Good morning and welcome to the finance and management meeting of today, October 28th.
The time is now 9.34 a.m. and this meeting has come to order.
Can everyone hear me? Thank you.
Before taking roll, I will provide instructions on how to submit a speaker's card for items on this agenda.
If you are here with us in chambers or here in Room 1 and would like to submit a speaker's card,
please fill one out and turn it to myself before the item is read into record.
online speaker requests were due 24 hours prior to this meeting. The meeting came to
order at 934 am. Speaker cards were no longer be accepted 10 minutes after the meeting has
began, making that time 944 am. With that we will now proceed to take roll. Council member
Brown.
Present.
Council member Unger.
Here.
Council member Wong.
Present.
Chair Ramachandran.
Present.
Thank you, we have four members present and before we begin councilmember Rama Chandra
and do you have any announcements for today?
Yes, thank you everyone for bearing with this room change things a little differently also
we're in a really difficult time financially now if folks might have read the news we're
facing millions of dollars of liability in a pretty big lawsuit over you know hundreds
of millions of dollars worth so this is really a time that we have to come together and think
about cost savings and how we're going to come together as a city and continue to make
tough choices as we've been in the past.
And with that I'm excited today to have on the agenda some interesting revenue generating
items as we figure out how to push forward as a city so thank you, happy to go on.
Thank you, Chair. Moving to our first item of the day, which is item number, item one,
the approval of the draft minutes from the committee meetings of July 8th and September
30th.
Move approval.
Second.
We have a, we have a motion made by Councilmember Brown, seconded by Councilmember Wong to accept
the draft minutes from the committee meetings of July 8th, September 30th, as is on roll.
Councilmember Brown.
Councilmember Unger? Aye. Councilmember Wong? Aye. And Chair Ramachandran? Aye. The motion passes
with four ayes to accept the draft minutes from the committee meetings on
July 8th and September 30, 2025 as is moving to item 2. Determination of
scheduled outstanding committee items. This is also known as your pending list.
To the administration, are there any changes? At this time there are no
changes okay I will entertain a motion I'll move approval second we have a
motion made by councilmember Unger seconded by councilmember Brown to
accept determination to schedule outstanding committee items also known
as your pending list as is on roll councilmember Brown aye councilmember
Unger aye councilmember Wong aye and chairwoman chondrin aye this motion
passes with four ayes to accept determination to schedule outstanding
committee items as it is moving to your first item of the day which is item 3.
First action item excuse me. Receive an information report for a list of options
to raise an additional ongoing 40 million to general purpose fund revenues
via an ordinance to adopt or increase a tax effective July 1st, 2026 to provide
ongoing resources for public safety and to maintain key equipment IT systems and
9-1-1 investments and you do have three speakers for this item. Okay to the
administer. Thank you Chairman Rylund-Chanden, Brad Johnson Budget
Administrator. Before your responses to your questions that were raised at the
prior committee meeting regarding options to raise the 40 million dollars
that is budgeted for our second year of our biennial budget, we did our best to
Respond to all the questions that this body had had in its open conversation
Plus some other questions that we had received via email and other at other times as you note
I would probably want to highlight for the benefit of the public and the members here the net effect of the proposed new parcel tax
when combined with the
projected change to our P first levy which are on page two and three of the report I
I would note that those are probably the items most important for you to make sure you review and understand,
but I'm happy to respond to any questions, further questions you may have on the other responses that are provided here.
And to have any further discussion as to how you'd like to proceed in terms of development of this ballot measure, potentially.
To the administration, can you talk a little bit about the paper's changes?
Absolutely. So the city currently levies a property tax override which funds its closed
retirement benefit system which will have a conversation on it another time later. That
property tax override will fade down over the course of the next several years as we
reach the PIFR's full funding date at the end of 2026 fiscal year, which is the current
fiscal year. As that PIFR's tax override fades away, residents of Oakland will see
savings on their tax bills. The PIFR's tax is an ad valorem tax and so it's a
little bit different than a parcel tax. It's more akin to our bonds that are
levied on property tax bill. The analysis before you shows you the effect
of the average homeowner of a parcel tax if structured like our current measure
Q and measure in in parcel taxes when combined with that reduction in the
PFS levy. As I mentioned earlier, the PFS tax is an ad valorem tax, so it's per
dollar value of assessed value of the house versus a parcel tax which is flat.
And so there is a little bit of difference in who is charged what under
the two tax resumes. Notably, people that have held their properties for a long
time may under California's Proposition 13 have very low assessed valuations on
their house. So if you've held a three-bedroom house in the city of
Oakland since Prop 13 was passed in the late 80s you probably have a very very
low AV on your tax and you actually probably pay a very very low property
tax. That same house were to sell today it may sell for an AV that would be
recessed to that could be up to ten times that value resulting in ten times
the amount of tax on an ad valorem basis for that same house. The way that the
switch over from a partial tax to to a partial tax from the ad valorem tax would
work is some of those lower valued properties would have increases in
comparison but for all of the various mechanisms you would likely see
decreases for the vast majority of homes in the city of Oakland. And so if you
If you were to look at the tables for a $40 million levy,
we will likely see between 61 and 63% of homes receiving a reduction.
And we expect that to be further discounted when we take into a pact that our
partial taxes have certain low income senior and very low income provisions in them that will also not apply to certain low income persons.
