HomeMy WebLinkAboutCC Minutes 2010-01-04SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010 Page 1
IN THE COUNCIL CHAMBER OF THE CITY OF SAN RAFAEL, MONDAY, JANUARY 4, 2010 AT 8:00 P.M.
Regular Meeting:
San Rafael City Council
Also Present: Ken Nordhoff, City Manager
Robert F. Epstein, City Attorney
Esther C. Beirne, City Clerk
OPEN SESSION — COUNCIL CHAMBERS — 7:00 PM
Mayor Boro announced Closed Session item.
CLOSED SESSION — CONFERENCE ROOM 201 — 7:00 PM
Present: Albert J. Boro, Mayor
Barbara Heller, Vice -Mayor
Greg Brockbank, Councilmember
Damon Connolly, Councilmember
Marc Levine, Councilmember
Absent: None
Conference with Labor Negotiators— Government Code Section 54957.6(a)
Negotiators: Jim Schutz, Leslie Loomis, Cindy Mosser, Robert Epstein,
Ken Nordhoff
Employee Organization(s):
San Rafael Fire Chief Officers' Assn. Western Council of Engineers
San Rafael Firefighters' Assn. Local 1 - Confidential
San Rafael Police Mid -Management Assn. SEIU Miscellaneous & Supervisory
San Rafael Police Association SEIU Child Care Unit
Unrepresented Management
Unrepresented Mid -Management
Elected City Clerk and Elected Part -Time City Attorney
City Attorney, Robert Epstein announced that no reportable action was taken.
ORAL COMMUNICATIONS OF AN URGENCY NATURE:
None.
8:21 PM
Councilmember Brockbank moved and Councilmember Heller seconded, to approve the Consent Calendar as
follows:
CONSENT CALENDAR:
ALL MATTERS ON THE CONSENT CALENDAR ARE TO BE
APPROVED BY ONE MOTION, UNLESS SEPARATE ACTION IS
REQUIRED ON A PARTICULAR ITEM:
2. Approval of Minutes of Regular City Council Meeting of
December 21, 2009 (CC)
3. Affirmations of Confidentiality of Closed Sessions from
Councilmember Marc Levine and Deputy City Attorney 11,
Lisa Goldfien (CC) — File 9-1-2
4. Statement of Disclosure re: Central San Rafael
Redevelopment Project Area from Councilmember Marc
Levine and Deputy City Attorney 11, Lisa Goldfien (CC)
File 9-4-3 x (SRRA) R140#8
RECOMMENDED ACTION:
APPROVAL OF THE FOLLOWING
ACTION:
Minutes Approved as submitted.
Accepted reports.
Accepted report.
SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
5. a) Resolution Authorizing the Mayor and City Clerk to Execute
an Agreement Between the County of Marin and the City of
San Rafael Regarding the Marin Literacy Program /
General Services (From 7/1/09 — 6/30/10) (Lib) —
File 4-13-86 x 9-3-61
b) Resolution Authorizing the Mayor and City Clerk to Execute
an Agreement Between the County of Marin and the City of
San Rafael for Literacy / F.L.A.G.SHIP Services (From
7/1/09 — 6/30/10) (Lib) — File 4-13-86 x 9-3-61
6. Resolution Authorizing the Director of Public Works to
Execute a Professional Services Agreement with Carducci
and Associates, Inc. for Design, Preparation of Final Plans,
Specifications and Estimate in the Amount of $78,525.00,
and any Additional Service on a Time and Material Basis, as
Required, Not to Exceed $21,475.00, for `Pickleweed Park
Synthetic Field Design' Project (PW) — File 4-3-505 x 9-3-40
a) RESOLUTION NO. 12902 -
RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE
MAYOR AND CITY CLERK TO
EXECUTE AN AGREEMENT
BETWEEN THE COUNTY OF MARIN
AND THE CITY OF SAN RAFAEL
REGARDING THE MARIN LITERACY
PROGRAM / GENERAL SERVICES
(From 7/1/09 — 6/30/10)
b) RESOLUTION NO. 12903 -
RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE
MAYOR AND CITY CLERK TO
EXECUTE AN AGREEMENT
BETWEEN THE COUNTY OF MARIN
AND THE CITY OF SAN RAFAEL FOR
LITERACY / F.L.A.G.S.H.LP
SERVICES
(From 7/1/09 — 6/30/10)
RESOLUTION NO. 12904 -
RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE
DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC WORKS TO
EXECUTE A PROFESSIONAL SERVICES
AGREEMENT WITH CARDUCCI AND
ASSOCIATES, INC. FOR DESIGN,
PREPARATION OF FINAL PLANS,
SPECIFICATIONS AND ESTIMATE IN
THE AMOUNT OF $78,525.00, AND ANY
ADDITIONAL SERVICE ON A TIME AND
MATERIAL BASIS, AS REQUIRED, NOT
TO EXCEED $21,475.00, FOR
`PICKLEWEED PARK SYNTHETIC FIELD
DESIGN' PROJECT
AYES:
COUNCILMEMBERS:
Brockbank, Connolly, Heller, Levine & Mayor Boro
NOES:
COUNCILMEMBERS:
None
ABSENT:
COUNCILMEMBERS:
None
ABSTAIN:
COUNCILMEMBERS:
Levine from item #2 due to absence from meeting of 12/21/09
OTHER AGENDA ITEMS:
7. CONSIDERATION OF CONTINUED PARTICIPATION IN THE MARIN ENERGY AUTHORITY'S MARIN
CLEAN ENERGY PROGRAM — FILE 271
1. REVIEW OF MICE CONTRACTS (POWER PURCHASE AGREEMENTS) FOR RENEWABLE
ELECTRIC POWER
2. FINAL DECISION WHETHER TO REMAIN IN, OR WITHDRAW FROM, THE MARIN ENERGY
AUTHORITY AND MARIN CLEAN ENERGY PROGRAM (CM)
As he owned stock in Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E), Mayor Boro recused himself and left the Council
Chambers, due to a potential conflict of interest.
Chair for this item was Vice -Mayor Heller.
Ken Nordhoff, City Manager, reported that the staff report was fairly voluminous with a lot of associated
handouts. He stated that Marin Clean Energy Program (MCE) was an effort that had been underway for
several years, dating back to legislation put into place that allowed for the formation of Community Choice
Aggregation Programs (CCAs), which in Marin County, was known as the Marin Clean Energy Program.
Referring to page 2 he noted some of the level of work being done by the City of San Rafael in relation to the
study of the program -- outreach efforts, community meetings, public presentations, discussions and
deliberations -- all leading up to two important meetings in November, 2008 when the City Council heard a
final presentation concerning the formation documents and Business Plan and on November 24, 2008, the
SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
City Council voted to become a member of the Marin Energy Authority (MEA). He indicated that on the
bottom of page 2 he made note of some requirements that had come through SB 375 and more specifically
AB 32, relating to greenhouse gas emissions and reductions -- mandates put on the state. Locally, in the last
year since participation in MEA had moved forward from San Rafael's perspective, the City Council had also
adopted a Climate Change Action Plan (CCAP) — page 3 - where similar to what had been done in other
California communities and the state, the City Council set some greenhouse gas reduction targets,
specifically 25% by 2020. The staff report also made note of some specific strategies and programs
resulting from the adoption of the CCAP. Item BU -1 denoted that the City Council should support efforts to
continue in this area.
Regarding the analysis section of the staff report, Mr. Nordhoff stated he copied from MEA's website the
listing of work they had been doing with respect to the procurement of an energy supply contract. It could be
seen that dating back to early 2009 they had been working on an RFP (Request for Proposal) process that
had been narrowed down to three bidders. Indicating that work had yet to be done, Mr. Nordhoff reported
that a draft contract was approved on November 5, 2009. Of importance was that this started a 90 -day
clock, also identified in the enabling Joint Powers Agreement Regulations and Ordinance that required that
each member agency of the MEA would have a 90 -day opt -out period, referred to as Program Agreement
#1. This allowed member agencies to evaluate the various documents being prepared and determine
whether or not they wished to continue to be a participant in the MCE Program, and therefore, de facto, in
the Marin Energy Authority.
Mr. Nordhoff reported that a lot of this work had been done through a separate board and separate staffing,
Councilmember Connolly had been serving as the representative of the City. That work lead to a further
public presentation in October, 2009 which summarized the contract documents, included as part of the staff
report for Council's review. The MEA Board in taking its action in November set a cut-off date of January 15,
2010 for final comment before making its determinations at its February 4t", 2010 board meeting.
Referring to pages 5, 6 and 7, Mr. Nordhoff reported he had denoted some of what was before the City
Council this evening for consideration and some of the additional outreach that had been carried out, and he
believed it important to note several items he wished to highlight as part of the program and the City
Council's consideration. He indicated it was clear that a lot of effort, thought and time had been put into the
formation documents, Business Plan and Draft Implementation Plan that would be before the California
Public Utilities Commission (CPUC). An enormous amount of work had been done by the MEA staff over
the past year. They had been very cooperative in providing information and answering questions, and Dawn
Weisz, Interim Director, had been very gracious in responding.
Mr. Nordhoff explained this was a contract that would provide energy electricity for a 5 -year period with the
intention of allowing some options - "light green" and "dark green." Because of the way the process was set
up it was not clear yet who the contract provider would be or the rates to be levied towards businesses,
government or residences. This would be made known as the MEA finished its work and began making its
final determinations in February; however, more work needed to be done subsequently.
Mr. Nordhoff reported that he and his colleagues from the member agencies believed that it would be good
to have some peer reviews. One had been conducted on the Business Plan, and as the contracts were
prepared, MRW & Associates looked at the documents, and their report was also included. He noted some
of their findings had already been addressed through continued negotiations and re -shaping of the contracts,
working through the MEA staff. Although the pricing points were unknown -- this had been a discussion
between, not him — and comparing the generation rate of PG&E to the generate rate under the MEA would
need to be well marketed and understood; therefore, an excerpt from the MRW report was included to try to
help the public understand how this was defined. In discussing rates, he clarified that this was not the
distribution portion of the rates, rather the actual generation — cost of buying power.
Mr. Nordhoff reported that much debate had occurred concerning the potential financial risk to the City were
it to assume the obligations of the contract or the MEA. He explained that when the Joint Powers Authority
(JPA) agreement was put into place, there were specific protections denoted that absolved the City from
those liabilities. Additional protections were built into the draft agreements. He indicated he had worked
closely with City Attorney, Robert Epstein, who had attended meetings not only involving San Rafael but
other municipalities for which he also serves as legal counsel, and Mr. Epstein had done a good job on item
7 — bottom of page 7, beginning of page 8 — of delineating and defining the Joint and Several Liability issue.
