Mayor Kamei, Vice Mayor Ramos, and Members of the Mountain View City Council,
Thank you for the opportunity to comment on Item 7.2 “Council Strategic Priorities and Fiscal Years 2025-26 and 2026-27 Council Work Plan Project Identification”.
We appreciate each council member’s efforts at suggesting new policy items that could improve our city. Unfortunately, it is difficult for us to provide meaningful comment on some of these items because no complete description of what is envisioned is provided in the staff report. So, we are listing some projects that we support, and others that are worth considering, but for which we have some key questions. The answers to these questions would inform us on whether we would support these projects. We suggest that council members ask these questions to guide an informed discussion of the merits of the projects.
Projects we would support:
#1: Complete funding agreements and begin engineering for the Stevens Creek Trail Extension
#4: Develop a plan for ending natural gas use by 2045
#6: Expand access to broadband citywide
#12: Develop a downtown vacant storefront window display and pop-up program
Projects that could be worthy of support, but we would need to know more:
#2: Develop a strategy to facilitate low- and middle- income home ownership
Traditionally, the city has provided opportunities for BMR housing through its mandate for BMR housing in new developments. We have been discouraged that state laws have at times undercut the city’s ability to enforce those local mandates. We would like to know what can be done, short of raising new taxes to pay for more affordable housing or direct payments, and how this would be communicated to the public. Does this project envision one or more study sessions, public meetings to inform proposed new policies or is there something more specific we can advocate before even beginning this project?
#7: Implement smart water meters
What would be the end product to residents, and who would pay for it? Are we talking about a cell phone notification when someone has a serious water leak of many gallons per minute? Or just periodic reports that someone’s home is using more water than “similar” homes? Who would pay for this program?
#11: Pilot an autonomous vehicle (AV) shuttle:
Does this project proposal envision that the city pay for this or would it require some AV company provide the technology and equipment for free?
#15: Create a framework to support volunteer organizations working with the city
It is not clear what is meant by ‘support’ and ‘working with the city’. Are volunteer organizations simply groups of residents and could any group be able to nominate itself? Would anyone be denied such access to staff and the ‘support’ envisioned? Who would decide? Would this be limited solely to residents and would there be a limit as to how many volunteer organizations staff would support? This proposal raises numerous issues not only as to staff time but also use of city resources, funds and transparency.
#17: Remove barriers to condo development
Frequently, developers have put forward condo-mapped projects, but condo-mapping a project does not mean that condos will ever be sold to the public. In the past, we have asked developers if they intend to purchase the units themselves or through a consortium and then simply rent them out and the answer has been that they can do whatever they want with their property. We would urge council to acknowledge this issue and focus on how to assure that any concessions by the city would yield condos that would actually be available for entry level home owners.
Thank you for considering our input to this important item.
Robert Cox, Louise Katz, Maureen Blando, Peter Spitzer, Muriel Sivyer-Lee, Hala Alshahwany, Jerry Steach, Leslie Friedman, and Nancy Stuhr
For the Steering Committee of Livable Mountain View
