HomeMy WebLinkAboutStaff Report 9191
City of Palo Alto (ID # 9191)
City Council Staff Report
Report Type: Action Items Meeting Date: 4/30/2018
City of Palo Alto Page 1
Summary Title: Potential 2018 Infrastructure Ballot Measure
Title: Finance Committee Recommendation Regarding Potential 2018 Ballot
Measure to Address the Funding Gap for the 2014 Infrastructure Plan and
Funding for Unplanned Potential Community Assets Projects, Discussion of
Next Steps for Addressing the Funding Gap Needs, and Potential Refinement
of Survey Elements and Objectives for a Follow-up Survey
From: City Manager
Lead Department: Administrative Services
Recommendation
Staff recommends that City Council
1. Review the results of the initial public opinion survey and provide direction on next
steps in addressing the funding gap for the 2014 Council Infrastructure Plan projects
including discussion of priorities with respect to competing future capital investments;
2. Discuss the Finance Committee motion to:
a. Move forward with a two percent Transient Occupancy Tax increase, including
moving forward with the necessary creation of a ballot statement, polling,
testing, and authorizing Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin, Metz and Associates to
perform associated tasks;
b. To discontinue consideration of a Sales Tax or a Parcel Tax; and
c. To continue to consider and explore a Real Estate Transfer Tax, including the
possibility of polling.
Background
At the City Council’s direction from January 2018, the Finance Committee has been reviewing
the funding gap identified in the 2014 Council Infrastructure Plan projects currently estimated
at $76 million. The Committee has met three times to discuss the funding needs for capital
investments and options for funding strategies. Staff reports considered by the Committee are
attached.
Ultimately the Committee approved direction to have Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin, Metz and
Associates (FM3 Research) conduct an initial public opinion survey to assess public support for
a potential November 2018 ballot revenue measure. FM3 staff will attend this Council meeting
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to present the initial survey results and answer questions.
Discussion
At the April 17, 2018 meeting, the Finance Committee reviewed the initial polling results and
discussed options for a potential scope of a more focused survey. Attached to this report are
the staff reports and minutes from prior committee meetings including the results of the initial
survey conducted by FM3.
After the April Finance Committee meeting, the Rail Committee met on April 18th and discussed
the possibility of a Palo Alto voter survey related to potential funding for grade separation. It
was suggested that any such polling would most appropriately be conducted separately from
any additional survey work related to Infrastructure Funding.
Timeline
If Council approves for FM3 to conduct the polling, it would be conducted in early May with
results presented to the Finance Committee and/or Council in late May or early June. If a ballot
measure vote is moved forward for action it would be presented to Council in June.
Resource Impact
No additional funding is required; the FM3 costs can be absorbed within the existing General
Fund budget.
Attachments:
Attachment A: February 6, 2018 Finance Committee Report ID #8927: Discussion on
Council Infrastructure Plan and Competing
Attachment B: February 6, 2018 Finance Committee Excerpt Minutes
Attachment C: April 17, 2018 Finance Committee Report ID #9107 : Review of Initial
Public Opinion Survey for Infrastructure Funding Needs
Attachment D: April 17, 2018 Finance Committee Action Minutes
Attachment E: March 20, 2018 Finance Committee Report ID# 9039: Initial Public
Opinion Survey for Infrastructure Funding Needs
Attachment F: March 20, 2018 Finance Committee Minutes
City of Palo Alto (ID # 8927)
Finance Committee Staff Report
Report Type: Action Items Meeting Date: 2/6/2018
City of Palo Alto Page 1
Summary Title: Discussion on Council Infrastructure Plan and Competing
Priorities Funding Challenges
Title: Discussion on Infrastructure Plan Projects, Anticipated Costs and
Funding Levels, and Potential Direction on Next Steps Regarding Project
Priorities, Timing and Potential Funding Options
From: City Manager
Lead Department: Administrative Services
Recommendation
Staff recommends that the Finance Committee:
1) Review the background and current status of the Council Infrastructure Plan projects;
and
2) Discuss and provide direction on next steps, including priorities with respect to the
Council Infrastructure Plan projects and competing capital priorities for the City
Manager to utilize when developing the proposed Fiscal Year 2019 Capital Budget and
2019-2023 Capital Improvement Program; and potential recommendations to Council
regarding development of new funding sources or measures to close the funding gap.
Analysis
At the January 22, 2018 City Council meeting, the Council referred Item 15 (See Attachment A)
to the Finance Committee for discussion and deliberation regarding Capital Infrastructure Plan
projects and funding. It is staff’s intent to review the status of the projects contained in the
Council Infrastructure Plan as well as the competing financial priorities as identified in the
January 22, 2018 report and the City’s FY 2019-2028 Long Range Financial Report. The
combination of these two reports outline the current limitations on resources available to
satisfy the growing desires of the organization. A more focused approach to services and
investments will be necessary. As the Committee and Council continue to discuss major
projects and obligations, such as pensions, infrastructure, and grade separations, a constant
eye on thinking outside of the box and managing expectations will be key. As noted, there are
several projects that are being discussed in the community and viewed as desireable, but that
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have not received Council direction as of yet. It is clear funding for additional projects is not
currently available unless alternative choices are made.
References:
City Council FY 2017 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report & FY 2019-2028 Long Range
Financial Report (CMR #8754):
https://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/62953
Attachments:
Attachment A: CMR ID# 8855 Infrastructure Plan and Projects: Status Update on
Infrastructure Plan
City of Palo Alto (ID # 8855)
City Council Staff Report
Report Type: Action Items Meeting Date: 1/22/2018
City of Palo Alto Page 1
Summary Title: Direction on Council Infrastructure Plan Funding Challenges
Title: Infrastructure Plan and Projects: Status Update on Infrastructure Plan
Projects, Anticipated Costs and Funding Levels; Recommendation and
Possible Action to Remove the Second Basement Level From the California
Avenue Parking Garage to Reduce Costs; and Discussion and Council
Direction on Project Priorities, Timing and Potential Funding Options to
Achieve a Fully Funded Infrastructure Plan
From: City Manager
Lead Department: Public Works
Recommendation
Staff recommends that Council:
1. Review the background and current status of the Council Infrastructure Plan projects;
2. Direct staff to modify the previously approved program for the California Avenue
Parking Garage project (PE-18000) to remove the second basement level, resulting in a
542-space parking garage with four levels of above-ground parking and one level of
basement parking; and
3. Discuss and provide direction and priorities with respect to the Council Infrastructure
Plan projects for the City Manager to utilize when developing the proposed Fiscal Year
2019 Capital Budget and 2019-2023 Capital Improvement Program, and directing staff
work toward potential development of new funding sources.
Executive Summary
The Council Infrastructure Plan was adopted in June 2014 in response to decades of inadequate
funding for maintenance and renewal of Palo Alto’s infrastructure assets. Significant progress
has been made toward the Plan’s implementation, but construction cost escalation, project
scope increases, and refined cost estimates have resulted in a current funding gap of
approximately $50 million relative to the total current estimated cost of about $235 million. In
response, one initial adjustment to the Infrastructure Plan in this report recommends removal
of the second basement level from the California Avenue Parking Garage (PE-18000), which is
estimated to reduce the cost of the garage by $6 million to $8 million. The report also
describes a number of other potential strategies for closing the remaining funding gap,
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including reprioritizing the Council Infrastructure Plan projects, reducing project scopes,
reprioritizing projects within the overall capital improvement fund, allocating new revenues,
and increasing taxes.
Background
In 2010, Council appointed the 17-member Infrastructure Blue Ribbon Committee (IBRC). IBRC
was appointed in recognition that the City had, over a period of several decades, systematically
underfunded maintenance of its existing assets and failed to plan funding for replacement of
assets at the end of their useful lives. Estimates of the infrastructure funding backlog varied
widely, ranging from $100 million to $500 million depending on which projects and
assumptions were included. IBRC was tasked primarily with developing an inventory of the
City’s infrastructure backlog and future needs, and with proposing ideas for funding those
needs.
IBRC released its final report, titled “Palo Alto’s Infrastructure: Catching Up, Keeping Up, and
Moving Ahead”, on December 22, 2011. The final report included a number of findings and
recommendations for improving the City’s management and funding of its infrastructure needs.
Key findings included the following:
“Keep-Up” maintenance of existing infrastructure was underfunded by $2.2 million per
year
“Catch-Up” deferred maintenance for existing infrastructure had grown to $41 million
An Infrastructure Management System was needed
A new Public Safety Building was needed on a new site as soon as possible
Fire Stations 3 and 4 should be rebuilt and upgraded on their present sites as soon as
possible
Following the completion of IBRC’s final report, Mayor Yiaway Yeh declared 2012 the "year of
infrastructure renewal and investment,” focusing efforts on the important task of identifying
long-term revenue sources to renew the City’s physical assets. Council held four retreats in
2012 to discuss the questions raised by the IBRC report.
Council took multiple actions to address IBRC’s recommendations, including the following:
Established street pavement condition index (PCI) goal and tripled annual funding
Added $2.2 million per year to the capital fund to address “Keep-Up”
Transferred an additional $36.9 million to the capital fund between FY 2012 and FY 2016
(in addition to the regular General Fund transfer)
Began funding “Catch-Up” capital projects
Funded a capital project to create the Infrastructure Management System
Most importantly, in 2013 Council sustained the momentum generated by IBRC’s work by
forming the Infrastructure Committee, an ad-hoc Council Committee that met 12 times
between March 2013 and May 2014. The Infrastructure Committee evaluated and prioritized
the City’s list of unfunded infrastructure projects, reviewed existing funding sources for the
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projects, and conducted two public opinion polls evaluating support for the individual projects
and a variety of potential tax measures. On June 9, 2014, following several meetings
evaluating the Infrastructure Committee recommendations, Council approved a list of 9
projects and a variety of funding sources that have since been referred to as the Council
Infrastructure Plan.
The funding sources included future Transient Occupancy Tax (TOT) revenues from four new
hotels that were not yet opened and an increase of 2% (from 12% to 14%) to the City’s TOT rate
for all hotels. Both TOT sources were to be used to support Certificates of Participation that
would fund about 50% of the total project costs. Council called for a special election to
increase the TOT rate on June 16, 2014, which passed with 76% approval in November 2014.
The Council Infrastructure Plan projects are a subset of the City’s highest priority capital
projects contained within the larger capital improvement fund, which contains many other
one-time and multi-year projects. The project costs and funding sources from the June 2014
Council Infrastructure Plan are presented in Tables 1 and 2.
Table 1: 2014 Council Infrastructure Plan Project Costs
Project Cost ($ millions)
Public Safety Building 57.0
Highway 101 Pedestrian/Bicycle Bridge 1.71
Bicycle/Pedestrian Plan Implementation 20.0
Charleston/Arastradero Corridor 7.52
Byxbee Park 2.8
California Avenue Area Parking Garage 9.6
Downtown Parking Garage 13.0
Fire Station 3 Replacement 6.7
Fire Station 4 Replacement 7.5
Total: $ 125.8
Table 2: 2014 Council Infrastructure Plan Funding Sources
Funding Source
Funding
($ millions)
Stanford Development Agreement – Infrastructure 22.1
Stanford Development Agreement – Sustainability 12.4
Infrastructure Reserve 8.5
FY 2014 Surplus 4.0
Parking In-Lieu Fees 4.0
1 The $1.7 million figure for the Highway 101 Pedestrian/Bicycle Bridge project represented only the unfunded
portion of the $10 million project cost estimate in 2014.
2 The $7.5 million figure for the Charleston/Arastradero Corridor project represented only the unfunded portion of
the $10 million project cost estimate in 2014.
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Parks Impact Fees 2.8
New Hotel Revenues (COPs) 33.6
TOT 2% Increase (COPs) 30.8
Available Revenue From TOT 0.1
Future Revenue TBD 7.5
Total: $ 125.8
It is important to note that project costs for the Highway 101 Pedestrian/Bicycle Bridge and
Charleston/Arastradero Corridor projects only include the amounts that were unfunded in June
2014. For comparison to current Council Infrastructure Plan costs presented later in this report,
the apples-to-apples figure is $136.6 million (rather than $125.8). Additionally, the project
costs in Table 1 do not include staff salaries and benefits. Beginning in FY 2016, staff began
budgeting the cost of staff salaries and benefits within the individual capital projects to more
accurately plan and account for the total cost of projects. These costs had previously been
budgeted in a single capital project that accounted for the salaries and benefits of all staff that
work on capital projects and are budgeted in the capital fund. The inclusion of staff salaries and
benefits in individual project budgets can appear to increase the overall cost of the projects. In
reality, the apparent increase is simply a shift of budget allocation from the single “salaries and
benefits” capital project to the individual projects.
Following the voter approval of the TOT increase, funding for the Council Infrastructure Plan
projects was included in the FY 2015 Adopted Capital Budget (some of the projects had been
partially funded in previous years).
Discussion
Council Infrastructure Plan Projects: Project Status
Attachment A provides a summary of the scope and current status for each of the nine Council
Infrastructure Plan projects. The following figure presents the current anticipated Calendar
Year schedule for design and construction of the projects.
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Some project status highlights are as follows:
Public Safety Building and California Avenue Garage: The Draft Environmental Impact
Report was published on January 8, 2018. The projects have had one formal
Architectural Review Board (ARB) hearing, and the second formal hearing for the Garage
is scheduled for January 18, 2018.
Highway 101 Pedestrian/Bicycle Bridge: The CEQA Mitigated Negative Declaration and
the Park Improvement Ordinance were approved by Council in November 2017.
Caltrans subsequently approved the project’s federal environmental document.
Bike/Pedestrian Plan Implementation: Phase 1 is currently under construction, and final
design for Phase 2 is in progress.
Charleston/Arastradero Corridor: Phases 1 and 2 are expected to go out to bid in
January 2018. Construction contracts subsequently will be brought to Council for
approval.
Downtown Parking Garage: The Draft Environmental Impact Report is expected to be
published in January 2018. The first formal ARB hearing is expected in February 2018.
Fire Station 3 Replacement: Construction of the new fire station began on January 8,
2018.
Council Infrastructure Plan Projects: Design Process, Current Estimates, Funding Shortfall
To understand how project costs have increased since the Council Infrastructure Plan was
adopted in 2014, it is important to understand the relationship between cost estimates and the
design process. Design of most infrastructure projects proceeds through a process of increasing
detail and complexity. Typically beginning with conceptual design, the design process moves to
schematic design, design development, and construction documents. The discrete steps are
most applicable to building projects, but other projects follow a similar progression. At each
level of design, construction cost estimates are based on greater detail and increase in
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accuracy. These design steps are described briefly in the workflow below:
1) Conceptual Design: The Conceptual Design Phase presents sizing, layout, and massing
options for building placement on a site. This involves verification that the program will
fit in the building and the building will fit on the site along with parking lot
configurations, verification of utility availability, and site access.
2) Schematic Design: The Schematic Design Phase refines the conceptual design by
showing the Project’s basic components, scale and location in more detail. This includes
plans of the site and improvements; preliminary sections and elevations of the
buildings; approximate areas, volumes, and dimensions of features for cost estimating;
and preliminary selections of materials and systems. For projects that require review by
the Architectural Review Board, plans are typically at the schematic level design when
the review occurs.
3) Design Development: Design Development further refines the Schematic Design to a
level that can serve as a basis for Construction Documents. This includes drawings and
outline specifications to establish and describe the size, character and site relationships
of major Project components. This phase involves extensive coordination for all building
systems such as structural, mechanical, plumbing, electrical, lighting, fire protection,
security, telecom, audio visual, acoustics, and all site improvements and landscaping.
4) Construction Documents: The last phase refines the Design Development package into a
final drawing set with technical specifications suitable for obtaining permits and issuing
for public bidding. The final plans, calculations, and specifications must be suitable for
construction, including structural, mechanical systems, electrical, site improvements,
landscaping, drainage, finishes, and furniture layout.
Once completed construction documents are advertised to secure bids for a project, the
maximum construction cost is known (assuming the typical 10% construction contingency
amount is not exceeded). Construction cost is also known as a project’s hard cost. The
construction cost is the largest component of total project costs, but total costs also include
soft costs such as design, construction management, architect construction administration,
permits, inspection and testing. Staff salaries and benefits are in addition to these hard and
soft costs, but are planned for in the capital fund regardless of the projects to which they are
assigned.
Table 3 presents the total project cost estimates (without salaries and benefits) as they existed
in 2014 at the adoption of the Council Infrastructure Plan and as they have been updated
during the design process. Estimates for the initial Council Infrastructure Plan were based on
conceptual information, and they used very rough percentage-based figures to account for soft
costs and contingencies. The year in parentheses indicates the construction year basis for each
(conceptual) project. At the time of the Council Infrastructure Plan’s development, older
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estimates were not escalated to the current year or to future years when construction would
actually occur.
Table 3: Council Infrastructure Plan cost evolution through design process (all figures in $
millions)
Project
2014 Plan
Conceptual
(Construction
year basis)
Updated
Conceptual Schematic
Design
Development
Construction
Documents
Bid and
Contract
Public Safety Building $57.0
(2012)
$75.4 $91.0
Highway 101
Bike/Pedestrian Bridge
$10.0
(2012)
$14.0 $14.0 $16.3
Bicycle/Pedestrian
Plan Implementation
$20.0
(2014)
$20.0 $20.0 $20.0 $20.0
Charleston/
Arastradero Corridor
$10.0
(2009)
$10.0 $10.0 $10.0 $14.6
Byxbee Park $2.8
(N/A)
California Avenue
Parking Garage
$9.6
(2013)
$34.8 $40.4
Downtown Parking
Garage
$13.0
(2013)
$23.5 $28.1
Fire Station 3
Replacement
$6.7
(2008)
$6.7 $8.1 $8.1 $8.7 $8.6
Fire Station 4
Replacement
$7.5
(2008)
The primary reasons for increased project costs are the significant construction cost escalation
that has occurred in recent years and additions to the scope of certain projects. For example,
the Public Safety Building was estimated at $47 million in 2012 (with an additional $10 million
included in the budget for land acquisition). Applying a Bay Area construction cost escalation
factor developed by a local builder, cost escalation accounts for an increase in the estimated
project cost from $47 to about $74 million by 2021, the current projected midpoint of
construction. This cost escalation does not account for the full increase, as the current Public
Safety Building cost estimate shown in Table 3 is $91 million. Attachment B is a chart detailing
the impact of construction cost escalation on project costs. Public Safety Building costs have
also increased because of the design decision to build two underground levels that will
accommodate parking and some of the program space. Some of the increase in the project
cost estimate for the Downtown Parking Garage is related to Council’s April 2017 direction to
increase the project scope by adding a basement level.
The Architectural Review Board (ARB) process can also impact project costs. Both the Public
Safety Building and California Avenue Parking Garage have had one formal review by the ARB.
In both cases, comments from the ARB have resulted in design changes that are expected to
increase project costs. These potential increases are not yet included in the project costs
presented in Table 3.
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Table 4 summarizes significant scope changes that have influenced the cost of Council
Infrastructure Plan projects.
Table 4: Project Scope Changes
Project
2014 Council Infrastructure Plan
Scope Changes to Initial Scope
Public Safety Building Separate stand-alone PSB and non-
essential services standard parking
garage
PSB over two levels of basement
parking and “operational basement”,
all built to essential services standard
Highway 101
Bike/Pedestrian Bridge
Bridge concept and alignment only At-grade pedestrian truss bridge over
the Adobe/Barron Creek confluence;
Raised sidewalk on West Side
Approach to address sidewalk and
bicycle lane concerns; Enhanced
lighting
Charleston/Arastradero
Corridor
No stormwater treatment features
envisioned
Nine green stormwater infrastructure
infiltration basins added
California Avenue
Parking Garage
Garage to add 158 parking stalls in
addition to replacing existing
parking from one surface lot
Garage to replace existing surface
parking on two lots (C-6 and C-7);
Garage to include one additional
above-ground and one additional
basement level for a net parking stall
addition of 335 stalls over the current
parking on the two lots
Downtown Parking
Garage
Garage to add 212 parking stalls in
addition to replacing existing
parking from one surface lot
Garage to include a basement level for
a net parking stall addition of 252
stalls; addition of 2,188 SF retail space
To determine the Council Infrastructure Plan’s funding shortfall, Table 5 compares the currently
budgeted amounts for the Council Infrastructure Plan projects with the most current total
project cost estimates.
Table 5: Council Infrastructure Plan budget and cost comparison (all figures in $ millions)
Currently Budgeted Current Estimate Shortfall
Public Safety Building 57.0 91.0 34.0
Highway 101 Bike/Pedestrian
Bridge
14.0 16.3 2.3
Bicycle/Pedestrian Plan
Implementation
20.0 20.0 --
Charleston/Arastradero Corridor 10.8 14.6 3.8
Byxbee Park 2.8 2.8 --
California Avenue Parking Garage 9.6 40.4 30.8
Downtown Parking Garage 13.0 28.1 15.1
Fire Station 3 Replacement 8.6 8.6 --
Fire Station 4 Replacement 7.5 7.5 --
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Staff Salaries and Benefits 6.5 6.5 --
Subtotal: $149.8 $235.8 $86.0
Unallocated Contingency** 30.0 0 (30.0)
Total: $179.8 $235.8 $56.0*
*Additional funding sources of $5.7 million have been identified to help offset this gap.
**The FY2018 Adopted Capital Budget includes contingency funding of $30 million that is not yet allocated to projects.
For further reference, Attachment C is a matrix that details how the currently budgeted
individual funding sources are allocated to each project.