So, the specifics again are there for the 40 million dollar, 50 and 60 million dollar
numbers just for your information and consideration.
And again I will note those homes that will be potentially be paying more that would hit
on the other side are likely properties that pay a lot less into this sort of municipal
system of city, school district, and county funding as it is right now.
Councilmember O'Connor.
So it's not just that some of the PIFRS tax will be rolling off, it's that some has already
rolled off, right?
So is that 40%, 50% number, does that just take in what is going to roll off in the next
year or does it also take into account what rolled off last year?
This is taking into account only what will be rolling off.
If we were to take into account what has already rolled off, you could effectively, these numbers
would double because we've brought down almost by half the levy already.
So we've all Oakland residents have already seen savings due to their papers taxes.
And when did the last roll-off happen?
We did it not this fiscal year, but the prior fiscal year.
So fiscal 2425, for the property tax bills that would have been paid in December 2024
and March 2025.
And you know, I think just for myself to help conceptualize it, I had asked for what the
amount was on a million dollar home just so people could then easily do the math on their
own do you have any not not here I can certainly cool give me a moment I will
give you a number on that we can move on while you're doing well it's not it's
not super complicated as it's 0.75% on a million dollar home I can do that math
relatively quickly but I'm happy to take other questions as I run through this
calculation I just think that would be a good number for us to sort of get out
there in the world so people can sort of do the easy back of the envelope math
for their own assessed value.
Happy to take other questions in the meantime as I'm running through this
calculation, sorry.
Paulies, I can't see all the council members at a given time, so if you just raise your hand.
Thank you. I do not like this room and I hope we go back to chambers.
About one and a half thousand dollars would be the average roll-off is what we
be saying health number so one and a half so $1,500 was the previous roll-off
yeah or the coming roll that's the roll off that that's the total roll off so we
for both for both so we had about a point one five percent total rate that
we were levying that rate will come down to near zero for a million dollar home
that's about a thousand five hundred dollars that you'll see roll off over
the course of the sunset of the PIFRS tax override okay so that that's it so
$1,500 over the course of two years ago to one year from now. Yep. Okay. Thank you
First of all, thank you so much Bradley for this very comprehensive report
You explored a lot of the tax scenarios that we had put forward one question on the progressive parcel tax
So the example that you provided was based off of use
instead of
For example property size, how challenging or would it be to do an analysis based off
of size or actually forget the analysis just to actually implement a progressive parcel
tax based off of property size?
So we would have to be, so there's a little bit of a legal question on that just to make
sure we're not coming close to approximating an ad valorem tax.
that's often a thing that we could run into legal trouble
with so we'd want to talk to OCA about that
to make sure there's no case law
that says that moving in that particular direction
isn't skating too close to the line as it were.
We could levy based on the size.
Are you interested in the parcel square footage
or are you interested in the size
of the built area of the parcel?
They're actually different questions.
So-
Can you explain the difference?
Sure. If we were to walk across the street, the center across the way has lots of buildings
that are in excess of 12 stories. The gross square footage of the total buildings on that
property is a lot higher than the floor print of the area underneath it, and so depending
on how you levied it, you might get disparate impacts. So one could imagine, because you
can't do it based on the value a if you only did it on the parcels square
footage you might be taxing a built-up you know holding a hundred people
parcel in downtown the same as you would hold for you know two or three small
units in East Oakland which happened to sit on a larger set of land but not
not but don't have as much square footage and we would want to analyze that
to make sure that we don't have inadvertently a negative progressive
effect on the income, because often what you may find is the parcels that are
larger in terms of their squid footage may be at a lower value and owned by
owners that are paying a lower value for them. We know we've gotten tissues with
our vacancy tax of some of the square footage being unbilledable, so that's
also sort of a question we would need to assess if we're looking to base
based on the land area, in addition to the legal question around that.
Okay, is there a difference in challenge of implementation?
Correct.
We would need to work with our current engineer assessor to make sure that we are properly
doing that.
I don't think partial area would be dramatically different.
It would require us to individually assess and bill every single property within the
city that should be available in the county's record, so it's not that it's undoable.
it might require both versions are the data is already available the square
footage of the buildable area may be harder to get come by that would be a
little bit more challenging potentially for us to do it changes require more
assessment and I can't say that implementation wouldn't require staff
resources okay to assess that and my other question is whether because for
example in the use the the use-based progressive structure that you provided
or the other one that you provided,
which is like the high density housing.
Is there anything that restricts people
from passing on that tax to like renters?
Not really, right?
And so it may actually flow down to renters inadvertently.
That's my concern.
I would imagine if the property
is under a city rent control ordinance
that that would be, I believe that's prohibited,
but I would want to look at some returning colleagues
and I'm not sure if we have that answer here.
I think it may be prevented for those that are covered
under the city's rent enforcement ordinance,
but if you are, if the landlord is capable
of raising your rent sort of at their own discretion,
then obviously they could pass it on to you
via one means or another if you aren't protected
by city rent control in one way or another.