He indicated it was clear that in order for the City to assume liability, the City Council would have to take a
formal action. Should this come at the request of the CPUC as part of approving an Implementation Plan,
the City Council would have another opportunity, or exit ramp, to decide whether to continue based on
SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
assuming that liability. It would be a condition they could impose, not necessarily one they would impose,
and this would not be known until the Implementation Plan moved forward and the CPUC indicated what, if
any, additional protections it would want from the local agencies involved.
With regard to the fiscal impact, Mr. Nordhoff stated that there were no specific direct costs intended to be
passed along to local agencies or City government. The entire program had a number of up -front costs
having incurred quite a fair expense in the County - the Marin Municipal Water District had been advancing
those funds; however, the intention was that, should the program get going, the contracts were signed and
the energy began flowing, all of those costs would be recaptured through customer rates.
Mr. Nordhoff explained that the City expends $880,000 annually on electricity. This was not just on city
buildings, but included parks, medians, irrigation systems, pools, etc. Should the program move forward, the
City would have a choice as would all other customers, regarding whether or not to participate and at what
level.
Mr. Nordhoff outlined the decisions before the City Council: Staff would like to capture any City Council
comments this evening related to the contract that should be directed back to the MEA, put them into a
written document and send back to meet the January 15, 2010 deadline. Regarding the structure of the JPA
agreement, he explained that all the member agencies would continue to stay in the program, absent a
formal action to withdraw. Should the City Council be so inclined, it would require a motion and a second of
the City Council and a formal action to withdraw at this point. This would satisfy the requirements in the JPA
agreement. Should the City Council require more information, beyond the handouts provided this evening,
this could be provided at a later meeting. He believed the topic had been well vetted and well publicized and
had a lot of involvement and presentation.
Charles McGlashan, Marin County Board of Supervisors and Chairman of the Marin Energy Authority, stated
that there was a lot of information on the issue on both www.marineneravauthoritv.orci and
www.marincleaneneray.ora.
Supervisor McGlashan stated he wished to address some unfortunate pieces of misinformation that had
arisen by virtue of the Grand Jury Report which had created some confusion. He stated the bottom line from
his perspective was that an important program had been developed that offered a fiscally feasible path to a
very large reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, without penalizing the taxpayer or ratepayer. The
constraints that the MEA laid out were to find a way to significantly jumpstart the greenhouse gas reduction
efforts without coming up with anything inordinately risky for anyone, especially the General Funds of local
governments. He stated the problem was that every other mechanism explored, from AB 8-11, Solar
Financing District options to transportation initiatives and a multitude of other ways - building efficiency
programs, the problem was that those all required General Funds to be used as the cost -support
mechanism and that they did not cut greenhouse gas emissions nearly as much. Supervisor McGlashan
reported that it had been found over the 6 years of study and the multitude of peer reviews, it continued to
appear that all of this could be done with zero premium to the ratepayer, other than a voluntary initiative
taken by the ratepayer to opt up to the deep green, 100% renewable product, if they so choose. He added
that the default product — light green, 25% renewable, which basically doubled the amount of renewable
people would be consuming in their electricity supply came with no price premium.
Supervisor McGlashan stated he felt politically, and as MEA board members they continued to feel that it
was very important to set that constraint and continue honoring that constraint because of the way the law
was written He commented that, after people got their various opt -out notices, presumably for Phase 1, in
late spring and summer, it was important to the MEA that under no circumstance should someone sleep
through all of the opt -out notices and wake up 4 months later to a higher electricity bill. The idea was that
the default "sleep through the mail' option had to be risk-free, which was a political covenant and a business
constraint the MEA set on itself to embark on this venture, so no one could get burned.
Supervisor McGlashan stated the only remaining risk was that sometime in the future, after year one, a
ratepayer could discover that by going back to PG&E as their generation supplier, they could end up paying
less than they would at MEA; however, MEA would fight that possibility vigorously; they would do everything
possible to keep rates at or below PG&E rates for generation throughout history. He added it was true that
at some point in years 2 through 50, as participants in this program, the ratepayer could discover they could
pay less by going back to PG&E. He indicated it was important to know that that ratepayer would suffer no
penalty and could do that at any time over the lifetime of enrollment in the program. Therefore, ratepayers,
businesses and the City itself, in managing its own municipal load as a business in San Rafael could move
its electricity generation back and forth between the two suppliers — PG&E or the MEA — by opting out of
4 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
either program at any time. He indicated that for sure it would be free to opt out during the first 4 months of
notification; however, subsequently, there was a chance that in order to opt out, an exit fee might have to be
paid sometime in the future because it would cost the energy authority money to sell the power purchased
on behalf of the customer at a loss in the market. The MEA board had not yet set policy on this; however, it
was possible that the board would be able to cover that payment, so that in the future, it remained free to opt
out for the ratepayer at any time for ever. He noted this was a business decision that after the year one free
opt -out period, the MEA board had to set policy through rate -making on what would happen in that scenario.
Supervisor McGlashan clarified that there was nothing that prevented a ratepayer from leaving at any time.
He explained that currently, as a City contemplating staying as a member of the MEA, the City Council's
main decision would be whether the risks were mitigable or acceptable to allow citizens to make their own
decision. The City Council's decision to vote the City out of the agency would block citizens from having a
choice -- the City Council's vote to remain with the MEA basically afforded every business owner and
ratepayer in the city limits of San Rafael their own choice. He emphasized that, even if ratepayers did not
avail themselves of that choice, they would not get burned financially. The contract terms and everything
written into the Business Plan and Implementation Plan on file with the PUC assures that the MEA would be
able to meet the at or below cost constraint they set for themselves three years ago.
On a point of correction, Supervisor McGlashan stated there was no scenario the MEA faced from the PUC
any more that any Joint and Several Liability could be requested from any of the members of the MEA.
Having spoken with Carlos Velasquez and Steve Roscoe from the PUC, Supervisor McGlashan stated that if
MEA paid the exit fee and developed a service agreement with PG&E now, there would be no possible
request; therefore, the Joint and Several Liability request would not be coming from the PUC because the
MEA had already budgeted into the startup the payment of the service fees to PG&E that cover the issue.
Referring to the old debate when San Joaquin was evaluating their contract arrangements and the approval
by the PUC of their Implementation Plan, he commented that the PUC regulatory decision was that, should
an agency pay in advance, no request was made.
Supervisor McGlashan reported the big issue with respect to the Grand Jury Report was that there was risk
to the taxpayer and to the City's General Fund; however, he clarified that there was no risk in either case.
With respect to the City's General Fund, none of the liabilities of the MEA could revert to the City of San
Rafael at any time now or in the future. Any cost-sharing request for any other program that the Energy
Authority wanted to do outside of MCE would require a proactive vote on the City Council's part to approve
any request for funds. Using the example of everyone deciding to contribute to implementation of an AB 8-
11 program, not Marin Clean Energy, he indicated that the MEA board would have to develop a policy on it,
develop a pro rata request for the City to consider, and the City Council would need to vote to approve any
expenditure of San Rafael General Fund money as a contribution into anything the MEA ever wanted to do
in the future. He indicated that no one could compel, bind or obligate the City to spend money the City
Council did not proactively decide to spend.
Vice -Mayor Heller clarified that the JPA board could not bill the City for any programs they believed the
entire group might want or need and she inquired as to what would happen should it not pass the 4 out of 5
cities.
Supervisor McGlashan explained the first step was that the MEA board had to vote for it. Using the
comparison of the House and Senate, he stated that the first vote would be that of a Senator — a simple
majority of the MEA board could decide to request City members to pay for something. Subsequently the
House of Representatives had to vote at MEA and that voting was weighted by the amount of electricity the
load as a City comprised — San Rafael comprised 24% of the weight of the House vote. Should the proposal
pass twice at the MEA board, the MEA board was authorized to request money from the City. Should the
City decline, it could not be billed and the program would only proceed with that coalition of the willing.
Supervisor McGlashan noted that for any non -Marin Clean Energy program, the City must give permission
before it could be obligated for anything, which was also true, unlike MERA (Marin Emergency Radio
Authority), for any land use issues. He stated that should MEA or some entrepreneur wish to build a
windmill in the City limits, San Rafael had its existing land use authority over that set of issues, which would
make the City more protected.
Reiterating that there was no threat to the General Fund, Supervisor McGlashan stated that in addition,
should MEA incur a lot of liability, debt or go bankrupt, it was analogous to Marin Municipal Water District
whose debts and liabilities did not become the obligation of the City of San Rafael anymore than it did the
City of Mill Valley or the County of Marin, rather it was a separate, autonomous government agency and that
is how JPA's were treated under state law. Even if MEA failed, it could not face plant and cause a General
SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
Fund liability for the City members that had been proven in court for 150 years under state law. It was a
separate corporation with its own debts, liabilities and management responsibilities. He explained this was
the reason California jurisdictions created Joint Powers Agencies for different matters, similar to organizing
MERA to be a JPA with its own set of liabilities.
Supervisor McGlashan stated that the Water District metaphor was appropriate for the second major risk
that was broadcast as something to be afraid of, i.e., the so-called risk to the taxpayer, which was also
erroneous. He explained that the MEA could not obligate the general taxpayer and could only obligate the
ratepayer who decided to stay a member of MEA through the MCE program. Ratepayers who decided to
opt out now or in the future could not be obligated by anything the MEA would do. Should there be a
cataclysmic failure, one of the things the MEA board had to do in advance was authorize the posting of a
bond that the PUC calculates, that is posted in the event that for some reason MEA had to unwind itself and
return the ratepayers to PG&E.
Supervisor McGlashan commented that in a sense, ratepayers were better protected than ratepayers of the
Marin Municipal Water District (MMWD). If MMWD built too expensively, drove rates too high and went
bankrupt, ratepayers would have to figure out what to do to have water supply. In terms of electricity, in the
worst case scenario, MEA had already posted a bond that returned ratepayers back to PG&E without a
"dimming of the lights." This bond had to be financially posted in advance with the PUC which covered the
unlikely scenario should something cataclysmically go wrong and MEA could not operate anymore.
Taxpayers were not liable for that scenario either.
