City Council

City Council Meeting June 25, 2024 Responses to City Council Agenda Questions 7:00pm Regular Meeting Item 6h & 6i. (Public Works) Councilmember Hamilton - intends to pull Items 6h and 6i for comment, with the following question on 6h: 1. Consent Item 6h. Can we please get an update during the meeting regarding the anticipated completion of the City website dedicated section for paving? https://www.sanbruno.ca.gov/997/San-Bruno-Paving-Program To clarify from the discussion about this in April, will the paving site include basic info on what streets are slated for paving this year and in upcoming planned years? a. Answer: Staff are currently working on the City’s dedicated paving website, with an anticipated launch date of July 2024 (preview screenshots below). The website will include a variety of resources including information about the pothole program, the pavement management program, the link to staff’s April 2024 paving program presentation, and other informational and educational materials. Screenshot of the draft website below. Because funding on future projects has not yet been approved, the paving website will not list the streets slated for paving in future years. Instead, the website will highlight completed projects in addition to in-progress projects in which funding has already been appropriated. Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 2 of 14 Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 3 of 14 Item 7a. (Finance) 1. What are the available fund balances, by fund? Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 4 of 14 2. What is the breakdown of General Fund taxes (p. 28)? 3. Funds 136 and 138 do not show any investment income in FY25. With their combined balance of approximately $11 million, wouldn’t they receive about $440K in investment income? a. Answer: Fund 136, Emergency Disaster Reserve, will not accrue investment earnings in FY25 because the Fund is closing. The full balance of Fund 136 is required to offset FEMA’s reimbursement denials for the 2022-23 Winter Storm Emergencies. Fund 138, Affordable Housing, was designated a noninterest- bearing account in Fiscal Year 2023-24 and FY25 maintained the status quo. The investment income that would accrue to Fund 138 has been credited to the General Fund. Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 5 of 14 4. What are the fund balances for the DIF and what are the anticipated revenues in each? a. Answer – the Development Impact fees are listed as separate funds on page 7 of the budget document. 5. How are the Walmart.com tax share agreement payments being sequestered (p. 33)? a. Answer - The City’s portion of the Walmart.com tax share agreement are placed in the General Fund’s Contingency Reserve. Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 6 of 14 6. What is the breakdown of the use of of One-Time Revenue Reserve in the FY25 Budget (p. 15)? a. Answer: The three items comprising the One-time Revenue Reserve expenditures are shown below. The “one-time revenue funded line items” are listed in the sections immediately preceding the highlighted text below. As Vice Mayor Salazar pointed out on 6/11/24, repayment of the loan to the Parking Fund should be reflected in the list below. The final budget will include the correction. Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 7 of 14 7. What is the City doing to fund its pension obligations? Are there any additional strategies that can be employed? a. Answer – The City’s pension costs are subject to CalPERS’ policy decisions, investment earnings, and demographics shifts, all outside of our local control. PEPRA reduced benefits for all new CalPERS members hired after 1/1/12, however, PEPRA members will not offset the unfunded liabilities resulting from classic CalPERS members. Our options are limited. Continue with CalPERS and pay as we go, or pursue other options that may reduce the overall burden on the City but which come with their own tradeoffs. 8. Why did the City Council budget increase from from $73K to $142K (p. 46)? a. Answer: The increased cost reflects internal service allocation increases resulting from setup, take down, technology, etc for Council meetings. 9. What drives the increase and fluctuations in the City Attorney’s budget (p. 50)? a. Answer - Operating costs in FY23 reflect an atypical staffing model of the City Attorney and their one support employee being paid salaries while the City brought on and transitioned to contract attorney between June 6, 2022, and December 31, 2022. Additionally, the RWG and other contract attorney (for example, BBK, Boucher Law, and Sloan, Sakai Young & Wong) invoices for FY23, all City work was paid directly out of the City Attorney operating budget. In FY24, these invoices were processed differently, and charged directly to: i. City projects. example, CIP projects like the RAC, water projects, sewer projects, stormwater projects, transportation improvement projects, etc. ii. Third