TRANSCRIPT AND SUMMARY

Manhattan Beach City Council Candidate Forum

Oct. 17, 2024  |  Small Theater, Mira Costa High School

Video Link: (on MB News YouTube page)

[below is a draft transcript built from automated closed captions; please address any necessary edits via email to -> [email protected]]

SUMMARY/OUTLINE OF EVENT (PROVIDED BY MB NEWS)

Section 1: Opening Statements (2 minutes each)

• Each candidate provides a brief overview of their qualifications, priorities, and vision for Manhattan Beach.

Section 2: Enforcing City Ordinances

• The candidates address the issue of enforcing existing city ordinances, particularly regarding the use of gas-powered leaf blowers and other quality-of-life concerns. They discuss solutions involving increased police visibility, code enforcement, resident reporting, and communication strategies.

Section 3: Parking and Construction

• Focusing on the impact of construction projects on parking availability, candidates discuss the balance between property rights and resident needs. They propose ideas including improved communication, parking expansion, and potential solutions for Lot 3 downtown.

Section 4: Campaign Finance

• The candidates address the issue of political action committee (PAC) money and endorsements, with some choosing to refuse such support while others accept endorsements from specific business-oriented PACs.

Section 5: Budgetary Experience

• Candidates highlight their experience in balancing budgets and managing finances, drawing on their backgrounds in both public and private sectors. They discuss the importance of fiscal responsibility and their commitment to responsible allocation of taxpayer dollars.

Section 6: Environmental Issues and Sustainability

• The candidates express their views on environmental issues and the potential for a dedicated environmental commission. They discuss existing sustainability initiatives, collaborations with organizations like Chevron, and the importance of promoting sustainable practices.

Section 7: Supporting the Aging Population

• Recognizing the growing senior population in Manhattan Beach, the candidates offer ideas for supporting residents aging in place. They discuss the need for improved facilities, accessible programs, and transportation solutions.

Section 8: Unique Qualifications

• Each candidate articulates a single unique reason why voters should choose them, emphasizing their experience, commitment, creativity, enthusiasm, or connection to the community.

Section 9: Proposition 2 and School Funding

• Candidates discuss the potential impact of Proposition 2, a state bond measure for school infrastructure, on Manhattan Beach. They consider the potential benefits of matching funds for local school bonds and the overall need for investment in school infrastructure.

Section 10: First Voting Experiences

• Reflecting on the importance of civic engagement, candidates share their personal experiences and memories of their first times voting, emphasizing the significance of voting rights and democratic participation.

Section 11: The Joint Use Agreement

• The candidates discuss the joint use agreement between the city and the school district, highlighting its benefits for both parties and the importance of a strong partnership. They express support for the agreement and explore opportunities for continued collaboration.

Section 12: Beach Cities Health District and Measure BC

• Candidates share their opinions on the services offered by the Beach Cities Health District and their positions on Measure BC, a potential bond measure to fund mental health and other services. They consider the accessibility and impact of the proposed measure and the needs of the community.

Section 13: Closing Statements (1 minute each)

• Candidates offer final remarks summarizing their qualifications, priorities, and vision for Manhattan Beach, encouraging voters to support them on November 5th.

Closing Remarks

• The moderators from the League of Women Voters conclude the forum, thanking the candidates and co-sponsoring organizations.

TRANSCRIPT OF EVENT

DAVE FRATELLO: 

I think we’ll start, we’ll try to be as close to on time as possible. Everyone, I’m Dave Fratello, I’m a local real estate broker. I‘m here tonight, I guess, in my capacity as publisher of MB News. We are one of three sponsors of this event, and we want to welcome you here. I also want to thank every one, thank our candidates for attending. Our cosponsors, the Manhattan Beach Chamber of Commerce and the League of Women Voters of the Beach Cities, who as you know, will be moderating tonight, with your questions.

For us at MB News, this is kind of a wonderful first for us, to be sponsoring this event. And I hope you already know MB News, and rely upon it. If not, maybe tonight will be the time when you tune in and follow it. MB News is really something of a passion project for my wife Jeanne and I. Long, long ago we kind of felt like there just wasn't enough quality, up to the minute news for people in Manhattan Beach, and we thought this community deserved it. Somebody had to do it, so we did. As of this fall we are actually now celebrating 10 years online. Well everyone is here tonight to hear the candidates. So I want to thank you once again for coming. I know that all of us are here because we care so much about our community. Let’s see what we can hear from the candidates tonight. Thank you.

MODERATORS:

DIANE: Welcome everyone. There are way more people here than I thought would be coming! I’m Diane Wallace and I’m with the League of Women Voters.

SAMANAZ: Hi everyone, I’m Samanaz Kapadia and I’m also with the League of Women Voters.

DIANE: And we're your moderators tonight and what you're seeing right here is, I've been doing this for years for the League, and I'm pulling a Biden. I'm transitioning to a new moderator. I think I've done it a long enough.

So the League is a political, but nonpartisan organization, and we exist to encourage people to register to vote, and to vote, and we also support activities to inform people, so they can mark their ballots in an informed way. Our forums are one of the ways that we do that. We've been very active recently registering high school students, and that's really fun to see – what their choices are when they register. When we register people, we register them for all parties, or no party preference, because we're nonpartisan and we want people to vote. And sometimes you don't agree with how they vote, but we support everyone voting.

Our organization was founded the year that women got the right to vote. So for all of you women here, those ladies over 100 years ago put their lives on the line so that we would get the right to vote. And so we honor them all the time. 

We're very grateful that all of our candidates are here for you… For each of the questions we will be asking each candidate all of the questions, so there are no questions that will just be asked of one person, but I want to make sure because of the lights, can you see the timer? Can you hold up a sign? So, okay so when you see stop, that means you have to stop talking. No sliding through the stop… Do any of you have any questions for us before we start? Because all of the questions will be asked by us, but you have submitted your cards. There are a couple of questions someone asked about the school district, but this is city council, so I don't think we'll have time for those, but all of the questions are interesting. I actually live in Manhattan Beach, and I would like to congratulate the candidates on running a very nice and respectful campaign with each other. This is not true other places. I recently did two forums in a local community and it was interesting, let's just say. So let's begin with some of the questions. These have all been submitted by people in the audience. Yes, right sorry… So, each of you have two minutes to make an opening statement, and the timer will be showing you to stop, and give you a little warning about how many seconds you have left. Let's just go in alphabetical order, so, Mr. Charelian, you can start.

STEVE CHARELIAN:

Can everyone hear me? Good evening and thank you for having us here tonight. My name is Steve Charelian. For 35 years, I've been committed to serving you, the residents, working at city of Manhattan Beach City Hall finance department and most recently retiring as year Finance director. As your city council candidate, I bring trusted leadership experience, financial responsibility and expertise in local government. I have attended more than 200 City Council meetings and made over 100 presentations to City Council on our community about our finances. As your former Finance director, I was responsible for reaffirming the city's AAA Bond rating allowing the city to obtain lower bar cost which saved our taxpayers money. I oversaw the city's finances ensuring that your tax dollars were managed responsibly. I provided balanced budgets and financial advice to the city council helping guide prudent decision making. I bring with me much needed institutional knowledge and expertise as the city is turning out two experienced City Council Members, also looking to fill the city manager position as well as the finance director. As your former Finance director, I presented city council with a balanced, balanced budget of $184 million of this upcoming year, with a 5-year forecast. I am the candidate that will bring common sense leadership, community focus, and will hit the ground running for you from day one. I have endorsements from over 10 current and former Manhattan Beach elected officials including the current and former city Treasures my wife and I proudly, called Manhattan Beach home for the past 12 years, my two young sons and family are deeply involved in the community through schools, sports and volunteering as a dedicated PTA member and Chamber of Commerce member I I want to build strong community ties, and let's keep Manhattan Beach thriving together. Please vote for me on or before November 5th. 

