Transcription Metadata

Whisper API Version 1
Generated 2024-08-15 03:28:06 UTC
Archive URI berkeley_d2ed9404-2ccd-11ef-81ef-005056a89546.ogg

Segment 1

It's a massive amount of savings.
So honestly, just to say, if it's the city manager's report comes back and says, well, there's this cost and this cost and so forth.
And by the way, this was funded in tens of millions of dollars.
By by by ARPA, I mean, that money was for this exact purpose, whether it's been used for this purpose.
I don't know, but that's what it was.
For that's what's intended for and we have information that, for example, their filter machines, air filtering machines in city buildings that aren't functioning because of a lack of a filter, like.
Not the not the whole box, the little filter.
For years, this is if this is true, this is malpractice and it can have a deadly result.
Um, please, um, let's make this happen and ask for a fulsome report that really gets to both.
Potential costs and avoided costs.
Personal costs, avoiding lack of.
No, uh, attendance at work.
Um, and, uh, uh, the social costs and the, and the, um, public health costs all of it.
And then we'll talk more about the, uh, thank you.
The climate measure.
Thank you.
Okay, are there any other members of the public here in person who like to address item 1 on the consent calendar? Uh, okay.
We'll go to speakers on zoom.
Chuck super followed by money law.
Hello.
My name is Chuck.
I'm speaking in support of the control of infectious aerosols and city buildings ordinance.
I'd like to play 2 short recordings from an article titled post pandemic and increasing focus on indoor air quality.
So, Joe Allen, Harvard's school of public health believes the rapid spread of coven in early 2020 was preventable.
Think about the public health gains we've made over the past 100 years.
We've made improvements to water quality.
Outdoor air pollution, our food safety.
We've made improvements to sanitation, absolute basics of public health.
Where has been in that conversation? It's totally forgotten about and a pandemic.
What a glaring mistake that was.
What do you think was lost because of that leg and understanding of how this was spread? Tens of thousands of lives in the U.
S.
any more globally.
Exaggeration and the next very short recording is about the misconception that old buildings cannot be healthy buildings.
Old buildings can't be healthy buildings.
Some of these fixes don't take much.
Improving the level of filtration that's easy.
It's cheap.
Protects against influenza also protects against wildfire smoke and outdoor air pollution.
It's against allergens simple, absolute basic.
For the past 2 years, I've been recovering from long.
For me, the ordinance is personal.
I care about the health and wellbeing of my coworkers as well as the community.
I urge the council to support this ordinance.
I believe it will pay for itself.
Thank you.
Thank you.
We'll go next to money law followed by Brianna McGuire.
And money, you should be able to speak now.
I think, thank you mayor and council.
I hope you can hear me.
I'm on my personal time speaking in my personal capacity on vacation right now on a bus.
I do believe this urgency of this matter cannot be understated or overstated actually overstated in that.
We all know that the climate is warming beyond the time that they'd expect.
Can you hear me.
Buddy, we lost you.
Okay, we'll come back to you.
We'll go next to Brianna and hopefully we'll be able to connect with you folks.
Can everyone hear me? Yes, amazing.
Hi, I'm Brianna McGuire.
I serve as chair of the environment and climate commission though.
Today I'm speaking in a personal capacity.
I wanted to briefly share 3 points that I'm hoping the report on the gas tax will address to ensure that the report is thorough and that city leaders are well informed on all facets of this initiative measure.
It's my hope that the report will account for the social cost of carbon and will estimate the financial benefits of this initiative.
Many residents and businesses who use gas appliances are paying unseen health care costs more sick days to workers, or even workers comp claims and regarding the benefits more money made available for people and businesses to electrify.
Should they choose to could lead to numerous health improvements, more financial flexibility for strapped homeowners, and even potentially reduce things like gas line explosion risk in our city.
In the case of an earthquake, a holistic understanding of costs and benefits is essential to assess this measure.
Point 2, Berkeley has struggled to reduce pollution from existing buildings.
Although I know we have many dedicated folks working on these issues.
I looked into the publicly available data collected by on natural gas use in the large buildings that would be impacted by this measure.
And while some buildings have decreased their usage from 2020 to 2023, the net gas consumption across these buildings has increased by over 230,000 firms.
According to these data, existing enforcement mechanisms are not currently spurring enough action to reduce emissions in these buildings.
These are buildings that are all subject to an energy assessment.
Every 5 years, receive an energy performance score annually, and some of them have to comply with base.
So, at the time of listing and other at time of infrastructure replacement.
So, I'm hoping that the report will look into all the available data, not just the public data.
I have access to to answer the question.
What is the cost to administer current regulation? And what is the trajectory of natural gas use in our large buildings without this possible ordinance? Is it likely that buildings will maintain or increase their usage of gas until they need to replace their equipment? Which could be decades from now.
Finally, it's my hope the report will state clearly that there is no required timeline of implementation of the just transition fund, meaning that city staff would not be under an onerous deadline to administer the fund.
Thank you so much for the time to comment.
Um, all of your suggested, um.
Points of research are really excellent.
And I'm going to make, I'm going to, when we entertain a motion, also provide that direction to staff.
Could you send me your remark, your talking points or summary of those particular.
Those particular research points, so we can make sure that's part of the direction of staff.
Yes, I'd be happy to.
Great.
Thank you.
Okay.
We'll go back to money law.
Hopefully we can.
Connect I don't see her on the zoom.
Unfortunately.
Okay, are there any other members of the public on zoom who would like to speak on item 1? Okay, if not, we'll close public comment.
Thank you.
So.
Um, you know, I want to just make very clear that this report will be.
Developed and presented in an impartial manner.
We're not.
Does not it's not appropriate for this report to advocate for any particular point of view.
This is really just requesting information so we can understand.
What are these proposals and what are the, what are the implications with respect to.
How the city will need to implement these proposals so so I want to just, I want to make it very clear and emphasize the city manager that we need to be impartial in the manner in which these the information is presented in these reports.
Moreover, it's not our, it's not our, it's not our responsibility nor is appropriate to use government resources to advocate.
For a measure, that's the job of the proponents.
It's not the job of the city of Berkeley.
That is that that's your job.
Now, this is qualified to campaign and to get your message out to the voters, but we cannot use government resources to do that.
This has to be impartial that's been sent in a neutral manner.
I'll just point to the provisions of elections code section 9 to 12.
And then I'm going to move on to the next item on the agenda, which is the legislative body's ability to attract and retain business and employment during the circulation of petition and before taking action to place a measure on the ballot, the legislative body may refer the proposed initiative measure to a city agency or agencies to report on any of the following 1, it's fiscal impact to its effect on the internal consistency of the city's general and specific plans 3, it's effect on the use of land for impact on funding for infrastructure 5, impact on the community's ability to attract and retain business and employment.
6, the impact on the uses of vacant parcels of land 7, it's impact on agricultural lands, open space, traffic congestion, existing business districts, and developed areas that's in a for revitalization and 8, any other matters legislative body requests to be in report.
So, the state law specifically gives the legislative body the ability to request this, these, these types of reports to understand the impact of a measure.
Um, and, uh, on on economic development, the fiscal impact, the operational impact and that's what that's the information we're trying to ascertain.
I completely agree with the speakers that there are benefits clearly that that these measures will will provide.
And so I thought some of the specific points that Brianna had raised in her remarks, accounting for the social cost of carbon estimating financial benefits, looking at how this can mitigate safety risk.
Um, this is respect to the fossil fuels tax.
Looking at the current trajectory of natural gas use and how this would impact that.
Um, I think those are all really excellent points and I think that's useful information for us and for the staff and the community to have.
So, um, I'm certainly happy to incorporate that in the direction that we provide on the 9 to 12 report for the net for the fossil fuels tax measure.
Madam city manager.
Thank you, Mr.
Mayor.
I just want to confirm our, our, our work ahead of us.
And it sounds as if you're looking for a cost benefit analysis, not just the cost impact analysis.
I think that is what, um, that's what the former chair of the climate and environment commission was suggesting.
Um, and, um, I think that information would be beneficial.
I think that would be okay.
Our initial was cost impact and we've kind of laid out.
We've kind of been marching to that.
To that, um, to that tune in terms of timing of getting everything to you all by mid June, if we kind of switch gears now and start talking cost benefit analysis, it may take a little bit longer, but I'm not certain.
But I do want to make sure we meet your needs, so we will do our best to have a really solid and strong report for you, but we were focused on a cost impact analysis and not a cost benefit analysis.
Yeah, and they're very different and very different and more more costly.
I understand.
Okay, we'll do our best.
Thank you.
Yeah, but, you know, I think I do think that information is beneficial for us for us to have as the potential implementing body and for the community to have, because this is ultimately information that will be publicly available and accessible.
So, people can make informed decisions about the things that are being put before them and in an impartial manner, not advocating for against any particular viewpoint that is 1st of all, illegal under state law.
This needs to be presented in a neutral manner.
It is the job of the proponents or opponents outside of city governments to articulate their point of view and to argue it strenuously and present it to the voters.
But that's not what the government's supposed to do.
So, okay, um, that's.
Yeah, I appreciate your comments and, um, I guess I'll just 2nd, those I definitely.
I definitely think that we cannot just look at costs.
I mean, of course, administering any tax has a cost to it and, um.
You know, implementing a new program has a cost, but obviously, if we're going to be levying a tax, we're going to get some money from it.
And so that's a benefit.
There's additional funding available for X, Y, Z.
Um, and, uh.
I, I do think we need to to have a more complete picture.
Um, I don't know exactly where the line is between, uh.
Sort of more subjective evaluation of the relative benefits as as related to the potential costs, but, um.
I think that, um, you know, to the extent that there might be actual scientific.
Uh, you know, studies or information that is not anecdotal or or helpful that tells us, you know, specifically what.
The benefits are, or the costs of getting rid of gas, or have a disincentive because that's what this really is.
Um, I don't know where the line is.
I don't know where I would want to include.
So, but again, I would want that to be based on, uh, scientific studies.
Um, you know, academic, verifiable, um, not not things produced by advocacy organizations either for or against because there's a lot of advocacy around these questions that I think is.
Uh, you know, it's it's it's it's it's it's, you know, it's brought forward in a different way.
Um, I'm wondering if, I mean, we do have really wonderful people who, um.
In in our city staff who are working on energy issues, and they may have some expertise that we can draw from, um, in looking at this so I just, uh, yes, I on all of these referrals that we've done I think we need to be, um.
Uh, looking at at at at costs and at potential positive impacts.
I won't call them benefits because that feels like it's advocating.
So, yes, please comprehensive councilor Kisilwani.
Thank you.
I, I just wanted to have a better understanding of these reports, given the, the, the bit of back and forth we're having, when do we anticipate that these reports will return back to the council and, and, you know, to be available to the public.
We're aiming for mid July at the latest late July and director Davis is on I know he's working on them along with Jordan client in our.
Planning director in our planning department, so we are aiming for.
Late July, mid to late July.
Okay.
And I do want to do.
Oh, go ahead.
Go ahead.
No, I just, you know, I asked the question earlier because our focus has been on operational impacts and I am I am somewhat concerned about the.
Moving into the realm of an impartial analysis benefits.
It was very framed for us in terms of looking at impacts because you need that.
Of course, we need that in terms of our operations for the city.
But in terms of the benefits to 1 of these measures and kind of leveraging them against the other.
I think that comes at the time of an impartial analysis and I, I don't want to mix the 2.
So, I just want to pause there because the city attorney's office handles the impartial analysis piece and then I thought we were just looking at the impacts for the operational implementation of these measures and I'll, I'll pause there.
Thank you very much.
Madam city manager.
I do want to acknowledge that the mayor's item does state potential economic impacts and benefits.
So, I, in my view, that is covering what people have expressed an interest in.
I, I do want to be careful about scope creep because a cost benefit analysis has a specific meaning and it assigns monetary value to the benefits.
And that is not my understanding of what the mayor's item is.
And I'm a little concerned about us using that language because.
I think that that is a rather involved body of work and I'm concerned that we would not be able to complete that by next month.
So, I want to express, I feel that the language that is in this recommendation for item.
Number 1 is comprehensive and will give the council and the public the full picture of this of these 2 items.
