Recommendation to adopt Plans and Specifications No. R-6959 for the Ocean Boulevard Erosion and Enhancement Project, Phase 2, award the Base Bid plus Additive Items AA, CC, DD, and HH, and to authorize City Manager to execute the contract with Drill Tech Drilling & Shoring, Inc., in the amount of $4,442,768, plus a 15 percent contingency in the amount of $666,415, if necessary and subject to funding availability, for a total not to exceed amount of $5,109,183, and any amendments thereto. (District 3) [To view city staff's agendizing memo here]

Councilmembers Suja Lowenthal and Dee Andrews had been present earlier in the meeting; Councilman DeLong was absent for the entire meeting.

Councilwoman Lowenthal left after making the motion to approve a Local Coastal Development Permit for an Ocean Blvd. hotel project (2010 E. Ocean Blvd.), a project opposed by a number of her Council district residents (who had filed an appeal to the Council of the Planning Commission's approval of the project.) Lowenthal's motion to overrule the residents' appeal and approve a Local Coastal Development Permit for the project carried 8-1 (DeLong absent) with Vice Mayor Garcia voting "yes."

Less than a year later, after the Council's approval of the project prompted an appeal to the Coastal Commission joined by the politically active UniteHERE hotel workers union, Lowenthal (then an Assembly candidate) sent a letter on her City Council letterhead to the Coastal Commission, urging it to disapprove the Local Coastal Development Permit that the Council had voted (on her motion) to approve. Coastal Commission member Robert Garcia (then a Mayoral candidate, now-Mayor elect) voted to disapprove the Local Coastal Development Permit that he'd joined in voting to approve on the Council.

Councilman Andrews was also present earlier in the July 9, 2013 Council meeting which included an item his office had advanced to regulate amplified music from ice cream trucks. The item carried 8-1 (DeLong absent) and Andrews left shortly thereafter.