[cross talk by moderator]

JOE FRANKLIN:

Good evening. Thanks for coming here this evening. In a perfect world, we would have adequate deterrence and diversion plans for first time and repeat criminals. In a perfect world we would have a County district attorney who would honor his oath of office to protect our citizens, our families and prosecute the criminals. But we learned from George Gascon's harmful and destructive social experiment that without the deterrent of going to jail, we have what we have now. We have unprecedented rampant crime by repeat criminals, continuous threats to your family safety we on council took a vow to protect. There's no security for possessions and our quality of life. Repeat criminals receiving a slip of paper and not even a slap on the wrist. You have a real threat to the survival of businesses and those who shop there from rampant and continuous theft. Look at CVS, Walgreens, Ralphs, Vons, Trader Joe's, Manhattan groceries downtown, Pasha jewelers, Bevmo, Macy's, and Target, to name just a few. And you have dispirited and frightened residents who, due to countless home break-ins, thefts of their cars, catalytic converters, packages and mail, are losing hope for the enjoyment of a safe life promised a mere handful of years ago. So this is the election we fight back. This is our line in the sand. It is literally in your hands. When you mark your ballot this election, with your vote, you send a message loud and clear for those who would cause you to and your loved ones harm. Vote for Nathan Hochman for County District Attorney. Vote yes on Proposition 36, the increased drug and theft penalties initiative, which repeals prop 47. Vote for homegrown Steve Napolitano for Superior Court Judge Office number 39. And please vote for me to return to council to continue making Manhattan Beach safer for you and your loved ones. Thank you.

KAREN KOMATINSKY:

Hi, everyone. I'm Karen Komatinski, and my husband and I, my husband Chris and I have been residents here in Manhattan Beach for 23 years. We raised our two children here who went through MBUSD schools, and now we have a multi-generational home with my 84-year-old mother living with us. Although there are six candidates running, I'm the one candidate with the proven track record of fiscal responsibility in both the public and the private sectors, along with over 10 years of public board management experience. I served as an elected official for Manhattan Beach Unified School District and led the district through periods of both economic volatility and growth. I helped influence local property taxes by ensuring successful completion of bond campaigns double B, double E, and C, which were all delivered on time and on budget. My District leadership days have provided me with a deep understanding of federal, state, and local financing structures and the fiduciary responsibilities that go along with being the public board officer. I've also always been a proponent of locally funded formulas, locally funded formulas and the importance of spending your tax dollars wisely. Professionally, I have over 25 years of experience as an HR executive and with over 80% of our city's budget dedicated to people, I'm the only candidate with the experience in strategic planning, employment law, and HR governance. These will be necessary tools, as we are getting ready to hire a new city manager and a new director of finance, which will bring about great strategic and cultural changes within our office staff. For the last 18 months, I've also served as a Parks and Rec Commissioner for the City of Manhattan Beach. And over the last 18 months, I've taken on a number of key projects, while establishing and forging relationships with staff and stakeholder groups. For me, this campaign is all about getting to know you, the residents, and finding out what are the important things to you. What are your concerns? I'm not a politician. I'm truly a public servant. And this is why I'm interested and I'm ready for this role. I thank you all for being here tonight. Thank you for the invitation and I look forward to the questions. Thank you.

JOE MARCY:

All right. Good evening, everyone. I just want to again thank MB News, thank the Chamber and the League of Women Voters for putting this together. You know, this is our last forum together with the candidates. And I would like to say before the gloves come off that it has been truly an honor to share this with you. You know, I'm glad that our last forum is here at Mira Costa. I graduated here in 2003. I was born and raised in Manhattan Beach and you know, I would like to say I'm not your typical politician, but my first campaign started here as a commissioner of campus morale and my family was involved getting signs up in the quad and getting the community involved. And I didn't expect that 20 plus years later, I'd be back running in a different platform like this. You know, I think the joy of running this campaign is really hearing from the community and what's important to all of you. And loud and clear, you know, public safety has to be a priority for us. Fiscal responsibility has to be a priority for us. We've heard a lot about city compensations. We've heard about pension liabilities, and we're going to get into a lot of issues tonight, and I hope we can dive deeper into some of this because it's important. Accountability is important with our leadership. And for me, it's about celebrating the work that our council and our leadership have done, but it's about building on it. And we have a lot to accomplish in this election and beyond. So it is quite an honor. A little bit more about me. I serve on the Parking and Public Improvement Commission. I was also on the Cultural Arts Commission, where I championed the rainbow crosswalk that's in front of the pier. I've served on the Manhattan Beach Hometown Fair Board for almost 15 years, three years as president. And I like to tell people, if you want to know how to work with people and how we lead, talk to the people that I volunteered with. When I was president of the Hometown Fair, I had the pleasure of being president during our COVID year, where we had to strategically adjust and create a virtual fair when we raised funds, created a platform for our nonprofits and boosters. Thank you so much.

BRENDA O’LEARY:

Good evening, everybody. Honey, don't film me, please. Thank you for coming out tonight and missing the Dodger game to be here. I'm Brenda O'Leary, and I will second what Joe Marcy said here. This has been, I didn't know what to expect. I knew it would be a contentious selection at the national level. So it's nice that it's been so peaceful at the local level. And I feel like I've made new friends with other people on this panel. I am a 33-year resident of Manhattan Beach. I raised my daughter in these schools. She graduated from Mira Costa in 2023, so it's kind of nice to be back. I miss those days. I go like that. My career has been more in investments. I work in capital raising. I've worked in that for 35 years. For small family offices as well as large firms like Wells Fargo and BNY Mellon. Investments are an industry where integrity is of the utmost importance. If you don't have integrity, you're not going to make it. It's also going to take an interest to you where you have to be the best. If you're not the best, you fail. And then industry over time, I raised $4 billion and that is because I approach our business with creativity and a high level of commitment. I feel like I can relate to our businesses here in Manhattan Beach because I start every single year looking at very high goals and saying to myself. How am I going to meet these goals? And I know that our entrepreneurs here in Manhattan Beach, it's a town because you have to have vision, you have to have the creativity to commit that to to achieve that vision and then you have to have the commitment to be successful going forward. I'm also on the outdoor dining committee, which has been a great opportunity to speak with our restaurants, our stores, the people in the community, and also work closely with the city. So hopefully we'll have more time tonight to talk about what I've learned by just reaching out to the community and listening to what you guys need and what you want from your city council, which is so important. Thank you.

NINA TARNAY:

Good evening. My name is Nina Tarnay and I'm running for City Council. I do thank all of you for being here today because not only are you missing the Dodger game, but I know Trevor Noah is down the street. It was really tempting for me to not attend that, you know, to be here tonight. But of course, I picked this because it's so important to me to be here and be here for our community. My path that took me here, I'm a refugee from Vietnam, so I grew up with a really, we escaped 45 years ago. So I grew up with a real deep sense of gratitude for this country and service to whatever community I was a part of. And fortunately, the community that I came to 25 years ago when my husband and I first got married, we landed here in this beautiful community and we've raised three beautiful children here. Colin, who is volunteering tonight in the corner hiding – he is my youngest. He's 16. And so I finally now have the time to be able to invest back into the community. I've been working as an attorney in municipal contracts and water law. I currently practice with a nonprofit water association. So I work with a lot of industry folks across the beach city. So having those relationships are really important. I've also had my own business, my own small business, a furniture store in Redondo Beach. So that's given me a perspective from the consumer side and working with the city and understanding how difficult that is sometimes for small businesses. And I've been really involved in schools. I know a lot of you out there. I've been on the sidelines … investing back in our PTA, our youth sports is very important to me. And I'm so excited to be here today and expand my world a little bit bigger, Manhattan Beach, beyond our schools, to serve the whole community. Thank you.

MODERATOR:

Thank you all very much.

So all of these candidates, I want to respond to something that was in the questions. All of the candidates agreed to talk about themselves, their experience, their plans, and their intentions when they serve on city council. And they have been, they've agreed to not speak about other people and to only speak about themselves and their campaign. So some of you asked questions about how would you compare yourself to the other candidates. We can't ask that because we asked them not to do that. So just wanted to explain that in advance.