The current estimate for the total cost of the Plan is $229.3 million, $235.8 million when
salaries and benefits are included. The FY 2018 Adopted Capital Budget includes contingency
funding of $30 million that is not yet allocated to projects. In addition to the currently
budgeted funding sources, staff has identified $5.7 million in funding that is proposed to be
used towards the Downtown Parking Garage and Charleston/Arastradero Corridor projects.
The funding sources consist primarily of additional parking in-lieu fees ($2.8 million), SB1
funding for FY 2019 ($1.2 million), and Stormwater Management Fee Green Infrastructure
funding ($0.7 million). Assuming use of these funding sources, the Council Infrastructure Plan
funding shortfall is currently estimated at $50 million.
In addition to the Council Infrastructure Plan, there are a number of other significant potential
capital projects that have been identified as a need that do not have funding identified. While
successful completion of the Council Infrastructure Plan has been identified as the highest
infrastructure priority, the following are some other potential competing funding needs:
Junior Museum and Zoo rebuild (Phase I essentials) (impacts in potential Phase II?)
Animal Shelter replacement or renovation
Caltrain Westside Fencing
Parking wayfinding and other improvements
Parks Master Plan implementation
Cubberley Master Plan development and implementation
Some of these projects have more immediacy than others. More detail on potential unfunded
projects can be found in the FY 2019-FY 2028 Long Range Financial Forecast (CMR 8676) that
was presented to the Finance Committee on December 5, 2017.
Additional discussion in the following sections relates to Council decisions and guidance on how
to address the Council Infrastructure Plan funding shortfall.
Recommendation to Remove Second Basement Level from California Avenue Parking Garage
Staff recommends the removal of the second basement level from the California Avenue
Parking Garage, resulting in a garage with one basement and four above-ground levels. This
removal will reduce the number of parking stalls from 636 to 542, and reduce the net increase
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in parking stalls (accounting for the existing surface parking stalls on Lots C-6 and C-7) from 335
to 241. The removal of the second basement level is expected to reduce the total project cost
for the California Avenue Parking Garage by $6-8 million.
The original 2014 scope of the California Avenue Parking Garage project assumed a net increase
of approximately 158 parking stalls by building a new garage on a not yet identified surface lot
in the California Avenue area resulting in an estimated project budget of $9.6 million and the
parking in-lieu fee in effect at that time. In December 2015, staff presented the results of the
Public Safety Building Site Evaluation Study that recommended building the Public Safety
Building on Lot C-6, and building the California Avenue Parking Garage on Lot C-7 to replace the
existing surface parking on both lots and to provide additional parking. At that time, Council
directed staff to proceed with design of a 460 parking stall garage that would provide a net
increase of 160 stalls. The direction from Council included a request for analysis of costs and
other impacts for possible options to provide more than the minimum 460 parking stalls.
On April 3, 2017, staff presented Council with parking garage options that included number of
stalls and conceptual cost estimates. Council directed staff to proceed with a 636-stall garage
that would include two basements and four above-ground levels. At that time, the conceptual
level project cost estimate for the 636-stall garage was $34.8 million. With schematic design
nearly complete, the current estimate is $40.4 million.
As work on the California Avenue Parking Garage has proceeded, staff has noted a number of
potentially competing factors and policy directives. The direction to proceed with a 636-stall
garage increases the Council Infrastructure Plan’s significant funding gap. The Evergreen-
Mayfield Residential Preferential Parking (RPP) program is in its first year and enhancements
are being proposed that may simplify short-term visitor parking within the RPP area. A
Comprehensive Parking Study for the California Avenue area has just commenced. The new
Comprehensive Plan and Sustainability Implementation Plan envision a shift from single
occupancy vehicle travel to modes of travel that are expected to reduce demand for parking.
At the same time, current occupancy counts demonstrate that on-street and off-street parking
in the California Avenue District is impacted during the weekday lunchtime hours (although
there is significant availability of parking for short-term visitors in the RPP zones).
Staff’s recommendation to remove the second basement level of the California Avenue Parking
Garage is made in recognition of the factors described above and the parking occupancy data
that demonstrate that demand for additional parking is principally confined to the lunchtime
hours of 12pm to 2pm.
The following information on parking occupancy is provided to inform Council’s consideration
of parking inventory in the California Avenue District.
Weekday California Avenue District Parking Occupancy Count Data:
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On-Street Parking (business district)
10/25/2017, Wednesday
Time Supply Demand % Use
9am-11am 406 191 47.0%
12pm-2pm 406 316 77.8%
3pm-5pm 406 253 62.3%
6pm-8pm 406 274 67.5%
Off-Street Parking (lots and garages)
11/21/17, Tuesday
Time Supply Demand % Use
9am-11am 1064 385 36.2%
12pm-2pm 1064 892 83.8%
3pm-5pm 1064 766 72.0%
6pm-8pm 1064 728 68.4%
Evergreen-Mayfield (RPP)
10/25/17, Wednesday
Time Supply Demand % Use
9am-11am 985 389 39.5%
12pm-2pm 985 469 47.6%
3pm-5pm 985 425 43.1%
Critical Time: 12pm-2pm
Combined On and Off Street Parking (no RPP)
Time Supply Demand % Use
12pm-2pm 1470 1208 82.2%
During the critical 12pm-2pm lunchtime hours, staff’s recommendation to add 241 (rather than
335) parking stalls would increase the combined on and off street parking inventory to 1711,
reducing the lunchtime use of parking from 82.2% to 70.6%. Proceeding with the second
basement level would add 335 parking stalls and reduce the lunchtime use to only 66.9%, with
even greater underutilization during the rest of the day.
The following table summarizes the chronology leading to staff’s recommendation:
2014 Dec 2015 January 2018 Staff
Recommendation
Additional Parking
Provided
158 160 335 241
Project Cost $9.6 million $9.6 million $40.4 million $32-34 million
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Additional Strategies for Addressing the Council Infrastructure Plan Shortfall
Staff recommends that Council consider and discuss the following additional options for
addressing the funding shortfall and provide guidance and identify priorities for staff’s use in
the development of the City Manager’s FY 2019-2023 Capital Improvement Program and
possible initiation of work towards development of new funding sources.
Reprioritize or drop projects from the Council Infrastructure Plan: One or more projects
could be removed from the Council Infrastructure Plan or deferred beyond the
timeframe of the 2019-2023 Capital Improvement Program.
Scope reduction: The scope of certain projects could be reduced to decrease project
costs. Staff’s recommendation to remove the California Avenue Garage second
basement level is one example.
Reprioritize other projects from the capital improvement fund: In developing the FY
2019 capital improvement fund budget, staff could carefully evaluate existing and
proposed capital projects that are not part of the Council Infrastructure Plan and
propose eliminating, reducing, or deferring some projects. Currently the unallocated
fund balance (also referred to as the Infrastructure Reserve) is estimated to be $11
million at the end of FY 2018. This funding could be directed to the Council
Infrastructure Plan; however, this would eliminate flexibility to address other competing
needs as outlined earlier.
New revenues: Anticipated new revenues could be allocated to closing the Council
Infrastructure Plan funding gap. For example, the new Marriott hotels are projected to
generate $3.6 million annually in TOT revenues upon their completion. If 70 percent of
these revenues are used to issue debt, it would provide approximately $35 million of
funding.
Tax increase: New tax increases could be proposed to the voters to provide additional
revenue. For example, each 1% increase to the TOT rate results in approximately $1.7
million annually. If 70 percent of these revenues are used to issue debt, it would
provide approximately $16 million of funding.
Timeline
Seven of the nine Council Infrastructure Plan projects are in progress and are proceeding
according to their individual project schedules with all seven projects to be completed by the
end of FY 2022. The California Avenue Parking Garage is currently scheduled to begin
construction in November 2018, and construction of the Public Safety Building will begin after
the garage is completed.
A Council decision on the garage’s second basement level is necessary to maintain the critical
path schedule for the California Avenue Parking Garage and the Public Safety Building, and to
City of Palo Alto Page 13
avoid additional construction cost escalation. Staff would recommend Council make that
decision the evening this agenda item comes to Council. And while Council discussion and
possible action in other areas may be warranted at the meeting, Council may also choose to
direct a set of issues to Finance Committee for in depth discussion on alternatives.
Resource Impact
The funding gap of $50 million identified in this report is anticipated to be considered and
addressed as part of the City Manager’s FY 2019 – FY 2023 Proposed Capital Budget with the
assistance of the feedback and discussion of priorities had by the City Council at this meeting.
Specifically, the staff recommendation to remove the second basement level from the
California Avenue Garage (PE-18000) is estimated to reduce the cost of the project by $6 million
to $8 million. If approved, this would reduce the funding gap to $42 million - $44 million to be
addressed as part of the City Manager’s proposed budget.
Policy Implications
The staff recommendation does not represent a change in existing policies.
Environmental Review
Individual Council Infrastructure Plan projects are undergoing the appropriate level of California
Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) review. Staff’s recommendation to remove the second
basement level from the California Avenue Parking Garage would reduce the environmental
impacts that are being assessed in the Environmental Impact Report for the California Avenue
Parking Garage and the Public Safety Building.
Attachments:
Attachment A: Council Infrastructure Plan Project Summaries
Attachment B: Local Construction Cost Escalation
Attachment C: Council Infrastructure Plan Funding Budgeted Funding Sources
Attachment A: Council Infrastructure Plan Project Summaries
Public Safety Building (PE-15001):
Summary: The new Public Safety Building (PSB) will house the Police Department, 911 Emergency
Dispatch Center, the Emergency Operations Center, the Office of Emergency Services, and the
administration needs of the Fire Department. The PSB will be located on Parking Lot C-6 (250 Sherman
Avenue) in the California Avenue business district. It will be designed and constructed to meet the
requirement of the Essential Services Buildings Seismic Safety Act that it be immediately ready and
available following a disaster such as an earthquake. The project includes a 135-foot tall emergency
communications tower that will be integrated with the 50-foot tall, 3-story PSB structure.
Status: The project is in the schematic design phase. On January 8, 2018, the Draft Environmental
Impact Report was released for a 45-day public comment period. The building design is expected to be
reviewed for a second time by the Architectural Review Board in early March. The Final EIR will be
presented to Council for certification in April or May 2018. Construction of the PSB will immediately
follow completion of the California Avenue Parking Garage project. The PSB is expected to be
operational in 2021.
Highway 101 Pedestrian/Bicycle Bridge (PE-11011):
Summary: The project will construct a year-round pedestrian/bicycle overcrossing of U.S. 101 at Adobe
Creek including a new trail connection to East Meadow Drive. The project will improve recreational and
commuter connections east and west of U.S. 101 to bike lanes on East and West Bayshore Roads and to
the existing Bay Trail. The project will close the existing Benjamin Lefkowitz pedestrian/bicycle
undercrossing of U.S. 101 at Adobe Creek, a facility that experiences frequent closures due to flooding
each year between October 15th and April 15th. The proposed overcrossing was determined as a high
priority and potential future project to improve connectivity and year-round access over Highway 101
per the City’s 2012 Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation Plan.
Status: The 65% design and environmental assessment services phase is now complete. On December
11, 2017, City Council awarded a contract amendment for Phase 2 final bridge design services. This
action followed Council’s November 27, 2017 adoption of a CEQA Mitigated Negative Declaration and
approval of a Park Improvement Ordinance for the project. Following Council’s action, Caltrans adopted
the project’s NEPA Categorical Exclusion.
Bicycle/Pedestrian Plan Implementation (PL-04010):
Summary: The project includes planning, design and construction of bicycle boulevards, enhanced
bikeways, shared-use paths, bicycle parking and a citywide bicycle sharing system in accordance with
the Palo Alto Bicycle + Pedestrian Transportation Plan, which was adopted by City Council in 2012. The
project is primarily being implemented through two phases of bicycle boulevard construction. Phase 1
includes the Amarillo Avenue/Moreno Avenue Bicycle Boulevard, Bryant Street Bicycle Boulevard
Upgrade, Louis Road/Montrose Avenue Bicycle Boulevard, and Ross Road Bicycle Boulevard. Phase 2
includes the Bryant Street Bicycle Boulevard Extension, Maybell Avenue Bicycle Boulevard, and Park
Boulevard/Wilkie Way Bicycle Boulevard.
Status: Construction of Phase 1 began in September 2017 and is scheduled to take approximately one
year. Concept plans for Phase 2 were adopted by City Council in 2015 and final design is underway.
Construction contract award is expected in fall 2018 and construction is scheduled to take
approximately one year.
Charleston/Arastradero Corridor (PE-13011):
Summary: The project is a streetscape improvement and resurfacing project on the
Charleston/Arastradero Corridor from San Antonio Road to Foothill Expressway. The project is split into
three phases and is expected to be completed in two years. The project has been a priority to residents
since its conception as the Charleston/Arastradero Corridor Plan in 2003. The project goals and benefits
include enhancing school commute safety for K-12 students, improving the quality of bike and
pedestrian experience, reducing the amount of very high-speed vehicles, and enhancing the streetscape
and quality of life in the corridor for local residents and surrounding community. After extensive public
outreach in its development, the concept plan line was approved in September 28, 2015.
Status: This project will be constructed in three phases based on grant funding deadlines. The bid
packages are being finalized, and Caltrans has approved the Authorization to Proceed with construction
for Phase 1 and 2. Phase 1 and 2 are anticipated to go out to bid at the end of January 2018 and will
need Council approval for the construction contract. Construction is expected to start in May 2018.
Phase 3 will start construction in 2019.
Byxbee Park (PE-18006):
Summary: As envisioned by the original artist and landscape architect, the completion of Byxbee Park
was to occur following capping of the remainder of the landfill (Phase 2C) and was to consist of a
network of white oyster shell‐lined trails with wooden viewing platforms. Additionally, the parking lot
for the park was to be expanded. In view of the significant improvements to Byxbee Park that have
already occurred since the landfill closed, the scope of the project is being revisited during the
development of the Baylands Comprehensive Conservation Plan.
Status: The Baylands Comprehensive Conservation Plan, which will include recommendations on the
scope of the Byxbee Park project, is currently under development. On September 11, 2017, Council
approved funding $400,000 of the project funds in the current fiscal year for urgent improvements and
restoration work at the newly acquired Baylands International Telephone & Telegraph Transmitter site.
California Avenue Parking Garage (PE-18000):
Summary: The parking garage will be located across the street from the Public Safety Building on
Parking Lot C-7 (350 Sherman Ave). It will replace and expand the existing approximately 300 surface
parking stalls on lots C-6 and C-7. The new parking garage will have four levels of above ground and two
basement levels providing approximately 636 spaces. The garage design and environmental impact
analysis are proceeding concurrently with the Public Safety Building because they are considered one
project under CEQA.
Status: The project is in the schematic design phase. On January 8, 2018, the Draft Environmental
Impact Report was released for a 45-day public comment period. The garage design is scheduled to be
reviewed for a second time by the Architectural Review Board on January 18, 2018. The Final EIR will be
presented to Council for certification in April or May 2018.
Downtown Parking Garage (PE-15007):
Summary: The project will construct a new parking garage at existing surface parking lot D located at
375 Hamilton Avenue, the northwest corner of Hamilton Avenue and Waverley Street in the Downtown
Business District. It is intended to supplement parking inventory as part of the City’s multi-pronged
approach to addressing parking and traffic congestion. The new parking garage will have five levels of
above ground and one basement level providing approximately 338 spaces with a ground floor retail
area of approximately 2,200 SF.
Status: The project is in the schematic design phase. A community meeting was held to gather public
input on November 15, 2017. The Planning and Transportation Commission will hold a public hearing for
the Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) in February 2018. The ARB hearing date for the formal
application is targeted for February 15, 2018.
Fire Station 3 Replacement (PE-15003):
Summary: The new Fire Station 3 will replace the aging Fire Station 3 and will meet current California
Building Codes (CBC), Essential Services Building Seismic Safety Act, Americans with Disabilities Act
(ADA), National Fire Protection Association, and OSHA standards. Per City Council policy established in
2007, the building will be designed to attain LEED Silver Certification. A study in 2005 found “extensive
structural, code, and operational deficiencies,” and recommended replacement or significant upgrade.
Status: Construction of the new station officially began on January 8, 2018 and is scheduled to be
completed in January 2019. Fire Station 3 has temporarily relocated to a facility at 2000 Geng Road.
The crew co-locates with Fire Station 1 during daytime hours and resides at 2000 Geng Road in the
evenings.
Fire Station 4 Replacement (PE-18004):
Summary: The new Fire Station 4 will replace the aging Fire Station 4 and will meet current California
Building Codes, Essential Services Building Seismic Safety Act, American with Disabilities Act (ADA),
National Fire Protection Association, and OSHA standards. Per City Council policy established in 2007,
the building will be designed to attain LEED Silver Certification. A study in 2005 found “extensive
structural, code, and operational deficiencies,” and recommended replacement or significant upgrade.
Status: The design phase for the project is scheduled to begin in FY 2019.
Attachment B: Local Construction Cost Escalation
-8.00%
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2022
Attachment C: Council Infrastructure Plan Budgeted Funding Sources
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Public Safety Building $4.70 $52.25 $0.89 $56.95 $0.89 $57.84
California Avenue Garage $9.49 $0.49 $9.49 $0.49 $9.98
Fire Station No. 3 $6.00 $3.46 $8.73 $0.73 $9.46
Downtown Garage $9.07 $4.04 $0.56 $13.11 $0.56 $13.67
Fire Station No. 4 $7.50 $1.58 $5.57 $7.50 $0.39 $7.89
Highway 101 Bike Bridge $8.35 $1.00 $6.66 $14.00 $2.01 $16.01
Charleston/Arastradero
Corridor $1.55 $0.84 $1.45 $7.95 $10.80 $0.98 $11.78
Bike/Pedestrian Plan $12.40 $0.20 $7.40 $20.00 $0.25 $20.25
Byxbee Park $2.80 $0.19 $2.80 $0.19 $2.99
Contingency Funding $30.00 $30.00
Total $34.47 $2.80 $0.84 $4.04 $93.32 $10.00 $1.00 $33.15 $173.38 $6.50 $179.88
*Values Stated in Millions
FINANCE COMMITTEE
FINAL TRANSCRIPT MINUTES
Page 1 of 67
Regular Meeting
February 6, 2018
Chairperson Scharff called the meeting to order at 6:03 P.M. in the
Community Meeting Room, 250 Hamilton Avenue, Palo Alto, California.
Present: Filseth, Kou, Scharff (Chair), Tanaka
Absent:
Oral Communications
Chair Scharff: All right. Do we have any oral communications? I’m seeing
one member in the audience. No card?
Agenda Items
1. Review the Draft Transportation Impact Fee Nexus Study and
Recommend That the City Council Consider Adoption of an Ordinance
Based on Study Recommendations to Consolidate and Update the
City’s Transportation Impact Fee Program as Anticipated in the City’s
Comprehensive Plan Adopted on November 13, 2017.
Chair Scharff: Alright, you want to go with the first item, which is Review the
Draft Transportation Impact Fee Nexus Study and Recommend That City
Council Consider Adoption of an Ordinance Based on the Study’s
Recommendations to Consolidate and Update the City’s Transportation
Impact Fee Program as Anticipated in the City’s Comprehensive Plan
Adopted on November 3, 2017.
Hillary Gitelman, Director of Planning and Community Environment: Thank
you, Mr. Chair and Members of the Committee. Happy New Year. I’m Hillary
Gitelman, the Planning Director. I’m joined by Joshuah Mello, our Chief
Transportation Official and Jane Clayton from Hexagon Consultants. Sherry
Nikzat is also with us from our Staff. We’re here today to talk about this
Nexus Study we’ve prepared in anticipation of updating the City’s
Transportation Impact Fee Program. We thought we’d use a program similar
to what we, or a process we used similar to when we updated the Housing
Impact Fee. In that case we brought to the Finance Committee a Draft
Nexus Study, got questions and comments. We went back and did some
further work on it, came back to the Committee, and then got a
FINAL TRANSCRIPT MINUTES
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Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Transcript Minutes: 02/06/2018
MOTION PASSED: 4-0
2. Discussion on Infrastructure Plan Projects, Anticipated Costs and
Funding Levels, and Potential Direction on Next Steps Regarding
Project Priorities, Timing and Potential Funding Options.
Brad Eggleston, Assistant Director of Public Works: February 22 at the
Council Meeting about the Infrastructure Plan and the funding challenges
that we’re faced with. So, just kind of upfront, I’m going to review a few of
the more pertinent slides from the January 22 presentation pretty quickly,
and then turn it over to Kiely for some more of the presentation. So, this
slide we looked at a couple of weeks ago shows the funding sources from the
initial Infrastructure Plan with what we had in June of 2014, $136 million in
funding sources there. Key thing to point out again is, there’s a range of
sources, but about half of this is coming from the Transient Occupancy Tax,
including the voter approval increase from 2014 that’s supporting the plan.
And then this is the chart that shows kind of our current schedule of when
design and construction on the nine Infrastructure Plan projects would occur.
To reiterate again, that’s kind of under the assumption that all the funding
for all the projects was in place, which is, of course, what we’re discussing.
And I just point out that we may want to refer back to this chart as we have
the discussion with the Committee to identify projects that are not in process
yet, or early enough that we might consider them for deferring as part of the
overall strategy. And then, this is where we looked at kind of the bottom line
of where we think we stand right now in terms of what we have budgeted in
the projects and our current estimates and shortfall. So, you’ll see kind of
the bottom line there. We’re at about $180 million budgeted for the nine
projects, but our current estimates are at about $235 million, which leads to
that shortfall figure of $56 million. We pointed out in the report and at the
bottom of this slide that there is about $5.7 million in other funding that’s
been identified. They are from sources like parking in lieu funds that can
support the projects. So, essentially the gap that we’re facing right now on
the Infrastructure Plan is about $50 million, but then I would also point out
again that we’re in the design process, working through the Architectural
Review Board (ARB) review process on some of these big projects like the
Cal Ave garage and Public Safety Building, and those are in flux and I do
expect that we will likely see some more increase in estimates on those
projects.