parties such as private developers and business owners. iii. Enterprise funds, including CityNet, Water, Sewer, and Parking. This billing process will continue in FY25, but there are anticipated additional legal costs that will be borne by the City Attorney operating budget, such as HR work on labor agreements, general city operations, etc. 10. Why are the Recreation revenues and expenditures fluctuating (p. 96)? a. Answer: The fluctuations result from the Recreation Center's closure and its impact on revenues and expenditures. The FY 25 budget anticipates a full year of both revenues and expenditures, as detailed in the RAC implementation plan. 11. What is the budget for street sweeping and basin cleaning (p. 37)? a. Answer: As presented in the June 13, 2023, Staff Report (Item 7.b.), the Franchise Agreement with Recology San Bruno indicates that the City’s annual street sweeping and catch basin waste removal costs are $798,993 per the Street Sweeping and Catch Basin Waste Removal Cost Allocation Study located as Attachment 3 of the Staff Report. The amendment with Recology that captures this fund is in Section 1 of the amendment under the modified section of 4.7.5 on PDF page 110 and is available at: https://www.sanbruno.ca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/3928/Recology-Franchise- Agreement?bidId=. Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 8 of 14 12. Has staff examined the credit card charges the city has been absorbing over the years? a. Answer – Yes. Credit card fees for water, wastewater, parking, and CityNet are built into their overall fee calculations. The User Fee Schedule has been updated to allow a 2% surcharge for non-rate payments like RAC fees and tax payments. 13. Can staff please provide a brief general description of the various funds, where the income typically comes from and what are typical expenditures and restrictions? a. Answer – The fund balance policy provides the fund descriptions and will be included in the final budget. 14. What are the estimated costs for the various services provided by CityNet (p. 38)? Answer: The following are the estimated costs for CityNet Services provided to the City as included in the 2024-25 Budget: i. Cost of fiber connectivity to 18 City locations @$1,000/fiber/location - $216,000 ii. 96 Service Calls @$128 per call - $12,288 iii. Custom install services @$120/Technician Hour - $14,400 iv. Expanded Basic TV Connections provided to 24 City locations - $28,944 v. TOTAL CityNet Services Cost for services to City - $271,632 15. What is the status of the Posy Park fountain repair project? a. Answer: Staff are working with WaterWorks, the original fountain builder, on this issue. So far we believe we have isolated the problem. About a month ago, we requested a proposal from WaterWorks to restore the fountain. We continue to apply pressure to get that proposal. They understand that Measure K funding expires at end of this calendar year. 16. What is the status of the Florida Park project? a. Answer: Bid documents needed to go back to the designer for corrections. Additional requirements for the project were required in the review of the bid documents. The City received an update that the documents should be delivered by 6/15. The RFP is prepared already and once the outstanding docs are received by the designer; it can be released. 17. What is the status of the Centennial Plaza project? a. Answer: Construction is on track. Over the next few weeks, the site will see significant concrete work. There are no open RFIs. Most of the work is slated to be substantially completed by end of September, however, the Festoon Light poles are on back order and should arrive in early October to finish out the project. 18. What is the status of the Athletic Scoreboard Replacements project? a. Answer: A funding request for scoreboards is in the CIP budget for adoption. Staff have received quotes for this project and the project will be prioritized in Late Summer/Early Fall 2024. Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 9 of 14 19. What is the status of the pathways project? a. Answer: This project has been prioritized after Centennial, Florida, Downtown Planters and Posy are completed. It will likely begin in winter 2024/25. The grant funding has been extended until 2028. 20. Where are special events budgeted (p. 94), for example the Posy Parade and Community Day? How much is budgeted City-wide for events? a. Answer: i. Posy Parade – City Council budget = $48,000 ii. Other Event – Community Services budget = $41,000 Community Day will be deferred to 2024 and possibly paired with the Posy Parade. The staff will be prepared to request funding from the San Bruno Community Foundation. 