So, um, start with just, so you'll each have a minute to answer. You don't have to take a minute. We like terse answers. Here's one. 

Gas-powered leaf blowers are illegal but they're everywhere. How can this be addressed? And so, I'm going to ask you to go in different order. So I'd like to start with, we're going to change the order for every question.

NINA TARNAY:

All right, I think that's going to come down to enforcement. Unfortunately, if we have ordinances that are on the books, we don't enforce them, then people break them. The rules and it comes down to that. So I'm not going to take a whole minute. 

BRENDA O’LEARY:

I started working from home part-time during the pandemic. And honestly, I found it never fails. The minute you're on an important Zoom call, either somebody comes by with a leaf blower or the garbage truck shows up. So I think that that is something just because people are continuing to work from home, we need to be respectful of that. And leaf blowers are extraordinarily loud. So again, as Nina said, it does come down to enforcement and as a city council member, that is something that I would put more effort into enforcing because I think it's only fair to our residents.

JOE MARCY:

So I'm going to tie this into some other pieces. It's not just leaf blowing, it's e-bikes. It comes down to all these violations that are not being controlled. And why is that? Because we're not seeing the police visibility. And we need to see more of it, right? We need to see the patrol in our downtown areas, in our neighborhoods. We need to see it in our downtown. Our businesses are asking for it. You know, I know that in the last week, the council has asked to agendize incentivizing recruitment for additional police, and that's something we should really be aggressive about. It's something we should have addressed a long time ago because we need it. We need to make sure that the police are visible because it deters crime and it's about being proactive in it. So even though we're just talking about a leaf blower, I'm not going to get too extreme here, but it's, you know, when you have the visibility, that's when you start to see some of these control items.

KAREN KOMATINSKY:

I agree with the fact that it's actually, it is about enforcement. We have a number, a lot of lists of ordinances in this city, and I do think that there is more time that needs to be put on to enforce it. With that being said, I do think that it is also incumbent upon we as residents to feel very comfortable and have access to being able to pick up the phone and report these kinds of things. So being able to find out where those telephone numbers are on the city website is really important. We have to make our city website a little bit more accessible for residents to use to be able to make those kinds of phone calls. And the third part is I do agree in the fact that we do need, I'd like to see, an increase of bike patrol officers. Those are the individuals who are able to get across town quickly and write citations from everything from dogs on the beach to leaf blowers and to everything else under the sun. So those are my three things on that.

JOE FRANKLIN:

I'd like to address the problem, that I've actually started to work on these. It's unfair to these workers. We all have these workers come to do our lawn because we don't want to do it, and they work very, very hard. They're feeding families. They come on time. I mean, I don't think my gardener has missed at all. I can fortunately speak Spanish. So I talk with them a lot and they're really become part of my family. And what I've been looking at is we need to change out the gas mowers to electric mowers and electric... And it should be vacuums, not blowers, but like that, their gas and electric mowers and the hedge clippers and things like that. So I've been looking to see, they all have to have a business license in town. I'm looking for grants that we can swap out that equipment. It takes a lot of batteries, though, to do a day's work. But I think we can go ahead and make progress on that, so that they will all be using electric in the future. 

STEVE CHARELIAN:

I think it comes down to enforcement, just understanding the operation of business licensing and enforcement through the city of Manhattan Beach. Business licenses are paid once a year, and there's an opportunity to communicate because you have a list of gardeners and you could send information to and be able to have that positive dialogue and let them know that it's appropriate to use it in this town. In addition to the city, the past couple of years have hired a few additional code enforcement officers. They get more boots on the ground to do the active and proactive enforcement that is necessary. So I want to continue championing the ability to have more visibility, not just the code enforcement, but as well as policing, 100%. The police department started a bicycle enforcement early in July, and it's in a pilot program. They're working through getting the analytics and I spoke to the chief about three weeks ago. 

MODERATOR:

Thank you. Next question.

MODERATOR:

Okay, full disclosure, this is my first time doing this and I just found out 30 minutes ago. Please cut me some slack. 

What is your opinion on the constant construction workers taking all the parking spaces, leaving residents and their guests with a real parking dilemma? And if we could start with O'Leary and come around, that would be great.

BRENDA O’LEARY:  

I think that it's problematic, but I'm not sure what the solution is, to be honest. We obviously have a very dense community and what we're seeing right now is a lot of construction and development going on in our community. We're seeing little beach cottages bulldozed and really giant houses being built. There's a company called Triwest that has come into Manhattan Beach, and they're a developer. So developers will build every single square inch of land that they can because then they can sell that property for the most money. Whereas a private development, like myself, might have more of a setback, more of a yard, or something like that. So these big developers are everywhere. And it's hard to find places where they can keep their trucks and their equipment. I mean, it's not like you can shuttle back and forth from a parking lot. I think there is a certain element of they do have the right to be there. I think that we are trying to keep the large trucks, and I know we deal with this on the outdoor dining committee because it carries across food delivery trucks and other trucks. And we're trying to have certain hours where the really big trucks can come in.

JOE MARCY:

Well, I serve on the parking and public improvement commission, and parking has always been an issue for us, and it's made worse because of what's happened with the structure, Lot 3 in downtown. So if we want to address parking as a whole, look at the situation we have down there. We knew there were deficiencies two years ago. We weren't aggressive in addressing it and setting up a contingency plan. So we did a wait-and-see approach, which was costly for us, ran a shuttle service that was not sustainable and it didn't meet the needs of our residents on East Manhattan. But we had to work quickly to figure out what our alternatives were, and what did we do? We found some aggressive solutions for parking, most on Valley Drive, which you can see. And I think our work needs to continue there. We need to continue to see where there are opportunities to expand parking, where it's not a hazard and it's safe for the community. Parking has been an issue, and I would hope that we're going to expedite the rebuild of that lot as soon as possible, because it's hurting 84% of our businesses downtown. And it needs to be addressed quickly.

KAREN KOMATINSKY:

Actually, I just got asked this question today about construction in town. And I think that I'd like to see if we could do a better job when permits are actually pulled and construction sites are actually developed. We could do better communication coming from the city office to not only the residents or the business who is actually doing the construction, but that area around those. When I served in the school district, I was a part of the overall facility management. And we spent a year working with stakeholder groups and getting people educated as to get ready, here it comes. There's going to be big construction here. It's going to be loud. It's going to be noisy. It's going to be messy, and there's going to be a lot of trucks. I think you have to have a full communication strategy. And one, yes, you can take it from a school district size, but you can shrink it down to a residential property. I think that's really important to consider.

JOE FRANKLIN:

So we actually do speak when construction starts, we do have one of our building inspectors who's responsible for meeting with the community. He’s going to talk about all those things: the noise, the proper time to start. You can see that there are signs now that provide all that information. You've got to be a little bit patient. And what I tell people is, because in our neighborhood, we had construction that would start and stop around our entire home when our kids were little. But remember, you have property rights. So that owner has the right to develop their property. Your home, whenever it was made, probably caused some inconvenience for the neighborhood. Remember, these are, again, workers and are trying to make a living. So it's well spelled out. If there's any problem, you can go ahead and call code enforcement, and they'll go ahead and listen to you and try to find a solution.

STEVE CHARELIAN:

Before a construction project starts, there's a meeting with an RCO. An RCO is a residential construction officer, and he works on our code department. And this gentleman sits down and comes up with a plan for the footprint. Works closely with the residents, calls a meeting, works with the contractor, and does the best to mitigate the impacts for parking. So that's already happening. I'd like to take it a step further and just provide more communication out to the residents of that footprint on a regular basis to see if there's any impact that they're seeing. But parking has always been an issue. We have a very poor sports model town, very dense. You start doing construction on the street at the same impact around, but there are things in place right now as we speak to mitigate that. And it's happening on a regular basis.

