Carpinteria City Council to review Annual Work Plan

By NEIL HARTSTEIN NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

The Carpinteria City Council today is scheduled to review the 2023 Annual Work Plan, considered the city’s primary document that guides new or significantly modified staff work for the coming year.

The council will meet at 4 p.m. in chambers, 5775 Carpinteria Ave. The meeting is expected to run about four hours.

“The city’s Annual Work Plan defines and prioritizes projects, programs and services to be undertaken over the next year, and is an important part of the city’s implementation of community goals and objectives,” city officials said.

Staff will present the draft Annual Work Program and Strategic Plan to the council, which is slated to discuss it and make any changes it deems appropriate for incorporation into the final Plan.

Council members will receive public comment regarding the Work

Plan before making any decision to approve, amend or reject it.

“The Annual Work Plan is an important precursor to the drafting of the budget for the coming fiscal year,” staff said. “Through the budget development process, which begins in March and concludes with City Council adoption in June, it will be determined what projects and programs are to be funded, and the basis for determining program/service effectiveness through performance measures.”

Further, the Annual Work Plan “is an opportunity to identify work that can help address legal, financial and other types of risk” facing the city, staff said.

Each year in late January, the city council, city manager and staff department heads meet to discuss strategic issues and the Annual Work Plan.

The Annual Work Plan includes a brief description of all departments, including a mission statement and detailed information about each department’s proposed work for the year. At the council’s request, the chair of each appointed board, committee and the Planning Commission was invited to attend the Work Plan meeting.

The Work Plan “includes the identification of strategic issues facing the city, a discussion of the proposed approach to addressing these issues, and implementation measures set out through the Plan,” staff said.

“The Plan’s strategic initiatives represent key long-range interests of the city that are not easily resolvable or entirely within the control of the city.”

The Strategic Plan also includes a discussion of progress, resource issues and adjustments concerning each strategic initiative.

Each Work Plan item proposes some type of discrete work matter. A Work Plan item may be a new city program or service or changes to an existing program or service, or can reflect a new or ongoing major capital project. Although work matters may influence or be affected by routine or ongoing work, the Work Plan is not a comprehensive description of day-today work of the city organization, staff said email: nhartsteinnewspress@gmail.com email: nhartsteinnewspress@gmail.com

Creation of the Work Plan is educated by the Strategic Plan and changes in context that are affecting progress addressing it, progress and/ or completion of Work Plan items in the prior year, and direction provided by action of the council in order to stimulate strategic thinking in advance of the meeting, each council member was provided a questionnaire to fill out.

The city also solicited comment and participation by the public by publishing an ad in the local weekly newspaper, and announcing the meeting at a recent past regular council meeting.

To date, no public comment had been received, staff said. Any comments received prior to the meeting will be provided to the council and be made available to the public at the meeting.

A Santa Barbara man has admitted setting a November brushfire near a bike path south of Ward Drive in Santa Barbara that prompted a fire department evacuation warning to local residents, prosecutors said.

Jose Martin Alvarez-Castro, 30, appeared in court last Tuesday to set a date for his preliminary hearing on a felony arson charge, but instead he changed his mind and switched his plea from not guilty to guilty, prosecutor Michelle Mossembekker told the NewsPress.

“The case was continued for sentencing to 2/21/23,” she said.

The defendant was charged with recklessly causing a fire of a structure or forest on Nov. 2 for starting a fire that burned some brush near the bike path.

He also was charged with possessing methamphetamine and resisting arrest, both misdemeanors, but those counts are expected to be dismissed when he is sentenced on the arson charge. Sheriff’s deputies and county firefighters responded at 11:40 p.m. on Nov. 2 to a report of a fire in the brush area near the bike path between the south end of Ward Drive and More Ranch Road.

“When deputies arrived, a witness provided information about a possible suspect in the area,” sheriff’s officials said in a news release at the time.

While deputies alerted residents in the surrounding area about the fire, additional deputies searched for the suspect.

At about 11:57 p.m., deputies located and detained a person matching the suspect’s description provided by a witness on the bike path, sheriff’s officials said.

Mr. Alvarez-Castro was subsequently arrested on suspicion of arson, obstruction of a peace officer and possession of a controlled substance.

Other sheriff’s deputies, meanwhile, remained on scene until county firefighters confirmed that the evacuation warning that was issued for the More Ranch area had been lifted.

Brigade

Continued from Page A1 the daughter could move around safely. We restored pathways, fixed fences and got the place back together to move safely around the property; so there was a reasonable expectation to be able to move around safely. The second location included major yard cleanup and removing the interior damage of the home: removing cabinetry in the house to get it off the walls and removing the moist dry wall so the house can dry out.”

Lunch for volunteers was provided by the Bucket Brigade with support from Goleta-based Direct Relief and The Santa Barbara Foundation.

“I think the thing we want people to understand is when we get natural disasters the damage can be so broad and severe that it overwhelms the normal system of resilience and recovery. In this case the people involved did not have flood insurance so they were looking down the barrel of monstrous debt. When neighbors come together and reach out and help people it restores trust and faith in the community. So this kind of work is really important moving forward with the impacts of climate change,” said Mr. Powell.

The Bucket Brigade was formed in 2018 in the aftermath of the debris flows in Montecito to help neighbors in a time of need.

Anyone that needs help clearing their property of mud or debris as a result of the January storms can visit www.sbbucketbrigade.org and click on the button “I Need Help.” email: kzehnder@newspress.com

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MONDAY, JANUARY 30, 2023