Noting a lot of discussion regarding huge future bond financing liabilities for the taxpayer, Supervisor
McGlashan clarified that it was not the taxpayer, rather the ratepayer. He explained that the bond financing
referred to in the Business Plan was the maximum possible extent of all the project financings if MEA
decided to be the owner of every one of those projects, which was unlikely. However, the Business Plan
elucidated that, if the desire was to have 100% renewable power in or near Marin County, bond financings
could be created using Revenue Anticipation Notes to build windmills, solar, biomass and other renewable
energy projects in and near Marin. He noted $450 million ($380 million was contemplated in the
Implementation Plan) would be utilized if MEA maxed out on its desire to own all of those assets as an
agency, which could result in combining individual project financings to total that number. The problem,
however, was that the Grand Jury made it sound like the MEA would immediately go out for a couple of
huge bonds and encumber themselves with a massive amount of liability that would be General Obligation
Bonds. Indicating that this was untrue, Supervisor McGlashan explained that project financing worked in the
energy business by financing an individual project, such as a solar field, building rooftop solar, wind farm,
etc., with Project Financing Revenue Anticipation Notes and the asset itself was the security for the bond.
He commented that as with a mortgage, the person taking out the mortgage did not become an indentured
servant by defaulting on the mortgage, rather they lost the asset. The only asset MEA would have was a
future revenue stream, which was mostly spoken for since it would be used to purchase electricity, as well
as the assets. Someone underwriting a project financing for a wind farm would look at the windmills as
security on that asset.
Supervisor McGlashan noted it had been implied that in order to succeed, MEA would have to run up a
massive bond liability, which he indicated was untrue. He explained that every project would have to pencil
out in an economically advantageous way to compete with the price of power from Shell, Macquarie Cook
Energy or another energy service provider in a cost -competitive, advantageous way. For example he noted
that a lot of entrepreneurs would like to use private capital to finance their own projects and sell MEA the
power without having MEA invest. Waste Management wanted to put a methane engine on the landfill and
sell MEA the power. This would be financed using their own private capital and was worth 7 megawatts —
approximately 5% of MEA's load. He indicated that through substitutions over the years, MEA could pick
and choose the projects and the way to finance them in the most economically advantageous way, without
any risk to the taxpayer. The risk to the ratepayer being only that which could drive rates up, relative to what
they would otherwise pay should they return to PG&E, which they were free to do.
Supervisor McGlashan stated that a lot of minor details had been twisted badly through misunderstanding in
the public debate and it was important that the City Council especially understood the detailed mechanics
and the checks, control and level of business analysis that the MEA staff was investing in analyzing these
different scenarios.
Supervisor McGlashan suggested that the critical point underlying this was that the advantages of MEA
boiled down to introducing competition in a monopoly circumstance faced today with no transparency for the
people, and that economic analysis could be done from now on side-by-side — what was being paid, what
6 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
would be paid by returning to PG&E and looking openly at whether a certain project financing opportunity
made sense. He reported an example of this was that two weeks ago he met with some wind co-op
representatives who wanted to build 50 megawatts of wind in 4 small parcels in Marin County, believing they
could harvest 85% of the wind potential not sitting in open space or parkland — basically property
opportunity. They believed that with their own private capital and a Power of Purchase Agreement from the
MEA, they could provide 50 megawatts -- one-third of the load which could be substituted in 3-5 years, if
they were successful, although he believed it might be somewhat hard to work around the County's land use
regulations. However, should they do that they could pull off a third of MEA's load in one venture.
Regarding Shell Energy, North America, Supervisor McGlashan reported that he and Councilmember
Connolly had travelled to Houston, Texas to meet with the CEO and management of the company. He
commented that they saw, as had been identified in contract negotiations, a very strong commitment to new
renewable power supply in California. PG&E already purchases a significant amount of Shell Energy's fossil
fuel, and Shell Energy had recently sold a natural gas-fired power plant to PG&E; therefore, Shell Energy
power was being received already in the existing power supply from PG&E. He indicated they were
encouraged by Shell Energy's significant commitment to increasing renewable power projects and
generation efforts. He remarked that Shell Energy would be speaking with local landfill managers about
investing in a methane gas harvesting engine in order to generate renewable power within Marin County. In
the short term, he believed that Shell Energy would survive as the first position bidder. They had, and
continued to be, the most responsive and able to deal with the arcane of the business, dealing with
transmission and scheduling charges, relationships with the integrated system operator and all of the
mechanics of providing the full requirements of the 175 megawatts of peak load power needs in Marin
County, while at the same time, assisting in weaning off of the general grid purchase of renewable power
and moving as either partners or supporters into a scenario to generate, invest or purchase more and more
of the supply in locations in or near Marin County.
Supervisor McGlashan stated it appeared that, should things go according to the Implementation Plan, it
would be possible to provide 100% renewable power within the next 6 years, with a significant amount,
about 40% coming from locally -developed projects. He noted the Business Plan wanted 40% of the load to
come from inside Marin County borders with a further 60% from the Northern California areas of Solano,
Sonoma, Napa and Mendocino counties. Although he couldn't quantify it yet, Supervisor McGlashan stated
that the final benefit would be the local economic benefit to solar installers, windmill producers and local
businesses. As long as the program did not fail on the default of meeting the at or below constraint
requirement of ensuring no one got burned from a pricing or cost increase, this program continued to look
like it could deliver a massive decrease in greenhouse gas emissions, while supporting the local economy at
the same time. Stating that things would be wrapped up in the next three weeks, he believed that the
program was exceeding expectations and that the contract negotiations had gone very well.
Responding to Vice -Mayor Heller's inquiry as to whether MEA would be making a formal presentation, Mr.
Nordhoff explained that he had not requested them to do so. He explained that a formal presentation from
MEA took place in October, 2009, with a community -wide meeting with several representatives from MEA,
PG&E and others on the Monday before Thanksgiving. He indicated that Exhibit 3 to the staff report was the
PowerPoint presentation, similar to that given in San Rafael and given in Mill Valley in December, and he
believed much of the content would have been duplicated in tonight's presentation.
Roper Roberts, Marin Conservation League, stated that the League had supported the establishment of
MEA and MCE and urged the Council to remain within the system for several reasons: 1) It provided a
choice for residents of the City to decide whether or not they wished to receive their power from MEA or to
stay with PG&E, and believed it was important for residents to have that choice; 2) The JPA, as members of
MEA, was shielded and insulated from any risk to the City or to its General Fund; 3) The risks associated
with the establishment of MEA had been well -reviewed by independent reviewers who found it to be a
reasonably well -constructed plan with the risks properly addressed; 4) Day-to-day operations of the MEA,
once up and running, would be handled by professionals hired by MEA, not bureaucrats at the County or
other level in Marin County running the operation; 5) MEA is fully committed to meeting and exceeding
greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets for Marin County, which could not be said for PG&E; 6) MEA is
committed to establishing locally distributed power generation facilities, something PG&E was not willing to
provide; and 7) There would be plenty of chances for the City as a municipality or citizens as ratepayers to
opt out if they decided they did not wish to take energy from MEA. In conclusion, Mr. Roberts felt that there
were many good reasons to continue to remain with MEA and encouraged the City Council to do so.
Bob Spofford, Sustainable San Rafael, believed it was very important in the late stages of this 5-6 year
process to look at the big picture — Global Warming and the Climate Change Action Plan. Having a Climate
SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
Change Action Plan was not an option; rather it would be life's work for the next 30-40 years. The
CCA/MCE proposition was a unique animal and the only thing anyone had put on the table to date that took
a really big, measurable bite out of greenhouse gas emissions, and uniquely, did it by taking money
currently being spent on electricity and spending it in a different way. Mr. Spofford expressed concern about
the fact that anything else coming down the pipe that allowed something really big and important to be done
about greenhouse gas emissions, especially in the transportation sector, would have an enormous price tag
attached to it and would have an enormous risk profile.
Mr. Spofford stated that if MCE and the concept of a CCA did not exist, the Climate Change Action Plan was
adopted and people were wondering how to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 25% in the next ten
years, should someone suggest looking at how electricity was purchased and lay out this proposition, he
believed the biggest sign of relief in the history of the Council Chambers would be heard.
Concurring with Supervisor McGlashan and Mr. Roberts, Mr. Spofford believed the measurement of the
risks, control, assessment and peer reviews had been superb and he commended Mr. Nordhoff on his staff
report and getting at some of the subtlety of the risks. Commenting that nothing was risk-free, he felt the
real challenge was not obtaining cheaper electricity, but rather doing something serious about global
warming, and he urged the City Council to stay with the program.
Although he felt very much in favor of the City doing something effective to reduce dependence on non-
renewable sources, Sid Waxman, San Rafael resident, stated that Shell Oil had less than a stellar record
with respect to honesty and their primary business was non-renewable energy. He recalled not long ago
another Houston energy company — Enron — that made a lot of claims and took from the ratepayers and he
questioned whether Shell Oil could be trusted any more. Despite professionals being hired, he believed this
was a relatively small piece of business to Shell and he questioned whether they could be trusted to deliver
truly from renewable sources without a major auditing effort that the MEA would not be able to carry out on
its own. He believed the goal was laudable and supported it, but believed the way in which the JPA was
going about the issue was questionable at best.
Elissa Giambastiani, speaking for herself, acknowledged that the MEA board had worked very hard on the
project; however, despite the publication efforts people still did not know about it. She indicated she had
been taking an informal poll, asking people if they knew about MEA and MCE; however, no one was aware
of it. They may have heard about MCE; however, had no idea that PG&E was about to be replaced by a
CCA. She guessed that approximately no more than 2,000 households really knew what would happen.
The process had not been transparent governance. Noting residents would not have the opportunity to vote
on the issue, she questioned whether MEA would lose in a popular vote. She commented that older adults
had lived through telephone deregulation and everyone was aware of what happened with energy
deregulation in California, noting older adults were much more skeptical - Marin had an older demographic.
Ms. Giambastiani noted that ratepayers had to opt out to stay with PG&E, and she recalled about 7-8 years
ago when banks and insurance companies indicated they wanted people to opt out if they did not want their
information shared, there was a hue and cry throughout the state, yet MEA would be requiring ratepayers to
opt out.