NINA TARNAY:

Hearing about all the programs that are in town, but, as someone who's been a resident here for 25 years, I don't think I've heard of very many meetings in my neighborhood when these projects have happened. So there have been times when we've had projects like four or five homes being built on our street at one given time, and the difficulty of that is it takes over all the parking. So I understand the frustration. So what I would like to see is some better planning and oversight over coordination of all. If we know in a geographical area there's going to be six, seven, eight construction projects, have those companies coordinate with one another. I mean, we're just going to have to collaborate and work together to find solutions because, it's true: we don't have enough parking and the contractors and the workers are also frustrated. So I think it comes down to collaboration.

MODERATOR:

Well, this is an interesting question. You can raise your hand. Since this is a nonpartisan election, by raise of hands: Have any of you taken PAC money? You know what a PAC, money? Political Action Committee. No, just any PAC money. Sure. 

BRENA O’LEARY:

Okay, so I'm actually endorsed by, it’s called BizFed PAC. It’s a business. It’s a huge, represents 420,000 business owners and 5 million employees across Southern California. And it's a PAC that's designed to further business interests and help the economy in Southern California. And I went through a very intensive interview across a lot of people, and they did endorse me. 

MODERATOR:

Thank you.

JOE FRANKLIN:

So I also... BizFed spoke with me. I shared my ideas about what they do. And I told them up front, I said, I take no PAC money, and I take no endorsements. They sent me money. And they said they endorsed me. I had to withdraw both, and I sent back the check. Thank you.

MODERATOR:

So this is a question, I'm going to edit it a little bit. Let's start with Joe Marcy and go this way and then back away. 

Please share your experience, if any, dealing with balancing budgets or encumbering funds for a project or a government agency or a business.

JOE MARCY:

Sure. So my career, I'm an executive in tourism for Central Coast California, where I'll tell you, small businesses and just making sure that these small communities are thriving is very important. I've overseen budgets not only for sales departments, but also these nonprofit organizations that I've worked with. I've worked with budgets that are well in the millions and less than that in these nonprofits. As president, I've overseen budgets as well. And this is a great question. I'm glad you're asking the question, because experience is important and we need to be fiscally responsible. We got to look at a lot of things in this coming year. Even the feasibility studies that we're approving, $240,000 for Begg Pool, $400,000 that we're spending for outdoor dining and we're looking at the solutions and what's come of them. So we have to be fiscally responsible. And I think that experience is important to make sure that that continues.

KAREN KOMATINSKY:

Well, so I served the school district for 10 years and have had 10 years of very large scale budgetary experience. Also in that though, not only working with the budgets itself, but also working with our union relationships with our two unions that we have here in our school district. In addition to that, I was also about, as I mentioned earlier, I was a part of three bond campaigns, as well as some parcel tax campaigns, et cetera. So I am all about trying to keep our money local. I am all about trying to continue to manage those monies as fiscally and successfully as possible. All three bond campaigns that I worked on all were delivered on time and under budget. Most of this room that you're seeing, it was because of those bond dollars that we brought in. I'm very proud of all that work that we did together for those 10 years. I now, on the Parks and Rec Commission, I am part of a budget at that point that supports activities coming out of the parks and rec. That’s it.

JOE FRANKLIN:

Well, I had four years of doing it with the city. Before that, I was a manager at a large corporation of a division, and always that is, where budgets are very important. I was just making a list real quickly of the projects I've been involved with, voted on, studied. In addition to these projects, we have these budget study sessions at city council all the time, every year. I wish I could see an audience like this in that meeting, but we don't. And my colleagues exhort the same thing. Where are the people? Get your input. So in the future, please remember that. Come on in. We have a work study program of identifying the projects that need money or need to be done. And as such, I just put down: fire station number two in East Manhattan Beach. Peck Reservoir, outdoor dining decks, the initial studying part. Polliwog Park, the new play structures there. Sand Dune Park. But anyway, the list goes on.

STEVE CHARELIAN:

The budget for the City of Manhattan Beach is 436 pages. It takes about six months to stand up. As the former finance director, we start this in January. We kick it off with a community budget study session. We invite the community to come and tell us what they need, because it's really your budget. I review the staff reports that go to council for their fiscal integrity, fiscal impact to your tax dollars. And I've been doing that for the last six years, prior to me retiring. We do have balanced budgets. We stand up a five-year forecast. In addition to that, we … for our budgets for adding the things that we have in this town that continue providing for the city operations. And most importantly, you know, it is about your tax dollars. You are the voice. You need to be able to come and tell us what you'd like in that budget, and the city's prepared to listen to you.

NINA TARNAY:

It’s hard coming after the finance director when you're talking about budget. I feel like his friend asked that question. Now, kidding aside, having had my own furniture business, I balanced that budget. And then for the past 10 years, I've worked for the West Basin Water Association. It's a nonprofit and I'm the only employee. So I've balanced that budget. And then I also work for the West Basin Water Rights Panel, an arm of the court that oversees work in the West Basin. So I balance that budget as well.

BRENDA O’LEARY:

So I ran a division for a company, a bond firm downtown called Hayden and Regal for 10 years, and I had employees across the country. So we obviously had a budget that we had to meet. As a bond firm, we were actually on the other side of this trade. Steve would issue the bonds and we would buy it. So we had to understand exactly what was going on here just to evaluate the true quality of that bond at an institutional level. In addition, I have my husband here who started a life sciences real estate development firm about nine years ago. Anybody that starts a business knows in the early days you're really hustling to just make ends meet. That company was bought by the largest real estate developer in the country about two years ago. My husband still works with them, and I helped them, from a capital raising standpoint, to start their first fund.

MODERATOR:

Climate challenges continue. Do you have any thoughts about restarting the Environmental Task Force or starting an environmental commission? If you'd like to start and then come all the way down. At the very end.

NINA TARNAY:

So I've been endorsed by the Los Angeles League of Conservation Voters. It's an important endorsement because it really showcases my commitment to climate change. And I've also been endorsed by all four founders of Grades of Green locally. So I do think that if they're a part of the solution, we should have a commission. We should start local and I'm committed to doing that.

BRENA O’LEARY:

So through the course of my candidacy, I've tried to meet meaningful leaders. One of the leaders that I met with was our local representative from Chevron. We talked about the refinery and its impact on the environment. I did some research on my own. Chevron has five different refineries. One of them is more like their home office, in Richmond, California. They're doing a lot of work with the community from an environmental standpoint. They've actually donated $100 million to the community to give them environmental grants, jobs in green energy, scholarships. So what I said to our Chevron rep, who happens to be Jeff, I said, Jeff, how can we work together to do more for the environment here in Manhattan Beach? Now, full disclosure, Chevron does a lot for our community. They do a lot for our schools, and they're good partners, but I believe we could do a little bit more from an environmental perspective with Chevron.

JOE MARCY:

We have a responsibility when it comes to sustainability to do our part, and it has to start with our city leaders. It has to start with our governance. How many electric vehicles do we have in our fleet? You have to ask the questions: what are we doing on our end to make sure that we're meeting those needs? We ran a shuttle service this summer that was running between nine to 12 hours a day. And that was not a sustainable practice for us. We are an outdoor active lifestyle community, and there's a lot of work to be done. And as we look ahead to future events, the Olympics will come in 2028 and other events. We need to make sure that we are promoting sustainable practices that are important to our community: to visit responsibly, to do our part. And it falls on all of us as a community to do that. But we need to make sure that we're doing everything we can on the city side to make sure that we're offering recyclables, that our vehicle fleet is electric, and that we are promoting any alternatives as well without hurting our local businesses and putting a burden on them.

KAREN KOMATINSKY:

I think that we have a responsibility given the fact that the ocean is right there. And that responsibility is everything from your occasional weekend beach cleanup to making sure that patrons who come here treat our beaches properly and are educated properly, et cetera. From that, I think we also have, I do think in this town, we have a great relationship with waste management. They are huge supporters of our city already. They have incredible environmental programs that they offer at the school levels, throughout our community, et cetera. We've got a great relationship with them already. I think we can probably enhance that even more so. And historically, we've had city council members who actually did have some youth advisory groups that were focused on environmental tasks, kinds of things for our local high school. I'd like to bring that back. That's since left when Nancy Hersman left council a number of years ago. And so I think that's really important to get the kids involved with that. The whole reduce, reuse, recycle thing that we used to sing when they were all in elementary schools. I'd like to bring it back. Thank you.

