Agenda packet — Los Altos Hills City Council, August 17, 2023 (part 4 of 6)

Resolution ____-23 Page 6

36. Hydrants shall be located as approved by the Fire Department. In most cases, hydrants shall be located a minimum of 40 feet from buildings and adjacent to roadways/driveways such that the centerline of the hydrant is at least 2 feet (but not more than 8 feet) from the face of the curb or roadway surface. Fire hydrants shall be painted safety yellow (or equivalent).

37. Solar photovoltaic power systems shall be installed in accordance with Sections 605.11.1 through 605.11.4, the California Building Code and the California Electrical Code.

31. Gate installations shall conform with Fire Department Standard Details and Specification G-1 and, when open shall not obstruct any portion of the required with of 12’ for emergency access roadways or driveways. Locks, if provided, shall be fire department approved prior to installation. Gates across the emergency access roadways shall be equipped with an approved access device. If the gates are operated electrically, an approved knox key switch shall be installed; if they are operated manually, then an approved Knox padlock shall be installed. Gates providing access from a road to a driveway or other roadway shall be at least 30 feet from the road being exited.

Project approval may be appealed if done so in writing within 21 days of the date of the approval.

Please refer to the Conditions of Project Approval set forth herein. If you believe that these Conditions impose any fees, dedications, reservation or other exactions under the California Government Code Section 66000, you are hereby notified that these Conditions constitute written notice of a statement of the amount of such fees, and/or a description of the dedications, reservations, and other exactions. You are hereby further notified that the 90-day approval period in which you may protest such fees, dedications, reservations, and other exactions, pursuant to Government Code Section 66020(a), has begun. If you fail to file a protest within this 90-day period complying with all of the requirements of Section 66020, you will be legally barred from later challenging such exactions.

Upon completion of the construction, a final inspection shall be required to be set with the Planning and Engineering Departments two weeks prior to final building inspection approval.

NOTE: The Site Development permit is valid for two years from the approval date. All required building permits must be obtained within that year (by February 16, 2024) and work on items not requiring a building permit shall be commenced within one year and completed within two years.

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TOWN OF LOS ALTOS HILLS

MEMORANDUM
DATE: February 17, 2021
TO: Honorable Mayor and Council Members
FROM: Zachary Dahl, AICP, Planning and Building Director RE: Notification of Fast Track Approval – Lands of Campo Vista LLC At the February 16, 2021 Fast Track hearing, the following application was approved:
13902 Campo Vista Lane – File #SD20-0022 – Lands of Campo Vista Lane LLC Site Development Permit for a new 3,554 square-foot, single-story residence with a 2,853 square-foot basement, a detached 660 square-foot carport, and a detached 1,181 squarefoot accessory dwelling unit.

CEQA review: Categorical Exemption per Section 15303(a) Project Planner: Jeremy Loh
Public notice of the hearing was sent on February 5, 2021 to all properties within 500 feet and posted on the site. Copies of the Fast Track Fact Sheet, Fast Track Hearing Report and conditions of approval are attached.

If you wish to appeal this application and review it at a future City Council meeting, you may indicate your intention to appeal in a written request to the City Clerk by 5:00 p.m. on March 11, 2021.

Attachment 2

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Town of Los Altos Hills February 16, 2021
Fast Track Hearing Fact Sheet
Project Description: New single-story residence with basement, detached carport, and detached accessory dwelling unit (ADU)
File Number: SD20-0022
Address: 13902 Campo Vista Lane
Owner(s): Campo Vista Lane LLC
Staff Planner: Jeremy Loh, Assistant Planner
Site Data
Gross Lot Area: 4.123 acres
Net Lot Area: 3.997 acres
Average Slope: 9.31%
Lot Unit Factor: 3.997
Floor and Development Area (square footage):

Area Type Maximum Existing Proposed Increase Remaining
Development 59,955 17,476 24,624 7,148 35,331
Floor 23,982 1,905 6,261 4,356 17,721
Basement (949) (2,853)
Height: Maximum Proposed
On Vertical Plane 27’ 19’-5”
Lowest to Highest 35’ 19’-5”
Setbacks: Minimum Proposed
Front (west) 40’ 192’-0”
Side (north) 30’ 90’-0”
Side (south) 30’ 316’-0”
Side (east) 30’ 384’-0”
Exterior Materials: Standing seam metal roof, vertical wood siding, and glass guardrails Parking: Required spaces: 5, 4 out of setbacks
Proposed: 6; 2 in carport, 4 uncovered
Fast Track Points: 4 (Less than 15 points required to be eligible for Fast Track process) Grading: Cut: 1,320 CY Fill: 435 CY Export: 885 CY
Sewer/Septic: Sewer
Environmental Design and Protection Committee: Committee recommends that the Heritage oak trees be fenced during construction. The Committee noted that the main structure is single-story, well screened, and far from property lines, and that the ADU was providing a 40-foot setback from the Campo Vista property line.

Pathways Committee: At May 14, 2020 regular meeting, the Committee voted to recommend that the Town build a path along the south side of Fremont Road along this property’s frontage in the future since the Pathways Element identified Fremont Road as being street with pathways on both sides. Alignment of this future path should be done in conjunction with the property owner and that an additional pathway easement adjacent to the Fremont Road right-of-way may be required. Applicant should pay in-lieu fees prior to issuance of the building permit.

Open Space Committee: The project will not impact wildlife, riparian habitat, or native vegetation, so the application was not routed to the Committee for review.

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Town of Los Altos Hills February 17, 2021
Fast Track Hearing Report
Project Description: New one-story residence with basement, detached carport and detached accessory dwelling unit
File Number: SD20-0022
Address: 13902 Campo Vista Lane
Owner(s): Campo Vista LLC
Staff Planner: Jeremy Loh, Assistant Planner
Attendance:

Zachary Dahl, Planning Director
Jeremy Loh, Assistant Planner
Patrick Tremo, Property Manager
Heera Basi, Architect
Carol Gottlieb, Environmental Design and Protection Committee (EDPC) Vijay Laxmi Shah, EDPC
Robert Ellison, Pathways Committee
Richard Contreras, Open Space Committee
Hugh Pearce, Neighbor
Project Issues: Neighbor was concerned about existing generator and propane tank within side yard setback area. The proposed project was deemed an appropriate time to require relocation of generator and propane tank to comply with Town setbacks. Sound attenuation will be required for new generator location to ensure compliance with the Tow’s Noise Ordinance. No other project issues raised.

Environmental Design and Protection Committee: EDPC’s recommendation for heritage tree protection fencing included as standard condition of approval. EDPC had no concerns about design, but did note that a basement was not included in the initial submittal.

Pathways Committee: The committee requested that, while there is adequate space within the Fremont Road right-of-way and Campo Vista Lane right-of-way easement, a proposed future pathway alignment should be shown on the plans. The property owner shall pay a pathway fee included as condition of approval.

Conditions of Approval:
• Standard conditions of approval; and
• Existing generator and propane tanks shall be relocated to meet Town building setbacks. The revised locations shall be reviewed and approved by the Planning Department during building permit plan check. The generator shall be located and/or enclosed to comply with the Town’s Noise Ordinance (Chapter 2, Title 5).

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Planning Director Action:

File # SD20-0022 (Lands of Campo Vista LLC) was approved at the February 16, 2021 Fast Track meeting subject to the attached conditions and a 23-day appeal period. / /
Zachary Dahl, Planning Director Date
Project plans are available for review on the Public Meeting Resource page on the Town’s website at https://www.losaltoshills.ca.gov/501/Public-Meeting-Resources.

For questions or additional information, contact project planner Jeremy Loh by phone at (650)- 947-2544 or by email at [email protected].

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CONDITIONS OF APPROVAL
Lands of Campo Vista LLC – 13902 Campo Vista Lane – File# SD20-0022

PLANNING DEPARTMENT

1. No other modifications to the approved plans are allowed except as otherwise first reviewed and approved by the Planning Director or the Planning Commission, depending on the scope of the changes.

2. The project is subject to the Town’s Construction Time Limit Ordinance (Chapter 10, Title VIII of the Municipal Code). The maximum time for completion of the new residence shall be 36 months from the date of Building Permit issuance. Failure to complete the project in the allotted time may result in substantial penalties and fees.

3. After completion of rough framing or at least six (6) months prior to scheduling a final inspection, the applicant shall submit landscape screening and erosion control plans for review by the Site Development Committee. The application for landscape screening and erosion control shall be accompanied by the applicable fee and deposit. The plans shall be reviewed at a noticed public hearing. Attention shall be given to plantings which will be adequate to break up the view of the new residence from surrounding properties and streets.

All landscaping required for screening purposes and for erosion control (as determined by the City Engineer) must be installed prior to final inspection of the new residence. The landscape screening plan shall comply with Section 10-2.809 (water efficient landscaping) of the Los Altos Hills Municipal Code.

4. A $5,000 landscape maintenance and water usage deposit shall be paid to the Town prior to final inspection of the new residence. Two years after the project has been completed, staff will review the water usage for the property and conduct a site inspection to ensure installed landscape screening is still present and has been adequately maintained. Inadequate maintenance of installed landscape screening and/or water usage greater than the annual usage indicated on the approved parcel water budget worksheet, may result in complete forfeiture of this deposit.

5. Existing generator and propane tanks shall be relocated to meet Town building setbacks. The revised locations shall be reviewed and approved by the Planning Department during building permit plan check. The generator shall be located and/or enclosed to comply with the Town’s Noise Ordinance (Chapter 2, Title 5).

6. Prior to beginning any grading operation, all significant trees, particularly any heritage oak trees, are to be fenced at the drip line. The fencing shall be of a material and structure (chainlink) to clearly delineate the drip line. Town staff must inspect the fencing and the trees to be fenced prior to commencement of grading. The property owner shall call for said inspection at least three days in advance of the inspection. The fencing must remain throughout the course of construction. No storage of equipment, vehicles or debris shall be

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allowed within the drip lines of these trees. Existing perimeter plantings shall be fenced and retained throughout the entire construction period.

7. Prior to requesting the final inspection, a registered civil engineer or licensed land surveyor shall certify in writing and state that “the height of the new residence complies with the 27’ maximum structure height, measured as the vertical distance at any point from the bottom of the crawl space or basement ceiling if excavated below natural grade, to the highest part of the structure directly above (including roof materials).” The overall structure height shall be similarly certified in writing and state that “all points of the building (including chimneys and appurtenances) lie within a thirty-five (35’) foot horizontal band based, measured from the lowest visible natural or finished grade topographical elevation of the structure along the building line and the highest topographical elevation of the roof of the structure.” The applicant shall submit the stamped and signed letter(s) to the Planning Department prior to requesting a final inspection.

8. The property owner shall remove all Stinkwort (Dittrichia graveolens) plants from the entire property and in the road right-of-way by manual pulling or use of herbicide by October 1st of each year until the final approval of the project.

9. Roof eaves of all structures shall not encroach into the required side and rear yards. The roof eaves shall be shown on the site and civil plans in the construction drawings.

10. Exterior lighting is approved as shown on the plans. Any changes to the approved lighting plan shall be approved by the Planning Department prior to installation. All exterior lighting fixtures shall have non-transparent glass, or shall be down directed or shielded non-movable fixtures. Light fixtures shall not exceed color temperature of 3000K and emit no more than 600 lumens. No lighting may be placed within setbacks except two driveway or entry lights.

11. Exterior finish colors of all buildings shall have a light reflectivity value of 50 or less and roof materials shall have a light reflectivity value of 40 or less, per manufacturer specifications. All color samples shall be submitted to the Planning Department for approval at time of submittal for building plan check. All applicable structures shall be painted in conformance with the approved color(s) prior to final inspection.

12. Skylights, if utilized, shall be designed and constructed to reduce emitted light (tinted or colored glass, or other material). No lighting may be placed within skylight wells.

13. Fire retardant roofing (Class A) is required for all new construction.

14. All space heating and water heating systems installed in a new residence and/or detached habitable building shall be all-electric systems. Gas or propane heating systems are not permitted. If gas cooking or clothes drying appliances are installed, then dedicated electrical receptacles and circuits will be required to allow for future electric appliances. Fireplaces and all outdoor gas appliances are excluded from these requirements.

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15. All construction shall comply with 2019 California Green Building Standards Code, Part 11, Title 24 mandatory measures. The property owner shall provide a 2019 CalGreen Residential Checklist demonstrating conformance with all applicable mandatory measures at time of building permit submittal.

16. All construction shall comply with Section R337 of the 2019 California Residential Code (Materials and Construction Methods for Exterior Wildfire Exposure).

17. All properties shall pay School District fees to either the Los Altos School District or the Palo Alto Unified School District, as applicable, prior to permit issuance. The applicant shall take a copy of worksheet #2 to school district offices, pay the appropriate fees and provide the Town with a copy of the receipts.

ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT

18. Any, and all, changes to the approved grading and drainage plan shall first be approved by the Town Engineering Department. No grading shall take place during the grading restriction (October 1st to April 30th) except with prior approval from the City Engineer. No grading shall take place within ten feet of any property line.

19. All public utility services serving this property shall be placed underground. The applicant should contact PG&E immediately after issuance of building permit to start the application process for undergrounding utilities which can take up to 6-8 months.

20. An encroachment permit shall be obtained from the Public Works Department for all work proposed in the public right-of-way. No work within the public right-of-way shall commence without an encroachment permit.

21. The property owner shall provide the Town with high-quality color photographs of the existing conditions of the roadways and pathways, at building permit submittal.

22. To ensure the existing sewer lateral is in good condition and watertight, the Town requires a water pressure test and a video inspection to be conducted on the entire section of existing lateral to sewer main. The inspection video (Windows media format or equivalent) and water pressure test shall be submitted to the Public Works Department for review and approval, at building permit submittal. The owner is responsible for providing necessary cleaning and/or repairs within the lateral and at the connection if the lateral is found in a defect condition.

All related proof of repairs shall be submitted to the Public Works Department prior to final sign-off from the Public Works.

23. The property owner shall provide a copy of the Residential Service Design Load Information to the Public Works Department, at building permit submittal.

24. Two copies of a Grading & Construction Operation plan shall be submitted by the property owner for review and approval by the City Engineer and Planning Director. The grading/construction operation plan shall address truck traffic issues regarding dust, noise, and vehicular and pedestrian traffic safety on Campo Vista Lane and surrounding roadways;

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storage of construction materials; placement of sanitary facilities; parking for construction vehicles; and parking for construction personnel. A debris box (trash dumpster) shall be placed on site for collection of construction debris. Arrangements must be made with the GreenWaste Recovery, Inc. for the debris box, since they have a franchise with the Town and no other hauler is allowed within the Town limits.

25. The property owner shall pay a pathway fee of $10,943, prior to permit issuance.

26. Two sets of a final Grading and Drainage plan shall be submitted for review and approval by the Engineering Department. Final drainage and grading shall be inspected by the Engineering Department and any deficiencies corrected to the satisfaction of the Engineering Department.

27. Two copies of an Erosion and Sediment Control plan shall be submitted for review and approval by the Engineering Department. The contractor and the property owner shall comply with all appropriate requirements of the Town's NPDES permit relative to grading and erosion/sediment control.

28. The Engineer of Record shall observe the installation of the drainage system, construction of the energy dissipators, and completion of the grading activities and state that items have been installed and constructed per the approved plans. A stamped and signed letter shall be prepared and submitted to the Town, prior to final inspection.

29. All areas on the site that have the native soil disturbed shall be protected for erosion control during the rainy season and shall be replanted, prior to final inspection.

30. The property owner shall inform the Town of any damage and shall repair any damage caused by the construction of the project to pathways, private driveways, and public and private roadways, prior to final inspection.

FIRE DEPARTMENT

31. An automatic residential fire sprinkler system approved by the Santa Clara County Fire Department shall be included in all portions of the residence. Three sets of plans prepared by a sprinkler contractor shall be submitted to the Santa Clara County Fire Department Fire Prevention Division (16795 Lark Avenue, Suite 200, Los Gatos, CA 95032) for review and approval. The sprinklers shall be inspected and approved by the Fire Department, prior to final inspection and occupancy of the new residence.

32. Provide an access driveway with a paved all weather surface capable of supporting apparatus weight at least 75k pounds, a minimum unobstructed width of 14 feet, vertical clearance of 13 feet 6 inches, minimum circulating radius of 36 feet outside and 23 feet inside, and a maximum slope of 15%. Installations shall conform to Fire Department Standard Details and Specifications sheet D-1.

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33. Potable water supplies shall be protected from contamination cause by fire protection water supplies. The applicant and any contractors shall contact the water purveyor supplying the site of such project, and shall comply with the requirements of that purveyor. These requirements shall be incorporated into the design of any water based fire protection systems, and/or fire suppression water supply systems or storage.

34. All construction shall comply with applicable provisions of the CFC Chapter 33 and Standard Detail and Specifications SI-7.

35. Approved numbers or addresses shall be placed on all new and existing buildings in such a position that it is plainly visible and legible from the street or road fronting the property.

Numbers shall be a minimum of four-inches high with a minimum stroke width of 0.5 inch (12.7 mm) and shall contrast with their background. Address numbers shall be Arabic numbers or alphabetical letters.

37. Solar photovoltaic power systems shall be installed in accordance with Sections 605.11.1 through 605.11.4, the California Building Code and the California Electrical Code.

38. Gate installations shall conform with Fire Department Standard Details and Specification G1 and, when open shall not obstruct any portion of the required with of 12’ for emergency access roadways or driveways. Locks, if provided, shall be fire department approved prior to installation. Gates across the emergency access roadways shall be equipped with an approved access device. If the gates are operated electrically, an approved knox key switch shall be installed; if they are operated manually, then an approved Knox padlock shall be installed.

Gates providing access from a road to a driveway or other roadway shall be at least 30 feet from the road being exited.

Project approval may be appealed if done so in writing within 23 days of the date of the approval.

The building permit cannot be issued until the appeal period has lapsed. The applicant may submit construction plans to the Building Department after the appeal period provided the applicant has completed all conditions of approval required prior to acceptance of plans for building plan check.

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Upon completion of the construction, a final inspection shall be required to be set with the Planning and Engineering Departments two weeks prior to final building inspection approval.

