the company, Berkeley Sound Artists, which has been in this building for 25 years.
Me and my cohorts are here tonight with a very simple goal, which is to protect a community.
The zoning that was put in place for this building was for the intention of our people and these filmmakers.
At the time, it was just a building of filmmakers, and the intent, again, was to give us one roof under which we can all share our arts.
I'm a musician and a sound artist, and I work regularly with writers and directors and other types of artists.
We collaborate to make films like the Steph Curry documentary that came out last year on Apple, the Barbara Lee film that came out a couple years ago and won the NAACP Best Documentary Award, Crip Camp, which the Obamas produced, and was nominated for Academy Award.
Those are the films that I'm a part of, that I work with these beautiful people with, and that being in one building allows us to work in that way.
If we were all spread out or not protected by this zoning, it would be a lot harder for us to do what we do.
We also honestly bring in millions of tax dollars from all of these films that garner a lot of attention and win a lot of awards, and we're very happy to pay those tax dollars to Berkeley and would love to keep doing so.
Thank you for your attention.
I would like to cede my time.
Good evening.
I'm Frank Samacona.
I'm a live multi-camera director who's been at the Fantasy Building for 13 years.
I direct for television, operas, and symphonies, and ballet across the U.S.
and in the Bay Area.
As I've said, I've been there for 13 years, and there's no other place like it.
It is unique to the Bay Area, Northern California, and the U.S.
I don't know anywhere else where there are as many editors, sound mixers, and designers, producers, writers, directors, executive producers under one roof.
It's a place of collaboration, a think tank of artists who come together to share their work with each other.
We bounce ideas off each other, give each other feedback, and that's what a community of artists is all about.
For the last two summers, I've employed my granddaughter who is in college learning filmmaking.
While at ZANCE, I've introduced her to other filmmakers, animators, editors, and sound designers, and hopefully she and other young artists will be able to return to join the next generation of filmmakers at ZANCE who will sustain the culture and filmmaking in the West Berkeley Arts District.
Thank you.
Hi, my name is Mel Morris, and I'm a filmmaker, and I've had the privilege of working with other filmmakers in the ZANCE media studio over the years, and many of the speakers have eloquently spoken to the points that I wanted to make primarily about the community of filmmakers at the center that is so unique, and I speak from the perspective, I'm not a current tenant, but I was back in, I guess, 10 years ago now that I made the first film, and I came to the center as an intern from Berkeley City College.
I guess I would consider myself the next generation, although I share the same hair as a lot of these folks, but it's just a, I came into an established group of veteran filmmakers who just welcomed me, and I learned from all of them, and it was because we shared the same kitchen, and the same coffee maker, and the same theater studio, and it wouldn't have happened otherwise.
Thank you.
Hi, my name is Richard Burmak.
I just want to give you a little sense of my history of why it's so important to protect these artists in this building.
I was originally part of the Berkeley film community with many of the people in that building in the early, mid-1970s, at which time we were on a building on Hollis Street.
We were then kicked out of that building when the property was taken over by the truckers, the law enforcement, and the police, and we were kicked out of that building when the property was taken over by the truckers below, who threw our space in to their own office space for the truckers that took it over.
Then in 1980, around 1980, then we moved to another building, I think it was called the Chiron Building, which was practically deserted at the time.
Then we got built up with people like the Jewish Film Festival, a whole bunch of other people who were interested in fantasy.
I had to leave in the 1980s because I was a photographer, I needed a dark room, there wasn't water in the facility, I had those.
So then eventually I went to another building in Berkeley on 4th Street, but that got redeveloped away for redevelopment reasons because of the flaky nature of the landlord.
So then I joined the Berkeley community in 1908, and was there for about 1990s to the building was sold.
Good evening, I'm John Curl.
I was a member of the West Berkeley Planning Committee decades ago, who wrote the Boston Crafts Protections into Berkeley's zoning ordinance in close collaboration with city staff.
I was also chair of WeBake for many years.
