440 1st Street, NW, Suite 440
Washington, DC 20001
To: CHRISTIAN CLEGG, CITY MANAGER, THE CITY OF BAKERSFIELD From: MARK DEDRICK & TERRY HEUBERT, SUMMIT STRATEGIES
RE: DC VISIT DEBRIEF
Date: FEBRUARY 2ND, 2024
During the U.S. Conference of Mayor’s (USCM) annual conference, your Summit team conducted a variety of meetings with Mayor Karen Goh and Anthony Valdez aimed at building relationships and advancing the City’s federal agenda.
This memo is intended to debrief you on the meetings that were held parallel to Mayor’s USCM meetings and events.
CONGRESSMAN DA VID VALADAO
Rep. Valadao is obviously a friend of Bakersfield, and this was a very friendly and helpful meeting.
Congressman Valadao was enthusiastic and eager to help Bakersfield with your US Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) issue, and asked for an update following our meeting with the Corps. We have followed up with his staff about setting up a meeting in California with the Congressman in attendance.
The Mayor raised the City’s community center priority and the Congressman was very interested in assisting. We spoke with his staff about seeking funding through the appropriations which will start in the next several weeks.
SENATOR ALEX PADILLA’S LEGISLATIVE TEAM
Senator Padilla’s legislative team was very helpful and expressed a willingness to provide letters of support for the City’s grant applications. We also covered the community center project and they seemed very positive about the process and interested in exploring funding options in the next appropriations cycle.
MATTHEW CEJA WITH SENATOR LAPHONZA BUTLER
This was the City’s first meeting with the new Senator’s office and it allowed us to make introductions and to talk about the City’s needs. The bulk of the meeting focused on the community center, and its associated benefits. Since this is the Senator’s only chance to advance projects in the
appropriations process, it is very unclear how she will proceed. Further, she is unlikely to be in office when the FY25 funding bills finally pass. We will continue to work this office. Everyone is in unchartered waters with Sen. Butler.
ASSISTANT SECRETARY DR. KIMBERLY MCCLAIN & DEP. ASSISTANT SECRETARY PATRICK BYRNE
DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT (HUD)
HUD is an important agency where we want to build relationships. We had a very productive meeting with Asst. Sec. McClain where we were able to highlight several priorities:
The Mayor expressed our challenges with people experiencing homelessness and talked about new initiatives to add beds.
McClain expressed her interest in the power issue where developers could leave Bakersfield because they can’t get electricity.
HUD talked about looking into programs like Community Development Block Grants (CDBG), Choice Neighborhoods, and commercial to residential conversion. o Choice Neighborhoods provides holistic opportunities and provides money for planning ($5-$10 million) and implementation ($40-$50 million). o Choice Neighborhoods Implementation is very flexible. HUD mentioned Jeff Bezos's new initiative to partner with cities to develop tech hubs.
Secs. McClain and Byrne expressed genuine interest in assisting Bakersfield. We feel this is a relationship that should be fostered.
SHANNON LONG, ASSISTANT DIRECTOR
COMMUNITY ORIENTATED POLICING (COPS) OFFICE; DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE (DOJ) This was an important relationship to establish, given the law enforcement needs in the City of Bakersfield. While the hiring program, which is the bread and butter of the COPS office, isn’t always a great fit for a city’s needs, Justice has a number of different grant programs and other services that could be helpful to Bakersfield. Shannon informed us that COPS, like most DOJ offices, is holding all grant Notice of Funding Opportunities (NOFO) until the budget is complete for the year, but that they hope to have a bunch of opportunities ready to go very soon. These include:
The Office of Juvenile Programs (OJP) has a big focus on Community Violence Interrupters and is a good place to look for assistance in this area. COPS unique and very flexible microgrant program: Grants of $175,000 for two years, do not require a match, and can be used for a wide range of things. This is worth exploring particularly if you are looking to start up a new policing initiative and need seed money. Both COPS and OJP have funding for police officer mental health initiatives. COPS has a sophisticated technical assistance where their experts could work with the city and assess law enforcement’s practices.
LANDON BAILEY, INTERGOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS ADVISOR AND TOIYRIAH TURNER
DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION (DOT)
As with DOJ, DOT is an important relationship for the City to foster. DOT is sitting on an unprecedented amount of money right now and has frequent NOFOs that can address different City transportation priorities.
Highlights from this meeting:
The Mayor thanked USDOT for the City’s $10 million RAISE Grant. Safe Streets for All (SS4A) Grant Program
o The “planning” side is undersubscribed and therefore less competitive than the “implementation” side of the program.
o SS4A will reopen in February or March.
SUSAN LUCAS, PROGRAM MANAGER
US ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS
This was an important meeting to restart communication and partnership with the Corps. Both the Mayor and Susan were able to share their understanding of the history of our stalled issue. Both Susan and the Mayor committed to ensuring that a meeting in California would happen, and that the lines of communication would be open going forward.
Follow up to this meeting should include sorting out the City’s understanding of project history, which is not consistent with the Corps’. The Mayor passed along information which was provided to us. We should discuss this issue in more detail.