So I would need to get back to you as to whether or not
the city's rent control ordinances provide protection.
think they may in terms of how they're formulated but for everyone else on
other properties it probably would not okay I will get back to you on which
version of the progressive parcel tax structure we'd like analysis on thank
you excellent yes I just also wanted to thank Bradley and the finance team for
so comprehensively answering so many of our questions and so I definitely
understand kind of the note around the real estate transfer tax and then I
guess maybe my question is about the UCT on the utility tax and you know just
some of the changes that we've made around really aligning ourselves with
some of the environmental efforts and we are seeing that more buildings that are
being built especially apartment units being built here in the city of Oakland
are moving towards electrification.
And so I know in the analysis, it basically
shares that it's not going to generate as much the 40 million.
Because we know the goal is the 40 million deficit.
But I guess I am curious, in the future,
or what would it look like if in the future
we were to kind of make this adjustment?
Is that something, I guess, what is
the precedent of actually having both of these items on the ballot to really show just folks
that we are really trying to support overall electrification.
Through the chair to Council Member Brown.
So I would say that the concern you would have about putting them both on a June ballot
would be a political one about the saliency of passage of both of them.
I would note that your utility users tax or utility consumption tax, similar names for
the same tax, is a general tax.
And should the council decide to put a general tax on the November election ballot coming
up in November of 2026, it would be a 50% margin tax provided it stayed as a general
tax.
So similarly to when Measure T, our more progressive business tax rate structure, was changed and
modernized a modernization of our UCT could be done at the same time but it
in order to do that it needs to be kept as a general tax which means it's not
earmarked and it needs to be held at a general election of the local entity for
which process November of 2026 okay thank you and I guess I'm just really
bringing it up because we see that a handful of other local cities have have
made that that change so even if it's not in the immediate future I think it
it would be something that we should have on our radar.
Understood, appreciate it.
Okay, colleagues, if there's no other comments now,
we'll move to public comment.
When I call your name, please approach the podium.
State your name for the record,
and you do have two minutes.
Procedure, we will start with in-person speakers,
and then we will go to Zoom.
Starting with Mrs. Asada, Kevin Daley, Dolly, excuse me,
and Derek Barnes.
You may approach the podium to your right, my left.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Sorry, Kevin Dally.
I'm the co-chair of the Policy and Legislative Committee
of the bicyclist and pedestrian advisory commission.
And I talked about parking policy in the past,
but I want to bring back something.
Last night, we had a discussion of parking policy
and how it affects traffic safety.
And there is one thing that I want to make clear.
First of all, parking policy needs to emphasize safety.
pedestrian, cyclist, etcetera and proper ticketing will reduce double parking,
parking the bike lanes, parking in the daylighting zones, etcetera. So if the parking department
is better funded, I think for a while it will make more money. Of course, there's a risk. Everyone
will suddenly start following the law and then we will make less money off of ticketing. I think
I think that's a net gain, though, overall.
But make sure we always look at how it affects safety,
of traffic safety when you look at the parking policy.
Still raise rates when appropriate, thank you.
Shame on you for what you did, Elmore Farmer,
and I'm gonna repeatedly talk about it.
Now you're going through all of this dialogue,
and I know and you know,
you're gonna put a partial tax on the ballot.
So why don't you just stop all of this
and say that's what we're gonna do.
But when you do that, nobody is asking the question,
what kind of impact is this gonna have on homeowners?
It's gonna have a big impact.
One example is, property values declined
as of September 2025 in a report that was done
on home values, particularly related to
zone 94612 zip code where the property went down 30% from early 2020.
Homeowners in Oakland face significant financial burdens due to high cost of living property
related to fees that is imposed on them, steep maintenance of their property, local
regulations that are costing them more money.
Oakland's medium effective property tax rates five times higher than the national rate.
Unlike many other cities, Oakland holds homeowners responsible for maintaining the public sidewalks
and sewers that are lateral to their property.
I got a whole list of stuff that you guys are imposing on homeowners.
I'm not a homeowner, so it's not bothering me.
Local crime rates, maintenance of property is causing property value to decrease.
The whole statewide homeowners insurance average, $737 per year, the average rate for Oakland
Homeowners that have to pay home, home insurance is $1,600 annually as of early 2025.
And I got some more stuff. Y'all not talking about the burden you're putting on homeowners and you're going to them again.
We're now moving to our zoom speakers. If you signed up, please raise your hand.
So you're easily identified. And we have Derek Barnes and that concludes your public speakers for item three.
Okay, colleagues, any other comments?
If not, I'll entertain.
So moved to, does this need to go to the full council?
Or we'll just receive it here, receive it here.
Second.
Thank you, we have a motion made by Councilmember Unger,
seconded by Councilmember Brown
to receive and file this into
Finance and Management Committee on roll.
Councilmember Brown?
Aye.
Councilmember Unger?
Aye.
Councilmember Wong?
Aye.
And Chair Ramachandran?
Aye.
with four I's to receive and file this in the Finance and Management Committee.
Moving to item 4, receive an informational report from the City
Administrator in response to the City Auditor's recommendations in this
substantiated whistleblower investigation regarding City of Oakland
uses unauthorized formulas for calculating over time that defer from
LFLSA guidelines and you do have two speakers for this item. Okay from the
administration I believe this is a oral report. Yes ma'am thank you through the
chair and members of the council. In response to the city auditor's
investigative report dated February 20, 2025 concerning the city's formulas for
calculating overtime pay for employees in the Department of Transportation and
Public Works, there were several key questions that have been answered and
we'd like to provide a brief update. The auditor bases findings on what is
required under the Fair Labor and Standards Act, or FELSA, it's commonly
known by, which is considered to be the floor of the baseline for calculating
overtime compensation. It is not uncommon that organizations are able to calculate
overtime that is more generous than what the FELSA requires as a baseline.