I can assure you, from my personal participation as a committee member, that it was always the explicit intention of the framers of the ordinance that filmmakers are included as a protected class of art studios, and that the filmmaker studios in the fantasy building were specifically discussed and included as examples of art studios that the ordinance was intending to protect.
Therefore, I urge you to continue to support the West Berkeley Plan and to uphold the arts protections for the filmmaker studios in the fantasy building.
Thank you.
Next speaker, please.
Hi, so if you talk to Rick at the end of the meeting, he has a full list of the filmmakers who were there in 2007, and of them, apparently 17 were forced out by very large raises in their rent.
Furthermore, I think the distinction between arts and crafts and media production is dubious at best.
A photograph is a piece of art, but then you line up a bunch of photographs and play them really rapidly.
That's not art? That seems very strange to me.
Anyway, we don't want Berkeley to become a culturally dead city, so it's important to preserve communities like this.
So, when I was on council, I had the pleasure of going into the building, and I want to thank all the filmmakers for being here, because your spaces aren't normally seen, and I appreciate all the work that you do.
How are you even trying to change your definition and not say that filmmaking is art? I mean, what kind of crap is this? This is so bizarre, I can't even believe it.
I've lived in Berkeley 43 years, and I've always appreciated what's come out of that building, the music, the films, the documentaries, going into the building and sitting under the picture and on the bench from a film that they just named now.
I can't think of the name of it.
Yeah, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.
It was such a joy while I was on council.
So, you have to uphold the Zab decision and appreciate the vibrant filmmaking community that Berkeley and West Berkeley District 2 has.
And it's shameful that the mayor and the District 2 had to recuse themselves.
We know they're bought and sold, but that just gave it a seal.
We know now for sure.
Thank you.
Hello, I'm Judy Wetterer.
Jeffrey Zurek, who is the executive director of Berkeley Humane, intended to be here tonight to address you.
He is in Chico rescuing pets who've been displaced by the park fire, and he asked that we read this to you.
Dear council members, you may not be aware that the Berkeley East Bay Humane Society, Berkeley Humane, has been a tenant at 2610th Street since 2011, where we lease several offices for our administrative functions.
Our shelter is undersized for the volume of pets we support, which is an ongoing challenge.
All available space in the shelter is dedicated to animal care, including adoptions, training, and our veterinary hospital, which means that our human resources funding, fundraising, and finance functions must be located elsewhere.
We understand that there have been proposals to reclassify the 2610th Street building as arts and crafts studios, and that will result in office users like us having to move out.
The location directly opposite our main operation at 9th and Carlton is ideal for us, especially as we were allowed to bring our animal friends into the office.
Moving would be very expensive and disruptive for us, and finding similar space for a price we can afford would be nearly impossible.
We are one of several non-for-profit organizations in the building, and we ask that you take consideration in the impact of the services we provide our community as part of your deliberations.
Sincerely, Jeffrey.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay, are there any other people in the audience now who would like to make a comment? Okay, seeing none, and I don't see any on Zoom either.
I'll bring, yes.
Hi, I'm Jenny Olson.
I'm a Berkeley filmmaker.
I don't know if you can see my, or can I? No, it's not possible.
Okay.
Thank you for your patience.
It's been very insightful.
Ben wants these few, I can't read this, something and square feet for R&D.
Well, Wareham has 1 million square feet of R&D.
In West Berkeley, there is another million square feet of unreleased R&D sitting empty right now within a few blocks of Fantasy.
There is an additional 1 million square feet.
At the planning department? Thank you, guys.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
And really, filmmaking is an art.
Clearly.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay, I'm going to bring the discussion back to the dais, and I'd like to say a few more words to get us started.
First off, I was on the planning commission when we wrote the West Berkeley plan, and I'm very familiar with the discussions, the lengthy discussions that we had about protected space.
It took us eight years to write that plan.
And Rick and John Curl, I remember those discussions very vividly.
Also, as many of you know, my husband was involved with that building since 1971.