And I know that we are, my understanding is we are engaging a consultant to help us prepare these reports for the 2 street measures.
Madam city manager, did you already clarify that we will be engaging a consultant for these 2 reports as well? I may have missed that.
Yes, I will defer to.
In terms of what they've been able to, um, to determine in terms of our ability to produce these reports.
Thank you.
Madam city manager, Terrence Davis, public works director.
So, relative to the 2 streets items, we are engaging consultants.
There's a multitude of things.
We're going to look at for those items.
And similar to this item before you, not only are we going to look at what the revenue projections are based on what the authors have put forward and just do some validation.
We're going to then overlay that against any of our capital improvement plans.
So, in this particular case, just because of the timing, we certainly will, it'll be a hybrid of us doing some of that work in house with our engineering and transportation.
And other professional staff, but just to kind of really move this along, we will be tapping into some professionals who do this on a regular basis.
So, as an example, 1 of the firms we use for our landscape and lighting districts, they do this kind of parcel tax analysis.
So, we'll be tapping into firms, such as that, such as that firm to kind of give us some quick horsepower to kind of turn this around quickly and then using our own professional staff and technical staff to also do some analysis about existing city facilities or infrastructure.
So hope that answers your question.
It will be a hybrid.
Okay, thank you very much.
That's all I have.
Thank you.
I have a question to our resident election law expert.
Mr.
Harvey.
So, I think you've heard the discussion around, you know, this is what I'm proposing.
There have been some suggestions of, you know, maybe expanding the scope of it slightly to look at the potential benefits of a measure.
What is really permissible or allowed? What would you advise us in this instance? We want to make sure we're.
Following the letter of the law sure.
So the, you know, the Alexis code as, as you.
You know, a moment ago, Mr.
mayor.
Has this list of things you can include in the report and includes any other matters that the city council request to be in a report.
So it's incredibly broad in terms of what you want to include in it.
So, I think, you know, it's a broad list of things that you can include in there as long as it's provided in a dispassionate analytical fashion and non argumentative.
Okay, well, for purposes of discussion, I'll move item 1 and it's cancer case.
I want to have noted 1 of the specific.
Aspects of the analysis will be looking at impacts and benefits.
So, I don't want to be too prescriptive.
I want to give staff the flexibility to, you know, look at some of the aspects of the analysis, but I think moving the direction general, I think would be appropriate.
2nd, taking consideration some of the points that were that were raised around.
Cost social, you know, the social cost of carbon safety.
So, I don't want to be too prescriptive.
I want to give staff the flexibility to look, look wildly at this and provide impartial analysis for us.
And I think, as a city city manager said, the city attorney will be doing their impartial analysis that we provided the voters and the voter information handbook.
So, so that's my motion.
I think I already 2nd day.
Yes, Mr Richard High.
All members if not, please call the service support.
Okay on the consent calendar counterstart yes or lying.
Yes.
Apple is absent Bartlett.
Yes.
Home.
Yes, when graph is absent, Luna Para.
I'm going to ask unanimous consent that we take public comment 1st, because we're going to have a rather lengthy presentation and discussion.
I want to get members of the opportunity to speak to this now.
They'd like.
So, Mr.
Mayor, if you want to kick things off, it's good to see you go giants and then we'll go to speakers on zoom.
Hi, I'm David mayor.
I am the founder and CEO of the Berklee music group.
We run the theater.
I'm here in support of number 4 on, I should say.
4 of number 2, which is to advance the idea of.
A parcel tax in support of performing arts organizations.
I think it's really critical.
There are a number of organizations in our ecosystem that are are had post pandemic very rough time and.
In order to help sustain them and help the ecosystem survive, the arts ecosystem survive is really a critical juncture here and and having the tax and support of that would make a dramatic difference.
Um, it's not just we've got a late start on this.
The late start is in part because there's no represent.
No representative in district 4 very happy to see that Igor is now.
About to join me at the council, and there is a, I was involved in a, a campaign during the pandemic was called save our stages, which was the, which was run by the national venues association.
It was independent music venues and performing arts theaters across the country.
At the time.
We didn't know how long it was going to be and what the impact was going to be.
It turned out that we were closed for 18 months.
We United across the country.
There's 60 of us that were.
What we call precinct captains, and we organized ourselves and went about getting congressional and Senate support for what became the shuttered venue operators grant.
And what I saw during that time, and that grant allowed us all the obligations to continue and survive what I've seen, we've had a number of zoom meetings with the major.
Organizations in downtown Berkeley, and what I see is that a group of people who seriously need support and some of them don't know how to advocate for themselves and.
We need to, we need the city council support to to speak for them as well as to speak for us in terms of putting this forward so that we can gain support.
We have hired a, we've not hired, but we have a, a, an estimate for running the campaign of 200,000 dollars.
Some of the organizations are concerned about how they can afford that.
Given now, they can't afford to pay their bills.
These are things that we're going to address.
We meet weekly.
We're committed to seeing this campaign through if the city, if the city council votes for it, and we urge you to to give it very serious consideration.
One thing I would add, this is not just about saving arts and culture in Berkeley and some of the key institutions that are around for decades, but it's also looking at the organizations as arts and music venues in particular.
As anchor tenants in the community, we're primary revenue generators and secondary revenue generators, primary job generators, secondary job generators as well.
There's a arts impact report that was done in 2019 in the Chicago area.
It shows the impact of the arts community on on the economics of Chicago.
The other survey, the other reports that show, for example, music venues, the impact that we have is 14 to 16 dollars per ticket sold, which means that for every.
100,000 tickets we sell, we generate 1.4 to 1.6Million in the community for restaurants, bars, hotels, parking and the I can provide you with the study that came out of Chicago.
That also takes into account how much these organizations spend on advertising, marketing.
It's really quite compelling the economic impact.
So it's not just arts and culture.
It's not just community benefit.
It's not creating continuing the, the, the wonderful.
Opportunity to go out and really experience different cultural experiences and music and performing arts.
It's also about how we together impact.
The local businesses and help to drive revenue and the economic benefits that we provide.
So those are those are 2 things to consider when we consider advancing this and I thank you very much for your time.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Mr.
mayor and city council members.
Thank you for this time.
My name is Kathleen.
I'm a commissioner as well as the vice president of community.
And I'm a member of the city of Chicago, and I'd like to make a quick announcement for the board for the Berklee Symphony.
So, on January, January, June 3rd, we had a 2024 music and art summit that was co-hosted by the Berklee Symphony and the Freight and Salvage and it was, it was an invitation actually as a love letter to the city arts that we invited some of the major art and music venues.
We had over a dozen that came for for that day they met and the reason I'm telling you this is because in that meeting, what came of it was a tremendous amount of goodwill and.

Segment 2

In feeling of taking a deep breath, we're in a whole new world since covid we would like to think that we've just bounced back.
But in fact, it's, it's more than just bouncing back.
It's it's a new world.
It's a new way of getting people out and about and into the, you know, into our venues.
So, all of these executive directors, they're, they're working really hard to keep things alive, but they need help.
And so I, so I truly believe we all have to show up and help them.
They're helping themselves and we need to help them.
So, I believe that it's everybody's best interest who loves Berkeley and loves the arts, which I do dearly that we advance this, the idea of the parcel tax and keep it keep looking at it.
It's, I think it's really important to do that.
And you've got a number of executive directors and art organizations that that will that they're organizing and they will continue to organize and want to do the best for the city.
And so, yeah, I think that's a, it's a really good thing.
So party going.
Thank you so much.
Thank you so much council.
I'm enjoying my last week of freedom before I'm actually really looking forward to joining you all soon on this side of the venue.
But for now, I have been meeting with arts organizations and leaders, like the ones you just heard from today, you know, in my homeland.
Going to the theater, going to an art gallery has been a form of resistance and the country has really rallied around that because it is so important.
And I think if there has been the ability to keep the arts going, even under duress and under war in my homeland.
There is certainly no reason for us to not be able to ensure that Berkeley continues to be a vibrant destination for the arts and our cultural centers, giving them the ability to thrive.
There is no limit to the amount of creativity that our leadership has already shown, but as you have heard, it's been made loud and clear.
They do need a little bit of help right now and so I'm really speaking both in support of the proposal that you will be discussing today and also just wanted to relay my commitment to working with you on this continuously and certainly in the coming weeks.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
We will now go to any speakers who are participating on zoom.
If you'd like to speak on the community server results and direction on November, 2024 ballot measures, please raise your virtual hand.
At this time.
Okay.
Hopefully.
We can hear you thank you mayor.
I actually was in the middle of typing my email comments.
So.
Just in the interest of time, suffice it to say that I'm the 3rd proponent of the item, the item 1.
And to that was discussed earlier, I signed on as an employee of Berkeley is a concerned worker about safety.
Also, the daughter of a father with dementia and a sister who has cancer.
So I'm.
Very vigilant about trying to stay safe.
Also, we're reaching out to a number of people in the community, including the faith community.
And there's a greening the church movement that pastor Carol is working on Ambrose.
Nationwide and others are coming together.
We also are reaching out.
To the question posed by a number of the council members to scientists and experts.
So, it's passion, but it's also based upon fact and evidence.
And supported by that, I believe we will succeed with your support and very much.
Thank you for your time for those 2 measures to be deferred.
Are referred to the city manager and the reports to come back and we're happy to provide other resources if those are needed.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay.
We'll go next to followed by Berkeley rep.
Thank you, mayor with the bridge Association of realtors.
We strongly urge you to exercise caution before sending a transfer tax increase to the November ballot.
We asked you not place an increase on the ballot simply because you think it will pass.
Rather, we ask you to be diligent and analyze all the unintended consequences before moving forward.
Transfer taxes are regressive and large increases can lead to decreases in income.
Real estate transactions, investment and structures and the overall quality.
Of the built environment, they are also associated with higher rents.
Lower property valuations, reduced residential mobility.
Diminished home ownership and the lower overall property tax will turn around.
We understand that many nonprofits rely on measure funds to provide needed services for the house.
And that those organizations need to have funding certainty.
However, that can be achieved without raising measure rates.
Removing the sunset date on measure people provide the certainty that nonprofits need to continue operations.
As, you know, revenue from transfer taxes, taxes are volatile and highly dependent on the housing market.
Though transfer tax revenue from home sales has suffered recently, that trend is certain to reverse as mortgage rates decrease over the course of the next year or 2.
Without an end date to the tax nonprofits will have the necessary runway they need.
While the city does its due diligence to analyze the potential impact of a drastic rate increase.
Lastly, making this a non revenue generating measure.
Would also likely decrease the chances of adverse outcomes for any of the numerous other revenue generating measures slated for the November ballot.
Thank you.
Thank you.
We'll go to our next speaker.
Berkeley rep, thank you mayor and thank you members of council.
My name is I'm the director of development at Berkeley repertory theater.
I want to echo my colleagues in their sentiments in support for a, an arts ballot measure this November and thanks to members of the city council and the mayor for your help.
It's been 4 years, a little bit more since the pandemic decimated the performing arts across the country and while many sectors have recovered.
Uh, or are doing better than their pre pandemic.
Uh, activities, the performing arts are sadly not, uh, the pandemic is not over for us and we are still facing, uh.
Reduced revenues and reduced attendance compared to pre pandemic, particularly in places like Berkeley, where residents are still very cobit conscious in how often they go out and spend time indoors.
So, despite all best efforts and re, imagining of business models and incredible fundraising efforts, the time has come to ask for an emergency measure like this and.
We are grateful to the city and to council and the mayor for supporting us in these efforts.
We wish it didn't come to this, but this is 1 of those moments where the city needs to ask itself what kind of place does Berkeley want to be and we are hopeful and optimistic that the city will tell us that it wants to be a place that supports the performing arts and is a vibrant cultural hub.
For the arts, thank you very much.
Thank you.
Are there any other attendees on zoom wishing to speak on item 2? If so, please raise your hand.
Okay, I don't see any raised hands, so we will close public comment and I'll bring it back to the council and we'll go to the staff presentation.
Thank you, Mr.
mayor and council and card.
Well, we'll be presenting the community survey results and potential ballot measures for November along with staff and.
Let's see, I think Merman is on and David Merriman.
Yes.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Good afternoon.
Mayor and council and card.