Chair Scharff: I need to stop you there. Do you have a sense, are we talking
a 15 percent increase kind of thing, 20 percent, are we talking?
FINAL TRANSCRIPT MINUTES
Page 35 of 67
Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Transcript Minutes: 02/06/2018
Mr. Eggleston: I think we’re talking more like 5 to 10 percent.
Chair Scharff: Can you go through each of these projects and basically say,
like Public Safety Building, you think that probably goes up 10 percent, or
highway bike and bridge, you know, are we at 16.3 or do you think that’s…
Mr. Eggleston: I would be happy to do that.
Chair Scharff: I think that would be really helpful.
Mr. Eggleston: Sure. So, the Public Safety Building, we’ve recently been to
the ARB. We’ve got some significant changes to the design as a result of
that and we’re working on an updated cost estimate right now.
Chair Scharff: You do recall that we said you could come back to Council and
override the ARB if we thought it was appropriate?
Mr. Eggleston: I do recall, and we’re in the process just now of trying to
assess the increases. That’s one that I would estimate could increase
somewhere in the range of 5 to 10 percent, maybe less than 10 percent.
(crosstalk)
Chair Scharff: So, we’re talking about $4 to $10 million or $4 to $9 million?
Mr. Eggleston: I’m just giving you a sense of (interrupted)
Chair Scharff: No, no, I’m not going to hold you to it Brad. I’m not going to
come back and say – I’m just trying to think if we’re going to start thinking
about how much money we need to come up with, it’s good to have some
sense.
Mr. Eggleston: I understand. The bike/pedestrian bridge, I’m not anticipating
increases to that project. The bike/pedestrian plan, we’re not expecting
increases. Charleston/Arastradero Corridor, there may be a small increase to
that project, probably less than $1 million, although that’s also first phase of
that is out to bid, so very soon we’ll actually have some bid numbers to
compare to estimates. Byxbee Park project, design on that hasn’t even
begun yet and the scope is not clearly defined. The California Avenue
parking garage, that’s another one where I would expect to see probably
increases in the 5 to 10 percent range. Downtown parking garage, there’s no
FINAL TRANSCRIPT MINUTES
Page 36 of 67
Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Transcript Minutes: 02/06/2018
updated design on that at this time, so there could be changes in the future,
but I don’t think they would be very significant. Fire Station 3 replacement,
that is the one project of these that we’re kind of locked in, assuming all
goes well with our project that’s now under construction, we know the cost
of that project at $8.6 million. Fire Station 4 replacement, we haven’t even
begun design on this project yet, and that’s an old cost estimate number, so
when that does eventually move forward it will probably be significantly
higher.
Chair Scharff: When you say significant higher, any sense?
Mr. Eggleston: Well, let’s see, the Fire Station 3 and 4 estimates were
initially compiled at the same time, and we went from $6.7 on Fire Station 3
to $8.6.
Chair Scharff: So, another couple of million?
Mr. Eggleston: So, probably another couple million. And the last column
there is not a project, staff salaries and benefits.
Chair Scharff: Alright, thanks.
Vice Mayor Filseth: And the JMZ we just allocated another $3.5 million for
last night, and that’s not part of…
Kiely Nose, Budget Manager: We are getting there next, so good evening.
Council Member Tanaka: Well, there’s also the Ranger Pipeline Project,
right?
Ms. Nose: I’m sorry?
Council Member Tanaka: The Ranger Pipeline Project is, what $3 or $4
million over? Downtown.
Lalo Perez, Chief Financial Officer: University Parking. So, there’s some
General Fund component of it, but the majority of it is Enterprise Funds.
FINAL TRANSCRIPT MINUTES
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Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Transcript Minutes: 02/06/2018
Ms. Nose: Okay, so good evening. I’m going to continue this presentation
and actually layer on the questions the Committee is asking about. Those
competing priorities that we’re all aware of. We’ve tried to summarize them
for us here. So, first we obviously have what we’ve discussed at length,
which is the forecasted $2.6 million gap that we will be making sure we
balance towards in our Operating Budget in the General Fund. Additional
operating funding needs that are coming up over the near term include labor
agreements. So, the Committee is aware, we have probably about six
contracts that need to be negotiated over the next twelve months. We have
the unfunded liabilities that we want to address as an organization for both
pension and retiree healthcare. We are in the negotiation stages with a
number of service agreements, and so those may have operating costs and,
obviously, coming to the Finance Committee next meeting will be further
discussions about our parking programs and any enhancements to that on
the operating side. On the capital funding side, as the Committee alluded to
last night, the Council approved the Junior Museum and Zoo phase I, so
that’s that initial $4 million additional cost. Now, there’s also the potential
for phase II. You know, we have the animal shelter as an organization,
whether or not we want to replace that or just renovate it. Westside fencing,
the Parks Master Plan, probably in the $40 plus million range. The Cubberley
Master Plan, we’re just working on developing right now as opposed to, we
don’t necessarily know the future. We have a bunch of City-owned assets
upcoming, Roth building and Avenidas. So, overall on this slide, in the next
probably I would say one to three years, we have just by the ones that we
can identify now, at least $20 million, right. If you look at JMZ, animal
shelter, Westside fencing, Avenidas, and then you start to balloon out if you
add in the Parks Master Plan and narrow down exactly the focus of that. Is it
the 7.7 acres over at Foothill, is it the 10.5 acres at Baylands, etc. You start
ballooning out into much, much larger numbers. So, now that we’ve given
you all the problems, let’s look at some of the potential options. So, this is a
review again from January, when we discussed the Infrastructure Plan, so
obviously we can look at reprioritizing projects, both within the
Infrastructure Plan as well as other programmed capital projects. We will
continue to look at new revenues, so we’ve talked about new hotels that are
coming on line and that can generate additional tax revenues that we could
also leverage from a debt perspective. Or we could also look at tax
increases. One example is Transient Occupancy Tac (TOT), an increase in
that. So, for example, there is a rate, 1 percent is about $1.7 million.
Infrastructure specific plan options that we reviewed, again, as a Council and
Committee, just to refresh your memory. The $5.7 that Brad already alluded
to is very project-specific funding, so Impact Fees or in-lieu fees, I’m sorry,
and SB1 funding. Obviously, we could defer projects. So, if we look at those
FINAL TRANSCRIPT MINUTES
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Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Transcript Minutes: 02/06/2018
projects that are not yet under way, for example, Fire Station 4. Those two
new hotels, the Marriott Hotels, with the estimated TOT from them, the
additional capacity for debt issuance, assuming 70 percent of TOT, is 35
million on top of the TOT base of the $3.6 that the hotels would generate.
Obviously, we can look at draining the reserves in the General Capital Fund.
Chair Scharff: Did you just say, do we get the $3.6 on an ongoing basis, and
the $35 million?
Ms. Nose: You would get the $3.6 on an ongoing basis. That would be your
TOT receipts, but then you could also issue an additional $35 million in debt.
Chair Scharff: But you still get the $3.6 and $36 million?
Ms. Nose: Correct.
Chair Scharff: That’s the part that’s confusing me. (crosstalk) I thought you
get the $3.6 to pay the $35.
Ms. Nose: In the long term, yes.
Chair Scharff: So, you don’t get the $3.6? You pay off the $35 million with
the $3.6.
Mr. Perez: We would get the $3.6 and we would use 70 percent of that
amount.
Chair Scharff: We get 30 percent of the $3.6?
Mr. Perez: Yes.
Vice Mayor Filseth: Can I ask a question on that? So, your sort of multiplier
here, if I have a dollar then I can finance $10 worth of Capital Expenses. For
our good friends to the south, Measure B, the grade separation, they’re
using a multiplier of like 25 or 30, okay. What’s the difference? Okay, we’re
looking at 30 years and you might be looking at 10 or something like that.
Mr. Perez: I’m sorry. Try it again.
FINAL TRANSCRIPT MINUTES
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Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Transcript Minutes: 02/06/2018
Vice Mayor Filseth: All the financial estimates that I saw on, particularly the
grade separation, County-wide and so forth, suggested that they looked at
that and said, “If I have a dollar of revenue per year, then I can finance $25
or $30 of capital expenditures as opposed to 10. Why are they using
different numbers than we are?
Mr. Perez: So, it depends on credit rating, credit rate assumption. (crosstalk)
And the amount of leverage they use. So, we’re being conservative at 70
percent. So, somebody could argue that, you know, maybe we could go 80
or 85.
James Keene, City Manager: Or 150 percent.
Mr. Perez: So…
Vice Mayor Filseth: I saw a reference somewhere to 10 years’ worth of
horizon on it too. Is that an element to that? We’re looking at 10 and they’re
looking at 30, or something like that?
Mr. Perez: So, those are, you know, that’s another variable on the amount
of time that we’re looking at.
Chair Scharff: What are you looking at for this $35?
Mr. Perez: For this $35 it would be a 20 year.
Chair Scharff: So, it’s 20 years? And if you went 30 years?
Mr. Perez: It’s a bigger number.
Chair Scharff: It’s a bigger number. So, maybe they’re doing 30 years.
Mr. Keene: And our ratio is more like 1 to 14, right?
Mr. Perez: That’s correct.
Vice Mayor Filseth: Oh, because you get 7 percent on it?
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Mr. Perez: So, you know, and we believe that that’s prudent, at least from
my perspective, because if you do have a downturn, then you’re not
counting on the operating in front to pick it up.
Ms. Nose: Okay, so I think moving on, kind of just providing a list to the
Committee of other financial options in terms of raising revenues, there’s a
list of potential ballot measures we can explore and discuss further, in terms
of estimates, options, timing, etc. And so, we have obviously property tax
increase, and to that would be a bond issuance. You could do a parcel tax.
You could increase TOT’s as we previously discussed. Documentary transfer
tax, we could increase that rate. Utility Users Tax, we modernized it. You will
recall that the Council approved a reduction in the rate. We’ve broadened
the base, but also reduced the rate. Business license tax, the City does not
have. And then we can also continue to increase sales tax, up to our cap.
There is a cap that we are, as a local agency, able to hit.
Mr. Keene: How much is left in there? I mean, is it 0.25 or is it?
Ms. Nose: I want to say it’s about a quarter percent that we have left in
capacity. And then this concludes our presentation, but ultimately, I think
the goal with the Committee tonight is to discuss all of these priorities, hear
your thoughts and feedback and, oh, I have another slide. Next steps. So,
tonight we’re going to discuss and prioritize the Committee’s feedback, both
of the funding options as well as on the expense side, the projects, the draw
so to speak. We hope to return back to the Committee in March to review
potential funding strategies, let us do our homework and come back to you
guys more educated. Sometime in April continue to work on infrastructure.
We also know we need to come back to the Committee on pensions, a new
policy surrounding that. We will have hearings in May with the Committee to
go over the FY19 City Manager proposed budget. And then we still have June
to have City Council actions. Obviously, we will have budgeted option then,
but any other further actions that we need to take. So, this is obviously a
very high-level timeline. We’re open to feedback and conversation,
depending on where this discussion goes. With that I will turn it back to the
Chair.
Chair Scharff: So, I see it as there are really two buckets here. There’s the
bucket of infrastructure projects that we’ve been talking about and that
we’ve told the voters we would do. We’re talking about finishing the Public
Safety Building, the garages, the bike bridge, the fire station and some
pedestrian and bicycle improvements, which we’ve already done some of the
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pedestrian and bicycle improvements. And, I don’t have the numbers in
front of me. It actually would have been helpful, but our shortfall…
Mr. Keene: It’s $56 million right now in the Infrastructure Plan.
Chair Scharff: So, wait, I think it’s $56 million, but I think we need to be, I
think we should add 15 percent to that. I was listening to Brad and most of
his things were 5 to 10 percent, and it’s probably prudent to have another 5
percent in there for some of that stuff. I don’t know if you think that. I
mean, if we’re going to start talking about which numbers to figure out how
to solve, you don’t want to solve for $56 million and then be short another,
you know, $9 million on the Public Safety Building, $1 million, that’s 10. You
start adding it up and it starts to really come up. So, you know, if you’re at
$56 million and you add 15 percent, what would you be at? Seventy million,
right? So, that’s my sense of what we should think about raising for that
bucket. And, you know, when I say raising, the other thing we can do is we
can look at deferring. I mean, there are those other things. But I think it’s a
$70 million shortfall, and you know, the Byxbee Park thing, I’m really
concerned about that number. I think it would be great if you could give us a
better number on that, and I don’t know how easy it is to do, but that was
done a long time ago too, and everything else went up 50 percent, so?
Mr. Eggleston: Can I say a couple of quick things about that? One is that
that was based on an overall concept for the park and now a lot of work has
been done, kind of as part of the closure of the landfill. I think the Council
has even seen some presentations and photos of things that look really nice.
Ultimately, the work that gets done out there could be, could cost
significantly less than this $2.8 million. But the one other thing I would like
to say is, it’s completely funded through Parks Development Impact Fees, so
it’s not really fungible with the rest of this plan and the issues we face.
Chair Scharff: Okay, that’s good to know. So, we really don’t have to worry
about that.
Mr. Eggleston: I would agree with that.
Mr. Keene: So, I think there’s two – I mean, if you were to say $70 million is
the number, you’ve run that $70 million on the entire base of the projects
that are in there. If you did choose to defer some projects, you may want to
decide whether or not you deduct them and then run that percentage, or
just stay overall with the $70 million. That being said, Kiely even identified
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some of the near known other issues that are out there, animal shelter, the
JMZ, that’s another $20 million.
Chair Scharff: I was going to say, I view this as solving one problem. And
then I do think we have to decide as a Committee, and we have a great
opportunity, frankly, to say, okay, we have the animal shelter, we have the
History Museum, we have the second phase of JMZ. There’s a whole bunch
of buckets, and what I would like to see staff do is put those buckets
together with numbers, and we can think about how to fund these things
separately, and if we want to fund them. I mean, that’s really the nexus.
And I think we should think about some of the Parks Master Plan and stuff.
If we do go to the voters, you know, last time we did this, what we did is we
had staff poll. What we should do, we put different things together. We said,
if we mix fire stations with, fire stations were popular, bike and pedestrian
improvements were popular. History Museum was very unpopular. Parking
garages were like at 50 percent of the people said they would vote for it.
You know, so, there were different things that were more popular and when
you put these things together in different buckets when you went to the
voters, you got different poll results, frankly. And so, and different taxes.
TOT taxes are wildly popular in Palo Alto, it passed at 78 percent. You are
very likely to pass that. Other taxes, you know, were less popular and some
of the taxes, like bond measures, require two-thirds majority. So, what I
think we need them to do is to come back to us with getting some polling
people to talk to us about how polling works, how we create a measure, how
we look at that, look at what kind of taxes. And, I think we all have to agree
that there are really only two ways to fund the infrastructure. We need to,
we’re going to need to put a measure on the ballot if we’re going to fund
this. Otherwise, I don’t’ see how we get to $70 million frankly, to do it. Now,
on the $70 million, we could say that the Marriott Hotels, that would take off
35 of that, right? At which point you need to raise about $35 million, which
seems a lot more manageable than $70 million. So, I don’t know if, I mean,
that’s something we can discuss, but that’s an obviously easy way to say,
and when we talked about the Infrastructure Plan, we did talk about new
hotels would go to the Infrastructure Plan. And so, I think that’s really a no
brainer to say, let’s make the Marriott Hotels fund the infrastructure. That
gives us 35 million, and then we basically need to close the other $35
million. We can talk about if we want to cut stuff. We can talk about what we
should go to the voters for, what that should look like, and how much money
we should raise. And then I think we should talk about a separate measure,
frankly, to fund – and we could mix and match the two, if we wanted to and
we might decide to do that as a Committee, to fund the other amount of
money on a different measure that does it. Because some of those things
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could be more popular, but we’re going to have to figure out from polling
what’s popular and what’s not popular. I mean, I have a gut sense of it, but
I could be wrong. Things could have changed. I’m basing it on what we
polled the last time we did the infrastructure stuff. So, anyway, with that I’ll
turn it over to Jim.
Mr. Keene: Thank you. A couple of comments. From the Staff point of view,
I think it’s pretty clear that the Council has given us a directive as it relates
to this core Infrastructure Plan. That’s sort of a policy direction that we
have. And, you know, we would generally be focused on how to accomplish
that, or accomplish as much of it as we possibly can with available funding
sources. On that second bunch of items, while clearly we can see that there
is a need, I think those do need some, those really need the direction from
the Committee and the Council at this stage to say, you know, we’re really
interested in this. We want you to look at how you can, how we include it.
For example, last night you essentially gave us that direction on the JMZ as
it relates to closing the gap. So, the consideration of how to come up with
that $4 million gap, that would be something that we could be working on
with the Committee. But things like the animal shelter, what to do, I think
those are some directives we would want to get from you all to say, do we
want to consider including those as near-term projects, and if so, how would
we also sort of poll the community and whatever to see whether or not there
are, whether there is an appetite for funding or supporting those. There
would probably be a few other of these items. Kiely, I don’t know if we can
put the schedule up that we had, the simple schedule for the ones. A couple
of items like the JMZ that will naturally be progressing and come forward;
for example, the Avenidas Project, we’re coming back to the Council in
March and we will have some suggestions as to how you could fund that $5
million gap. But for the most part, I do think that the Committee, the reason
I asked for that schedule is, by the time we get into this March 2018 period,
how do we start to assess what the possible package is, which means us, as
the Chair said, working with the pollsters that we’ve used to sort of assess
what the possibilities for those things are. And then that being said, I just
would say, if there is any ballot measure item that the Council ends up
recommending, they really need to do that by the end of June, when you go
on recess, because pretty much the first week in August we would have to
have everything ready for the election cycle to be able to meet the 2018
ballot. So, I do think in the next two months, clearly you need to at least
say, here’s the universe of projects that we think are worthwhile and viable.
Here’s the approximate scope of the costs. And then look at how we would
test how to fund some things. I do think that there is, we should still expect
that we should be focusing on value engineering these projects still as much
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as we can, without undermining them. And, being open to considering to
deferring some projects and just saying maybe it’s not the time to do those.
I mean, I made the point repeatedly that I think Fire Station 4 could be
deferred, and we certainly have a lot of challenges right now with
Charleston/Arastradero, even where the funding is. You know, those may be
other things that you want to be thinking about too. We did run, we did get
some data from the, during the Rail Committee process on a range of
different yields on different revenue sources that we could also provide the
Committee, but I would say in a general sense, just even seeing what you
saw with TOT and that sort of thing, and what these numbers are, if you
leave things like Cubberley and the Parks Master Plan, or something which
could be really, I mean, depending upon the scale, could be really big
expenditures. I mean, I’m just making it up. They could each be over $50
million. I mean, depending upon the scale of them over time. But if you
don’t, and we’re not really ready to deal with Cubberley, if you look at most
of the rest of these things and the gap that you have in the main
Infrastructure Plan, to me those seem achievable by different combinations
of revenues, to be able to maintain our course on that. We’ll have to see
ultimately where the community would be. My thoughts.
Chair Scharff: I agree with all of those thoughts. Comments, questions?
Vice Mayor Filseth: I was going to ask about the Charleston/Arastradero
Plan, but I think you touched on it.
Chair Scharff: Alright. Comments, questions?
Council Member Tanaka: So, one question I have is, from like the long-range
forecast, aren’t you already including in the Marriott numbers as future
revenue, to make sure that we are able to balance our budgets in those
future years?
Ms. Nose: We have not included these two hotels specifically.
Council Member Tanaka: So, on the long-range financial forecast, there is no
money at all?
Ms. Nose: Not associated with these two new.
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Council Member Tanaka: Okay. Because I’m just trying to make sure that
we’re not double counting.
Ms. Nose: You and me both, thank you.
Chair Scharff: That’s a great question.
Council Member Tanaka: Okay. And then, what about the grade separations?
Like funding that?
Chair Scharff: So, I’ll answer that since I’m on the Rail Committee. Well, you
were on the Rail Committee. You can answer it too. (crosstalk) So, where we
are on grade separations is, we’re talking about ballot measures for this
year. I do not believe that they were even close to coming up with a ballot
measure for grade separations. We’re going to have to choose a preferred
alternative. We’re not going to do that before, until at least the end of the
year, and I think that’s aggressive. If we can choose a preferred alternative
on Rail by the end of the year, I think we’d have done a great job this year
and be good. And once we have the preferred alternative, then you move
into the phase of how we fund it, because then you could start to figure out
how much money are we talking about. And right now, the different
alternatives range from let’s say over a billion dollars for what I call the
mini-trench down in Charleston and Meadow to, you know, $4 billion if you
did a full tunnel. So, something along those ranges. So, the point is that I
don’t believe that in this Committee or now is really the time to worry about
how to spend that. That’s probably a different election cycle, once we know
what we want to do.
Mr. Keene: I can just say one thing from many, many years of experience in
going to the ballot, and I’m sure that any of the consultants, if we bring
FM3, who is sort of our go-to firm, would tell you that it’s generally really
hard to get a successful vote if you don’t have a clearly identified project
and purpose and be able to really explain how it’s going to be used and what
the benefits are. So, we really have got to work through the winnowing
down process in the Rail Committee on the grade separation issue. And even
though there are huge demands for meeting a construction schedule in the
2020 decade, I think that when we discuss this with the Rail Committee, it
will be pretty clear that there’s not an urgency for us to have revenues
available before 2020 anyway.