He was there from the very, very beginning and did the post-production sound on about 135 feature films during his career, and also untold number of documentaries.
So, as you all know, and I consider myself part of your community, even though I was seduced into this crazy job of being a politician.
You all know that I was once an independent documentary filmmaker myself.
So, I'm very, very sympathetic.
And I also want you to know that I cherish, I absolutely cherish the community that we have here in Berkeley.
And we need to nurture you and we need to keep you here.
So, I just wanted to say that and get that off my chest.
But I also have to say, and this is the part you're not going to like, that when we, my memory is that when we were talking about arts and crafts use, there was a lot of emphasis at that time, and this is many years ago, on artisans, on people who made things with their hands, on woodworkers and ceramicists, and glass blowers, and people who were not able to work in ordinary office spaces.
They needed something special in order to do their craft, in order to do their art.
A fantasy building, and I know it very well, is an office building.
It's seven floors of offices.
And because of the way the industry, the film industry has changed over time, films are now no longer films.
Films are now no longer films.
There used to be an analog process, and now it's a digital process.
And films are made on computers.
And, excuse me, I have the floor.
And so, it's possible to work in an office space and create films now.
I just want to point out on the map that we were given that, let's focus on the space that this application is about.
So, if you turn to I don't know, the pages aren't numbered, but the proposed project on the first floor, those spaces, my memory is that those spaces were the recording studio, the record recording studio.
And the space has changed over time, by the way, because the building evolved.
The pink space in the lower left-hand corner, which I think Mr.
Barlow referred to as the Foley studio, wasn't always a Foley studio.
It was a 16 millimeter mixed studio in the very early days.
That's actually the room where I first met my husband.
So, now I'm being nostalgic.
But that space is not being proposed to be converted.
That space would stay.
Most of the filmmakers, my understanding is, and I also want to disclose, and I'm on the board of the Berkley Film Foundation, are on the fourth floor.
And the space that's proposed to be converted is on the first floor and the second floor.
So, this is my question, and I think that this is really the heart of the matter.
The filmmaking community is feeling threatened.
And that's not a good thing.
And we don't, I personally don't want the filmmaking community to be threatened.
But I'm trying to understand what is the threat.
And I want to put a question to Mr.
Barlow.
Is there any intention to displace this community of filmmakers? And I just want to say also, this is a part of the community.
Not every filmmaker in the building is here tonight, and I know that.
So, is there any intention on Wareham's part to displace this community? Because this community is very important to the city of Berkley.
The legacy of this group, as was pointed out, is enormous.
And I want to do everything I can to help this community stay here.
So, I'm going to put you on the spot.
Can I answer that question in two parts? The first part is, as part of the AUP, absolutely no displacement of filmmakers.
The spaces have been vacant for a long time.
So, no filmmakers have been displaced by the areas under the AUP.
Long term, we would love more filmmakers.
I would love to have those 30 offices filled with additional filmmakers.
No intention to displace filmmakers in the building.
And are you intending to renew their leases, extend their leases, if they want a 10-year lease? Is that a possibility? We've always offered the filmmakers in the building, as long the lease is 10 years, would be fantastic.
When we first bought the building, as was mentioned, we sat down with every tenant individually.
And in that process, we learned of some of the challenges they're in, one of which is the cyclical nature of their funding.
They've often only got money for two or three years.
They asked if they could go to two or three-year leases.
Ours is a world of seven, 10, 15-year leases.
So, we agreed to do two or three-year leases with them.
Five-year leases, 10-year leases, fantastic.
And if you're a tenant with a longer-term lease, that guarantees you your ability to stay in the building.
All you basically have to do is pay your rent and not trash the place.
But that's the way that tenants guarantee themselves the 10-year inspect.
Okay, thank you.
Does that answer your question? Yeah, thank you.
Thank you.
And now, questions or comments from my colleagues? I pushed the button.
What? I'm in line.
Oh, sorry.
Council Member Hunt.