NOTE: The Site Development permit is valid for one year from the approval date (until February 16, 2022). All required building permits must be obtained within that year and work on items not requiring a building permit shall be commenced within one year and completed within two years

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TOWN OF LOS ALTOS HILLS August 17, 2023
Staff Report to the City Council
SUBJECT: RESOLUTION APPROVING FINAL MAP AND SUBDIVISION

IMPROVEMENT AGREEMENT ACCEPTING ROADWAY RIGHT-OF-WAY

EASEMENT DEDICATION FOR LANDS OF AUQUI AND PUTNAM AT
27600 ALTAMONT ROAD WITH CERTAIN CONDITIONS OF APPROVAL FOR RECORDATION (FILE #FM23-0001)
FROM: WooJae Kim, Public Works Director/City Engineer
APPROVED: Peter Pirnejad, City Manager
RECOMMENDATION: That the City Council adopt a resolution (Attachment 1) to:

1. Approve a Final Parcel Map (Attachment 2) and Subdivision Improvement Agreement (Attachment 3) accepting a roadway right-of-way easement dedication for the Lands of Auqui and Putnam at 27600 Altamont Road with certain conditions of approval relating to demolition of existing structures onsite and modification to Condition No. 15 of the Tentative Map for clarification; and

2. Authorize the City Manager to execute the Subdivision Improvement Agreement and a deferred demolition agreement pursuant to the conditions of approval between the Town and the subdivider to fulfill a Condition of Approval of the Tentative Map to demolish structures within all proposed new setbacks before the Final Parcel Map (“Final Map”} and Subdivision Improvement Agreement can be recorded.

BACKGROUND:

On November 17, 2022, the City Council approved a Tentative Map for a two-lot subdivision of the 2.2-acre property at 27600 Altamont Road (APN 182-028-026). The Tentative Map includes Conditions of Approval to be completed by the applicant prior to the recordation of the Final Map.

DISCUSSION:

As approved with the Tentative Map, the Final Map includes a ten-foot roadway right-of-way easement dedication to create a 30-foot half-width right-of-way adjacent to Altamont Road and for public utility purposes. The applicant is proposing to enter into a Subdivision Improvement Agreement and furnish bond for the needed subdivision improvements. The Subdivision Improvement Agreement and bonds have been reviewed and approved by the City Attorney. All required fees and deposits have been paid to the Town at this time. Subdivision improvements are required to be completed within next year.

Pursuant to the City Engineer’s review, the applicant has substantially completed all items listed in the Conditions of Approval for the Tentative Map, except for Condition No. 15, which requires “All existing structures located within the building setback lines shall be removed prior to recordation of the Final Map.” However, the applicant’s existing residence is currently located within the new building setback lines of the Tentative Map and straddles the resulting new lots.

AGENDA ITEM #4.U
W.K.

P.P.

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City Council Page 2
27600 Altamont Road – Final Parcel Map
August 17, 2023
This circumstance is not consistent with Condition No. 15 and if the residence was to be left in place after the new lots are created, the home would create additional inconsistencies with the Building Code such as fire separation requirements. Further, the Final Map cannot be recorded, and the new parcels cannot be sold if the residence is not removed from the lot lines/setback areas as approved in the Tentative Map. The Town’s Subdivision Ordinance under Section 9-1.307 contains such a provision making any conveyance or sale of parcels inconsistent with the Subdivision Map Act and Town ordinances voidable.

At the request of the applicant and as the applicant is currently residing in the existing home, the Town is agreeable to approve the Final Map subject to a deferred demolition agreement where the application agrees to demolish the home and remove it from the property lines within a time certain and prior to the Final Map being recorded. As such, staff is seeking Council approval of the Final Map with the dedication and subdivision improvement agreement, while deferring Condition No. 15 to be completed within a reasonable timeframe. The Town will not release the Final Map and the subdivision improvement agreement for recording until the demolition condition has been met.

In addition, should the applicant apply for site development on the new parcels, the application will not be deemed complete, nor will a public hearing be scheduled until the residence has been demolished and the Final Map has been recorded.

The applicant is in agreement with the foregoing conditions of approval and as reflected in the accompanying resolution and agrees to demolish the residence prior to Final Map recording. The applicant is also in agreement to execute a deferred demolition agreement with the Town, in a form and content as approved by the City Attorney and City Engineer, which would stipulate a timeline for the removal of the structures with a performance bond.

FISCAL IMPACT:

There is no fiscal impact associated with this recommendation.

ATTACHMENTS

1. Resolution

2. Final Parcel Map

3. Subdivision Improvement Agreement
Report prepared by: Jonathan Fox, Assistant Planner

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Resolution CC _-23 Page 1
RESOLUTION NO. ____-23

RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE TOWN OF LOS ALTOS HILLS

APPROVING FINAL PARCEL MAP AND SUBDIVISION IMPROVEMENT

AGREEMENT ACCEPTING ROADWAY RIGHT-OF-WAY EASEMENT
DEDICATION FOR LANDS OF AUQUI AND PUTNAM AT 27600 ALTAMONT ROAD

WITH CERTAIN CONDITIONS OF APPROVAL FOR RECORDATION
WHEREAS, the City Council approved a Tentative Parcel Map (“Tentative Map”) for a two-lot subdivision of the 2.2-acre property at 27600 Altamont Road (APN 182-028-026) (“Property”) for subdivision applicants Carlos G. Auqui and Robert L. Putnam (collectively “Subdivider”) on November 17, 2022 via Resolution No. 113-22; and WHEREAS, the Tentative Map includes Conditions of Approval to be completed by the Subdivider prior to final parcel map recordation, and the Subdivider has now requested the Town to approve a Final Parcel Map (“Final Map”) along with certain right-of-way easement dedications and subdivision improvement agreement; and
WHEREAS, the City Engineer has examined the proposed Final Map with a roadway right-of-way easement entitled “A TWO LOT SUBDIVISION CONSISTING OF THREE (3) SHEETS BEING A SUBDIVISION OF LOT 2 AS SAID LOT IS SHOWN UPON THAT CERTAIN MAP ENTITLED “TRACT NO. 4713” FILED AUGUST 8, 1962 IN THE OFFICE OF THE COUNTY RECORDER OF SANTA CLARA COUNTY IN BOOK 257 OF MAPS AT PAGE 40” and has determined that the said final Parcel Map is in general conformity with the requirements of Chapter 1 entitled “Subdivisions” of Title 9 of the Los Altos Hills Municipal Code, and the provisions of the Subdivision Map Act, subject to the Subdivider fulfilling its obligation under Condition of Approval No. 15 (“Condition No. 15”) for the Tentative Map pursuant to Resolution No. 113-22; and
WHEREAS, specifically, Condition No. 15 requires “All existing structures located within the building setback lines shall be removed prior to recordation of the Final Map”, and the Subdivider’s existing residence is currently located within the new building setback lines of the Tentative Map and straddles the resulting lots, which residence must be demolished or removed from said setback and lot line areas; and
WHEREAS, the subdivision applicant has substantially completed all conditions imposed for the Tentative Map except for Condition No. 15, and has agreed to enter into a deferred demolition agreement with the Town to fulfill Condition No. 15 and to memorialize that the Final Map may not be recorded and the new lots may not be sold or conveyed until the existing residence has been demolished or removed from the setback and lot line areas; and WHEREAS, staff recommends that the City Council approve the Final Map, accept the roadway easement dedication with the parcel map, and approve the Subdivision Improvement Agreement, subject to a condition of approval consisting of the following: (1) the applicant and Town execute a Deferred Demotion Agreement within 30 days from approval of the Final Map to set a time certain for the demolition of existing structures within proposed setback area and lot lines as approved in the Tentative Map; (2) that said agreement be recorded against the Property Attachment 1

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Resolution CC _-23 Page 2
and shall be released by the Town at which time all said required demolition work has been completed; (3) that the Final Map not be recorded, nor resulting new lots be sold or conveyed, until all existing structures straddling the lot line or that encroach into the setbacks as approved in the Tentative Map have been demolished to be out of the lot line/setback areas; and (4) should the Subdivider submit a site development application for the new lots prior to recordation of the Final Map, such application shall not be deemed complete nor shall a public hearing be scheduled for the application until the Final Map has been recorded;
WHEREAS, for the avoidance of any doubt and pursuant to agreement with the Subdivider, it is further recommended that the City Council modify Condition No. 15 to state that “the final parcel map cannot be recorded until all structures that encroach into the setbacks on the approved tentative map are demolished.”; and
WHEREAS, pursuant to a duly noticed public meeting on August 17, 2023, the City Council has reviewed and considered the Final Map, Subdivision Improvement Agreement, rightof-way easement dedication, and proposed condition of approval relating to Condition No. 15 and the foregoing, and considered all other evidence, testimony and public comments presented to it and in the record below.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the Town of Los Altos Hills as follows:

1. Approve the above-described Final Parcel Map and Subdivision Improvement Agreement as attached in Attachments 2 and 3, respectively, to the staff report and accept all easements offered for dedication to public use in conformity with the terms of the dedication offer designated on the Final Map for the Lands of Auqui and Putnam at 27600 Altamont Road, subject to the following conditions of approval:
a. Within thirty (30) days from the approval of the Final Map, the applicant/Subdivider shall execute a Deferred Demolition Agreement in a form approved by the City Engineer and City Attorney, to require demolition of existing structures within proposed setback area and lot lines as approved in the Tentative Map within a time certain;
b. The Deferred Demolition Agreement shall be recorded against the Property and shall be released by the Town at which time all said required demolition work has been completed;
c. The Final Map shall not be recorded, nor shall resulting new lots be sold or conveyed, until all existing structures straddling the lot line or that encroach into the setbacks as approved in the Tentative Map have been demolished to be out of the lot line/setback areas; and
d. In the event that the applicant/Subdivider submits a site development application for the newly created lots prior to the recordation of the Final Map, such application shall not be determined complete, nor shall a public hearing be scheduled for the application until the Final Map has been recorded.

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Resolution CC _-23 Page 3

2. Authorize the City Manager to execute the Subdivision Improvement Agreement in substantially the same form as that in Attachment 3 and the Deferred Demolition Agreement in a form and substance approved by the City Engineer and City Attorney.

3. Modify Condition of Approval No. 15 (“Condition No. 15”) for the Tentative Map pursuant to Resolution No. 113-22 shall to read as follows: “The parcel map shall not be recorded until all structures that encroach into the setbacks on the approved tentative map are demolished.”
The above and foregoing Resolution was passed and adopted by the City Council of the Town of Los Altos Hills at a regular meeting held on the 17th day of August 2023 by the following vote:

AYES:

NOES:

ABSTAIN:

ABSENT:

By:____________________________
Linda G. Swan, Mayor
ATTEST:
_____________________________
Deborah L. Padovan, City Clerk

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SHEET 1 OF 3

PARCEL MAP
JUNE 2023

SANTA CLARA COUNTY, CALIFORNIA

TOWN OF LOS ALTOS HILLS

VICINITY MAP
N
Attachment 2

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SHEET 2 OF 3

BOUNDARY AND EXISTING

EASEMENTS
JUNE 2023

SANTA CLARA COUNTY, CALIFORNIA

TOWN OF LOS ALTOS HILLS

PARCEL MAP

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SHEET 3 OF 3

LOTTING, PROPOSED EASEMENTS &

FINAL CORNERS TO BE SET
JUNE 2023

SANTA CLARA COUNTY, CALIFORNIA

TOWN OF LOS ALTOS HILLS

PARCEL MAP

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Attachment 3

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Exhibit A

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Exhibit B

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1 TOWN OF LOS ALTOS HILLS August 17, 2023
Staff Report to the City Council
SUBJECT: RESOLUTION ACCEPTING THE BROADBAND FEASIBILITY STUDY

AND PRESENTATION BY GOVERNMENT TECHNOLOGY GROUP, LLC
ON THE STUDY’S FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
FROM: Cody Einfalt, Interim Assistant to the City Manager APPROVED: Peter Pirnejad, City Manager
RECOMMENDATION: That the City Council should:

Adopt the attached resolution accepting the Broadband Feasibility Study’s findings and recommendations and plan to discuss the next steps for the Town at a future Council Study Session meeting on Broadband.

BACKGROUND:

On May 25, 2022, the City Council discussed a proposal to enter into an agreement with a broadband consultant, Government Technology Group, LLC (GTG), to conduct a broadband feasibility study for the Town. In preparation for the discussion, staff prepared an in-depth report explaining all the steps that had occurred prior to bringing the topic before the Council. That staff report can be reviewed in Attachment 2. The Council postponed approving of the agreement and directed staff to have the Technology Committee review the proposal before moving forward.

On June 1, 2022, the Technology Committee met and reviewed the proposal from GTG. The Committee unanimously passed a motion for the Town to engage with GTG to conduct the feasibility study (Attachment 3).

On June 16, 2022 the City Council discussed GTG’s proposal a second time, now with support from the Technology Committee, and authorized the City Manager to engage in a contract with the consultant to begin their research (Attachment 4).

Since engaging in a contract, GTG has been meeting with staff, the Council, stakeholders of the broadband community, and Town residents, researching the current environment of broadband in the Hills.

Following the scope of work in their contract, GTG conducted two Town-wide public outreach initiatives to formally hear from the residents. The first public engagement effort was a hybrid (in person and virtual) Town Hall event named the “Broadband Listening Session”. Held on October 5, 2022, residents of the Town had the opportunity to speak directly with GTG about their experience dealing with the limited number of internet service providers in Town. A recording of that meeting can be seen on the Town’s Vimeo account, and a full transcript of the meeting can be reviewed in Attachment 5.

AGENDA ITEM #5.A
C.E.

P.P.

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The second public engagement effort was a Town-wide online survey that focused on figuring out the current needs of Los Altos Hills residents as it relates to broadband. A Town-wide mailer was sent out the last week of November 2022 advertising the survey (Attachment 6). GTG collected responses form the community for 4 weeks and closed the survey in December 2022. 377 residents responded to the online survey, which is a significantly higher response rate than previous Town surveys on other topics such as indoor/outdoor community Space. The high response rate shows that residents are interested in the broadband initiative and are following along in its progress. A summary of the survey results can be seen in Attachment 7.

Between January 2022 and April 2023, GTG worked to compile all the information they had gathered for the study. During this time, the Broadband Ad Hoc Committee continued to hold monthly meetings with GTG in attendance to answer ongoing questions from the community.

In early April, the first draft of the Broadband Feasibility Study was released to staff. Shortly after, on May 10, 2023, staff brought the Feasibility Study to the Technology Committee for their review and comments. The Technology Committee passed the following motion at that meeting:

Given the cost and timeline for covering the Town with fiber, the Technology Committee recommends:

1. Forming a broadband advisory board as suggested in the GTG Report. Appointing some residents with deep subject matter knowledge to help steer the process.

2. Extending fiber to Town Hall and the three towers on Town property: Town Hall, Purissima Park, and Westwind Barn. This may be done via an RFP. ***

3. Extending fiber to as many additional locations as feasible (e.g., Purissima Hills / Cal Water facilities, Foothill College, Emergency Operations Center). Helps with emergency communications.

4. Conducting a pilot program with a fixed wireless provider (like Tarana Wireless or similar) to assess the technical and business feasibility of a wireless broadband option for the Town.

5. Directing the advisory board to develop a roadmap to implement phases beyond Phase 1.

6. The business model for utilizing the fiber/conduit in items 2-3 needs to be defined.

7. Implementing items 2 & 3 with ARPA and/or PEG funds as far as possible. (Attachment 8)
*** Staff would like to note that at the time the draft Broadband Feasibility Study was brought to the Technology Committee, it was assumed that the Town physically owned the three telecommunication Towers that currently stand on Town-owned property. Since this meeting, staff has confirmed that this assumption is incorrect -- the Town does not own the Towers, but rather the land itself under the towers. The final Broadband Feasibility Study and related recommendations in Attachment 1 of this report take the correct ownership information into account.

Staff also brought the draft Feasibility Study to the Emergency Preparedness and Response Committee (EPRC) on June 6, 2023 (Attachment 9). The EPRC received the report, but did not have any recommendations or changes on the report to forward to the City Council.

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DISCUSSION:

The main takeaways from the Feasibility study include a list of gaps in the Town’s administrative power to support broadband, and the recommended next steps for the Town to move forward.

GAPS
The Town has major gaps in its policies related to fiber and other network infrastructure. These include:
• “Dig Once” and joint-build policies and programs
• Development conditions that include fiber
• Siting cells on public assets/property, including a master license agreement • Limited Town assets for Broadband infrastructure to leverage • The Town lacks fiber to the home in a significant portion of the Town • The Town has limited wireless communication capabilities due to terrain and foliage in the community
• The Town has limited technical staff to support expansion of broadband • The Town has a disparity in high-speed community between those that have fast reliable Internet access and those that don’t

NEXT STEPS

1. Create a board to advise, keep abreast of, and hold accountability for broadband. a. Define roles and responsibilities
b. Establish safeguards to prevent conflict of interests

2. In addition to the board, assign or hire a person to be the Town’s point person and technical advisor.

3. Create workflows to ensure broadband is a consideration on all city capital improvement projects, permitted work in the ROW, and planning efforts. a. Planning projects to be reviewed by broadband board for relevance to add broadband components when needed.
b. Permits submitted by private companies performing work in the ROW, reviewed by broadband board, adding dig once policies to applicable permits.

4. Review city policies update as needed.
a. Dig Once policy
b. Developer agreements
c. Review wireless telecommunication facilities ordinance

5. Create a broadband enterprise fund to support broadband efforts, construction, and partnerships.
a. Assign a portion of PEG fees to a broadband fund where applicable b. Assign a portion of franchise fees to a broadband fund

6. Create a financing strategy that separately tracks revenues and expenditures for this fund. a. Create a funding policy that established a reserve as well as strives to ensure that revenues match expenditures without being a burden to the Town’s General Fund.

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7. Explore funding mechanisms such as:
a. A legacy giving fund to support the installation of broadband b. Grant opportunities
c. Franchise Agreements
d. Public Private Partnerships

8. Create an RFP to find partnerships with a local ISP
a. Find a partner that can engineer and construct phase 1 b. Create a partnership that will accomplish the goals of the broadband plan in providing underserved households with reliable service.

9. Work with a partner to finish the buildout of the network. a. Collaborate with the chosen partner to begin building the phases of the network in order of need. Further discovery may be needed to determine the best buildout locations and timeframes.

10. Promote digital inclusion efforts for the residents of the Town. a. Due to LAH’s lack of access to reliable high-speed broadband, the Town should create and promote an Affordable Connectivity Program.

