Cotati City Council
Agenda Staff Report
Item type: REGULAR AGENDA (ACTION)
To: City Council
Subject: Direction on City Seal
Date: November 22, 2022
Written by: Damien O'Bid, City Manager
Recommendation
It is recommended that the City Council discuss the public comments received on the draft city seal themes and provide direction to staff on revisions for a final draft.
Background
City staff began exploring an update to the City seal several years ago at the same time that the City began developing the new branding logos. As part of this process, staff provided an initial draft of an updated Chief Kotat’i seal to the Graton Tribe for their input. The Tribe communicated to the City that they preferred that the new seal not include the likeness of a Native American.
This led staff to discuss alternatives, and working with a local graphics art company, developed three general themes, shown below, representing music, nature, and landmarks. These three themes were presented to the public in August 2022 to determine which direction residents wanted to go with the new seal design.
Based on the results of the community survey, the public largely supported a nature-based theme, represented in the concepts as an oak tree. The summary graph, as well as some other “homegrown” design submitted are provided below. The narrative comments are attached.
Analysis/Discussion
The City Seal design project is in the concept phase and is requesting feedback from the City Council at this time. Staff will then attempt to incorporate the main themes conveyed by the public, as directed by the City Council. This new draft will presented to the City Council once more for final feedback prior to moving to the illustration phase.
As stated previously, three general thematic concepts were presented to the public for feedback and the results leaned strongly toward a theme of nature. There was also some discussion, although no consensus, of incorporating the city’s hexagonal shape or music.
Based on feedback to date, staff recommendations for City Council consideration are:
1. A circular shape seal. The benefit of the circular shape (versus a hexagon) is that it is a more efficient use of space, which would allow for the maximum amount of area for the illustration. The seal will need to represent well at various sizes, so we need to maximize the illustration size within the seal. In addition, the accompanying text will wrap easily around the more traditional circular shape.
2. Illustration that features nature elements native to Cotati, with the Laguna de Santa Rosa central to Cotati’s identity. This is based largely on the feedback from the public. The exact subject is still to be determined, but some ideas are native plants/trees associated with the Laguna de Santa Rosa, and possibly some native wildlife. This will be determined in the next phase if supported by the City Council and directed to move forward with this concept.
3. Finally, as a more subtle incorporation of native culture, an option is to incorporate decorative detail into the seal that is reminiscent of local Native American Indian basket weaving. The exact design would be created upon researching the subject matter to ensure historical/cultural accuracy.
There was no obvious way to incorporate music in the limited graphics space and not have it get too busy. A potential alternative is to have this element more overtly incorporated into future branding graphics.
Financial Considerations
If the seal is revised through the suggested draft and then illustration steps, additional funding is likely to be minimal. However, if there are numerous iterations, it could significantly increase the cost, depending on the extent of additional work.
Environmental Issues
This action is exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) because it is not a project which has a potential for resulting in either a direct physical change in the environment, or a reasonably foreseeable indirect physical change in the environment, pursuant to CEQA Guideline section 15378.
Attachments:
Seal Suggestions from the Public, August 2022 Survey (PDF)