Based on our records, the city has applied a more generous overtime
calculation for at least 17 years, and although we have not been able to
locate documentation of this practice based on the length of time we have
effectively established a binding past practice we would need to collectively
bargain a different calculation method should that be the pleasure of the
council and the council's direction we certainly appreciate the auditor's
diligence in investigating this matter but we do not believe we have deviated
from the method of calculation for almost two decades and requests after
hearing this item, that this item be received and filed.
Thank you, so myself and Constanbor Unger brought this item to get some clarity basically
on the auditor's report that we were paying unauthorized amounts of overtime that was
not per any written formula.
I understand that you're saying this is a floor, but so that this can be authorized
and in writing do you have plans to change the official overtime calculation to reflect
what these staff members have been getting paid?
Through the chair, so I think that's something,
if that's the direction and pleasure of the council,
we also have our representatives
from the Department of Human Resources here
to assist me with answering questions also.
I'm sorry, I wanna give Director Howe
an opportunity on the front end to answer that question.
We'll start going to jump in and go deeper.
Thank you.
Good morning, members of the Finance and Management Committee.
Mary Howe, Director of Human Resources.
Chair Ramachandran, I'm sorry,
was your question about memorializing the current practice
or changing the practice?
Memorializing the current practice,
which is above the FLSA guidelines, but still allowable.
Certainly we can look into methods of doing that.
One way would be to, I guess,
include it into the collective bargaining agreements,
or the other way would be to have some sort of
a established process memo
where we would memorialize this practice.
And so we would discuss that with our partners
in the finance department to determine the best method
to pursue.
Thank you, and through the parliamentarian,
is that something that councilists can provide direction on
or is an administrative process
that doesn't require our direction?
Malia McPherson from the city attorney's office.
If the question is about the item in front of you today,
it's just an informational report.
If there's an interest in scheduling a future council action,
It could be a scheduling item.
And I think what the city administration is saying
is that there's already plans to work with the council
on future council action, if necessary.
But it could be a scheduling item
if you want more direction.
Thank you.
If we simply wanted an update,
could we continue this item in committee
for a few months down the road to hear any update
on what changes have been memorialized?
that is one of the options if you'd like more information defer to the City
Administration on how to handle this item so if it wants to be a scheduling
for a new item for three months or a continuing item versus just continue
this item indefinitely. Through the chair to Councilmember Schondron and members of the
committee so we can certainly offer up in writing what the path forward
actually would be after we consult with our partners in finance and HR to
identify what the path forward,
recommended path forward would be,
happy to put that in a memo to the entire council
so that we can preserve the time at committees
for other business, given that we've talked through this.
But also want to offer just time with Audrey Houston
so that his office does know how we're moving forward
as well because we want to make sure
that we do this in partnership across the board.
Thank you, I'm open, of course,
to the feedback of colleagues,
but my preference would be to hold this item in committee.
And I appreciate the offer to send a memo,
Having because this was something that was very very made very public by the city auditor to keep it in the public eye
And I know understands this might take some time, so I'm happy to have it scheduled
Down the road so like perhaps the last meeting in December or something by the committee meeting by December if that's enough time
through the chair if
If it's the pleasure of this body if we can certainly revisit that closer to the end of January
To give us enough time given the fact that we have a number of pressing items in front of us that we're working through and
With the auditor's office. I think that would be more than a reasonable amount of time that I would respectfully request that additional money
Thank you. I have two more quick questions
So, um, I'm happy to have this the end of January so we can receive some kind of substantive update
My second question is other departments quite possible that this extends to departments outside of public works
works and what was studied by this very narrowly scoped auditor's report, what is the plan
to look at other departments or if a formula has changed, would it be citywide for all
departments receiving this kind of FLSA overtime?
Through this year, we certainly want to really identify a broad scope to make sure it does
it is just not limited to through the Department of Public Works and Transportation and to
your question, yes, there would be consideration across the spectrum to make sure that we're
equitably applying whatever policy that we have, but also want to defer to
Director Howe to give some additional context and insight. Certainly, thank you.
So Chair Ramachandra, the formula is not just exclusive to departments, it's
likely based on bargaining units, and so if, so I would venture to say, and we
can certainly have our colleagues and payroll, central payroll take a closer
look, but it would apply citywide. Thank you. And final question is the auditor
available? I'd love his feedback on through the chair or someone from his
office, Tyman. This came from through the chair he did let our office know that he
wasn't available today but happy to coordinate time with his office so that
we can all kind of get on the same page and discuss. Thank you. So just to put a
bow on this my understanding is that there are different ways to calculate
We are calculating one that is somewhat more generous than the minimum FLSA wage, which is there's nothing illegal or inappropriate about that.
It's just something that we have been doing. We've been doing it for close to 20 years.
And any changes to that because of that past practice should be undertaken through the negotiation process, which is, you know, eight months away from a new contract.
Is that correct?
a new contract is that correct through the chair that is correct thank you okay
thank you so much for the update my question is and correct me if I'm wrong
and maybe I missed it I guess I'm just curious has there been a report that has
uplifted based on different bargaining units what is the calculation for the
the various departments for overtime?