11. In the case where they find itself in possession of extra broadband infrastructure after deployment, the Town should donate to local groups and individuals that would benefit rather than auctioning off equipment.
a. Senior Centers
b. Youth Centers
c. Economic Development Groups
d. Small Business Associations
e. Under privileged households
f. Schools
g. Etc.

12. Reach out to wireless providers to setup proof of concept. For example:
a. Reach out to Tarana Wireless. It will not be free, but it could save substantial money in the deployment of broadband.
i. Ask for models and budgets for end user and town costs for deploying their network.
b. Reach out to Terragraph for a proof of concept
i. Ask for models and budgets for network cost separated by end user and town/operator costs.

An in-depth discussion of these recommendations will take place at a future Council Study Session tentatively set for August 23rd, 2023 in the Council Chambers.

ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW:

Accepting the Broadband Feasibility Study is exempt from California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) due to this work not being defined as a “project” under CEQA. 2023 CITY COUNCIL WORK PLAN
The Broadband Feasibility study was an item identified initially on the 2022 Work Plan and was carried over onto the 2023 Work Plan. Receiving the Report and accepting the recommendations

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will help the Town move closer to its goal of expanding broadband internet service to the underserved residents in Town.

FISCAL IMPACT:

Receiving the report from GTG and accepting the recommendations does not make any financial commitment to the Town. The Council will place action items on subsequent City Council agendas in relation to the recommendations made in this report.

ATTACHMENTS:

1. Resolution Accepting the Broadband Feasibility Study

2. May 25, 2022 City Council Meeting Staff Report on Broadband

3. June 1, 2022 Technology Committee Meeting Minutes

4. Resolution 61-22 on Broadband

5. October 5, 2022 Broadband Listening Session

6. Town-wide Broadband Survey Postcard

7. Town-wide Broadband Survey Results

8. May 10, 2023 Technology Committee Meeting Recommendation

9. June 6, 2023 Emergency Preparedness and Response Committee Meeting Minutes

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Resolution __ -22 Page 1
RESOLUTION __ -23

A RESOLUTION ACCEPTING THE BROADBAND FEASIBILITY

STUDY AND PRESENTATION BY GOVERNMENT TECHNOLOGY
GROUP, LLC ON THE STUDY’S FINDINGS AND

RECOMMENDATIONS
WHEREAS, access to a reliable internet connection is limited in many areas of Los Altos Hills and expanding access has become an important issue for the Town to address; and WHEREAS, the broadband industry is complex and the Town partnered with a broadband consultant, Government Technology Group, LLC (GTG), to conduct a Broadband Feasibility Study; and
WHEREAS, over the last year GTG has been research broadband in Los Altos Hills to compile their report; and
WHEREAS, attached to this resolution is the Final Broadband Feasibility Study with findings recommendations on how the Town can advance the availability of broadband internet to its underserved residents (Exhibit A); and
WHEREAS, the City Council has called a Special City Council Study Session meeting on August 23, 2023 to discuss the findings and recommendations of the report at length.

NOW THEREFORE, the City Council of the Town of Los Altos Hills hereby receives and accepts GTG’s Broadband Feasibility.

The above and foregoing Resolution was passed and adopted by the City Council of the Town of Los Altos Hills at a regular meeting held on 17th of August 2023 by the following vote:

AYES:

NOES:

ABSENT:

ABSTAIN:

By:

Linda Swan, Mayor
ATTEST:
_____
Deborah L. Padovan, City Clerk
Attachment 1

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Strategic Broadband
Feasibility Study
for
Town of Los Altos Hills
26379 Fremont Rd
Town of Los Altos Hills, CA 94022
From
2930 Geer Rd
Suite 273
Turlock, CA  95382
(209) 678-3077
[email protected]
Attachment 1a

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Table of Contents
Executive Summary ........................................................................................................ 5 Introduction...................................................................................................................... 6 Methodology............................................................................................................................................ 6 Key findings............................................................................................................................................. 8 Asset Assessment ........................................................................................................... 8 Town Owned Broadband Infrastructure.................................................................................. 8 Technology Trends......................................................................................................... 9 Broadband Market......................................................................................................... 13 Key Findings ..........................................................................................................................................14 Providers in Los Altos Hills...........................................................................................................15 Los Altos Hills Community Fiber (LAHCF)..............................................................................................15 AT&T ................................................................................................................................................................16 Comcast Xfinity..............................................................................................................................................17 Goals and Needs ............................................................................................................ 18 Listening Session.................................................................................................................................19 Broadband Survey...............................................................................................................................20 Survey Responses ..........................................................................................................................................20 Internet Services ............................................................................................................................................21 Speed test results...........................................................................................................................................24 Government Assistance ...............................................................................................................................26 Respondents Comments ..............................................................................................................................27 State and Federal Data.....................................................................................................................28 Policies ............................................................................................................................. 32 LACHF Certification...........................................................................................................................33 Gaps .................................................................................................................................. 34 Conceptual Design ........................................................................................................ 35 Tradeoffs .................................................................................................................................................37 Phases........................................................................................................................................................38 Timing.......................................................................................................................................................39 HLD Footages and Budget..............................................................................................................41 Business Model and Funding...................................................................................... 42 Capital Expenses .................................................................................................................................46 Operating Expenses...........................................................................................................................46 Revenue Potential ...............................................................................................................................46

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Financial Viability ...............................................................................................................................46 Grants and Other Funding Sources ..........................................................................................47 Phased Implementation Plan ...................................................................................... 49

1. .............................................................Form or designate a broadband advisory board .......................................................................................................................................................................49

2. ................................................................................................ Create policies and workflows .......................................................................................................................................................................49

3. ..................................................................................Create a Technology Enterprise Fund .......................................................................................................................................................................50

4. ..............................................................................Create a Public Private Partnership (P3) .......................................................................................................................................................................50

5. .....................................Incrementally build town-owned Broadband Infrastructure .......................................................................................................................................................................50

6. ........................................................................................................... Support Digital Inclusion .......................................................................................................................................................................51

7. ......................................................................................................Donate surplus town assets .......................................................................................................................................................................51

8. ...................................................................................................... Evaluate Wireless Solutions .......................................................................................................................................................................52 Next Steps........................................................................................................................ 52

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Figures
Figure 1- Methodology............................................................................................................. 7 Figure 2 – Town Owned Assets............................................................................................. 9 Figure 3. Responses................................................................................................................ 21 Figure 4. Type of internet service by percentage of responses ................................ 21 Figure 5. Adequacy of internet service by percent of responses ............................. 22 Figure 6. Service provider percentage of market .......................................................... 23 Figure 7. Percentage of respondents using these devices .......................................... 24 Figure 8. Responses by speed.............................................................................................. 25 Figure 9. Responses by provider and speed ................................................................... 26 Figure 10. FCC Broadband Map of fiber to the premise in Los Altos Hills ........... 30 Figure 11. FCC Broadband Map of fiber to the premise in north Los Altos Hills 31 Figure 12. CPUC Broadband Map of internet access service available in the Los Altos Hills area......................................................................................................................... 32 Figure 13 – HLD Overview .................................................................................................... 41 Tables
Table 1- AT&T Pricing ............................................................................................................ 16 Table 2. Comcast offerings (prices vary by location)................................................... 17 Table 3 – Satellite Offerings................................................................................................. 18 Table 4 – Survey Age Range ................................................................................................. 22 Table 5. Number of responses by speed range.............................................................. 24 Table 6. ACP eligible households in Los Altos Hills..................................................... 26 Table 7. Internet service providers in the Los Altos Hills area per FCC data ...... 29 Table 8 – Construction Methods......................................................................................... 35 Table 9 – Estimated Timing by Phase ............................................................................... 40 Table 10 – Estimated Costing by Phase............................................................................ 42

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Executive Summary
Broadband is a 21st century challenge ranked as one of the most important technology investments to make worldwide. It is key for economic development purposes, competitiveness, job creation and the new foundation for more prosperous communities.

Although different technologies, the terms broadband and internet can be interchangeable terms that refer to ability to access the “NET” or internet. ”High-Speed” Broadband is the term for devices to connect to the internet via wireless, fiber optics, hybrid fiber coax, or DSL technologies. The Federal Communications Commission has defined broadband as internet speeds of at least 25 Mbps download and 3 Mbps upload. California has set a higher standard of 100Mbps down ad 20 Mbps up.

The internet of things (IoT) is the concept that most devices can be connected to the internet to make life easier, faster, more efficient, and better. From refrigerators to televisions and cloud-based voice services, many devices and technologies will be connected to the internet with the ability to report data and provide information. Outside the home, there are smart city applications such as intelligent traffic control systems, smart irrigation systems, and total building monitoring systems, city-wide wi-fi networks, and much more.

Technology advancements are creating an online reality that cannot be ignored, and any city/town that does not embrace this new reality will be left behind.

Distance learning, telehealth, and remote working are requirements for residents to be able to function in this new online environment. Until recently, broadband was viewed as a luxury provided by the private sector, with cities and towns held captive by the whims of these companies regarding which geographic areas to build and provide these services. Water, power, and sewer are utilities that are a part of city planning efforts, and broadband must be included as a new utility and treated as such by towns, cities, counties, and states. Broadband communications have become a quality of life issue and is the foundation to improve the sustainability, workability, and livability of a community.

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The Town of Los Altos Hills is no different. Partnering with Government Technology Group LLC (GTG), a broadband feasibility study was performed to discover and outline the needs and then devise a plan to help fill those needs.

The Town recognized the need for essential high-speed affordable broadband services for all residents and as a result adopted a Broadband Bill of Rights. The Government Technology Group (GTG) performed the assessment of the broadband needs of the town exploring opportunities for improving and expanding high speed broadband communications for all residents in their jurisdiction.

The assessment included a survey of the community, workshops with residents, discussions with the Town’s Ad Hoc committee and the Town’s technology committee.

The outreach performed by GTG clearly showed there is a need to expand fiber to areas of the Town that are underserved. The top reasons as a result of the research include improving the ability to work from home, improving access to the internet for education and providing improved public safety.

This feasibility study provides recommendations for the organization and is a roadmap to keep the organization focused on using time and resources efficiently.

Introduction
Methodology
The methodology GTG used for this plan uses proven steps that encompass the vital information needed to provide a plan and steps to accomplish the plan.

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Figure 1- Methodology
Asset Assessment is investigating and analyzing what assets exist in the town that can be leveraged for the expansion of broadband. GTG looks at town owned assets as well as privately owned assets.

Market Assessment includes researching the area and discovering what services are available, in what areas they are available, and at what price.

Needs Assessment is required to understand what the town needs to support economic development, as well as residential and business needs.

High-Level Design provides a road map for the expansion of broadband through construction. Although it is not always recommended that municipalities build a network to serve the community, a high-level design is necessary to understand what it would take to build a network, providing the town the opportunity to incrementally build and take advantage of dig once policies, developer agreements and capital projects.

Recommendations comprise the totality of the report, with an outline of the direction that the Town should follow to support the needs of the community.

Next Steps apply actions to the recommendations in order to accomplish the tasks required for implementation of the Broadband Plan.

Final Report and Presentation

DISCOVERY PHASE
Asset Assessment
Market Assessment
Needs Assessment

VISION PHASE
High-Level Design
Recommendations

FINAL REPORT
Next Steps
Final Report

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Key findings
• Community of haves and have-nots
• Incumbent providers have limited plans to expand in LAH • Households on the same street do not have access to the same connections – providers serve some homes on a street and will not expand to the underserved residents.
• The Town government needs to step in and find solutions for the underserved areas.
• Due to the terrain of the community, wireless technologies have difficulties extending into some neighborhoods.
• The Town has a local community group, LAHCF, that has installed fiber infrastructure to alleviate some the Town’s broadband needs. • The Town lacks a Dig Once policy and developer agreement standards for expanding broadband infrastructure at a reduced cost to the Town.

Asset Assessment
Assets are everything owned by a town that has value. This includes physical things as well as the non-physical such as space and intellectual property. Asset inventory is one of the first steps in the planning process and is required to find a starting point for infrastructure expansion. For this study GTG focuses on assets that are or can be utilized for broadband. Some assets evaluated include:
• Network equipment
• Fiber optic cables
• In ground conduits
• Wireless towers and antennas
• Agreements with assets attached
• Office space, rack space
Town Owned Broadband Infrastructure
Infrastructure owned by the town is comprised of property that house three privately owned towers, which are used by cellular providers and 4 strands of fiber in all locations where Los Altos Hills Community Fiber has cable installed.

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• Town Hall (26379 Fremont Road)
• Westwind Community Barn (27210 Altamont Road)
• Purissima Park baseball fields (27500 Purissima Road) The town assets include property that three privately owned towers are located, as shown in the map below as well as IRU for approximately 29,500 feet of four strands of fiber placed in the right-of-way by a private entity. This fiber has been incorporated into the design to help reduce costs and increase the speed at which the design can be deployed.

Figure 2 – Town Owned Assets
Technology Trends
Overall, activities, processes, and resources are being digitized and virtualized.

On one level, this is simply a function of the increasing capacity and speed of digital technologies. On another level, these trends are driven by a larger megaPage 477 of 770 Town of Los Altos Hills, CA Project Page 10
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trend toward demand-driven, pull-based systems, including agile development and lean production. Much of the rationale for digitization has been around cost avoidance or reduction, whereas the larger trend is primarily focused on increasing customer value and revenue, but doing so more efficiently. These trends are interacting with socioeconomic trends, particularly the aging population and reduced workforce, and climate change. While beyond the scope of this study, this report provides a solid foundation for effectively addressing the trends noted below.

A specific trend directly impacting local governments is the emergence of Smart Cities, which can be defined as “a place where traditional networks and services are made more efficient with the use of digital solutions for the benefit of its inhabitants and business.”1 While Smart City activities have often been very technology-centric rather than citizen-centric, the general purpose is to improve and integrate public processes. Generally, Smart Cities focus on energy, environment, and public-facing activities, but major internal changes, typically referred to as digital transformation, are necessary for external improvements.
“Digital transformation is the integration of digital technology into all areas of a business, fundamentally changing how you operate and deliver value to customers.”2 This has important implications municipalities, not the least of which relate to residents and other external stakeholders. For Los Altos Hills, digital transformation means residents are likely working remotely or running businesses from their homes. Of course, it also means major changes for the town itself. Specifically, citizen/customer-facing systems must be deployed and/or upgraded so the town’s business can be done totally online. This also means the town should provide some form of connectivity, such as electronic kiosks and public Wi-Fi, for convenience and those who do not have access as well as amenities.

Three related trends are the rise of cloud services, integration of information technologies (IT) with operational technologies (OT), and, most significant for current purposes, emergence of broadband as a utility. Cloud services include a wide range of applications, data collection, processing and storage, and 1 https://commission.europa.eu/eu-regional-and-urban-development/topics/cities-and-urbandevelopment/city-initiatives/smart-cities_en 2 https://enterprisersproject.com/what-is-digital-transformation

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network functions provided via numerous, distributed computing resources.

The two major implications for municipalities are (a) reduced need to operate servers but (b) increased costs for and reliance on online services along with (c) new applications—most web-based—that were impractical or unavailable in the past.

A general class of cloud-based applications and related technologies focus on adding intelligence to assets and machines of various sorts, allowing them to be integrated with information technologies (or vice-versa). Operational technologies (OT) are “[p]rogrammable systems or devices that interact with the physical environment … [to] … detect or cause a direct change through the monitoring and/or control of devices, processes, and events.”3 For municipalities, OT includes everything from garbage trucks to traffic signals.

Increasingly, OT is being added to “dumb” assets such as manholes, parking meters, and streetlights. Integration with IT enables cost reduction and performance improvement.

Broadband is technically any channelized communications media but it has come to mean always-on, high-speed internet access. Broadband is important for people as it allows them to access media content, connect with friends, and pursue their interests. As businesses and government undergo digital transformation, broadband is increasingly important in everyday life. Access to education, jobs, and healthcare effectively require broadband. On the other side of this trend, businesses and municipalities that do not have and use broadband are at a huge competitive disadvantage. While it may seem a bit pedantic to include broadband as a trend in a report for a broadband study, it is important to understand that broadband isn’t an end in and of itself. Rather, it is a means to improved outcomes that enables other trends.

Beneath all of these trends runs a more fundamental trend: The critical and growing need for robust cybersecurity. Internet access can provide a way for malicious hackers to steal data from or take over municipal systems. Too much OT has digital vulnerabilities that allow hackers to control them, operate software bots, and attack other systems. Cybersecurity is as much about practices and procedures as well as technologies. For example, “deep fake” technology and spoofing—imitating or taking over accounts—are being used to 3 https://csrc.nist.gov/glossary/term/operational_technology

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get critical information or direct payments. People need to be educated about how to recognize possible scams and “social hacks” and avoid them.

Fiber optics has become the gold standard for broadband deployment. There is no broadband deployment medium that can compare to the speeds, bandwidth, or latency that fiber optics can provide. Wireless, cellular, or HFC cannot hold a candle to the speeds or reliability of fiber. Japan’s NICT set a new speed record over a single strand of fiber at 1.02 petabits per second. 4 To put this into
perspective it is “equivalent to sending 127,500 GB per second or 10 million channels of 8K broadcasting per second.” Fiber is essential for backhaul for all network to connect to the internet, this includes all cellular networks. Fiber optic cables are flexible strands of glass that trap the light inside a core only 8- 10 microns inside of a strand that is 125 microns. Trapping the light and being able to control where it is going allows fiber to avoid the many issues that arise form wireless networks and copper networks such as obstacles in a wireless environment to the slow speeds of analogue or digital signals over copper.

Wireless technologies are advancing in ways never imagined. There are two basic trains of thought on broadband, fixed wireline and wireless. The two rarely come together and proponents of each technology over play their own importance thinking that either wireless or wireline is the only way to go. In more urban areas, the reality is wireless last-mile deployment is the future.

Last-mile refers the connection from the street to the resident. This is commonly referred to as fiber-to-the-neighborhood. Fiber optics networks are essential for back-haul, connecting each neighborhood to the internet, however the cost savings realized by a wireless last-mile cannot be overlooked, especially with the current wireless technologies available. Terragraph is one wireless company that uses a different technologies and deployment strategies to overcome the inherent issues with the typical wireless deployments. Tarana Wireless is one such company that is reshaping the future of wireless deployments making it faster easier and more cost-effective to deploy highspeed broadband. Companies such as Mimosa, Ubiquity, and others are all creating better, stronger, more resilient, equipment with higher bandwidth.