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Chair Scharff: You know, and I think we should address Cubberley upfront
too. I also don’t believe we should talk about Cubberley in terms of this. I
think Cubberley we have the same issue. We do not yet have a plan with the
school district or how we want to spend the money, and so, I think that’s
beyond the scope of this.
Mr. Perez: Just to remind you, the lease is up in 2020, so we still need to
negotiate even that piece before we get to the Master Plan.
Chair Scharff: Now in the Parks and Rec Master Plan, I actually think there
are elements of the Park Master Plan that we should possibly think about
funding. I mean, we have the ten acres, frankly, you know. Every time we
delay on that, a generation of children are not getting to use that ten acres.
So, I mean, I do think that we should think about some of those things. I’m
not sure, I would actually like to see Rob and it’s what, Kristen, working with
the Parks and Rec Committee, starting to put together a list of projects that
they believe are well defined, clearly articulated, you know, that we could
think about funding.
Mr. Keene: I’m sure they would enjoy that.
Council Member Kou: So, the $56 million, it takes into account all the grants
that is mentioned here for each of the projects?
Ms. Nose: That’s correct.
Chair Scharff: So, the other thing we might want to do, and I got this from
Council Member Filseth, or Vice Mayor Filseth, was, there is certain
opportunities to buy park land, and we don’t have enough park land, right?
There was that seven acres or?
Vice Mayor Filseth: There’s the one acre AT&T.
Chair Scharff: Right, the one acre AT&T Park I was thinking of, and it might
be nice if we had a fund where we had money to buy that. Because I know a
lot of people want to buy that site. So, I don’t know where we are as a City
in thinking about the ability to buy that. But it’s something like those kinds
of things, we should, when Staff puts together a list of projects, we should
think about the things that people have really talked about that they want.
And I know that AT&T site has come up many times.
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Mr. Perez: We’re monitoring that situation. They have put forward their
realignment of the lot, and it’s going through that process. It’s not final. Just
to remind you what they told us is that they expect a competitive process.
What we asked is that since we’re are a public agency, that they try to give
us some heads up so we can react accordingly.
Chair Scharff: We also have the power of Eminent Domaine, and I think the
power of Eminent Domaine for parks and something like that, is absolutely
something we should consider.
Mr. Perez: In terms of funding, not to get too specific with this one, but
some of the things that I think Staff would recommend to you is to look at
some of your stranded assets. You have a couple of lots in Middle Field that
are not being utilized. They are in a residential area, that you could consider
selling to purchase park land, so, for example.
Chair Scharff: That might be smart.
Council Member Kou: So, I remember Santa Clara’s Supervisor (not
understood). They had a fund for Magical Bridge, if you were going to do a
park like Magical Bridge. Would that be something that we might, I mean, is
there funds still available? Would we be able to use that and get a grant for
that parcel that you were mentioning?
Mr. Perez: Let us follow up. I did read that there was an appropriation
specifically set up, but I don’t know what the criteria is for those particular
uses, but it’s related to the concept of the Magical Bridge. So, let us look
into it and see what that criteria are and see if we would be able to
participate in that process.
Council Member Kou: That would be super.
Chair Scharff: So, I think in terms of next steps, Staff, for March, when you
come back in March, are you coming back with a polling firm or is that too
early to do that? To start to explain what they want to do?
Mr. Keene: I think we could do that. I mean, it’s for your direction. I can tell
you that we don’t need Council authorization to engage with a polling firm. I
mean, the cost of that is within the authority of the City Manager’s
contracting authority, and that’s typically the way we’ve done it in the past.
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So, we would be good to get your, even your direction that you’re interested
in us doing that for sure, and we could be ready to have them come back
and talk to you about the process. I mean, some of you are familiar with
working with these firms. Some of you will be new, but I think it will be
interesting and educational, and they will be able to give you a lot of
perspective, not only on what it takes for things to be successful, but what’s
the general mood of the electorate, how do things work in a general election
that’s a non-presidential election. To what extent do you have to be
concerned about ballot fatigue or whatever and all of those kinds of things.
Vice Mayor Filseth: I would be comfortable giving Staff a nod on that one
now.
Chair Scharff: I would too. So, let’s talk about it overall and see if we can
come to an agreement on what we should do. Staff should come back with a
polling firm. You’ve got the direction on that if we’re all in agreement. I don’t
know, are we all in agreement?
Council Member Tanaka: I have some comments. Are we doing questions or
comments?
Chair Scharff: You can do either. Go ahead.
Council Member Tanaka: I thought about what the City Manager said in
terms of the need to value engineer and prioritize, and I think before we go
out and ask our citizens for more taxes, I think we owe it to ourselves to
really make sure that we have really thought hard about these projects and
prioritize them, that we value engineer the heck out of them, before we ask
people to open up their pocketbooks, because the feeling I have is that a lot
of people already feel like they pay a lot of taxes, right? If you look at the
property tax bill, their like, wow, this is a lot of money. And, you know, I feel
also that I’m not necessarily sure that the City is as optimal as it could be in
terms of getting bids and getting contracts, so I think we need to get a
better handle on that before I would be in favor of increasing our taxes. Oh,
one other question I just thought of, which is, so where was the Marriott
money allocated to before? Where did you put it?
Ms. Nose: For the new hotels?
Council Member Tanaka: Yeah.
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Ms. Nose: We didn’t include it.
Council Member Tanaka: Anywhere.
Ms. Nose: No.
Mr. Keene: It doesn’t exist yet.
Ms. Nose: It’s not alive yet.
Chair Scharff: Okay. I agree with Council Member Tanaka in that we need to
really look hard at value engineering, look hard at making sure that we are
doing the best we can on that kind of stuff. I think we all would probably
believe that. Council Member Kou.
Council Member Kou: Just another thing. You know, on Table 3, I believe, I
was wondering if there was any way to add another column in there to show
what the grants are, so that we know how much actually, you know,
updated conceptual over here for the Public Safety, but, well, that one is not
a good one because it doesn’t have grants. Charleston/Arastradero, for
example. I understand 4 million is what we have to come up with, or is that
the gap?
Mr. Eggleston: I don’t believe that Table 3 is not trying to show what the
current gap is. Unless I’ve got the tables mixed up. (crosstalk) I think that
would be Table 5.
Council Member Kou: Okay. I’m not specifically talking about the gap, but
more, just basically more columns to show, okay, if the whole cost is 10
million, then what is our portion and what is the grant portion?
Mr. Eggleston: I understand.
Vice Mayor Filseth: Can I try to rephrase this to explain it? Because I think
it’s a really good question, which is, you know, we’re looking at these and
we’re going to say, Gee, if we push this one out a few years we would save
this much money. But I think what Council Member Kou is asking is, is that
really true, because some of these things may have money earmarked for
them that’s not fungible to other things.
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Mr. Eggleston: So, like a great example would be the Highway 101
bike/pedestrian bridge, where we’re saying it’s a $16.3 million project, but
we have $8.35 million in grants and a $1 million currently from Google
supporting that.
Vice Mayor Filseth: So, you couldn’t just free up $16 million by saying, you
know, we’re going to do that in 2023.
Council Member Kou: It kind of will help, you know, when we’re looking
through this, so we know exactly the funds that we have to show (crosstalk)
if we could have that. And then also, another thing I was looking at, on the
Packet Page 62. I mean, it’s great that you have all the design steps. So, is
there any way that you would be able to kind of provide an average from
conceptual design to actually awarding the contract? What is the average
delta that you see at these projects, and if you might be able to also add it
in so we can kind of factor it in when we’re reading all of this in the table. I
don’t know if that’s too much. I mean, you know, an average, because
obviously we see that from when in 2012 you guys decided, when we
decided on the project a lot has changed in the pricing. As a matter of fact,
as I was looking at the infrastructure costs, it was like a lot of them were
half more than it was back then.
Mr. Eggleston: That’s right. And so, is what you’re looking for where we get
from conceptual at the beginning, like all the way to the end, where we have
that?
Council Member Kou: To when we award the contract to whichever
contractor we’re going to be using. Is that possible to get that?
Mr. Eggleston: We can do that. Are you thinking just for these projects?
Because we can do that. The issue right now is that only one of them is so
far at the point where we think we have the final costs. The Fire Station 3
Project that I was mentioning.
Council Member Kou: The reason I asked for that, even the ones that
haven’t, you know, does not have the actual costs, if you could include that
number in there, then we can see far down the line what it increases to.
Does that make sense?
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Ms. Nose: I think I understand what you’re saying. What I think you’re
actually seeing is also just an evolution of Staff’s ability to forecast these
costs.
Council Member Kou: And the rising costs.
Ms. Nose: Right. And they have become, to Brad and his team’s credit, have
become more sophisticated in projecting these costs and not, you know, he’s
able to give us those estimates of, these are the costs for every month that’s
going to compound if it delays. And so, I guess, what I’m trying to say is,
naturally you shouldn’t see that significant of a change across this process to
the extent your scope stays the same, and you built in the right
contingencies from the get go. And I think as a whole and the timing, right?
So, the inflation costs. As a whole the PW Team is working on has done a
really good job of revising how they do this. So, these new costs are looking
at not only just current-day estimates, but when it’s going to happen, the
rise in inflation costs between now and when the project is going to happen.
Council Member Kou: So, it’s already been looked at, it’s factored in?
Ms. Nose: We’re actively looking at it I would say. I don’t want to say that
it’s perfect, because when this chart gets completed on every one of these
projects, and the costs continue to escalate from today all the way through,
I want to be on record saying that they won’t. But I do think that the PW
Team as a whole is becoming much more sophisticated as they’re working
their way through these projects, so that Council has a much better idea of
the estimated costs of them across the forecasted period.
Council Member Kou: Thank you.
Council Member Tanaka: So, I was just looking at slide 4 again, and Council
Member Kou kind of made me think about this. So, we have Staff salary and
benefits at $6.5 million, correct?
Ms. Nose: Correct.
Council Member Tanaka: Is that allocated across all the projects above
there, or is there a Staff salary and benefits in some of these other
numbers?
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Ms. Nose: I’ll look for it.
Mr. Eggleston: It’s allocated throughout all the projects.
Council Member Tanaka: But we have this additional $6.5 here as well?
Mr. Eggleston: No, the $6.5 is, essentially, if you were to go to the Budget
Document, you would see numbers that are different than what we show
you and currently budgeted because they would include the Staff salaries
and benefits. But to make it easier to actually compare these figures to the
original Infrastructure Plan figures from 2014, which did not include Staff
salaries and benefits, we’ve shown it this way. So, you’re able to compare
the current estimate to the original estimate, but still see on the bottom line
what the total Staff salaries and benefits figure is.
Council Member Tanaka: I see. Do you know what is the percentage of the
Staff salaries and benefits is for each project? Because I wonder like for
projects like the 101 bike bridge, which has been going on for a long time,
that might have like a very significant chunk of Staff costs, versus some
other ones might be very little.
Mr. Eggleston: We could show that, and I agree with you, it does vary
widely. So, for instance, on a project like Fire Station 3, we add funding, we
went through the design process, and here we are, it’s under construction. I
don’t think we’ve spent that much on salaries and benefits. On the Bike
Bridge Project it’s had starts and stops and a lot of time invested in the
design competition, and it has a much higher salaries and benefits figure.
Mr. Keene: Just so we’re clear, this is, these are budget plans for the
projects, which include projected costs for the project, for the remainder of
the project and it would also include costs that have already been paid to a
project to the extent you have had Staff already working on it. So, it is
designed to be the total cost of the Staff time allocated to this set of projects
essentially from beginning to completion.
Chair Scharff: So, do you want to follow up on that? You look like you do.
Vice Mayor Filseth: I do, but I’m waiting to see…
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Council Member Tanaka: So, just to be clear, (crosstalk). So, just to be
clear, the $6.5 is all the Staff cost that has ever been incurred, and ever will
be incurred for these projects? Is that the way to think about that?
Mr. Perez: But it wouldn’t be an obsolete number because it could change. I
think (crosstalk) Right. You know, if for example you ask us to redesign
something, then we would have to add additional.
Council Member Tanaka: I understand that. I mean for at least the
foreseeable future it’s $6.5. That’s been all the costs so far and all the costs
it would be in the future, assuming nothing else changes.
Mr. Keene: That’s correct.
Council Member Tanaka: But what’s missing here is that we don’t know that
maybe some projects like the bridge might be, like a huge percentage, and
some other ones like the fire station, might be a small percentage, right?
Ms. Nose: Correct.
Council Member Tanaka: When could you guys provide the percentages?
Chair Scharff: Yeah, I’d like to see that too. Also, I’m really curious on some
of this, on the Staff costs. So, let’s say the Charleston/Arastradero Project
has been around, I think, since I was born. So, there must be a ton of Staff
time that’s gone into that back and forth. If we decide not to do that, what
happens to those Staff costs?
Mr. Eggleston: Those would become a sunk cost.
Mr. Keene: We would be booking those costs against those projects when we
close them out.
Chair Scharff: But, how does that work? Because there’s no money then. So,
we say we’re saving, so we say you have $3 million, I’m making it up
obviously, in Charleston/Arastradero and we decide not to do it. And then we
say, okay, we’ve now saved $15 million off our Infrastructure Plan, but
you’ve already spent that. You’ve paid those salaries. You’ve done all of
that, so what happens to the $6.5 million? I’ve always thought this was on a
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going-forward basis of Staff costs, not a looking back, because who do we
pay back? The General Fund suddenly gets the money back?
Mr. Eggleston: It’s not just the salaries and benefits. These figures are not
just looking forward. They include all of the soft costs like design services,
that have already been incurred on the projects.
Chair Scharff: So, if we’ve incurred money on the projects, I mean, I guess
I’d like to look and see what we still need to incur. Because that’s what we
have to raise. If we’ve spent the money, we spent the money. And I don’t
understand who we pay back by putting it in here? I guess that’s what I’m
trying to understand.
Mr. Keene: So, one of the things is the budgeted versus current estimates is
just the Budget Plan and estimates. It’s not an accounting for what we’ve
spent. We don’t have a column in here that would say, Expenses To Date, in
each one of these projects, which we also do have. The fact is, I mean, we
do not account to the quarter of an hour of Staff time on every project. We
basically use a general kind of cost allocation model. (crosstalk) Well, and
that degree of extra accounting has its own cost to it that compounds all of
the pricing.
Chair Scharff: Ask Terence. I bet he’s older than he looks.
Mr. Eggleston: Can I make one more point on the salaries and benefits issue
is just that what the question about salaries and benefits in each project, if
you look at Attachment C to the Staff Report, we’ve actually provided a table
that does show that project by project.
Chair Scharff: That’s C, right?
Mr. Eggleston: I think it’s the very last page of the report.
Chair Scharff: Why does yours look more useful? Mine is small.
Mr. Eggleston: I am looking at the printout of the report from January 22, so
maybe there was a mistake in the printing.
Chair Scharff: The reason I was going there was all I wanted to know was,
how much more money do we need?
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Mr. Eggleston: Are you asking, Chair, specifically about that project right
now, or just when we come back you would like to have that?
Chair Scharff: I’d like to know how much money we need.
Mr. Eggleston: Another way of saying that would be, how much do we save
if we removed a project or deferred it?
Mr. Perez: Just a little background. We used to have all the salary and
benefits charged to one Capital Project and not allocated to projects, but
maybe six years ago, Finance Committee said, no, we’d like to see the
allocation at least for the current projects, so that’s how this originated.
Mr. Keene: Just so we’re clear, these are the direct costs for the projects.
We don’t do allocated overhead charges. So, for example, the fact that we’re
all in here sitting with you guys, talking about this right now, we’re not
billing our time to the project. It’s not part of it.
Chair Scharff: Alright, any questions?
Mr. Keene: We keep a running tally of our allocated charges, but we don’t
actually book.
Chair Scharff: So, I think the other thing I think we just wanted to briefly, I
wanted to briefly talk about is, you have a list of different ballot measure
options here. I’m not sure this is the meeting where we bring that down, but
I think, for instance, for the Infrastructure Plan and for the other, and for
what I would call the Community Projects, the Business License Tax is
probably not the right one. We’ve been talking about using a Business
License Tax to fund transportation at some point, and so I’m not sure that’s
the right one, but, we can obviously talk about it. I’m not sure the Sales Tax
increase is the right one either for those two things. And the reason I say
that is that the sooner we narrow down these, the easier it is to have the
polling, to have all of that. So, I don’t think we should have Staff spend a lot
of time on ones that the Committee, the four of us, are not interested in,
looking at, for those two measures. Not to say that we wouldn’t use these
for other things, but that’s – I mean for parks and for a lot of the community
stuff, Property Tax may make sense. Parcel Tax may make sense. I don’t
know. I do think our Documentary Transfer Tax is low compared to other
cities. I know I’ve seen stuff like that. I’m not necessarily advocating for that
either, but I mean, I think Staff should come back, look at these and make
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some suggestions when they come back to us in March about that, and we
as a Committee could think about what we want to do. But I don’t think we
want to go through every single possible tax and have Staff spend the time
and effort to do that, if we’re not going to do that. Utility Users’ Tax, for
instance, we just went to the voters on that. I don’t know, it seems a reach
to ask the voters again now to raise that, but I could be wrong. This is sort
of a gut sense, but I do think we need to think about that and make that
decision fairly quickly.
Vice Mayor Filseth: Well, the fundamental issue behind the $50, $60, $70
million gap, construction costs are going up in the Bay Area. I mean, it’s
getting more and more expensive to live here, as the area generates more
wealth and more people come here, but the amount of land remains the
same. So, in my mind, we’re all as a community just going to have to accept
it’s going to cost us more to get these kinds of things. So, whether it’s, I
mean, I think you raise an interesting point for thought as to which kinds of
revenue and so forth. But, at some level we have to have the expectation
that if we want these kinds of things, then we’re going to have to pay more
for them because of the dynamics and the boom in the Silicon Valley, and so
at some level that’s going to affect whether it’s a business tax or a sales tax
or a parcel tax or, you know, a hotel tax or whatever. A Utility Users’ Tax,
even though we went out to them last year for a Utility Users’ Tax, that’s the
way it is, right?
Chair Scharff: Right. My point was more that I think we should take the time
when we leave here, I wanted to focus people that these are the different
taxes. We should come to a discussion, I don’t think we should make a
decision tonight, obviously. I’m saying we should think about it. I wanted to
focus everyone that these were what Staff was thinking of in different taxes,
and we should have that discussion.
Vice Mayor Filseth: You’ve asked a question that I’m going to go think about,
which is, we’re used to thinking about this as, okay, well, how would we
fund this and so forth. Well, the other end of that is, well, this kind of lever
and that kind of lever, what’s the appropriate uses for those kinds of levers?
I haven’t thought about that, and I’m going to go think about that.
Chair Scharff: And it’s also, there’s a practical aspect to it of different taxes
are received differently by the voters, and at the end of the day, we have to
get 51 percent for some taxes and two-thirds for other taxes, you know, and
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that plays a big role in it, because you’ve got to win. Otherwise, you get
nothing.
Council Member Kou: So, which ones are the 51 and which ones are the
two-thirds?
Mr. Perez: As long as they’re general.
Chair Scharff: I believe as long as they’re general, right?
Mr. Perez: You get a simple majority.
Chair Scharff: But not on a bond. You can’t do a simple majority bond, can
you? I though bonds were always two-thirds.
Mr. Perez: GO’s two-thirds.
Mr. Keene: So, they are two-thirds on the bonds, Property Tax typically, or
the Parcel Tax.
Chair Scharff: So, Parcel Tax and Property Tax are typically two-thirds,
right?
Mr. Keene: Yeah.
Chair Scharff: That’s what I thought.
Mr. Keene: All the others for the most part are, if we use it for general
purpose as opposed to a specific purpose, it’s 50 percent. However, if we
were to just, for example say, we wanted to go out for a tax to fund the
Public Safety Building just in and of itself, that would be for a special
purpose. That would need a two-thirds.
Chair Scharff: But we would never do that. What we would say is, here’s the
advisory measure. This is what we’re going to spend it on. That’s what we’ve
always done. And I don’t think, I would say I don’t want to spend any time
on this Committee saying that we should go out for a two-thirds tax when
we can put in a 50 percent tax by simply having an advisory measure.
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Mr. Keene: And those are things, when we bring in our consultants who can
kind of give you a lot of texture and details on how all of these things work
and what the pros and cons of them are and if you want a particular way,
what’s the best way to structure it to be effective.
Chair Scharff: Do you guys feel like you have enough direction from us, or
do you need more direction?
Mr. Keene: I would say one thing. I do agree with Council Member Tanaka’s
comments that it’s important that we kind of pursue all options. I would also
say, though, that we can’t do this in an entirely linear process. We have to
do some parallel work, and then it doesn’t mean you make a decision by us
doing this work. We’re going to get at some point down the road, and then
you will maybe have enough convergence between value engineering,
potential realignment of priorities and what the revenue streams are to be
able to make that decision. But, we would need to pursue gathering data on
sort of what the public response would be to projects and all of those things
in polling concurrent with, as we’re working on value engineering, some of t
hose other things. Because some of the projects just aren’t far enough along
for us to maximize what we would do in value engineering for example.
Mr. Perez: I think the only clarity that might help us is on the ballot measure
option, if there’s an item there that you definitely don’t want us to pursue, it
would save us time. Because we’re trying to work on the budget as well, at
the same time.
Chair Scharff: Correct, and I think we can make that decision in March. I
didn’t want to force people to try to make that decision tonight.