Well, thank you very much.
I have a couple questions for both sides of this equation here.
I guess if maybe someone could answer for the filmmaker community.
I would like to know what this particular space has been used for or could be used for from a filmmaking perspective.
I'm not, I do not have the knowledge that Council Member Weingraf has about this craft.
So, I'm curious what kind of filmmaking tenant has or would, yeah, sure, anyone who thinks they can answer this.
I'm trying to.
Before we, before, Vivian, before you answer, we need to extend the meeting.
Okay, I'll make a motion to extend the meeting until 11.15.
Second.
Okay.
Roll call, please.
Okay, Council Member.
I second.
Yeah.
Cecilia seconded.
Council Member Keserwani.
Yes.
Taplin is absent.
Bartlett.
Yes.
Trigub.
Aye.
Hahn.
Yes.
Weingraf.
Yes.
Lunapara.
Yes.
Thumber.
Yes.
And Mary Erving is absent.
My motion carries.
Okay, thank you.
All right, and please, since we don't have a lot of time, if the answers can be succinct to everyone.
So, I'd like to know this particular space, what would the use be for a filmmaker? Well, first of all, the space was gutted without anybody asking about the filmmaker's use of the space.
There was a small screening room that I used once a month prior to where I'm taking over the building, after which we were not allowed to use that little screening room on the first floor.
Mr.
Barlow showed you an empty space, but prior to that, there had been opportunities for us to use those spaces before they were gutted.
The recording studios, for example, I understand that Jeffrey Wood was very active and continued to be using that space, and it was in the black, but it got gutted without anybody's input.
So, could that be reversed? Yes, but with a lot of money.
But I have to speak to one other comment, which is that the sixth floor is empty, not because- Okay, I'm only having you answer the questions I ask.
Thank you.
So, you're saying that these were previously outfitted in a way that they were a screening room and a production room or something? You know, quiet rooms to record narration, music, whatever.
Okay.
And the other question I have that perhaps you or others can answer is, do you feel at this time that your own tenancies in other spaces are at risk? Yes, we were never offered anything more than a very short lease.
Nobody offered us a longer lease, and I assure you, I've been doing filmmaking since the late 70s.
I don't need a two-year lease.
Did you have that one-on-one meeting with the owner? I did not.
Okay, were you in the building at the time? I was in the building since 19, what it was, 85, 86.
I guess for the owner, I would just say there's someone here who would like a longer lease.
Maybe you can talk after the meeting.
Yeah, thank you.
And then I think someone else just wanted to add something.
Mr.
Aldack, unfortunately, you have to come all the way up.
Wareham attempted to sell the building a few years ago.
After they did not receive the price they wanted, they all of a sudden decided that these protected spaces, the owner, Rich Robbins, is on the record as saying that these spaces were protected.
In 2008, city staff said they were protected.
I'm sorry, you're not answering my question.
Okay, so they tried to sell the building, and we think that they may try to sell the building again, so that puts the filmmakers at risk.
What's important tonight is that we come out affirming that the filmmakers are in protected arts and space.
That's the essential core of the issue here.
There is a space at issue, and we can argue that all film includes sound.
All the definition of making film includes, you know, narration or music.
I honestly really just need my questions answered.
That's the space at issue.
I think perhaps you didn't hear my question.
Why don't you take a deep breath and listen to my question.
Okay, go ahead.
I want to know if the spaces that are currently occupied by filmmakers are at risk.
That's all.
I'm trying to get the answer to that question.
Are you saying that they have the same use designation, therefore they are at risk, or have people been told they need to leave, or I'm trying to understand the risk here.
If you affirm the appeal tonight, it puts in question the protections on the filmmakers as art and craft studio space.
So are the spaces the filmmakers currently occupied the same designation, or are they different?.

Segment 7

Well, the same designation, that's the question.
I mean, who's making the designation? I guess you'd have to ask city staff what they call those, if they call those Art and Craft Studios.
We did call them in one staff report.