Wireless technology is a way that cities, towns, and private companies quickly deploy more cost-effective networks.
4 https://www.tvtechnology.com/news/japans-nict-sets-new-data-transmission-speedrecord#:~:text=Japanese%20researchers%20have%20set%20a,(32%20miles).

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Satellite is another budding technology that is currently going through growing pains. Satellite uses light to relay information from the end user to a satellite orbiting the earth at either low level, 250-350 miles above the earth, or as far out as 26,000 Miles. Although the signal is travelling at the speed of light, going that far into space being bounced off a satellite and returning to earth creates very high latency, the time it takes for data to reach the other end.

Satellite signals are shared which requires a lot of satellites to be in orbit with many base stations on earth connected to fiber optic networks providing the end users a connection to the internet.

Starlink wants approval for 30,000 low orbit satellites to be deployed for the satellite network to function better that it currently is. The FCC in December granted to 7,500 satellites to be deployed, however Starlink was recently denied RDOF subsidies of nearly $885 million because the satellite provider failed to provide the speeds promised and the high cost of the dish required at residents’ homes. Satellite holds possibilities as a broadband provider to the more rural areas of the USA that have no other options. “Starlink’s technology has real promise,” FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel explains. “But the question before us was whether to publicly subsidize it’s still developing technology for consumer broadband — which requires that users purchase a $600 dish — with nearly $900 million in universal service funds until 2032.”
Broadband Market
Market assessments are intended to discover the broadband availability and costs of services and determine if the market is supporting the current needs of the local population. To better understand the needs and how those needs are affecting the residents, GTG looked at the current offerings within the town and what those offerings cost.

Planning for the future is equally important to understand the future needs and goals of the town, residents, and area so those needs can be met when called upon to deliver the services needed.

Broadband access and adoption are influenced by many factors including availability, pricing, quality of the service and how it meets or does not the

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needs of the community. In broadband and telecommunications, quality means the speed and reliability of the services provided. Broadband is being considered by most municipalities as the “new” utility because it has become such an integrated part of our everyday lives and as such customer service is a small factor in the quest for high-speed reliable broadband and only comes into decision making when there is a competitive environment.

GTG focused on the following questions when doing the market assessment:

1. What is the current coverage by the local providers?

2. What technologies are offered, such as fiber-to-the-home, HFC (hybrid fiber coax), DSL, 5G, or Satellite?

3. What are the pricing tiers for each provider?

4. What is the competitive nature of broadband in Los Altos Hills? GTG analyzed the broadband landscape for the Town of Los Altos Hills to determine the broadband options available to the residents, businesses, the town, and other entities. The analysis focused on the internet speeds offered, what those services cost, who provides these services, and the competitive nature in the local market, and existing and planned infrastructure.

Key Findings
• Los Altos Hills is a wealthy tech savvy community.
• Comcast is the largest provider in the town.
• Households on the same street are do not always have the same access to broadband
• Local incumbents are not willing, in most cases, to extend their networks to accommodate unserved locations
• There are three facility-based wireline providers, AT&T, Comcast, and Los Altos Hills Community Fiber.
• AT&T provides fiber-to-the-home in a small area of Los Altos Hills • Access to high-speed reliable internet is an issue for certain areas of the town.
• Those residents that have good broadband are less inclined to support efforts to aid those residents that do not have access to broadband.

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Providers in Los Altos Hills
Los Altos Hills Community Fiber (LAHCF)
Los Altos Hills Community Fiber (LAHCF) is a group of citizens of Los Altos Hills that collectively see deficiencies in current broadband options in the town. They address those deficiencies and help their neighbors install ultrahigh speed internet through underground fiber to their homes. It is a member supported cost sharing network with the highest speed available in the US for residential broadband. They offer up to 10 Gbps fiber to the home for $155 / month. Neighbors share the costs of building the network and receive reimbursement via pro rata method (similar to private sewer districts). The goal is to cover 100% of Los Altos Hills and the organization is excited about the grassroots work of the community.

LAHCF came into existence in response to the lack of quality broadband to a substantial number of residents in the Los Altos Hills area. LAHCF provides Ultra-high-speed Community-Owned Internet through a non-profit coop business model. “Local community members come together to collectively build and deploy utility infrastructure for their own purposes and, in this case, it is a broadband fiber optic network.”5 The company’s mission statement is:

Using the interest, skills, talents, and expertise of our local residents to create collaboratively a community owned and operated mutual benefit corporation that offers an affordable, high speed fiber optic Internet network for Los Altos Hills and nearby communities.6
LAHCF service is provided on an individual case basis. Their pricing is subject to construction costs to connect, membership fees, etc. A key issue for LAHCF is they do not have a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity (CPCN) that allows them to have access to the Town right-of- way and/or public utility easement (PUE) limiting their ability to build on telephone poles and go under highways.
5 https://lahcommunityfiber.org/general-faqs/
6 https://lahcommunityfiber.org/mission/

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AT&T
AT&T is the world’s largest telecommunications company and the second largest provider of mobile phone services. In recent years, the multinational conglomerate made significant moves into the media and entertainment industries, most notably becoming the parent company of WarnerMedia in 2018. But in February 2021 AT&T announced it would spin off DirecTV, six years after acquiring the satellite TV business. And in May it announced plans to spin off WarnerMedia, combining it with Discovery. Under CEO John Stankey’s aegis, the company instead wants to focus on growing its 5G wireless connectivity and, in pursuit of this goal, is now in the midst of an intense, multibillion-dollar battle with competitors like T-Mobile and Verizon for the highest speed and most widely available 5G network.7
The majority of Los Altos Hills is served with DSL (digital subscriber lines), an obsolete technology providing slow speeds, 25/3, typically under the federal threshold of broadband. AT&T does not install new DSL circuits, only servicing existing DSL customers. There are a handful of households that are being served with AT&T fiber and after talks with them it is undetermined when fiber services will be expanded to the whole of the Town. Moving forward AT&T should not be considered a viable option for supporting the needs of the residents, especially on the west side of highway 280.

According to bestneighborhood.org, 15.25% of the town is covered by AT&T fiber. Pricing for fiber service is listed below.

Table 1- AT&T Pricing8
Speed MRC Data Cap
300 Mbps $55.00 No
500 Mpps $65.00 No
1000 Mbps $80.00 No
2 Gbps $110.00 No
5 Gbps $180.00 No
7 https://fortune.com/company/att/
8 https://att-bundles.com/internet/

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Comcast Xfinity
Comcast is a multinational telecommunications and media conglomerate and is the largest cable TV company and the largest internet provider in the U.S. They have over 30 million residential subscribers and 2.2 million business customers across 40 states. Net income in 2020 was over $10 billion.

In Los Altos Hills, Comcast uses a Hybrid Fiber-Coax (HFC) plant for deploying services which uses fiber to bring broadband to a node. Each node has anywhere from 200-400 customers connected via coax, cable tv cables. Coax is a copper cable delivering speeds significantly slower than fiber and can only handle fast speeds over short distances, leading to cable companies using fiber to shorten the distances while saving costs by utilizing the existing copper/coax infrastructure. Broadband infrastructure utilizing HFC, do not support symmetrical speeds, meaning the speed of download and upload are significantly different whereas fiber and wireless systems deploy symmetrical speeds.

As the legacy cable TV provider in Los Altos Hills, Comcast has the most coverage of all the providers, offering service to most residents. Unfortunately, not all customers living on the same streets have access to Comcast services.

The lot sizes in Los Altos Hills are significantly larger than the typical urban environment and that leads to high construction costs to extend services. Many customers would sign up for Comcast services however, the lack of return on investment prohibits a profit driven company from expanding in Los Altos Hills.

Table 2. Comcast offerings (prices vary by location)
Service Speed MRC
Data
Cap
Device
Limit
Connect 75 Mbps $62.00 1.2 TB9 5
Connect More 200 Mbps $82.00 1.2 TB 10
Fast 400 Mbps $92.00 1.2 TB 50
Superfast 800 Mbps $102.00 1.2 TB 50
Gigabit 1000 Mbps $112.00 1.2 TB 50
9 TB is “terabtyes,” which is one trillion bytes, a measurement of stored data.

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Satellite Providers
Satellite service available in the Town include ViaSat, Hughes Net, and Starlink.

Satellite companies use wireless signals transmitted from a base station/ground unit bouncing that signal off an array of satellites orbiting the earth at an average of 26,000 miles. Even at the speed of light a 52,000-mile round trip adds a great deal of latency. Latency is the time takes for data to pass from one point on a network to another.

Starlink has begun adding satellites at a 350-mile orbit and those using these lower orbit satellites have a much better, lower latency, with a better speeds and performance, however, Starlink’s application to add an additional 9000 low orbit satellites has been denied due to a myriad of reasons the foremost being not understanding how low orbit objects behave over time, and what happens if/when they return to earth. Another reason is the need to keep “space pollution” in check by not allowing to be too many things in orbit limiting the ability to observe space from the earth’s surface.

Table 3 – Satellite Offerings
Provider Mbps MRC Data Cap
ViaSat 12 $69.99 40 GB
25 $99.99 60 GB
30 $149.99 100 GB
30 $199.99 150 GB
30 $299.99 300 GB
Hughes Net 25 $74.99 50 GB
Starlink 25 $110.00 1 TB
Goals and Needs
The Town of Los Altos Hills is seeking to improve broadband connectivity for its residents that lack high-speed reliable Internet access ensuring Digital Equity in its community. As part of this goal, the Town adopted a proclamation that it is the right of their residents to have:

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1) Broadband that is sufficient and reliable,
2) Broadband that is ubiquitous,
3) Broadband that is affordable,
4) Broadband that provides educational opportunities,
5) Broadband that enhances public safety,
6) Broadband that improvise quality of life,
7) Broadband that supports economic development.
8) Broadband that attracts capital investment
9) Broadband that supports innovation and research, and 10) Broadband that empowers and enables participation in democracy To accomplish this, the Town set objectives to evaluate building a fiber ring/backbone and offering connectivity to all underserved households within five years.

The project involves following best practices for wireless and wired broadband communications included in this feasibility report with recommendations and steps for moving forward. The process includes evaluating funding sources available to assist building out broadband infrastructure. Another goal is to better understand policy that can assist in building out fiber to the home infrastructure faster while reducing cost to the Town.

Listening Session
On October 5th, 2022 a listening session was held to get input from the residents of Los Altos Hills, allowing them to have an open forum to discuss how they feel about broadband, issues they are experiencing, and provide input on actions, if any, the town should take to alleviate disparities in broadband. • The participants were split between those that have high-speed internet through the local providers and those that do not.
• Very few residents have fiber connections.
• Comcast covers most of the town with Hybrid Fiber-Coax (HFC). • Many residents live on roads where some households are served and some are not, and the providers are unwilling to extend networks to include unserved residents.
• Most unserved residents would support a bond to build fiber to the underserved residents.
• The served residents are not sympathetic to those that do not have good broadband and feel the incumbent providers will eventually fill the need. • Safety and home security systems need broadband, and there is a significant number of home burglaries in Los Altos Hills.

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Broadband Survey
Online surveys are one of the best ways to look past the inadequate federal and state broadband maps, census maps, and other resources and get the real response from locations in Los Altos Hills with what we assume is the truth about broadband. The following is information gathered from the online survey that was conducted in Los Altos Hills over an 8-week period with an excellent response rate of 377 total responses. Although 87 responses were partially complete, the information is valuable and is included when possible. The survey is intended to gain an understanding of the perception and reality of broadband throughout Los Altos Hills on a location by location basis. Some of the questions are plotted on a map to gain a visual depiction of the data. Speed test is one of the questions that is plotted on a map to see if there are sections or areas of the Town that are lacking high-speed broadband connections.

Survey Responses
The Town had a higher response rate compared to other municipalities where GTG has conducted similar surveys. While the average response rate has been 1% of the households in other similar surveys, Los Altos Hills had a response rate of 12% of the 3,12510 households surveyed, which is ten times higher than average. Complete responses are surveys that where all the information is complete with the incomplete surveys are missing at least one answer but do add to the data gathered. Any response that missed more than half were deleted and are not part of the data set used.
10 https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/losaltoshillstowncalifornia/PST045222

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Figure 3. Responses
Internet Services
When plotted, this question provides an insight to the areas that have access to high-speed broadband in comparison to those areas that do not. As shown in the chart below, 89.4% of the respondents reported having access to the highspeed broadband compared the 9.8% that reported low-speed broadband.

Figure 4. Type of internet service by percentage of responses Adequate internet access differentiates access from quality, meaning merely having a high-speed connection does not mean the connection is reliable, affordable, or consistent. With only 75% of the expected 89.2% percent of respondents saying the internet is always or usually adequate, that leaves 14.2% 0 100 200 300
Disqualified
Partial
Complete
Disqualified
Partial
Complete

89.4%

9.8%

0.3% 0.5%
High-speed, Always-on
broadband service
Low-speed service, Including
cellular, dial-up or satellite
This location has no internet
service
Unsure / Don't know

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that have high-speed broadband with connections that are not adequate and need bolstering.

Figure 5. Adequacy of internet service by percent of responses Ages of individuals in the household is an important demographic needed to understand the types of needs for broadband that exist. Older populations have different requirements and use broadband in different way. Older populations use more tablets and e-readers, while younger populations use online gaming requiring very low latency. Latency is the amount of time it takes for information being transferred to connect with the destination. Fiber optic networks provide the lowest latency, or fastest to connect, while satellite networks perform the worst with high latency, or very slow connection times.

Table 4 – Survey Age Range
Age Range Responses %
Under 17 70 14.03%
18 - 30 69 13.83%
31 - 45 58 11.62%
46 - 60 102 20.44%
Over 60 200 40.08%
According to the 2020 US census, Los Altos Hills is highly educated with 98.7% with a high school diploma or higher, and 86.3% with a bachelor’s degree or

18.6%

56.4%

16.6%

8.1%

0.3%
Always
Usually
Sometimes
Rarely
Does not apply -
No internet at this
location

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higher11. These demographics tend to have higher demand for broadband, more work from home, and have a lower-than-average reliance on governmental assistance.

Comcast is the largest internet/broadband provider in Los Altos Hills at 72.5% of respondents being customers. AT&T is the next largest with 22% offering two different technologies, fiber is in an exceedingly small area and DSL, digital subscriber line, being offered in the rest of the town.

Figure 6. Service provider percentage of market
The types of devices that are connected at the location provides insight to the speeds and latency required at that location. Laptops, desktop computers, and smart phones require the highest speeds while streaming devices, smart TVs, and voice activated devices like Alexa or Echo do not require as much bandwidth or speed.
11 https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/losaltoshillstowncalifornia/PST045222 22%
73%
2%
1%
1%
5%
0 20 40 60 80
AT&T
Comcast/Xfinity
LAHCF
Verizon
Starlink
Other - Write In AT&T
Comcast/Xfinity
LAHCF
Verizon
Starlink
Other - Write In

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Figure 7. Percentage of respondents using these devices Speed test results
The chart below shows the speed test results grouped into categories as up to 25 Mbps, up to 100 Mbps, up to 500 Mbps, and Over 500 Mbps. There were 292 speed tests completed, results shown in table below. Currently the FCC considers 25 Mbps download and 3 Mbps upload as being served by broadband.

It was proposed in July of 202212 to raise the standard of broadband to 100 Mbps down and 20 Mbps up, 100/20 Mbps. The groupings are intended to be in line with the FCC current definition of 25 Mbps. The State of California has adopted a broadband definition of 100/20 Mbps.

Table 5. Number of responses by speed range
Category Count
Up to 25 Mbps 42
12 https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/07/19/fcc-broadband-new-definition-100mbps/ 0 20 40 60 80 100
Smartphone
Tablet, ereaders,
Gaming consoles connected
to interent
Laptops
Desktop Computers
Alexa, Echo, or other
Internet connected Smart
Home Devices (securty …

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Category Count
Up to 100 Mbps 90
Up to 500 Mbps 106
Over 500 Mbps 54
Grand Total 292
The information above provides limited value until it is plotted on a map, which is shown below, where it helps to identify areas or pockets of town that do not have access to higher speed broadband. There are reasons for this and disparities that exist that will be discussed later in the report. The map below shows the plotted speed tests grouped according to the table above. It is important to note that in the interest of privacy, the plotted locations are not intended to provide details of any address but general area.

Figure 8. Responses by speed
The map below shows the speed results identified by provider. For clarity, the smaller providers are not depicted on the map. According to the map it is assumed that Comcast and AT&T have coverage throughout all of Los Altos Hills.

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Figure 9. Responses by provider and speed
Government Assistance
The following gives insight to the number of residents using government assistance to access the internet through the Federal Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP). This data shows when the low speed is a result of low adoption rates due to affordability, knowledge of how use, no devices available, or no access to broadband. As expected, very few residents in Los Altos Hills are enrolled in ACP. The surprise is the number of households that are eligible,13 and even more surprising is the number of eligible unconnected households.

This category represents the number of households that do not report having an active internet connection.

Table 6. ACP eligible households in Los Altos Hills
Adoption Rate < 1%
13 https://www.educationsuperhighway.org/no-home-left-offline/acp-data/#dashboard

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Eligible
Households 655
Enrolled
Households 20
Eligible
Unconnected
Households
126
Respondents Comments
“Simply put, we barely get by. I have actually taken to going to the homes of my siblings to download large files since I can't reasonably do it. My children have commuted to my parents’ house to go online for college. As internet access has become more of a utility good, it has become a large concern that our access to it is so incredibly limited.” – Respondent 341
We live online! This is the highest priority for us. Xfinity is so bad that I have recently bought a Verizon wireless modem as secondary internet service and put a load balancer between Xfinity+Verizon and my home Eero network. But still, I get brief outages! Please work with LAH Community Fiber to give us the internet we deserve!” – Respondent 260
“reliability most important, Comcast cable is very poor and customer service is a nightmare.” – Respondent 68
“We are an affluent community in a high-tech area. We should have reliable internet and good cell phone service. We sometimes can't work from home due to poor internet and cell connections. That needs to be fixed.” – Respondent 36 “We are quickly falling behind the technological curve. A stable, high-bandwidth optical fiber connection should be standard throughout the community. Current Xfinity offerings to the neighborhood, while decent on paper, fail to deliver. Poor uptime coupled with even poorer customer service can make working from home very problematic. We should strive to make 1 Gbps up + 1 Gbps fiber-to-house connectivity readily available throughout Los Altos Hills.” – Respondent 6

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Survey Conclusion
The survey provided valuable information, and when compared to the residential Listening Session show some interesting results. One question that arises from the mapped-out speed test results is why is there such different speed results on the same street? It would be assumed that if a resident can get a good high-speed connection, then the neighbors would be able to get the same connection and speed. This disparity in speed can be explained by the many residents that shared thoughts during the listening session exemplified by the statement “We asked what the cost would be to extend down the street to our house, we got quotes of over $100k, we agreed and still the provider wouldn’t build to us.” Another possible conclusion is that some residents are unaware of better internet access in their area and are with the same provider they have had for many years. Some could have completed the speed test using cellular data (4G), which is slow and unreliable in Los Altos Hills.