JOE FRANKLIN:

So we have a sustainability commission. I believe it has eight to 10 community members. I'm not quite sure, haven't heard too much about their meetings, but there have been a lot of projects. That doesn't mean everything stands still. Look what we've done. I mean, with your help we fund the storm drain system, so that's where stormwater runoff goes through the streets, picks up materials and garbage, and goes right through to the 28th Street filtration system. And that has a big impact on returning cleaner water back to the ocean. We had a dune restoration project that was in association with the beach community. I've just … water filtration at Peck Reservoir so we can recycle water. The purple pipes that you see are for recycled water. There's a lot going on with it.

STEVE CHARELIAN:

Yeah, we currently have an environmental program division within our community development department. They do a really good job. Please take a look on the website or the city's website at all their programs that they have and award-winning programs. I 100% will continue in the committee and I would even want a little bit more transparency in how communication between the committee and City Council, let this council know what you're doing and how you're doing it. And being a former finance director, I was over purchasing, and that's the procurement for vehicles. And we started a program about five years ago, and eight out of the 10 vehicles that we purchased currently with the city are clean air vehicles. So that program's already in back there, and I want to make sure that it continues. Another thing is we work closely with AQMD, making sure that we do have clean air vehicles, and if there are any grants available to us to get those. That helps us put charging stations that doesn’t impact your tax dollars, and that's through a grant through AQMD. Thank you.

MODERATOR:

Thank you. Now I get to ask this question. And it's definitely because I'm old for 61. In the next 10 years, Manhattan Beach will have 10,000 people older than 60. I'm not sure how they know that. But what will you do to support them as they age in place? So let's start. Let's begin on this side.

STEVE CHARELIAN:

Well, I'll be one of those people. I would just make sure that we work closely with the older adult programs and through Parks and Recreation, they're the subject matter expert, and find out from them through surveys and information as to what their needs are and making sure those things are budgeted so they're able to utilize programs that we have in the city. But what programs do they want? It's not the wants, it's not the needs, it's the wants. So we really need to hear from them and make sure we have enough infrastructure. We have enough. The crosswalks are safe. We have ADA access as well. Just making sure that we have enough infrastructure in place and keeping an eye on that through the budget.

JOE FRANKLIN:

So being in that class of residents, I have been partaking of our programs. We have a really robust older adults program. There are certainly activities, but the phrase that I want to key in on is “aging in place” because my wife and I just remodeled our 1946 beach bungalow for aging in place. Widening the doorways, roll-in shower, you know, hand grips and everything in the shower. We've actually kind of logically set up the house where we could have a caretaker live in the original three-one staff part of the house, and then we could live in the back sort of like a junior ADU type situation. There's a lot of planning. You can go to our planning department and get some advice about putting in an ADU. And unfortunately, or fortunately, this is Sacramento, they designed the ADU program to increase affordable housing. The majority, the vast majority of the ADUs are used by family members.

KAREN KOMATINSKY:

So I obviously already have, I'm living that world already with having an 84-year-old living in my house currently. We have an incredible older adults program already from everything from health and physical kinds of things to technology. There's technology classes there to teach some of these older adults how to use a cell phone, which, thank God for that, because I can't do it any longer for my mom. But I do think some really important things are, I'd like to see the Scout House get completed. That's been a project that's been just sitting there not getting completed. And that needs to get done. I also think we need to think about updating some of our, expanding upon some of our crosswalks. We've got a lot of speeding that goes on downtown and for older adults trying to get across Valley or get into Joslyn, I think it's a little bit dangerous at times. So I'd like to see a little bit more there. And I think that maybe part of that is getting more, diving into, the planning department and finding out what else the planning department could really offer, because there's a lot of us who are going to be in that position soon.

JOE MARCY:

You know, my parents are seniors and they're everything to me, and I have advocated and championed taking care of them over the years. And, you know, the median age of council, I believe, is somewhere like 63. So I expected that to be more aggressive in getting more things done for our senior community. You know, even looking at the programs that we're offering at the Joslyn Center for arthritis and fitness courses. We're charging quite a bit of money for our seniors to take part in this! We shouldn't be doing that. We need to expedite and make sure that we're aggressively completing the adult and scout house so there's a facility that is available for them to use. We're going to be offering these fitness courses and programs that are accessible and affordable. And we managed to see more in regards to parking as well. We need to look at opportunities for older adults to have reserved parking, because that's more challenging for them in their age as well. So there's so much to be done. I'd love to work with the chamber too and find ways to work with our local businesses to advocate for our senior discounts and senior community because it's important. It's our generation that's taking care of them. 

BRENDA O’LEARY:

So our seniors are the largest demographic in Manhattan Beach. And it's very important for our community that we keep them out and about. It's good for their mental health. It's good for our restaurants. It's good for the stores. Our seniors tell me that they like outdoor dining. They like the ability to sit outside. I believe the Scout House is so important to keeping our seniors out and about. On my website, I describe a program that I've invented, it's called Dogs and Donuts, where we team up with some local rescues and maybe once or twice a month we all have coffee together with some rescue organizations and seniors can interact with the rescue dogs. Maybe after the coffee, if they want to go on a walk, we all go on a pack walk together, and it's nice for the dogs. Some of the seniors tell me they can't have pets anymore, and they miss their pets. Another thing that I've been getting involved with, I've gotten to know more about Beach Cities Health District. They have a wonderful Blue Zones committee, which is all about healthy aging. And I've been very impressed with that.

NINA TARNAY:

I think as a city, we should address it in a number of ways, which is, A, facilities. The Scout House, we can upgrade Joslyn Center and Manhattan Heights, create more spaces that are mixed spaces, not just for seniors, but to bring in youth and have more collaborative blended programming. We shouldn't isolate our elderly population. We should integrate and create spaces where there's more collaboration and involvement between the community. I volunteer with the Torrance Memorial Hospital and I'm on the foundation board at Little Company of Mary. We do a lot of educational programs, so I'd love to continue to bring those programs into our community because no matter what we do, at some point, there are going to be issues that all of us have to face. So having access to those educational programs and then those facilities, when the time comes.

MODERATOR:

What is one unique reason why they should vote for you? And if you'd like to start in the middle.

KAREN KOMATINSKY:

Only one? I have already served as a public officer before. I have had, as I mentioned already twice before, I have served at the school district for 10 years. I think it's a really important part to know, because I understand large-scale budgets. I understand large-scale project planning. I understand timelines and how to execute and deliver when it's necessary. I also understand the necessary partnership between the city and the school district. There are 10 elected officials in this town, one for the school district and one for the city, and those 10 officials have to work together because they're the ones that actually really run these major budgets that we have in town. For all those reasons, that's why you should elect me.

JOE MARCY:

I'm the only candidate here that’s born and raised in Manhattan Beach. This is my hometown. I really feel that when you love where you live, you do everything you can to protect it. And I've spent my adult life trying to maintain and keep our traditions alive, everything from the Hometown Fair to the pumpkin races to the fireworks. These are things that we did as children and we're carrying on to the next generation. And that's also why I'm just so invested in public safety. Because whenever you hear any excuses of what's been done, why it hasn't been done or whatever it is, I've always pushed that we have to be aggressive on our timelines and get things done quickly, because we're Manhattan Beach. And we should have a level of expectation. Cities like Irvine and Southern California have that reputation of being some of the safest areas, and we should be too. It doesn't just mean the police department, it takes all of us to make that happen. So I think we need to be aggressive, and we've got to do our part to make it happen.