Regardless of what had been stated about the risk involved, Ms. Giambastiani questioned who would be left
holding the bag if MEA were to fail and she did not trust that the CPUC would not find them liable. No CCA
had been created yet in California — even the City of Berkeley decided it was too risky. She believed this
was feel -good legislation that would not really change people's behavior and initially might not even reduce
greenhouse gases. While it could help the City meet the AB 32 requirements, she questioned whether any
locally produced emissions would be reduced. Initially, MEA's renewable energy would not be new, but
rather purchased from existing sources, and no real new reduction in greenhouse gases would occur until
the suppliers brought new production on line or Marin built its own facilities. She inquired whether the
County of Marin would ever build its own generation facilities, let alone 40%, and wondered whether there
ever could be wind farms or large solar installations in Marin, noting West Marin could not even get one wind
turbine for the olive oil farm.
Ms. Giambastiani believed it would be a tough sale to convince people that buying energy from Shell Oil was
any better than buying it from PG&E. MEA would be borrowing millions of dollars and creating a new
bureaucracy during this unstable economic period where local jurisdictions had no money. She believed the
MEA board lacked the professional expertise to manage an electrical utility company and inquired as to who
the key staffers hired to do this would be. Ms. Giambastiani commented that the Civil Grand Jury's
recommendation that Marin County find other approaches that could be as effective as creating a CCA had
been scoffed at by members of the MEA board, yet other counties were doing exactly that.
8 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
Commenting that Marin County had the largest footprint in the state, Ms. Giambastiani inquired as to why
houses larger than 3,000 square -feet were still being built, why gas -guzzling cars were still being driven, why
affordable housing near transit was not being strongly supported and why homeowners were not being
incentivized to install rooftop solar systems like Sonoma County was doing. She urged the Council not to
move ahead tonight as part of the MEA JPA. She believed it was risky, costly and too sophisticated an
undertaking for a county as small as Marin. She urged the City Council to actively pursue the approaches
suggested in the Grand Jury report for actually reducing greenhouse gases produced locally, not just
importing energy produced outside of the state and feeling something great was being done for the
environment.
Dr. Ed Bovice, San Rafael, stated he was in favor of the City staying with Marin Clean Energy. He and his
wife felt very strongly that this was the right thing to do, and furthermore, they wished to have the option, as
they intended to order the "deep -green" power when it became available, a choice they would not have
should the City decide not to stay with the program. Dr. Boyce indicated he was a member of the 1999/2000
Civil Grand Jury, and was very upset to read the report from this year's Grand Jury regarding MEA. Having
looking it over, he disagreed completely with their findings and the way they were presented to the public -
meant to generate fear. He had attended meetings of the MEA board and he thanked Supervisors
McGlashan and Adams for their leadership and the City for voting to join the MEA last fall. He urged the City
Council to continue to stay with the program so that residents would have the choice to order green power
on their own.
Stating he had lived in San Rafael for two years and fully intended to raise his two children in the City, Ron
Averiette indicated he wanted the option to buy energy that would be less destructive to the environment and
would not produce as many greenhouse gasses. He did not understand why there was currently only one
option, which was not what the country was about, and believed in not letting the perfect become the enemy
of the good in that there was an opportunity to do something with some vision that would also be a good
step forward. Acknowledging that it was not a dramatic step and it would not change everything, he believed
behaviors would need to change and everything was needed at this point in the climate crisis. Currently
there was an opportunity to do something with vision, was practical and provided choice which was really
what democracy was all about. He urged the City Council to go forward with the plan.
Bill Carnev, Co -Chair of Sustainable San Rafael, expressed pleasure that the Climate Change Action Plan
had been referenced several times this evening as he believed it was the big picture, as indicated by Mr.
Spofford. He urged the City Council to take the long view. The many details were being evaluated with
great acumen by very many people; however, in the long view, he believed that beyond the initial rates,
within six years there was the prospect of 100% renewable energy and there was no other way that anything
close to it could be achieved. Regarding risk, he issued a reminder that the baseline of the status quo was
not without risk. Fluctuating rates had been seen over time and as outlined by the Civil Grand Jury, many of
the risks also applied to the existing utility. Mr. Carney stated that the far greater risk was to do nothing; the
status quo was no longer an option with the constraints of climate change. The potential cost of compliance
with the state climate change legislation had been alluded to and certainly that was a risk, and he noted talk
of tremendous amounts of resources being diverted from solving climate change to dealing with the impacts
of climate change. He believed focus needed to remain on preventing the catastrophes to be faced unless
measures such as this were continued.
In thinking about risk Mr. Carney believed one must think about rewards. To achieve, as this program
offered, 100% renewable energy sources by 2020, that would have reduced the City's footprint by about
17%, which was a substantial amount towards the goals of the Climate Change Action Plan and carbon
reduction, although nowhere near the 80% that the state legislature called for by mid-century and that many
scientists indicated needed to be accomplished in this decade in order to begin to reverse the effects of
climate change. Concerning how to do this, Mr. Carney reported that Marin Clean Energy offered the
clearest path towards the larger goal. Rolling out this year along with the roll-out of MCE, people would
begin to see the roll out of electric vehicles at affordable prices by respected and experienced manufacturers
which people would begin buying, as Americans bought cars once every four years on average. If
consumers and citizens had the option of buying electric vehicles with 100% zero emission and plugging
them into electrical power that was 100% carbon -free, the 80% reductions goal was getting very close. He
stated that 62% of Marin County and 61 % of the City's footprint was due to cars. Believing this was a huge
opportunity, Mr. Carney felt very pleased and proud that the City had taken a leadership stance in continuing
with the program.
David Rubin, Pacific Gas and Electric, stated that they strongly supported the goals of taking decisive steps
to reduce the carbon content of the energy supply and worked hard daily acquiring renewable supplies.
SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
They had over 20% of the power requirements of their customers either delivered or under contract. They
were signing contracts every day across the spectrum of small local projects and larger central renewable
projects and were also working with customers to reduce their energy use and helping them to install
renewable supplies to provide their own on-site power. Despite being in strong agreement with the
objectives, Mr. Rubin stated that they did not believe that MCE would actually deliver on their promises.
Enumerating some of the reasons for this, Mr. Rubin stated that with regard to the provisions of the draft
contract with Shell Energy there was a provision that stated that the supplier need not acquire or develop
new power supplies to satisfy the terms of the contract. This meant that existing resources would be used.
He commented that it really became a shell game in terms of moving power from one group of customers to
another. They also did not believe the notion that the contract was actually a bridge to some future of
developing local renewable projects was correct. The contract needed to be looked at based on its own
specific terms. To the extent that the community wanted to develop additional renewable supplies, it would
need to either borrow money if it intended to own, which had been a strong premise of the program until
recently, or it would need to counter -party with other suppliers to buy the power from renewable projects. He
noted that in both cases, either the lenders of money for owned projects or the counter -parties of contracted
power would necessarily look past the JPA in order to make sure that they were comfortable and that they
had the appropriate security for the undertaking of that investment.
Mr. Rubin stated that the assets themselves would not provide a suitable basis for a lender to want to
provide money, whether $375 million or some sub -set of that, in order to own renewable projects. Looking
at the contract with Shell, even if they were able to achieve the 25% renewable supply in the contract, it was
not clear what the additional power supply would be made up of; therefore, they did not believe, absent
assurances, that the power would have a low carbon content that on an aggregate basis would end up with
a lower greenhouse gas emission supply portfolio than what could be achieved by PG&E, which was 50%
and getting cleaner in terms of the greenhouse gas emission characteristics of the supply.
Regarding pricing, Mr. Rubin stated that the draft contract did not have prices; however, in looking at the
Implementation Plan submitted to the PUC, one could calculate the total price that would be charged to
customers. Referring to a table on page 44, Mr. Rubin stated this identified the revenues from sales to
customers, and divided by a table on page 24, identified the amount of load. Having done the calculation,
Mr. Rubin stated that the prices one could calculate from those tables indicated they would be much higher
than PG&E's generation rate. He indicated they just reduced their generation prices starting January 1, 2010
by 5%, and looking at the cost the customer on the MCE program would not pay to PG&E — the cost they
would avoid from PG&E — it was approximately 7.6 cents a kilowatt hour for 2010. Looking at the numbers
calculated from the Implementation Plan, they were north of 11 -cents per kilowatt hour; therefore, it was not
clear to PG&E how MCE would be able to deliver on the promise of lower prices.
For all of those reasons, Mr. Rubin stated that PG&E believed there was much less certainty and much more
risk associated with the program than had been communicated earlier.
Thanking the City Council and recognizing that many had already made up their minds, Gladvs Gilliland
concurred with Ms. Giambastiani's statement that not many people knew what was going on, and those who
did, did not like what they heard. She believed the option to vote was not being afforded, which Supervisor
McGlashan supported, and which residents would like to have. She appreciated the Council listening to the
public and commented that she and most of her neighbors would opt out of the program.
Kiki LaPorta, Co -Chair of Sustainable San Rafael and President of Sustainable Marin, believed that a lot of
loose language had been flying around this evening. She thanked PG&E for continuing to nip at the heels of
MEA and MCE and for continuing to force them to refine, analyze, study, make changes, and continue the
public process which had been going on for five years. She suggested to those in the audience and
throughout the county that, if they did not know what was going on with Marin Clean Energy, they had not
been paying attention to their civic duty. The process had been extraordinarily transparent and anyone who
had a desire or interest to participate or learn about the issue had had ample opportunity to do so.
Ms. La Porta stated that many in the advocate community had not been back -roomed, glad-handed or
cocktailed by lobbyists and paid members of the incumbent utility. They were only present for what they
perceived to be the urgent need of the community to step up to their responsibility. Responding to the
earlier comment that Marin County had the largest footprint in the state, she believed that Marin may be the
richest county in the state and among the richest counties in the United States. The only way that Marin
Clean Energy could fail would be if residents faltered in their commitment to do what they must do within
their means to substantially, impactfully and immediately reduce the global warming impact. This was an
ecological U -Turn that, if not made, would mean going over the cliff.
10 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
Ms. LaPorta commented that business -as -usual with incremental change as proposed by esteemed
members of the audience and PG&E would provide more of what had been available. She did not believe
anyone was very happy with the state of the environment and all other benefits related to affordable housing
would also be evaporating in the costs of dealing with the crisis to be faced. She applauded and thanked
City staff and the City Council for being courageous, thorough, standing ground and for understanding that
there were those who would continue to snipe the old arguments that continued to be addressed with fact.