Other staff people said they were definitely protected spaces.
Okay.
I'll ask staff.
Good point.
I really would like an answer to this question.
If there's someone from staff who can explain to me the spaces that these existing studios are in that are not in question here, but that could be in the future, what are they designated? Do they have the same designation as this space? The spaces would currently be designated based on what zoning certificate they had at the time.
There's a mix of uses within the building.
Some of them could be considered Art and Craft Studio, others are offices, others are media production.
Then the use of the building as a whole was media production.
Does that answer your question? You're saying that some of the spaces these folks occupy are considered office, some are considered arts and crafts, and some are considered media production? Correct.
Are you just talking about the sixth floor? I guess so, yes.
The floor where the filmmakers are.
I'm trying to understand if they have designations that this owner can come a year from now, and ask to clarify or switch to R&D or whatever.
That's what I'm trying to understand.
Sure.
Well, I'll let the chair decide.
Right now, staff is speaking, so let's let them finish.
There are a number of different zoning certificates throughout the building.
Some are media production, non-profit video production, video production services, touring studio for web applications, film education.
I think we would have to do more.
I think it's still a mix.
Okay.
It's more complicated than I imagined.
Within on the sixth floor.
Okay.
But I would, yeah.
No, thank you.
I thought it might be simple, but it's not.
Aileen? Yeah.
The one thing I wanted to add is just to go back to the protected uses, that the protected uses only apply if the arts and crafts studio existed prior to 89.
Even if there's a zoning certificate, as Samantha said, for a space on the sixth floor, that's an artist studio, if that wasn't established prior to 89, it's not a protected use.
I see.
Okay.
Correct.
Thank you for clarifying that, Aileen.
The building itself was not an art and craft studio.
In 1986, it was a media production.
So, at the time of the designation, so in order to be protected, art and craft studio had to exist as of July 6th, 1989, and as a standalone use.
Okay.
Thank you very much.
I appreciate it.
I have some questions for the owner.
Sir, thank you very much.
I'm curious, since I know that there is a lot of R&D space in West Berkeley and folks are having a lot of trouble renting that out, I believe you are involved in a massive new complex.
Is that correct? No, that's not you.
I think you're confusing with Berkeley Commons.
May I just clarify that point for you? Sure.
The figure that's been put out by the Office of Economic Development, which is a recent number, I think that Rick is referring to, talks about there being a million square feet vacant.
That is because there are two major new projects about to come online that don't have a tenant in place.
So, those are buildings that are not yet leased out, but OED has put them in their bucket of available space.
Yeah, they're on the market and they're not leased.
OED is not making a mistake.
It's a new product that's come on the market.
Fine, but they're not being leased.
It's not a great environment for that.
So, my question for you is.
What are you expecting to fill the space with tomorrow? Why is it so urgent to change the designation on this space that appears to be sort of windowless and in the bowels of the building? So, as was pointed out earlier, we've already converted 20,000 square feet into research and development.
And you've seen from the photograph there, we're working on that.
That is that one sliver space there.
We lost one tenant.
Who was going to take 20,000 square feet, but needed adjacent expansion space.
So, that is the logical expansion space there.
It's on the ground floor.
It's in the right place.
It doesn't interfere with any other adjacency there.
So, we'd like to get that added to the 20,000 square feet we have.
And then the space on the 2nd floor, as you've seen is never been occupied as a storage space.
So, you're just hoping that you'll be able to attract an R&D tenant.
Whilst other developers have vacancy, we have been remarkably successful in West Berkeley in finding R&D tenants is what we do well.
Okay, what about the other spaces on the 6th floor? Are you planning to change there? The 6th floor? The floor that these folks are on? So, on the ground floor, the space is a double volume and they work for R&D.
They're on ground floor.
As you get up the building, the capacity the floor has is office level capacity.
It was built, as was being mentioned, it was built as an office level.
It would be extraordinarily difficult to shoe in an R&D facility in those upper floors.