Well, deputy city manager, I will kick us off with just a couple of slides and then hand it over to David Merman to go over the community survey results on this slide.
Just to provide a little context, I think, as you've been discussing a bit already, these are the ballot measures that have either qualified or in the process of qualifying for the November 2024 election.
And then on our next slide, we have a timeline that provides information on dates and steps that need to be taken to place the ballot measures on the ballot.
We're here at June 14, and then on July 30th, we would be coming back to you, hopefully, at a potential special council meeting ahead of the regular meeting for formal action to place any ballot measures on the November 2024 ballot.
And then we have the August 9 deadline of the registrar's office.
So, with that, I will go ahead at this point and kick it over to David Merman and I'm happy to continue clicking through the slides for you.
David.
Thanks so much and appreciate working with fine staff at the city.
Once again, on this important research to help the council determine.
The views of the city voters on on these potential revenue measures.
So, this is results from a poll that we fielded earlier this month.
We were in the field.
May 30th to June 4th in the city of Berkeley, this is 500 likely voters registered and likely to vote in the city of Berkeley.
Error margin on the survey is plus or minus 4% for the top line numbers that I'll show you.
And on the next slide, you'll see the methodology and then the.
The measures that we, if we could put that apologies, but the 2nd, I'm going to stop sharing and dancing.
Okay.
Sorry about that.
Okay, so advancing right now.
Yeah, hold on just a second.
Let me just go ahead and jump forward a slide and see if that works.
Apologies.
Yeah, here we are.
So this is a.
Telephone survey from a voter file sample includes live from their views as well as text online interviews to get the highest response rates.
And as always, we.
It's a representative sample weighted slightly by gender, region, age, and other demographics to reflect the.
The Berkeley on the next slide, assuming they are advancing.
Yes, sorry and I have a siren under my window.
Apologies.
The, we tested a number of things we have we have in the past, including what is the highest priority for Berkeley voters top issues of concern.
And we have people were asked to give up to 2, pick up to 2 responses from this list of priorities and the clear top 2 among all voters were.
Uh, affordable housing, the phrase was increasing affordable housing for low income and homeless residents.
56% of the voters chose that as 1 of their top 2 priorities.
And repairing deteriorating streets and sidewalks 41%.
Shows that those are the clear top 2 priorities on this list.
We did have substantial numbers though.
Also wanting to.
Improved pedestrian bike and traffic safety planting, maintaining trees and park maintenance and infrastructure, upgrading storm drains, protecting facilities from climate change and improving the Berkeley waterfront.
But those are going down the list in terms of level of priority, the number of voters who chose them, but those are percentages out of 100 picking them as 1 of their top 2.
We also tested the next slide.
The feelings about the overall direction of the city of Berkeley.
This is a.
Uh, 1 of the advantages of having done this work for the city now for several.
Uh, years in a row is that we have a time series on this question and this shows, uh, since the 1st city of Berkeley survey that we did back in 2012.
Um, what the responses have been to this question about the direction of the city with consistent question wording over that time.
And you'll see, uh, we're very consistent with, uh, 47% of saying that things are going in the right direction.
That's exactly where it was 2 years ago.
The percent saying that we're going in the wrong direction and the city of Berkeley has ticked up a little bit.
It's a 29%.
And those who are not sure are at 23%.
But those are pretty consistent over the last 3 years.
There was a little more negativity in 2021 and the highest positive measure on this was back in 2014, 2016.
but for the last several years, this has been a fairly consistent number.
Uh, from year to year, and on the next slide, we see, uh, what how people think the city is doing specifically at providing services to residents.
So, the previous was a general feeling about the direction of the city.
This is a more specific job rating of the city in terms of providing services and 54% give the city a good or excellent rating.
We combine those as the sort of net positive, uh, 8% excellent and the remaining 46% a good rating for the city and providing services.
42% total give it a just fair or poor.
We combine those is that at least leaning that negative, but 32% of those are saying just fair 10% poor.
So, together that's 42.
so this is a net positive result, but obviously some substantial number with less positive feelings about the.
About the services in the city, so that's all for context.
Uh, and our main purpose in the survey was to test some potential.
About measures, and as many of, you know, from having done this work in previous years.
Oh, we, uh, we have in the past sometimes asked about.
General concepts, and then later tested specific about language.
This year, we went straight to a fairly specific language on 2 of these measures and in both cases, tested a couple of alternative versions.
And then we had 1 other measure that we did test more as a concept on the arts funding, which we'll get to in a minute.
The other thing we do when we test these in these surveys is we get an, we get an initial ballot and then we also asked an informed ballot.
Which is how people respond after hearing arguments on the positive and negative side.
And we are not trying to push people.
We're trying to understand what happens when I can, when there is an actual election campaign.
And there are arguments made on both sides how strongly the support that continues increases or decreases as a result of people hearing.
Equal arguments on both sides of the measure, so you'll see that in a minute.
But we start with the initial vote, and the 1st measure that we tested here is the parks tax.
And we described it with an introduction, telling people that this would be a ballot measure to provide funding for an increase in Berkeley's existing parks tax.
In order to establish a city wide tree planting unit.
To provide increased annual funding for physical improvements to the city parks and apply the city's parks budget to all parks, including the waterfront.
We then tested language that similar to what would actually appear on the ballot.
Obviously, this may.
Be adjusted, but it's we were trying to simulate as closely as possible what people might see when they actually had a measure on their ballots on the next slide.
We see that.
And we did 2 versions, as I mentioned, and in this case, we did a split sample.
So.
Uh, that meant each voter in the survey heard 1 or the other version of this measure.
And that allows for a straight head to head comparison.
They're hearing it for the 1st time, but we can see if there's a difference in how they respond based on the level of increase that we're discussing.
And with the 2 versions, 1 provided a 20%.
Parks tax increase, and it specified what that means in terms of square footage and revenue.
Uh, as a ballot measure will do.
So that's the 20% increase you see in the top blue box there.
And then the 2nd, the alternate version that the other half of the sample heard.
Randomly was a 28% increase.
So, a slightly higher.
Level of taxation per square foot and a higher level of revenue as a result.
On the next slide, we see the results of this.
This is the initial ballot again when they just heard again that introduction saying what this is about and then that.
Straightforward description of what might appear on the ballot for a 20% increase versus a 28%.
Uh, those who heard the 20% tax increase their vote on that measure, if it was the election where today is 68%.
Either voting or leaning toward a yes vote on that.
And as we know, for this type of measure, it requires a 2 3rd threshold to pass.
So we see that as slightly exceeding that threshold at 68%.
Yes.
Uh, only 19% said they would likely vote.
No, or lean toward a no vote.
But you do have another 12% who are undecided or not sure.
Historically, generally, when we measure.
When we test ballot measures, particularly revenue measures, you do tend to see the undecided votes break toward a no.
It is also true, however, that in Berkeley, and some on some previous revenue measures, you actually have seen the vote go higher from the initial.
Survey results where some of those undecided voters clearly broke to.
Yes.
That has happened, for instance, on a couple of the infrastructure measures in 2018 and 2020.
However, in 2022, we also tested a large infrastructure measure.
Uh, and the undecided voters in the survey ended up breaking more toward a no, and it did fall as short as everyone knows from.
A 2 3rd threshold in that case, in this particular result, we see for that 20% increase in the parks tax 68%.
Voting or leaning yes, that is a fairly promising sign for passing that measure based on the initial read that people see on that ballot.
The other version at 28% and the other half of our sample.
61% said they would vote yes on that measure vote or lean.
Yes.
20% would vote no, 16% of decided somewhat lower.
Yes.
Vote and a slightly higher undecided on that higher revenue amount.
Would it could it pass still with that initial ballot? Certainly it's pretty close to the margin of error.
It is, uh, you know, it has sometimes happened where the, where the yes vote has increased as after people get more information during the campaign, but it does appear this is the 7 point difference in this split sample.
From a 68% yes vote to compared to a 61% yes vote.
Does suggest that there is a more robust support likely for the lower level of the tax increase of 20% and the resulting.
Amount of tax and the amount of revenue that results from that.
So, that's our initial read on that parks tax.
We then tested a.
Uh, what we call an informed ballot where people heard.
Uh, statements on both sides, and we tried to write these as clearly as we could, but expressing the opposing points of view.
Uh, and, you know, as they would be expressed in a back and forth campaign.
On the issue, and then retested after people heard this, so a supporter statement talking about the importance of parks and how vital they are entries and how vital they are for communities, families, seniors, et cetera.
Uh, explaining this is a modest funding increase that will address the need to, uh, address these needs in terms of the parks, including areas of the waterfront that are currently not funded.
And then the opponent side saying taxes are too high.
We can't afford this.
They should find it out of existing revenue.
So, after voters heard that back and forth and heard those arguments on both sides, we then retested.
And what we found is that both went down a little bit, the 20% increase went down more, but it also had started at a higher level.
So it ended up at 62%.
Yes.
After hearing that had to had argument, so clearly some of the arguments being made on the no side there did increase a little bit.
The no vote.
And reduced a little bit the yes vote is still clearly close to the threshold that we need to pass at 67%.
Um, and it certainly looks like it would be.
A viable and have the potential to do that, but it does just show that there would, you know, the, the impact of the communication and campaigns that might occur around this measure could possibly drive it.
A little bit below, or if the side were more effective, a little bit above that threshold.
So clearly it's within the range where it could pass.
And then the other version, which started at a lower level does not lose.
Support as much, but it's still a couple points lower.
60% total yes, and the other thing we would notice here is that the strong yes vote is still 8 points different of the 37% and the last graph there.
That's the percentage say, I'm strongly in favor of this measure at the 20% level.
And then the other half of the sample, 29% saying they're strongly.
Yes, for the 28% increase.
So, you're, you're getting less total support and also some less enthusiasm when you have that somewhat higher revenue amount.
Again, not to say that it's not possible.
Either 1 of these still could potentially pass, but it looks like it's a little bit.
Less of a stretch to do so with the 20% increase.
From there, we turn to the other specific measure that we tested on the ballot, which is the extension of the real estate transfer tax.
Which is funding homeless services.
Because of the design of this measure is a real estate transfer tax.
Our understanding is that it would take only a 50% plus 1 threshold to pass.
Um, and as before, we tested for, we gave people some ballot language.
1 thing we did differently though, and this time is rather than have the split sample.
What we did is have the.
Uh, and an explanation of a tiered increase.
In the extension of this.
Transfer tax, that's the blue box and everyone heard that rather than splitting the sample.
Everyone heard that 1st as.
1, a possible approach the city could take to.
Change the way this tax is collected.
So, instead of having a single threshold of 1.5M dollars for the.
Amount of transfer that subject to where it would be subject to this tax.
It would keep that threshold, but then add some additional tiers above that.
So that the level would be.
A 2.5% at 1.5M dollars or higher.
Then go up to 3% for properties value to 3M dollars and go up to 3.5% for properties value to 10M dollars or higher.
So introducing those tears as opposed to a single threshold.
For this tax to be, uh, uh, collected.
So, that's the 1st version and then everyone then heard a 2nd version that said, or another option is is to extend this tax, but not to increase it or introduce the tears, but simply keep the same formulation of.
All properties, 1.5M and higher subject to the same 2.5%.
So those are the 2 versions that people heard.
In order, and on the next slide, we see the result again.
This is what we would call an initial ballot.
It's just the ballot language.
Explanatory to make it clear, but not any arguments 1 way or the other.
And 62% with that initial tiered increase.
Where they're extending the tax for properties over 1.5M, but also adding.
A higher tier of that.
Percentage collected for the higher value properties.
62% of the voters saying they would vote or lean.
Yes, on that measure.
And again, with the lower threshold here, 50% to pass that's well over.
The 50% that would be needed, and it looks like that would be in a strong position to pass with that added.
Tiered increase and then notably and interestingly.
When that is followed up with a lower cost version or lower revenue version.
Where you would simply extend the tax at the current level.
It actually goes down a little bit in terms of its level of support started at 62 and ends up at 59%.
With that simple extension, no increase and that suggests that there's actually some value.
In the voters find it like the idea of having this tiered system where the very high value properties pay a higher rate.
In that transfer tax, but that seems to account for a little bit more enthusiasm for this when it's a tiered increase, rather than a straight extension with no increase.
