This item was scheduled for Oct. 23 but withdrawn without public explanation after residents blasted it online and sought a postponement. The "parking study" resulted after Alamitos Beach and downtown area residents formed a non-profit group (TAPS [Transportation And Parking Solutions]) hired a law firm, sued the City and won a settlement requiring City Hall to fund a professional parking study of impacts in their neighborhoods. The item as originally agendized item can be viewed here. In a November 30 response on its Facebook page, TAPS says:

One way or another, this parking study will be over soon along with the good that it could have done for us. While the parking study only covers downtown and Alamitos Beach, our work could help parking in other areas, too. All of Long Beach will soon be affected by the City's parking policies...

Will the parking study help make parking easier for us?

That's the question we hear most often. The answer is probably not. We've always known that the City could just toss this study aside and choose not to do anything. This is worse than that...

This is not just our opinion but also that of our parking consultant Mike Kodama [whose] summary memo on the parking study...points out how some of their key conclusions are not backed by analysis and that key things are missing to make their recommendations work...

[Scroll down for further.]

LB Health Dept. staff, which oversees now-multi-million dollar LB homeless programs funded by taxpayers at various government levels) is writing the report. Agendas of the Task Force meetings indicate city staff was the main information source for a 30-member "Task Force" chosen by Mayor Robert Garcia. And now there's an added twist: as separately reported by LBREPORT.com (here), on Dec. 4, Councilwoman Price (joined by Pearce and Supernaw) have agendized a Council item seeking a report from staff to learn exactly how many homeless-related beds LB currently has available. Their request seeking this key fact invites an obvious question: did the Task Force have or not have this information when it offered its recommendations now being written by city staff and coming to the Council on Dec. 11?

The "Task Force" meetings, while open to the public, didn't meet CA's Brown (open meetings) Act requirements because the Mayor used a loophole in the law by creating the Task Force without Council voted action. Informal efforts by LBREPORT.com to date to obtain minutes of the Task Force meetings or records of its voted actions haven't been unsuccessful thus far but some items caught our attention, prompting our inquiry handled by Kelly Colopy, Dir. of LB's Dept. of Health and Human Services:

Q: At its final meeting (Nov. 9) meeting, the Task Force agenda indicated "Review and discussion of recommended policies and goals" and "Approval of policies and goal[s]." :What policies and goals did the Task Force approve? What was there a vote (and if so was it unanimous or a split vote)?...

Response: The policies and goals will be presented to the City Council on December 11 for review and adoption. The report on the policies and goals is currently being developed by the Health and Human Services Department. There was a consensus vote on the recommendations and goals. Consensus was reached for those who attended the meeting and those who voted electronically.

...The recommendations focus on building governance, data capabilities, and financing to support a coordinated and robust homeless services and housing system; expanding housing opportunities; incentivizing and engaging landlords to provide housing to low-income and homeless individuals and families; providing services and incentives to prevent homelessness; increasing employment opportunities for people who are either at-risk or experiencing homelessness; supporting children and families who are precariously housed or homeless; increasing access to behavioral health and physical health services; developing service models specific to older adult, transition-aged youth, LGBTQ, and re-entry populations; and implementing a robust communications strategy.

Q: At the Task Force Aug. 17 meeting, PPT slide p. 15 listed among "Proposed Policy Recommendations" the following as "Housing Commitments"

• "Opportunities in all Long Beach neighborhoods"
• YIMBY Campaigns

Q: What type of opportunities in all LB neighborhoods are envisioned? What type of YIMBY campaigns were recommended, and by whom? And what actions did the Task Force take on these recommendations on Aug. 17 or at its final meeting?

Response: The Taskforce recommends that services to support people at-risk of, or experiencing homelessness, be available across the City of Long Beach to help support ending homelessness. Services could include low-income or homeless housing, substance use treatment/sobering centers, mental health treatment, recuperative care, employment training, or other social service supports. The Taskforce approved moving forward with a Yes In My Backyard (YIMBY) campaign, but specifics will be developed in the future. LA County has developed a Yes In My Backyard (YIMBY) campaign that could be utilized as a model as well as models from other communities across the Country. The focus is educating and working with communities across the City so that there is an understanding that ending homelessness in Long Beach requires support in each community and that we all have a role.

Q: At the Task Force Aug. 17 meeting, PPT slide p. 17 listed among "Proposed Policy Recommendations" the following:

• Tenant relocation assistance
• Just cause for termination of tenancy
• Anti-Retaliation Policy
• Tenant-Based senior rental assistance
• Funds for legal defense

What actions did the Task Force take on these recommendations on Aug. 17 or at its final meeting?