She commented that Mr. Rubin continued to bring forward arguments that were absolutely untrue, i.e., "50%
carbon -free" which she indicated meant something close to 30% or more power was coming from nuclear
generation, and it was not yet known what to do from that generation. She was not interested in hearing that
was her only choice and preferred the choice the City and the County had afforded her to purchase green
energy for herself, her family and her business.
Responding to comments made regarding some of the structure in the contract and other elements, Mr.
Nordhoff acknowledged that there were some unknowns that would be made known as the process moved
forward. He was not informed, for example, to discuss what level of non-renewable energy might be in the
Shell Power Agreement or to what extent Shell was a power provider in the renewable market. There were
elements he had been unable to pay attention to or make note of because of not sitting at the table and
negotiating the agreement and he did not know to what extent those energy portfolio questions could be
answered.
Mr. Nordhoff believed that much of what the City Council heard this evening was what they had heard all
along. He was aware that in the Business Plan there was an intention of instituting and hiring professional
management and this was well documented many years ago. There obviously were some professionals in
the business that needed to be hired to continue to make the program move forward.
Vice -Mayor Heller reiterated that she had expected someone from MEA to give a presentation and inquired
whether someone would discuss the timeline on the MUTA (Marin United Taxpayers Association) letter,
which was sent to the Council and which included questions about why the timing was such that it was being
"rushed through" and she believed this needed to be addressed.
Addressing the timeline, Mr. Nordhoff noted that there had been an extensive amount of processes
discussed leading up to the approval by the MEA board in November, 2009 of the draft agreements, and
because of the way the Joint Powers Agreement was structured, it began the 90 -day clock running from
which member agencies could choose whether to continue participating or withdraw with respect to the
Program Agreement 1, or the Marin Clean Energy contract. He did not know whether there was a specific
deadline for the MEA board to take action on February 4t", although they had been working diligently to do
so, or whether there was a requirement to meet that obligation. He noted there was some discussion a year
and a half ago at a City Council meeting about considering voting and whether or not that should be made a
condition of moving forward or proceeding; however, there was insufficient support to do that at that time.
Mr. Nordhoff stated that the City of San Rafael was also obligated to respond to the Grand Jury Report as a
member agency of the Marin Energy Authority and there were a number of findings and recommendations
the City needed to specifically respond to. Staff would do so and return to the City Council with a report for
comment and consideration in February.
Councilmember Connolly thanked Mr. Nordhoff for an outstanding staff report which he felt was very helpful
in evaluating some complex issues. He thanked the members of the public who attended tonight's meeting
to express their opinion, and Supervisor McGlashan, his colleague on the Marin Energy Authority Board.
Commenting that a picture is worth a thousand words, Councilmember Connolly stated that in this case he
believed that was more apt than ever. He indicated that information in the lobby included a graph on GHG
Reduction targets for Marin. In looking at what it would take to meet obligations under AB 32 he explained
that the red line represented the intended target. A series of methods could possibly be used to reach the
target. On the far right of the graph, towering above the rest in terms of the impact on GHG reductions, was
the Marin Clean Energy program. He noted the intention was to do a combination of these programs,
including AB 8-11 solar on rooftops and residences. He believed the chart summed it up that this was the
way to go.
Elaborating on the program, Councilmember Connolly stated that it provided local control to achieve goals
as expressed, not only under AB 32 — the state mandate — but also the City's own Climate Change Action
Plan. He explained that the program would provide ratepayers with a choice and it would provide the
incumbent monopoly with some competition. If a customer did not want to switch, they would have every
11 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
right to opt out of the program and they would have a chance to vote on four separate occasions to opt out
over time. Commenting that any new venture had risk, he believed that in this case, everything had been
done to manage and mitigate that risk.
Explaining that he had some perspective on this, Councilmember Connolly reported that he had been the
Chair of the Technical Committee of MEA where they actually had been most involved in the details of the
program, evaluating those risks over time. Another unique perspective was that he was a member of the
State Attorney General's Task Force that investigated the energy companies that ripped off the state,
including Enron; therefore, he brought those perspectives to bear on his work on this project also.
Councilmember Connolly stated the risks managed included risk to taxpayers and also to City funds and he
believed those risks had been mitigated. He also agreed with the perspective that was repeated this
evening that there was more risk in not acting given the reality of the situation with the threat of climate
change.
Councilmember Connolly stated this afforded a way of achieving goals to meet the regulatory obligations
and a lot more. Over time, other goals would be achieved, such as building more renewable energy locally,
including distributed generation opportunities with solar panels on rooftops, while improving the local
economy.
Addressing a few of Mr. Rubin's (PG&E) comments, Councilmember Connolly stated it was incorrect that the
program would stifle the ability over time to substitute in local, renewable energy sources. In fact, he was on
the team involved in negotiating the contract, and this was one of the mostly hotly negotiated subjects of all
in the contract and they ensured it was included. They also were already looking at different ways of
financing the projects as they came online. Regarding pricing, the letter Mr. Rubin referred to was given to
the Council at 5:00 this evening and apparently reflected new prices that PG&E had submitted to the PUC
five days prior. Not having had a chance to thoroughly evaluate it, he indicated they purported to state what
MEA's prices were in a footnote in fine print and he believed those representations were at odds with every
indicative price that had been seen in the contracts as they had negotiated them over time. Furthermore,
Councilmember Connolly stated that MEA was on record as stating that, if the MEA program could not meet
or beat PG&E rates for the "light green" alternative, they would not go forward, and this was a guarantee to
ratepayers.
Councilmember Connolly stated he remained strongly in favor of the program and he urged his colleagues to
remain on board.
Councilmember Brockbank thanked City staff for their work, and particularly the dozens of people who had
spent hundreds of hours on this project - Supervisor McGlashan, Dawn Weisz and Councilmember Connolly
just in the last year alone since becoming a key member of the MEA board. There also could be many other
dozens who had spent dozens of hours studying the project, some immediately after first being elected two
years ago. At the time he learned that PG&E had been stuck in the 12%, 13%, 14% renewable category
and he suggested not being fooled by their claim that 50% of their energy was carbon -free, as only the
renewable energy portfolio standard could be counted, which did not count their nuclear and large hydro.
Every time they made the claim regarding 50% carbon -free energy, Councilmember Brockbank stated he
continued to raise the question that was never satisfactorily answered, that, unless one were to look at
where their marginal additional energy was coming from (gas-fired peaker plants) and where MEA's
additional energy was coming from (renewable sources), that question had never been answered.
Councilmember Brockbank reported that when he first began asking questions about this issue
approximately two years ago in public hearings, he inquired about PG&E's compliance with the law to
cooperate with CCA's; however, this was not answered, or PG&E's loyalty to their shareholders versus the
requirement that they cooperate with CCA's, which again, was never answered. In fact, the only things he
had received were two or three-page letters or documents, woefully vague and inadequate and it was an
understatement to state he was shocked and dismayed at the vagueness and the inadequacy of all their
responses, as he expected more from a worthy adversary such as PG&E, who obviously, did not want to
lose 1 % of its customers.
Councilmember Brockbank stated he always believed, and he was originally told, that as Supervisor
McGlashan mentioned, he keeps hearing from people that were willing to sell 7 megawatts, 20 megawatts,
etc., towards the 140 megawatt load requirement; however, MEA was approximately 1 % of PG&E's
customer base as PG&E deals with hundreds of megawatt contracts. He, therefore, had never bought the
argument that there was no net new renewable energy to be gained. Should the demand be created, the
12 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
suppliers would appear as this was how the free market worked. He believed that those who complained
that there was no new net energy or a government operation could not be trusted because of lack of
competence or motivation, had either not studied the proposal sufficiently and could start with the ten -page
frequently asked questions, or they had an innate distrust of government. Having spent many dozens of
hours on this, as had many dozens of others, he indicated there were 300 pages in this evening's packet
alone, which was just a small fraction of what had been produced in the last two years alone.
Councilmember Brockbank stated he was more than satisfied that the risk was extremely minimal and the
Grand Jury dramatically overstated the risk. He believed the benefits were tremendous and that the Grand
Jury had underestimated those benefits. Regarding Shell, he felt it would be nicer if the City had a more
pristine company than one with a record such as theirs; however, should a nice, pristine -sounding
environmental organization have been chosen to be the energy service provider, there could be criticism for
choosing someone that lacked experience. The MEA, in its wisdom, picked a heavyweight power trader and
for those who felt they would not do it or they could not be trusted, he believed they were selected because
they promised they would. MEA had entered into a draft contract with them because they promised they
would. They clearly had the ability, motivation and legal requirements to do so and should they not, they
could be sued for breach of contract.
Addressing those who felt other things should be done instead, Councilmember Brockbank stated that as
one speaker noted, all of those things had to be done. Regarding the chart that Councilmember Connolly
had shown, Councilmember Brockbank felt that of the dozens slides, charts and PowerPoint presentations,
this one chart which showed that the greenhouse gas reductions that could be achieved from MCE far
exceeded many times over all other methods that could possibly be done in the foreseeable future, put
together, indicated that it would be crazy not to do this. There was an obligation to do this and the City
would not afford the cost of everything else it would take to try to meet the greenhouse gas reduction
targets.
Regarding the Climate Change Action Plan referenced by Mr. Carney and others, Councilmember
Brockbank stated that like so many other things, a group of residents was commissioned to study this issue
for a few dozen hours and this was what they had returned with. He believed there would have to be awfully
good reasons not to trust their recommendations, and frankly there were no such reasons. Should the
recommendations of the volunteers who had studied this for many hours not be trusted, he questioned what
type of signal that sent next time citizen volunteers were invited to study an issue. In two years he had not
seen any such reasons.
Councilmember Brockbank indicated he supported the project and urged his colleagues to do so also.
Reporting that he had spent the past six months speaking with community members across San Rafael and
communicating to them regarding positions he supported while learning from them about issues they cared
about, Councilmember Levine stated that very early he took a position to support Marin Clean Energy. He
also spent money to ensure that people knew what his position was. He included his support of Marin Clean
Energy in his mail pieces, on his website and received continuous feedback from people because of that
outreach, most if not all of which was positive and overwhelmingly so, which really helped him to understand
that there was a market for Marin Clean Energy and to support what MEA was doing. He indicated that the
only regret he had tonight was that the issue did not actually call for any action on the City Council's part.
He would not get to vote as Councilmembers Brockbank, Connolly and Heller had, for Marin Clean Energy.
