City Council's Hot-Button Agenda Includes Last-Minute Add-Ons

Three hot button items are among the things on the City Council's agenda at today's meeting, beginning at 5 p.m., including a possible effort to prevent the loss of redevelopment funds:

1. A second enacting vote is scheduled on adding restrictions to the city's ordinance regulating medical marijuana collectives.  These new restrictions require surveillance cameras and create a buffer zone adjacent to parks where collectives won't be allowed.  The new restrictions exclude beaches from the ordinance's definition of parks. That means City Hall wouldn't be able to exclude a location based solely on being near the beach. 

Those opposed to adding new restrictions include a lawyer for three outlets, including Herbal Solutions, Naples, at 5752 E. Second St.

Jamie T. Hall emailed a legal-brief citation filled letter to the mayor and council last week, alleging legal defects in the proposed restrictions and urging that the item be removed from the agenda. 

Last month, the council voted 6-3 (Andrews, Johnson, Gabelich dissenting) to approve the restrictions. Councilman Robert Garcia offered them as an alternative to tougher restrictions initially proposed by Councilmembers Gary DeLong, Patrick O'Donnell and Gerrie Schipske.

2.  Councilman DeLong has joined as co-author of an item by Councilwoman Gerrie Schipske that proposes two ballot measures if the governor calls a June special election.  One measure would require City Hall to disclose contract offers that it puts on the table during negotiations with city employee unions, and require the city manager to certify in writing that the city can meet those costs during the term of the agreement.  State law currently requires School Districts to disclose their contract offers publicly and the Schipske-DeLong proposal would extend that principle to the Long Beach City Council.

The second measure would require the city to disclose in its annual budget all salaries and total compension for all funded positions. 

Both of these proposed charter amendments would first be sent to the Council's Charter Amendment Committee (comprised of all councilmembers) for discussion, then referred back to the City Council for a vote on whether to put them on the ballot.

3.  With no backup details available as of early today, five-related agenda items appeared on the City Council agenda yesterday afternoon (Jan. 17), a federal holiday, using a special meeting 24-hour notice procedure. They're apparently in response to Gov. Jerry Brown's Jan. 10 budget proposal to phase out redevelopment agencies statewide. The San Francisco Chronicle reports on this effort in an article headlined "Cities move to wall off redevelopment funds before program is killed."

The five items propose to encumber or otherwise remove from Sacramento's access hundreds of millions of dollars in increased property-tax revenue over the coming years that Long Beach's Redevelopment Agency could use. City Hall has also tapped those funds in previous years for local projects, including some infrastructure and capital projects. 

Gov. Brown says redevelopment is costing Sacramento billions that could otherwise fund schools. A link to the council's agenda can be found at right.

Patch will update as details develop.