Resolution 26-116
Happy Tuesday Daly Citizens!
In two weeks our City Council meets. In June they approved an agreement with the Olympic Club over Westlake Park on the calendar, without discussing it. September 14th is the night we ask them to undo it, and we need to be there.
Westlake Park
September 14th is our opportunity to get the council to undo the agreement it made in June. It is their chance to put this whole thing behind us.
On June 22nd the council approved the non-binding memorandum of understanding with the Olympic Club as Resolution 26-116, inside the consent agenda's block vote, with no separate discussion (item 2026-458).
For the next 14 days, I am calling on all of you to email [email protected] and [email protected] and demand that rescinding Resolution 26-116 is on the September 14 agenda. The agenda is posted 72 hours before the meeting, so don't wait until the last minute.
ALSO come on September 14, 7 p.m., City Hall, 333 90th Street.
If it is not on the agenda, we ask for it from the podium. Oral comment is open to anyone on any subject, and the agenda sets the terms: "Speakers are limited to two minutes, unless modified by the Mayor. The Council cannot take action on any matter raised under this item." What a council member can do is ask staff to bring it back as an agenda item, the way Mayor Sylvester did in March with the Lake Merced road diet study. That is the ask in the room.
For the organizing side, visit SaveWestlakePark.com.
A pool hall on Mission Street
In some other news, we may be getting a new billiards hall on Mission. The old Dollar Tree at 6232 Mission Street has been sitting vacant for a while. Tonight, the Planning Commission takes up a plan to fill it with a billiards hall. It would be great to bring more life to Mission Street. Mailed notice went only to property owners within 300 feet, so if you live anywhere near it, consider this your notice.
George and Henry Khanouf want to convert the empty building into a billiards hall: 21 pool tables, two snooker tables, an air hockey table, packaged snacks and bottled beer (the ABC license is still to come). They asked for closing at 1 a.m. Sunday through Thursday and 2 a.m. Friday and Saturday. Staff met with the Police Department and the City Attorney's office and recommends midnight every night instead, with minors out by 8 p.m. on weeknights and 10 p.m. on weekends. Other conditions: door security from 6 p.m. to close, cameras coordinated with the police and no more than a quarter of the windows covered, so you can always see in.
Parking is always an issue on Mission though. The building is about 12k square feet with three parking spaces on site. The Zoning Ordinance has no parking standard for billiard halls, so staff applied the general retail rate, which works out to about 40 spaces. Staff's answer is that the building was short as a Dollar Tree too, so the new use makes nothing worse.
This is a large issue in working to revitalize Mission street. Also, what is going on with the meters on Mission? They don't take credit cards and no one pays them anyway?
The hearing is tonight at 7 p.m., City Hall Council Chambers, 333 90th Street. Written comments need to reach [email protected] by 4 p.m. The commission's vote is only a recommendation; the City Council makes the final call. Here is the staff report and the meeting page.
City Meeting Updates
The Women's Commission met Thursday, and it turned into a bigger night than the agenda suggested (meeting page).
Nobody has asked the Women's Commission anything
The commission spent forty minutes on a question it couldn't settle: is anyone at the city supposed to bring it things? "We've sat on this commission for almost a year and a half, and we have not been at all approached about any of the things that we've said," one commissioner said. She pointed at the Bicycle/Pedestrian Advisory Committee, where staff bring street designs over for comment before construction, and the Planning Commission, where state law requires the referral. The staff member in the room read the charter the other way: the commission is "in the driver's seat to identify those issues," and the council expects recommendations to come up rather than assignments to come down. The ordinance backs the staff reading. The commission's plan is to invite someone from the City Manager's office to a future meeting to walk through what the city is actually working on, which sounds like the right first step. Still, a year and a half is a long time for nobody to have asked them anything.
Housing help the city already pays for
HIP Housing came to present, and it turns out Daly City fully sponsors HIP's Housing Readiness Program: one-on-one help for county residents 62 and older living on about $1,800 a month or less. Budgets, housing applications, scam recognition, a case manager through a move. Free, by phone, at (650) 348-6660. Details. HIP also runs home sharing, matching people with a spare room to people who need one, as it has since 1979. Matches last about five and a half years on average, and some are rent-reduction deals where the housemate helps with driving or chores.
$85,000 a year now counts as low income in San Mateo County. That is why HIP says its home-share matches include police officers, firefighters, gym managers and baristas.
Save the evening of November 5
The commission's domestic violence community conversation is taking shape: a moderated panel on Thursday, November 5, 5 to 8 p.m., with survivors, the District Attorney's office, a Daly City police domestic violence detective and CORA, plus resource tables and refreshments. They are still recruiting a healthcare provider for the panel. Flyers are headed for the libraries, the senior and community centers and the Chamber.