Has that been generated?
It's the members and FMT committee.
I'm Angie Saxena, I'm the payroll administrator.
So there is a calculation that we can email
and share with you that's been long standing
for about 17 years.
For non-sworn, there's a seven day calculation,
two seven day calculations.
And for sworn, we have a look back period
police goes back 28 days so not the pay period we put back 28 days to calculate
their FLSA and then for sworn fire we have a 27 day look back for them and
then also special over 204 hours pension ability but that formula has been sit in
there in Oracle to calculate based on what people enter on their time sheet
I see. Okay, thank you. Okay, I know we have to hear public comments, the comments from
council members will move to public comment. Thank you, Chair Aromachandran. Moving to our
public comments. Want to call your name please approach the podium. If you're
participating via Zoom, please raise your hand so you're easily identified. We
will take in-person speakers before Zoom speakers, Mrs. Asada and Kevin Dally. I
I suspect you don't know how to get that money back.
$1.7 million went to 526 employees.
You're supposed to be in a process
of informing those employees they were overpaid
and directing them with a Pacific amount of money
that they have to return to the city.
You haven't spoken about that.
You also have that you in May hired a consultant company
to advise you on the issue and how to fix it.
They should be in the room. You're calling for the auditor to be here.
Why didn't you call for the vendor to be here to say since May,
what progress have you made in fixing the system? Do your job.
Then you have the IFPTE local 21 has found in May of 2025 that the city had not
civilian lies, 38 sworn office positions, and departments like Internal Affairs, IT,
a move that would reduce overtime costs of $13 million.
Now, I read that.
Why haven't you brought that up today?
Because you're too busy going after people like Omar Farmer degrading them and causing
them to have a picture of they don't know how to do their work do your work
we could have saved 13 million dollars if you would have followed what was in
the report today if I called your name you're still wishing to speak Kevin
Dali thank you that concludes your public speakers for item four thank you
then I will make a motion to hold us in committee until January to the January
twenty-seven so I think one of my colleagues has suggested that we do an
analysis across the departments can we also begin with the departments have
that have the highest number of overtime because that would be the most benefits
for the city thank you it's a question yeah do the chair that can do the chair
to Councilmember Wong, yes, we can certainly consider that.
But obviously, with the experts in the room,
we need to figure out how do we scope that project out.
Okay.
Okay, so I'll restate my motion to hold this in committee
until the January 27th Finance and Management Committee
meeting to be able to get an update written or oral on,
I take that back, a written update on the status
implementing any written changes to the overtime pause. Thank you we have a
motion made by Chair Romachandran seconded by Councilmember Brown to
continue this item to the January 27, 2026 Finance and Management Committee
unroll. Councilmember Brown? Aye. Councilmember Unger? Aye. Councilmember Wong? Aye.
And Chair Romachandran this motion passes with four ayes to continue this item to
January 27, 2026, Finance and Management Committee. Moving to item five, adopt a resolution approving
the side letter to amend to clarify article 2871 of the November 1st, 2020 June 30th,
2026 memorandum of understanding between the City of Oakley and the International Association
of Firefighters Local 55 to be effective November 1st, 2020. You do have two speakers for this item.
Good morning Finance and Management Committee Chair Ramachandra. My name is Crystal Rainey-Adams. I
am a Principal Employee Relations Analyst in the Department of Human Resources. I am here today
to present to the the Fire Staff Premium Pay Side Letter signed by both the International
Association of Firefighters, IAFF, Local 55, and the City. I'd like to start off by thanking
IAFF President Seth Oyer for working with Central Payroll, our office, and with CalPERS to reach this agreement.
This side letter agreement amends Article 2.8.7.1 of the IAFF MOU, renamed as Fire Staff Premium,
to clarify the purpose and criteria for eligibility of the premium, and ensures the premium complies with the public employee's retirement law.
requirements for reportable compensation.
There will not be any additional costs as a result of this side letter, and this premium
will only apply to those employees who are performing administrative duties versus suppression
duties.
The side letter will be effective as of November 1, 2020 to ensure that represented employees
who have already received this premium based on existing contract language will have the
compensation considered as reportable compensation to CalPERS. The revisions to
the MOU reflected in this side letter are for compliance with the public
employees retirement law and do not increase the universe of employees who
are eligible for this assignment as that will be based on the operational needs
of the fire department. We recommend that you adopt the resolution that
approves the fire staff premium pay side letter between the city and the
International Association of Firefighters Local 55. I'm happy to take
any questions. Thank you. Thank you, colleague. Okay, public comment. Moving to
our public speakers. When they call your name, please approach the podium, state
your name for the wrecking of two minutes. Miss Asada and Kevin Dolly. So
this says that you didn't do something right. So you got to correct it. So how
How did it happen that the language in the MOU originally created did not comply with
the public employees retirement law requirements for reportable compare, uh, I'm not gonna
go into what it was about, but that's the bottom line.
Something wasn't done right, and now you got to redo it because it wasn't done right.
Oh, I want to remind you, nobody's gonna lose their job because a lot of this happens.
We got to go back and fix things because it wasn't done right and we just skirt over
it.
It's no problem.
But with an Omar farmer who didn't do absolutely nothing wrong, all of you sat there and said
it wasn't appropriate for him to be reassigned to the police commission.