Regarding the role of government, Councilmember Levine believed that its role was dealing with all of
society's greatest challenges, of which climate change was one. It was a place where the City of San Rafael
had done a fantastic job of harnessing community members and resources on finding out what the City
could do locally to actually achieve outcomes benefitting the greatest challenges. He indicated this was
completely in line with local government doing something where there had been federal inaction, state laws
without teeth and San Rafael and the County of Marin forging forward in doing a great job, and he was
grateful to be part of the community doing so.
In discussing whether or not to be a customer, Councilmember Levine believed this was a separate issue,
and having had a conversation with his wife regarding whether or not to become customers of MCE, they
both decided to wait and see what the renewable energy mix was like and then decide the level at which
they wished to participate in MCE, or whether to remain with PG&E. This was a separate choice; he
respected those who wished to opt out which was something he would consider in evaluating the situation
himself. He believed that having the choice was the best that could be done for the community. It was the
vision, the long-term path discussed by Supervisor McGlashan.
13 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
Councilmember Levine also commented on the MEA staff and City of San Rafael staff who had answered so
many of his questions, together with PG&E who courteously responded to his queries also. He believed
there needed to be understanding and appreciation for the long-term role PG&E has had in the community,
and would continue to have, as a service delivery provider for energy, and it would be necessary to work
both with them and the families who work with them to help produce energy and make sure they had a place
in any future plans also.
Stating that her main objective was always to keep the City's finances separate from anything that could be
taken, as finances were too vulnerable at this point to give up one penny to anything except the City, Vice -
Mayor Heller inquired as to the PUC Joint and Several Liability paragraph because she had been informed
they would force that upon any group coming before them. She noted Supervisor McGlashan just made a
statement indicating that they would not do this. To her it was a deal -breaker, should they indicate the City
would be responsible.
With regard to the CPUC, City Attorney Rob Epstein stated he had read a lot of paper with regard to MEA
and more recently with regard to the issue concerning what prerogative the CPUC might have in connection
with the issue of Joint and Several Liability. He also conferred extensively with the MEA attorney and as
reflected at Page 7 of the staff report, there was no means by which the CPUC could require without the
consent of any of the members of MEA that they would assume Joint and Several Liability for any
obligations. Concurring with Mr. Nordhoff's comments, Mr. Epstein stated the only way that could possibly
happen would be if such a decision were to be returned to the City Council and they affirmatively decided
they wished to assume such liability.
With regard to Supervisor McGlashan's remarks, Mr. Epstein explained this involved new information staff
did not have since he had just received it today, concerning discussions that he reported took place
between MEA personnel and CPUC staff, in which he indicated that the CPUC had stated that, based on
MEA's provisions for bonding the exit fee, that the CPUC would not even get to the question of whether to
impose Joint and Several Liability — a determination had already been made at staff level that that would not
occur. Mr. Epstein stated that the entire discussion arose due to an attempt by San Joaquin to have its
program Implementation Plan approved two years ago. That was when the CPUC recognized its authority
to seek members of a CCA's desire to agree with the CPUC if it wanted to impose Joint and Several
Liability. The situation here was different, per Supervisor McGlashan, and should he be wrong, Mr. Epstein
stated his judgment was that the only way it could occur would be by returning it to the City Council and the
City Council making an affirmative vote.
Mr. Epstein informed Vice -Mayor Heller, based on her colleagues' comments, no action was required on this
item this evening as clearly there was not a majority that would wish to opt out of the Marin Energy Authority
at this juncture. The City was already a member of the Joint Powers Authority and there was no affirmative
act required to remain a member.
With regard to Agenda item #7 — items 1) and 2), Vice -Mayor Heller confirmed that no action was required.
Mr. Nordhoff confirmed that, unless there was something specific related to the contract or related
agreements the Council would like to direct him to send back to MEA, no action was required, and unless
there was a motion, second and an action to withdraw from MEA and the Marin Clean Energy program, no
Council action was required.
Vice -Mayor Heller stated she had heard affirmative votes by Councilmembers Brockbank, Connolly and
Levine.
Councilmember Brockbank suggested calling for a motion on the issue so that it was clear for the record that
there had been an opportunity to make a motion.
Mr. Epstein stated it was appropriate if Vice -Mayor Heller wished to call for a motion at this time.
Vice -Mayor Heller inquired as to whether there were any motions at this time. There was no response.
Accepted report.
8. BUDGET UPDATE AND RESOLUTION ADOPTING AMENDMENTS TO THE CITY OF SAN RAFAEL
BUDGET
FOR FISCAL YEAR 2009-2010 (CM/FIN) — FILE 8-5
14 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
Mayor Boro returned to the Council Chambers at 10:10 p.m.
City Manager, Ken Nordhoff, stated that before the City Council this evening was the first in a series of
actions to be considered and take to bring the 2009-2010 budget back into balance, as well as provide some
direction on other items staff might choose to build into Fiscal Year 2010-11. Indicating that he and Finance
Director Cindy Mosser jointly generated the staff report, Mr. Nordhoff reported that Ms. Mosser had identified
the causes of the budget situation, mostly driven by the economy and most of which was driven by a decline
in sales tax. Deficits for the current year and projecting into next year were in the $3 million and $4 million
ranges.
Mr. Nordhoff reported that he and the Department Directors considered a number of budget options, a great
many of which were discussed at a workshop on December 15, 2009. Staff took intentional time trying to
walk through a number of different implementation ideas and options and, being a service organization, these
were largely tied to a reduction in staffing levels. Staff also fairly thoroughly tried to express some of the
projected service impacts, should the City Council chose to make reductions in certain areas across
departments.
Mr. Nordhoff reported that at the conclusion of the December 15, 2009 meeting, the City Council requested
staff to return with a timeline of how to move forward with this process; therefore, at the meeting of December
21, 2009, a timeline was approved, which included scheduling some additional meetings for this month
(January, 2010). It was made abundantly clear by the City Council that some of the items being considered
needed to have additional public input and weight. However, at the meeting of December 15, 2009, the City
Council also noted there could be items they might chose to act on sooner, not necessarily preferences or
better choices, rather they believed there could be a menu of items as part of the Round 1 recommendations
to be considered this evening.
Mr. Nordhoff explained that the staff report delineated the events that had occurred to date and identified
where the City was headed. Attachments to the report included some traditional types of amendments as
part of the mid -year budget review conducted annually at this time. Staffing level reductions from this
evening's recommendations were shown on Exhibit C. Exhibit D summarized what had unfolded to cause
this decline in tax revenues and some of the items for Council consideration that could make a down -
payment on bringing the current budget into balance. Exhibit E detailed the items staff sought City Council
direction on this evening.
Mr. Nordhoff distributed documents prepared today to the City Council and public concerning the public
meetings to take place on January 6, 12 and 14, 2010 and enlisted comments, if any, prior to acting on the
resolution. He explained that on January 6, at 3:00 p.m. in the Council Chambers, staff would provide
responses based on a number of the service options outlined at the December 15, 2009 meeting.
Presentations would be made around Library services, Planning services, further reductions in the Police
Department and a number of issues the City Council had questions on — staff hoped to address and receive
further direction on these.
Mr. Nordhoff explained that the first page of the documentation provided this evening was a flyer, which
would be sent to members of the community, summarizing the fact that there was a problem and the City
would like to reach out and involve as many members of the public as possible. Three mechanisms were set
up to do that — two scheduled meetings, or staff would be glad to talk to individual groups or organizations.
There also was an opportunity to offer comments online and make suggestions on important issues the City
Council might wish to consider.
Page 2 — Agenda — included a public primer on finance for the two meetings on January 12 and 14, 2010 and
Mr. Nordhoff indicated that he and Ms. Mosser would jointly provide a status report on the budget, discuss
the actions taken this evening and any further actions the City Council might wish to consider. In the
Breakout Groups the public would be afforded the opportunity to meet and interact with the Department
Directors and Councilmembers. He commented that often he finds these Breakout Groups are helpful
because public finances was a fairly complex subject; therefore, it was an educational opportunity to talk one
on one. Subsequently, the public would be invited to provide their comments to the assembled City Council
in terms of balancing the budget. Staff hoped to receive final direction from the City Council at the end of
those sessions.
Mr. Nordhoff explained that Page 3 listed the types of questions that could be responded to electronically —
this document would also be available at the meetings for those wishing to make written comments.
15 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
Considering the budget crisis, Mr. Nordhoff stated that staff did not consider it appropriate to print and mail
flyers; therefore, information would be distributed tomorrow electronically via Snapshot, Fire and Police,
Homeowners Associations, Boards and Commissions, San Rafael Connects, etc., and the documents would
also be available online.
Mr. Nordhoff reported that based on input from these public meetings staff hoped to return at the January 19,
2010 meeting with additional actions for Council consideration.
Mr. Nordhoff explained the specifics recommended this evening, noting subject matter experts were also
available to assist with the details:
Commencing on Page 5 of the staff report, Mr. Nordhoff explained that with regard to the various
departments he had attempted to capture and summarize some of the service impacts that had already
occurred this past July in adopting the budget, noting staffing reductions or other actions were identified in the
left-hand column, with the service impacts in the next column. The two right-hand columns delineated what
was proposed this evening, together with the additional service impacts or consequences.
Police:
Mr. Nordhoff noted that the positions under discussion this evening for action did not invoke layoffs, rather
they were positions that had become vacant due to attrition, promotions, transfers, retirements or a
combination of issues.
When the current year budget was adopted there were three vacant police officer positions and a vacant
dispatcher and staff suggested a continued freezing or suspension of these positions into Fiscal Year 2010-
11. Additionally, two police officers had retired; therefore, staff suggested putting the officers remaining in
place back into basic patrol service. A service level reduction would entail removing the second of two
mental health officers, putting that position back into basic patrol service. Mr. Nordhoff believed everyone
was aware of the work being done by Officers Tom Sabido and Joel Fay in the Mental Health Programs and
while the skill set would not be lost, certainly the dedication of having someone available daily on the street
would decline, with an obvious reduction in service relating to some segments of the homeless population.
Staff also suggested that a second officer position not be filled which would necessitate no longer assigning
an officer to the County Probation Department that runs the COPE program. This officer assignment deals
with following up and checking on parolees, most of whom were in San Rafael; therefore, these contacts
would not be made on a regular basis.
A vacant Regulatory Officer position dealing with massage permits and involvement with graffiti abatement
and complaints would need to be assigned within the remainder of the Police Department. Mr. Nordhoff
noted that as staff had been working through updating the Massage Ordinance, some of the recent state laws
had taken away some local authority to regulate or permit; therefore, some of the work had been in the
process of declining, which would continue. The City Attorney and Police Department were working on an
updated massage ordinance details of which could be provided at the City Council Retreat later in January,
2010.