State and Federal Data
The State of California and the federal government have data sets and maps to help identify areas in need of broadband services. Internet providers are required to fill out FCC form 477 that indicates the census blocks where each provider is providing broadband. There are inherent flaws to the mapping, such as providers over-reporting service areas and the fact that if one address is served in a census block then the entire block is considered served. Census blocks vary in size from a few hundred square feet to many square miles.

Although flawed, these maps and data sets are valuable information to incorporate and provide data.

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) is based on speed test data, census data, and form 477 reporting data. Areas shaded in red are areas that have needs based on the criteria found in the below chart. The map below shows no red areas, which indicates that Los Altos Hills does not, from this data set, have any unmet need for broadband.

The latest FCC Broadband Map shows coverage for hexagonal areas that change in size depending on area viewed (“zoom level”). Zooming all the way reveals data for specific premises, i.e., real estate parcels when zoomed to a neighborhood. Each address includes information on the providers and services at that location, including technology and nominal speeds.

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Table 7. Internet service providers in the Los Altos Hills area per FCC data Provider Technology
Down
(Mbps)
Up
(Mbps)
AT&T Inc. Fiber to the
Premises (FTTP)
5000 5000
Comcast Corporation Cable 1200 35
Hughes Network Systems,
LLC
Geosynchronous
Orbit Satellite
25 3
Raw Bandwidth Telecom, Inc. Copper 10 1
StarLink14 Nongeosynchronous
Orbit Satellite
350 40
T-Mobile USA, Inc. Licensed Fixed
Wireless Access
(FWA)

0.2 0.2
Viasat, Inc. Geo-synchronous
Orbit Satellite
100 3
14 Space Exploration Holdings, LLC

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Figure 10. FCC Broadband Map of fiber to the premise in Los Altos Hills15 The FCC map shows areas considered served shaded blue with darker shade indicated higher percentage of units served (see Figure 10). Fully zoomed out, the entire Los Altos Hills area is served by some form of broadband. At the town level, there is clearly some areas with limited 100 Mbps/20 Mbps broadband, which is the state standard for California. The gap becomes apparent at the neighborhood level, as shown for the northern portion of the Town in Figure 11. Most of Los Altos Hills is not served with fiber. Only the center of the town, east of Fremont Country Club is shown to have 100/20 Mbps service.
15 https://broadbandmap.fcc.gov/area-summary/fixed?zoom=12.05&vlon=- 122.148594&vlat=37.370399&br=r&speed=25_3&tech=3
Served Units Percentage

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Figure 11. FCC Broadband Map of fiber to the premise in north Los Altos Hills The CPUC’s California Interactive Broadband Map16 shows services faster than 100 Mbps available in and around Los Altos Hills. As shown in Figure 12, there are relatively small areas immediately south and east of the Town without 100 Mbps available.

Los Altos Hills appears to have limited fiber access infrastructure. Most premises in substantial portions of the Town and surrounding area are connected via copper. The federal and state data must be considered “best case scenario” even if the data is for last year.
16 https://www.broadbandmap.ca.gov/

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Figure 12. CPUC Broadband Map of internet access service available in the Los Altos Hills area
Policies
The Town of Los Altos Hills has few policies in place regarding broadband and related assets. The relevant policies include an article on wireless telecommunications facilities (e.g., cell sites and towers) in the chapter on zoning. The ordinance specifies that no such facility may be located or modified anywhere in the Town without a site development permit or conditional use permit. It then lays out the process and requirements for such a permit, including conditions specific to use of the public right of way. The Town does not appear to have a master license agreement or similar for network service providers to use its assets.

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The Town’s municipal code includes several references to utility construction, particularly in reference to underground utility districts. Another policy relates to informing infrastructure owners of excavations for forthcoming improvements by the town. Beyond that, the Town appears to have no “Dig Once” or joint build policies or procedures to facilitate broadband development and minimize restoration issues.

The Town has a formal Technology Committee with members appointed by the Town Council. The Committee did not have goals for 2023 as of the writing of this report but goals for 2022 included:
• Develop evaluation criteria and metrics for Automatic License Plate Reader (ALPR).
• Investigate technologies that help residents stay safe during earthquakes and improve safety against fires.
• Investigate micro-grids and municipal power, and propose greener, more resilient, and affordable power sources.
• Support for online municipal services, including hybrid meeting technology, cybersecurity audit recommendations, and improvements to the town’s website.
• Contribute to the LAHCF project, including collaborating to meet local connectivity requirements and potential uses LAHCF fiber granted to the town.

Information technology, communications, and broadband are not explicitly addressed in the Town’s General Plan.

The Town adopted a broadband or internet “Digital Equity Bill of Rights” based on a declaration by the California Emerging Technology Fund. This document contains important criteria, outcomes, and principles for digital equity, but it does not include identify specific policies to achieve or even commit to allocating resources to the goals inherent in the document.

LACHF Certification
The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) requires all communications service providers to be certified to operate in the state and place assets in the public rights-of-way. It is not clear what the penalties for not having such certification are, but non-certified providers are undoubtedly exposed to additional liabilities and have no protections against damage to their facilities from certified providers. Such certification is the basis for recognition as an

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Eligible Telecommunications Carrier (ETC), which is necessary receive federal high-cost and/or low-income support.

There are three approaches to certification. The first approach is for facilitiesbased “telephone companies,” resellers, and competitive local exchange carriers (CLEC) that provide voice-grade services, including VoIP. This approach results in a certificate of public convenience and necessity (CPCN). The second, simplified registration procedure is for non-monopoly providers of voice services. The third approach is for companies that provide “Commercial Mobile Radio Services,” i.e., cellular telephone companies.

The state also instituted statewide video franchises and regulations for the deployment of broadband infrastructure with the Digital Infrastructure and Video Competition Act of 2006 (DIVCA). Nominally, DIVCA facilitate competitive market entry by ensuring consumer protections, establishing a “level playing field,” and requiring technology investment, all while protecting local government ability to control public rights-of-way.

It is not clear whether LAHCF is subject to any of these requirements. Without state certification, LAHCF may be open to undue liabilities and not protected from damage to their assets. It is possible the state or certified providers could require LAHCF remove its assets from the public right of way. The Government Technology Group and Young Fiber do not provide legal services and nothing in this section should be construed as legal advice. LAHCF and the Town should consult legal counsel to determine whether to pursue state certification.

Gaps
The gaps in fiber optic infrastructure appear to be in the last mile, from internet service providers’ distribution networks to residents’ homes.

Consequently, reliability and speed seem to be major issues for residents.

There also seem to be gaps in cellular coverage. The Town has major gaps in its policies related to fiber and other network infrastructure. These include:
• “Dig Once” and joint-build policies and programs
• Development conditions that include fiber
• Siting cells on public assets/property, including a master license agreement
• Limited Town assets for Broadband infrastructure to leverage

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• The Town lacks fiber to the home in a significant portion of the Town • The Town has limited wireless communication capabilities due to terrain and foliage in the community
• The Town has limited technical staff to support expansion of broadband • The Town has a disparity in high-speed community between those that have fast reliable Internet access and those that don’t Conceptual Design
High-Level Designs, HLDs, are a conceptual design that includes routes, possible construction methods, and overall footage to gain a budgetary overview as well as possible timeframes needed to complete the project.

Los Altos Hills has a unique situation and requires a different approach to developing a HLD that will serve the community as it should. There are members of the community that have great internet and there are those that do not have broadband and the HLD must address the connection of Town facilities, supporting the residents that do not have broadband, and finally to support the economic development of Los Altos Hills.

The HLD is put together utilizing the most cost-effective construction methods first: existing fiber optic cables, conduits, and other existing infrastructure before considering new construction. New construction methods such as boring, plowing, micro trenching, or aerial, are by far the most expensive and slowest ways to build a network. Although the cost of new construction methods can vary greatly, they are typically more expensive than using existing infrastructure. The chart below shows the construction methods available and estimated cost for each.

Table 8 – Construction Methods
Construction Methods Estimated
Cost/Foot Brief Description
Existing Infrastructure
Existing Town owned Fiber Optic
Cable $4 – $10
Re-splicing, adding splice cases,
testing, and documenting existing
fiber
Existing Town owned empty
conduit $10 – $15
Placing new cable in existing
conduit, splicing, splice cases,
testing and documenting fiber

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Remove and replace Town
owned Fiber $25 – $35
Removing working circuits, splicing,
adding splice cases, testing, and
documenting existing fiber
Upgrade traffic interconnect
conduit $30 – $40
Removing interconnect cables,
upgrade handholes and sweeps, pull
new cable, splice, test, document
Aerial Construction
Over lash aerial cable $7 – $15
Pole Loading, place new cable on
existing strand (over lash), splice,
test, and document
New attachment aerial cable $15 – $25
Pole load, build new attachments,
place strand, lash cable, splice,
test, and document
New aerial with new poles $90 – $120
Same as above but must permit
and place new telephone poles
first.

Underground Construction
Plowing $15 – $25
Using a vibratory plow with 4'
stinger to place conduit prior to
new cable placement
Micro trenching $15 – $25
Micro trenching uses a thin 1" –
2" by 12" deep to cut a trench
into the ground, pavement, or
other and place conduit in the
trench and seal it with special
material to prevent cable from
coming out of the trench.

Rock Wheel $100 –
$125
Uses a 6" – 8" blade to cut a
trench up to 36" deep through
any material including rock,
gravel, asphalt, dirt etc.

Boring/Directional Drilling $75 – $100
Uses rods and a machine to drill
a hole under the surface of the
earth at any depth needed with
minimal disturbance
Open trench $80 - $100
Using machines like mini
excavators, backhoes, shovels to
open a trench to place conduit
and back fill over conduit
Assumptions used for the Town of Los Altos Hills HLD including:
• Need to build to 80% of households.

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• All new underground construction will be directional drilling/boring. • Construction costs are for placing conduit only.
• Town desires 100% underground construction providing a more robust network.
• Underground networks are also more protected from wildfires. • Existing conduit is suitable for fiber cable placement. • Phased deployment 5-year period.
• Per foot costing is based on average pricing from local vendors. • Any cabinets, hubs, or assets built must be placed in the public-right-ofway. • Routes are based on road access. There may be easements to lessen the footage
Tradeoffs
Construction method costs vary widely, and the inclination would be to use the least expensive methods to save on the up-front capital investment needed.

However, all construction methods have good and bad elements about them, and the tradeoffs are something that needs to be considered in advance of construction of a network. Below are some examples of tradeoffs when considering different construction methods.

Example 1: New underground construction can be done in a variety of ways with varying costs, with boring being one of the most expensive.

Microtrenching is one of the least expensive methods but has drawbacks that need to be evaluated and mitigated prior to use. Microtrenching is a shallow underground technique that is a viable in neighborhoods where there is little traffic and little exposure to major emergencies, such as water main breaks, that require major excavation in a hurried manner possibly exposing the shallower fiber to possible damage and outages. However, in major intersections, heavily travelled roads, water mains, storm drains, side sidewalks and gutters microtrenching presents a much higher risk to damage that using directional drilling/boring which is much deeper at 36” -48” deep on average.

Example 2: When implementing a wireless network, it relies on a fiber backbone to operate effectively and setbacks with regards to tower and pole placement would need to be adjusted accordingly. The cost and speed of deployment may

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be the best possible tactic for network construction, below are possible tradeoffs:
• Wireless Telecommunication Facilities ordinance would have to be updated with setbacks reduced or eliminated leading to reduced control allowing all wireless and cellular providers that same access adding towers and poles.
• Aerial equipment is more exposed to the elements, destruction, wildfires, and as such can have a higher maintenance cost. • Wireless networks are susceptible to line of site issues with foliage, buildings, concrete structures, hills, and other blockages that change over time. Trees grow, buildings are constructed, and foliage changes over time which could lead to worsening wireless connectivity.

Phases
Attempting to provide the best possible scenario aiding the Town of Los Altos Hills HLD in deploying a fiber network is broken down into 6 phases. It is important to note that although the town separated into 6 key phases, each phase should be evaluated and built in order of need, spreading out the cost and speeding up deployment. Although the phases build off each other, they do not have to be built in the order presented or each phase does not have to be complete before moving on.

Phase 1: Town Sites is the first phase intended to connect town assets, the properties that have private towers, as well as prepare to tie into the existing fiber strands. Agreements could be made so the towers can be used as a backup connection during an emergency and/or used to attract ISPs and utilize the towers as part of a wireless network. There have been many advancements in wireless technologies and those should be explored as a possible solution to the broadband shortage around the towers. Connections to the towers is essential for this option course of action.

Phase 2: It was determined from the online broadband survey and other outreach meetings that there are areas with worse broadband than the others.

Phase 2 focuses on the northwest portion of the town, west of Hwy 280 and north of Taaffe Rd. It builds off the phase 1 build and utilizes the expensive highway crossing. The area should be built in a logical manner connecting the neighborhoods and streets that are of the highest need.

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Phase 3: Building off phase 2 construction efforts, phase 3 supports the south/southwest area of the town. It also utilizes a portion of the IRU fibers strands available for town use. Phase 3 area according to the survey, has a higher concentration of residents with broadband above the state standard of 100/20. Refer to needs assessment section for mapping.

Phase 4: Phase 4 supports the area northeast portion of the town and will utilize the highest percentage of IRU fiber. There are residents that report low bandwidth and slow broadband mostly along the edges of highway 280 and also the east side of the town.

Phase 5: Phase 5 is the last area of focus as it had the highest number of respondents with very good internet and some are already served with fiber from local providers. This area also has some streets and residents that do not have good broadband and report lower than 25/3, the federal definition of broadband.

Phase 6: Phase 6 is overbuilding the areas of town that are currently served by an incumbent’s fiber-to-the-home network. It is not prudent to overbuild those portions until the rest of the town has reliable high-speed broadband.

Timing
Approximate timing for each phase can be found below. Timeframes are subject to following assumptions:
• 20-day work month
• 100% underground build
• Fielding is ¼ mile per day
• Engineering is ½ per day
• Construction, boring, at a 3000’ per week rate, per rig • Vendor can dedicate one rig to project

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Table 9 – Estimated Timing by Phase
Phase Footage
Procure a Vendor
Phase 1 22,294 6 M 2 M 2 M 4 M 14 Months
Phase 2 130,614 8 M 2 M 11 M 21 Months
Phase 3 155,425 9 M 2 M 13 M 24 Months
Phase 4 118,648 7 M 2 M 10 M 19 Months
Phase 5 37,697 3 M 2 M 4 M 9 Months
Phase 6 17,701 2 M 2 M 2 M 6 Months
Total 482,379 31 M 12 M 44 M 93 Months
Estimated Timing by Phase Fielding Eng. Permitting Construction Total
*Permitting is a delay to start only. Permitting will continue during construction but will not add time after the initial time frame * Construction times can be reduced by using vendors with more equipment available for construction and quicker permitting. Page 508 of 770 Town of Los Altos Hills, CA Project Page 41
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HLD Map
Figure 13 – HLD Overview
HLD Footages and Budget
The below chart shows the footages by phase with the estimated budgetary cost for each phase. The budgetary numbers do not include drops to each resident or business, drops can add a significant cost and some of the residents would require longer than normal drops that would make the cost above normal and is a cost that should be absorbed, at least in part by the end user.

It is recommended that the Town place conduit and find a partner ISP to install their own fiber therefor, the construction costs are for placing conduit only.

Although the assumption is the town wants an all-underground network, for budgetary comparison the aerial budget below assumes that there is 40% of the

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network that could be using telephone poles, a more cost-effective construction method. This option would also require the town or a partner to be a registered CPCN company in order to use the aerial infrastructure, it also creates a more vulnerable network. It also assumes the aerial construction would place strand and FOC instead of conduit.

Table 10 – Estimated Costing by Phase
Phase Footage Boring Aerial Microtrenching
Phase 1 Total 22,294 $1,894,990.00 $1,315,346.00 $724,555.00 Phase 2 Total 130,614 $11,102,190.00 $7,706,226.00 $4,244,955.00 Phase 3 Total 155,425 $12,727,045.00 $8,843,321.00 $4,884,910.00 Phase 4 Total 118,648 $8,646,040.00 $6,028,880.00 $3,361,390.00 Phase 5 Total 37,697 $2,766,805.00 $1,928,851.00 $1,074,782.50 Phase 6 Total 17,701 $1,504,585.00 $1,044,359.00 $575,282.50 Grand Total 482,379 $ 38,641,655.00 $26,866,983.00 $14,865,875.00 As the table above shows there are different ways to construct a network all having different costs, pros, and cons. Understanding that most towns don’t necessarily like or want microtrenching used, the cost savings makes it a construction method that needs to be looked at. Most networks include some of all of the different techniques to balance the cost vs rewards and risks.

Business Model and
Funding
There are a range of business models for local governments to impact broadband development, from passive, policy-only models to fully active, fullservice models. Given the Town of Los Altos Hills limited organizational capacity and the presence of LAHCF, the best model for the Town is likely policy-only. The Town simply doesn’t have the means or reasons to own fiber assets. Instead, it makes sense to develop policies to encourage local, non-profit broadband service providers. This would involve establishing expedited, nondiscriminatory access to local public right-of-way (PROW) and standards for constructing and developing network assets that use the PROW. Beyond that, the Town could establish procurement preferences for services from such

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providers and a special class for them within a wireless facilities master license agreement.

To determine the proper business model for a municipal network, local governments need to understand the various factors and how they interplay with each other.

The different business models shown in the table below compare the different levels of investment and amount of municipal control. The Town of Lost Altos Hills has different options from do nothing, let the incumbent providers handle broadband all the way to becoming a municipal ISP and provide services to the businesses and residents in Los Altos Hills. Rarely is either extreme a viable option with the key factors leading to a business model somewhere in the middle.