So now you got to screw up with a document not being done correctly and you got to fix
it and you're going to act like, Oh, this is not important.
Yes, it is important, particularly if you're going to hold black men like Omar farmer accountable
for something he did not do.
So every screw up, I'm gonna emphasize it.
You're gonna act like it's no big deal.
It is a big deal.
Your city attorney's office is supposed to review
every document that goes, that is brought to this city
for us to have some kind of input about.
That didn't happen.
The city administrator, you have a responsibility
to review every document to make sure it's done correctly.
That didn't happen.
And you approve this council and you didn't see it.
You got a nerve to hold Omar formal responsible
and all day long I'll be recognizing stuff.
I read every document.
Do you read them?
I conclude your public speakers for item five.
I just want to flag that this change was a result
of CalPERS changing their reporting requirements
and that every public safety agency in the state
is having to make a similar change at their council
order to comport with the new CalPERS language and just to confirm that it
says in this report that there's no fiscal impact can somebody clarify why
that is? The chair becomes for Wong we already provide a staff premium we are
not updating that we are providing a staff premium or changing work we are
They're updating the terms and conditions that allow us to comply with the new CalPERS
standards.
So this is an existing practice.
Okay.
Understood.
Thank you.
Councilmember Brown?
Move approval of this item.
Second.
To the clerk and parliament.
Does this need to be forwarded to council for the full council meeting on consent?
Yes.
We have a motion made by councilmember Brown seconded by councilmember.
And I just want to double check it and what time is the meeting is that the nine this is for the regular scheduled 9am on Tuesday.
It's a special meeting is it 9am 9am on November 4th. Yes.
Thank you. We have a motion made by councilmember Brown seconded by councilmember Wong to approve the recommendations of staff and for this item to the November the 4th.
Special City Council meeting for 930 on consent.
On roll, Council Member Brown.
Aye.
Council Member Unger.
Aye.
Council Member Wong.
Aye.
And Chairwoman Machandran.
Aye.
This motion passes with four ayes
to approve the recommendations of staff
and to forward this item to the November 4th
City Council Agenda at 9 a.m.
Thank you.
Moving to item six.
Receive an informational report
regarding the annual equal access
to services ordinance compliance report
for fiscal year 24 through 25.
And you do have one speaker for this item.
Good morning Chair and members of the committee.
My name is Andrea Mariano.
I'm the HR manager over organizational development
and equal access.
And today we're gonna present
the annual language access report.
I'd like to start off by acknowledging
the vital work of the equal access program,
the first of its kind in the country,
serving almost half of the Oakland community
who have limited English proficiency.
This program, based on language equity,
is important and vital to one of the most linguistically
diverse communities in the country.
Today, to introduce the report and give you a summary
is Mei Tam, who runs the Equal Access Program.
Thank you.
Good morning.
Good morning, Chairperson and members of the committee.
My name is Mei Tam.
I am a program analyst for the Equal Access Program,
and today I'm going to present to you
our annual compliance plan.
So this is an information report
and it serves as a city administrator's annual compliance
plan on the implementation of equal access ordinance
for the period of July 1st, 2024 to June 30th, 2025.
There's two sections of the report.
First, there's the agenda report
which provides aggregate citywide data
and then there's also attachment A.
So attachment A includes all the translation
and interpretation record for the reporting period,
Census data are limited English speaking population
and also department compliance plan
for each of the city department.
On page two, provide a very nice little snapshot
on citywide compliance data.
City of Oakland is culturally and linguistically diverse.
Census data shows that 42% of Oakland residents
speaks a non-English language at home.
The most common non-English language
is Spanish followed by Chinese.
About 2,500 city employees work at an office
or city facility that regularly interacts with the public.
These positions we are referred to
as public contact positions.
And 24% of our public facing employees
are bilingual in either Spanish or Chinese.
During the reporting year 412,
translated documents were produced
and 308 hours of live professional interpretations
were provided.
A citywide language access survey was launched
in the fall of 2024.
Data is presented on page eight and page nine of the report.
Surveys were disseminated in city public contact locations
throughout the city's facilities.
A total of 795 responses were collected.
More than 45 languages were identified on this survey.
The most common spoken languages identified in the survey
are English, Cantonese, Spanish, Mandarin,
Vietnamese, French, and Korean.
By implementing a language access policy here in Oakland,
Everyone living, visiting, and doing business in Oakland
is provided with fair and equitable opportunity
to access city programs and services.
It helps advance citywide policies, priorities,
and promo-meaningful civic engagement.
The Annual Compliance Report presented today
serves as an information report
to capture citywide language access services,
and staff recommends the committee accepts this report.
I'm available to answer questions,
and staff from city departments are also available
in the audience to respond to questions.
Thank you.
Thank you for your report.
I appreciate the many efforts over the years.
Some of this is, of course, mandated by law and settlements
and others is to show that Oakland cares about access
to a very diverse population of different language speakers.
So these efforts are noted and appreciated.
Colleagues, comments, questions?
Councillor Wong.
Hi, thank you so much for this important report.
How do we hold departments,
what are the accountability mechanisms?
I will say later today, in public safety,
we are receiving an informational report from the auditor
that notes fairly concerning inequities
when it relates to 911 response time
when someone doesn't speak English
and how that adds significant really
when that is minutes saves lives and it makes a difference
and how we can move this forward
and hold departments accountable to this.