So it's 59%.
Yes.
With the, no, no increase.
Simply an extension voting.
Yes.
24%.
No, in that case.
But the tiered increase, the no vote is very similar.
25% for the S vote is 3 points higher at 62% and because voters heard both of these in order.
These are literally the same voters saying, actually, I'm switching from a yes to an undecided.
On the 2nd, version of the increase appears to be what's happening.
Then we did do again a, an informed ballot on on this measure where we.
Posted after people had voted, we then said, okay, now we'll hear arguments on the yes side of the no side.
Yes, side supporters saying cities making progress on homelessness and this funding is valuable to do that.
It's enabled more housing.
And producing measurable results.
And then the opponents again, saying this cost too much, we can't afford it.
We're being soaked by taxes.
We look at other.
The sources of use the existing revenues to to provide these services.
After people heard those arguments back and forth, the yes and the no, we then asked again the same 2.
Versions, but the extension either with the tiered increase, or the straight flat extension of the transfer tax and we see the result here.
So that 62% on the tiered increase.
Drops just slightly to 61% essentially no change and the strong.
Yes, actually increases a little bit on that vote.
And then the other version with no increase, merely extending the tax basically remains where it was at 59%.
Yes.
The note that was a little bit lower on that version at 22% when you get as a slightly higher undecided.
Uh, in that that version of the extension.
So, again, both of those look like they are well over the 50% threshold that's beyond the margin of error in the survey.
And it does suggest that these are the position where if you had at least equal.
Communication on both sides, these would either version would be likely to pass.
That's that's the 2 measures that we tested as specific measures.
We had a 3rd measure.
Uh, the council requested to add to the survey.
And this did not have specific revenues or attacks levels attached.
It was simply an advisory question.
Saying this measure would advise the mayor to work with residents and experts and developing a general performing arts rescue and maintenance revenue package.
Sport performing arts institutions and programs in Berkeley.
Describing what those are and ask people.

Segment 3

In concept, would you support having this type of a measure to support, provide revenue to support performing arts institutions and programs, but it did not provide an actual.
Specific dollar amount or specific way to raise the revenues.
The reaction to this is a positive 69% over 2, 3rds of the voters a few points over 2, 3rds say.
I like the idea of a measure to fund arts arts funding and arts revenue.
Uh, in the city, um, 34% strong.
Yes.
So this is.
Uh, again, in the, in the ballpark of the similar, uh, the other measures we tested that are more specific, but it is a little bit higher a total.
Yes.
And 69%.
17% saying, no, I would not want to support such a measure and 13% don't know.
And again, just noting this is a little bit apples and oranges.
We didn't test here any specific revenue amounts or thresholds, but we did.
Um, so, um, I would ask people if, in principle, they would support such a measure and we have this result of 69%.
Yes.
So, that's that's the summary of the findings.
These, of course, are totals and top lines.
There is a full set of data set of across tabs and so on happy to answer questions about any of that if needed, but that's the overall findings that we have to share with you today.
So, um, what I can do is just run through a couple of sort of additional slides that summarize the options for the council this afternoon and then we can take any questions.
So, as David was just describing on the parks, top tax ballot, major options, there's the 2% 20% and 28%.
And then we have the extension and increase option with the tiered approach or the extension only and then this slide shows the expected new annual revenue as well as total revenue with with that tax and then with the major P or homeless services tax options again, as David described, we have the extension and increase option with the tiered approach or the extension only.
And then we have the extension and increase option with with the tiered approach or the extension only.
So, I'm going to move on to the next slide that I've just summarized here.
This 1 was more of an informational item as just described.
So, what we've done in these next 2 slides is just sort of outline the decision points for council today to begin the conversation.
So, we have the extension and increase option with the tiered approach and then we have the on the parks tax to select which percentage to proceed with if you wanted to go forward.
Similarly, with the homeless services tax to select either an extension and increase option, or the extension only and then finally on the arts ballot measure as David just mentioned that 1 did not identify a specific revenue vehicle as what's done with the other measures.
So, we have a number of options that are available to staff to specify here was 1 avenue would be to take some time to conduct some additional survey to look into a potential tax option and then provide that additional information to get input on or the other option would be to go ahead and select that revenue option now and give staff direction to draft language for council's consideration for the November 2024 election.
And so with that, I will go ahead and conclude and we're happy to take any questions you may have.
Thank you so very much and thank you to our city staff and to Mr Merman for getting this survey out in the field really quickly.
We only met, I think, what 2 weeks ago.
And so the fact that we have results is really a rapid timeline.
I want to kick things off and I have a question to Mr Merman relating to slides 8.
8 and 9, and it's not about revenue measures.
It's about the likely voter.
Sentiment about the city and about our.
Delivery of city services, so on slide 8, that's the right direction.
Wrong direction question sort of.
Showing the where we tracked year after year curious about is and I'll just is not a substantial change over the last.
Well, so there's no change over the last year and certainly not a substantial change over the last.
3 years I know that other jurisdictions are seeing much lower numbers.
I think in Oakland, I saw a poll where.
Over 60% of likely likely voters did not think the city was doing a good job.
So I'm curious about what you're seeing other jurisdictions around this kind of question.
Yeah, I mean, we don't have a company, you know, nobody that I know of have a comprehensive view of all of the.
You know, what this local polling looks like in every different city around the country, but I can tell you that we have seen several cities.
This year recently that have somewhat low, you know.
You know, an upside down number where more people are saying city is going in the wrong direction or doing a poor job compared to those saying it's going in the right direction.
So have this fairly consistent net positive.
It's not.
Uh, quite a majority saying, uh, going in the right direction, but it's about half of the right direction about a quarter saying wrong direction and another quarter roughly saying that it's they're not sure is more positive.
On balance than we've seen, and I know of.
3 other West Coast cities that we have pulled in fairly recently where these numbers were significantly worse.
Yeah, I'll just I literally just saw polling results for a survey that did about a regional housing measure and.
58% of the voters throughout the Bay Area said that things are in the wrong direction regionally.
So I just want to put this in context.
This is actually pretty good.
Um, so I think that bodes well for, um, you know.
Our efforts to put forward a tax measure.
I'll also point to slide 9, which is 54% of residents think that we're doing a good job of providing services.
That's encouraging.
I guess I had a question just in terms of how the data is presented.
Why fair and poor together.
Because those kind of mean those can be 2 different things.
Yeah, this is our standard way of measuring a job performance where we, we deliberately say just fair.
Rather than fair, which to imply that that is a.
A mild dissatisfaction, um, uh, relatively to the, and we'd like to have a 4 point scale.
So that so that we have equal, equal, positive and negative options.
And then the remainder is the don't know say, I don't have an opinion and they're in between.
So, there are people who ask this differently and put fair in the middle.
Um, we think this is more accurate, more consistent with the way people actually feel.
If you talk to those letters in a, who are responding just fair, they will usually say, yeah, there's some things I'm not particularly happy with.
So, just just to note that, but I would also.
Echo your earlier point that this relative to what we've seen, and I have seen this particular measure, for instance, in a large city across the Bay.
Uh, recently, uh, where it's, uh, you know, it's, it looks very different from this.
It's roughly in the, in the 20s on the excellent or good and over over 60% on the just report.
So.
There are, uh, this is still a relatively good number.
You know, it's, it, you know, there, you talk to 3 or 3 or 4 different posters and they'll give you different ideas about how to how to.
Measure the scale, but this is the way we like, we prefer to do it and we try to be consistent.
Thank you.
Um, so, um, to the, um.
Those are all my questions around the survey to the.
The direction that we staff is seeking from council today.
I think I'm looking at the recommendation.
There are 4 elements of the recommendation.
1 about the parks tax to about the potential extension to measure P3 about should be beverage tax and for about arts.
I guess 1st and foremost, I think we're in agreement that we want staff to.
Bring back in a measure to.
Amend or to continue the sugar, sweet beverage tax and to remove the current expiration date.
So I think the staff is already working on that, but I think we should provide that formal directions that can come back to us.
By July 30th, so we can take action on that.
We can put the ballot question resolution.
Regarding the parks tax, just on the basis of the results, and this requires a 2 thirds vote.
If we decided to move forward with with preparing language for an increase in the parks tax, I think the 20% increase.
Makes sense because that's that.
That increase got the most support consistently in the survey and since this is a 2 thirds measure.
We should go with, even though it's less revenue, we should go with the.
The version that will likely get the most support.
If we decide to move forward with that on the.
Potential extension and measure P1, we have to extend measure P.
I think 1 question is, do we.
Just remove the expiration date and have it be in perpetuity or is it for a fixed period of time? I know what we surveyed was just removing the expiration date and then looking at a tiered increase and I did request information from the finance department.
Which I got today, I had not had time to really evaluate it around our transfer tax and.
The number of transactions, the amount of revenue generate at different.
Different price points, because part of what we're considering is a potential increase in the transfer tax for the highest value properties.
That's like, 5 or 10M and so I want to ascertain how many of those transactions did occur.
And how much revenue would be generated if we did increase it at those higher break points.
So I think that's actually very relevant to.
To us in determining if we do a tiered increase where to set the tiers.
So, I think the entire council would benefit from that information, not just myself, because I think it's very relevant to the decisions we have to make if we do decide to study this.
So I think that's relevant and important information for us to have.
But I don't, as I had stated at our last meeting, I don't want to do anything to make it more expensive.
For people to buy a home in Berkeley, the cost of a single family home is already.
Way out of the reach of most people who work in our city and but we have had these very big transactions like when.
Equity residential sold a number of apartment buildings, for example, in downtown Berkeley.
And the city got a substantial amount of transfer tax revenue from that and specifically, we got money because of the additional.
1% through measure P.
so.
You know, so these, this does happen and I would argue it's kind of a spec.
It is essentially kind of a speculation tax because those, the flipping of those buildings, we do recruit some additional value from that through the measure P tax.
So, if that is going to happen, I mean, and to be perfectly honest, I mean, if you're selling a building for, you know, 50Million, you know, an additional 1% and transfer tax, kind of a wash on the whole.
So, and, you know, in 1 instance, we got 17Million in measure P tax revenue in 1 year when we have those large transactions.
So they do happen.
So, I do think that we need to be mindful of how we're going to do a tiered increase whether it's commercial or residential and why not recoup some additional tax revenue on those transactions not like, I don't think it's going to discourage those transactions, but I do think if we're going to do a tiered increase, we need to also be mindful of how it will impact the average.
And I actually, I actually think that kind of approach is progressive.
It is literally a progressive tax.
And I think it's, I think it's fair and I think it's equitable reducing the tax burden on the average individual while taxing the wealthiest people and the highest value properties.
That's progressive.
So, and we do need more revenue.
And we'll get into this, we talk about the budget on the 25th.
But the current amount of revenue we get for the measure P tax is volatile.
It's really contingent on market conditions.
We're seeing less now because interest rates and the lending environment is really is very constrained.
And so not a lot of people are buying properties right now.
And so we're seeing less revenue coming in and.
And so it is, it is volatile, but it is probably the most reliable revenue source that we can rely on a sales tax increase.
That's regressive, but it's also not going to generate that much money and neither will an increase in the transient occupancy tax.
So, property tax is our most stable revenue source, and until we can reform prop 13 and make it make make our system more equitable.
This is this and have more revenue.
This is this is what we have to do at the local level.
We have to go rely on self help.
So, I do, I personally believe that we do need to move ahead with extending measure P.
it has been enormously beneficial.
The fact that we have a 45% reduction unsheltered homelessness in Berkeley in 2 years is directly appreciable to the investments we made to measure P.
And so, you know, for people that call our offices asking for help dealing with encampments, for example.
Our encampment resolution team is funded all through measure P.
that's going to go away unless we find money in the general fund to support that.
Our leasing of hotels through home key and encampment resolution fund.
We're not going to have the money to support those those programs are public health programs, mental health programs, employment programs, outreach programs, housing, navigation, all that's going to go away and with the state decreasing funding for homeless services and with us facing deficits in future years in our general fund, we need additional revenue.
And so I think we should take this step now build on our success to make sure that we have the resources going forward to continue these critical services to reduce and homeless system, Berkeley.
And we need additional revenue just there's not enough revenue to support the wider rate, the 30 programs that we have right now.
