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HomeMy WebLinkAbout00 - Written CommentsReceived After Agenda Printed December 8, 2020 Written Comments December 8, 20209 City Council Agenda Comments The following comments on items on the Newport Beach City Council agenda are submitted by: Jim Mosher ( iimmosher(@-yahoo.com ), 2210 Private Road, Newport Beach 92660 (949-548-6229) Item 1. Minutes for the November 24, 2020 City Council Meeting Suggested corrections: The passages shown in italics below are from the draft minutes with suggested corrections indicated in strikeout underline format. The page numbers refer to Volume 64. Page 570, Item SS2, paragraph 4, sentence 1: "In response to Council questions, Deputy Public Works Director Martin advised that the current hauler is moving away from the wee -two -cart system, and the State mandate favors a three -cart system, ..." [see video at 13:00] Page 570, Item SS2, paragraph 5, sentence 2: "In response to Mayor O'Neill's question, Deputy Public Works Director Martin explained that the options for processing material is are becoming more limited such that a two -cart blended system is challenging." Page 571, paragraph 7: "Council Member Dixon indicated a successful program will require education and behavior change, the program will benefit the environment and lower operating costs, and noted that the City Brooklyn, New York, fines residents and will not pick up refuse if it is not sorted correctly." [as correctly stated in video at 43:40] Page 572, last paragraph: "Hoiyin Ip thanked Council Members for attending the Circulation Element workshop and suggested making online workshops more exciting and giving participants homework, a cliff hanger or a takeaway before and after the meetings, and commented that public participation doubled during they'a.,.,i g Commission Meetin workshop's public comment period." [The final participation comment may not have been clear, but it referred back to the originally -mentioned online workshop held for the benefit of the Planning Commission, not to any regular Planning Commission meeting.] Page 581, last paragraph: "In response to Council questions, City Manager Leung related that PERS' numbers lag by two years, PERS' return was 4.7% as of June 30, 2020 when the assumed rate was 7%, staff calculated the shortfall will add about $16 million to the City's unfunded liability, and the $5 million payment is critical to paying down that additional amount, and so the City can pay down a sizable piece of the $16 million and PERS' charge for the -two ears the City does not ay the full amount in 2% years before the contribution rate chan_pes." [See video at 3:13:40. This long sentence attempts (ungrammatically at the end) to combine several comments by the City Manager and Mayor in which "2 years" and "2'/2 years" seem to have been used interchangeably. Their point was that the additional amount that needs to be paid down as a result of this year's investment shortfall is a combination of a $16 million one-time hit plus what PERS would (or will?) charge the City for underpayment over the next 2 or 2'/2 years.] December 8, 2020, City Council agenda comments - Jim Mosher Page 2 of 4 Item IX. MATTERS WHICH COUNCIL MEMBERS HAVE ASKED TO BE PLACED ON A FUTURE AGENDA The second of these items ("Consideration of staff assisting with this year's Newport Beach Boat Parade") does not make much sense in that it has been scheduled for a discussion and vote only on the very limited topic of whether the matter should be placed on a future agenda, but the Council is not expected to hold another meeting until January 12, 2021, long after any boat parade held in 2020 will have ended (see Item 15 on the current agenda). Moreover, this has generally been treated as a non -discussion item (even though the agenda has never said that). I thought that at the last meeting, on November 24, former Council member, Mayor and now Chamber of Commerce CEO Steve Rosansky provided a very reasonable explanation of the Chamber's reasons for cancelling their sponsored Christmas Boat Parade in light of the COVID- 19 upsurge and the problems that could be generated by an impromptu one replacing it. Is it the intention of the Council to direct staff to schedule a special meeting before a possible non -permitted boat parade takes place? If nothing else, this raises the question of whether Section 17.30.040 (Special Event Permits) of our Harbor Code applies to the possible event. And if not, whether it should be modified so that it does. Item 3. Ordinance No. 2020-28: Residential Design Standards Amendment to Title 20 of the Newport Beach Municipal Code A seemingly obscure point, but I notice that on staff report page 3-13, in proposed Subsection 20.48.180.A.1.b, the word "below" that was seen when this ordinance was introduced on November 24 (and asop sted subsequent to that) has been replaced by "as follows". I applaud the City for striving to get its laws as clearly stated as possible before codifying them, but I don't see this very minor change brought to the Council's or the public's attention in the staff report. Is this regarded as a clerical correction? Item 4. Award of Employee Health Screening Professional