21. What is driving the increase in the Senior Center budget (p. 97)? a. Answer: The change in year-over-year salaries is due to a designated Senior Center Manager position all being charged to the Senior Center. This was a shift from the vacant Superintendent position that was spread across various divisions of the department. The operating has remained fairly constant. The transfers include a $250,000 transfer from the Bequest Fund to the Facilities Capital Project fund for senior center improvements in the CIP (p.144). 22. What is the status of the Transit Corridor Feasibility project? a. Answer: The proposed budget includes $150k for the financial feasibility analysis. An RFP will be published for the study pending adoption of the budget. 23. What progress has been made in implementing the Short-Term Rental permitting program and its anticipated revenue? a. Answer: City data shows that, prior to the launch of the City permit for short term rentals, around $500,000 in TOT was received annually, as many operators already pay TOT through their online services (like Airbnb). Earlier in 2024, just over 100 short term rentals were identified and contacted, and less than 20 have applied for permits to date. All of those that have applied had already been paying taxes through the online service they use. As a result, these permits will not result in any increased revenue. Of those that have not applied, some have indicated they plan to stop being a short-term rental due to the permit requirement. Another round of notifications is planned. If operators continue to rent their unit without a City permit, then Code Enforcement will be relied upon to gain compliance. Staff believes that the major operators already pay TOT and are most likely to promptly apply for a City permit. The majority of the unpermitted operators may not have high volumes, therefore as the program continues to be implemented, staff expects revenue increases to be low to moderate. 24. Why are Police charges for services, fines & forfeitures, and intergovernmental revenues fluctuate so significantly from FY24 to FY25 (p. 106)? a. Answer: The increase in charges for services is primarily attributable to parking meter revenues, which are projected to be $672k in FY25. Additionally, the new downtown parking program is anticipated to generate an additional $730k in Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 10 of 14 parking fine revenue. The fluctuation in intergovernmental revenue is largely due to the Board of State and Community Corrections Grant for combating organized retail theft awarded in FY24. The City expects to receive $1.3 million in the current year and $114k in FY25. 25. What is the breakdown of revenues and expenditures related to the LAZ contract? Are citations differentiated by street sweeping and parking meters or other? a. Answer: Please see below table for LAZ expenditure and increased revenue: Differentiating citation revenues is time-consuming and cannot be completed within a short period of time. Herewith provide the total parking fine revenue for your reference. One thing to mention is that the City’s parking fine revenue is recorded in the General Fund, whereas parking meter revenue is recorded in the Parking Fund. 26. What is the interest rate has been applied to the Parking Fund loan from the General Fund and how does that compare to interest charged for other internal loans? a. Answer: The City Council has not adopted a policy on interfund loans and there has been no interest charged to the Parking Fund for its loan from the General Fund. The policy matter is on staff’s project list for FY25. 27. What percent of each parking citation does the city receive? a. Answer: This cannot be answered as simply as it is being posed. There are costs associated with generating a citation, processing a citation, collecting payment for a citation, and county/state assessments on citations, none of which are as simple as a universal percentage of the citation amount. Additionally, the percentage of a citation actually paid can vary based upon a variety of factors such as appeals. Staff could work on generating some general numbers around this request, but not in time for this meeting. 28. What is the historical revenue from Parking Citations? Any breakdown for street sweeping will be appreciated a. Answer: I’m sure that Finance can provide numbers here, but those numbers will be of little value without significant context that requires a significant amount of work, for which there is no bandwidth. Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 11 of 14 29. The budget shows 31 streetlight pole replacements planned for FY25 (p.118). Can this number be increased? a. Answer: This was a mis-print and it will be corrected in the final Approved budget document. For clarification, replacing the 31 streetlights was a FY24 Goal in last year’s budget. Once corrected this work will be listed this year as a FY24 Accomplishment in the budget, as these streetlights were replaced and completed in September 2023 as part of the CIP. 30. How much was budgeted for the City Hall remodel? a. Answer: $725,000 31. What is the overall plan for Bayshore Circle and wouldn’t it be more efficient to both sides at the same time? a. Answer. Bayshore Circle Westbound (WB) and Eastbound (EB) are on separate street segments, divided by a private parcel approximately 60 feet wide. The two segments were analyzed separately. Due to the adopted selection methodology for SB1 funds, Bayshore Circle WB was ranked slightly higher on the prioritization list than Bayshore Circle EB. In the current Prioritization List, Bayshore Circle EB is ranked number 5. 