[Councilmembers Colonna, Kell and City Auditor Burroughs were then called back to receive presentations.]

...As you all know, we had to change the direction of our city because we lost our image and our tax base when the Navy left and when the aerospace downsized. This city has changed so dramatically...This was a Navy town. We had people living here because their parents came after the Second World War. We had people living here because they were in the Navy and they wanted to use the privileges of the Navy....To change the attitude about your hometown is really tough, but this city was able to do that. This city had the fortitude, it had the knowledge that if we didn't do something, we would be in a very difficult situation. And Jenny [Oropeza] and Alan [Lowenthal] were on the Council at that time, and we really made some tough decisions because we in about two years were going to go down the drain financially. And decisions were made as to the future and that's why we started with more tourism and international trade because we knew that those would go on and we could have a future on that.

But now we have more retail stores than ever before, we have more residential living spaces than before, more concern for the environment and the most transparent budget of any city that I know...And we are going to continue to change; if you don't change, you die...We're renewing ourselves. We need to continue to grow and develop, and I came into this job with real optimism because when I was a child...I had a working mother, I grew up here taking advantage of all the things that Long Beach had to offer that were free...took advantage of the public schools...and so the advantages that were here made a difference in my life, and the thought that people didn't like that, or that or that they didn't like the city because of one thing, or two things, I felt was so shortsighted, it was so myopic to think that nothing was good because one thing wasn't good. And that's really why I ran for Mayor, because I felt such optimism for this city, and I still do.

"And as I said at one of the gatherings that I was at, I'm not disillusioned. I don't feel soured. I don't dislike politics because I think that what's happening and what we're going through every city goes through. They all have some big crisis now and then, but that doesn't mean the city is a bad city, that doesn't mean the city's not going to blossom, it means that we work our way through it...

"...We have added 25% more sworn officers and completed two public safety facilities and this is in addition to the Emergency Operations Center. By 2010, there will be 5,000 more residential units in this downtown area without about 10,000 new residents making it a totally urban downtown area.

"The city is fiscally stronger than anytime in the past two decades...

"The Los Angeles and Long Beach ports are nationally economic generators for the entire nation...We have recently been named by the Meyers Group as the most livable city in southern California...Now, many of these things happened in the last few years and I didn't do 'em. I was here at a time when people were working together, and that's really the key. It's the Council working together...

"...This happens because the city works together. I've never worked with a better group of people than the city staff...It happens because people believe in the city, and that's their main goal, not that they can't get over some obstacles that they have...

"...The people in the city of Long Beach are really the one that have really made the difference...[T]he people in this room...I see leaders, I see people that are working for things in their community, people that have made a difference in their community. I've appreciated working with Randy Gordon, the president of the Chamber...

"So I think Long Beach will continue to flourish, but you gotta love it, and it will continue to blossom, but you've got to feed it, you gotta water it...I feel very fortunate that I've had the opportunity to be such a part of my hometown during this time of transition. Thanks."

[Standing ovation from Council and audience.]

[Councilmembers then paid tribute to the exiting officials]