Mr. Perez: Fair enough.
Chair Scharff: I do think you need to come back to us a little bit, with a little
bit of information. I’m not sure if everyone has information. Like I’d like to
know where we are compared to other cities, and are other cities going out
on Documentary Transfer Taxes recently? I want Staff to think a little bit
about this. I mean, Utility Users’ Tax, is this a good time to go out for that?
And maybe it’s just a polling question. What are we likely to win on? What
are we likely to get to get this stuff passed on?
Mr. Perez: We can provide you that. We’ve done some preliminary research,
for example, on the TOT increase, and we’re on the high end. Now, there’s
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an asterisk on that because there’s other add-on taxes, a Tourism Tax, for
example, on hotels. So, there’s other components of how others have done
it, but we can do that and we can give you a comparison on Documentary
Transfer Tax. Some cities in the County, for example, don’t have it, others
do and what do they have and how do we compare to others in the
peninsula.
Chair Scharff: Give us some cities that have recently started going out to
raise their Documentary Transfer Tax.
Mr. Perez: Yes, and right now, just to remind you, it’s $3.30 per thousand.
That’s what it is.
Vice Mayor Filseth: That’s probably a useful exercise, don’t you think. That’s
probably the one that sort of strikes most of us as sort of maybe one of the
most likely.
Chair Scharff: To me, the TOT, the Documentary Transfer Tax, possibly a
Utility Users’ Tax, are interesting, and for funding parks and that kind of
stuff, maybe some sort of Parcel Tax or Property Tax, but I’m concerned that
it’s two-thirds, and I think that’s a really high bar.
Mr. Perez: It’s a simple majority if you keep it general.
Chair Scharff: Okay, so we can keep it general and still do a Property Tax
increase?
Mr. Perez: It’s when you do a special tax then it becomes a super majority.
Chair Scharff: So, those are the ones that interest me, the Property Tax, the
Parcel Tax, TOT, Documentary Transfer Tax, Utility Users’ Tax for those
items, and I think if we were doing transportation, and a Sales Tax increase
is an interesting one, but I think we should save that for something else. I’m
not sure what, but I don’t know why I think that. We’ve had discussions
about it. On the other hand…
Vice Mayor Filseth: A lot of Sales Tax is paid by residents.
Chair Scharff: It is. No, I’m fine with Sales Tax, so we should consider that. I
mean, the other advantage to the Sales Tax is that we’re only allowed to go
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to 10 whatever it is. There’s a quarter left, and other people could grab it if
we don’t. (crosstalk) That’s what I mean. So, we might want to grab that
and grab it now, and fund stuff. So, I’m good with that too.
Ms. Nose: Just for context on the Sales Tax, two other jurisdictions in our
County have individual Sales Tax of a quarter percent. So, for example, San
Jose just passed their Sales Tax increase specific to their district.
Chair Scharff: Oh, they just did?
Ms. Nose: A few years ago.
Vice Mayor Filseth: Are they at the cap?
Ms. Nose: Yes.
Chair Scharff: So, we should probably seriously consider a Sales Tax
increase.
Ms. Nose: I’m not sure the year they went, but it’s been in the last three
years maybe.
Council Member Kou: Do you guys also know, I know that Mountain View
had looked at increasing their revenues and doing something. Have you
looked at what they were doing?
Mr. Perez: I think they’re just beginning the discussions, but we will look at
it and bring you that.
Ms. Nose: I’m sorry. Say that again.
Vice Mayor Filseth: San Jose probably was not at the limit before Measure B.
Ms. Nose: That’s correct.
Mr. Keene: I was trying to remember what the Documentary Transfer Tax
rate was in Berkley. I remember it was high. (crosstalk) So, ours is $3.30
and Berkley is at $15. And actually, a lot of the Alameda County cities are
$12 and $13.
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Council Member Kou: I think we also have to remember their prices are a lot
more less than what we have over here. I mean, their real estate prices,
right?
Mr. Keene: They’re not at the level we’re at.
Council Member Kou: Right. So, when you do $3.30 per thousand.
Michelle Flaherty, Assistant City Manager: Well, and as we look at Sales Tax,
of course, that is leveling off anyway, so the calculations on estimates of
what that’s going to raise over time is not what it would have been 5 or 10
years ago.
Chair Scharff: That’s true. It’s leveling off, whereas those Documentary
Transfer Taxes are rising.
Council Member Kou: So, on the additional capital funding needs, you know,
the ones on page 8, will you be adding it to the, to your tables so that we
look at them, or is this a separate set?
Mr. Perez: I think what we heard, at least from the Chair, and this will be
good feedback for us, the suggestion was to have two buckets, one for the
Infrastructure Plan I call it, and the other for these types of projects, if that’s
the direction the Committee wants to give us, that’s how we’ll allocate them.
Mr. Keene: And with a specific exemption on Cubberley out of that mix,
right?
Chair Scharff: (Unintelligible) no Cubberley.
Ms. Flaherty: Did that include the operating as well, from the preceding
slide?
Ms. Nose: So, I think she’s wondering when we are trying to bucket, what
our outstanding obligations are, or that are coming up, rather. Do we want
to include all of the outstanding operating costs as we’re looking at this, or
do you want us to just keep those to the side?
Chair Scharff: Maybe that’s a third bucket, operating costs? I’m unclear what
you mean by operating costs.
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Ms. Nose: So, operating costs, pension, right, if we want to start adding
addition contributions to our pension costs to pay down UAL.
Chair Scharff: I think that’s a third bucket, I really do.
Ms. Flaherty: Just confirming it’s not included?
Mr. Keene: Right, yeah. I think definitely it’s not. I mean, just to be clear,
the direction that the Committee is giving us is not to turn to the General
Fund as it is now and find additional money, which would be putting us in
the competition with operating costs. This is to see how do we get the costs
down on the projects on the demand side, and then what’s a new supply of
revenue that we could find for this purpose, and the Vice Mayor’s point
exactly. We’re not talking about pension obligation bonds or anything like
that.
Council Member Tanaka: I had one other question. I just got this Packet
Page, so I’m just looking at it now. For some reason I’m the only one that
did not get it. So, I’m looking at this and I’m looking at Page 4 of our slide. I
don’t know if you guys can – you guys will have to look at it manually, so,
I’m just trying to match these up. The numbers are a little bit different, but
that’s okay. The thing that I’m just puzzling over is, when you go from $180
million to $235 million, the Staff salaries and benefits are the same, but,
because I’m looking at the salary and benefits, the second to last column on
Packet Page 75, and I guess I’m just trying to understand. So, is there really
no increase at all? Like, when you go from $180 to $235 or $236 million,
right. So, the $6.5 is everything, even…
Mr. Keene: If we were adding new projects, that could be a driver that would
change, but keeping the projects the same, they just have escalating costs
associated with the projects themselves.
Mr. Perez: If there are project delays then there are salary increases and,
therefore, benefit increases, the costs could drive up too.
Council Member Tanaka: Okay, so where it says Budgeted Plus Actual, what
does that mean?
Ms. Nose: To your earlier question of, does the $6.5 include money that
we’ve spent on salaries, this charge is telling us that, yes, it does. And just a
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quick note, the reason why this total project funding looks different than the
slide that you’re looking at, I don’t remember what slide number that is.
Council Member Tanaka: Four.
Ms. Nose: Four, thank you. We’re looking on Slide 4, the projected costs for
these projects, whereas, this matrix that we’re looking at for the 180 million
was what’s currently budgeted for those projects. So, actually, if you look at
the initial column on Slide 4, the $179.8 is the same as the $179.8 on what
we’re looking at right now, the allocations. And so, ultimately, now the
project costs have risen from a construction standpoint and we’re kind of
making some forecasts as to where we think the project costs will be. And
also, just a quick note for Council Member Kou, it also talks about the
grants.
Council Member Kou: This is exactly what I was thinking. Thank you.
Chair Scharff: Anything else. Anything else from Committee Members?
Council Member Tanaka: Actually, a last question. So, when are we going to
prioritize?
Chair Scharff: I think at the next meeting.
Council Member Tanaka: At the next meeting, okay.
Ms. Nose: I’m sorry, could you repeat that?
Chair Scharff: When are we going to prioritize stuff?
Mr. Keene: So, to the extent that you’re going to say, are there some
projects that would be deferred or something like that?
Mr. Perez: I think at the next meeting you could definitely do that with the
Infrastructure Plan first bucket. The second bucket, there’s going to be
some…
Chair Scharff: The second bucket we’re not ready yet.
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Mr. Perez: Right, because we’re going to try to do the first cut, and then
you’re going to see our recommendations, and then you’re going to make
those calls in the budget hearings. And then there are some that are going
to be obvious to you that are not in there that (interrupted).
Chair Scharff: So, in the second bucket, I don’t think so in the budget here.
The second bucket is questioning do we want to go to a ballot measure for
the second bucket.
Mr. Perez: There are some that, yes. And so…
Chair Scharff: There’s really a third bucket of stuff that goes in the budget
hearing.
Mr. Perez: Sure, we can split it up that way. (crosstalk) It makes it cleaner.
Chair Scharff: In my view, Finance has the Infrastructure Plan, what I call
the second bucket items, Animal Shelter, community investment. Why don’t
we just call it community investment. I like that. So, community investment
is the second bucket. Then we add in a third bucket, we have pensions and
that kind of stuff we talked about. And then we have “the budget” that we
do every year. And then, obviously, we have all of the Utility stuff that
comes to us.
Neilson Buchanan: Just a point of order, do the people in the community
have a chance to talk?
Chair Scharff: Sure. Would you like to speak? We never called for oral
communications.
Mr. Buchanan: I appreciate the opportunity to attend these meetings,
because it’s fulfilling a need that I have as to better understand why the
Council acts the way it does. So, as said before, I really decided I wanted to
follow the money. So, this is my 20th hour or something like that, sitting
through the build out of the budget. I’ve heard all the departments coming
in and I continue to feel it’s a very good process. I am reluctant to even
comment very much, because I don’t think I have enough grasp of what
you’re doing, other than I’ve got a fair amount of confidence about it. Jim,
you said something very quietly in the beginning of a Council meeting not
too long ago, and it really caught my eye, because it triggered what I don’t
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understand. In a previous meeting you’ve commented on how are we going
to communicate this to the public. You really hit me between the eyes,
because you talked about the average assessment of a home is 600,000.
Well, that’s me and you’re getting about $600, you the City, is getting about
$600 of that.
Mr. Keene: In the Property Tax.
Mr. Buchanan: Property Tax side. Well, here’s some hints. In my little 8-unit
condominium I pay $1,000 a year for mediocre management. I pay more
than that for my cell phone. So, I don’t know how to turn that into
something individuals can understand, but it’s a piece of the communications
that I don’t hear discussed here. That’s all I was going to say tonight, but,
the comment about the sliver of Sales Tax that’s left for grabs, I didn’t quite
hear the pucker factor. If I were you guys, I would be really worried about
other people grabbing that first, if it’s possible. I don’t know the mechanics,
but I just heard that discussion. I read a lot of newspapers. I read every
frigging newspaper every day up and down the peninsula. If there are
newsletter, then you could get a digest of that. But, there are more people
planning to go to the public pocket. Los Altos, Mountain View schools are
over a quarter billion, and I’m beginning to try to add all that up, and many
of them are very needy and deserving. No question about it. If anybody
could do that barn raising, this region should. From where I grew up in
Mississippi, there’s no barn building potential. It’s just simply sliding to hell
and back. So, I just think you need to be really careful about figuring out
what the public is going to tolerate, because the thing that we don’t know,
and the pollsters apparently don’t know at all, but the Federal SALT, State
And Local Tax thing, really is going to complicate people’s propensity to
pony up money, because the perception is, I can’t write it off. While my
overall tax rate may be better, but I can’t write it off. And I don’t think
anybody has dealt with the high-income states and what’s going to be
happening. The governors are all in a twit, as you know. But, I’m just, I
would put that down into your great uncertainties. Because I don’t think a
pollster can tell you how the individual taxpayers are thinking, because none
of us have thought through our Federal taxes. And some people, it’s a major
hit. For me it’s not. In fact, I’m willing to give $100,000 for a good rail car
fix, because I’ve figured out, hey my property would be worth a lot more,
it’s a direct benefit for me, because I’m in a unique situation because I’m not
paying any taxes to speak of. And I’ve got free cash. I could do that. It
would be like Bell’s Book Store. She just prepaid the Parking Assessment
District. So, I don’t think I’m typical at all, but I think the uncertainty is
typical. And I think I went way over my time. Thank you.
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Chair Scharff: Kath Durham.
Kathy Durham: I will try to be very brief. I actually was intending to speak
about next steps regarding project priorities, which apparently you’re not
doing tonight. But I’ll throw this comment out for you to reflect on for
whenever it is that you do do this. When you’re considering these
Infrastructure Projects what I am struck by is how they are not framed or
presented with reference to our City’s sustainability goals. And I’ve been
involved since 1998. There have been plans, priorities, goals, number one
items, etc., the importance of shifting the mix of mobility choices. And we
really haven’t done a very good job about doing that at the City level. We
have now fairly aggressive targets in reducing green house gases. Okay, 40
percent of those gases are generated by transportation. The largest chunk of
that is single occupancy motor vehicles, but when we’re looking at these
budgeted costs and shortfalls, where is that in any consideration of
prioritizing? I don’t see that here. That doesn’t mean there hasn’t been
energy doing that. But, I liked what Council Member Scharff said about
already, what’s already been spent, sunk into a project that you’re not going
to get back, versus what is the incremental, the cost to get to finishing it, to
complete it? Because if you look at these, there’s the shortfall, and then,
some of them are projects that now have tens of millions over. Some of
them will only take a small amount to get there. When you’re making those
decisions, look at reducing congestion versus managing congestion.
Subsidizing daytime housing for cars versus other things you could be doing
with that money. And it’s not an either/or, but you have to have the big
picture of, and not always sacrifice for the immediate urgent need of housing
for cars to shifting the priorities in our local trips and the big-picture items
like rail, shifting priorities for our long-distance trips. Please consider climate
change, the future for our children. All of that wonderful stuff, and not just
these little columns you’ve got there today. How you put that into a
number? It would be good to communicate that. It would really be helpful in
terms of prioritizing I think. Thank you.
Chair Scharff: Alright. Are we ready to adjourn? Does anyone else have any?
Vice Mayor Filseth: Future meetings and agendas?
NO ACTION TAKEN
FINAL TRANSCRIPT MINUTES
Page 67 of 67
Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Transcript Minutes: 02/06/2018
Future Meetings and Agendas
Chair Scharff: Oh, yeah.
Lalo Perez, Chief Financial Officer: Our next meeting is the 20th of this
month. We’ll bring you three items. Two related to Utility, hydroelectric,
water adjustment policy and then the review of the Downtown Parking
Management Study.
Chair Scharff: You’re bringing this issue back to us?
Mr. Perez: This one comes back on, Kiely, March 20
th, right? Coming back
with this issue?
Ms. Nose: We will do our best.
Chair Scharff: And the next one is March 6
th, is that right?
Mr. Perez: Yes, and at this point there are no agenda items on March 6
th.
But, we need some time to do the homework.
Chair Scharff: So, right now we have February 20?
Mr. Perez: February 20th.
Chair Scharff: And we have nothing on March 6
th right now?
Mr. Perez: At this point, and then March 20th is the continuation of this and
we put slash pension, in case you wanted to talk about some high-level
policies that we could propose.
Chair Scharff: Okay, sounds good.
Mr. Perez: Thank you.
Chair Scharff: Alright. Meeting adjourned.
ADJOURNMENT: Meeting adjourned at 8:44 P.M.
City of Palo Alto (ID # 9107)
Finance Committee Staff Report
Report Type: Action Items Meeting Date: 4/17/2018
City of Palo Alto Page 1
Summary Title: Review of Initial Public Opinion Survey for Infrastructure
Funding Needs
Title: Review of Initial Public Opinion Survey Results Regarding Potential
2018 Ballot Measure to Address the Funding Gap for the 2014 Infrastructure
Plan, Discussion of Next Steps for Addressing the Funding Gap, and Potential
Recommendation to Council Regarding Refinement of Survey Elements and
Objectives for Follow-Up Survey
From: City Manager
Lead Department: Administrative Services
Recommendation
Staff recommends that Finance Committee review the results of the initial public opinion
survey and provide direction on next steps in addressing the funding gap for the 2014 Council
Infrastructure Plan projects, including discussion of priorities with respect to competing future
capital investments and a potential refinement of survey elements and objectives for a follow-
up survey.
Background
On March 20, 2018, the Finance Committee approved direction to Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin,
Metz & Associates (FM3 Research) to conduct an initial public opinion survey, from March 23 to
April 2, 2018, to assess public support for a potential November 2018 ballot revenue measure
to help address the funding gap for the 2014 Infrastructure Plan projects, currently estimated at
$76 million including a $20 million contingency placeholder. The survey also gathered
information regarding the level of public support for funding other “community asset” projects,
such as the second phase of the new Junior Museum and Zoo, a New Animal Shelter, and
implementation of elements of the Parks Master Plan which were estimated to cost $55-65
million.
In addition, the staff report provided discussion and tables outlining the current cost estimates
for both the Infrastructure Plan projects and other community asset projects as well as
potential funding options for these projects. (CMR #9039 Initial Public Opinion Survey for
Infrastructure Funding Needs)
City of Palo Alto Page 2
On February 6, 2018, the Finance Committee discussed the next steps for addressing the
existing funding gap1 for the Council Infrastructure Plan projects. The Council Infrastructure
Plan includes the following nine projects:
Public Safety Building
Highway 101 Pedestrian/Bicycle Bridge
Bicycle/Pedestrian Plan Implementation
Charleston/Arastradero Corridor
Byxbee Park
California Avenue Parking Garage
Downtown Parking Garage
Fire Station 3 Replacement
Fire Station 4 Replacement
Discussion
Survey Results
FM3 Research conducted a survey from March 23 to April 2, 2018 by phone and through email
and received approximately 1,200 responses from likely November 2018 voters. (For more
information, a summary of survey results from FM3 Research is provided in Attachment A.)
These survey results were juxtaposed to recent similar survey results completed in 2013 and
2016. Overall the survey results indicated that the City’s current direction is not as highly
supported as it was in a similar survey in 2016. In addition, the confidence in the City’s
management of infrastructure and finances has declined since 2016; however, it is important to
note that this trend is not unique to Palo Alto. These sentiments have been expressed in recent
polls done for other surrounding communities and jurisdictions in the Bay Area. Even though
confidence has declined overall, the City’s maintenance of its infrastructure still has approval
from two-thirds of the survey sample.
Additional funding to support infrastructure polled with a little less than 50% support, which is
similar to results from a poll question posed in 2013 asking about the need for additional
funding to maintain and improve infrastructure. When asked about specific infrastructure
projects that have been identified as upcoming needs, projects that pertained to public safety,
streets maintenance, and bike/pedestrian safety all rated over 60% in terms of importance. A
majority of the projects that fall into the community asset project category previously discussed
by the Committee rated less than 40% in terms of importance.
Specific types of funding mechanisms were evaluated that could potentially be used to fund the
City’s infrastructure repairs and improvements. The four funding options polled were increases
to the transient occupancy tax (TOT), documentary transfer tax, and sales tax, or establishing a
1 Information on the 2014 Council Infrastructure Plan funding gap is provided in the February 6, 2018 Finance
Committee report (CMR #8927) at https://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/63293
City of Palo Alto Page 3
parcel tax. Increases to both the TOT and the documentary transfer tax polled with over 50%
support, while increases to sales tax or establishing a parcel tax both polled with under 40%
support. The survey also assessed how much in additional taxes households would be willing to
pay annually to support infrastructure needs. A $100 increase per year was the upper limit that
still received a majority of positive support.
Updated Potential Funding Options
Staff continues to work to identify multiple types of funding sources, ranging from currently
available funding, anticipated new funding, and funding from potential revenue generating
ballot measures. Below is an updated version of a table previously presented addressing
available and anticipated funding, and a new table estimating potential revenues generated by
ballot measure initiatives.
Table 1: Project Funding Options
Additional Parking In-Lieu Funds (Downtown Garage) $2.8 million
FY 2019 estimated SB1 funding (Charleston/Arastradero Project) $1.2 million
Other Sources (Charleston/Arastradero Project) $1.7 million
Infrastructure Reserve (currently “scheduled annual” General Fund transfer
for CIP investment between FY 2019 – FY 2023
$25- $30 million
Available Funding Sources (w/o ballot measure) $31- $36 million
New Estimated Transient Occupancy Tax estimated debt issuance
(anticipated opening FY 2020, Marriott hotels)*
$35 million
Additional hotel development Transient Occupancy Tax receipts (in
entitlement process)*
$10- $12 million
Transportation Tax measures (SB1, Measure B, through FY 2023) $12 million
Sale of City of Palo Alto real estate assets (Middlefield lots) $4 - $5 million
Anticipated Funding Sources (with less certainty) $61- $64 million
The table below articulates both the potential annual revenue generated as well as potential
debt issuance that can be leveraged against the four tax increases that were polled in the initial
survey. Except for a parcel tax, which requires 2/3 voter approval, each of these measures
could be structured as a general tax measure requiring a simple majority for approval. Should a
“special tax” measure be pursued, dedicating these funds to certain purposes, this would
require a 2/3 voter approval.