32. What is the status of the sidewalk repair project? a. Answer: Staff has added an additional repair method to the sidewalk repair program; which includes concrete shaving of trip hazards. This will the ability to eliminate more trip hazards with the current funding. The first phase of the program will be to assess sidewalks to identify repair methodology for concrete shaving vs concrete replacement. The assessment of sidewalks is anticipated this summer and repairs will begin in the fall. Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 12 of 14 Other Budgetary Inquiries 33. Remote Cameras. A number of years ago the city installed some cameras to deter public dumping. What funding options are available to install and monitor the cameras? There are problematic areas that could use camera surveillance, motion- activated lighting and signage. We can utilize the San Bruno Responds App to identify the hot spots. a. Answer: Remote surveillance involves significant legal restrictions and requirements depending on a variety of factors. The cost of cameras is significant, but pales in comparison to the costs of legal process and required monitoring. In addition, capturing a crime on camera does not equate to suspect identification, let alone prosecution. A modern remote surveillance program would fall into what are now referred to as real-time crime centers. This is something that the police department would like to explore, but it lacks the substantial funding and staff requirements to do so. 34. Trees. For the past couple years there has been funding in the tree replacement fund. What can staff do to increase the number of trees replaced? How can community service organizations partner to help install more trees? a. Answer: The tree replacement fund has a balance of $104,000, and the funds can be used for replanting trees that have been cut down or damaged, maintaining existing trees, or other related expenses such as purchasing equipment for tree care or hiring arborists. The fund essentially supports the preservation and management of trees within the CIty. Staff will continue outreach to local community service organizations, environmental groups, youth groups, and schools that are interested in environmental projects and collaborate on tree planting events or neighborhood beautification projects where these organizations can contribute volunteers and expertise. The path will need to be sustainable with staffing levels and resources while at the same time, beautifying our city with the help of the community. 35. Big Belly. The addition of Big Belly garbage cans has been a great addition to our downtown. It is my understanding there is no garbage collection over the weekend which eventually leads to a number of overflowing cans. The addition of more Big Bellys would keep the trash off the street and minimize labor costs. Is there available funding available for the installation of more cans? Does staff have some cost-benefit analysis on the first round of installed cans? a. Answer: CIP #60027, Downtown Trash Receptacles & Newspaper Rack Enclosures, of which the Big Bellys and Dumor receptacles were one component of, is funded through a variety of funding sources including AB939, Equipment Reserve funds, the Transportation Facilities Impact Fee Fund, and CalRecycle funding (through the annual Beverage Container Recycling City/County Payment Program). Material cost for each double station (trash and recycling) Big Belly costs approximately $7,500 (inclusive of taxes and shipping). CIP #60027 is planned for closeout this current fiscal year as both components of the project are now complete. The City can decide to dedicate the annual CalRecycle grant referenced above towards more Big Bellys, however, San Bruno’s annual allocation is approximately $10,000 and therefore only enough to purchase one Big Belly without any additional funding source. Although this has Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 13 of 14 been a consistent funding source for almost 10 years, there is no guarantee that the state will continue to provide this funding opportunity. Considerations for this decision include whether additional Big Belly stations will be effective, placement of additional stations, and a cost/benefit evaluation of the additional operational and maintenance costs accompanying additional location/s. The annual cost of the City’s downtown clean-up program (street sweeping and waste pickup) is approximately $230,000. Additional Big Belly receptacles would