Response: No actions were taken in the Aug 17 meeting. Policy recommendations were revised and submitted to the taskforce for the final November 9 meeting. Tenant assistance strategies are currently being developed by the Development Services Department in partnership with community advocates and landlords. [LBREPORT.com has independently confirmed this latter point, see below.] The Taskforce approved supporting the results of that work.

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On November 20, 2018 the Mayor/Council excluded the public and press and discussed price and terms behind closed doors, using a loophole CA's Brown (open meetings) law allowing "a closed session with its negotiator prior to the purchase, sale, exchange, or lease of real property by or for the local agency to grant authority to its negotiator regarding the price and terms of payment for the purchase, sale, exchange, or lease." To date, LB elected officials (including 4th dist. Councilman Daryl Supernaw leading the charge) have avoiding plainly asking the public in multiple public meetings how much LB taxpayers should spend, if anything, to enable "Molina/Wu/Network, LLC'" to operate a downsized version of LB's former Community Hospital. City staff has publicly acknowledged in previous public discussion significant costs to address with the site's seismic issues and it's hinted at the possibility of some type of "public participation" (translation: spending taxpayer dollars as part of the deal.)

When the item does come to the Council, will it include the text of a proposed contract/lease with the entity? (Other cities do this, so does the Port of LB) but for years, the LB City Council has let city management "summarize" the salient terms in a memo, and on that basis simply votes to authorize management to authorize a contradict binding taxpayers sight unseen. [LBREPORT.com has previously urged the Mayor and City Council to show the public major contracts proposed for Council approval before approving them as a minimal level of businesslike, taxpayer-respectful transparency.]

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[Dec. 3, 2018, 9:00 p.m. UPDATE]: After the close of the Dec. 3 business day (several hours after LBREPORT.com reported our initial story), multiple parties received an email from city staff, indicating (consistent with our initial story) that staff plans to bring a proposed "Tenant Assistance Policy" and associated report" based on staff's research" and input provided by various parties in "stakeholder focus groups" that took place in the fall (reported by us below) to the City Council...but [in a change from what several parties were previously told] this will take place on Jan. 8, 2019 [not Dec. 18.] The remainder of our story remains unchanged. [end UPDATE]

On Jan. 16, 2018, the City Council voted (9-0) to approve a broadly worded motion to direct city management to:

...schedule a City Council report to review progress on the city's Report on Revenue Tools and Incentives for the Production of Affordable and Workforce Housing adopted by the City Council in May of 2017. Include updates on all 29 action items, including progress on the inclusionary housing policy, short term rental policy, and updates on new funding from recent State legislation including recording fee legislation [AND} through the Department of Development Services and the Housing Authority, to present research and findings on [font highlight by us for clarity] potential polices to support tenants, protections for seniors, rental assistance programs, and support for renters to move into homeownership. Policy considerations should include:

A "Seniors First" program to ensure vulnerable seniors receive priority in rental assistance and relocation programs;

Options for new and/or expanded rental assistance and relocation programs;

Policies that support tenants adopted in other cities; Input from local housing and property owner organizations as part of the study;

Added resources and enforcement tools to address the issue of negligent landlords (persistent code violators, consistent quality of life issues, blight in the neighborhoods, etc.).

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Sponsor

LBREPORT.com has learned that earlier this year, city staff (Housing Services) hired a consultant/facilitator ("PlaceWorks") which met separately with landlord and tenant reps and has since held at least two "three-way" meetings with both sides, at least one of which included reps from ten groups encompassing a wide range of views. A summary of the September meeting, obtained by LBREPORT.com, indicated there was "some degree of consensus" on tenant relocation assistance (noticing requirements and the like) but acknowledged "there were a number of other housing issues and policy ideas discussed that it said "are not being pursued at this time." We believe city staff and its hired consultant may want to try to circumscribe discussion to "relocation assistance" but a City Council majority may have other ideas (unless Mayor Garcia blocks their action with a veto he's never used and six Council votes can override.)

On a state level, advocates of recently-defeated Prop 10 (that sought to allow cities statewide to adopt sweeping rent control measures) wrote on Nov. 14: "Attention will now turn to Governor-elect Gavin Newsom and the legislature" and "conversations about what to do next are taking place right now in city halls throughout the state." That could have local implications, as we presume Mayor Garcia (a Newsom ally) will likely follow the incoming Governor's lead. Meanwhile, we believe/speculate at least one LB Councilmember will enter the race to fill a state Senate seat (stretching from Long Beach to Huntington Park) vacated by incumbent Ricardo Lara's election as Insurance Commissioner. Last year, Council incumbent Al Austin filed paperwork and began raising money to seek the seat in 2020 (and hasn't said whether he'll opt to seek a third Council term in 2020, now spared a write-in requirement by passage of Measure BBB.)

For now, we don't know the full extent of where this agenda item could lead. To borrow a phrase, it's like an Irish wake: "Remains to be seen."

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