We have no intention of doing that.
So, the ceiling? Yes, I'm sorry.
So, it's very restricted.
It's slab to slab, it's 12 feet there.
I think you'll remember some of the early conversations.
R&D facilities, you want to be 15 feet plus to get everything in.
So, would it be safe to say that you will not come back to convert those spaces? We have no intention of converting those spaces.
Okay.
All right, I think that those are my questions.
Thank you very much.
I appreciate it.
And yes, you seem to have something pressing to add, but please very briefly.
I can answer your question in 1 sentence about whether these current filmmakers are at risk.
If you come out here tonight and decide that filmmaking is not an art, then every single filmmaker is at risk long term.
Okay.
All right, this is one of my questions.
I did have maybe a comment or something, but I'll let others ask their questions.
Okay.
Let's see, next is Council Member Humbert.
Thank you, Madam Vice Mayor, and I don't have any questions.
I have some remarks I'd like to make and some observations.
I'm a lawyer and I really spent some time working with this and trying to understand the issues.
And I think it comes down to 3 main questions.
1st, was the previous use of the space in question media production.
Which is not protected or Arts and Crafts Studio, which is protected.
That's a protected use.
2nd, if this was, in fact, an Arts and Crafts Studio use, was it standalone? As is required for it to be considered protected.
And 3rd, and finally, were protected standalone uses established prior to the 1989 cutoff.
And based on my review of the record and what I've heard here tonight, I think the answer to each of these questions is no.
I don't see any substantial findings that support the ZAB decision.
I think the 1st question is 1 of the most difficult and I see that there may be 2 different views on it.
1 is that the West Berkeley plan is passed and subsequently amended should be interpreted in a manner that is maximally protective of Arts and Crafts uses.
Therefore, we should somehow liberally construe film production as Arts and Crafts.
I frankly don't think that that's a sensible interpretation.
A different view is that these different definitions were established to actually differentiate between uses and by extension, which uses were and were not protected.
I take the 2nd view because I believe that when we create categories, we intend those categories to be distinct and have meaning and impact.
If the intent was to be maximally protective, both of these categories would have protection, but they don't, or they'd be collapsed, but they're not.
So, pretty clearly, the established use was media production, which is not reasonably interpreted as Arts and Crafts, I don't think, under the relevant definitions.
And to insist that each individual space constitutes a standalone use is, I think, not correct.
And it's completely contrary to the definition.
This would be like declaring a store at the bottom of a mixed use building as a standalone commercial use because the commercial space is separate from the residential spaces.
And this is not common sense.
So, I'm prepared to vote to overturn this decision and grant the use permit.
Thanks.
That's all I have.
Thank you.
I have some questions for staff.
And maybe this is the city attorney, or maybe that's planning staff, but I'll let you decide.
If my reading, just, I've been trying to make heads or tails of this all night, and I think there is maybe a distinction between the intent of what was intended to be protected through the West Berkeley plan and the plain language.
So, can someone just give me a very quick history of prior to 1989 when these uses came in? One was media production, which was not protected.
One was Arts and Crafts, which was not protected.
And then the last one, I'm not quite sure what the last one was, what was the thinking behind that distinction at that time? Thank you.
I think I can answer some of that question.
So, in researching the staff reports and the ordinance history, for radio, television, or audio sound recording and or broadcast studios in 1999, when we were adding the new West Berkeley amendments into the zoning ordinance to implement the West Berkeley plan.
So, it took several years for those amendments to come forward.
And so, at that time, we also added the definition for Art Craft Studio.
And I think, you know, based on that definition, I'll read it for you.
It's an establishment in which art or crafts are made or manufactured.
Art and Craft Studio is characterized by having no more than two persons at a time engaged in an occupation, vocation, or trade requiring special manual dexterity or artistic skill in the production of art or craft object.
And then some of the other limitations about appointments and customer visits.
And so, what that suggests is that the Art and Craft Studio definition, which was came into the code as a protected use, was really about the smaller scale art studios where you go to make your art.