BRENDA O’LEARY:

The one thing that has helped me throughout my life is creativity. I've always been creative. And I believe in a situation like this, we have to look at the city and we have to say what worked in the past may not be what works today, and that may not be what works tomorrow. It's very easy to say, because we've done it this way in the past, we must always do it this way. Though we are facing a new normal. We have challenges that come from technology, from people coming from outside our community. And we have to look at our community and say, how can we face these challenges and how can we do things differently? I don't believe we should just rebuild a parking garage in the middle of our community. I believe there are better solutions. I'm excited about self-driving cars and I really want to work this into the conversation at some point, but there are cars out there now at Waymo. We'll talk later about them because we have 15 seconds, but I really think that they could contribute to our community. Similar to the downtowner, but more of them and a cheaper service. They're already being used from Santa Monica to Marina Del Rey to downtown.

NINA TARNAY:

I think one more that would describe me is enthusiastic. No matter what I do, I am enthusiastic about it. Whatever I champion, and it's going to be our city, I'm going to do it enthusiastically because all the challenges that we have, I think a lot of us are on the same page. It's how we're going to attract those issues and I'll enthusiastically, passionately do it. Those two words, so sorry, but that's what I think would distinguish me is my ability to reach out to people, get people involved and get excited to participate.

STEVE CHARELIAN:

This is the most important election that we've had in the last 30 years. As I mentioned, we have a lot of institutional knowledge walking out the door, and there are two key positions in the city would need to be filled, and have about seven years of experience between the two. You know, when you're buying a home, it's all about location, location, location, right? This campaign is about experience, experience, experience. That's my one word. You're going to get a person that's going to hit the ground running that understands a full 180-degree view of the city operations. I've had to come to a consensus with nine different department heads from Parks and Rec, police to public works, and stand up nearly a $200 million budget. In addition to that, if you elect me for council, I'll only have to come to a consensus with five people, so it'll get a little bit easier. Thank you.

JOE FRANKLIN:

Great. Well, thank you for the opportunity to answer this. Well, you know, I have four years of experience on council. I ran my first campaign in 2019 and I lost and I learned a lot from that. And I've always told my kids that failure is sort of a stepping stone to success. I learned a lot from that and I won in 2020. I work hard. People always mention that, you know, talk about that, about me, and I work for it. I'm always trying to find a solution to the problems, thinking outside the box. We have, as council members, we have one-on-one sessions with the city manager. That's where we put our input for solutions that could possibly help the city. And I've been very active in doing that and providing robust solutions to some of these really hard, hard problems. And as many of you know, I listen to you. You are the greatest source of inspiration, but also problem-solving and great ideas. I'll be real happy to serve on the city council.

MODERATOR:

Aren't you glad this isn't the national stage? And aren’t we all glad that these six individuals took time out of their personal lives to submit papers to run and be candidates and then run a campaign and hopefully then serve on city council?

So now I get to answer the question. Are we good that we haven't told you what the Dodgers score is? Because of two people right there? I'm just kidding.

Here's a question. Why would voting yes for Proposition 2 be good or bad for Manhattan Beach? What are your thoughts on that? So, Joe, how about if we start with you, go back and come back.

JOE FRANKLIN:

So Proposition 2 is a bond measure. I believe it's about $10 billion from the state that will be shared with school districts across the state. You got to look at the numbers too. Steve, I might need your help, but I mean, that's putting the state into an obligation of $500 million a year with a $10 billion bond. You know, the state makes plenty of money for education. The challenge is they don't give it to everybody. Because they have a local control funding formula. And that's patently unfair, in my estimation. Are we an overachieving school district? Absolutely. And you are all to blame. Okay? Because you care about your children, you teach them, you take care of them. So I don't think we should be penalized by the state. And it's a really difficult decision to make. Because we want to encourage them. We all have our property tax statement. You see what the state gets. They need to bring that back to the cities.

KAREN KOMATINSKY:

Actually, I'm in support of Prop 2. The reason behind that is because it actually will put us in a position here in Manhattan Beach that there are matching funds available to support the measure RLS, which is also on your ballot in the fall. They have to go hand in hand in order to get that matching fund dollars. You need to pass RLS here in this community in order to get those Prop. 2 dollars. It's a huge amount of money that could come from that state bond dollars. The most important thing to know about this is we've already done this before in this district. We did this before when I sat on the school board for other previous bond campaigns where we've actually received matching funds from the state. And so we've got metrics that are in place here in the school district between having public, having community residents participate on the bond campaign, as well as we have some pretty visionary people at the district level who really have, in fact, helped make sure that those bonds do come in. So it is really important to support both of those. Thank you.

JOE MARCY:

I'm a product of our public schools here in Manhattan Beach and there are so many infrastructure projects that still need to be done. And we talk a lot on this campaign trail about RLS, about MMB, doing what we can to support our local initiatives here. I have always, and I will always support our schools here because we are cultivating leaders. I absolutely believe that is true and we need to continue to do so. When you look at infrastructure, it is so sad that it starts on the school level with our youth, and then you look at our seniors that also are having struggling facilities. It goes full circle. There's so much infrastructure that needs to be taken care of. And that's why we need to address a lot of these measures. And I hope that you are, and I appreciate that you're all here tonight because I know you're all informed voters that are going to make a difference in this election.

BRENDA O’LEARY:

The thing about managing bonds at the state level or the local level is there's a lot of bonds out there, and some mature and roll off and others are issued. It's kind of like when your car lease matures and you get a new car lease, it doesn't raise your car payment. That's what's going on at the state level. They carry about 80 billion in general obligation bonds. And here at the local level, we have measure RLS, which provides matching funds. So Prop 2 is a $10 billion infrastructure bond for the schools. It will likely pass because there are millions of dollars behind it, and there's almost nothing in opposition to it. We haven't passed an infrastructure bond since 2016. So we need to have RLS on the ballot, which is the other side of that. We have a $200 million bond on the ballot, which will receive $57 million in matching money if Prop 2 passes. Everyone around us has these bonds on the ballot. Redondo, PV, Pasadena has a $900 million bond on the ballot. We need the infrastructure money. Our infrastructure dates back to the 70s. Our schools are falling apart and we don't have any money left.

NINA TARNAY:

So as a product of LAUSD, I went through the school, through the LAUSD system. Those schools were way worse off than our school. And our schools, it's too bad that we didn't have an opportunity to tour our campus because you can see the state of some of the classrooms. We need infrastructure upgrades. So I do support Proposition 2 and as stated before, I also support RLS because to not try to capture that 58 million that we could have in matching funds would be foolish, because it's going to go to another district and then we would lose out twice, because we wouldn't get the money to upgrade what we need to do within our school district and then we would lose out on the 58 million as well. So I support both RLS and Proposition 2.

STEVE CHARELIAN:

Thank you. I have, as a parent of two young children under seven, I too, endorse, RLS, much needed upkeep and maintenance for infrastructure for schools for many, many years. I think that goes hand in hand with Prop 2. I think you heard about the matching funds. So I would be for both.

MODERATOR:

So we are here with the League of Women Voters. Obviously, voting is incredibly important. So what can you tell us about your first experience with voting? Thank you. Thank you.

Actually, let me repeat the question. What can you tell us about your very first experience with voting?

STEVE CHARELIAN:

Well, for me, I mean, I believe how often one votes and who one votes for us is kind of a personal decision, and local elections are nonpartisan, so it's best to vote for the most qualified candidate.

MODERATOR:

Well, wait, maybe you didn't understand. Do you remember when you first voted? How old were you? How do you find the experience? Tell us about it.

STEVE CHARELIAN:

Oh, sorry, I didn't know. For me, I've worked in government all my life, over 35 years, and I've always taken a kind of an unbiased approach. So when I learned this, earlier this year that, in voting, when I learned earlier this year that I’m gonna be retiring, that's when I registered to vote, so.

