Meeting Minutes for online OMVNA Steering Committee Meeting
on Monday, April 29, 2024
Attendees:
Voting members in attendance: David Lewis (DL), Deborah Vasquez (DV), Jamil Shaikh (JSH), Jerry (JS), Judith Harrison (JH), Kristin Bailey (KB), Mark F (MF), Maureen Blando (MB), Max Hauser (MH), Robert Cox (RC), Sherril Brennan (SHB), Shivika Nayyar (SN)
Guests in attendance: Kevin Nutt, Rakhee
Summarization of Steering Committee Meeting on Monday, April 29th:
- Time and place of the next Steering Committee meetings, including to July 29 after a voting process. (3:03 – 7:52)
- Mountain View City Updates Presentation was presented by Robert Cox (RC)
- On rezoning plans, specifically focusing on residential building type number three (R3) and the council’s decision regarding increased density in specific areas. (18:59)
- Southern California court striking down the SB9 housing law, which ended single-family zoning in California, and the potential implications for charter cities like Mountain View. (23:12)
- The city council passed their economic vitality strategy, detailing changes in targeting Mountain View as a whole, addressing office and retail vacancies, and improvements in sales receipts post-COVID. (25:21)
- Statistics on fentanyl-related deaths in Santa Clara County was presented by David Lewis (DL), emphasizing the significant increase in fatalities from one month to the next, underscoring the severity of the problem. (43:08)
- Newsletter Updates was presented by Susan Bickford (SB). This included its printing status, interest from contributors, and challenges with limited space for ads and articles, leading to a discussion about potential successors. (1:03:05)
Next steps we discussed:
- A link to the Fentanyl film by the Los Gatos high schooler could be included on the OMVNA website so that neighbors could be educated and share with their friends and neighbors
- Deborah to prepare the minutes with the wording provided by Max for Carola to use in external relations with the bank as an “Assistant Secretary” for bank transactions requiring such a title, ensuring it is recorded accurately. 16:08
– Deborah to share a copy of the prepared minutes with the bank to address the technical requirement raised by the bank regarding Carola’s additional title for bank transactions. 17:33 - Robert to ensure Sherril is included in the parking subcommittee discussions and tasks, as she was inadvertently left out of the agenda. 1:13:12
- Sherril to propose a date for the Shakeout event in October, aligning with earthquake preparedness activities with SB. 1:16:59
Detailed OMVNA meeting minutes by Deborah
Action statements are in bold
*Starred words are main presentation topics
*Next meetings dates discussed by OMVNA:
- DL: Next Steering Committee meeting is 7/29 after newsletter comes out.
- SB: 9/30 for the following Steering Committee meeting
*Neighborhood Grant presented by RC:
- Robert, Carola, Deborah were a few people at the neighborhood grant meeting
- RC: 2 Unusual issues
- 26 groups asked for neighborhood grants this year, meaning smaller money amount will be distributed and total amount to be given still has not yet been finalized
- Nonconforming grants which were not part of neighborhood associations were cut
- DV: They cut frisbees and arts since they don’t include everyone
*“Assistant Secretary” term for Carola presented by MH:
- There is a technical Requirement by the bank so we can put the OMVNA money in an interest CD account
- Carola has to be assigned a formal ad hoc title to use with the bank protocol and it doesn’t affect OMVNA by-laws
- The title for her which will be “Assistant Secretary” is solely for authorizing bank transactions as an authorizing representative of our OMVNA association
- The motion for this name change with the formal title of “Assistant Secretary” for Carola was passed by 8 people in the OMVNA Steering Committee in order to do bank transactions to put the OMVNA money in an interest CD
*Key Developments for City of Mountain View in early 2024 presented by RC:
- R3 Rezoning plans: Residential Type #3 such as condos, multifamily and townhomes will be increased and the city wants to shoot for 20% affordable of these R3 buildings instead of 15%. Potential Projects that will be targeted are ones with close proximity to transit which is Old Mountain View
- Google terminated a new Mountain View office projects linked to housing and will no long partner with housing. MV City spent $900,000 for Rengstorff new park playground, unclear if Google will return the monies.
- SB9 Housing law which was passed by Governor Newsome was struck down – it was supposed to end single family zoning in California
- Kin said “SB9 not related to help affordable housing”
- Bonta will appeal
- This only affects charter cities, such as Mountain View
- In MV, our local ordinances currently match SB9 so not sure if the rules will have to be rewritten…
- Economic vitality for MV – currentstrategy is to focus on the whole city instead of just downtown. Their new statement does not emphasize “growth” as much, it is balanced with other things unlike in the past.