And 1 of the things that staff has proposed is we could potentially fund the specialized care unit.
Through potentially through measure P, because there is no revenue source, identify to continue the specialized care unit.
It's 3Million dollars.
And so, if we were to do that, measure P could be a revenue source support funding the specialized care unit, but that will require that we have to increase it.
So I hope that we give direction today to.
Ask staff to draft a measure to extend measure P without a sunset and to look at a tiered increase for the highest, highest value properties.
I do want staff to come back with information about how much we.
How much money we've gotten and how many transaction have occurred at 1 and a half 1,000,002,000.
At 1 and a half 1,000,002,000.
3Million 5Million 10Million because that information is very important for us to consider as we're making decisions about.
If we have a tiered system, where do we set those tiers? But I think we can do this in a way that's that's progressive.
It's equitable.
That does not disproportionately and negatively impact the average homeowner and average taxpayer and making sure that when we have these big transactions that happen.
That we're recouping some of the costs associated with these speculative acquisitions and purchases.
I know counselor Hans going to talk about the arts measure.
We've been working very hard with a consortium of arts groups for the past several weeks.
Um, not only to understand what their needs are is a very dire situation.
We can't wait 2 years.
We have to do something.
And working with them to not just understand what their financial needs are, but to come up with a framework.
Around, um, uh, if we were to consider putting a tax measure on the ballot.
You know, what are the, what are the needs and what are the different arts programs that we could support.
Through a measure, and so we've got a lot of valuable input from.
Whether it's a Berkeley rep, Aurora, you see theater, smaller arts organizations as well.
And we do have a framework we want to present to the council today and I'll stop there.
Thank you very much.
Thank you to staff for all their work and to Mr.
Norman and like research.
Um, I'm going to start by saying where my head is right now about the 4 recommendation points and then I'll go back and explain a little bit why on each 1.
So, on the parks tax, I concur with the mayor and I think we should go ahead and prepare the.
Let me backtrack a little bit today.
We're not putting anything on the ballot today.
We're like.
Deciding how to move things along and so, um, for the parks tax.
Given the polling, I think the 20% increase is the 1 that we should.
Go ahead and put on the ballot.
I don't think we need to.
Draft.
I'll just say that it's easy to change the number on that.
My guess is it's exactly the same measure, whether it's 20 or 28%.
So I still think from a drafting perspective, given the polling, but what we should be drafting now is the 20% increase.
So, I'm going to go ahead and put that on the ballot.
I don't know what my recommendation on bullet point 1 would be today on measure P.
Um, I was delighted to see that the people of Berkeley continue to value the work that we are doing to address the homeless crisis.
And even without knowing that homelessness is down not 45% 55% since 2019.
So, I'm going to go ahead and put that on the ballot.
I think that this started since we got the money for measures.
We have seen the decline of our unsheltered homelessness and homelessness overall.
I mean, I don't know.
I think Piedmont maybe had 3 homeless people.
Now they have 1 there.
There's there are some small communities whose statistics are better than ours because 2 out of 3 people got rehoused.
So, I'm going to go ahead and put that on the ballot.
For a heavily impacted community in the Bay area.
We have absolutely stunning results that represent.
A huge reduction in human suffering and a lot of relief for our streets and our commercial districts.
We still have a long way to go.
So, I'm going to go ahead and put that on the ballot.
I am going to support moving ahead with the measure P.
Renewal I am also interested in following what.
Our survey told us, which is that people want more money.
So, I am not going to be supporting a straight reauthorization literally.
I'm not going to be supporting a straight reauthorization.
I'm going to be supporting what they have been providing up up till now.
I do share the mayor's interest in getting some actual.
I do share the mayor's interest in getting some actual.
I do share the mayor's interest in having the opportunity to do some actual calculations.
So that I can better understand what break points make sense, but I am committed to increasing the amount of money that we obtain through this tax.
But I want to say that in terms of.
If you just if you don't care that much about the human suffering and and maybe they do, but, you know, they're looking at it from the perspective of their industry, right? It is so good for real estate values in Berkeley.
And I think it's important to recognize that.
When we are when we reduce hopelessness, our streets and commercial districts were not and sidewalks were not designed for human habitation.
They are very poor and horrible place for people to try to survive, but it also impacts the normal use of our parks and our streets and our sidewalks.
And so, I think that we need to look at.
How do we change the outcomes we have from this tax to to the real estate values and the desirability of Berkeley as a place to buy not just a home, but to have a business.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I agree with you completely.
And I would hope that the real estate professionals understood that clearly the people of Berkeley understand it.
So, at this time, I do not have the information I need to know whether I would support exactly which break points.
Thank you.
I think we need to move ahead on drafting a tiered measure.
And anticipating maybe the increases that are written here, knowing that we will probably come back and change that those thresholds and maybe the amounts, but I, I think a tiered approach.
I think we need to move ahead with that structure and those numbers.
And and we can adjust it once we've had the opportunity to to actually do some analysis.
On the arts measure.
Thank you.
Thank you.
The arts measure has been a little bit late coming, but I just want to make it clear that.
I think the reason is because because of the absence of of a council member in that district.
So, I had a request for help from a Laura.
And 1 day after watching those cries for help go by for a week or 2 in my all council inbox.
And.
I came to put on our agenda, the 150.
$1000 request, which is far less than they requested or need.
And I use that amount because that's the most we've ever given an arts organization and a runoff.
So, I had a request for help.
For our arts or arts organizations, and that if not just a word, but others, if they don't have help this year or next year.
They just might not be there once word got out that I had talked to a Laura and that I put an item forward.
Arts organization started reaching out to me.
And.
I just want to say that.
The community based arts organizations are.
Are really on the edge of.
It's existential and I do not believe that we will know.
That we will have 2 years to just find out and if they shut their doors.
I just want to say that.
We're really excited that Igor is going to be seated soon and can pick some of this up because, you know, it was something a matter that one would expect the district for council member to take leadership on.
But we've we've stepped in.
I'm.
I'm.
I'm coming in late.
And I hope that my colleagues will keep an open mind.
And I want to report a little bit.
I have had probably.
For more meetings with large, larger groups of arts organizations.
I just want to say that.
We have already thrown together a.
Kind of working term sheet.
It is not.
By any means settled, but we do have some basic outlines that we're working with.
There is a desire to have some polling information.
I would be very happy to see in the staff report.
I would be very happy to see.
Some additional surveying done.
My lake, and I'm very, very interested in that.
I think that the general question that we put forward and already.
I think that the general question that we put forward and already.
I think that the general question that we put forward is please go ahead and try to put something together.
I certainly think that tells us that people are positively disposed to saving the arts, but it doesn't tell us the fine grained information that we need to know exactly what to put forward.
Okay.
So should I read from it or should I show it if I show it to them have to put it in the record.
Well, okay, I'm just going to read from it folks so because it's so draft version that I just don't want it to suddenly have more.
Okay.
So this has been discussed in a very hurried manner.
And is not yet settled.
A similar tax to the parks and library in that it would be a square footage assessment.
Okay.
Still up in the air is whether it would be split role or not I think that's a question we we might want to call on.
Okay.
So I'm just going to read from it folks.
I think that's a question we might want to call on.
And then lowering it after a couple of years and just having what I'm calling a maintenance amount because, you know, when the arts are tough.
And if we want to have flourishing arts and Berkeley over the long run, it's very clear that we're going to have to provide some public subsidy.

Segment 4

I'm going to talk a little bit about this.
It's some kind of a surge and then coming down to what I'm calling a maintenance level.
And I'm going to talk a little bit about the maintenance and grant programs and those grant programs would all be administered on a competitive basis.
Nobody would be guaranteed funding in any one year or over many years.
People would have to apply and reapply for a grant.
It would be competitive.
You know, organizations get 50% of their funding from the city or something like that.
It would be competitive.
They would have to have viable business plans and some of the ideas for how to use the revenues would be the lion's share of the city's revenue.
So it would be a competitive support.
Another piece, about 10%, we are thinking about using for middle and high school multicultural arts.
BUSD has a lot of strong arts programs, but there is no stream of income for those grants.
The arts program would be focused on the full diversity of the students.
And so it would be dedicated to rounding out and having a broader multicultural offerings in the arts.
The third use would be arts grants.
We have a current arts grant program.
We have a current arts grant program.
The additional stream of income for those grants would allow us to have more grants and potentially to raise the dollar amount on the grants.
But we already have an arts grant program.
We have a current arts grant program.
We have been very sad to see the kite festival leave, that we are having to squeeze all these people who want to come forward and do festivals and bring liveliness to the city.
And so our festival program is a little bit smaller than that.
It probably is of a size where the grants that we have available don't really match the need.
And so the idea would be that that program, again, we already have a program, it would be potentially the dollar limits would be higher than that.
And so we would be able to bring, you know, music in the streets and really bring some liveliness.
And so the idea is that that program would get 7.5% of the revenue.
And then I did sit down with staff.
And obviously, if we're going to be administering way more arts grants then we're going to have to have a little bit more of a capital fund for the arts itself.
So finance always needs a little extra FTE.
I've put in 10% potentially for that.
And these are all very preliminary.
That brings it to 100%.
There's also a desire to have a capital fund for the arts.
And so we've had these requests.
UC theater, Luna.
So we over the years have had these one-off requests.
But, you know, there's kind of an equity issue where we don't have a specific capital grants program.
And it's kind of, you know, it's hard for us to say, you know, by creating an actual capital fund and then actually having a program, we could really be more equitable in the way that we provide capital support.
We also will be able to provide more.
We all know that our arts organizations are really struggling to have a roof over their heads.
And, you know, there's a lot of seating and, you know, dance troops need floors that are springy.
And, you know, there's costs to outfit a space to use it for the arts.
So that capital fund would be a new fund and it would have criteria, it would be competitive, but it would be competitive.
So, you know, if we had this idea that we would have a capital fund, if we do a surge at the beginning, that would allow us to quickly build the capital fund.
Otherwise, for us to build a capital fund, we would have to take a little money every year.
And so that would be a new fund that would allow us to quickly build a capital fund for our organizations and also allow us to quickly amass this capital fund and be able to provide that kind of support as well.
So I am hoping that my colleagues will at least, we do have some time, we'll give the arts organizations and those of us who are working on this project a little bit more time.
I do think that the information and in particular polling information would be extremely helpful.
And I do think that we could shape some questions based on the outline that we have.
I don't know if Council, does Council have to approve this.
But I do think that it would be helpful to take a look at the survey and allow Mr.
Mermin to work with staff and the mayor and myself to suggest what we pull on.
So that's where I would like to go with this.
Prepare a 20% increase in the amount of money that we will be able to provide for this project.
But we will probably come back with some adjustments to that.
Move forward on the sugary sweetened beverage to prepare that.
And then give authority for us to work with Lake to put together, quickly put together some polling information.
But still go ahead and anticipate that we may like to do an arts tax.
Thank you for indulging me.
Councilmember Humbert.
Thank you, Mr.
Mayor.
And I'll go through the items in sequence.
The first one is the parks tax.
I think it's a good question.
I think it's a good question.
I think it's a good question.
It also strikes me that it's possible that even a proportion of undecided voters support it, that could push the margin up.
On the other hand, voters haven't been exposed to any negative arguments from the public.
I think that's a concern.
When folks are exposed to, you know, both sides' arguments, you know, the numbers fall.
And that's worrisome to me.
It's also important to note that districts, and I'm reading here, 3, 4, and 7 seem more sensitive to the level of the tax.
I think that's a concern.
I think that's a concern.
Overall, I'm open to the 20% version.
The 28% version seems to be a bridge too far.
Although I think as we consider the other potential measures, we have to keep in mind how they could affect this one at the margins.
If people see this, they're going to be concerned.
I, you know, no one has come, and I have to note this, no one's come forward from the community to speak about this particular measure.
And with these wobbly numbers, that also raises some concern for me about the parks measure.
So I just want to put that out there.
I do think that there is a significant, you know, partially transformative impact on our homeless population.
And it's critical that we extend it.
I do think that, you know, when it was passed, it was aimed at the top 33%, the top third of our property total.
I do think that the cost or the median price of a home in Berkeley, and I'm using only, you know, homes, has gone up, a single family home, significantly.