So we do have this annual process.
I would say this annual process is very valuable every year.
We meet with each of the city department.
We have a language access coordinator assigned
to each of the departments and we have meetings
and we have compliance plan, we have compliance report
and there are different check boxes in the compliance report.
So if you go to Attachment A in the Department Compliance
Report, they each have to check out the different checkboxes,
make sure trainings are provided,
resources are provided to staff, make sure phone lines are
providing multilingual messages, make sure vital documents are
translated into different languages,
and it's included on this report.
So this is a valuable process.
We do it every year.
It feels very fast.
Nine months down the road, we start the process all over
again.
So it feels very frequent and we do have
ongoing communication with the departments.
And I understand there's a report from the auditor's office
encouraging more translators and more bilingual staff.
And that's definitely something that we have
in communication with the police department
in terms of the dispatch center.
And there are currently selective certification
for police communication dispatch going on
and we're encouraging the department
to hire someone who's bilingual.
And furthermore, you've done a department by department analysis.
Is there, are there, what departments would you name?
It's been critical that we actually increase language capacity because it does a disservice in terms of our city services.
Now the city, the city ordinance and AI administrative instructions provide a formula for calculation and space on limited English speaking population data.
So the goal for Spanish speaking bilingual employee
is 10%, and the goal for bilingual Chinese
and English bilingual employees is 4%.
So if you look at the table,
if any area that shows 0%,
that would be an area of concern.
It also depends on the number of public contact positions.
Some departments are huge,
like public works department is very huge,
but not everybody talk to the members
of the public directly.
So we focus on public contact positions,
people that are really working with the public
and apply that percentage.
So in some areas, you see the, for instance,
the mayor's office, when this report was produced,
have zero Chinese bilingual employees available
in the office, that could be one of the concern.
But at the same time, departments oftentimes have interns
and volunteers who work in the office
that could also provide the language capacity.
I think one that I find noteworthy is fire because they provide medical services and care so do you, can you make comment on how that impacts, especially the medical services when we don't have bilingual, the bilingual capacity, as you've recommended.
Yes, so we also have members represented by the fire department today I don't know if you want to hear from the fire department directly.
Throughout the year, all the requisitions for recruitment will come through human resources management and come through our office as well, and we would recommend hiring bilingual staff.
But I also understand sometimes waivers or exemptions may be applied.
I don't know if the fire department representative wants to speak on other efforts.
Good morning. Michael Hunt, Oakland Fire Department.
So how just if there's somebody who has a medical emergency and fire shows up
and they don't speak English how does the department handle that considering
communication with the person would be critical? So the dispatch
services uses the interpretation line as well as members in the field use it as
well. So if there is a situation where there's a medical incident that fire
responds to they can utilize the interpretation line to develop a
translation to directly interact with the patient and family. Okay so basically
it's somebody's got a phone and they're interacting with the patient on okay
interesting. Okay thank you. I have one just because it came up in my previous
work as a workers rights attorney. Do you have one of the languages that is
We see more and more in Oakland as mom,
which is very notably different from Spanish.
Are there staff members in the city that speak mom or do you rely on the language line?
I would say both.
Now, for equal access ordinance,
the focus is on threshold languages.
That means still with the English-speaking population over 10,000
threshold in terms of city of Oakland population.
So the focus for this report is on Spanish and Chinese,
because that is the focus of the ordinance.
Now we do have different contractors that we bring in to serve the city of Oakland.
All the contractors have language capacity to cover 100 languages,
and MAM is one of the languages covered by our vendors.
So from time to time, we have colleagues from OBRYD,
we have colleagues from DHS,
wanting to arrange for interpretation among languages,
and we'll work with our vendors to bring in one.
Okay. Good. Thank you.
We will move to public comment.
I want to call your name.
Please approach the podium, Ms. Asada.
Every year I come to this meeting and I ask you the same thing, you are the finance committee.
The questions you should be asking is mainly, you can ask all these other questions, but
mainly, how much money we spending?
How much money, they say here, 24 hour a day over the phone interpretation, how much that
cost?
Staff, how much does that cost?
Translation of written documents, how much does that cost?
translation. How much does that cost? Maintaining telephone messages. How much
does that cost? Vietnam's Arab translation materials. How much does that cost?
Contracted consultants. How much does that cost? 601 employees are eligible for a
premium pay. How much does that cost? Cost of surveys, cost of posters, cost of
employee training program cost of the... is there a cost related to the
department access coordinator or they do that for free? Okay the cost of
administrative, bilingual, text and verification of language skills. How
much does that cost? Y'all looking down you are the finance committee. What's the
cost and what's the source of funding for all of this every year I've been
coming here for years when y'all do these reports you never ask any
questions about how much money they spending you also have them with 42% and
they said he only supposed to apply this skill of what they do to Spanish and
Chinese but they're doing it to all different groups but they leaving out
groups too. Why do you leave out those groups if you're helping some groups
that don't come under the 10,000 spectrum? Ask the question, how much money
are you spending in this department? You are being irresponsible if you are not
looking at costs related to this issue because you are the finance committee.
