Silverstein Gets Gentle Nudge From City Consultant Over Criticizing Staff In Public

Malibu’s city council got a gentle … but firm guidance on how to handle themselves in public meetings yesterday.

A consultant from the city’s insurance company … Gerry Preciado … gave the five city council members a two hour lesson on best practices. 

Preciado was brought in by the city’s insurance company … apparently worried about lawsuits that may be coming towards the city … and the insurance company … from stressed city employees.

And about an hour and a half into his lesson … the insurance consultant and lawyer honed in on the major issue of contention at recent city council meetings.

That would be the public criticism of city employees … at council sessions … by city council members.

Gerry Preciado … at the meeting Monday. 

70503 CONSULT 111 GERRY PRECIADO 

“You can make comments in public that seem to fall into a category where they are sharing private personnel information about city employees… that should be done in a closed session. 

“I’m not I’m not saying this group has done that… 

“But I am saying that that is a pitfall that we want to avoid.”

Then… The government consultant walked towards Bruce Silverstein and directed his comments to him.

“it could be could be crossing the line. I’m not saying anyone did.. But I am saying that is a protective statement, an admonition I give you. 

“So just be careful whenever you’re making statements like that.

“Bruce, did I hit a nerve on anything?”

SILVERSTEIN: “I could take forever,  I’ll just let it (unintelligible).”

The government consultant than said he would enjoy talking to Silverstein over lunch some time.

The danger is this, according to government experts both in city hall and outside.

The city of Malibu needs insurance against lawsuits … lawsuits that could bankrupt the city.

The city of Malibu faces a very real threat of a lawsuit from at least one city employee … now out on stress leave after having been castigated by city council members this summer. 

And maybe others. 

That consultant … from the insurance collective called the Joint Powers Insurance Authority … may hold your tax rate in his hands.

Planning Commission – Minus One Member Who Stomps Out – Grapples With Housing Plan 

Malibu needs to come up with 79 low income housing units … to meet state housing laws.

Last night … the city planning commission grappled with the city’s response to a consent order … from the state attorney general … requiring it to approve a plan to comply with that law.

The meeting was marked by a fit thrown by one commissioner, Kraig Hill, who angrily stomped out after Commission Chair John Mazza told him to stop making comments on the plan.

“Let’s talk about who were are counting as affordable or low income….”

MAZZA, INTERRUPTING:  “No no no no no, Kraig. They have a limit …”

HILL, INTERRUPTING AND SHOUTING:   “John, I have things I want to say here. ”

MAZZA, STAMMERING: “You do not … You get called on.”

HILL, SHOUTING  AND GATHERING HIS PAPERS: “I am going home.  Thanks everybody.”

MAZZA: “See ya, Kraig,

HILL:, SHOUTING:  “This is bullshit. Seriously ”

MAZZA:  “We have to do our job.”

HILL, WALKING OUT: “Good night everybody.

MAZZA: “Good night Kraig.”

After the hissy fit … objections were raised by some of the remaining commissioners over the city staff’s proposals to concentrate the 79 proposed low income units on four lots … at the Civic Center and near Paradise Cove.  City staff explained those were the only places where large residential developments … big enough to house the requires low income housing … could go.

Planning chair John Mazza last night tried to find a way to get out of the centralized housing unit concept. 

Mazza asked why the state has decided that putting the low cost housing on vacant lots … across PCH from Paradise Cove … was the way to go. 

He noted that the plan calls for about 500 apartments or condos on vacant land at PCH at Zumirez Drive …  across from paradise Cove … with about 20 percent of them reserved for low income households.

70507 MAZZA 500 UNITS  

“We’re looking at a general plan that says any development in Malibu shall be, west of Malibu Canyon Road, shall be more rural than east of Malibu Canyon Road.

“And then we’re talking about dumping 111 condos next to 400 condos all on one spot right across from Paradise Cove, and no diversification anywhere else except maybe someday some behind the shopping center (at the Malibu Civic Center).”

The answer was obvious to other commissioners … state law trumps the city general plan.  And there is no real estate in eastern Malibu that could accommodate the required low income units, plus market rate units necessary to make a development pencil out.

Which is required by the state housing law … and the consent agreement that Malibu’s city council agreed to last spring … enforced by the state Attorney General.

The city’s consultant … Joyce Parker Bozylinski … said clustering the new lower income units on the lots at PCH at Zumirez is only part of the solution.

The other part will be to count ADU … auxiliary dwelling units … that are expected to be built as an affordable housing source, scattered around the city. 

But Commissioner Kraig Hill — before his stompjng out — attacked the state plan for ignoring a major factor that should limit additional housing units in Malibu.

70508 HILL EVAC

“Malibu’s absolutely constrained by having a single arterial access.

“We are in a very high fire hazard zone. 

“We have proven evidence from the Woolsey fire evacuation on PCH already takes much too long.

“Summer beach days are a parking lot already.

“We have a extraordinary physical constraint here in the city with this artery, that makes us unique compared to anywhere else, and this has not been acknowledged in the element at all.”