Not significantly, I mean, there was a period when it went way up, it's come down a little bit.
But it might make sense to me to move it up a little bit.
I think that the median price of interest rates fall will become the median again.
But 1.5 right now is what is, could be what somebody paid for a starter home in central Berkeley.
And I have real concerns about burdening, you know, burdening those transactions.
So, you know, I'm in a position to look at that before we reach 10, maybe another tier 10, you know, I'd like to have folks look at that.
Sugar-sweetened beverage product distribution tax, it's a no-brainer.
The soda tax is great, the revenue and the health programs it funds are wonderful, they've had a real impact, and I think we can win it again, and I think we ought to do it.
Then finally, on the arts, the proposed art tax at this point, you know, thank you, Councilmember Hahn for sort of articulating your proposal for how the tax might be formulated or the measure might be formulated, but it's still really inchoate to me.
I really want to offer, you know, support to our performing arts institutions.
They're really critical, I think, for Berkeley.
Berkeley is a city known for its performing arts.
We have great theater companies, we have the wonderful Freight and Salvage, which is one of my personal favorites, they're incredible acts that Freight and Salvage does, and they do a great deal of entertainment, and they do a great range of entertainment.
So we need to draw people to downtown, and so generally I'm going to be in support of an arts measure, but I'm not sure it should be in the form of a parcel tax.
We're loading up people's property tax bills with a whole lot of, you know, a lot of, you know, property insurance premiums.
People are paying a lot more in property insurance, if they can get it.
I mean, property insurance premiums, fire, you know, flood insurance, homeowners insurance is going way up.
Again, if you can get it, and if you can't get it, then you're forced to pay a lot more, and it's very expensive.
So I'm thinking, you know, maybe instead of a parcel tax, that we look at the potential for an increase in the sales tax, or maybe an increase in the hotel tax.
I think we ought to look at all options.
Generally in favor of this, because I think it's critical that we keep our performing arts in Berkeley and keep our performing arts in Berkeley.
I think that's the existential situation right now.
So anyway, those are my comments on all of these items.
Thank you.
Thank you.
We'll go to Councillor Casselani.
Thank you very much, Mr.
Mayor, and thank you for the presentation.
This has been a great conversation.
So I'm going to go ahead and move on to the next item.
I'm going to start placing that on the ballot, preparing that.
I believe we want to remove the expiration date, right? Okay.
So that one is straightforward.
And on the parks tax, you know, I was very interested in the polling that it wasn't reaching that two-thirds of voters.
So I'm going to go ahead and move on to the next item.
Is he still with us? Yes, I'm still here.
Okay.
What was your margin of error? So the overall margin of error for the full survey, the full sample of 500 likely voters is plus or minus 4%, 4.0%.
Oh, okay.
So any of these numbers, it doesn't look like it's going to go anywhere.
It's going to go in either direction, 4 points.
Yes.
And if I recall, the parks was at 62 for the 20%, right? Yeah.
Let me make sure we're referring to the same thing.
But when you look at the parks tax and the two versions were, I mean, this is the initial vote for the parks tax and the two versions were 68% increase.
But that rate of increase, you know, that increase in the rate of the parks tax got 68% voting or leaning yes.
So that could vary up or down.
So maybe it could be anywhere between 64 and 72, but it's a curve.
So most likely it's right around 68% voting yes.
And then the other version was 68% increase in the tax to 28%, 28% higher on the tax rate.
The result in terms of the voters response was 61% of likely voters said I would vote yes on that.
So that's 7 points lower and we see that as a significant difference.
Right.
It is now, if we had only tested the 28% and we got the 61, we would say that's pretty close to the threshold.
It certainly could pass, but it's, you know, it's in the zone of where it could pass or it might not.
Okay.
But I think, but I appreciate you putting this slide up because I was, my memory was not quite right.
So it does narrowly surpass the two thirds.
So that is positive that it does in the zone of where it could pass.
Right.
So that's the number I'm thinking of.
The way it does fall below that.
Then after, you know, fairly, you know, we were tough in the sense of, you know, we made the strong argument that might be made on the no side along with the yes argument and, you know, tried to be strong on both sides to make sure that, you know, it would pass.
But it's still, you know, it's still, you know, it's still narrowed equally from both sides.
It does look like that yes vote would come down a little.
It's still close to the threshold, certainly quite plausible that it would pass.
You just still have a 14% undecided there.
So it's marginally there.
It looks like it's very close based on the polling, if not already at that two thirds.
I think there are some uncertainties here that Councilmember Humbert talked about.
One is I'm not really clear who the proponents and opponents are going to be, who's going to run these campaigns.
Obviously I hope there wouldn't be a strong opposing side.
But it seems like to get it over the threshold, there needs to be a positive campaign.
And I'm concerned about who is going to run that, who's going to step up and do that, because that will be important.
So that's also something I'm thinking about, because the ballot is very crowded, not entirely open.
And I have to be honest with Councilmember Hahn's presentation about the possible parcel tax for arts, this is also a parcel tax.
There's two possible street measures that are parcel taxes.
There's a library tax that we didn't talk about today that's also a parcel tax.
So that's how many parcel taxes was that? That was five parcel taxes.
So we're going to raise the question of whether this is the right time for this parks tax, because it's not quite at, it's not a clear slam dunk the way measure P is in easily surpassing the 50%.
It's sort of barely there.
I'm not clear who the proponents are who are going to make the strong case for it.
And there's four other proponents who are going to make the strong case for it.
I don't know.
I care about our parks.
I know we have a very concerning deficit with our marina fund.
But I think that we need to get really serious and prioritize our, what we're going to put forward.
But I do think for now, preparing the 20%, as some of my colleagues have suggested, the 20% would make sense to prepare.
So those are my thoughts on the parks tax.
On the measure P revenue, I know it's Friday afternoon, so I'm not going to talk so much about all of the important initiatives we've been able to fund because of this revenue measure.
I will just say as the council member who hosts the golden bear home site, I had the privilege of having lunch with residents today.
And I just want the public to know that there are people in our community with serious medical needs, illnesses, serious mental health needs, serious substance use issues, serious trauma, and they live in our neighborhoods because of what we've been able to do as a result of measure P.
And, you know, I think we definitely have a responsibility to continue this.
I was very pleased that it easily surpasses 50%.
And we know from our budget presentations, revenues are not growing as fast as expenditures.
Or I should say expenditures are growing much faster than revenues.
This is a general revenue tax, so it does provide flexibility for us to be able to continue this.
And we know that there are growing liabilities and costs.
And so I think I also think it's difficult for our staff for planning purposes when it's only 10 years.
I think just having no sunset, as the mayor had noted in his remarks, makes a lot of sense on this.
I think the tiers also are reasonable.
And I think we can take more time with that and be more thoughtful about the appropriate cutoffs for the tiers.
Of course, the past is not predictive of the future with real estate transactions necessarily.
So but in any case, I think we should make an informed decision and not just throw darts for those tiers, for those cutoffs.
So I think we need to spend more time thinking about where those tiers should be.
But I think we can proceed with drafting.
And I do want to say that I would also like to see a higher threshold amount for the transactions that are subject to the higher rate, which I think we're going to have at 2.5%.
And I think 1.5 million right now is the, I think it's just above the median price of a home in Berkeley.
And I tried to get some information about, you know, what might be a reasonable higher number to go to that was more reflective of sort of a top third number.
And the number I got was about 1.8 million.
I'd also be interested if there's a way to write into the measure a way to adjust that number.
Because I think, as has been noted, when interest rates come down and people start buying again, 1.8 could quickly become the average.
Although I hope not.
I hope we can continue to build housing in this state and in this region and have that not occur.
But we do have to be realistic.
So if there is a way that we can think about adjusting that in the ballot language, you know, that might be, that would be something I'd be interested in.
So I think I've covered measure P.
Now, I think that the biggest question is the arts organizations.
I do want to thank the organizations that were there giving public comment today.
And, you know, I know it's been such a difficult few years because of the pandemic.
And I think the most important question to me is, what is the size of the need? You know, that was not something I heard Councilmember Hahn, do you have a dollar amount that you have heard from these arts organizations? Because that really will drive what we pull and what type of tax.
So I wanted to ask Councilmember Hahn if you had a total revenue amount that you're seeking to raise, you know, through your conversations with the arts organizations.
Okay, thank you.
I know that one organization needs $500,000 in the next six months, right? I do not have a specific amount that all of the organizations might need in the next, say, three to five years.
But I do know that there is a need for $500,000.
But I could try to get something like that.
Honestly, it's been very kind of rushed.
And that's why I'm asking today just for more time, basically.
But obviously, that's a good question.
And I do know that there's a need for that.
And I do know that, you know, in some communities, government supports the arts to a much greater extent than we do with public subsidy in the United States.
And to truly have a robust arts, to have robust arts in the community, over the long run, we probably need to have some more funding.
Thank you.
I think that kind of covered my question.
I'm just going to have to respectfully cut you short there because I know we're short on time this afternoon.
So what I heard you say is that you know that one arts organization has a $500,000 need.
I think obviously we can't fully fund every arts organization's full need.
But I do want to note that in the spreadsheet that we received today, there are estimates of how much can be raised with a certain percentage increase of the sales tax, a certain square footage increase in the parcel size, and a certain percentage increase in the revenue.
And I do want to note that in the spreadsheet that we received today, there are estimates of how much can be raised with a certain percentage increase in the parcel tax and the transient occupancy tax, a 1% or a 2%.
So that would be my first suggestion is to come up with a number.
And I would suggest a low number.
Parks was trying to raise $3 million.
I would suggest a number lower than that.
And it's not because I don't value the parks.
It's because people don't have unlimited or necessarily, you know, very fast-growing resources.
So I personally am very concerned about, you know, a fifth parcel tax.
If the other four are on the ballot, you know, two of them we don't have control over, the Safe Streets measure and the other Fix-It Streets measure.
And so I look to the transient occupancy tax as one way to raise some amount of funding.
The additional 2% would raise $833,000.
That may not be the total number we're trying to raise.
I also want to posit that we have an arts fee on development.
And I don't know what the statutory, oh, my son is home.
I don't know what the statutory requirements are for, okay, he brought challah bread from JCC.
So we're going to enjoy that.
Okay, folks.
So, you know, I don't know what the requirements are around the arts fee for development.
Maybe we can have multiple strategies to get at, I'm going to say a number of like $2 million.
But I know, Council Member Hahn, you talked about, you know, the arts fee.
I know that's a significant amount.
So we want to think about what that might be as well.
So I think I've said enough about the arts fee.
But I want to thank the arts organizations.
I want to tell you, we value the contribution you make to downtown.
We're just trying, I'm just trying to balance all of these very important things.
So thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Which I sometimes feel the need to do.

Segment 5

We're going to go next to Vice Mayor Wengraf.
Thank you.
And my apologies for being late.
I did not hear public comment.
I'm sorry.
So, I have a question for Mr.
Mermin, if he's available.
Yes, I'm here.
Hi.
So, when you did the polling, do people have a sense Of the totality of what might be on the ballot? We did not ask all of the other.
We did not state that there would be multiple other measures or test those other measures.
No.
So, the response is a kind of in a vacuum.
Well, they're based on what people know or already understand today, but I would guess that many do not know that they're going to be facing several other revenue measures on the same ballot.
Okay, and what is your best wisdom from all of your years of experience about how many revenue measures to put on the ballot? Yeah, there's no right answer because every election year is different in terms of what else is on their minds and the situation in the economy and other concerns that voters have.
So, I don't think there's a magic correct answer to that question.
But we do know that it is more difficult to pass local revenue measures when there's a large number of other revenue measures also, at whatever level, state, regional.
And if, in fact, that's the case this year, which I understand there will be quite a few, what I would do to interpret that in terms of our results here is that it suggests that that will it's more likely that the number would we would not see an increase in the yes vote and more likely that we come down a little bit as people you know, look at the many, many different measures, increasing revenues and try to make, you know, they might decide to choose a few priorities or, in some cases, vote no on everything.
And that could cause the yes vote to come down somewhat.
Yeah, from your experience, would you say we should pick those priorities and narrow the number of votes on the ballot or put everything on and let the voter choose? Well, it is true that it's up to the voters to decide.