- Office vacancies – Downtown 25%, City 20%, Target office vacancies = 10%
- Retail is better – Downtown 8.5%, Target retail vacancies = 5-7%
*Fentanyl Report presented by DL:
- Fentanyl overdose are not isolated incidents, high school students are dying
- Background is that the family that manufactured the drug Oxycontin caused overdoses and therefore the drug was banned, therefore people produce counterfeit Oxycontin using Fentanyl to replace
- 2 mg of Fentanyl is a lethal dose, akin to a few grains of kosher salt
- Recent film made by Los Gatos high school student made about how friends and people took Fentanyl to cope
- Fentanyl is used by people everywhere – high school, college, and older adults with a variety of other drugs such as opiates, amphetamines, cocaine and combining them
- Narcan and Naloxone are effective ways to countereffect fentanyl
- One way to help is to educate people, watch the movie by the Los Gatos student, show at homes – show it at schools
RC: Put a link on the OMVNA webpage for the Los Gatos high schooler’s movie on Fentanyl so people can look at it
MB: School system educated us in Florida
SB: In 2022 14 deaths from Fentanyl in Santa Clara County, in 2023 1 month later, 41 deaths
*Proposal – Role Playing City Game for Children presented by DV
DV: What are your thoughts to try to plan a city, with different children from OMVNA? This is a project for students to have a bird’s eye perspective of how to run a city. Like a mini OMVNA. Input from group for support?
SB: Need a solid proposal and written up project to follow through.
MH: This is not the place to brainstorm. Discuss with us offline and reach out to community via OMVNA talk.
*Updates from DV:
DV:
- Sustainability committee vacancies and Director needed at the Performing Arts Center – all voluntary positions
*Requirements for Secretary DV’s minutes to provide Carola for the bank:
SB and MH: DV has to make the meeting minutes and sign in blue ink at bottom.
*Eventors: Egg Crawl and Events presented by KB:
- Egg Crawl 7 routes, 300 kids, 77 hiders
- Scavenger Hunt – 150 people, sold t shirts and gave out prizes
- Mixer upcoming at Cliffords this month
- Wheel Party in late May
- Ice Cream social 8/24
- We researching a back up plan for delivery and considering a potluck event for deliverers as a way to thank them
*Downtown Report presented by JSH
74 events in city, 54 in downtown
- Music on Castro are Wed 5-645pm
- June is music on Plaza
- Games downtown are widely played, come by 830-9pm even!
- City annual update, no one from community came, but we have our 2nd digest out, on May 7th is our next downtown meeting
*Newsletter Updates presented by SB:
- Newsletters is at the printer, online version up
- Trend seems to be in parents helping children – ie: Eagle Scout candidate with pawprints project has his dad write about him
- Ads are filled – thanks to Shivika
- Sept issue of OMVNA Lamppost will have 4 pages with local candidates info which includes info on school board, city councils and therefore that issue will bring in cash
- No more room for ads in newsletter, limited layout set up
KB: Lorri and I have routes, names and info and will gave to SB for back up system
SB: Please think about who will take over our positions in the future. I am thinking about moving on…Fall issue will be early for this year due to candidates info.
JSH: Just use AI to do newspaper layout…
SB: We can use AI for language translation to Spanish for our Spanish population
JSH: I will send a small pic to SB for next issue – people playing downtown
MH: People dying is not hypothetical
SB: If I moved on, I would not like to put you all in position of repaying advertisers
DL to SB: You cannot die until you have trained and appointed a successor!
*Parking News and Subcommittee presented by RC and JSH:
RC: 2 volunteers joined our parking subcommittee – Stephanie Wen, Valerie Harris and we will be getting together in May to have coffee
JSH: More parking subcommittee members is a good thing, parking in downtown on weekdays are up – we have guests in our downtown even on weekdays
*CERT News presented by SHB:
Grants for CERTS went down from $1,250 last year to $718 this year.
- We purchased bleed kits, 4 Stop the Bleed with tourniquets for the Cert Team and radios batteries
- 150 year fire department celebration on 5/19, Certs Representatives will be marching
- October Shakeout and will propose dates for CERT Shakeout for Eventors (to KB)
- We put an airtag on our generator and reinforced the trailer door
Secretary: Deborah Vasquez