Services Agreements While I certainly appreciate the service provided by our City's excellent Executive Management employees, I'm not sure I understand the rationale for offering them an annual physical exam more rigorous (pages A-18 and 19), and more expensive (page 4-21), than that provided our firefighters. Do the Council members get this as well? December 8, 2020, City Council agenda comments - Jim Mosher Page 3 of 4 Item 10. Certification of General Municipal Election Results Although not mentioned in the staff report, it is good to see the County Registrar of Voters has finally solved the problem that in past years caused the sum of votes by "wards" (also known as Council districts) to differ from the sum of votes by precinct. As noted by me in connection with the certification two years ago (Item 11 at the December 11, 2018, meeting), Tim Stoaks won in the total of reported votes by ward/district, but Duffy Duffield won in the (apparently more accurate) total of reported votes by precinct. This year, for the first time in a long while, the totals match. Of this year's Council results, it is striking that within normal statistical errors the District 2 and District 5 results are indistinguishable. That is, they could be two runs of the identical race. I suspect this is at least in part a statistical fluke, because the precinct by precinct reports indicate there were precincts in which the two races fared quite differently, but when averaged over the entire City they came out the same. As to the turnout, others, including the Registrar, have noted the unusually high level this year, with 91.5% of registered voters in Newport Beach casting ballots (see, for example, the "Newport Beach" line on page 9-16 of the staff report). As a measure of the vitality of local government in Newport Beach, I think the fraction of those casting ballots who bother to vote on the City races is a better statistic to follow. To that end, the following chart was compiled from the election certification documents presented to the Council from 2000 to the present. The black line indicates the number of ballots cast by Newport Beach voters normalized to the (unusually high) 55,826 cast in 2020. The remaining dots and lines show the fraction of those Newport Beach voters who chose to vote on city ballot measures, contested council races and uncontested council races. By this measure, and over this period, the local decision exciting the most interest among those bothering to vote was Measure Y in 2014. That soundly -defeated effort to amend the General Plan to move the Irvine Company's unused development allotments from Newport Coast to Newport Center attracted votes from 94% of those casting ballots in that off-year. It was followed in interest by the Greenlight initiative in 2000, with several other measures close behind. This year's Measure Z involving the Harbor Commission attracted less interest than most with 85% of those casting ballots expressing an opinion about it. Contested council races typically elicit a vote on around 80% of the ballots. bA C U +_+ L Q Ln +1 O 75 O C O U L L.L 1.00 0.95 0.90 0.85 0.80 0.75 0.70 0.65 0.60 0.55 0.50 2000 Newport Beach City Election Participation Trends Year The following trends are evident: 2020 Ballots vs 2020 • Contested smoothed —4 --Uncontested —E—Measure 1. There is strong tendency for more Newporter Beach voters to turn out in presidential election years than in the "off' years when we vote for governor. The ballots cast in some off -years were a mere half of those cast this November. 2. Of the City decisions, Newport Beach voters consistently show the most interest in voting on City ballot measures. Interest in voting on contested council races is less, and on unchallenged candidates still less. 2020 was a slight exception to this rule in that the two contested council races attracted essentially the same level of interest as Measure Z. 15% of Newport Beach voters chose to express no preference on the contested council races, and 26% chose not to vote in the uncontested race for the District 7 seat. With regard to the certification of Measure Z, although not mentioned in the staff report, the City Clerk will undoubtedly make it effective by notifying the California Secretary of State of the result as provided in Elections Code Section 9269 and Government Code Sections 3459 and 3460. Once that has occurred, it is unclear from either the text of Measure Z or from the ballot materials if, in approving it, the citizens of Newport Beach have created a new Harbor Commission (to which appointments need to be made) or, in some sense, ratified the existing one created by the Council. Does the Council need to do anything further to clarify what the effect of Measure Z was or to clean up any existing ordinances or resolutions that may be in conflict with it? Either way, it would be good for the Council to encourage the Harbor Commission to avail itself of the power it has always had under City Charter Section 704 to adopt formal bylaws for the conduct of its meetings, including how it memorializes its actions and recommendations to the City Council (for example, by adopting resolutions similar to what the Planning Commission does).