Mr. Nordhoff noted that further reductions would be discussed on January 6, 2010, which would definitely
involve layoffs.
Mayor Boro stated that subsequent to Mr. Nordhoff's presentation, the public would be afforded the
opportunity to address the City Council.
Fire:
A number of actions had been taken over the past year, some of which were intentional as staff worked
through negotiating a new labor agreement, specifically, eliminated six engineering positions and replacing
them with Firefighter/Paramedics to better deploy emergency medical services across the City in the various
fire stations. Additional reductions at that time included Administrative Officer and Administrative staff
positions. Mr. Nordhoff noted that currently it was cheaper in the public safety arena, both for fire and police,
to pay overtime rather than fill positions. A number of vacancies had occurred through retirement in the Fire
Department and it was suggested freezing four of these positions for the next eighteen months. It was
anticipated creating and possibly filling a Training Officer position in January; however, as part of some
administrative restructuring in the Fire Department over the past year, staff suggested that this vacancy
remain in place for the next eighteen months.
16 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
Indicating the City Council was aware that the City has contracted with Marinwood since the early 1990s
when station 3 was closed on Joseph Court, Mr. Nordhoff stated there had been a long history of various
agreements and funding levels. The City had written checks ranging from as low as $150,000 to upwards of
$500,000, currently at a level of $275,000. This past year in extending the agreement one additional year
with Marinwood, they were asked to lead, and the City would participate in, a study, and this had commenced
with Matrix. He and Fire Chief Gray had a conference call with Matrix last week, together with their
counterparts from Marinwood. The report was almost finalized and when completed opportunities would be
seen for different ways to put service delivery together as well as the way of creating some financial model or
structure to pay for the services.
Noting a lot more time could be spent discussing the Marinwood contract and services, Mr. Nordhoff
summarized that because of a single station district operation not being able to provide the level of service,
such as a dedicated paramedic on duty daily, staff believed there were ways to enhance this, exploring
different ways of contracting and potentially saving money to both agencies from their General Fund budgets.
He noted some of this would be influenced by looking at the Paramedic Tax that Marinwood and two County
Service Areas and the City all had to renew this coming fiscal year — 2010-2011.
Councilmember Heller suggested giving consideration to improving the Vegetation Management Program,
which had to be reduced from clearing 100 -acres annually to 25 -acres. While she was pleased the entire
program was not being abolished, she believed it was crucial to the City to try to continually manage
vegetation resources and keep adding as many more acres as possible, at the top of the list.
Indicating he would not like to see any further cuts, especially beyond those recommended today,
Councilmember Brockbank stated he had not seen enough about options. He understood there was a
certain minimal level beyond which the City would not like to drop and that there should be 23 firefighters on
duty at all times, to fully staff all the stations; however, he inquired whether there were any options such as
reducing staffing at night. Unaware of the differences between rolling brownouts or a permanent closing of a
station, both of which were horrible and would increase response times, he indicated he did not know the
pros and cons of these options. Also, he questioned whether a compromise could be available, such as
closing a station while still conducting training and drills and in the event a call was received, the response
time of approximately 6 -minutes could be adhered to.
Mr. Nordhoff stated that these details would be answered at the Study Session on Wednesday, January 6,
2010.
Councilmember Connolly clarified that when the Matrix study on the Marinwood Services Contract was
received the issue would be taken up again — a certain course of action was not being decided on this
evening.
Mr. Nordhoff explained that at least in terms of trying to build a financial model moving into next year, staff
would look hard at ways to eliminate the General Fund dollars used to subsidize that service. No formal
action was being taken this evening; however, formal action would need to be taken relating to the current
agreement subsequent to the Matrix study and other possibilities.
Public Works:
With some repetitiveness from July, 2009, Mr. Nordhoff stated the staff report provided a sense of the various
items Public Works was responsible for and delineated on page 8 some of the occurrences of several months
ago and some of the additional losses in service.
Staff recommended three additional vacant positions be eliminated, two in Parks and one in Streets. In
looking at the data and staffing levels in Exhibit C it could be seen that marked reductions had been taken in
staffing and service capabilities, particularly in Parks and Streets crews, which resulted in a limited
emergency response in such situations at this time of year. He noted also a clustering of a number of cost
allocations and operating expense reductions, including street sweeping which would be discussed on
January 6.
With regard to median work, Councilmember Levine noted a number of neighborhoods had decided to
assume some of that responsibility themselves, and he inquired whether this was because the City had not
been providing this service to this point and had never had staffing for this purpose, or whether some gains
were being realized in staffing in other areas because of no longer doing median work.
17 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
Mr. Nordhoff explained that dating back approximately seventeen years when the City went through a round
of budget discussions, in the maintenance area this was the first step at dialing down and trying to prioritize
where to put Parks crews, and medians was a place that was stepped down. This had intentionally been
done over time, to the point of literally providing a "hair cut" to address some safety issues and allow staff to
spend time on other priorities in parks and other areas. He commented that the Point San Pedro Road
Coalition had again indicated they would like to consider forming an Assessment District — this was done in
1998 and entailed a lot of work. The process was explained; however, a sub -committee of that organization
was tracking the issue.
Community Development:
Mr. Nordhoff explained that at the time of adopting the budget, the Code Enforcement Manager resigned and
the position was re -classed to a Supervisor position, which actually saved some money. It was being
reassigned, essentially eliminating a management position and putting the Code Enforcement Supervisor
position under the responsibility of a Principal Planner. A vacant administrative position would leave some
staff intact to do the basic health and safety types of inspections and staff would also assume administrative
duties to the extent it was a paper driven process to seek compliance.
The Community Development Department collects Technology Funds and staff believed a portion of that
money could be used for covering some of the cost related to the staff overseeing the software being
managed in terms of permitting and planning uses. $25,000 would be allocated as a down -payment towards
technology upgrades in the Council Chambers.
Noting questions were raised at the workshop regarding Planning services and residential building
inspections, Mr. Nordhoff explained that Mr. Brown would address these on January 6, 2010.
Library:
Mr. Nordhoff reported that a proposal was put forward at the workshop on December 15, 2009 which
centered around having to reduce the hours of the library and eliminate some part-time staffing. He believed
Mr. Dodd would provide information on January 6, 2010 regarding the ways some of the restricted moneys
the library had collected over time were used and perhaps buy some breathing room. Mr. Nordhoff stated he
had suggested that Mr. Dodd generate some type of strategic planning document that addressed a number of
City Council questions and set a course to figure out what level of operations, hours, staffing and
expectations would be met by the customers using the library, and try to come up with a plan that afforded a
little time, provided some different input and attempted to address some of the questions raised. This would
be discussed in more detail on January 6, 2010.
Community Services:
An Administrative position was being eliminated. Ms. McCart and her staff had agreed that restructuring and
rescheduling of permanent staff would be done. He noted there would be some facility closures — Terra
Linda Recreation Center on Monday evenings and San Rafael Community Center on Friday evenings. There
would be some shrinkage of hours in terms of operating the Terra Linda Pool — while the pool would remain
and run a program, it might start a little later and close a little earlier. He also noted that staff would be
realigned to deal with the loss of facility attendants to ensure that the facilities were properly managed and
maintained.
Mr. Nordhoff noted the December 15 workshop had an additional consideration regarding some loss of
staffing concerning youth and family programming, and this would be addressed on January 6, 2010.
Administration:
Mr. Nordhoff stated that this evening's staff report outlined a number of operating expense reductions across
the various Administration Departments — Management Services, City Attorney and City Clerk's budgets as
well as Finance and City Manager.
Summarizing, Mr. Nordhoff referred to the number of items listed on Exhibit E. He noted that the top of Page
12 of the staff report identified $1,872,000 of budget recommendations against an approximate $3.5 million
deficit, which included attempting to rebuild reserves in the amount of $500,000. Subsequent to the last
workshop, he and Ms. Mosser had been refining the deficit for 2010-11, anticipating cost increases in public
pensions, redefining sales tax projections, etc., and were now estimating that deficit to be $4.4 million.
18 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
Taking the items being recommended this evening that staff wished to build into the 2010-11 budget (the
2010-11 budget was not being formally being acted upon this evening), those would total $2.6 million. The
remaining deficits of the current year would be $838,200 and $455,900 for 2010-11.
To the extent the problem was not being resolved in the remaining months of this year, Mr. Nordhoff stated
this was being aggregated over a two-year period, which essentially was $1.3 million. He indicated this
would include a number of the items to be considered on January 6 and, while the City Council was not being
requested to act on this this evening, were they to provide direction on those services, the City Council could
in a couple of steps make some fairly substantial progress, recognizing there still was a ways to go. As
mentioned in the report, Mr. Nordhoff explained there really were only two ways left to deal with that particular
situation. Over the past few weeks, staff had been in discussions with all of the bargaining groups and
management to ascertain whether there were additional labor or compensation concessions that could
minimize some of the inevitable layoffs. Absent that, he would be returning with a list of another twelve or
thirteen positions, assuming the City Council had acted on the items currently listed, that would close the
deficit. Mr. Nordhoff noted some of this did not need to occur immediately; nevertheless, he strongly believed
that the sooner the City Council felt due diligence had been done, had received and heard the information
from which to make decisions and had completed the public process, that these decisions be made, and
move forward as expeditiously as possible.
Mr. Nordhoff stated that included in the report was a summary from the Recession Action Plan and he
believed it important to continue to present to the City Council and members of the public the work staff had
already accomplished and things remaining to be done. Attachment B was provided based upon the input
received from the December 21, 2009 City Council meeting. This was the revised schedule of the decision-
making process.
Mr. Nordhoff stated staff recommended adoption of the resolution.
Paul Carroll, SEIU, expressed thanks for receiving a draft of the most recent audit for 2009. He was unsure
whether the notion of doing cuts to buoy up the reserve was still part of the projected cuts. If it was, he noted
that currently there was approximately $9.6 million in unreserved, undesignated money in the non-
governmental funds, some of which was sourced from the General Fund, and some of which could be
redirected back into the General Fund to raise reserves — not spend it. Mr. Carroll stated that cutting to
achieve the $500,000 for reserves would definitely mean cutting people, whereas, should money be
transferred from some of these funds into reserves, that $500,000 in cuts would be avoided.