Street safety
The Bicycle/Pedestrian Advisory Committee next meets Wednesday at 6 p.m. in the City Hall Engineering Conference Room. On deck for the meeting: the John Daly/Skyline pedestrian connection and intersection safety work, the Lake Merced Boulevard lane and bike-lane protection study, Safe Routes to School, John Daly Boulevard improvements and the Hillside Complete Streets corridor, plus a review of two years of resurfacing projects still in design. The committee is also weighing an ad hoc subcommittee to write letters about the concerns members raise, since it has no formal authority of its own (is this a pattern with our city commissions and committees?). Zoom registration is on the agenda.
Other Business
Nothing new on the vehicle license fee shortfall. The August 13 joint session with the county still has no minutes or video posted, and the roughly $12 million a year figure Bay City News reported still doesn't square with the $6.5 million the Mayor described in February. September 14 is the council's first chance to sort that out in public.
The Cow Palace data center hasn't moved either. A neighbor asked for an update and whether anyone is organizing, and the honest answer is that there has been nothing to show up to yet. On July 27 Councilmember DiGiovanni reported a Global Stack presentation and an in-progress MOU and asked the council to consider a moratorium. Two weeks earlier she had read a Cow Palace letter into the record saying there was no move to put a data center there. Nothing in the record since explains the difference between those two accounts. The first place it could move is the September 14 agenda.
And the Flock camera. A neighbor posted a photo of one pointed at the Kaiser exit and asked why it is there. The license-plate-reader program the council actually voted on is Axon: 105 more cameras approved in June, about $2 million in Measure Q money over nine years. Flock Safety appears once in everything I track, as a $570k subscription liability in the city's audited financials, and I can't find any council discussion of that vendor. This may be our next call to action.
Important dates
Tuesday, September 1, 4 p.m. Written comments due on the pool hall hearing, to [email protected]. The hearing itself is that night at 7.
Tuesday, September 1. Last day to apply for the County's free nine-week Civics 101 Academy. Apply
Monday, September 7. Write-in candidate filing opens for the three council seats and runs through October 20. Papers from the City Clerk, (650) 991-8078.
Monday, September 14, 7 p.m. City Council, City Hall, 333 90th Street. First regular meeting since July 27: the two housing hearings set back in July, plus open public comment. Email [email protected] and [email protected] before then. Meeting
Thursday, September 24. First pre-election campaign finance statements due, covering July 1 through September 19. We finally get to see who is funding the council race.
Monday, October 5. Early voting begins in San Mateo County.
Around town
Tuesday Fun Night Tuesdays, 6 to 7:30 p.m., through September 29. Westlake Library, 275 Southgate Ave. Drop-in, a different activity each week, kids and adults. Free.
World Art Break Day Friday, September 4, 2 to 4 p.m. Drop in at any Daly City library, supplies provided. Free, all ages.
Play & Learn with Help Me Grow Fridays, 10:30 to 11:30 a.m., through September 25. Serramonte Main Library, 40 Wembley Drive. Ages 0 to 5. Free.
Card Show Con Saturday and Sunday, September 5 and 6, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Cow Palace, 2600 Geneva Ave. Ticketed; kids 6 and under free.
No school Monday, September 7 for Labor Day in the Jefferson Union High School District. District calendar
Grocery Outlet grand opening Thursday, September 10, ribbon cutting at 10 a.m. 6100 Mission Street. A gift card for the first 100 customers and free reusable bags while they last.
4th Annual Book Bash Friday, September 11, 5:30 to 8 p.m. Colma Community Center, 1520 Hillside Blvd. Peninsula Books' annual fundraiser, with signed copies, a silent auction and a limited number of free teacher tickets.
Just Between Friends consignment sale Friday through Sunday, September 11 to 13, 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Cow Palace, 2600 Geneva Ave. Presale September 10; event parking free.
Author meet and greet with Mindy Hall Saturday, September 12, 2 to 4 p.m. Peninsula Books, 441 Westlake Center.
Silent Book Club Sunday, September 13, 2 to 4 p.m. Peninsula Books, 441 Westlake Center. Free.
The library storytimes run weekly into late September: Serramonte Tuesdays and Baby Bounce Wednesdays at 10:15 a.m., John Daly Wednesdays at 6 p.m., Westlake Thursdays at 10:15 a.m. and Bayshore Thursdays at 6 p.m. All free.
Everything past two weeks out is on the events calendar.
Other Alerts
The Westlake slurry seal runs into January. Same drill on your street's posted day: closed 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., and anything still parked after 7 a.m. gets towed at your expense. Signs go up 48 hours ahead; the schedule is on the construction projects page. A neighbor asked on r/DalyCity why Westlake gets a fresh coat while Mission Street stays rough, and the record has a direct answer from May: Mission is a state road, and the city can't fix a street it doesn't own. One more thing to expect: new paint. Limit lines are moving behind curb ramps and high-visibility crosswalks are going in along the higher-injury streets in the project area.
How is Jagalchi doing? A neighbor counted five weekday visits to the Korean market at Serramonte with every register empty, and wondered whether a store that size can make it on that kind of traffic. Regency Centers told the council in July that Serramonte draws about 60 million visits a year. I hope it makes it.
Until next time!