City of Palo Alto Page 4
Table 2: Potential Ballot Measure Initiatives
Tax Measure
Annual
Revenue
Total Debt
Leverage
1% Increase in TOT
(from 14% currently, to 15%)*
$1.7 million $16.7 million
$1.10 per $1,000 increase in Documentary Transfer Tax
(from $3.30 per $1,000 currently, to $4.40 per $1,000)*
$2 million $19.6 million
1/4 cent increase in Sales Tax
(additional 0.25% to rate of 9.25%)*
$5-$6 million $49-$59 million
Parcel Tax
($100/parcel)
$2.1 million $29.4 million
* All economically sensitive revenues are modeled at 70% of estimated receipts leveraged for
debt service.
As mentioned above, increases to the TOT and Documentary Transfer Tax polled favorably;
however, an increase to the sales tax or establishing a parcel tax both polled below 50%
approval. Below is additional background information for TOT and Documentary Transfer Tax
rates compared to other cities. In addition, Attachment B has a full list of these comparables.
Transient Occupancy Tax
Palo Alto has a TOT (hotel tax) rate of 14 percent of the room rate. This rate increased from 12
percent to 14 percent in 2014 as approved by the voters and is consistent with other
destination cities such as San Francisco, Oakland, Santa Monica and Beverly Hills. The highest
rate in the state is currently 15 percent in Anaheim and the median rate in the state is 10
percent, according to Californiacityfinance.com. Some cities have other taxes included in
addition to the hotel tax, such as tourism tax and/or convention center tax. For every 1 percent
increase in the tax rate, we estimate collecting $1.7 million in additional revenues annually.
Documentary Transfer Tax California’s Documentary Transfer Tax Act allows counties and cities
to collect tax on transactions that transfer real estate. In addition to the county rate, cities may
impose additional documentary transfer taxes. The amount that the city may impose depends
on whether the city is a charter city or a general law city (Palo Alto is a charter city). In Palo
Alto, property owners pay a total of $4.40 ($1.10 county rate plus $3.30 city rate) on each
$1,000 of property value transferred. In comparison to other Santa Clara County cities, Palo
Alto’s rate is consistent with San Jose and Mountain View, but higher than Sunnyvale and Santa
Clara which are at $0.55 per $1,000 even though they are charter cities.
City of Palo Alto Page 5
Projected Uncertainties and Risk
As discussed at the Finance Committee meeting on March 20 and in the associated staff report
(CMR 9039), it may be possible that sufficient funding sources will be available over the
Proposed 2019-2023 Capital Improvement Program (CIP) to address the Council Infrastructure
Plan funding gap and $20 million contingency. However, there are risks and uncertainties
associated with this strategy:
Currently Measure B and SB1 are both facing challenges through litigation and a
referendum. The outcome of these proceedings remains uncertain.
Additional TOT revenues are contingent on the development and construction of new
hotels and timely opening of permitted facilities.
The funding model assumes continued economic growth through the projected five-
year period; no recession or contraction in the economy is presumed or modeled.
The model would exhaust all funding options and delay the City’s ability to invest in any
projects outside of the 2014 Council Infrastructure Plan projects, including the
community asset projects previously identified.
Many of the 2014 Council Infrastructure Plan projects remain in the design phase.
Project cost estimates are still in flux, and there is a potential that a $20 million
contingency will be insufficient to address further increases.
As a result, this approach could reduce the flexibility of the City to respond to unforeseen,
urgent capital needs over the next five years. In addition, execution of the five-year CIP
assumes current projects remain within budgeted levels and that there are no new capital
requests beyond those projects.
Looking forward, the City is facing numerous pressures. These include the 2014 Council
approved Infrastructure Plan, FY 2019 General Fund operating budget forecasted gap of $2.6
million, growing obligations to fund employee pension benefits, current labor negotiations for
some of the City’s largest employee units, and needed additional capital investment such as
rail/grade separation. Palo Alto serves a diverse community with a broad range of unique
services adding to the complexity of managing resources and expectations in both the near and
longer term. A containment strategy is necessary to maintain a manageable financial position
and to address these future financial challenges as well as any unforeseen changes such as
program needs or the inevitable economic downturn. The City is faced with prioritizing the
growing needs of the City with the long-term stability of these needs.
City of Palo Alto Page 6
Ballot Measure – Timeline
Should the Committee provide direction to conduct a refined survey and potentially pursue a
November 2018 ballot measure, Table 3 outlines the schedule necessary to accomplish that.
The schedule allows for Finance Committee to bring a potential recommendation for a
November 2018 ballot measure to Council before the Council summer break, so that the
remaining steps can occur in time to meet the relevant election deadlines. This is a very
constrained schedule that will require late packet reports and assumes that decisions needed
from Finance Committee and Council will be made at the indicated meetings.
Table 3: Estimated schedule for consideration and preparation of ballot measure
Activity
Estimated
Schedule
Finance Committee approval of initial survey objectives - COMPLETE March 20
FM3 conducts initial survey and compiles results - COMPLETE March 23 – April 2
Finance Committee review of survey results and recommendation on
refinement survey objectives (late packet distribution)
April 17
Council approval of refinement survey objectives (late packet distribution) April 30
FM3 conducts refinement survey and compiles results May 7 – May 14
Finance Committee review of survey results and recommendation on
placing measure on ballot (late packet distribution)
May 30
Council takes policy action to place measure on the ballot (late packet
distribution)
June 11
Council adopts resolution of necessity June 11
Council adopts resolution calling election June 11
Deadline to submit election measure to County August 10
Election Day November 6
Timeline
Following completion of the refinement of the initial public opinion survey, staff would to
Council to review the survey results on April 30.
Resource Impact
The recommended actions in this report do not have a resource impact as costs associated with
polling will be funded from FY 2018 budgets. However, the result of this process will assist in
informing the both the FY 2019 budget development and proposed funding for various
infrastructure investments.
Attachments:
Attachment A: Initial Survey Results
Attachment B: Tax Rate Comparisons
220-5016
Key Findings of a Survey of Palo Alto Voters
Conducted March 23-April 2, 2018
Palo Alto Voter Views on
Infrastructure Funding
Attachment A
1
Methodology
•1,191 interviews with likely November 2018 voters in
Palo Alto
•Conducted March 23 to April 2, 2018, online and via
landline and cell phones
•Margin of sampling error of ±4.0% at the 95%
confidence interval
•Due to rounding, some percentages do not add up to
100%
•Selected comparisons to 2016, 2014, 2013 and 2008
surveys
2
Key Findings
•Voters are now divided on the City’s direction compared with 2016 – a trend
common in recent months for Bay Area cities facing increasing challenges like
housing costs and traffic congestion.
•Majorities approve of the City’s management of infrastructure, and more
approve than disapprove of its handling of budget and tax dollars.
•In principle, voters support a measure to fund improvements to City
infrastructure – and a solid majority is willing to pay up to $100 per household
per year for such projects.
•Ensuring a modern emergency response system, and repairing streets and
roads, are the highest-priority projects.
•Among mechanisms tested in concept, a TOT or real estate transfer tax have
the most initial appeal.
•Note that this poll was not designed to gauge the ultimate feasibility of a fully-
developed ballot measure concept; should the City choose to move forward,
future research will need to test draft ballot language and pro and con
arguments.
3
Issue Context
4
Q1.
Right
Direction
61%
Wrong
Track
25%
DK/NA
14%
Right
Direction
43%
Wrong
Track
37%
DK/NA
20%
2018 2016
Would you say that things in the Palo Alto are generally headed in the right
direction, or do you feel that things are pretty seriously off on the wrong track?
Voters are now split on the city’s direction,
reflecting a regional trend.
5
10%
18%
15%
16%
50%
56%
53%
56%
27%
19%
23%
22%
10%
5%
6%
2018
2016
2013
2008
Excellent Good Only Fair Exc./
Good
Fair/
Poor
60% 37%
74% 24%
68% 29%
72% 26%
Three in five say the City does an “excellent”
or “good” job providing services.
Q2.
How would you rate the overall job being done by Palo Alto city government in
providing services to the City’s residents? Would you say the City is doing an …?
6
21%
10%
9%
43%
37%
38%
5%
23%
16%
17%
16%
21%
13%
14%
16%
Maintaining the City's
infrastructure
Managing the City's
budget and finances
Efficiently utilizing
local tax dollars
Strng. App.Smwt. App.DK/NA Smwt. Disapp.Strng. Disapp.
Q3.
Total
Approve
Total
Disapprove
64% 31%
47% 30%
47% 36%
Nearly two-thirds approve of maintenance
of City infrastructure; they are more divided
on budget and tax management.
I am going to read you a list of specific aspects of the City of Palo Alto’s work in managing city government.
Please tell me whether you generally approve or disapprove of the job the City is doing in that area.
7
Q3. I am going to read you a list of specific aspects of the City of Palo Alto’s work in managing city government. Please tell me whether you generally approve or disapprove of
the job the City is doing in that area.
Appraisals of the City’s work managing
infrastructure and its budget have declined – as
they have in many cities - but remain net positive.
City Palo Alto City Government 2013 2016 2018
Maintaining the City's infrastructure 75% 75% 64%
Managing the City's budget and finances 62% 64% 47%
Efficiently utilizing local tax dollars 63% 67% 47%
(Total Approve)
8
11%
35%
19%
25%
11%
Q5. Split Sample
10%
36%
22%
23%
9%
Great/
Some Need
46%
Little/No
Real Need
45%
Great need
Some need
Little need
No real need
Don’t know
Great/
Some Need
45%
Little/No
Real Need
43%
Just under half see at least “some need”
for funding for infrastructure.
More specifically, how would you rate the City of Palo Alto’s need for additional
funding to maintain and improve infrastructure: is there a great need for
additional funding, some need, a little need or no real need for additional funding?
2018 2013
9
10%
31%
25%
25%
8%
Q6. Split Sample
11%
43%
19%
22%
5%
Great/
Some Need
54%
Little/No
Real Need
41%
Great need
Some need
Little need
No real need
Don’t know
Great/
Some Need
42%
Little/No
Real Need
50%
About two in five see at least “some need” for
more specific infrastructure improvements.
More specifically, how would you rate the City of Palo Alto’s need for additional
funding to maintain and improve public parks, streets, sidewalks and vital
facilities like police and fire stations: is there a great need for additional
funding, some need, a little need or no real need for additional funding?
2018 2013
10
Voter Priorities for
Infrastructure Funding
11
“Now I would like to ask you a
few questions about potential
local funding measures. The
City has identified between
$75 million and $150 million
in needed improvements to
City’s streets, sidewalks,
parks, public facilities and
other basic infrastructure.”
11 Q7.
12
35%
22%
24%
26%
25%
15%
23%
22%
16%
40%
44%
39%
35%
36%
43%
31%
31%
35%
18%
29%
30%
27%
29%
37%
27%
32%
33%
6%
5%
7%
12%
10%
5%
19%
14%
16%
^Ensuring a modern and stable 911
emergency communications network
Maintaining City streets and roads
Fixing potholes and paving city streets
^Providing safe routes for bicyclists and
pedestrians
Maintaining City parks and recreation
facilities
^Improving safety at Caltrain crossings
^Improving city streets to make busy
intersections safer
Providing adequate parking
Ext. Impt.Very Impt.Smwt. Impt.Not Too Impt./DK/NA
Q7. I’m going to read you some of the objectives of the infrastructure projects identified through this process. Please tell me how important each objective is to you as a
resident of Palo Alto: extremely important, very important, somewhat important, or not important. ^Not Part of Split Sample
Ext./Very
Impt.
75%
66%
63%
61%
61%
58%
54%
53%
51%
Ensuring a modern emergency communications
network is important to three-quarters.
^Ensuring vital City facilities like police
stations and the emergency command
center are earthquake safe
13
17%
20%
14%
15%
10%
9%
32%
25%
29%
29%
29%
21%
14%
8%
8%
35%
31%
34%
32%
41%
38%
46%
32%
29%
16%
24%
22%
24%
21%
32%
37%
59%
61%
^Making sidewalks, City buildings and parks
accessible for people with disabilities
Funding transportation incentives that
improve traffic by reducing solo driver trips
Providing downtown parking
^Providing a safe crossing over Highway 101
for pedestrians and cyclists
Improving parks, playgrounds and playfields
for youth and adult recreation
^Providing a modern animal shelter
^Upgrading the Palo Alto
Junior Museum and Zoo
^Upgrading Byxbee Park
Restoring the historic Roth building
Ext. Impt.Very Impt.Smwt. Impt.Not Too Impt./DK/NA
Q7. I’m going to read you some of the objectives of the infrastructure projects identified through this process. Please tell me how important each objective is to you as a
resident of Palo Alto: extremely important, very important, somewhat important, or not important. ^Not Part of Split Sample
Ext./Very
Impt.
49%
44%
44%
43%
39%
30%
17%
10%
10%
Fewer are concerned with upgrading the
museum, zoo, Byxbee Park, or Roth building.
14
Support for
an Infrastructure
Funding Measure
15
19%
39%
17%
18%
6%
Strongly support
Somewhat support
Somewhat oppose
Strongly oppose
Don't know
Many of these projects and improvements are beyond the scope of the City’s
existing budget and may require additional funding through a local voter-
approved bond or tax measure. Based on what you’ve heard, do you think
you would support or oppose a bond or tax measure to fund some group of
these projects to maintain and improve Palo Alto’s infrastructure?
Total
Support
59%
Total
Oppose
35%
Q8.
In principle, nearly three in five support a bond
or tax measure for infrastructure upgrades.
16
Younger voters are slightly more
supportive than those over age 50.
Q8. Many of these projects and improvements are beyond the scope of the City’s existing budget and may require additional funding through a local voter-approved bond or tax
measure. Based on what you’ve heard, do you think you would support or oppose a bond or tax measure to fund some group of these projects to maintain and improve Palo
Alto’s infrastructure?
64%
56%
62%
59%
30%
39%
33%
33%
Men Ages 18-49
Men Ages 50+
Women Ages 18-49
Women Ages 50+
Total Support Total Oppose % of
Sample
15%
33%
15%
36%
By Gender by Age
17
While nearly seven in ten Democrats support
the idea, independents are split.
Q8. Many of these projects and improvements are beyond the scope of the City’s existing budget and may require additional funding through a local voter-approved bond or tax
measure. Based on what you’ve heard, do you think you would support or oppose a bond or tax measure to fund some group of these projects to maintain and improve Palo
Alto’s infrastructure?
68%
49%
38%
61%
64%
51%
25%
43%
57%
35%
29%
44%
Democrats
Independents
Republicans
Asians/Pacific Islanders
White Voters
Voters of Color
Total Support Total Oppose
% of
Sample
58%
27%
15%
14%
62%
30%
By Party & Ethnicity
18
Renters are stronger backers than owners,
though majorities of both support it.
Q8. Many of these projects and improvements are beyond the scope of the City’s existing budget and may require additional funding through a local voter-approved bond or tax
measure. Based on what you’ve heard, do you think you would support or oppose a bond or tax measure to fund some group of these projects to maintain and improve Palo
Alto’s infrastructure?
63%
64%
56%
64%
56%
66%
29%
32%
38%
30%
38%
28%
<$100,000
$100,000-$150,000
$150,000-$250,000
$250,000+
Homeowners
Renters
Total Support Total Oppose
% of
Sample
18%
12%
19%
28%
72%
23%
By Income & Residence
19
51%
36%
23%
19%
20%
24%
18%
18%
5%
5%
5%
8%
11%
16%
14%
16%
24%
37%
43%
$50 per year
$100 per year
$200 per year
$250 per year
Very Will.Smwt. Will.DK/NA Smwt. Unwill.Very Unwill.
Q9.
Total
Willing
Total
Unwilling
71% 25%
61% 35%
41% 53%
38% 57%
Three in five voters are willing to pay up to
$100 annually for these improvements.
Regardless of how the measure was structured, would your household be willing to pay
______ in additional taxes if it were dedicated to the types of Palo Alto infrastructure repairs
and improvements we have been discussing?
20
Examining Potential
Funding Mechanisms
21
27%
25%
13%
8%
34%
27%
27%
20%
5%
7%
5%
17%
16%
17%
23%
17%
25%
38%
47%
Increasing the transient
occupancy tax, charged to
hotel and motel guests
Increasing the real estate
transfer tax rate, paid when a
property is bought or sold
Establishing a flat tax on every
parcel of property in Palo Alto
Increasing the sales tax
Strng. Supp.Smwt. Supp.DK/NA Smwt. Opp.Strng. Opp.
Q10. I am going to read you a list of several methods that might be used to raise money to fund the types of infrastructure repairs and improvements we have been discussing.
Please tell me if you would support or oppose that particular way of raising new revenue for these purposes. Would you support or oppose_____?
Total
Supp.
Total
Opp.
61% 34%
53% 40%
40% 55%
27% 70%
Three in five back a higher TOT, and
a majority favors an RETT.
22
Q11.
Voters then heard a pro/con exchange on a
potential sales tax increase in isolation.
Let me ask you about the idea of increasing the sales tax.
Supporters say increasing the sales tax ensures that people who make
purchases in the city, including visitors, pay a small share of the cost of
maintaining city infrastructure without raising taxes on homeowners
once again.
Opponents say sales taxes increase the price of nearly everything we
buy, which hurts the poor more than it does the rich. Our sales tax
rates is already 9 percent.
Having heard this, would you support or oppose increasing the sales tax
as a way of raising money to repair and upgrade City infrastructure?
23
9%
17%
21%
51%
2%
Q10a. I am going to read you a list of several methods that might be used to raise money to fund the types of infrastructure repairs and improvements we have been discussing.
Please tell me if you would support or oppose that particular way of raising new revenue for these purposes. Would you support or oppose increasing the sales tax?
Q11. Having heard this, would you support or oppose increasing the sales tax as a way of raising money to repair and upgrade City infrastructure?
8%
20%
23%
47%
2%
Total
Support
27%
Total
Oppose
70%
Strongly support
Somewhat support
Somewhat oppose
Strongly oppose
Don’t know/NA
Total
Support
26%
Total
Oppose
72%
This did not shift opinions – more than seven
in ten still oppose a sales tax increase.
After Pro/Con Initial Opinion
24
Q12.
They also heard an exchange of messaging on
a transient occupancy tax increase.
Let me ask you about the idea of increasing the transient occupancy tax,
charged to hotel and motel guests.
Supporters say increasing the transient occupancy tax ensures that visitors
to our city pay their fair share for our infrastructure while keeping costs
lower for residents.
Opponents say higher transient occupancy taxes will cause tourists to stay
in cities outside Palo Alto, driving business out of the City, and especially
hurt parents and students who visit campus.
Having heard this, would you support or oppose increasing the transient
occupancy tax charged to hotel and motel guests as a way of raising money
to repair and upgrade City infrastructure?
25
25%
33%
19%
19%
4%
Q10b. I am going to read you a list of several methods that might be used to raise money to fund the types of infrastructure repairs and improvements we have been discussing.
Please tell me if you would support or oppose that particular way of raising new revenue for these purposes. Would you support or oppose Increasing the transient occupancy
tax, charged to hotel and motel guests?
Q12. Having heard this, would you support or oppose increasing the transient occupancy tax charged to hotel and motel guests as a way of raising money to repair and upgrade
City infrastructure?
27%
34%
17%
17%
5%
Total
Support
61%
Total
Oppose
34%
Strongly support
Somewhat support
Somewhat oppose
Strongly oppose
Don’t know/NA
Total
Support
58%
Total
Oppose
38%
A solid majority continued to support a TOT
increase after messaging.
After Pro/Con Initial Opinion
26
Q13.
Supporter and opponent rationales for a real
estate transfer tax were also read.
Let me ask you about the idea of raising the real estate transfer tax
rate, paid when a property is bought or sold.
Supporters say the it makes sense for people who buy a home in
Palo Alto to contribute to the City’s infrastructure with a one-time
investment when they buy the house.
Opponents say the cost of housing is already outrageous, and we
shouldn’t make it even more costly to buy a home in our community.
Having heard this, would you support or oppose raising the real
estate transfer tax rate as a way of raising money to repair and
upgrade City infrastructure?
27
21%
26%
17%
32%
4%
Q10c. I am going to read you a list of several methods that might be used to raise money to fund the types of infrastructure repairs and improvements we have been discussing.
Please tell me if you would support or oppose that particular way of raising new revenue for these purposes. Would you support or oppose increasing the real estate transfer
tax rate, paid when a property is bought or sold?
Q13. Having heard this, would you support or oppose raising the real estate transfer tax rate as a way of raising money to repair and upgrade City infrastructure?
25%
27%
16%
25%
7%
Total
Support
53%
Total
Oppose
40%
Strongly support
Somewhat support
Somewhat oppose
Strongly oppose
Don’t know/NA
Total
Support
47%
Total
Oppose
49%
After messaging on the RETT as a funding
mechanism, voters were evenly divided.
After Pro/Con Initial Opinion
28
Q14.
Voters heard reasons to vote “yes”
and “no” on a flat parcel tax.
Let me ask you about the idea of establishing a flat parcel tax on
each piece of property.
Supporters say that it is the simplest way to ensure that property
owners all pay a fair share in improving the City’s infrastructure.
Opponents say that this method is unfair because owners of smaller
homes will be forced to pay the exact same price as owners of larger
and more valuable properties.
Having heard this, would you support or oppose establishing a flat
parcel tax as a way of raising money to repair and upgrade City
infrastructure?
29
12%
22%
22%
41%
4%
Q10d. I am going to read you a list of several methods that might be used to raise money to fund the types of infrastructure repairs and improvements we have been discussing.
Please tell me if you would support or oppose that particular way of raising new revenue for these purposes. Would you support or oppose Establishing a flat tax on every
parcel of property in Palo Alto?
Q14. Having heard this, would you support or oppose establishing a flat parcel tax as a way of raising money to repair and upgrade City infrastructure?