JOE FRANKLIN:

I was very excited. Being the ninth child of 10, I saw my older brothers and sisters get their, you know, register to vote, you get to vote. There was a lot of World War II veterans in our neighborhood, because I'm a baby boomer here, in the middle part of the baby boomers. So I admire those veterans. We saw during World War II. You talk about existential threat. There was an existential threat that we may not be able to vote ever again. So to me, voting is very, very important. Speaking of voting, I'm just going to take my last seconds. The Daily Breeze put out an election guide here and they inadvertently lost my submission. So you'll see that it has my photo there, but not any of my answers to their questions. But I've saved you. You should be getting my flyer in the mail and in the same edition, I have a full-page ad. And between the two of those, you can see where I stand.

KAREN KOMATINSKY:

I had to do the math, because I had to try to remember how old was I, what was happening at that time. But now I'm recalling, I remember my dad taking me to the polls to kind of walk me through like exactly what needs to happen, how this is. And then I remember walking out with the sticker. And I have become a sticker junkie. Every year after that of voting, I have probably been able to take my children to the polls now to show them, to walk them through it. And I think both of my kids are – I ran a few years ago for Beach Cities Health District and both of my kids were now, sort of laughing. I've become a trivia question in our family as to: How many times has mom been on the ballot? And so it's a little funny in our house, but it's kind of a joyful thing to be able to share that because it is a huge responsibility that we have as citizens. Make sure that you're getting your kids to polls. Give them the sticker, though.

JOE MARCY:

Joe, since you mentioned that Beach Reporter, there is a lot of content that's submitted from there, including mine and Brenda's. So yeah, that is not like you to not submit for an article like that. So I was surprised to see that too. In regards to voting, you know, I was so proud just to cast my ballot in the first election, to go into the polling place, to put the stamp there, to get my sticker and to wear it proudly all day. It is something that is a civic duty. It is something that I've been proud to do. It's something about when you see strong leadership, not only nationally, but locally, that can inspire a community. And I hope, and I hope to start candidates at this platform can do the same because it makes all the difference. It really does.

BRENDA O’LEARY:

I'll tell you about my daughter's first experience with me voting. I sat her down at the table and, full disclosure, I voted for Hillary Clinton. And I said to her, you are watching your mother elect the first woman President of the United States. Obviously, that didn't go as I thought it would. But then somebody sent me the other day, they sent me a photo of a sign for Kamala Harris. And next to that was my sign and Karen's. And I think it's cool that, no matter who wins, my sign is there beside a woman who, again, may be the first president of the United States. Now, not to be partisan, but I do think it is important that at some point soon we have a woman president, whether it's a Democrat or a Republican, we are long overdue for a woman to be the leader of the free world. 

NINA TARNAY:

And we serve locally with women on city council. So I'm the only person that has really put my hand up. I swore to this country when I was naturalized. I turned 18 and that was one of the first things I did. So I take my duties really seriously. I've been teased for wrapping myself in red, white, and blue because I am a geek for it. I voted in probably almost every election. And those of you who know me know that I dress up to go to the polls. I drag my kids. I make them dress up. So it's a little embarrassing for the kids, but I really take great joy and pride in doing it. And so, yeah, it's such an important part of our democracy.

MODERATOR:

I remember vividly when I first voted. And I met one of the presidential candidates here in California. And every time I go and vote, I remember the suffragettes. And I wouldn't miss an election. I have always finished my...

So here's the next question. There's a joint use agreement between the city and the school district. What are your thoughts about it and would you suggest any changes? So Nina, let's start with you and we'll go ahead.

Yeah. You want me to repeat the question? Yes.

NINA TARNAY:

I support the joint use agreement. I think it's important for our cities to support our school. For those of you who are unfamiliar with it, I think we're one year into a 10-year agreement between the city and the school. The city pays the schools, I think it's around 9 million. I know there are some adjustments. But so I, you know, and that gives public access to school facilities, parks, Begg pool. That's the wonderful thing about our city is the collaboration between the school district and city hall. So I support it. I think we're only a year into it and it seems to be working well, you know, from what I can see. So I support it.

BRENA O’LEARY:

I support joint use agreements. I support that one. I think it's a good way to get things done on both sides. I support public-private partnerships. There's one right now that we're looking at with the Bay Club, where instead of renovating Begg pool, which costs a lot of money – because it has to be made ADA compliant and it has to all be union labor, because it's a public property – so the Bay Club has offered to build two outdoor pools that we can use for the community even if you're not a member of the Bay Club. So, you know, there's deals like that that can definitely help further our needs without a huge cost outlay from the residents. There's other ways we can use public-private partnerships to enhance our community. As I mentioned, I'm not a fan of building up parking structure three. I'd like to see us underground it, and then possibly do some sort of public-private partnership to put something on that lot that would be very meaningful to our residents.

JOE MARCY:

I would assume that most of us would be aligned on this. The schools are the heart of our community and we have to support and maintain that agreement and continue that and be good partners. If we're discussing the Bay Club partnership, yes, I also support looking at the partnership with Bay Club because it makes the most sense for the community. It would expedite the process, and it would be fiscally responsible for us to explore it. You know, we're an active lifestyle community. We have had Olympic athletes in our community. We have had people that have just enjoyed our outdoor facilities. I would never want to touch Polywalk Park. I would put a moratorium on any builds there because our green space is important to us. And getting the pool done would be ideal in a timeframe that is reasonable. You know, we put $400,000 into a feasibility study for outdoor dining, 200 plus for the pool. And, you know, hopefully we can come up with some solutions quickly.

KAREN KOMATINSKY:

The joint use agreement between the city and the school district is a very important document, not only for technical and financial purposes, but I think it's more important from a relationship standpoint. These are two, as I mentioned before, it's really important to have a very strong relationship between the school district and the city. The school district actually owns property in Polliwog Park. And so this whole conversation that we're having about Begg pool, and it is the heart of the city and it has been a jewel for a very long period of time, it has also outlived its life. And we do have to address that in a joint partnership between the district and the city itself. Being on the Parks and Rec Commission, I've worked with a few other colleagues who we have gotten into that conversation in quite a bit of detail. It's not a done conversation. It's not an end conversation. Yes, there is exploration happening with the Bay Club partnership, private partnership, but that's far from a done conversation also. We need to have continued conversations about these kinds of things, but the joint use agreement is very, very important because it really does bring the two together. Thank you.

JOE FRANKLIN:

So I was very privileged to be on the subcommittee between the city and the school district, and of course we always talk about the joint use agreement. My family benefited greatly from it because the city pays to maintain the fields and then the Parks and Recreation can go ahead and put programming on those fields. So it's a quid pro quo. The city also pays for the two school resource officers, who, I don't know if it's a good thing they knew my kids by their first names, but that was very important. Also, the city pays for the 22 crossing guards. This and, a while back, in the recent past, the city paid a million dollars to put up fencing and security measures at all the campuses. I'm in favor of keeping it strong and it's great to have that dialogue. We talk once a month on the subcommittees.

STEVE CHARELIAN:

Yes, I'm on board for the partnership and collaboration that we have with the school district. I'm also a big believer in public and private partnerships as well. We engaged in one with the older adult and Scout House capital improvement. We got about $2.3 million from the scout house, Friends of the Scout House, and the city put in about $5 million there. And that's going to be completed here in the next two, three years. It's taken a little bit longer than it needs to, but the city's on it. They're looking at it closely. I do believe that we're kind of at the end of life at Begg, the pools, and the public-private partnership is important. We have a lease with the school for Polliwog Park. And we pay $1 as the city to Polliwog Park. We keep maintenance of that park. As well as Joe said, the resource officers and the crossing guards.

MODERATOR:

What is your opinion of the services offered by the Beach City's Health District and do you have a position on Measure BC?

JOE MARCY:

My family takes advantage of some of those classes and services that they offer. And I have expressed my public support for Measure BC. And, you know, it ties back that there are opportunities to help our senior community. I absolutely support it. You know there's just so much that still needs to be done in the community. And we're trying to meet the needs of all of our demographics here and our senior community is just as important as our youth and our young leaders to meet those needs. Yeah, I definitely want to bring support and advocate for them as much as possible.

