CFSB Board Meeting Minutes - March 29, 2021

Attendance:

Chris Voss, Harry Liquornik, Gary Burke, John Colgate, Garrett Rose, Paul Teall, Ben Hyman, Kim Selkoe, Mike Nelson

Absent: Bernard Friedman, Michael Harrington, Mike McCorkle

Notes:

Kim Selkoe, BR Hoover

Agenda:

Board of Directors – Vacancies
City of Santa Barbara/CFSB: Local Seafood and Infrastructure Initiative
March Harbor Commission Meeting
Review Financials
Offshore Wind Update
Consideration of New Grant Opportunities
Harbor Happenings
Saturday Market

Chris Voss opened the meeting on March 29, 2020 at 4:00pm. Meeting was held in-person at Shoreline Beach Cafe.

1. Board Of Directors – Vacancies

Kim Selkoe and Chris Voss advised that there were currently vacancies on the Board of Directors. Later, we realized there is only 1 vacancy. The current board is:

President -- Chris Voss
Vice President -- Bernard Friedman
Treasurer -- Garrett Rose
Board Members --
- John Colgate
- Gary Burke
- Harry Liquornik
- Alternates: Paul Teall, Ben Hyman, Miles Wallace
- Lifetime honorary board member: Mike McCorkle

Alternates Paul Teall and Ben Hyman are both interested in moving into board positions. The Board voted unanimously to conduct an election. This can be done by email or in person at the next meeting.

2. City Of Santa Barbara/CFSB: Local Seafood And Infrastructure Initiative

Airport Property: Chris Voss reported that he continued to work with City Councilmembers Friedman and Jordan to identify property for CFSB and reminded the Board of the possible opportunity on city owned property near the airport at 716 Robert Keister Road. The Board emphasized that this property was less than ideal because of its distance from the Harbor, but said might be willing to consider it for gear, boat, boat and cold storage if the lease rate was very low.

Addendum/Update: The city is no longer offering the land by the airport to CFSB, due to concern that they must recover market rate on rent and they know CFSB would not/should not pay market rate.

Economic Development Plan: Chris also mentioned that staff had encouraged the City’s Economic Development Manager to include in the Draft Economic development Plan he will submit to the City Council language that would require implementation of a strategy that maintains and expands infrastructure for commercial fishermen and ensures coastal zoning that promotes the local seafood industry.

3. March Harbor Commission Meeting

State Lands Commission (SLC) Presentation, The Harbor Commission sought clarification regarding the ability of the Waterfront Department to use revenues generated at the Harbor(tidelands) on projects outside the Harbor. The presentation by SLC stated that these revenues could be used as long as their expenditure addressed the purposes of the State’s conveyance of its tidelands to the City. Commercial fishing and its infrastructure is one of those purposes.

4. Review Financials

Pushed to next meeting

5. Offshore Wind Update

Background

Currently, there are three potential locations for the offshore wind farm in California. All of the companies that have submitted a bid (12 companies) are foreign owned. Massive scale and floating design both totally untested. Blades 340 ft.

A pilot project is being proposed off of Vandenberg Air Force Base to gather more data on the turbines and how they will interact with the marine environment and stakeholders.

The following points were discussed:

Wind energy needs a framework for mitigation and Cable committee is a good model
Mitigation fund should be tied to wind energy revenues
Commercial fishermen should work as an organized, statewide system. It is better that individual fishermen do not negotiate and make one of deals with the companies.
Either everyone gets a little bit of mitigation or those most affected get a lot of mitigation funding.

Concerns were raised with the data the state is using to make decisions on the location for the wind farm. Records are from Logs and VMS, however not everyone has VMS and sometimes fishermen only state one fishing block on a fish ticket, instead of all fishing blocks.

Additional questions brought up regarding the offshore wind project

Will the cables be buried?
Is there a plan to build a giant battery plant at Morro Bay?
Windy areas often mean upwelling, which is an important feature for fishing. Will turbines affect this?

6. Consideration Of New Grant Opportunities

Mike Nelson explained that staff was pursuing additional funding from the Santa Barbara Foundation and local charities to pay fishermen to catch fish that would be processed and donated to local Food Bank and Soup Kitchens. The Board offered no objections to continuing the seafood donation program.

7. Harbor Happenings

Slip Transfer

Mike Nelson reported that a subcommittee of the Harbor Commission was reviewing the Waterfront Department’s Slip Transfer Fee policy and procedures; particularly a prohibition of adding an adult child to a Slip Permit. He also said that the Subcommittee asked the City Attorney to determine whether a clause in the Municipal Code that addressed commercial fishing and aquaculture would allow the City Council to take this action if the Department could not.

Ice House Replacement

Staff advised the Waterfront Department had budgeted $600,000 to replace the Ice House, which is currently under design. Fortunately, COVID-19 related financial impacts at the Harbor had not affected this funding.

8. Saturday Market

Paul Teall noted that attendance at the Saturday Fishermen’s Market had decreased since construction to replace the fuel storage tanks has decreased parking. He recommends using grant funding, if available, to advertise the market.

Kim Selkoe informed the Board there is still about $12,000 from various grants including the one originally intended for the boiling station, which she felt could be used for advertising. In addition, she said it was still necessary to approach local regulators regarding approval of a boiling station.

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Voss adjourned the meeting at 5:30PM.