20210222 Late Correspondence1
From:Elizabeth Sax <saxhouse1@gmail.com>
Sent:Monday, February 22, 2021 6:02 PM
To:CityClerk
Subject:Ladera Linda added to Goals
The Ladera Linda project needs a careful review and local community deserves to understand the full impact of this
project which has changed over time.
Things have been told to us but recent city representatives and plans show differently from what was told to us.
Drawings reflecting what was told and consideration for smaller footprint with fewer classrooms, no amphitheater and
silhouette structures being required is what I am looking to see from the city.
We deserve this at the very minimum, since we have been asking for these items from the start and this project moves
with fits and starts. With changes in city personnel and changes in city hired consultants, I feel it is necessary to regroup
and take a clear view of what local residents need and want since we are paying for it.
I hope you will give us that consideration. It is necessary the goals are set for this project with residents being informed
of providing their insight and vision along the way.
Respectfully,
Elizabeth Sax
4022 Admirable Dr. RPV
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TO: HONORABLE MAYOR & CITY COUNCIL MEMBERS
FROM: CITY CLERK
DATE: FEBRUARY 22, 2021
SUBJECT: ADDITIONS/REVISIONS AND AMENDMENTS TO AGENDA
_____________________________________________________________________
Attached are revisions/additions and/or amendments to the agenda material presented
for tonight’s meeting.
Item No. Description of Material
1 Corrections by EPC Chair Diana Feinberg
Email from Lowell Wedemeyer
Respectfully submitted,
__________________
Emily Colborn
L:\LATE CORRESPONDENCE\2021\2021 Coversheets\20210222 additions revisions to agenda .docx
1
From:Karina Banales
Sent:Monday, February 22, 2021 11:16 AM
To:CityClerk
Cc:Jesse Villalpando
Subject:FW: My 2021 goals for City Council consideration
Attachments:City Council goals, 2021-22.pdf
Hi Team,
Please see the attached সহ
K
From: Jesse Villalpando <jvillalpando@rpvca.gov>
Sent: Monday, February 22, 2021 11:11 AM
To: Karina Banales <kbanales@rpvca.gov>
Subject: FW: My 2021 goals for City Council consideration
Hi Karina,
Would it be best to add this email as late correspondence or amending the report?
Please advise.
Thanks!
Jesse Villalpando
Senior Administrative Analyst
Emergency Preparedness
City of Rancho Palos Verdes
30940 Hawthorne Blvd.
Rancho Palos Verdes, CA 90275
310-544-5209
Jvillalpando@rpvca.gov
To limit public contact and help prevent the spread of COVID-19, City Hall is temporarily closed to the
public, but services are available by telephone, email, online and limited curbside service. Some
employees are working on rotation and may be working remotely. Please note that our response to your
inquiry could be delayed. For a list of department phone numbers, visit the Staff Directory on the City
website.
From: Diana Feinberg <diana.feinberg@rpvca.gov>
Sent: Saturday, February 20, 2021 3:03 PM
To: Jesse Villalpando <jvillalpando@rpvca.gov>; Karina Banales <kbanales@rpvca.gov>
Subject: Fw: My 2021 goals for City Council consideration
Hi Jesse and Karina,
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2
I just read the Agenda report for next Tuesday's City Council goals meeting and wanted to mention an agenda
mistake that should be fixed.
In my slides shown during the EPC meeting and emailed to you afterward I mentioned a possible City goal of
improving electric system reliability by seeking financing for undergrounding three miles of utility lines
biennially. Biennially means "every two years" but the City Council Agenda report changed it to
read biannually, which means "twice a year." Could you ensure there's a correction on this point?
Thanks very much,
Diana Feinberg
From: Diana Feinberg
Sent: Thursday, February 11, 2021 9:23 PM
To: Jesse Villalpando <jvillalpando@rpvca.gov>; Karina Banales <kbanales@rpvca.gov>
Subject: My 2021 goals for City Council consideration
Hi Jesse and Karina,
Attached as a PDF are the two slides I showed tonight...page one being my suggested goals for the City Council
from an EPC perspective and on the second page goals from a personal perspective, some of which are EPC
related.
Thanks for holding this informative meeting.