Distinguished from, you know, radio, television, audio, sound recording, which was more of the commercial related services.
And so, the definition isn't about what's art, what's not art, who's an artist, who isn't an artist, but really about the scale and the type of activity.
And that's what our records show with the adopting ordinance that implemented the West Berkeley plan.
Okay, thank you.
The hard testimony tonight, and I think we also received the letter from the same nonprofit that represented that it is possible that if we were to make findings that this building in and of itself will be a protected use that the seven nonprofits in the building would become an illegal or non-conforming use.
Can you speak to that? I'm not sure if we, are you asking staff to answer that question? What would be the impact in to the zoning code if we were to hypothetically make vote on findings that would make the entire building a protected use? I think we need to move to extend.
I'm sorry to interject.
I move that we extend till 1130.
Is there a second? Second.
Okay, roll call, please.
Council Member Kastorwani? Yes.
Bartlett? Yes.
Tragoob? Aye.
Ahn? Yes.
Weingraf? Yes.
Munapara? Yes.
And Council Member Humbert? Yes.
Okay, motion carries.
So I'm not sure if that letter came to planning staff.
I'm not sure planning staff has that letter you're talking about, Council Member Tragoob.
Is this a question for the city attorney or is this a question for staff? Whoever is equipped to answer this, if there are existing uses in the building, such as the seven non-profits that exist in the buildings now, when it's not a protected use, there is a claim being made that if we were to make the entire building a protected use, that the non-profits would be displaced or that somehow it would no longer be a legally permissible use of the building.
And I was asking if you can evaluate, well, just comment on whether this is some, you know, is this a concern that, you know, we need to make a policy decision around? I can just speak to if the existing uses where Art and Craft Studio changing from it, which are protected non-industrial uses, then an AUP or use permit would be required depending on the size.
And subject to additional findings for approval that requires comparable replacement space to be provided.
I don't know if that's helpful.
So an existing non-profit in the building would have to apply for an AUP or some other permit to continue operating in the building if we change the use designation of the building? Right.
So it is possible to change a protected non-industrial use through a use permit.
So there is a permit pathway for that.
However, I think it's difficult for us to speculate on the, because a lot of these spaces were established as office already.
And so they are legal, so they do exist legally and have existed legally for quite some time.
And I think my last question, and this may be for Mr.
Wareham, is that you probably said it, and I just can't recall because a lot of things were said today.
What was the date of the last occupancy of the new space that is being, or the space that is newly being proposed currently for R&D on the 1st and 2nd floors, respectively? The last tenant in the space left in 2008.
From 2008 to 2018, it was maintained as a recording studio, but it was operated by the ownership, so there was no tenant in there.
Use didn't change, but there wasn't a tenant.
It was done by the building owner.
Does that make sense? Yes, as much sense as anything is going to make after 11 tonight.
But yes, thank you.
Okay.
Are you finished? Yeah.
Okay.
I am complete.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, Vice Mayor Wengraf.
I've listened to the discussion.
I want to thank our staff, and given the late hour, I'd like to make a motion to uphold the appeal and reverse the Zoning Adjustment Board decision, thereby approving the administrative use permit.
Second.
That's all I have.
Thank you.
Okay.
Thank you.
Council Member Bartlett? Thank you, Madam Vice Mayor.
Listening to all the back and forth and reading the package here, quite complicated, lots of nuance.
And again, I actually have an emotional connection to this place, the Fantasy Records building.
I taught my first class there at the Berkeley Digital Video Academy many years ago.
It was great.
What's that? Yeah.
Are you here? Is that you? Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Exactly.
And it was fantastic.
But those who don't know, this is where Jimi Hendrix recorded Grateful Dead.
Really amazing.
Oh, yeah.
CCR.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Anyway.
So, Council Member Laraponi, you don't know who we're talking about here.
But having done eight years of these complicated land use disputes, a couple of things come to mind.