BRENDA O’LEARY:

So youth mental health is something that is very near and dear to my heart. Our youth are in a mental health crisis, and it's for so many reasons. It's based on social media for the younger ones, and then the older ones are experiencing a lot of anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, psychosis. Some of that is from smoking pot. Now, the new pot that people are out there smoking these days is, you know, in the 1990s, it was about 5% THC. The new pot is about 99% THC. So if you talk to somebody like the ER doctors at UCLA, they're saying that they're seeing teens and young adults coming through the ER every day with psychosis from smoking pot. So it's very dangerous. Beach Cities health district has Alcove, which is a mental health center designed for kids ages 12 to 25. I believe it is so important to this community and I do support Measure BC. I hope you do too.

NINA TARNAY:

I hope my son and the other volunteers are listening to Brenda talk about pot, how bad it is for you. I also want to thank you guys for being here today because it's a long day. I know for all of you to still be here. So thank you for that. This one's a difficult one for me because on paper, I do support Alcove. I do support the mental health support component of it. And I think it's a great space for students. I'm still on the fence because we have so many tax measures that are on the ballot. And because of the location, it's not really accessible for kids. The kids who can drive are, you know, I don't know if they would drive themselves. It's over in Redondo. So I would have liked them to have a component where it's in each of our cities, to be able to reach and have a space for the kids to go to. So I'm sorry, I'm still undecided.

STEVE CHARELIAN:

I too agree. Youth mental health is an epidemic. It's, you know, post-COVID and everything else that's going on. I too am not fully engaged in this bond measure. I haven't come to a consensus yet. You know, there's, again, it's a community of beach cities, so there is, you know, what I heard earlier, that there's distance between Manhattan Beach and this location. So I haven't come to a full consensus on this. But it is a lot of money and it does, it will, impact that neighborhood, although not in Manhattan Beach. But I have not come to a consensus on it.

JOE FRANKLIN:

Let's make this interactive. How many here have actually used services at Beach Cities Health District? … See, about maybe four or five percent of you have used it. 

MODERATOR:

Put your hands up high so he can see. It's not like a bad thing.0

JOE FRANKLIN:

​​Yeah, because I think we have some geography issues, you know, where it is and redundancy issues with what they offer. I personally like it. I'm currently Alcove where they were offering youth mental services. The facility is very helpful, and I think that should be maintained. I'd like to see them maybe offer some more homelessness services, because that's a big challenge that we have. I am heavily involved with the homeless solution that we have, but the services that they need, the remediation and the diversion services, which I don't see, for homeless and also for criminals, that needs to be a little bit more realistic.

KAREN KOMATINSKY:

So I think that Beach Cities Health District has done a really fabulous job. We saw a lot of it, their attention really spike during COVID and all the services they offered to our schools and to our local residents during that period of time. I think the Alcove program is absolutely stunning for what it has offered and it really has been a safe haven for a lot of kids who are struggling and need those services. I have to agree, I would like to see, it would be interesting to see how much more impactful or how much more involved they could get with the unhoused programs and challenges that we have. A lot of these unhoused individuals need mental health services. They need medical services. And it is a public safety issue for them as well as for businesses and other residents. But I think I'm still a little on the fence about it, honestly, because I think what I'd really like to see is I'd like to see a bit more integration from BCHD into our zip code. It's an entity that is stretched over three cities. And while its physical footprint is Redondo, I would really love to see more of a presence in Manhattan Beach for all of us.

MODERATOR:

You guys are great. [audience clapping] So our time frame was seven o'clock to 8:30. I believe the game is still going on. If we answer all these questions, you should have brought sleeping bags. So we're going to give all of you a chance to make a one-minute final statement and then you can leave your last forum. Woo hoo.

Nina, let's start with you and go next way for your final statements.

NINA TARNAY:

… My name is Nina Tarnay, and I'm running for city council. I have the background, I have a professional background to do the work. I'm an attorney. I've had my own business. I've worked for the city of El Segundo, so I have experience. I have experience behind the counter as well. And I've raised my kids through this community. I'm passionate to do the work. So I hope that I get one of your three votes on or before November 5th. Nina Tarnay. Thank you.

BRENDA O’LEARY

Hi, Brenda O’Leary. Thank you for this opportunity tonight. I've done a pretty thorough job of detailing all my initiatives at my website, brendaoleary.com. Also a shout-out to Tracy Wymbs, who's not here tonight, but she let me feature all of her photography across my website. So I don't know what you think of the content. It's quite beautiful. So thank you to Tracy for that. I will represent you on the City Council with integrity and creativity and make sure that you are being listened to and that you have a voice in the community. It's so important, and I believe it's so integral to success to be able to build relationships, listen to what people's needs are, and then come up with creative solutions to solve your problems. So I believe that this is a very interesting moment in our city. We're going to need creative solutions to face new challenges that we haven't faced in the past. And I'm the person to do it. Please vote Brenda O’Leary for City Council in November. Thank you.

JOE MARCY:

Again, I'm Joe Marcy. I want to just say thank you to all of you for being here. And again, thank you to this wonderful group of candidates that I've had the pleasure of working with on this campaign trail. You know, this has been an experience of a lifetime. And honestly, the future is very bright for our community, and it's because of our police, our fire, our staff, MB Safe. There are nonprofit organizations, our volunteer groups. It takes the entire community to make it happen, but it also takes strong leadership. You know, Stephen Napolitano is someone that I was here at Mira Costa a few weeks ago who were both installed into the Hall of Fame. And he took office at the age of 24 years old as a community homegrown leader. And I hope to continue and do the same kind of work and make this community proud. I've used every platform I can to do that for our community, and I'll continue to do that regardless of what happens after November 5th. But I would love your vote. I'd be honored to serve this community in this capacity. And again, thank you again to all of you for being here and to the organizers.

KAREN KOMATINSKY:

So I'm the one with the really long last name, kind of hard to forget. But to close, why do I want to do this? I love this community and I love this kind of work. I proved myself as an accomplished community leader, a strong advocate, and a devoted public servant. And the roles from which I've served within the community. I'm humbled and honored to actually have received a large number of supporters from former and current elected officials and hundreds of community leaders and residents who all know and trust in my leadership and experience as they witness how I lead and how I govern. From bonds, buildings, and budgets, I'm the candidate with the HR background, the history experience and drive and passion to getting things done. I'll be able to start the work on day one, and hopefully ask for your vote on November 5th. And thank you for being here.

JOE FRANKLIN:

All right. I stand between you and a Dodger game, so… Manhattan Beach is fortunate to have excellent police, fire, and paramedics. Public safety is my top priority. As your council member and mayor, I provide consistent, proven support for strong prosecution of state misdemeanors, strong fully funded police fire departments, strong proactive e-bike education and enforcement, strong responsibility, strong homeless solutions and enforcement, strong local zoning control, and strong schools city partnership. I have the unprecedented endorsement of 15 current council members and former mayors. I ran for council four years ago when enormous challenges faced our city. I promise to continue bringing common sense, independent leadership, and solutions that put Manhattan Beach residents, small businesses, and schools first. My name is Joe Franklin. My website is votejoefranklin.com. Thank you so much.

STEVE CHARELIAN:

35 years, I've been a public servant to this city. And I'm very fortunate to have planted some deep roots here with my beautiful wife and children over 12 years ago. And just embedded into the community in every aspect. I want to continue doing that. I want to be our voice. I want to be your voice. And I want to continue being, providing consistency to a very challenging time. Common sense. Solution-oriented. I was in finance leadership when we navigated through the Great Recession. We didn't lose any services then, because it was just a strategic, being able to pivot financially to be able to do that. The pandemic, global pandemic once again, no services were lost. I was the only department head then that walked into city hall, because I know that there was need of leadership when all my other peers were in different cities. So again, solution-oriented, consistency. I want to be here. Continue watching your tax dollars as I have for all these years. And I'm going to be in this community a long time. So look forward for your vote. Vote Steve.

MODERATOR:

Thank you all. The league would like to thank MB News and the Chamber of Commerce for co-sponsoring...