And if they were in, if everything they looked at is something they cared about and thought was a really high priority and they felt they could afford to pay whatever those increased taxes are, you know, it's not impossible that you would see them vote yes on a wide range of things.
They certainly have sometimes in the past passed multiple revenue measures at the same time.
I would say, as a general principle, they're more likely to pass a particular measure if it doesn't have too many other things.
Also, asking the same voter to increase their same type of tax, such as a property tax.
And how important is the effectiveness of the campaign for each measure's success? That also varies.
If it's something people sort of instinctively think is a high priority and already, you know, have a kind of fundamental understanding of what it's, what the money is for and what purpose it will go to, that tends to be easier to hold that yes vote than it's something that appears complicated or unclear.
So, I would just say.
Those measures that.
Clearly address the high priority the voter already shares is more likely to sort of survive in that environment where they have multiple competing measures, as opposed to something that may be a somewhat lower priority, or maybe just more confusing to the voters to what its purpose is.
Okay, thank you.
I don't mean to put you on the spot, but I really appreciate it.
Yeah, and I wish I had more definitive answers to those questions, but there are none.
It's, you know, it's always a bit of a, there are things, unknowable factors that will affect what people do in November that we can't measure at this time.
Yeah, and our voters are very generous and, you know, they have historically voted in favor of taxing themselves.
But in the city of Berkeley, the history has been and over as, as you saw, we, we have, in fact, done these surveys for the city now for 12 years and in most cases, when something has appeared on the ballot and the level of revenue was clear and the need was clear and the purpose was clear in most cases, voters have voter support does not every case.
And, of course, there was the large measure that did not pass 2 years ago, but in many, many cases, they have.
Yeah, okay, thank you very much.
So, I think the soda removing the expiration date on the soda taxes and no brainer.
And we should just direct staff to go ahead and.
And write that measure on the parks, the parks are very important to me personally, and I'm very concerned about the Marina and I would like to see something pass.
Um, so if we put anything on, it should be at 20%.
And, um, because that has the greatest chance of passing.
Um, and I hope that there, there are a group of advocates out there.
Who will work hard on a campaign.
Uh, to get it passed, I don't know, I haven't heard from anybody yet, but.
I really hope that they would be able to help it over the finish line.
Measure P, I think measure P has actually.
Shown us or shown the citizenry of Berkeley that their money can be put to very good use.
I think we're seeing terrific.
Effectiveness of measure P and dealing with our homelessness.
And so, um, I would like to see measure P, um, put on, but I would like to also see us honor.
That original formula of the top 1 3rd of home sales.
And so, um, I think right now the median home prices 1.7.
It's probably going to go up to 1.8.
so I would, I think it was council member.
Humbert who suggested 1.8 as the threshold and I think I agree with that.
And then and then a tiered.
A tiered formula after that.
In terms of the arts, the arts are very important to me, and I think that they are absolutely essential to the health of the downtown, especially.
And I really want to do anything possible.
To help arts survive.
The consequences of covert, I don't know how long it's going to take.
Or if people's habits have changed permanently, we don't we don't really know.
Whether whether live performance will come back, especially.
Theatrical performance, I think the music music performance.
Is is doing better because it reaches a broader.
A broader community, but I do think the numbers are important and that we need to have some numbers when we go.
If we do another poll to find out more information.
Um, it's my.
It would be my desire to find some kind of.
Emergency funding for these organizations.
From within the city.
To allow them to continue.
To move forward and that we find.
A more sustainable source of funding.
For the future and Sophie says.
You know, we probably will have to find some, some permanent form of subsidy.
Moving forward, which is fine, but this is all very rushed.
And I'm not sure that that way and we're coming in late.
I'm not sure.
That we actually have the time to craft something.
In the, in the, in the short amount of time that we have.
So, I also would like to look at the possibility of finding maybe a 1Million or 2Million.
From within the general fund or the arts.
I don't know what's in the arts fund.
I don't know what the art fears for development.
We have.
A huge amount of development in the pipeline.
And I'd like, I'd like some numbers on what all of that might mean.
As a revenue screen for supporting the arts.
So, that's that's where I am right now.
But I do think that we have to keep in mind that all of these parcel taxes.
You know, young couples are putting every penny they have into purchasing a house.
And now we're just slamming them with.
All of these additional.
Fees insurance is tripling.
PG and E rates are going up exponentially.
The cost of living in Berkeley is really, really expensive and then.
People who are on fixed incomes.
Are having an even harder time keeping up with all of this and I do think we have to be very sensitive to that.
We can't just keep taxing and taxing and taxing.
People who own property and we can't keep taxing and taxing and taxing businesses either because it's not a friendly business environment.
And we have a lot of competition out there, so I think we have to be.
Very balanced and and.
And really consider what are the most important things.
That we need to do, and that we need to ask our voters to.
To support, um.
I would, I would prefer for us to have that discussion before we put everything on the ballot.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Council member to par.
Thank you.
Yeah, I first want to say that I am comfortable with moving forward with the 20% tax, although I do question and I'm not.
Necessarily suggesting this, because I'm also concerned about our.
Marina funds, but I do question whether our products tax would do better without the inclusion of the waterfront in the language.
I wouldn't necessarily want to see that, but.
It depends on what we're weighing as as I guess the most important.
I'm just going to jump in here and just kind of throwing that out there in terms of measure P, it's clear that we have a strong support for a tiered increase and it's also clear that people want a progressive tax and so I would, you know, be interested in seeing that.
Play out as well, and any other taxes that that we're putting forward, I would support a partial tax over, um.
Um, and also, for the arts tax.
Um, I echo my colleague support for the sugar beverages taxes, like multiple council members.
I've said this is a no brainer.
Um, and also for the arts tax.
Um, I would support a partial tax over, um, multiple council members.
I've said this is a no brainer.
Um, and also for the arts tax.
Um, although it we should be aware that this poll is without final numbers of the support will very likely go down, um, if the what once we have a specific number for.
Councilor, um, thank you, mayor, just a couple of little random things here and there just responding.
1st of all, for council member customer Ronnie, I wanted to thank you for, um, your comments on the arts.
Tax and, um, again, this has been a very quick kind of, uh, I don't even call it a process that that would give it too much credit.
Um, but absolutely, uh, I think your idea of of of actually.
Asking because a consortium of groups has pulled together, they are now meeting regularly.
Uh, they're all incredibly busy and most of them are drowning yet.
They're showing up for these, um, you know, curtain calls, uh, to discuss the tax.
And I think, uh, I might be able to at least get a ballpark of, um, kind of what the urgent needs are and, um, maybe a little bit better of a sense of of what support obviously is not going to be spreadsheets and things like that.
But I think we could probably get some realistic numbers because this group is well organized.
And so I'm definitely going to be asking for that right away.
Um, regarding.
The fact that there's lots of tax measures on the ballot potentially, I personally think that everything that we're talking about is something that I strongly support.
And I am, I'm very reluctant to make the decision.
Um, and, um, I'm not sure that we have a lot of time to talk to ourselves.
Um, about, uh, you know, to guess what the voters.
Would say when they have a bunch of measures before them, I do want to point out that yes, there's these 2.
Oh, they both said, okay, so that's very recent.
So so there are 2, but council member 1 graph, um, they wouldn't both.
Pass, they might both pass, but only 1 would be operative.
So on that 1, it's an either or it's not both.
And then, um, on these other potential, I, I'm just wary of saying what's last in is what we shouldn't do just because it's last.
I do think we need to evaluate all of these for the likelihood that they'll pass even the likelihood that they'll generate the amount of money we need.
Um, I'm not sure that we have a lot of time to talk to ourselves.
So, for example, I would be interested in finding out from from Mr.
Ferris well, if the lower amount is what can be put forward does he want 2 years to gather more community support because quite frankly, I haven't seen 1 person in all these meetings we've had come forward so I'm not feeling where the grassroots support is for that is it better and I'm not, I'm not sure that we have a lot of time to talk to ourselves, but I'm just wary of saying what's last in is what we shouldn't do just because it's last.
I do think we need to evaluate all of these for the likelihood that they'll generate the amount of money we need.
So, for example, I, I'm not sure that we have a lot of time to talk to ourselves, but I'm not sure that we have a lot of time to talk to ourselves, but I'm not sure that we have a lot of time to talk to ourselves.
So, I'm not sure that we have a lot of time to talk to ourselves.
So, I'm not sure that we have a lot of time to talk to ourselves.
So, I'm not telling I'm asking, would it be better to wait 2 years on that one gather more community support really show us and show the community and go for a higher number on a less crowded ballot.
I would like to know from Scott Ferris what he thinks of.
I would like to know from Scott Ferris what he thinks of.
You know who he's been working with on his commission and things like that.
You know, maybe that is something that need, but we would be wiser to wait until 2026.
Thank you.
I don't know if you or Scott or anyone was there, but I guess that's a question I have.
Thank you.
I'm wondering if we haven't seen this swell of community interest, at least not here at council.
Might it be better to spend 2 years building something a little more robust and then have the potential to actually get more for the parks.
I'm not sure.
I think it's a good question.
It's a good question.
I think we have a lot of community interest.
I think we have a lot of community interest.
So, I don't see that as our role.
You know what we're trying to articulate it on the staff side is just what the need is.
And so when we describe the need for 660,000 for tree planting.
For the 1.5 million for the Marina and the waterfront parks.
And for the 1.45 and capital.
That's really.
We're going to have a lot of hard choices.
As we're waiting from the side of the need.
If we don't have an infusion of new funding, then we're going to have a lot of hard choices.
Within the next year, especially down at the waterfront.
And as our tree planting grants sort of sunset and as our capital needs continue to grow so that from the staff side, that's what we can represent.
So, you know, it's, it's enough to do those three things that I mentioned.
It's enough to close the structural deficit at the waterfront and to sort of set the Marina fund on a much more stable path going forward.
It's enough to do more capital.
We have 225 million in needs and capital.
So, of course, this is a larger question than just what the parks tax could help us with.
And it's enough to do to establish a tree planting unit in a way that we think it's going to be successful for the next many years.
Okay, well, that's helpful for me because I want to make sure the parks has what it needs.
And, you know, I understand that the perspective of staff is like, here's what we need.
We need to be able to meet the needs of our city.
And there's a reason why we do surveys as a city, right? That's also.
We want to be successful in meeting the needs of our city.
So we do have to take into account.
Thank you.
That's very helpful for me.
And thank you.
I will just say that I would rather put all of this before the voters and and see what we can do the streets taxes.
Only one is going to end up being a tax if any.
And that is a tax that is paid by the wholesalers.
The city of Southern Berkeley pays that tax to tax you pay when you buy into the community.
And that is a tax that is paid by the wholesalers.
And it is not necessarily passed down in the form of extra cost on soda.
It is absorbed into the general costs of the retailer and they may pass pass along to me not.
And that is a tax that is paid by the wholesalers.
The only parcel taxes that we would be putting on will be the parks.
And the libraries.
And that is a tax that is paid by the wholesalers.
And it is not all the same and it's not quite as much as we might think.
And I really these are all needs that are urgent.
And personally, I would rather put them before the voters rather than, you know, decide which which baby to kind of.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I just wanted to clarify there is a formula right now.
Right now we do not have any fixed cutoffs for measure P.
We do not have any fixed cutoffs for measure P.
We do have an approximation.
It's not exact of the top one 3rd of transactions.
And if folks want to understand how it works, I'm happy to explain it.
It's an approximation of the top one 3rd of transactions.
It's a calculation based on what the top one 3rd of transactions were in the previous year.
And it projects that as the threshold for the next year.
So every year, the threshold is changing currently.
It's a formula that I wrote myself.
But it's too complicated to state here.
And I haven't floated it with Henry yet.
But I'm, you know, that is a formula that I wrote myself and.
I do understand how it works and and and the ways that it has slightly not work the way we intended.
But I do understand how it works and and and and the ways that it has slightly not work the way we intended.
And I do understand how it works and and and the ways that it has slightly not work the way we intended.
And that's it.
And I guess do we need a motion now? Are you ready to make a motion? Motion be good.
Okay.
I'm going to try.
All right.
I'm going to try to move this stuff.
So I would like to move that we direct staff.