One, by now I know when we get into territory where we shouldn't be, where we get sued and we lose.
And as much as I love my people here, when you look at this sort of vacancies and the implications of displacement, not that pronounced, and also the legal framework around what is the intended use within the plan, and people who helped draft the plan commenting as well, and the legal opinion reflected by staff, I just don't see any way but to rule with the staff opinion, just legally, from our experience here.
So, that's all I would say.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Yes, Council Member Hahn.
Thank you very much.
I just want to say that I think we have two issues before us here today.
One is technical, and the other is a macro issue that's very real.
The technical issue is legalese parsing of, you know, some definitions and who was where when in 1989.
And unfortunately, that is how we have to make our decisions on zoning matters.
But I think that completely belies the other question that we have in this room that I don't think is before us in this decision, but is implicated, which is what are we going to do to save the arts in Berkeley? And that goes for filmmaking, it goes for theaters, it goes for dance, and arts and crafts in the traditional sense of like potting and printmaking.
You know, I mean, I don't think there's anybody here who does not value the full spectrum of the arts in Berkeley.
And what we have seen is that the arts community is being priced out, and that we are going to have trouble remaining a diverse and creative community if we don't do something about it.
And I think this particular micro zoning question is kind of becoming symbolic of a bigger sense of being under threat because of affordability, inability to find appropriate space at appropriate costs, housing costs, and all the pressures that are being felt by the arts community broadly regardless of how they're defined in our zoning code.
And I just want to say that, I mean, I just Council, Vice Mayor Weingraf knows I just spent a month and a half trying to get a measure on the ballot to save, to have a real stream of money so that we can support the arts in the way that we should in Berkeley.
Unfortunately, that didn't work out for this ballot, but I hope we will have something in 2026.
And I want to say that I am fully committed to what it will take to save the arts in Berkeley, but I don't think this one decision is what is going to save the arts.
I will be voting for the motion because on a very micro technical basis with the zoning frame, I believe that is the right decision.
I don't like it.
It is not the decision I want to make kind of in the world.
I would like to protect more space for the arts and artists, but that's not what we're asked to vote on when we vote on a zoning matter.
So I'm going to, I'm going to close and just say that I am deeply committed to the bigger issue and I look forward to working with you on that and will reluctantly be voting with the motion.
Before we take a vote, we need to close the public hearing.
Motion to close the public hearing.
Second.
Okay, please call the roll in closing the public hearing.
Council member.
Yes, sir.
Yes.
Bartlett.
Yes.
Trigum.
Aye.
On.
Yes.
Yes.
Yes.
And Humbert.
Yes.
Okay, we have a motion on the floor in a second.
Roll call vote, please.
Okay, to show that.
Can you repeat the motion, please? Yeah, the motion is to uphold the appeal and reverse the zoning adjustments board decision and approve the administrative permit.
Okay, and before we vote, I just want to say that this vote does not mean that we think that you are not artists.
It has nothing to do with that.
This is a land use decision.
It's not about qualifying what you do.
I know that you're all artists.
Okay.
Okay, on the motion.
Council member Kessler-Wanning.
Yes.
Bartlett.
Yes.
Trigum.
Aye.
On.
Yes.
Weingrath.
Yes.
Lunapara.
Yes.
And Humbert.
Yes.
Okay, you have your AUP.
Thank you.
Before we have a motion to adjourn, just to clean up small business, Council member Hahn, would you like to be reported as voting yes in the consent calendar? Okay.
Thank you, I appreciate that.
Sure.
And we now have a comment on non-agenda matters.
Yes, you can do that.
Okay, I think given the late hour, I'd like to suspend the rules.
Suspend the rules and adjourn.
Call and move to close the meeting.
Second.
Roll call.
Okay, Kessler-Wanning.
Yes.
Bartlett.
Yes.
Trigum.
Aye.
Hahn.
Yes.
Weingrath.
Yes.
Lunapara.
Yes.
And Humbert.
Yes.
Okay, meeting is adjourned.