result in an incremental increase to the City’s annual downtown clean-up program costs due to the additional time spent on collection in addition to maintenance of the Big Belly units 36. Traffic Calming: Speed humps and Pavement marking. In the past couple of years our community has requested more traffic calming measures like speed humps. Is the current funding appropriate to the increasing requests? Are there additional funding sources for more traffic calming? a. Answer: For FY2024-25, Public Works added $75,000 to CIP #60020, Pedestrian Safety and Traffic-Calming Program – TSPC Studies (Page 188), which will be utilized to continue the evaluation of resident requests and the implementation of traffic changes pending careful consideration. The current funding is appropriate as many requests like speed humps have to follow the process approved by Council. The process ensures that this funding is going to communities that feel strongly there’s an issue and that there is indeed a speeding issue. Funding for this does come from Gas Tax and Measure A, which is also the same funding source used for paving, which was deemed the #2 top priority after safety. Utilizing more funds in this effort will take away funds that can be used to paved streets. If the ability to handle request are to increase, traffic staffing capacity will need to increase as well to managed the workload. Traffic staff is also constrained by workload capacity as they also have to deliver capital projects and provide support for capital projects and development projects. Here are some of the recent traffic calming efforts by staff: i. Speed bumps and Traffic calming; ii. Traffic calming measures last year included: iii. Speed Humps installed on Cherry Ave, Commodore Ave, Cunningham Ave iv. Speed humps installation coming to Glenview Dr v. Speed Humps were to be installed on Cedar Ave but residents reversed their decision vi. Traffic Calming requested and being evaluated on Elm Ave and Hawthorne Ave vii. Crosswalk and Crossing Enhancements installed on College Dr and Susan Dr viii. Various Curb Marking Changes ix. Evaluating Residential Parking Permit Program for Hensley Ave 37. Pavement marking. Parking spaces need to be delineated to optimize the available space. For example there are locations where two or three cars can park on the street Responses to City Council Agenda Packet Questions June 25, 2024 Page 14 of 14 but because of the way the vehicle is parked only one or two cars can park. Additionally AB 413 requires drivers to leave at least 20 feet (or one large car length) between a marked or unmarked crosswalk and their vehicle… are there plans to paint curbs red? Are there budget line items for traffic calming and pavement marking? a. Answer: For FY2024-25, Public Works added $75,000 to CIP #60020, Pedestrian Safety and Traffic-Calming Program – TSPC Studies (Page 188), which will be utilized to continue the evaluation of resident requests and the implementation of traffic changes pending careful consideration. Delineation of parking spaces may not provide more spaces. For example if we had only 36 feet of curb space, we would be only be able to mark 1 space at 20 feet. If it were unmarked, two compact vehicles would be able to fit in the 35 feet. Marking parking spaces also subjects the City to provide ADA (blue curb) spaces on the street. Flexibility for parking may be better and community education among neighbors on parking may be a more efficient and successful approach. There is no plan to paint curbs red as it is not required by law to be enforceable similar to fire hydrants. Painting all intersection approaches red is very costly from an implementation and maintenance standpoint. However, staff may consider them in areas with a history of collisions. 38. Streetlight Pole Replacement. In December 2023 the council accepted a phase of the Streetlight Pole Replacement Project as Complete. 2100 streetlight poles were installed across the city and 680 were identified for replacement. 31 poles were replaced for $476K (which is approximately 4.5% of the poles at a cost of $15,366 per pole. At the current replacement schedule and 649 more poles to replace (total cost $9,972,534 in 2023 dollars) it will take 20 years to replace all of the current poles. How many more poles will need to be replaced by then? Is there funding available to replace more than the current 31 poles? Additionally, some San Bruno streets are very dark. Is there available funding to perform a photometric study? Install solar streetlights in these locations? A solar streetlight was installed a number of years ago on a street segment between 5th and 6th Avenue. The residents that requested have expressed improvement in the area with less dumping and better night visibility. a. Answer: The analysis or replacement of non-regulated output (RO) streetlight poles is not currently a CIP Project. For FY2025-26, the budget does not include any funding for this project.