13%
27%
17%
38%
5%
Total
Support
40%
Total
Oppose
55%
Strongly support
Somewhat support
Somewhat oppose
Strongly oppose
Don’t know/NA
Total
Support
34%
Total
Oppose
62%
This increased opposition
to more than three in five.
After Pro/Con Initial Opinion
30
Conclusions
31
Conclusions
•This limited test of mechanisms alone indicates that a transient occupancy tax
or real-estate transfer tax present potential avenues for voter-approved
revenue.
–Both a TOT and RETT (without the rate of increase) begin with majority
support, and retain it after a very brief exchange of messaging.
–Voters in general support up to $100 per year in new taxes for
infrastructure improvements and repairs.
•Maintaining the emergency communications network, repairing streets and
roads, and pedestrian and cyclist safety are top priorities.
•Voters are increasingly pessimistic about the direction of the City, and offer
middling approval ratings on the City’s work managing tax revenues and the
budget.
•At the same time, fewer than a majority see a need for new funding for the City
generally or for infrastructure specifically.
•Further research should test a 75-word ballot label, which includes the rate of
increase and projects funded, as well as a fuller suite of messaging, to
determine viability in a November election.
For more information, contact:
1999 Harrison St., Suite 2020
Oakland, CA 94612
Phone (510) 451-9521
Fax (510) 451-0384
Dave@FM3research.com
Miranda@FM3research.com
Revised
Apil 15, 2017
Count 483
Mean 9.80%
Standard Deviation 1.85%
Median 10.00%
Minimum 3.50%
Maximum 15.00%
City County Rate
Anaheim Orange 15.0%
Garden Grove Orange 14.5%
Beverly Hills Los Angeles 14.0%
Culver City Los Angeles 14.0%
Healdsburg Sonoma 14.0%
Inglewood Los Angeles 14.0%
Los Angeles Los Angeles 14.0%
Oakland Alameda 14.0%
Palo Alto Santa Clara 14.0%
San Francisco San Francisco 14.0%
San Leandro Alameda 14.0%
Santa Monica Los Angeles 14.0%
Palm Springs Riverside 13.5%
Blythe Riverside 13.0%
Del Mar San Diego 13.0%
Indio Riverside 13.0%
Mammoth Lakes Mono 13.0%
Burlingame San Mateo 12.0%
Campbell Santa Clara 12.0%
Cupertino Santa Clara 12.0%
East Palo Alto San Mateo 12.0%
Los Gatos Santa Clara 12.0%
Menlo Park San Mateo 12.0%
Pacifica San Mateo 12.0%
Redwood City San Mateo 12.0%
San Bruno San Mateo 12.0%
San Mateo San Mateo 12.0%
Sunnyvale Santa Clara 10.5%
Mountain View Santa Clara 10.0%
Transient Occupancy Tax Rates
California Cities and Counties
SOURCE: CaliforniaCityFinance.com
SOURCE: CaliforniaCityFinance.com
California City Documentary and Property Transfer Tax Rates
CONTRA COSTA COUNTY $ 1.10 $ 1.10
RICHMOND Chartered $ 7.00 $ 1.10 $ 8.10
SAN MATEO COUNTY $ 1.10 $ 1.10
SAN MATEO Chartered 0.5% of value $ 1.10 $ 6.10
SANTA CLARA COUNTY $ 1.10 $ 1.10
CUPERTINO General Law $ 0.55 $ 0.55 $1.10
GILROY Chartered $ 0.55 $ 0.55 $ 1.10
LOS ALTOS General Law $ 0.55 $ 0.55 $1.10
LOS ALTOS HILLS General Law $ 0.55 $ 0.55 $1.10
MOUNTAIN VIEW Chartered $ 3.30 $ 1.10 $ 4.40
PALO ALTO Chartered $ 3.30 $ 1.10 $ 4.40
SAN JOSE Chartered $ 3.30 $ 1.10 $ 4.40
SANTA CLARA Chartered $ 0.55 $ 0.55 $ 1.10
SUNNYVALE Chartered $ 0.55 $ 0.55 $ 1.10
Governance
General Law or
Chartered
Per $1000 Property
Value City Rate
Per $1000 Property
County Rate
Per $1000 Property
Value Total
ALAMEDA COUNTY ALAMEDA $ 1.10 $ 1.10OUNTY
ALAMEDA Chartered $ 12.00 $ 1.10 $ 13.10
ALBANY Chartered $ 11.50 $ 1.10 $ 12.60
BERKELEY Chartered $ 15.00 $ 1.10 $ 16.10
EMERYVILLE Chartered $ 12.00 $ 1.10 $ 13.10
HAYWARD Chartered $ 4.50 $ 1.10 $ 5.60
OAKLAND Chartered $ 15.00 $ 1.10 $ 16.10
PIEDMONT Chartered $ 13.00 $ 1.10 $ 14.10
SAN LEANDRO Chartered $ 6.00 $ 1.10 $ 7.10
FINANCE COMMITTEE
ACTION MINUTES
Page 1 of 3
Special Meeting
April 17, 2018
Vice Mayor Filseth called the meeting to order at 6:06 P.M. in the
Community Meeting Room, 250 Hamilton Avenue, Palo Alto, California.
Present: Filseth, Kou, Scharff (arrived at 6:09 P.M.)(Chair), Tanaka
Absent:
Agenda Items
3. Review of Initial Public Opinion Survey Results Regarding Potential
2018 Ballot Measure to Address the Funding Gap for the 2014
Infrastructure Plan, Discussion of Next Steps for Addressing the
Funding Gap, and Potential Recommendation to Council Regarding
Refinement of Survey Elements and Objectives for a Follow-up Survey.
MOTION: Chair Scharff moved, seconded by Council Member xx to
recommend to the City Council to raise the Transient Occupancy Tax by two
percent, to move forward with the next round of polling, craft a ballot
measure, test it and to recommend to the City Council to discuss whether or
not to move forward with a measure that would fund more park land.
MOTION RESTATED: Chair Scharff moved, seconded by Vice Mayor Filseth
to recommend to the Council to:
1. Move forward with a two percent Transient Occupancy Tax increase,
including moving forward with the necessary creation of a ballot
statement, polling, testing, and authorizing FM3 to perform associated
tasks;
2. To discontinue consideration of a Sales Tax or a Parcel Tax; and
3. To continue to consider and explore a Real Estate Transfer Tax,
including the possibly of polling.
ACTION MINUTES
Page 2 of 3
Special Finance Committee MeetingAction Minutes: 4/17/18
AMENDMENT:Council Member Tanaka moved, seconded by Council
Member xx to have Staff reach out to all the hotels and realtors in the City
of Palo Alto to inform them of the possibility of a tax and to hear their input.
AMENDMENT FAILED DUE TO LACK OF A SECOND
INCORPORATED INTO THE MOTION WITH THE CONSENT OF THE
MAKER AND SECONDER to add to the Motion, “Community outreach
before the measure goes on the ballot.”
MOTION AS AMENDED RESTATED: Chair Scharff moved, seconded by
Vice Mayor Filseth to recommend to the Council to:
1. Move forward with a two percent Transient Occupancy Tax increase,
including moving forward with the necessary creation of a ballot
statement, polling, testing, and having FM3 to perform associated
tasks;
2. To discontinue consideration of a Sales Tax or a Parcel Tax;
3. To continue to consider and explore a Real Estate Transfer Tax,
including the possibly of polling; and
4. To do community outreach before the ballot measure goes on the
ballot.
MOTION AS AMENDED PASSED: 3-1, Tanaka no
The Committee took a break from 7:50 P.M. to 7:55 P.M.
1. Adoption of a Resolution Amending Utility Rate Schedule D-1 (Storm
and Surface Water Drainage) Increasing the Storm Water Management
Fee by 2.9 Percent to $14.05 Per Month Per Equivalent Residential Unit
for Fiscal Year 2019.
MOTION:Vice Mayor Filseth moved, seconded by Chair Scharff to
recommend to the City Council to adopt a resolution amending Utility Rate
Schedule D-1 (Storm and Surface Water Drainage), to Implement a 2.9%
rate increase consistent with the applicable Consumer Price Index,
ACTION MINUTES
Page 3 of 3
Special Finance Committee MeetingAction Minutes: 4/17/18
increasing the monthly charge per Equivalent Residential Unit (ERU) by
$0.40, from $13.65 to $14.05 for Fiscal Year 2019.
MOTION PASSED:4-0
2. Utilities Advisory Commission Recommendation that the City Council
Adopt: (1) a Resolution Approving the Fiscal Year 2019 Water Utility
Financial Plan; and (2) a Resolution Increasing Water Rates by 4
Percent by Amending Rate Schedules W-1 (General Residential Water
Service), W-2 (Water Service from Fire Hydrants), W-3 (Fire Service
Connections),W-4 (Residential Master-Metered and General Non-
Residential Water Service), and W-7 (Non-Residential Irrigation Water
Service (Continued From April 3, 2018).
MOTION: Chair Scharff moved, seconded by Council Member xx to move
forward with Alternative 2, reducing reserves.
MOTION RESTATED: Chair Scharff moved, seconded by Vice Mayor Filseth
to recommend to the City Council to move forward with Alternative 2,
reducing reserves.
MOTION PASSED: 3-1, Tanaka no
ADJOURNMENT: Meeting adjourned at 9:17 P.M.
City of Palo Alto (ID # 9039)
Finance Committee Staff Report
Report Type: Action Items Meeting Date: 3/20/2018
City of Palo Alto Page 1
Summary Title: Initial Public Opinion Survey for Infrastructure Funding Needs
Title: Review of Options to Address Funding Gap for Infrastructure Plan
Projects, and Approval of Objectives and Elements of Initial Public Opinion
Survey Regarding Potential 2018 Ballot Measure to Raise Revenue
From: City Manager
Lead Department: Administrative Services
Recommendation
Staff recommends that Finance Committee review options for addressing the funding gap for
the Infrastructure Plan projects, and approve the objectives and elements of an initial public
opinion survey regarding a potential ballot measure to raise revenue, as provided in
Attachment A.
Background
On February 6, 2018, Finance Committee discussed the next steps for addressing the existing
funding gap1 for the Council Infrastructure Plan projects. The Council Infrastructure Plan
includes the following nine projects:
x Public Safety Building
x Highway 101 Pedestrian/Bicycle Bridge
x Bicycle/Pedestrian Plan Implementation
x Charleston/Arastradero Corridor
x Byxbee Park
x California Avenue Parking Garage
x Downtown Parking Garage
x Fire Station 3 Replacement
x Fire Station 4 Replacement
Committee members described the need to obtain public opinion research information on the
public’s support for a potential November 2018 ballot revenue measure to help address the
1 Information on the 2014 Council Infrastructure Plan funding gap is provided in the February 6, 2018 Finance
Committee report at https://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/63293
City of Palo Alto Page 2
funding gap. There was also an interest in determining the level of public support for funding
other “community asset” projects, such as the second phase of the new Junior Museum and
Zoo and implementation of elements of the Parks Master Plan. These projects are not currently
included in the Council Infrastructure Plan. Committee members also requested a comparison
of Palo Alto’s tax rates compared to those of neighboring jurisdictions, and information on how
removing or deferring individual projects on the Council Infrastructure Plan would impact the
funding gap for the plan.
Discussion
Following the February 6, 2018 Finance Committee meeting, staff has continued to assess
available and expected new revenue sources to address the funding gap for the Council
Infrastructure Plan, and to develop approximate costs for implementing community asset
projects that are not currently part of the Infrastructure Plan.
Project Costs
The funding gap for the Council Infrastructure Plan, using current project cost estimates and
including a placeholder contingency of $20 million to ensure funding for any unanticipated
escalation in cost, is $76 million. Staff has included the following unbudgeted projects as
potential community asset projects:
• New Junior Museum and Zoo - Phase II
• New Animal Shelter
• Construction of priority projects in the Parks Master Plan
The estimated cost of these projects is $55-65 million. Table 1 summarizes these figures.
TABLE 1: Estimated Project Costs
Infrastructure Plan Gap (current estimates) $56 million
Contingency Funding for unanticipated future cost escalation $20 million
Infrastructure Plan Total $76 million
Junior Museum and Zoo Construction Phase II $5 million
New Animal Shelter (tentative estimate) $10-15 million
Parks Master Plan (priority projects, tentative estimate) $40-45 million
Community Assets Total $55-65 million
City of Palo Alto Page 3
Projected Project Funding Options
Staff have worked to identify multiple types of funding sources, ranging from current funding,
anticipated new funding, and potential revenue generating ballot measures. Below is a
summary of possible funding options. In addition to these funding options, Attachment B
outlines the estimated total project cost of each of the nine Council Infrastructure Plan projects
and estimates the savings that could be realized for each project if the project was eliminated
from the plan or deferred beyond the five-year CIP.
TABLE 2: Project Available or Anticipated Funding
Additional Parking In-Lieu Funds (Downtown Garage) $2.8 million
FY 2019 estimated SB1 funding (Charleston/Arastradero Project) $1.2 million
Other sources (Charleston/Arastradero Project) $1.7 million
Infrastructure Reserve (currently “scheduled annual” General Fund
transfer for CIP investment between FY 2019 – FY 2023)
$25-30 million
Available Funding Sources (w/o ballot measure) $31-36 million
New estimated Transient Occupancy Tax receipts/estimated debt
issuance (anticipated opening FY 2020, Marriott hotels)
$35 million
Additional hotel development Transient Occupancy Tax
receipts/estimated debt issuance (in entitlement process)
$10 - $12 million
Transportation Tax measures (SB1, Measure B, through FY 2023) $12 million
Sale of City of Palo Alto real estate assets (Middlefield lots) TBD
Anticipated Funding Sources (with less certainty) $57-59 million
As demonstrated in Table 2, it may be possible that sufficient funding sources may be available
over the current planned five-year Capital Improvement Program (CIP) to address the Council
Infrastructure Plan funding gap and $20 million contingency. However, there are risks and
uncertainties associated with the funds identified above, including:
x Currently Measure B and SB1 are both facing challenges through litigation and a
referendum. The outcome of these proceedings is uncertain.
x Additional TOT revenues are contingent on the development and construction of new
hotels and on timely opening of permitted facilities
x The funding model assumes continued economic growth through the projected five-
year period (present through FY 2023); no recessionary or contraction in the economy is
presumed or modeled.
x Identified funding above would exhaust all funding options and delay the City’s ability to
invest in any projects outside of the 2014 Council Infrastructure Plan projects.
As a result, this approach could reduce the flexibility of the City to respond to unforeseen,
urgent capital needs and limit the ability to begin work on the additional community asset
investment projects identified in this report over the next five years. In addition, execution of
the five-year CIP assumes current projects remain within budgeted levels and that there are no
new capital requests to those projects.
City of Palo Alto Page 4
Potential Revenue Generating Ballot Measure
In order to allow for more flexibility in the five-year CIP and beyond, a ballot measure could be
used to generate additional revenues. As discussed at the February 6, 2018 Finance
Committee, there are a number of types of revenue generating measures that could be
explored, including but not limited to a parcel tax, increased rates for the Transient Occupancy
Tax (TOT) or Documentary Transfer Tax, and an increase to the sales tax. The latest information
available for some of the key tax rates in California and a short summary for each potential type
of tax that could generate additional revenues is below. Attachment C provides more specific
rate details for the various cities surrounding Palo Alto and other parts of the state.
Transient Occupancy Tax (each 1-percent estimated $1.7 million annually)
Palo Alto has a TOT (hotel tax) rate of 14 percent of the room rate. This rate increased from 12
percent to 14 percent in 2014 as approved by the voters and is consistent with other
destination cities such as San Francisco, Oakland, Santa Monica and Beverly Hills. The highest
rate in the state is currently 15 percent in Anaheim and the median rate in the state is 10
percent per Californiacityfinance.com. Some cities have other taxes included in addition to the
hotel tax, such as tourism tax and/or convention center tax. For every 1 percent increase in the
tax rate, additional revenues of $1.7 million are estimated to be collected.
Documentary Transfer Tax (estimated $1.0 million to $3.8 million annually)
California’s Documentary Transfer Tax Act allows counties and cities to collect tax on
transactions that transfer real estate. In addition to the county rate, cities may impose
additional documentary transfer taxes. The amount that the city may impose depends on
whether the city is a charter city or a general law city. A charter city is a city in which the
governing system is defined by the city’s own charter instead of by California law. In general,
charter cities have authority over their municipal affairs and have greater ability to impose
taxes (subject to voter approval). We are a Charter City. Only about 20 percent of California
cities are charter cities.
Many of California’s 121 charter cities have enacted their own documentary transfer tax rates
which are typically articulated as a percentage or rate per $1,000 of property value. In Berkeley,
for example, the city documentary transfer tax rate is $15.00 for each $1,000 of property value,
significantly higher than Palo Alto’s equivalent of $3.30 for each $1,000, and Santa Clara
County’s rate of $1.10 per $1,000 of property value. Typically, when a charter city imposes its
own tax rate in excess of the county’s tax rate, the county does not provide a credit for the city
tax. This means that the county and city property taxes in charter cities are cumulative. In Palo
Alto, property owners pay a total of $4.10 ($1.10 county rate plus $3.30 city rate) on each
$1,000 of property value transferred. In comparison to other Santa Clara County cities, Palo
Alto’s rate is consistent with San Jose, and Mountain View, but higher than Sunnyvale and
Santa Clara which are at $0.55 per $1,000 even though they are charter cities. The City of San
Mateo is at 0.5% of the property value which translates to $5 per $1,000. The County of
Alameda has an average rate of $11.00 per $1,000 for their cities.
City of Palo Alto Page 5
Cities that are not charter cities are known as general law cities. General law cities may impose
a transfer tax equal to one-half of the rate imposed by the county. When the general law city
imposes a tax, the county transfer tax is reduced by the amount of the city’s transfer tax so that
the amount that the taxpayer pays remains at 55 cents per $500 of property value or
consideration.
Depending on the amount of any increase in the tax rate, current collections are estimated to
generate an additional $1.0 million to $3.8 million. These estimates assume a rate of $3.80 per
$1,000 to $5.00 per $1,000 or a marginal increase between $0.50 and $1.70 per $1,000.
Utility Users Tax (estimated $1.4 million to $2.9 million annually)
This tax generally applies to utility services and the tax rate can vary depending on the utility or
commodity. To simplify comparisons to other jurisdictions, these various rates have been
grouped into “utilities” and “telecommunications.” In Palo Alto the utilities tax is 5.0 percent
and 4.75 percent for telecommunications. For cities in Santa Clara County that have a Utility
Users Tax (UUT) it ranges from 2 percent in Sunnyvale to 5 percent in Palo Alto and San Jose.
The highest in the region is Santa Cruz at 8.5 percent and the highest in California is Los Angeles
at 10 percent. Depending on the amount of any increase in the tax rate, current collections are
estimated to generate an additional $1.4 million to $2.9 million).
Sales and Use Tax Rates (estimated $5 million to $6.0 million annually)
The sales and use tax rate in Palo Alto is at 9 percent of which the City receives one percent
directly and is in line with most other cities in the County. (The State and County receive the
rest.) The Santa Clara and San Mateo county cities range from 8.75 percent to 9.25 percent
with the highest tax rate being in San Jose and Campbell. Assuming a 0.25 percent increase to
9.25 percent, current sales tax activity is estimated to generate an additional $5 million to $6
million annually.
City of Palo Alto Page 6
Potential Ballot Measure – Timeline
The City has contracted with Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin, Metz & Associates (FM3) to conduct
public opinion research on a potential ballot measure. Given Finance Committee’s interest in a
potential November 2018 ballot revenue measure, staff recommends that FM3 conduct an
initial survey, with an additional refinement survey if Finance Committee and Council wish to
follow up on the results of the initial survey. Table 1 outlines a schedule that provides for an
initial survey and a refinement survey, with a Council review of Finance Committee’s
recommendations for the refinement survey objectives and elements. (This schedule does not
anticipate City Council review of the initial survey objectives.) The schedule allows for Finance
Committee to bring a potential recommendation for a November 2018 ballot measure to
Council before the Council summer break, so that the remaining steps can occur in time to
meet the relevant election deadlines. This is a very constrained schedule that will require late
packet reports and assumes that decisions needed from Finance Committee and Council will be
made at the indicated meetings.
Table 3: Estimated schedule for consideration and preparation of ballot measure
Activity
Estimated
Schedule
Finance Committee approval of initial survey objectives March 20
FM3 conducts initial survey and compiles results March 26 – April 6
Finance Committee review of survey results and recommendation on
refinement survey objectives (late packet distribution)
April 17
Council approval of refinement survey objectives (late packet distribution) April 30
FM3 conducts refinement survey and compiles results May 7 – May 14
Finance Committee review of survey results and recommendation on
placing measure on ballot (late packet distribution)
May 30
Council takes policy action to place measure on the ballot (late packet
distribution)
June 11
Council adopts resolution of necessity June 11
Council adopts resolution calling election June 11
Deadline to submit election measure to County August 10
Election Day November 6
Timeline
Following completion of the public opinion survey, staff anticipates returning to Finance
Committee to review the survey results on April 17.
Resource Impact
The recommended actions in this report do not have a resource impact as costs associated with
polling are anticipated to be funded from FY 2018 budgets. However, the result of this process
will assist in informing the both the FY 2019 budget development and proposed funding for
various infrastructure investments.
City of Palo Alto Page 7
Additional Resources
Attachment A provides a high level overview of the objectives of an initial survey. The
proposed survey will focus primarily on potential revenue measures to help address the
estimated $76 million funding gap in the 2014 Council Infrastructure Plan, and on support for
the community asset projects described above. The survey will also assess a range of potential
levels of funding support for grade separation work.
