Police and fire academy funding, medical pot on council agenda

What's on the LB council agenda?

The Long Beach City Council meets today in City Hall, 333 W. Ocean Blvd.

The meeting can be viewed live in Long Beach on Charter Communications
Channel 3, Verizon FiOS channel 21, and online at www.longbeach.gov.

Among the items that will go before the council:

A discussion about how to fund new police and firefighter academies in
2011 despite ongoing budget problems. The academies were axed in the
2009 and 2010 fiscal years, but the police and fire departments are now
losing personnel as people retire.

A vote that should finalize regulations for medical marijuana
collectives in Long Beach. Last month, one pending issue was whether the
collectives should be required to grow their marijuana on site or within
the city of Long Beach, or whether the law shouldn't include a
cultivation location requirement at all.

Final approval of the 10-year plan of the Community Partnership to
Prevent and End Homelessness.

A five-year extension, beginning in 2011, of the city's contract with
Sea Festival Association to run the annual event. The contract will
change the city's cut to be the greater of either 20 percent of the
gross revenue from the Sea Festival or the value of all of the
application costs and fees associated with the event (estimated at
$40,000 to $50,000).

This changes the previous revenue commitment of $150,000 to the city,
which was to be paid in advance this year - a change that is being
implemented because of the difficult economic times.

A recommendation to nominate 7th District Councilwoman Tonia Reyes
Uranga as the city's candidate to represent the Western Los Angeles
County Cities region on the South Coast Air Quality Management
District's governing board, a position that Uranga holds now.

A proposal by 5th District Councilwoman Gerrie Schipske to give the
city's traffic engineer authority to determine whether a neighborhood's
parking is affected by traffic directly related to the use of a public
park by permitted team sports, to conduct a parking study, and then
establish a preferential parking district if 60 percent of the residents
agree.

Proposals from 6th District Councilman Dee Andrews to have the city
manager work with utility companies to develop a streamlined process to
more quickly remove shoes that are hanging from utility lines and to
streamline city procedures and implement additional penalties for the
illegal posting of signs on the public right of way.