That concludes your public speakers for item six. Thank you so much to our
public speakers and colleagues and I assure you the costs that we spend on
These programs are a lot less on a lawsuit if we would be sued on these things
Colleagues is there a
motion and
To the parliamentarian clerk does this have to go to full councilor? Can we file in committee? I
Think it can be filed in committee
But if there's a past practice of having it go to full council, I defer to city administration
there a
So moved or to accept the report to full council or
Yes on the number fourth meeting on consent. Yeah
I'll second it
Thank you. We have a motion made by councilmember one seconded by chair
Ramachandran to receive it for this item to the November the 4th city council agenda at 9 a.m. On consent on
Roll councilmember Brown. I
comes remember under
Hi councilmember
Wong hi and chair roma chandrin. I this motion passes with four eyes to receiving for this to the November 4th
City Council agenda at 9 a.m. On consent moving to item 7
Good morning committee president receive an informational report on the Oakland police and fire retirement systems
Investment portfolio as of June 30th 2025 and you do have one speaker for this item
Good morning committee chair and members of the finance and management committee
My name is Taylor Jenkins, and I am the investment and operation manager of the retirement division for the City of Oakland
police and fire retirement system more commonly known as peepers
The purpose of this report is to provide an update on the investment portfolio of peepers as of June 30 2025
This is a critical report because this is the report that feeds into our audit and our actuary and is used in the city's
contribution calculation I
Would like to note that you know due to our recent performance our strong performance over the last few years that the city's
contribution from the PTO to PFS decrease 10 million this year
to assist me in presenting the
Investment information I have the PFS investment consultant David Sands, which of Makita investments
Just to give you a brief overview PFS is a closed retirement system. It was closed to new members in
After that point, City of Oakland employees became members of CalPERS.
Currently all the members of PIFRS are retired, and as of June 30, 2025, we had a membership
of 597 members and an investment portfolio valued at approximately $480 million.
Based on the most recent valuation, PIFRS is 90% funded.
Next PIFRS investment consultant, David Sandswitch, will discuss the PIFRS investment portfolio
and more detail. Good morning it's a pleasure to be back here again we give
these reports on a quarterly basis and I will say candidly that given the
previous agenda items will end on a good note. The PFS Hotel, PFS
portfolio is a very healthy position as Thayer mentioned we're now above 90%
funded it has an assumed rate of return of 5% so we recently brought that down
last year and consult with the actuary so we don't have to shoot for the stars
with this portfolio. And as of June 30th, we were in the middle of transitioning the portfolio out
of risky growth equity assets and into more fixed income and bond-like investments. That has
happened as of July and August. So the next report you see, you'll see that 61% of these assets
are now in bonds, which are much less risky and safer than equities. The really good news about
this portfolio is with the 5% return objective, we more than doubled that for the fiscal year period
ending 2026. So we had a 10.2% net return for that fiscal year period and even though we de-risked
the portfolio we gained an additional 5% in the previous three months. So year to date through
September it's up 10% as well. You do have the report in front of you and I won't go through
page by page on that to save you a bunch a bunch of time. But the portfolio grew from 453 million
dollars after you figured in expenses and benefits that are paid out. The investments brought in 44
4.9 or 45 million dollars
Ended at a market value of 480 million
We're pretty happy with where the portfolio is and where it's going and we certainly will be paying attention to this
We do have a board meeting tomorrow over in hearing room two or one
I don't know which room it is if folks would like to attend and ask questions that meeting starts at 1030
But that concludes my report and happy to answer any questions
Thank You colleagues and council longer. I just want to thank you all for good work on this providing
some relief to Oakland taxpayers and the Oakland budget. I appreciate it.
Okay. If there are no other comments, we'll move to public comment.
Thank you. I want to call your name,
please approach the podium, Kevin Dolly.
That concludes your public's comments for item seven.
Thank you. Do we re-receive and file this report, right?
Okay. I will entertain a motion to receive and file.
Second.
I'll go ahead and make the motion to receive and file.
thought you made the motion sorry I'll second it thank you have a motion made
by chair Rama Chandra seconded by council member Unger to receive and file
this in a finance and management committee on roll comes from member Brown
aye council member Unger aye council member Wong aye and chair woman
Chandra and I the motion passes with four eyes to receive and file this in a
finance and management committee as a reminder item 8 regarding the audit
recommendation follow report as of June 30 25 was withdrawn from this agenda by
the October 23 25 Rules and Legislation Committee and rescheduled to the
December 2nd 2025 City Council agenda on non-consent an additional reminder item
9 regarding the professional services agreement with Marcia's Ginny and O'Connell
LLC was withdrawn from the agenda by the October 23rd 20 25 Rules and
legislation committee and rescheduled to the finance and management pending list
no date specific moving to open forum Kevin dolly miss Asada and please
approach the podium state your name for the record I'm not gonna spend a lot of
time because you obviously don't care this grand jewelry report clearly states
the reasons why you should not be selling bonds and you know it you know
it, Ryan, that we should not be selling bonds. And it's in the report for people
like me to understand why. And you did it anyway. You're putting us at risk by
selling those bonds. We are already financially unsolvent. We have a
tremendous deficit. And to sell bonds like you've done is irresponsible again.
You've been irresponsible to hold me
So I'm waiting to see how you go on respond to the grand jury report related to this issue
You can sell the bond, but it's a tremendous risk factor and you instructed him not to do it
You told him to wait into until December to see how we would be as far as our ability to have our
positive rating
That concludes your public speakers for open forum
Okay, the meeting is adjourned
1040.