Mr. Carroll stated that the savings from suspending the four firefighter positions was only listed as $50,000
and he questioned why this was so low.
Mr. Nordhoff clarified that the positions were not being saved, rather they were not being filled, back -filling
the shifts with overtime; therefore, this was the cost differential between the two for the balance of the year.
Mr. Carroll clarified that the rollups for the four positions was $50,000 and he questioned whether this should
be in excess of $50,000.
Mr. Nordhoff explained this was the net difference between rolling up their cost and the cost of overtime,
because it was time and one half.
Mr. Carroll suggested that somehow solving the overtime issue could realize the full savings of those four
firefighters.
Mr. Nordhoff stated that currently the City was committed to a staffing level of 23, with some vacancies;
therefore, staff believed it was appropriate that by not filling those for at least the next eighteen months would
save some money.
With regard to moving forward in terms of talking to employees about concessions, etc., Mr. Carroll stated
that in these times it would be very difficult to do this during the current contract without looking at future
years and opening up a contract to extensions, etc. Therefore, he hoped the City Council would urge staff to
look at extending contracts in light of concessions because that was the only way he would agree to any type
of current concessions; they already conceded going into the last contract and employees had already
suffered a 5% reduction in pay.
19 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
Ursula Davidson stated she was present on behalf of the public library. As a concerned citizen she had been
involved with library affairs for many years and she was concerned about he proposed cut backs. She
commented that the library was shrinking when it should be expanding. People needed libraries in these
economic times; hours and materials should be increased, not decreased. Ms. Davidson stated that libraries
provided access for information, for job seeking, for housing information and books that educate and inform.
Computer access was essential in today's world and with the proposed cut backs availability would be
curtailed. New immigrants needed language skills and this would also be curtailed. School libraries had been
eliminated in some cases and children needed the San Rafael libraries — youth should not be compromised.
Ms. Davidson stated she felt strongly that the City Council should try as far as possible to maintain the quality
of the library as it currently was, improve it and not decrease the books available or hours of business.
Ms. Davidson quoted: "It is however, not to the museums or lecture halls or drawing schools but to the library
that we must go for completion of our humanity. It is books that bear from age to age the intellect wealth of
our world."
Mayor Boro clarified that nothing before the City Council this evening had anything to do with cutting the
library.
Sean Prendiville, Library Board, stated he would be unable to attend the Study Session on Wednesday,
January 6, and encouraged the City Council not to cut the library. He explained that the library in 1978 was
open 72 hours per week — 6 days a week, 12 hours a day — and under one of the scenarios discussed, library
hours would be cut back to 35. He concurred with Ms. Davidson's comments; there was more circulation,
more people using the library, more library cards, and more children and students attending. Mr. Prendiville
stated that in the middle of this recession with all the other cuts being made to schools and school libraries,
now was not the time to cut the library, rather it should be expanded, which he did not believe would happen
at this time. He reiterated that now was not the time to make any more cuts. He commented that it would
come to the point of why bother to have a library with such restricted hours and no money for new books or
materials. The librarians already were doing an incredible amount of work with the few resources available to
them.
Jeneanne Ward, unable to attend on Wednesday, stated she was speaking on behalf of all her neighbors,
many of whom were disabled or senior citizens, on behalf of her daughter and son-in-law with small children,
one of whom had special needs, and on behalf of the many, many people in the area who had been affected
because of the financial difficulties being faced and who needed, utilized and relied on the library for
information, job training, school work and learning new skills to help them become more employable.
Understanding the almost impossible position the City Council was in with all of the pressing needs, she
concurred with Mr. Prendiville that at this time of diminished resources what the library offered was more
important than ever.
Sarah Houahton-Jan, San Rafael resident of six years, stated she had been a librarian for ten years, worked
in San Jose and chose to commute because of her love for San Rafael, the services it offered, a large part of
which was the library services. She used the computers, wireless connection, checked out books and DVDs
not found at her large 20 -branch system. She believed library services currently were more important than
ever; studies had shown that for every dollar thrown into a library, seven dollars come back to the community.
She believed that now more than ever when economic stimulus and money returning to the community was
needed, every dollar expended on the library would return seven -fold, and she urged the City Council to keep
this in mind during their deliberations.
Regarding Mr. Carroll's comment on reserves and the audit report which he had received, Mr. Nordhoff
indicated that staff could meet with Mr. Carroll to explain the figures and where the dollars were included. By
way of illustration - Parkland Dedication Fund — by ordinance the City collects a fee to help set aside and
dedicate these funds for park improvements, upkeep and upgrade types of projects and these were some of
the types of dollars embedded in the figure quoted by Mr. Carroll. He reiterated that staff would be glad to
meet with Mr. Carroll at his convenience to walk through some of these issues.
Mr. Nordhoff stated staff had continued to scour the reserves of the City and all of its funds. Last year putting
money into the Vehicle Replacement Fund was suspended - $750,000 - and staff continues to readjust
reserve levels in sinking funds for items such as liability and workers' compensation, and on occasion where
there have been surpluses, those dollars were transferred back to the General Fund.
Mr. Nordhoff commented that he and Ms. Mosser spend a lot of time evaluating these issues and considering
where it would be possible to tap into some necessary items, and legitimately do so. However, he
20 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
emphasized that, should there be more funds to do this with, the General Fund reserve would not be 2% or
3%, far below the 10% goal, which did concern him. Should there be a major incident, a very limited amount
of funds was available from which to respond.
Mayor Boro confirmed that there were no questions from the City Council on the handout concerning the
Town Hall meetings on January 12 and 14, 2010. With regard to the email blast to community leaders,
residents, businesses and boards and commissions, he believed City employees should also be included.
Councilmember Brockbank moved and Councilmember Levine seconded, to adopt the Resolution.
RESOLUTION NO. 12905 — RESOLUTION ADOPTING AMENDMENTS TO
THE 2009-2010 BUDGET
AYES: COUNCILMEMBERS: Brockbank, Connolly, Heller, Levine & Mayor Boro
NOES: COUNCILMEMBERS: None
ABSENT: COUNCILMEMBERS: None
9. ELECTION OF VICE -MAYOR FOR THE SAN RAFAEL CITY COUNCIL FOR YEAR 2010 (CC) - FILE
Councilmember Brockbank placed in nomination the name of Councilmember Connolly to serve as Vice -
Mayor of the City of San Rafael for year 2010. Council member Levine seconded the motion and
Councilmember Connolly was elected Vice -Mayor for 2010.
AYES: COUNCILMEMBERS: Brockbank, Connolly, Heller, Levine & Mayor Boro
NOES: COUNCILMEMBERS: None
ABSENT: COUNCILMEMBERS: None
CITY MANAGER'S REPORT:
10. None.
COUNCILMEMBER REPORTS: (including AB 1234 Reports on Meetings and Conferences Attended at City
Expense)
11. CITY COUNCIL APPOINTMENTS TO COMMITTEES (CC) -FILE
Mayor Boro reported that over the past few weeks he had discussed Committee assignments with each
Councilmember and informally advised them of the list to be presented this evening. He distributed the
proposed list of City Council Appointments for 2010 to Councilmembers for review.
Mayor Boro noted the following changes:
Agency: New Appointments
San Rafael Sanitation District: Barbara Heller
Marc Levine (Alt.)
Central Marin Sanitation Agency Barbara Heller
Marc Levine (Alt.)
League of California Cities - North Bay Division Marc Levine (2" d Alt.)
Legislative Committee (MCCMC) Greg Brockbank
Citizen of the Year Selection Committee Barbara Heller
County Priority -Setting Committee (CDBG) Greg Brockbank
Barbara Heller (Alt.)
Farmers' Market Board of Directors Greg Brockbank
Marc Levine (Alt.)
Oversight Committee - Council Liaison Marc Levine (Alt.)
21 SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010
Mobile Homeowners Associations Liaison
Marin Energy Authority (MEA)
Marin Telecommunications Agency
City Council Ad -Hoc Committees -
Marc Levine (Alt.)
Greg Brockbank (Alt.)
Marc Levine
Referring to the list of City Council Ad -Hoc Committees Mayor Boro noted the addition of the Canal Dredging
Ad -Hoc Committee and indicated that he and Richard Landis, staff support person, had been working with
the Corps of Engineers on Canal Dredging. Hopefully, sooner rather than later discussions would take place
about actually beginning the dredging. He commented that current funding was approximately $2.5 million.
Mr. Epstein clarified that as reflected on the City Council Ad -Hoc Committees list, staff members were acting
in support roles and would not be considered members of the committees.
Mayor Boro and Councilmember Heller currently work with Nancy Mackle, Economic Development Director,
on the Downtown Ad -Hoc Committee.
Mayor Boro and Councilmember Brockbank were appointed to the SMART Ad -Hoc Committee in 2009,
working with Ms. Mackle as the staff person. Mayor Boro clarified that this included Downtown, North San
Rafael, Andersen Drive Crossing and a myriad of other avenues.
Mr. Nordhoff stated that because the City has secured two grants from MTC (Metropolitan Transportation
Commission, this project would begin to get busy in the coming year.
Councilmember Heller to work with Councilmember Connolly on the General Plan 5 -Year Review and
Housing Element with Linda Jackson, staff.
With regard to the BERST (Green Building, Energy Retrofit and Solar Transformation) committee on which
Councilmember Brockbank represented the City, Mayor Boro reported that Bob Brown, Community
Development Director, indicated that this project was pretty much complete.
Mr. Brown confirmed that the Green Building Ordinance would be before the City Council on January 19,
2010.
Mayor Boro thanked Councilmember Brockbank for the great job he did on that committee. Councilmember
Brockbank commented that it was great staff work.
Councilmember Heller moved and Councilmember Levine seconded, to accept the report.
AYES: COUNCILMEMBERS: Brockbank, Connolly, Heller, Levine & Mayor Boro
NOES: COUNCILMEMBERS: None
ABSENT: COUNCILMEMBERS: None
Mayor Boro thanked the City Council for their willingness to serve and help the City, noting that being a
Councilmember was not just the first and third Mondays of the month, rather Councilmembers served many
different groups and San Rafael was a leader in these endeavors.
There being no further business, Mayor Boro adjourned the City Council meeting at 11:05 p.m.
ESTHER C. BEIRNE, City Clerk
APPROVED THIS DAY OF 2010
MAYOR OF THE CITY OF SAN RAFAEL
22
SRCC Minutes (Regular) 1/4/2010