But the state’s plan is being forced onto Malibu  and the state law in fact does not allow for individual dangers to be factored in.

The state’s plan also came in for criticism from Ed Niles. He’s the longtime Malibu resident … an architect … in fact, the retired dean of the USC architecture college. 

Niles said the city of Malibu should not put all of its low income renters in one place. 

70506 ED NILES

“There should be very few low income housing structures packed togerther. 

“They should be distributed through the community … as ADUs.

“They should be distributed and developmed whereever commercially we might have in the future.

“And I don’t think we have to say Joe blow lives over there because he’s low income.”

One advocate for building interests … Candy Martin … said the state’s proposal to build large projects and reserve some of the units for low income families should not 

She said the city should divert money money from taxes on hotels and short term rentals … use part of the tax money to subsidize rents for some low income people. 

70505 CANDY MARTIN 

“The maximum rents (that can be charged), based on the housing element, using 2021 rates, range from $1,400 to $2,400 a month.

“That just doesn’t work in Malibu.

“What makes more sense is to allocate a percentage of the city’s Temporary Occupancy Tax revenue to affordable housing for various properties throughout the city.”

Candy Martin works for Don Schmitz and associates … and she ays the city is taking in 6 millions dollars a year in taxes on overnight accommodations for tourists.

The Planning Commission last night urged the city council to cut the number of units possible on those lots … from 27 units to 20 units per acre. 

It would be up to the city council to figure out exactly what the minimum density would be possible under state law. 

City staff last night said the current proposal is th minimum that the state will accept … that meets state law … 

A couple of recommendations were made by the planning commission for the city Council… Like establishing a minimum size for these low income housing units… To avoid 800 square-foot studios

The planning commission also wants the city to require that a nonprofit agency build the affordable housing… And that the affordable housing units be distributed to applicants via a lottery.

As for the shouting and the stomping out … Malibu does not have a specific code of conduct for its city council and city commissions.

Malibu Actor Arrested On Broad Beach In Domestic Dispute

A Malibu actor was arrested over the weekend … taken into custody for misdemeanor domestic battery.

66 year-old Michael Madsen was arrested at a house on Broad Beach Road. 

Deputies said there was a “family disturbance” … where a woman reported that her husband pushed and locked her out of the house.

This was just after midnight Saturday morning. 

Madsen was released on $20,000 bail, according to Variety.

Michael Madsen has more than 200 credits … including the villain called Mr. Blonde in “Reservoir Dogs.” 

He also played Budd in the two “Kill Bill” movies and acted in “The Hateful Eight.”

Pelicans May Be Overpopulated In California, Causing Some To Die

Pelicans are dying in increasing numbers up and down California. 

The have started showing up …in severe distress … in places far from the ocean: in the middle of roads, backyards, even in the middle of a San Francisco Giants baseball game.

The wayward marine birds were cold, disoriented, anemic and dying … The Washington Post reports. 

Up and down the coast, something was wrong with California’s brown pelicans, but no one was sure what. 

So far this summer … nearly 900 brown pelicans have been brought into wildlife rehabilitation centers from Southern California to the San Francisco Bay Area.

Hundreds more have died in the wild.

So why are the brown pelicans dying?
It’s not demoic acid … the poison that sometimes crops up in their food.

Oddly … one veterinary surgeon Rebecca Duerr says the stomach contents of one dead pelican that she opened up was full of feathers and wood chips.

One leading theory has to do with the way brown pelicans feed. Pelicans plunge headfirst into the water to scoop up fish near the surface with their massive bills and swallow them whole.

But the birds can only divebomb so deep. Storms may have reduced their ability to see into the water, 

Or maybe the fish that pelicans like to eat may be swimming deeper than usual, possibly the result of warmer waters due to climate change.

That is only a possibility. 

One biologist says the deaths of the birds may be …/ counterintuivily … a good thing…. 

It may simply be the case that “there are more pelicans competing for food resources now, so this could be a natural fluctuation of the population,” one biologist says.

He told the Washington Post … that “These die-off events are not good news for those individual pelicans,” he added, “but the pelican population seems to still be doing well.”

This story is based on reporting in the Washington Post.

California Sailing Through Summer With Electricity To Spare

And why isn’t California running short on electricity like Texas??

Four years ago this week, California’s power grid was so strained by a heat wave that rolling blackouts hit hundreds of thousands of residents over two days. I

This year a record heat wave scorched the state over three weeks from mid-June to July … but there was plenty of power. No warnings. No shortages. No flex alerts.

The reason??? California’s  boom in the construction of giant battery projects … most of them fed off of solar power.

California’s high-tech battery centers built with thousands of lithium-ion batteries similar to the batteries in cell phones and electric cars.

Battery storage has increased sevenfold in the past five years in California.

 from 1,474 megawatts in 2020 to 10,383 megawatts now. A megawatt is enough electricity to run 750 homes.

This article is based in reporting in the San Jose Mercury News.