To prepare a parks tax with a 20% increase.
For consideration by council.
To prepare a measure P.
I would like to make a motion.
I'm interested with the tears, knowing that we will probably and then those tears.
And we may retain the reset every year for that top one 3rd.
But I think for ease sake and to allow them to move forward.
I would recommend that they prepare the tax.
My motion would be that they prepare the tax.
On the arts tax.
On the sugary sweetened beverage.
I would recommend that they go ahead and prepare that for for our consideration.
We're moving the sunset.
And then on the arts tax.
I would like to propose I'd like to recommend.
That we.
That we set up.
A final set of survey questions and a survey.
On the question of the arts tax.
And that it would that the mayor would take into consideration what he's heard here today.
And help formulate some quick, but thorough.
Thank you.
In the meantime.
I'm.
I don't know if we should have.
I think we should allow staff to begin drafting.
But I I'm thinking we would need this to come back.
And we would need another session like this with the polling in hand.
And then we would need staff to come back.
And then we would need staff to come back together to draft something.
So that would be my motion.
Prepare the 20% parks tax prepare the sugary sweetened beverage.
Removal of the expiration date.
I would like to propose.
That we do the survey knowing that we will probably come back.
And make some tweaks and then give the.
Mayor the authority to work with.
The polling firm to prepare questions around.
An arts tax based on the conversation we've had here.
And to bring that polling data.
I would like to propose that we do the survey.
Knowing.
Probably as an urgency item because time is short.
That's my motion.
I'll second that for purposes of discussion.
And with respect to the arts, I heard TOT.
I heard sales tax.
I heard.
Parcel tax.
I heard sales tax.
And obviously those will yield different amounts.
Based on the information we received today.
A.
2% increase in the TOT would generate.
83,833.
And then.
0.75% increase, which is the maximum we can go up to.
In the sales tax would generate, you know.
Roughly $2 million in additional revenue on an annualized basis.
And then obviously parcel tax could generate significantly more on the basis of the rate and.
How the method of assessment.
So, but I did hear those 3.
So.
Just to follow up on what.
Counselor Hans said, based on information received from finance.
The measure P transaction threshold, meaning the threshold at which the.
The additional 1% applies.
The measure P tax, the additional 1% applies.
Was 1.8 million in 2023.
Oh, so every year it gets as counselor Hans said.
The median is 1.8 million.
Which is what the 30% is.
And so each year that just keeps changing based on the property values.
And I think the intent of that was.
To make sure that we are capturing the.
The top 1, 3rd of the transactions.
And recognizing that.
Property values prices are going to change.
They're going to fluctuate.
They're going to be, they're going to adjust making sure that we're not.
Going backwards and.
You know, increasing the median that, you know, the average home, because we don't want to create a barrier for.
People to be able to buy homes in Berkeley.
So I think that should continue.
Because I think.
I think that's a very elegant way of making sure that we're not.
Increasing the tax burden on the average buyer.
If you raise your hand.
Yes, I just wanted clarification on that issue.
I'm sorry.
At the time when we passed measure P.
1.5.
And above was in the top 1, 3rd.
Is that correct? Yeah, looking here.
It was a starting point.
And I think Henry economy is on the call too.
He can probably address this.
Okay.
So.
I just remember saying, and what I agree with is.
The median price has gone up.
And it's closer now to 1.7.
Maybe even 1.8.
And so in order to avoid.
Taxing.
The median.
We need to raise the threshold.
Okay.
Can I, can I, can I, let me see if I can tackle this.
What we have now says the floor.
Is 1.5.
Every year.

Segment 6

And it went up for the past three years.
It was 1.8.
When we calculated it last year, it dropped to 1.6.
So it's currently at 1.6.
So it fluctuates.
Okay, catching the 3rd, the 3rd of the highest numbers.
So what is the 3rd? What is the top 1 3rd now? It's 1.6.
1.6.
So it's constantly changing.
1.5 is actually misleading.
The 1.5 says, according to the measure that that is the floor that is the lowest it could ever.
That wasn't clear to me.
I didn't know that was the starting point and everything above 1.5.
Was captured.
Yes, but it now says that that is the flow.
So you cannot go below 1.5, but you can capture the 1.
So maybe we need to raise the floor.
Okay, if in, you know, to use your language, we raise the floor to 1.6 or 1.7.
So that, I mean, that's a possibility.
Okay, also, Henry, could you clarify.
How how the transfer tax is paid.
I don't believe it's paid entirely by the buyer.
I understand it's a negotiated thing.
I understand it is negotiated and usually a split.
It's split 5050.
Sometimes it is sometimes it depends on how smart you are, if you're a buyer or how smart you are.
So it's.
So, I just wanted to correct the record on that council member Han.
The transfer tax is split.
Usually.
It's negotiated, but usually it's split 5050.
Buyer and seller.
Okay.
Thank you.
Councilor Bartlett.
Just just briefly to just note for the record to everyone listening, there was a big change recently in the way brokers do their fees.
They lost some major litigation, large class actions.
They were found to have been.
Unfairly, I guess, price fixing in fees.
And so now there's a radical change in how they charge fees.
So I don't know how that factors into our analysis, but we need to incorporate it.
Thank you.
Councilor.
Yes, thank you very much.
Mr.
Mayor.
I just wanted to do a logistical check.
If we were to do.
A poll question about an arts revenue measure.
Madam city manager, do we have the time.
To undertake that poll and get the results.
With adequate time to prepare the language.
And be able to submit that.
For the November ballot, I'm going to yield that question.
We did have some discussions earlier with staff and with Mr.
Merman to talk about timing needed because.
We had initially shared with the council that we didn't number 1, have enough capacity in this initial survey to include a number of additional questions for the art.
But we also talked about what would the timing be if we needed to do an additional survey.
And so where we landed is that an additional survey would put us well outside of the next 45 days, which.
We are in a 45 day timeframe right now, in terms of, and I'm just ballparking the timing.
It may be 48 days or what have you, but we are in a time crunch for language for decision points for getting things on a ballot and getting to the register of voters.
So, I will defer to Christina Erickson and Mr.
Merman, and maybe they can share the only other thing that I can think of around this is the contract and we'd have to talk a little bit about that as well in terms of amending the contract, the existing contract with Mr Merman to cover the cost for the additional surveying and I, and I believe that that cost may exceed my, my available threshold financially.
So, but I'll pause there and hand it over to Christina and if Mr.
Merman has any comments.
Thank you.
And please Mr.
Merman chime in if I misstated any of this.
I think technically, in terms of timing, it's possible to get the polling done if we start on Monday.
For a 6 minute poll, and we could, we'd have to sort of start absolutely no later than June 28th.
I don't know how we will arrange the funding.
We'd have to identify that it's not identified at this point.
And I think the cost is going to be close to $30,000.
Okay.
Okay, so it can be done.
We have to identify 30,000 and we have to prepare these poll questions.
So it's, you're saying by Monday, the 17th, but at the latest, the 28th.
Yeah, we would need to get started Monday.
Yeah, we would need to get started Monday.
Okay, so I'm going to help us along and just suggest, these would be the 3 questions I would ask, in terms of revenue, I would pull on the transient occupancy tax at 2% that raises $833,000.
I would pull the maximum sales tax increase we can do, which I believe the mayor says raises $2 million.
And then I would do the same thing that we did for parks, which is $0.04 per square foot, which would raise roughly $3 million and change.
So that gives 3 options.
We can continue to work with the arts organizations to find out.
I mean, one of those 3 options is going to have to work, right? So obviously, they might want the highest, but we have to see also the voters appetite.
You know, I'm not the pollster, but we know that the voters are willing to pay.
They're just there for the parks at $0.04.
They're just barely at the threshold.
So that will be informative.
You know, do we exceed the two-thirds threshold when it's for arts? We don't know that right now.
So those would be my suggested 3 poll questions.
They give you 3 different revenue amounts in 3 different ways, and I think that would help us be able to arrive at a decision.
Thank you.
Okay, I think those are good suggestions.
And I know that we are, I think we've got to move really quickly to get that, what is the need, the number.
Because it may, just going off what the parks tax said, that may not be enough, or it may be enough.
We don't know.
So I think that's a good direction.
We might want just some flexibility to make sure that on the parcel tax side, that if we do need to increase that rate a little bit more to provide that surge, that surge funding, that we can do that.
And we'd like to work with staff on the language to effectuate the direction.
But I think Councilor Castellano, that's good direction.
That's good direction.
Okay.
Councilor Bradley, did you speak already? Councilor Hahn? We do need to, you need to go.
I know you have something at 5.30, so we've got to go.
A lot of time's running by, yeah.
I did just want to clarify on this, because there was so much confusion about the measure P reset.
I'm just going to try to explain it really simply.
The first year, we said 1.5 million, because that year when we passed measure P, that represented the top, the threshold for the top one-third.
It was not the median, it was not the average, it was the approximate threshold for the top one-third.
That's why we started at 1.5.
The following year, we started using the formula.
And every year since, we have used the formula.
What the formula does, as it looks back at the previous year's transaction, it calculates the 67th percentile, and it puts the cutoff for the following year at the 67th percentile of the previous year.
So it's an approximation, but it attempts, it's the best way we have of trying to approximate what is the top one-third in the following year.
The next year, it looks back again to the year just before.
And that's why the top one-third resets over and over.
When Henry says it was 1.8 million, that wasn't the median or the average.
That was the top one-third cutoff.
So I just, super, it's confusing.
I want to be really clear.
That is what we have right now.
It is true that 1.5 million as the top third is also a floor, the way it's written.
Our real estate prices would have to go way down for that to be the top one-third threshold.
So we could keep it, we could change it, but I don't think it would have any operational impact because the operating threshold is this reset formula every year.
Just wanted to hopefully clarify how it works.
And so I do have the motion.
Yeah, let me, let me, let me wrap this up as a presiding officer.
So before I do that, however, I don't want to belabor this.
I'll follow up with staff.
I thought we had allocated $100,000 for the survey and the outreach.
So how did this one survey cost $100,000? How can we not have any money left over to do an additional smaller survey? So if we can look into that, because I think we did allocate $100,000 for this, unless we reappropriated some of that money for something else, we should have some money left over.
Thank you, Mr.
Mayor.
We will certainly look into it.
I know that the cost was $28,000.
I don't know what the cost for this previous survey was.
So we will look into it and get back to you.
If we don't, I'm already in the background searching to figure out what we can do in terms of getting an amended contract.
So we're working on that now.
Okay.
So let me just briefly restate the motion.
We're providing direction to the city manager to begin the preparation of ballot measure language we brought back on July 30th.
One, for an amendment to the existing parks tax that results in a 20% increase.
Two, an amendment to the existing Measure P tax, removing the January 1, 2029 expiration date and the tiers that were studied in the survey at a higher tax rate.
Three, an amendment to the existing sugar, sweetened beverage tax, removing the 10-year expiration date and direction as stated on additional survey, looking at a variety of revenue options for an arts tax.
I think that's it.
Yes.
I do think both the P and the arts would probably have to come back for an interim version.
I think we want to, yeah, with P, well, the arts, if we do a survey, we're going to get the results and we'll discuss that and then provide direction on drafting the language.
If we decide to go ahead with that.
On P, yes, there was information requested.
I think we want to come back and really think more about if we're going to do a tiered increase, what that looks like.
I believe that's the motion.
Unless there's any further discussion, please call the roll.
Is the tax rates that Council Member Keserwani discussed for the arts tax? That's part of the direction.
Okay.
And then is the top one-third reset in the Measure P draft also part of the direction? Yeah, that's the existing law and we're proposing to change that.
Okay.
On the motion, Council Member Keserwani? Yes.
Taplin is absent.
Bartlett? Yes.
Hahn? Yes.
Wengraff? Yes.
Lunapara? Yes.
Humber? Yeah.
Mayor Harrigan? Yes.
Okay.
Okay.
That completes our business for this afternoon.
I'll move to adjourn the meeting.
Is there a second? Second.
Please call the roll.
Council Member Keserwani? Yes.
Bartlett? Yes.
Hahn? Yes.
Wengraff? Yes.
Lunapara? Yes.
Humber? Yes.
And Mayor Harrigan? Yes.
Okay.
Thank you.
We are adjourned.