Business Models
Any business model beyond leasing a limited amount of dark fiber will require dedicated staff. The Program or Division would need a Broadband Manager with a strong understanding of facilities leasing and maintenance. The Broadband Manager would be responsible for the overall organizational performance, focused on finances and governance.

If the City is actively promoting use of the network, it will also need a Sales and Marketing Specialist to identify and manage leases. The Sales and Marketing Manager may also work with wholesale customers to promote internet services to the community. An Infrastructure Specialist will also be needed to follow through with the policies put in place, dig once, also to track placement, ownership, and maintenance of the infrastructure. Finally, the Program or Division will need a fiber management system (FMS) and should have a maintenance fund to cover repair costs. Major maintenance or repair tasks — anything requiring excavation— may be contracted out or may be handled by the Public Works Department staff. Additional positions may also be needed, depending on the scope and scale of the project.

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If the Town were to move forward with any of the above, it will require substantial overhead and operating costs, as well as much larger capital investment in infrastructure and equipment. Payroll can account for 90% or more of ongoing costs. Equipment licenses, maintenance, refresh, and upgrades create high periodic costs and ongoing reoccurring costs. Limiting operations to a backbone network will greatly reduce both up-front and on-going costs and set the stage for private investment.

Public Private Partnership (P3)
P3 agreements are a common business model in the modern municipal network for the construction, operation, and maintenance of city owned infrastructure. These agreements are so popular because they can entail any of the following business models by working with private ISPs and creating an agreement that the City can support. All cities have differing levels of assets, capital, and staff to support municipal networks. Some cities have a sufficient staff that can run and monitor a network and some cities contract the majority of the operations to private companies or individuals and have very little staff that can help with the running of a network, while other cities have substantial infrastructure that can be leveraged in a P3 to ultimately generate revenue through these agreements. It is important to understand the level to of commitment from both parties when considering the following:
• Who will pay for the network construction?
• What funds will both parties be required to put into the agreement?
• What are the roles and responsibilities of either party? • Who will determine the ownership and control of any future network expansion?
• What is the revenue model that will allow both parties to benefit from an agreement?
Public policy only
Public policies are a vital part of the modern city broadband network, whether it be city or privately owned. Policies that can have a large impact on the broadband networks include dig once policies and developer agreements. Dig once policies put in place a mechanism for the city to add infrastructure while other companies and agencies are doing work in the right-of-way allowing the city to add infrastructure as part of these other projects. Developer agreements are important because they allow the city to require infrastructure to be added to the development of large plots. Other policies that should be created and implemented are those that streamline the permitting process to encourage local ISP investment in broadband throughout the city. A major deterrent for private company broadband construction in municipalities is if the permitting process and restoration requirements impact the return on investment (ROI) that drives all private company investments. This is not a real “business” model but does have an impact on the local broadband market and

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regardless of the business model used, policies must be evaluated and updated or implemented.

Infrastructure Provider
In this business model the municipality builds infrastructure and leases that infrastructure out to other agencies with the goal of generating enough revenue to, at a minimum, pay for the cost and maintenance of the infrastructure. Private companies work off profits and ROI models that require lower cost construction and enough subscribers to offset these costs. There are areas in every city that have a low ROI and private companies simply will not build in these areas and skip to higher profit areas. Cities can build infrastructure that the private sector can use lowing the costs of construction and increasing the ROI. The infrastructure can be conduit only, fiber, or wireless towers.

Public Services Provider
Cities connecting publicly owned assets, public organizations, county, nonprofit organizations, schools, libraries, and/or other non-private locations are considered public services providers. These organizations are usually limited to anchor institutions, critical organizations, public safety organizations, utilities, and healthcare. Government owned network can provide a better quality of service at lower costs.

Open Access Provider
Open access networks are those networks that do not offer exclusive access to anyone entity. This philosophy is geared towards increasing competition and potentially increasing revenue by not limiting access only one lessee.

Lit services is when the provider supplies the equipment, fiber, and anything needed to support a certain level of service. Simply put, if the customer wants 100 Mbps service that is what the city would need to provide. The customer pays for the level of service they want and the cost increases with the increase in speed.

Conversely, if the customer wants to provide their own equipment, the city would only provide the fiber from end to end and the customer is responsible for the equipment and speeds they are wanting. The city only maintains the fiber and does not have any involvement with the equipment. These circuits are known as “dark” circuits and the bandwidth used is not controlled by the city. Although the equipment is not provided by the city, the circuits are very close in cost.

Municipal Services Provider (ISP)
Municipalities that provide end user services to residential and business customers are considered retail service providers. Most commonly, local governments offer triple-play services consisting of phone, television, and

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Internet services, essentially becoming an equal competitor to incumbent cable and broadband providers. As a retail provider, the organization is responsible for a significant number of operational functions, including management of retail services, network operations, billing, provisioning, network construction, and general management.

For a municipal services approach, the following would need to be taken into consideration.

Capital Expenses
• Develop the cost model for the network, including one-time and ongoing capital expenditures to build the network. This will include an assessment of current facility locations, Town owned land and the Town right-of-way for construction, and the need to purchase any land or equipment.
• Provide a phased deployment approach, including prioritization and costs for each phase.

Operating Expenses
• Develop the cost model for operations, including O&M, network operations, field services, staffing, billing, and customer service.

Revenue Potential
• From the market analysis and outreach, determine the customer segmentation and growth on the network, across each type of customer (business, school, hospital, etc.).
• Determine customer growth rates for the network, based on benchmarking analysis from other utility and municipal providers. • Determine a proposed competitive rate schedule for potential services, using pricing information from the market analysis and benchmarking information.

Financial Viability
• Develop financial statements including:
o Operating income and cash flow
o Net present value analysis
o Projected revenues and benefits
o Uses and sources of funds

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o Operational expenses
o Depreciation schedule
o Debt service analysis
o Key assumptions
• Conduct comprehensive financial analysis on the project to determine overall financial sustainability using key metrics such as free cash flow, debt service coverage, operating margin, and net income.

Grants and Other Funding Sources
The Town of Los Altos Hills is an affluent community and therefore is not competitive for most federal and state grants that support expanding broadband to unserved and underserved communities. Examples of Grants that are competitive regarding need for unserved and underserved at this time are:
• The California Public Utilities Commission’s (CPUC) LATA program (at the time of this writing, this program has run out of funding as well) • Federal Funding Account (FFA) last-mile grant program. This program is part of the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) grant program and is subject to Federal requirements.

The Town should monitor and apply for transportation related grants which can be coupled with expanding fiber optic installation during the project.

Grants the City should monitor and apply for that could be coupled with fiber infrastructure expansion include:
• RAISE
• INFRA/MEGA
• Safe Streets for All
• FEMA Inter/Intracity Rail Program
• Bus and Bus Facilities Program
• Smart City Grants
• EPA Clean Heavy Duty Vehicles Program
The Town has existing American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) and Public, Education and Government (PEG) funds that can be used to begin the installation of broadband infrastructure within the constraints of the funding sources. Due to the Town’s lack of competitiveness for current broadband grants, the Town is left with options outside the above two sources that are limited to private funding (including possible Legacy fund), bonds, debt, or direct revenue (fees & taxes).

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Building out broadband infrastructure does provide the Town with opportunities to obtain lease funding for building out additional fiber infrastructure.

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Phased Implementation Plan

1. Form or designate a broadband
advisory board
Without accountability and designated resources, master plans can fall by the wayside. It is important that there is a level of accountability. The Town should evaluate a committee with one to two council members and town staff that have the level of authority and interest to ensure Broadband progresses in the community. We recommend that in order to avoid any conflicts of interest, the council should not appoint any individuals with ties to broadband service providers that could be perceived as having an unfair influence on the board’s decisions.

2. Create policies and workflows
Dig once policies are a good way of ensuring the town can capitalize on private sector investment by adding conduit(s) for the town anytime underground construction is being performed in the public-right-of-way, ROW. Developer agreements are another way to have developers of larger parcels or land development. Permitting and restoration requirements prove to be difficult for developers and private ISPs looking to build in the ROW. Permits can take too long to approve, through policies and updated requirements, the Town can alleviate some of this by ensuring the permitting process is streamlined. These policies need to be created or updated with positive influences to encourage private sector investment in Los Altos Hills. Realizing this is a good policy, it should also be advised that creating a dig once policy and development agreements varies from agency to agency depending on their needs and community desires. A dig once policy is of higher importance than updating development agreement requirements and should take precedence. These policies take time and careful consideration for a community, including coordination with public works staff, regional utilities, and providers to protect the City’s interest especially regarding the public right of way and pavement quality/maintenance.

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3. Create a Technology Enterprise Fund
Dedicating all revenues generated from telecommunication carriers or ISPs through leases of Town poles, ROW access, cell towers and/or land for placement of towers, and other public assets to a Technology Enterprise Fund will ensure the Town has a financing source for the purchase, installation, and/or construction of new broadband assets and smart town applications, particularly to take advantage of opportunities outside of the annual budget process, such as coordinated joint trenching. These funds would also be used for digital inclusion efforts.

4. Create a Public Private Partnership
(P3)
Partnerships between the town, schools, service providers and the community assist with improving the overall well-being of the community and lower telecom costs while increasing speeds.

The Town should submit a request for proposal to build broadband infrastructure with existing ARPA funds and evaluate the use of Public Education and Government (PEG) funds to expand high speed broadband in the community.

To entice a P3 vendor to engage with the Town, potential benefits could include a five-year moratorium on access to Town assets and a master agreement that would assist with expediting building out infrastructure in the community.

In the partnership, the Town would own the infrastructure and the public private partner would maintain, market, and operate the network.

5. Incrementally build town-owned
Broadband Infrastructure
The town should build phase 1 of the plan including running broadband infrastructure by three town owned properties where private towers are located. The City expressed interest in pursuing wireless solutions in the

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future and this would provide the necessary fiber backbone to support this opportunity. The town has funds available to construct phase 1.

The results of the public private partnership will hopefully lead to the build out of the remaining phase of the network, phase 2-5, and if found prudent to overbuild a fiber-to-the-home network phase 6 should be implemented.

6. Support Digital Inclusion
The digital divide means there are households that have great access to the internet, have devices for internet usage, can afford services, understand how to use the internet, among other positives, and those that don’t have these.

Households can suffer from the lack of all these things or just one, the difference between the haves and have nots is known as the digital divide.

Digital inclusion is the process of trying to eliminate the divide through policies and programs designed to address these issues. The town of Los Altos Hills needs to work on digital inclusion efforts to help households get and stay relevant in the ever-changing online environment.

The Town needs to work with Santa Clara County’s digital inclusion efforts to have a synergistic approach to helping all residents and households in the area.

The Town should promote the Federal Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), in coordination with local ISPs, which is an FCC-funded subsidy that helps ensure households can afford the broadband they need for work, school, healthcare and more. Details can be found at https://www.fcc.gov/acp. Training and economic advancement organizations need to be engaged and promoted through all town avenues.

7. Donate surplus town assets
Cities have equipment, desks, computers, and laptops, among other things, that could be donated to senior centers, schools, economic development centers, or any other group that helps lessen the digital divide. Senior centers are in particular need with most residents being on fixed incomes with no way to purchase devices.

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8. Evaluate Wireless Solutions
Wireless infrastructure relies on fiber optics for connecting to the Internet for high-speed reliable communications. The Town should evaluate the use of wireless last mile connectivity to homes as an interim and potentially long-term solution that could assist in reducing cost to build out communications for those that have limited access and speeds. To protect the Town’s interest, the Town needs to ensure any wireless option is supported by a proof of concept. It should be noted that pursuing wireless communications may require revisiting the town’s wireless telecommunications facilities ordinance.

Next Steps

1. Create a board to advise, keep abreast of, and hold accountability for broadband.
a. Define roles and responsibilities
b. Establish safeguards to prevent conflict of interests

2. In addition to the board assign or hire a person to be the Town’s point person.

3. Create workflows to ensure broadband is a consideration on all city capital improvement projects, permitted work in the ROW, and planning efforts.
a. Planning projects to be reviewed by broadband committee for relevance to add broadband components when needed.
b. Permits submitted by private companies performing work in the ROW, reviewed by broadband committee, adding dig once policies to applicable permits.

4. Review city policies update as needed.
a. Dig Once policy
b. Developer agreements
c. Review wireless telecommunication facilities ordinance

5. Create a broadband enterprise fund to support broadband efforts, construction, and partnerships.
a. Assign a portion of PEG fees to a broadband fund where applicable

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b. Assign a portion franchise fees to a broadband fund

6. Create a financing strategy that separately tracks revenues and expenditures for this fund.
a. Create a funding policy that established a reserve as well as strives to ensure that revenues match expenditures without being a burden to the Towns General Fund.

7. Explore funding mechanisms
a. Explore a legacy giving fund to support the installation of broadband
b. Explore grant opportunities
c. Franchise Agreements
d. Public Private Partnerships

9. Work with a partner to finish the buildout of the network. a. Collaborate with the partner to build the phases of the network that in most need. Further discovery may be needed to determine the best buildout locations and timeframes.

10.Promote digital inclusion efforts for the residents of the Town. a. LAH suffers from the lack of access to reliable high-speed broadband
b. Promote the Affordable Connectivity Program. LAH is affluent but there are still those residents that have a hard time affording internet access.

11.Instead of auctioning off extra and surplus equipment, donate to local groups and individuals that would benefit.
a. Senior Centers
b. Youth Centers
c. Economic Development Groups
d. Small Business Associations
e. Under privileged households
f. Schools
g. Etc.

12.Reach out to wireless providers to setup proof of concept. For example:

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a. Reach out to Tarana Wireless. It will not be free, but it could save substantial money in the deployment of broadband.
i. Ask for models and budgets for end user and town costs for deploying their network.
b. Reach out to Terragraph for a proof of concept
i. Ask for models and budgets for network cost separated by end user and town/operator costs.

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1 TOWN OF LOS ALTOS HILLS May 25, 2022
Staff Report to the City Council
SUBJECT: DISCUSSION OF BROADBAND PLANNING IN TOWN AND TO: FIRST,

DIRECT STAFF ON HOW TO ADVANCE FURTHER COMMUNITY

ENGAGEMENT EFFORTS RELATED TO BROADBAND, AND SECOND,

ADOPT A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE CITY MANAGER TO

ENTER INTO AN AGREEMENT WITH GOVERNMENT TECHNOLOGY

GROUP, LLC FOR BROADBAND CONSULTING SERVICES FOR AN
AMOUNT NOT TO EXCEED $95,000
FROM: Cody Einfalt, Management Analyst II
APPROVED: Peter Pirnejad, City Manager
RECOMMENDATION: That the City Council should:

1. Receive the report and advise staff on how to proceed with further community engagement regarding broadband.

2. Review staff’s recommendation and move forward with entering into an agreement with Government Technology Group, LLC for broadband consulting services for an amount not to exceed $95,000 or provide alternative direction on how to proceed.

BACKGROUND:

Access to a reliable internet connection is limited in many areas of Town. Low density and large lots have left major internet providers such as Comcast and AT&T little incentive to construct the infrastructure needed to provide service to properties throughout Town. These providers have openly stated that they are willing to install the infrastructure to those who inquire, however the financial burden falls on the individual customer. This often leads residents with proposals of up to $100,000 to bring internet to their homes.

In response to this situation, Los Altos Hills Community Fiber (LAHCF), a community-based organization in Town, was formed to provide an alternative for residents looking for broadband internet service. To assist this group, On August 19, 2021, the Town entered into a Master Access Agreement with LAHCF for the construction and operation of a fiber optic network within the Town’s public right-of-way. This agreement allowed LAHCF to expand its broadband service within Town owned easements. The agreement also educated staff to the complexity of the broadband industry in municipal government.

Town staff soon became aware that they lacked the specific knowledge and expertise to navigate the broadband discussion and began reaching out to consultants who specialize working with government entities on this issue. Below is a list of firms that staff contacted for proposals:

P.P.

C.E.

Attachment 2

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Broadband Consultant
May 25, 2022
2 • Joint Venture Silicon Valley
• Magellan Advisors
• Entry Point Networks
• Cruzio Internet
• Ting Internet
• Government Technology Group, LLC
Of the six groups that staff met with, only two submitted a proposal to the Town: Joint Venture Silicon Valley and Government Technology Group, LLC. This is in large part because many government agencies are experiencing similar pressure to provide broadband and firms such as these are in high demand. Therefore, many of the firms are already engaged with other municipalities and have stated they cannot take on new projects.

The Emerging Tech Ad Hoc Committee saw this as an important topic and brought it forward to discuss during their January 17 and February 11 meetings. At these meetings, staff discussed the need to acquire the technical bench strength in this field in order to advise staff and the Council on how best to proceed with broadband deployment, as well as creative ways to support LAHCF in their efforts. At the same meetings staff shared Joint Venture Silicon Valley’s proposal and received comments from individuals within LAHCF as well as representatives of the Emerging Tech Ad Hoc Committee. Both representatives from LAHCF and the Emerging Technology Ad Hoc Committee were generally supportive of Town securing technical expertise in the area of broadband but were less supportive of the Town building out its own broadband network.

Community Engagement Efforts:

To compliment the efforts of staff, and given the Town’s vast network of volunteers, on January 20, 2022, the City Council passed a motion to conclude the Emerging Tech Ad Hoc Committee and form the Technology Standing committee. This Committee, named the Technology Committee, was directed by the Council to advise them and staff on policies, initiatives, and practices related to innovation and technology that could enhance services to the public and increase efficiencies. Investigating broadband access in Los Altos Hills and helping support Los Altos Hills Community Fiber was one of their policy areas.

On April 13, 2022, the Technology Committee met and discussed the proposal from Joint Venture Silicon Valley, which was the only proposal received at that time. Following a discussion of the proposal and a broader discussion of broadband needs in Town, two motions were passed (Attachment 3):
• Motion: Develop a broadband access master plan that meets the needs of the Town’s residents in the most cost-effective manner with universal availability. Given the Town’s terrain, lot sizes, and access issues, it is recommended to have a multiplicity of providers
• Motion: The Technology Committee supports the City Manager’s proposal to hire a consultant, at reasonable cost, to help develop a master plan for broadband access in the Town.

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Broadband Consultant
May 25, 2022
3 From discussions that occurred at the Technology Committee meetings and given the complexity of the broadband issue, on April 21, 2022, the City Council passed a motion to form an ad hoc committee specifically focused on broadband. The Ad Hoc Committee is comprised of Council members Kavita Tankha and Stan Mok and they were charged with advancing the discussion, soliciting community input and continuing the work done by previous committees.