Attachment B compares the estimated total project cost of each of the nine Council
Infrastructure Plan projects with the actual incurred costs to date, and estimates the savings
that could be realized for each project if the project was eliminated from the plan or deferred
beyond the five-year CIP.
Attachment C provides a summary of estimated revenue increases resulting from potential tax
measures, and a comparison of Palo Alto’s tax rates with those of neighboring communities.
Attachments:
x Attachment A: Initial Survey Objectives
x Attachment B: Project Costs and Potential Savings
x Attachment C: Tax Rate Comparisons
12100WilshireBoulevard,Suite350|LosAngeles,CA90025
Phone:(310)828Ͳ1183|Fax:(310)453Ͳ6562
1999HarrisonSt.,Suite2020|Oakland,CA94612
Phone:(510)451Ͳ9521|Fax:(510)451Ͳ0384
TOBradEgglestonandClaudiaKeith
CityofPaloAlto
FROMDaveMetzandMirandaEveritt
FM3Research
RE:SummaryofObjectivesforPublicOpinionResearch
DATEMarch6,2018
ThismemooutlinesobjectivesforourupcomingpublicopinionresearchamongPaloAltovoters.Thesurveywill
aimtodetermine:
x GeneralattitudesaboutconditionsintheCity,includingtheperformanceofCitygovernment
x PerceivedneedforfundingforCityinfrastructureprojectsgenerally
x Whichfinancemechanisms,ifany,areacceptabletovotersaswaysoffundingneededinfrastructure
improvements
x Impactofproandconargumentsonsupportforthosemechanisms
x Willingnesstopayfortheseimprovementsbasedoncostimpactsatthehouseholdlevel
x Rankingoftherelativeimportanceofspecificinfrastructureprojects
x SupportforamajorgradeͲseparationproject,overallandwithawarenessofcostimpacts
Wherepossible,wewilltrackquestionsfrompriorsurveystoassesschangesinopinionovertime.Usingvoter
filedataanddemographicquestions,wewillalsodeterminedifferencesinopinionbymajordemographicand
geographicsubgroupswithintheCity.
Ifyouhaveanyquestionsorifthereisanyfurtherinformationwecanprovide,pleasedonothesitatetocontact
us.YoumayreachusinourOaklandofficeasfollows:
DaveMetz
Fairbank,Maslin,Maullin,Metz&Associates(FM3)
1999HarrisonStreet,Suite2020
Oakland,CA94612
(510)451Ͳ9521(Office)
dave@fm3research.com
Attachment A
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Revised
Apil15,2017
Count 483
Mean 9.80%
StandardDeviation 1.85%
Median 10.00%
Minimum 3.50%
Maximum 15.00%
City County Rate
Anaheim Orange15.0%
Garden Grove Orange14.5%
Beverly Hills Los Angeles 14.0%
Culver City Los Angeles 14.0%
Healdsburg Sonoma 14.0%
Inglewood Los Angeles 14.0%
Los Angeles Los Angeles 14.0%
Oakland Alameda 14.0%
Palo Alto Santa Clara 14.0%
San Francisco San Francisco 14.0%
San Leandro Alameda 14.0%
Santa Monica Los Angeles 14.0%
Palm Springs Riverside 13.5%
Blythe Riverside 13.0%
Del Mar San Diego 13.0%
Indio Riverside 13.0%
Mammoth Lakes Mono 13.0%
Burlingame San Mateo 12.0%
Campbell Santa Clara 12.0%
Cupertino Santa Clara 12.0%
East Palo Alto San Mateo 12.0%
Los Gatos Santa Clara 12.0%
Menlo Park San Mateo 12.0%
Pacifica San Mateo 12.0%
Redwood City San Mateo 12.0%
San Bruno San Mateo 12.0%
San Mateo San Mateo 12.0%
Sunnyvale Santa Clara 10.5%
Mountain View Santa Clara 10.0%
TransientOccupancyTaxRates
CaliforniaCitiesandCounties
SOURCE: CaliforniaCityFinance.com
Attachment C
SOURCE:CaliforniaCityFinance.com
California City Documentary and Property Transfer Tax Rates
CONTRA COSTA COUNTY $ 1.10 $ 1.10
RICHMOND Chartered $ 7.00 $ 1.10 $ 8.10
SAN MATEO COUNTY $ 1.10 $ 1.10
SAN MATEO Chartered 0.5% of value $ 1.10 $ 6.10
SANTA CLARA COUNTY $ 1.10 $ 1.10
CUPERTINO General Law $ 0.55 $ 0.55 $1.10
GILROY Chartered $ 0.55 $ 0.55 $ 1.10
LOS ALTOS General Law $ 0.55 $ 0.55 $1.10
LOS ALTOS HILLS General Law $ 0.55 $ 0.55 $1.10
MOUNTAIN VIEW Chartered $ 3.30 $ 1.10 $ 4.40
PALO ALTO Chartered $ 3.30 $ 1.10 $ 4.40
SAN JOSE Chartered $ 3.30 $ 1.10 $ 4.40
SANTA CLARA Chartered $ 0.55 $ 0.55 $ 1.10
SUNNYVALE Chartered $ 0.55 $ 0.55 $ 1.10
Governance
General Law or
Chartered
Per $1000 Property
Value City Rate
Per $1000 Property
County Rate
Per $1000 Property
Value Total
ALAMEDA COUNTY ALAMEDA $ 1.10 $ 1.10OUNTY
ALAMEDA Chartered $ 12.00 $ 1.10 $ 13.10
ALBANY Chartered $ 11.50 $ 1.10 $ 12.60
BERKELEY Chartered $ 15.00 $ 1.10 $ 16.10
EMERYVILLE Chartered $ 12.00 $ 1.10 $ 13.10
HAYWARD Chartered $ 4.50 $ 1.10 $ 5.60
OAKLAND Chartered $ 15.00 $ 1.10 $ 16.10
PIEDMONT Chartered $ 13.00 $ 1.10 $ 14.10
SAN LEANDRO Chartered $ 6.00 $ 1.10 $ 7.10
County City TelecommunicationsUtilities
Alameda Berkeley 7.5% 7.5%
Alameda Emeryville 5.5% 5.5%
Alameda Hayward 5.5% 5.5%
ContraCosta ElCerrito 8.0% 8.0%
ContraCosta Hercules 8.0% 8.0%
ContraCosta Richmond 9.5% 10.0%
LosAngeles HuntingtonPark 9.25% 9.5%
LosAngeles Inglewood 8.0% 8.0%
LosAngeles Irwindale 7.5% 7.5%
LosAngeles LosAngeles 9.0% 10.0%
Sacramento Sacramento 7.0% 7.0%
SanMateo DalyCity 5.0% 5.0%
SanMateo EastPaloAlto 5.0% 5.0%
SanMateo MenloPark 2.5% 3.5%
SanMateo RedwoodCity 4.0% 5.0%
SantaClara Cupertino 2.4% 2.4%
SantaClara LosAltos 3.2% 3.2%
SantaClara MountainView 3.0% 3.0%
SantaClara PaloAlto 4.75% 5.0%
SantaClara SanJose 4.5% 5.0%
SantaClara Sunnyvale 2.0% 2.0%
SantaCruz SantaCruz 8.5% 8.5%
UtilityUserTaxRatesͲCalifCitiesͲupdatedJanuary2017
SOURCE: CaliforniaCityFinance.com
AlmadenValley 9.00% SantaClara
Alviso(SanJose) 9.25% SantaClara
BlossomHill 9.00% SantaClara
BlossomValley 9.00% SantaClara
CambrianPark 9.00% SantaClara
Campbell 9.25% SantaClara
Coyote 9.00% SantaClara
Cupertino 9.00% SantaClara
Gilroy 9.00% SantaClara
HolyCity 9.00% SantaClara
LorreEstates 9.00% SantaClara
LosAltosHills 9.00% SantaClara
LosAltos 9.00% SantaClara
LosGatos 9.00% SantaClara
Milpitas 9.00% SantaClara
MoffettField 9.00% SantaClara
MontaVista 9.00% SantaClara
MonteSereno 9.00% SantaClara
MorganHill 9.00% SantaClara
MountHamilton 9.00% SantaClara
MountainView 9.00% SantaClara
NewAlmaden 9.00% SantaClara
PaloAlto 9.00% SantaClara
Permanente 9.00% SantaClara
RedwoodEstates 9.00% SantaClara
SanJose 9.25% SantaClara
SanMartin 9.00% SantaClara
SanTomas 9.00% SantaClara
SantaClara 9.00% SantaClara
Saratoga 9.00% SantaClara
Stanford 9.00% SantaClara
Sunnyvale 9.00% SantaClara
ValleyFair 9.00% SantaClara
Atherton 8.75% SanMateo
Belmont 9.25% SanMateo
Brisbane 8.75% SanMateo
Burlingame 8.75% SanMateo
Colma 8.75% SanMateo
SanMateoCounty
SantaClaraCounty
CaliforniaCity&CountySales&UseTaxRates(effectiveOctober1,2017)
SOURCE:CaliforniaCityFinance.com
DalyCity 8.75% SanMateo
EastPaloAlto 9.25% SanMateo
ElGranada 8.75% SanMateo
EmeraldHills(RedwoodCity) 8.75% SanMateo
FosterCity 8.75% SanMateo
HalfMoonBay 8.75% SanMateo
Hillsborough 8.75% SanMateo
Hillsdale(SanMateo) 9.00% SanMateo
LaHonda 8.75% SanMateo
Ladera 8.75% SanMateo
LomaMar 8.75% SanMateo
MarshManor 8.75% SanMateo
MenloPark 8.75% SanMateo
Millbrae 8.75% SanMateo
Montara 8.75% SanMateo
MossBeach 8.75% SanMateo
Pacifica 8.75% SanMateo
Pescadero 8.75% SanMateo
PortolaValley 8.75% SanMateo
RedwoodCity 8.75% SanMateo
SanBruno 8.75% SanMateo
SanCarlos 8.75% SanMateo
SanGregorio 8.75% SanMateo
SanMateo 9.00% SanMateo
SouthSanFrancisco 9.25% SanMateo
Woodside 8.75% SanMateo
SOURCE:CaliforniaCityFinance.com
FINANCE COMMITTEE
FINAL MINUTES
Page 1 of 7
Special Meeting
March 20, 2018
Chairperson Scharff called the meeting to order at 6:01 P.M. in the
Community Meeting Room, 250 Hamilton Avenue, Palo Alto, California.
Present: Filseth, Kniss, Scharff (Chair)
Absent: Kou, Tanaka
Oral Communications
Andrew Boone wanted to bring attention to several streets that could use
improvement for walking and bicycling. These are a section of El Camino
Real and East Bayshore Road.
Agenda Items
1. Review of Options to Address Funding Gap for Infrastructure Plan
Projects, and Approval of Objectives and Elements of Initial Public
Opinion Survey Regarding Potential 2018 Ballot Measure to Raise
Revenue.
Chair Scharff stated there is a short Staff presentation.
James Keene, City Manager noted they brought a report on the status of
various infrastructure initiatives that the City has, and Dave Metz with
Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin, Metz & Associates (FM3) was asked to discuss
some next steps that could be taken as part of a survey that could play a
role in how the Council ultimately decides about funding. Following an initial
survey Staff wanted to come back to the Finance Committee (Committee)
for a Refinement Survey on April 17, 2018 and would be looking for a
recommendation from the Committee to ultimately go to Council to approve
the objective of that Refinement Survey which will be done in May. Dave
Metz and FM3 has done polling work for the City and he will talk about what
the City will be attempting to achieve at this stage as part of discussions
FINAL MINUTES
Page 2 of 7
Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Minutes 3/20/18
about how the Committee will ensure they are able to make progress on the
infrastructure needs that have been identified.
Dave Metz, Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin, Metz & Associates discussed their
proposed research approach which mirrors a series of surveys they did
previously when the City was contemplating ways to increase funding for
infrastructure. They started with a survey that allows them to test building
blocks that might go into a ballot measure that would be placed before
voters. There were three sections: 1) The relative importance that voters
assign to a variety of specific projects and infrastructure improvements that
might be funded; 2) The viability of a range of funding mechanisms that
might be used to generate dollars to fund those projects; and 3) The
durability of support for those mechanisms in the face of pro and con
arguments specific to those mechanisms that might be put forward. With
that data, they planned on coming back to the Committee with some
recommendations about how combinations of projects and finance
mechanisms might be put together to form a measure that voters in the City
would likely support. After that, the refinement survey was to be used to
make sure the package met the standards needed to have a high likelihood
of passage. They wanted to propose asking some questions in the survey
that were asked in surveys done for the City going back a decade - tracking
people’s perceptions of the quality of life, the performance of City
Government and the condition of the City’s infrastructure overall, to
determine if those perceptions are remaining static or have changed. If
changed, what the implications of those shifting opinions might be for voters’
willingness to support additional infrastructure funding. One modification to
their research approach relative to what was done in the past is, they
recommend conducting the survey through three different modes of
outreach to voters; 1) Calls on land-line phones; 2) Calls on wireless
phones; and 3) Reaching out to voters on line via e-mail. People were
severing their land-line connections and are more comfortable with on-line
communications, so using all these modes to reach out to voters, enables
FM3 to get a broad and representative sample and to obtain it more cost
effectively. The underlying sampling methodology was still the same. They
draw a random sample of voters who were likely to vote in November’s
election from the voter. E-mail was simply added as a way of reaching out to
those voters in addition to phone calls. In a lot of other communities, most
recently in Mountain View, this was found to be a very effective way of
broadening the sample and gathering more public feedback without
significant additional expense. This was built into the proposed approach put
before you.
FINAL MINUTES
Page 3 of 7
Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Minutes 3/20/18
Chair Scharff put this to the public.
Ann Pianetta, Board Member for the Friends of the Palo Alto Animal Shelter
stated they have been trying for five years to upgrade and eventually
replace the existing animal shelter. Pets-In-Need has offered to manage the
facility but has been waiting for three years for a final decision by City
Council. They asked that Pets-In-Need be the authorized organization to run
the shelter. Also, as the animal shelter falls under auspices of the Police
Department, they asked that the shelter expenses be included with the new
Public Safety Building infrastructure plan.
David Coale with Carbon-Free Palo Alto asked to add a few numbers to their
report and analysis at the Staff Report. For each California Avenue Garage
new parking space, it was $124,000 and for the Downtown Garage it’s
$112,000. He put forth some solutions, including Transportation Demand
Management (TDM). When polling people about potential funding measures,
he encouraged including both Business Tax and a Special Assessment Tax.
James Pflasterer wished to address the Arastadero Corridor Project. He
encouraged completion of this project and prioritizing this higher than other
projects.
Libby Lundgren, Parent Teacher Association (PTA), Safe Rides to School,
wished to express support for the bike and pedestrian plans in the Budget
Plan. She wanted Council to consider the projects that will affect the most
people in the most cost-effective way.
Penny Ellson asked for support of funding for the three Bike/Pedestrian
Transportation Plan projects in the Infrastructure Budget. She noticed that in
the list of potential revenue sources in the Staff Report there is no Business
License Tax or Business Tax of any kind and no plan to price automobile
parking for users. She felt businesses should think about helping fund
projects that serve them.
Paul Goldstein urged the Council to continue making progress on the bicycle
and pedestrian projects in the Infrastructure Plan. He suggested that, as the
parking deficit appears mainly around the noon hour, implementing variable
time-of-day pricing strategies might be an appropriate source of revenue for
some garages.
FINAL MINUTES
Page 4 of 7
Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Minutes 3/20/18
Sophie Alexis stated she is a sophomore at Gunn High School and was hit by
a car when she was biking through the El Camino/Arastadero intersection.
She encouraged the Committee to address the safety issues at that
intersection.
Michael Maurier reiterated his support for the Charleston/Arastadero Plan
and asked the Committee to prioritize the expenditures required to complete
the plan.
Nina Bell voiced her encouragement to finish the Charleston/Arastadero
project.
Melanie Liu with Divest Palo Alto and Alliance and Solidarity with Standing
Rock wished to remind the Committee that they are still actively looking for
divestment from fossil fuels from Palo Alto. She provided some information
from Los Angeles on their move to divest.
Evan Lurie expressed his disappointment with Palo Alto regarding losing
sight of what our core values used to be. He encouraged developing a
mechanism for prioritizing projects on the table and support for the
Charleston/Arastadero Corridor. He encouraged regulating future growth and
felt those benefiting from the improvements must be asked to defray the
costs.
Chair Scharff indicated that tonight the primary thing on the Agenda was to
give direction to Dave Metz and FM3. He briefly outlined this and thought all
of the projects on the list could be done. A Colleague’s Memo in 2010 from
the Committee to Council listed infrastructure needs to be done and the
Committee came up with a list of projects. Those projects are in the Staff
Report. He agreed the Charleston-Arastadero Project needed to be finished.
Also discussed at that time was a Public Safety Building, a parking garage
downtown and a parking garage on California Avenue, two Fire Stations, a
bike bridge and some money for Bixby Park. It was decided the best way to
fund it was a Transient Occupancy Tax (TOT), which is primarily a tax on
business. The TOT since 2010 has been funding the Infrastructure Plan.
That’s been the Council direction and the Council policy. The question to the
public was, what should the TOT be. On a 5-4 vote it was decided the TOT
should be 2 percent. He reiterated the City needs to complete this
Infrastructure Plan. He believed the City should poll the voters and move
forward with a TOT to fund all the items on the Infrastructure Plan. One of
the things the Staff Report pointed out about the downtown parking garage
FINAL MINUTES
Page 5 of 7
Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Minutes 3/20/18
was that there will likely be an additional $2.8 million in Parking In-Lieu
Funds that were paid to the downtown. With that extra $2.8 million, there
was expected to be about $10 million in that fund and he stated that if the
Downton parking garage is not built, that $10 million would have to be given
back to the developers. The reason there was $10 million in that fund is that
the City has allowed people to pay into the In-Lieu Fund rather than building
a parking space; so, the $10 million represents parking spaces that have
already been promised that were not built. He felt the City needed to
complete that promise to build a Downtown parking garage. The City also
needed to fund the Parks Master Plan Fund and buy more park land. The
issue with the Animal Shelter needed to be solved. The second phase of the
Junior Museum and Zoo needed to be funded, as well as other things related
to parks and recreation. He suggested a $0.25 Sales Tax and stated that if
Palo Alto doesn’t take it first, another government entity could get that. The
grade separation issue also needed to be solved. A preferred alternative for
what grade separations looked like in Palo Alto is needed, then projects can
be made ready and a decision made on how best to fund that. He felt the
best way to fund that would be a Business Tax in 2020 or 2022.
Vice Mayor Filseth questioned how many responses were expected from the
survey.
Mr. Metz stated they are shooting for 600..
Vice Mayor Filseth asked if that would be at random across the City.
Mr. Metz answered yes, a random sample of likely voters.
Mayor Kniss recalled over the last couple of years several polls have been
done and she presumed that included in this poll would be general
questions. She asked that a sample be given to the City.
Mr. Metz replied that surveys were designed to provide a specific information
need, but there were also a range of questions asked which were helpful as
general management tools for the City. These included how people feel
about the quality of life in the community, what they see as the major issues
facing it and their overall evaluation of the performance of City Government.
Mayor Kniss asked Mr. Metz how many polls his firm has done for Palo Alto.
FINAL MINUTES
Page 6 of 7
Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Minutes 3/20/18
Mr. Metz believed going back to the bond measures tested in 2007, probably
six or seven polls.
Mayor Kniss remarked that in today’s world, people felt that polls don’t count
anymore. She felt polls were important regarding support for budgetary
needs and what is happening in the community.
Chair Scharff asked Mr. Metz if his firm is planning on polling on the
individual projects listed in the Staff Report or not.
Mr. Metz replied some questions will ask people to rate the importance of
general categories of spending and also some specific projects.
Chair Scharff thought other areas where the Council may want to spend
money would be a dedicated funding source out of the TOT to expand the
Transportation Management Association (TMA) and, the Roth Building
renovation.
Mayor Kniss believed Chair Scharff did a good job of summing up everything
that happened while he was on the Council.
MOTION:Chair Scharff moved, seconded by Mayor Kniss to recommend to
the City Council to approve the objectives and elements of an initial public
opinion survey regarding a potential ballot measure to raise revenue, and
direct Staff to return with more information on the Parks Master Plan
Projects.
Chair Scharff added into the Motion that Staff return with more information
on the Parks Master Plan Projects.
Mr. Keene restated that this would be an initial poll. FM3 was to come back
to the Committee with the findings and the Committee could then weigh in
more specifically on strategic angles to pursue. He reiterated that to have
something on the November 18 ballot, the Council needs to make the ballot
question decisions before the end of June.
Vice Mayor Filseth hoped everyone was aware of the need to move
expeditiously. He thought Council and Staff needed to develop a plan and
the poll was needed to shed light on the way to pursue this.
FINAL MINUTES
Page 7 of 7
Special Finance Committee MeetingFinal Minutes 3/20/18
MOTION PASSED:3-0 Kou, Tanaka absent
Mr. Keene believed the Staff Report presented the challenges and the
Committee spoke to measures to resolve these. Staff targets April 17, 2018
to return with the results from this poll and will be looking for the
Committee’s discussion and action on the next step.
Chair Scharff thanked the public for coming out and speaking.
Mr. Keene thanked Mayor Kniss for sitting in for Council Member Kou.
Future Meetings and Agendas
ADJOURNMENT: Meeting adjourned at 6:46 P.M.