Hello and welcome back to The People's Business! We hope this blog is helpful in connecting you to YOUR local government.

The full City Council meets on Monday and Tuesday. The Public Safety and Livable Neighborhoods Committee and the Economic Development and Intergovernmental Relations Committee both meet on Wednesday. And the Environment Committee meets on Thursday. For background on the agenda items mentioned here, click on the agenda, then click on the item and find the staff report and supporting documents over on the right. We'll preview the full Council meeting today and give you the lowdown on the committee meetings in a separate post.

City Council -- Monday, Feb. 10

The operative word for Monday's meeting is the wonkiest word in all of Wonkington. It's Wonkington Mayor Wonky McWonkinson's favorite word of all time. The word is "infrastructure." Zzzzzzzzz.

But wait! As Councilmember Mark Kersey will tell you every chance he gets, infrastructure is REALLY important! It's our streets and roads, water and sewer systems, storm drains, public buildings, libraries, fire and police stations, and park facilities. In short, it's all the physical stuff that a city needs to function properly. The way the City of San Diego pays for new infrastructure projects and repairs to existing infrastructure is through its Capital Improvements Program, which is updated every June when the city budget is passed.

On Monday (full agenda), the City Council will make nearly $140 million worth of adjustments to its Capital Improvements Program budget for the current fiscal year, involving roughly 100 different actions -- mostly moving money around within the program but also adding new money. The bottom line is a nearly $2.9 million net increase to the CIP budget. When the matter went to the Council's Active Transportation and Infrastructure Committee on Jan. 29, the committee rejected a transfer of roughly $957,000 from the Mira Mesa Community Fund and approved an additional proposal to establish a fund for the Gaslamp Promenade Project, which would make Fifth Avenue between Broadway and L Street a no-cars-allowed, pedestrian-only thoroughfare.

The Council will also peer into the future as they hear a report on how much money the city is expected to have for infrastructure projects over the next five years. According to the Five-Year Capital Infrastructure Planning Outlook, it would cost a touch more than $6 billion for the city to complete all of the needed infrastructure projects during the next five years. The report estimates that this city will have about $3.9 billion to spend, leaving a shortfall of roughly $2.2 billion. The report then divides the needs into "priority" projects and "discretionary" projects. When you look only at priority projects, the infrastructure deficit is lowered to $1.29 billion.

The five-year planning outlook is a product of the executive branch, overseen by the mayor. For the legislative branch (the Council), here is the Independent Budget Analyst's review of the forecast, which will give Council members more fuel for discussion.

Also on Monday's agenda:

• Fiscal Year 2019 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR). We won't go into much detail here -- suffice to say, the CAFR is super-important, if not exactly thrilling to talk about. Essentially, Required by law, it's what tells the outside world (read: bond investors, credit rating agencies, etc.) how healthy the city's various funds are.


• Balboa Park Palisades Project Phase I: This one is way more fun than a CAFR! The Balboa Park Palisades is the area south of the Plaza de Panama and the Spreckels Organ Pavilion. Among the city's goals for the park is the removal of parking and reclamation of the southern part of the Palisades parking lot as a pedestrian plaza.

Phase I of the project includes asphalt removal in the South Palisades to create a public plaza with turf areas, upgrades to the tram stop, additional landscaping and irrigation, improved lighting, repaving the entire Palisades lot, re-striping the North Palisades parking lot, and ADA improvements. Under this agenda item, the Council will simply consider allowing the use of city workers to accomplish much of these elements, at cost of no more than $600,000.

And since we're talking about Balboa Park, here's a rundown of planned improvement projects throughout (from the staff report):

"Additional projects currently in design or under construction in Balboa Park include the renovation of the Botanical Building, retrofit of the California Tower at the Museum of Man, a $52 million renovation of the Mingei International Museum, expansion of the International Cottages at the House of Pacific Relations, Plaza de Panama Water & Sewer Group Job, roof replacement at the Air & Space Museum, a new fire alarm system for the Casa de Balboa, construction of two new comfort stations on the West Mesa at Thorn and Nutmeg Streets, improvements to the Balboa Park Club, upgrades to the Bud Kearns swimming pool, and improvements to the Alcazar Garden and Casa del Prado courtyard."

The meeting starts at 2 p.m.

City Council -- Tuesday, Feb. 11

Tuesday's Council agenda is limited to "consent" items, which are considered noncontroversial and are voted on en masse, as well as several proclamations. There are no items scheduled for the afternoon session that normally begins at 2 p.m. You might consider using the free time to watch old episodes of The West Wing or Parks and Recreation, two of the best TV shows ever made.

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