On April 19th the City Manager was invited to attend the LAHCF Board meeting where again he explained the need for technical bench strength and the need for professional experts in the area of broadband to support the Town’s effort to promote broadband. The City Manager explained that it was the council’s intent to promote broadband and include LAHCF. That being said, the Town staff was preparing to move forward with a recommendation to the City Council to award a contract to a consulting firm that can help make that happen. The City Manager explained that LAHCF’s concerns, and recommendations, along with other feedback, would be considered when selecting a consultant. At that meeting there was also discussion about the need for additional legal opinions about the use of PUE’s, municipal code amendments and other legal opinions that would help LAHCF continue to make progress on their broadband deployment. The City Manager explained that legal expertise in the area of broadband would be sought as part of a larger effort to create a team of experts to help advise the Town staff and Council.

The Broadband Ad Hoc Committee met three times since they were formed at the April 21 City Council meeting. The first meeting on May 2 was to provide the Ad Hoc Committee an overview of the work that had been done up to date on broadband. This included discussion about the funds that were set aside by the ARPA Ad Hoc Committee, made up of Councilmembers Mok and Schmidt, which identified $800K in support of broadband deployment. At the meeting of the Broadband Ad Hoc Committee, staff also identified the consultants that were reviewed and the proposals that were received. The Ad Hoc Committee asked to have interviews with each of the consultants to learn more about their qualifications and approach to their proposal. The next two meetings of the Broadband Ad Hoc Committee were held to interview the two consultants. On May 9th they interviewed Joint Venture Silicon Valley and on May 10th they interviewed the Government Technology Group.

Staff feels that additional engagement and community input is required as the Town continues to find a path forward with the goal of making broadband universally available throughout the Town. The Broadband Ad Hoc Committee should continue to solicit community feedback and opinion on this topic. Therefore, the staff is recommending that additional outreach and community engagement be supported by the City Council and that the Broadband Ad Hoc Committee be the focal point of that outreach and that they update the Council and community during regular Council meetings. The community, the two members of the Broadband Ad Hoc Committee and the Council should be aware of the structure and parameters of the Ad Hoc Committee and ensure there is an appropriate level of transparency, community engagement and involvement. Since the Ad Hoc Committee is not a brown act committee, the Council members assigned to the Broadband Ad Hoc Committee can decide when to meet, who to invite, and when to share the results of the meeting.

Page 525 of 770 ends

Staff Report to City Council Page 4
Broadband Consultant
May 25, 2022
4 Recommendation To Engage Broadband Consultant:

As a result of the community engagement outlined above, staff feels they have the feedback needed to make a recommendation to request Council to authorize staff to enter into a contract with a qualified broadband expert. Upon the conclusion of our outreach and interviews staff recommends the council authorize staff to enter into a contract with the Gov Tech Group. They were open in their approach and alternatives to how they might advise the Town and work with LAHCF to support broadband deployment in Los Altos Hills. They were responsive to the needs expressed by the LAHCF Board, the Emerging Tech Ad Hoc Committee, the Technology Standing Committee, and it is staff’s opinion that they were responsive to the need for flexibility openmindedness that was expressed during the Broadband Ad Hoc Committee. They also have the qualifications and credentials to advise the Town and staff on how to navigate efforts related to broadband deployment.

It should be noted that staff also had three individual meetings with both consultants before making this recommendation and feels that the Gov Tech Group had a more complete and responsive proposal. This will satisfy staff’s need for technical experts in order to continue to support LAHCF as well as advise the City Council on how to proceed.

Currently, the proposals staff received have been left without a response from the Town and staff feels that the Town should respect the time and attention the two consultants have invested into their proposals. If the Council directs staff to engage in more outreach and analysis before a consultant is selected it would be helpful to understand what has been done to date and what the Council might suggest be a path forward so staff can plan accordingly. Staff would just ask the council to be mindful that the consultants we have engaged so far may not be available if we delay our selection process. Therefor staff would have to start the selection process from scratch which will take several months.

Staff and the Council have received public input that additional discussion and transparency should happen before a decision is made. In the interest of these requests for more transparency staff is bring this forward to an open meeting to describe all the outreach and community engagement that has already happened.

It is staff’s position that the public outreach efforts used to date have solicited a wide range of perspectives and attempts to bring forward a consultant with the technical strength to advise the Council. Selecting a consultant would be in the best interest of the Council and the community to help make decisions and understand the options and ramifications of the direction the Town may want to pursue. A broadband consultant would help advise the Council how the Town can support LAHCF with the ultimate goal of securing broadband for the entire Town as quickly, equitably and as cost effectively as possible.

DISCUSSION:

Attachment 2 is the proposed agreement between the Town and Government Technology Group, LLC for a strategic fiber optic feasibility study.

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Staff Report to City Council Page 5
Broadband Consultant
May 25, 2022
5 The scope of work submitted by Government Technology Group, LLC (GTG) is to complete a strategic fiber optic study. This type of study is different than a master plan in the sense that a strategic study only includes a high-level design for a broadband network. Master plans include more elaborate engineering details such as materials and construction specific information.

The study is broken down into 12 parts. On the following page is a high-level summary of the proposal.

Work Item Proposed Short Description

1. Project Management Meetings Bi-weekly meeting with staff, hosting workshops, and interviews with the
community.

2. Asset Inventory Conduct an inventory to understand current infrastructure that can be leveraged for this
project.

3. Technology and Trends Review The firm maintains a presence in many forums and groups that help influence the direction of
broadband. This knowledge can be applied in
Town.

4. Broadband Availability and Market
Analysis
Research to understand the current providers in
Town, what are their costs, and barriers to
providing service.

5. Needs and Goals Assessment Interview stakeholders within Town to determine the needs of each group: community
groups, focus groups, major employers, etc.

6. Policy Assessment Making sure Los Altos Hills has the policies and practices in place to ensure the Town is
protected and behaving in a legally responsible
and fiduciary manner.

7. Gap Analysis Document and compare the current
infrastructure with the network that will be
needed to meet the goals of the Town.

8. High-level Broadband Design
Conceptual Routing
Create a High-level Design to expand
broadband in Town that will explain the most
efficient, direct, and cost-effective
construction methods.

9. Business Model & Financial Analysis Develop the findings of the study into a business model that fits the financial,

Page 527 of 770 ends

Staff Report to City Council Page 6
Broadband Consultant
May 25, 2022
6 operational, and organizational requirements
of Los Altos Hills which will have the highest
likelihood of success.

10. Phased Implementation Plan Present the core strategies to develop a fiber optic communications study that supports
Smart City/ the Internet of Things initiatives.

11. Grants and Funding Opportunities Research Grant opportunities for the Town.

12. Finals Report and Presentation A final presentation summarizing the methodology, findings, and recommendations.

One service that is not included within GTG’s proposal is legal services in relation to specific broadband questions that the Town may have. This service falls outside of GTGs expertise; however, they recommend engaging with a specialized broadband law firm to help ensure any policies and solutions approved provide the City with defensibility against broadband providers in the area.

GTG proposal includes research, planning, and design for a broadband solution that works for Los Altos Hills’ community, whereas a supplemental broadband law firm will review policies to support the Town. The law firm can help guide the Town on the defensibility against broadband service providers in the community and to protect/limit the City’s exposure from abandonment or takeover of a long-term solution.

GTG has already referred the Town to several broadband law firms. Should the Council wish to engage with a broadband law firm, an agreement may come back to Council at a subsequent meeting.

Staff contacted other municipalities GTG has worked with for reference checks and only received positive reviews. Below is from the City of Moreno Valley where GTG completed a Fiber Master Plan.

Moreno Valley –
“I can endorse Preston Young and GovTech w/o reservation. They are just now completing a Fiber Master Plan for the City of Moreno Valley. The process has been very thorough and professional.

Preston established good communications w/ the City from the beginning and has maintained them through the project. There were no change orders or even discussions about one. We appreciate surveys to contact all stakeholders and obtain feedback about their experiences and interests” Steve Hargis, PhD
Strategic Initiatives Manager
Financial & Management Services
City of Moreno Valley

Page 528 of 770 ends

Staff Report to City Council Page 7
Broadband Consultant
May 25, 2022
7 ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW:

The proposed Strategic Fiber Optic Feasibility Study is exempt from California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) due to the proposal not being defined as a “project” under CEQA. 2022 CITY COUNCIL STRATEGIC PRIORITIES:

This proposal for a broadband study was not envisioned earlier in the year and falls outside of the Council’s priorities for 2022. Should the Council wish to continue with the broadband study proposal, staff recommends deprioritizing one of the key projects listed for the City Manager’s Office in the remaining months of the calendar year.

FISCAL IMPACT:

The proposal for a strategic fiber optic feasibility study from GTG is listed at $74,685. The proposal includes an additional cost breakdown for project management of an RFI or RFQ should the Town wish to engage GTG in developing a public private partnership solution, priced at $19,500. Staff recommends including this cost for budgeting purposes, which brings the total cost of the proposal to $94,185. Staff has rounded this number to $95,000.

Should any authorized work occur outside of the fixed fee proposal, GTG will only bill for actual hours worked at a rate of $195 per hour.

There are currently no funds available in the FY2021-22 budget for this study, and currently there are no funds to cover this large of a contract within the proposed FY2022-23 budget.

Should the Council wish to proceed with GTG, the Council can make a recommendation at the Joint FIC/City Council Budget Meeting on May 26, 2022, to include $95,000 in the FY2022-23 operating budget for this proposal.

ATTACHMENTS:

1. Proposed Resolution

2. Proposed Agreement with GTG, including Proposal

3. April 13, 2022, Technology Committee Minutes

Page 529 of 770 ends

1 Cody Einfalt
From: Rajiv Bhateja <>
Sent: Thursday, June 2, 2022 8:41 AM
To: Peter Pirnejad
Cc: Ameesh Divatia; Deborah Padovan; Kavita Tankha; Stan Mok; Sarina Revillar; Cody Einfalt; Sarah Robustelli
Subject: Motions Approved at 6/1/2022 Technology Committee Meeting Hi Peter,
Thanks to you, Sarina, Cody and Sarah for participation in the meeting yesterday.

As you requested, below are the motions approved by the Technology Committee yesterday. #3 and #4 (in bold) are most relevant for the broadband proposals.

1. Motion: Approve of minutes from 5/11/2022 Meeting.

Passed unanimously, 7‐0.

2. Motion: No need for additional indoor/outdoor space from the Technology Committee.

Passed unanimously, 7‐0.

3. Motion: Technology Committee recommends that the Town move forward with the Government Technology Group proposal.

Passed unanimously, 7‐0.

4. Motion: Request Town Staff to check references for GTG and require changes in the scope of the proposal to include multiple options beyond fiber (including wireless connectivity).

Passed: 6‐0 (Sasha Zbrozek not present for this vote)

5. Motion: Adjourn
Passed: 6‐0 (Sasha Zbrozek not present for this vote)
Please let me know if you have any questions.

Regards,
Rajiv
Attachment 3

Page 530 of 770 ends

RESOLUTION 61- 22

A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE TOWN OF LOS

ALTOS HILLS AUTHORIZING THE CITY MANAGER TO ENTER

INTO AN AGREEMENT WITH GOVERNMENT TECHNOLOGY

GROUP, LLC FOR BROADBAND CONSULTING SERVICES AND
APPROPRIATING $ 95, 000 FROM THE UNRESERVED GENERAL FUND FOR FY 2022- 23
WHEREAS, access to a reliable internet connection is limited in many areas of Los Altos Hills and expanding access has become an important issue for the Town to address; and WHEREAS, the broadband industry is complex and Town staff lacks the specific knowledge and expertise to move this initiative forward without specialized help; and WHEREAS, to advance this initiative staff solicited six firms and received two proposals from broadband consultants to research and complete a broadband feasibility study for Town; and WHEREAS, the two proposals have been reviewed several times in meetings with staff, the Ad Hoc Emerging Technology Committee, The Technology Committee, and the Ad Hoc Broadband Committee; and
WHEREAS, the proposal from Government Technology Group, LLC proved to the best proposal for the Town; and
WHEREAS, to allow for staff bandwidth, the update to the Town' s website will be deprioritized until later this or early next year as part of the City Council' s 2022 Strategic Priorities.

NOW THEREFORE, the City Council of the Town of Los Altos Hills hereby authorizes the City Manager to enter into an agreement with Government Technology Group, LLC for broadband consulting services and appropriating $ 95, 000 from the unreserved general fund for FY 2022- 23.

The above and foregoing Resolution passed and adopted by the City Council of the Town of Los Altos Hills at a regular meeting held on the 16th day of June, 2022, by the following vote:

AYES: Tyson, Swan, Mok, Schmidt, Swan
NOES: None
ABSENT: None
ABSTAIN: None
ATTEST:

Deborah Padovan, City Clerk
BY:

George Ty n, M or
Resolution 61- 22 Page 1
Attachment 4

Page 531 of 770 ends

From: Jeff Hoel
To: Cody Einfalt; Kavita Tankha; Stan Mok; George Tyson; Lisa Schmidt; Linda Swan; Peter Pirnejad Cc: Jeff Hoel; LAHCommunityFiber; Gautam Agrawal; BCC - Scott Vanderlip Subject: TRANSCRIPT & COMMENTS -- 10-05-22 Los Altos Hills Town Meeting on Broadband Date: Saturday, October 15, 2022 1:02:36 PM
You don't often get email from . Learn why this is important Council members and Town officials,
On 10-05-22, the Town of Los Altos Hills held a "Community Discussion on Fiber" meeting http://www.losaltoshills.ca.gov/Calendar.aspx?EID=3310
Video:
https://vimeo.com/757634479
I have created a TRANSCRIPT of this meeting (below the "######" line), and added my COMMENTS (paragraphs in red beginning with "###").

I hope the Town of Los Altos Hills is able to figure out how to facilitate bringing fiber to the premises (FTTP) access to the residents who want and need it.

My advice: Don't be distracted by wireless. Don't settle for HFC. Don't settle for AT&T's being the monopoly FTTP provider to a fraction of the Town.

Jeff
-------------------
-------------------
PS: I have been advocating for citywide municipal FTTP in Palo Alto since 2002. I have no financial interest. ############################################################################################# 0:00:03:
### Slide 1 --

BROADBAND INTERNET STUDY

COMMUNITY LISTENING SESSION

GOVERNMENT TECHNOLOGY GROUP, LLC
Cody Einfalt: All right. It's about six o'clock, and we have everyone. Welcome. I apologize for the technical difficulty, in that you cannot see the camera feed in the Council Chambers. But, as I was mentioning, I'm happy that the audio as well as the presentation IS transmitting correctly.

Tonight, we have our broadband listening session. And this is part of the broadband feasibility that the town has partnered with Gov Tech Group, our broadband consultant. And a part of this broadband feasibility study, there is a piece where our consultant is speaking with members of the community in an open discussion, to figure out your broadband needs, broadband wants, where there IS broadband, where there is NOT broadband, throughout the community. So, this is really just an opportunity for the residents to speak with the consultants, and let them know about their own situation, and what they desire for the Town.
0:00:58:

I'm going to pass the mike over to Preston Young, one of the consultants with Gov Tech Group. And Preston has put together a presentation, that has questions that he will prompt for the community to respond to. And, Preston, you can go ahead and tell me when you want to forward this slide to the next slide.
0:01:20:

Preston Young: You can go to the next slide.
0:01:27:
### Slide 2 -- AGENDA
OK. So, I am Preston Young. I am -- Well, I am a consultant. I do broadband consulting. I have lived in the Bay Area for about 35 years now. And I have worked primarily in the private sector. I have worked for all the big companies around. AT&T. Before that, when it was SBC. Verizon.

AT- I've worked for about everybody in -- you know, Wave. Everybody around in the Bay Area. And when I was in that capacity, I would do what they called greenfield builds. And sometimes brownfield, which is existing neighborhoods, or existing towns, or existing -- where they want to expand. And so, what I would do is, I would go, and I would help them decide where to go, where not to go. 0:02:10:

About 5 or 6 years ago, I was working for one of them, and I got very disenfranchised, because they kept skipping over people. ### Maybe he means disenchanted? Or disillusioned?
You know. It's all based based on return on investment. Right? If you can't make money, they're not going to build. And why do towns like Los Altos Hills have issues? Because your lots are so big. Right? There's issues that prevent people from building here. And what I try to do now is, I try to help towns, cities -- we work with a lot of counties, COGs [councils of governments?], government groups and stuff. And we try to help them. What is it that the private sector -- why are they not building? Why are they not building fiber? Why are they not giving the citizens everything that they need? Everywhere they go? Right? 'Cause they pick and choose. Unfortunately, I used to be one of those people that helped them decide where to pick and choose. And I didn't like it. And that's why I started doing what I do. 0:03:07:

Also, with our group is my number one partner. His name is Jeff Lewis. And he's a former CIO from Concord and Merced and Modesto area. So, he's over from the Central Valley. But he comes from the government side. And so, he has a -- together, we make a very good team, because we have the two different perspectives on how to make these things work. So, one of the things that we have to do, as we try to figure out what does the Town of Los Altos Hills need to do. Right? Because their goal is to get broadband services. Not just broadband. They want everything.

Water, sewer, every- -- They want everything. To their residents. The particular thing I focus on is broadband. Broadband and internet. They're interchangeable. ### The term "broadband" focuses on the speed of transmission, in support of potentially multiple protocols. The term "internet" refers to a particular protocol, and doesn't imply anything about speed.

