By Brett Callwood
At the City Council meeting on the evening of Tuesday, June 27, the City Council approved a number of contracts, following the official adoption of the annual budget.
Following the proclamations, presentations, and Consent Calendar items, the council members went ahead and approved the 2023-24 budget without fuss and drama. They then voted for the appropriations, or spending, limit to be set at $138,153,439 for this fiscal year.
With the budget firmly in place, the council set about approving multiple contracts under advisement from City Manager Clint Osorio. The first was to, “Renew the Professional Services Agreement with Alliant Insurance Services, Inc., to provide Insurance Brokerage and Consulting Services for City Property and Casualty Program, in the amount of $491,095, for Fiscal Year beginning 2023/2024 through 2027/2028.”
That was followed by another Administrative Services item, to “Authorize the City Manager to Purchase and Bind Insurance Coverage in the amount of $2,130,152.04 for Fiscal Year 2023-2024.”
Both were agreed to by the council fairly quickly.
Community Development Item 13A saw the approval of the creation of “five condominium units for a property located in the Medium Residential Multiple-Family Residential (R-3) Zone that qualifies for an exemption for CEQA pursuant guidelines Section 15061(B)(3).” The project will be located at 1715 West 149th Street and conducted by FM Marketing & Properties, LLC.
The council also approved a pilot Commercial Façade Improvement Program, and a budget of $5,670 for Mayor Tasha Cerda and Council Member Rodney Tanaka to travel to the Japanese sister city of Ichikawa.
The Gardena Police Department was granted $35,770.94 for a Crisis Negotiation Incident Command System from 836 Technologies, and $36,830.41 for Thermo Scientific TruNarc Handheld Narcotic Analyzer. The latter is to detect narcotics without officers actually having to be in contact with the substances.
Under Public Works, $37,983 was approved for the replacement of the baseball diamonds at Rowley Park. Finally, Transportation items saw a project total of $698,764 approved for the RideCo for On-Demand Microtransit Software project. That will, “provide a transit accessible community route within the City of Gardena’s boundaries. Microtransit is a flexible, demand-responsive transportation service that integrates technology enabled software for on-demand trip planning on smaller vehicles, similar to Uber and Lyft.”
In addition, a pilot Beach Trolley service will run between July 11, 2023 and September 2, 2023, ending on the Labor Day holiday weekend. That will carry passengers from Gardena to the beach.
Finally, a contract was approved with Merrimac Petroleum, Inc. for the Purchase of Unleaded Fuel for a Two-Year Term with Three, One-Year Options at a Cost Not-To-Exceed the Annual Budget Approved by City Council.
It was overall a busy evening, but it passed without much in the way of controversy or confrontation.