Diana Feinberg
RPV City Council goals, 2021-22…from Emergency Preparedness Committee
perspective
§Have wildfire mitigation initiative mostly in place
§Increase City ROW clearance awareness via goats/other efforts
§Promote resident brush clearance, fuel reduction
§Encourage home hardening
§Increase electric system reliability and safety in RPV
§Find funding to underground at least three miles biennially on major
ROWs
§Encourage HOAs with overhead utility lines in view corridors to consider
Underground Utility Districts
§Develop alternate Emergency Operations Center site to ensure continuity of
government
§Ensure multiple disaster communication methods between City and
residents
RPV City Council goals, 2021-22…from Diana Feinberg personal perspective
§Continual focus on enhancing property values and value to residents
§Ensure increase of internet capacity in RPV
§Extend Regional Fibre network to non-city subscribers
§Incent Cox and Frontier to enhance networks
§(Big if…satellite internet from SpaceX and Amazon via thousands of
small satellites)
§Reduce cost and effort in View Restorations, link with Wildfire
mitigation
§City trees
§Private trees
§Incentives to upgrade/fire-harden homes (reducing/waiving certain
permit fees)
§Street beautification initiatives (better sweeping, fencing)
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From:Teresa Takaoka
Sent:Friday, February 19, 2021 6:09 PM
To:CityClerk
Cc:Ramzi Awwad
Subject:Re: City Council Goals
Late corr for Monday.
From: Lowell Wedemeyer <Lowell.Wedemeyer@rpvca.gov>
Sent: Friday, February 19, 2021 4:25 PM
To: CC <CC@rpvca.gov>
Cc: Lauren Ramezani <LaurenR@rpvca.gov>; Ramzi Awwad <rawwad@rpvca.gov>
Subject: City Council Goals
A memo is appended concerning managerial turn‐over and City institutional memory.
It is a personal memo not on behalf of the IMAC.
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Honorable Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem and Council:
RE: 2021 Goals and Action Plan: Managerial Turnover and Institutional Memory
The Problem: In the past 14 years there have been numerous changes in managerial staff,
including city managers, department directors and deputy directors. There have been many
short-term “acting” managerial stand-ins. These managerial changes interact with changes in
city council membership due to the electoral cycle. With each managerial departure the city
loses that person’s operating knowledge of the city and suffers discontinuity. The city’s
effective institutional memory is impoverished by such managerial turnover.
Solutions. There are two obvious modes to address this problem: (A) increase employee
satisfaction to reduce turnover and (B) maintain in the ordinary course of business readily
accessible records to ease the transition to managerial replacements. This memo deals with
routine creation and access to recorded institutional memory. Employee satisfaction is beyond
the scope of this memo.
Background. In its early years the Infrastructure Management Advisory Committee (IMAC)
expended a great deal of effort, in cooperation with Public Works Staff, to develop accessible,
comprehensive lists of city projects, because none then existed. Public Works staff and the
IMAC addressed this issue with emphasis on integration of such record keeping into routine
business. There were three goals: (1) insure that contemporaneous records were created
routinely in the regular course of business; (2) make sure the record-keeping enabled efficient,
useful staff analysis of projects; and (3) make the resulting records easily accessible in the
absence of the person(s) who created the records.
Much of that IMAC/Staff work product still exists in two forms: (1) Project spreadsheets
that are developed in the annual budget cycle, and (2) the Automashion CIPS online database.
The projects spreadsheets are still in use. They are mostly prepared manually each
year, apparently using prior spreadsheets as templates. There is relatively little capacity to
perform a computerized search of the history of a particular project over a period of years.
This involves searching across multiple, separate, annual spreadsheets which may have
poorly compatible structures from year to year. Often manual searching is the only practical
way to compare across annual spreadsheets. Thus, institutional memory exists in
spreadsheets but in a clumsy, poorly accessible form.
The Automashion CIPS data base was developed on a shoestring budget (a few
thousand dollars) as proof of principle. It still exists and provides an organized, searchable,
historic record of city projects for several years. It only has limited, built-in reporting capability.
It is not integrated into the routine workflow of Staff (so far as this writer knows). Thus, it
serves only as limited, aging institutional memory. Its potential never has been realized.
Events of this past year are illustrative. There is a new city manager, who has personal
memory because he was elevated from years of service to the City in the Development
Department. There is a newly appointed Director of Public Works who has only a few months
experience as Deputy Director and has to learn every City project from zero.
IMAC members provide some, limited, living memory but of course there is turnover on
IMAC membership and Staff cannot readily consult individual members’ memories.
The writer urges that a searchable data base is a superior technology for institutional
memory. Such a data base should have sophisticated searching and report writing built in.
The preference of many (but not all) engineers for spreadsheets can be accommodated by
systematically importing/exporting data between spreadsheets and the database. Such a data
base can also integrate with the City’s Graphical Interface System (GIS).
Conclusion: I invite the Council to include in its 2021 Goals and Action Plan a project to
enhance institutional memory and ease transitions from changes in managerial staff.
Our new Public Works Director, Ramzi Awwad, is in a unique position to record his own,
on-going experience with the City’s recorded, institutional memory.
As always, nothing in this memo should be construed a criticism of anyone. It is
intended to invoke a policy discussion about the City’s future.
Lowell R. Wedemeyer 2021-02-19
This is a personal communication not made on behalf of IMAC.