You know, they're the same thing. What can they do to entice people to come in and build. Do they need to build infrastructure? Right? Whatever that is. To fill the needs of the community. So, one of the things that we have to do is, we have to identify what those needs are. And that's what we're here tonight for, is to figure out what some of those needs are. You can go to the next one. 0:04:14:
### Slide 3 --
And so, just in the Bay Area, towns that are very similar to Los Altos Hills that I've personally worked with: 1) in Atherton. And 2) I'm working with Tiburon. They're very, very similar. Demographics, size, everything. Right? They still have the same incumbent issues that you guys do. The incumbents just don't care enough. Right? And so, I've got a lot of insight and knowledge on my side of it. You know, what do I think Los Altos Hills needs to do. But, now, it's, what do YOU guys -- What are YOUR priorities? What are YOUR needs? What are the things the Town should do to make its residents happy? You know. 'Cause that's what it's all about. It's not about, you know, Los Altos Hills becoming an ISP, and starting to provide and, you know, support services for everybody. That's not their job. ### Why not?
Their job is just to try to make sure that the citizens are happy, and that they get the things that they need. So, that's what we want to do tonight. And a lot of the questions and stuff will come up to -- you can forward -- 0:05:15:
### Slide 4 -- ABOUT GOVERNMENT TECHNOLOGY GROUP
are nothing more than to help spark conversation. Right? You don't have to answer all the different -- next one, please -- I skipped ahead -- 0:05:26:
### Slide 5 -- WHAT KIND OF TECHNOLOGY DO YOU CURRENTLY HAVE? These are just -- Like I said, just try to get people to talk. Just try to figure out -- Because people usually have ideas in their head. And they sit at their home. And they're, like, nobody ever listens to me. Well, I want to listen. That's what we're here for. I don't -- You know, I don't support any particular incumbent. I don't -- ISP group, nothing. I'm not here to, you know, shove Comcast in your face and say you need to go with Comcast. I'm not here to say Los Altos Hills Community Fiber group is the only way to go. Or AT&T's the only way to go. I'm very independent. I don't -- I don't have those goals. So, the first question is, what kind of connectivity do you currently have? 'Cause if I look at online, I can go to, you know, the National Telecommunications Information Administration -- the NTIA. They have maps. ### I'm not familiar with NTIA's maps. But FCC has a map. https://broadband477map.fcc.gov/#/location-summary?
version=jun2021&place_name=Los%20Altos%20Hills,%20California,%20United%20States&lat=37.379663&lon=-122.137464&tech=fo&speed=1000_100&vlat=37.37806362004979&vlon=-122.13595450000003&vzoom=15.133526062108515 I have initialized the map to look at Los Altos Hills, and show only fiber providers that provide a speed of 1000 Mbps down and 100 Mbps up. But you can change these parameters by clicking on the gear icon. The map says some of Los Altos Hills has one such provider and the rest of Los Altos Hills has no such providers.

And they say, oh, these areas have broadband, and they don't need any more. ### The map says how many providers there are for the specified speed and technologies. It doesn't say how many providers are enough.

And then they have -- you know, census blocks is what they all go off of. ### FCC is working on a map that has finer granularity than census blocks. https://muninetworks.org/content/our-view-slightly-better-fcc-maps-horizon-maybe These have, those don't have it. These have it, those don't have it. Well, you know what, Los Altos Hills has gig service everywhere, if you didn't know that. ### Not according to FCC's map.

But we know that's not true. Right? Pockets do. Here does, and there does, there does. And how they do it is, they use what's called Form 477. So, all providers have to fill out this form. And it's on the census block group -- or, census block level. And so, if they serve one address within a census block, the National Telecommunications Information Administration says that entire census block is covered with gig service. ### Worse, an ISP can claim that an entire census block IS covered if at least one premises in the census block COULD BE served. https://muninetworks.org/content/when-you-can%E2%80%99t-trust-data-broadband Or 100 meg service. Or whatever the service is that they offer. ### The FCC map I cited above doesn't allow you view only areas that offer 1 Gbps symmetrical service.

Well, if it's a really big census block, which communities like Los Altos Hills usually have, that is very not accurate. So, what we have to do is, I have to identify where are these needs. Where -- You know, is it the northeast corner? Is it southwest? You know, where is it that people need service? Where is it that we need to help -- or the Town of Los Altos Hills needs to help -- figure out a way to get these -- broadband to these areas. So that's the first question. Does anybody have answers? Or does anybody want to talk? And if you have anything else to say that's not the question, feel free. Just yell it out there.
0:07:46:

Cody Einfalt: And as these questions come up, I would advise that we take the speakers who are here in person. And then, if -- when everyone's done in here, I could let you know who has raised their hand on Zoom. And I could help pass the mike around. Just as a reminder, you have to speak into the mike for the people at home who are watching. Just to let you know, we have over 70 people watching at home. 0:08:08:
**: [inaudible]
Attachment 5

Page 532 of 770 ends

0:08:09:

Cody Einfalt: And if you could introduce yourself, just kind of -- who everybody is. 0:08:13:

Robert Schlossman: My name is Robert Schlossman. I live at 10417 Lone Oak Lane, which is in South Los Altos Hills. And we currently have -- Comcast has never run cable lines to our -- we were one of the last two houses on our street. They never ran lines to the last two houses on the street. AT&T has never run anything beyond, I think, old, old, 30-year old DSL copper. So, we get 12 megabits per second, if we're lucky. ### I assume that's 12 Mbps down and even slower up.

And that's obviously becoming just not functional. So, we're very worried about our property value. We're very worried about the next few years, when that's just not going to work any more, and, you know, neither AT&T nor Comcast has any interest in, you know, providing service to our homes. So we're in exactly the situation that you're, you know, describing. You know. We're sitting here in the middle of Silicon Valley, and we'd be better off in, you know, many other parts, you know, of the country. Thank you. 0:09:18:

Paul Marcos: My name is Paul Marcos. And I'm actually a very new Los Altos Hills resident. Just buying a house this last summer. I actually -- I don't know what speed our house has yet. We haven't actually moved in. But it is serviced by Comcast. But the point that I wanted to make primarily was, our cellular signal at our house is non-existent. So, my hope had been to rely on a decent internet connection to carry voice communication, in addition to data, as well. I've been down the route of trying to get a cellular company to install towers, and expand coverage. And they have similar maps, and, you know, according to their map, we have solid 5-bar service. And we don't. So, that's one of the things that I'm looking at. For a good internet broadband plan. 0:10:18:

Preston Young: Thank you.
0:10:22:

Sasha Zbrozek: Hi, there. I'm Sasha Zbrozek.
### He's a member of the Town's Technology Committee.
https://losaltoshills.ca.gov/542/Technology-Committee
I moved into Los Altos Hills three years ago. To 11511 Summit Wood Road. At the time, I was double-checking any home that I was trying to buy, to make sure that broadband was available. Comcast said that it was. And then I move in. And, lo and behold, I was the only address on that street that they, in fact, don't serve. And after a year and a half of harassing Comcast to get them to tell me what it would cost to get connected, including the generous help of our City Manager at the time, they finally bid $210,000 for the job. This was not reasonable. And so, I and a bunch of other neighbors on our street organized, and we joined up with the Los Altos Hills Community Fiber folks. And it's been a little bit of a bumpy road. You know, I can't say that everything has been perfect. But, you know, I now have a symmetric 10 gigabit connection. And this is way better than my alternative at the time, which was that 12 megabit AT&T DSL. Thank you. 0:11:29:

Johannes Schmidt: Hi. My name is Johannes Schmidt. I live on 24799 Nicole Lane. It's off Summerhill. I've lived here about 26 years. I think for over 20 years now the only service that I had available is AT&T DSL. And myself and multiple neighbors have contacted AT&T and Comcast and asked for service. And once, they quoted us -- me -- like $10,000. But then they never followed up. And you call them, and they never answer your phone. And now, -- And that was like years ago. Now, when we call them, they won't even give us a quote. And so, I've also been starting to work with Los Altos Hills Community Fiber. Because DSL just doesn't cut it. And there's been zero improvement for 20 years. And I just -- It's not going to get better that way. And I think, you talked about -- one of you talked about home values. I've lived here a long time. My kids, which are in their early 20s now, they're like, yeah, we'd never ever buy your house, because the internet sucks at your house. That wouldn't even be on my shopping list. Even if I could afford a house in the area, I'd never buy your house. And I think that that's more and more common. And so, that's maybe not the main reason I care about it. I care about it because I just think it is one of the basic services that we expect. Like, we expect electricity. We expect water. We expect those sort of things. Internet is equally important nowadays. And the service that many of us in the Town are getting is not cutting it. So, -- 0:13:05:

Preston Young: You bring up a good point. That, five years ago, even, broadband was considered a luxury. Right? It wasn't even like regulated by the FCC, because you don't need it. You don't have to have it. And all you're going to do is watch TV with it. Well, especially since COVID hit, it's a completely different world. I mean, you know, the global economy that happens on the internet, versus -- you know -- also, with telehealth, and distance learning, and working from home, and all the other different things that are going on, you have to have good -- And I'm not going to just say good -- You have to have RELIABLE internet. It can't be good during the day when nobody's home. It has to be good all the time. Or, it can't be good only in the evenings, you know. It has to be consistent. It has to be good. And so, one of the projects I was working on with Tiburon is, there's no fiber on the Peninsula. At all. And so, I'm helping them build -- and the town is actually going to build a fiber run all the way from 101 all the way down to the Tiburon Peninsula. And -- or, down to the roundabout right down by the Marina. Because there's just no way.

Once that's built, then they have, like, four or five ISPs -- small ISPs -- like, we will absolutely come in and overbuild Tiburon. Right? I'm not saying that's the only way that Los Altos Hills can do it. Because they have a completely different demographic. They have different -- Right? The needs are different. The assets that are here are different. The people that -- You know, there IS fiber around. So, we can help tap into that. 0:14:38:

And saying, like, everybody needs gig service. That's -- That's silly. Everybody doesn't need gig service. You know. The -- I worked in Nebraska for quite a while. ### This source says from 2011 to 2013.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/preston-young-srprogmgr
Just kind of something to think about. And the name of the company was Allo. A-l-l-o. They're a very big company now. And when we started, it was just a startup company. ### This source says Allo was founded in 2003, and debuted 1 gig internet service in 2013. I think that in 2013, they were using GPON technology. https://www.allocommunications.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Allo-Press-Kit.pdf ### When Chattanooga launched its FTTP network in 2009, using GPON technology, its fastest internet service was 50 Mbps. https://muninetworks.org/content/chattanooga-launches-nations-largest-public-full-fiber-network But in 2010, the fastest tier was 1 Gbps.
https://muninetworks.org/content/chattanooga-announces-1-gbps-tier This was like -- gosh -- in 2010. And so, we'd overbuild to homes. And we'd offer then 100 meg service. And then, we thought, well, what if we give gig service? Is that going to totally overload the system, and people won't get really good internet. Right? So, what they did is -- peak performance -- they had about 5,100 people on their network. And so, at any given time, the peak performance in one day was 743 megs download. That was it. Out of 5,100 people. That's not that much download. Right? So, they said, let's give them a gig, and it's going to go through the roof. Well, so they opened it up to -- everybody had gig service. Do you know what it went up to? 768 megs download. ### More data is needed. Were customers really getting 1 gig peak bandwidth when they asked for it? ### How soon after the switch to 1 gig was performance measured? It might take users a while to learn how to take advantage of 1 gig service.

So, do they need a gig? NO.
### The data don't show this.
### Studies like this may show that for bursty applications, peak bandwidth is a LOT higher than average bandwidth. So an ISP's backhaul can be smaller than you might think. ### Studies like this may also show that GPON's speed (2.4 Gbps down, 1.2 Gbps up) is adequate to support 1 Gbps symmetrical service for the 32 premises that share a fiber.

You really don't need a gig. You really need reliable. You need fast. Fast is 100 megs, 200 megs, 300 megs, whatever. Right? Every house is different. Businesses are different. And so, I don't want you to think that only really, really fast is the only way to go. 0:16:07:

Jeff Egan: My name is Jeff Egan. I live on Fremont Pines Lane, and have lived there since 1978. So I've suffered through the foibles of the legacy providers for internet. We have four kids and 10 grandchildren. I didn't realize I needed speed until they all came home. They're all out of the house now. When they came home, it was just moaning and whingeing all the time. What the hell is going on? I didn't really -- I retired a few years a few years back, so I didn't think I really needed speed. But there's not a murmur out of them now when they come home. I've got the Los Altos Hills Community Fiber.
0:16:41:
**: Um hum.
0:16:42:
**: Yeah.
0:16:44:

Preston Young: Anybody else have a comment on this part? 0:16:46:

Cody Einfalt: We do have six people with their hands raised online. 0:16:49:

Bill Wong: My name is Bill Wong. I've been living here for over 30 years, across the street, at 14211 Sholes Court. OK? Let me really -- I'm really looking forward to some actions When is the Los Altos Hills city -- action item to put fiber to this city? 15 years ago, fiber is all over Asia. That is a requirement. The technology is -- continue moving forward. If you don't have fiber, you will be behind. You will be in the third world. How can you live on a 15-10 megabit internet? No, you can't. The technology is continue moving. It require higher and higher speed. It's a must. We cannot continue ** around this -- oh, let's survey this. The City Hall has to make a decision. Make it. Build it. You know. Earthquake ** alarming system surveilling system requires high bandwidth. If we don't do this, we're so behind. The value of the property here will go down. So, I'm looking forward for action item. Let's do the planning. Get it done. I think the city is rich enough to support it. Just tell us when, and how much is it. We will support it. I have seen houses here that **. A Google's ** has their own. Across the street next -- have their own. Why can't the whole city -- You can -- how do we tax, you collect all this money? Figure out what it takes. I don't think we have to make all kinds of, you know, surveys, study. We have fallen behind. We are way behind Asia. And 5G is all over. ** You know. ** 5G is required. Gigabit fiber to the home is a must. Because if you don't do it --
0:19:17:
**: Nobody's going to.
0:19:17:

Bill Wong: No. We are in trouble. Let us stop, you know, surveying. Let's put an action item and do it. The city -- the whole city -- think about the community. We are the Silicon Valley. This is the top -- 94022, you know, zip code is the best in the country. And yet we still don't have fiber to the home. That's ridiculous. I'll be ashamed. You know? Cupertino -- two blocks -- all the big company -- they got fiber. ### AllConnect says AT&T Fiber's FTTP is available to 43 percent of Cupertino. (Using Form 477 data, which overestimates.) https://www.allconnect.com/local/ca/cupertino
0:19:53:
**: Um hum.
0:19:53:

Bill Wong: We should share that. it's not that difficult. Does City Hall even have fiber? The whole technology -- 0:20:10:
** [inaudible]
0:20:07:

Bill Wong: I'm just frustrated. I don't know why we have to figure out the survey -- ** The need is here. 0:20:16:

Preston Young: Well, I will answer that question for you. The one reason that they hired GTG -- my company -- to come in here is because if you go look at like the town Tiburon's master plan, that I just finished with them about 4-5 months ago, I and Jeff, we put plans together. They're actionable. You need to do this. You need to do this. You need to do this. Connect this. Do that. Do this. We give them step-by-steps. 0:20:40:

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Bill Wong: OK:
0:20:40:

Preston Young: This is how you do it. So, we're different. We're not just, like, you know, hey, great, what do you need, and then we're just going to be, like, we'd be flapping in the wind. 0:20:48:

Bill Wong: OK. So, where are we? What is the status?
0:20:50:

Preston Young: Well, that's where-- I'm defining all of the needs. 0:20:53:

Bill Wong: When do you think we're going to have our fiber to the home in Los Altos Hills? When is this -- When -- Los Altos Hills, you know, right here, City Hall, right now -- have it. 0:21:08:

Preston Young: Right.
0:21:09:

Bill Wong: Because -- You know. And another thing, when an earthquake hits, it is in milliseconds. And we don't have fiber to ** us, we're in big trouble. You know. All the contents are all high bandwidth. You won't be able to communicate with anybody else. You know. I think we are just kidding ourselves. Still have to do survey, and do check out. Let's make a plan. Then -- Why other people have it and yet none of our residents -- pay high property tax, and yet we don't get it. We don't even get a call from AT&T. That is ridiculous. You know, come on. Just make it happen. It's only --
0:21:55:

Angela Lee: Hi. My name is Angela Lee. I live on 26755 Robleda Court. I echo your feeling that indeed we do need reliable internet service at a desirable speed. What I understand, from looking at the website, for fiber for Los Altos Hills is that SOME areas of Los Altos Hills does already has fiber. And that's because of individual people who have championed it at certain areas. So, they're calling for -- I think they called it neighborhood leaders. Or something like that. I looked at their website. I do not know whether it's on purpose, but there is no cost listed on that website.

I am interested. I do not know whether today is the forum where I find how much it cost, what it takes, and how many people in that area does it require? Say, you know, is it 20 people? Is it 40 people? That we need to get together in order to foot the cost? But that's what I am interested in. 0:23:06:

Preston Young: We can do the people online now.
0:23:10:

Cody Einfalt: OK. For those online, I'm going to go to people raising their hands. The first member of the public is Daniel. 0:23:22:

Daniel Dulitz: Hi. Can you hear me?
0:23:24:

Cody Einfalt: Yes, we can.
0:23:25:

Daniel Dulitz: Excellent. Good evening. I'm Daniel Dulitz. And I'm president of Adobe Creek Networks. I live on Page Mill Road in Palo Alto. And Adobe Creek Networks is the Palo Alto version of Los Altos Hill Community Fiber. The large companies have not served us. In our neighborhood, in Palo Alto, we have no Comcast. And AT&T doesn't even offer DSL, and can't even keep up the voice lines reliably. So, most people have dropped AT&T entirely. One of us got a personal quote to install fiber service from AT&T -- for $250,000. But then, when they came up with $250,000, AT&T refused to honor their quote. We would like to express our gratitude to Los Altos Hills Community Fiber, and to their service provider, Next Level Networks, who have guided us as we begin to install fiber in our neighborhood. We have found that the only way to get reliable, high-speed internet is to build it ourselves. Because the large companies will not provide it. I look forward to seeing a good partnership between the Town of Los Altos Hills and Los Altos Hills Community Fiber. And I would look to Los Altos Hills as a model for that type of joint work to bring reliable, high-speed internet to everyone who needs it. Thank you. 0:24:56:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Daniel. The next member of the public is Alex Randall. 0:25:03:

Alex Randall: Hello. My name is Alex Randall. I'm 16 years old. And I've been living in this Town my entire life. I use the internet every day, especially for school. And our house used to be connected to DSL. Which basically provided us with no internet. Our family of four couldn't function when all of us tried to access the internet. Especially during COVID on Zoom. The cost of getting a fiber line to our house was super high. And it was not an option. And, luckily, we were hooked up to Los Altos [Hills] Community Fiber. And I'm now able to actually learn something, instead of watching loading screens all day. And I think the internet's super important. And we should be looking to improve it, and give it to everyone. 0:25:52:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Alex. The next member of the public is Al Whaley. [pause] Al, please accept the unmute. 0:26:10:

Al Whaley: Yeah. Sorry. I'm Al Whaley on Taaffe Road. And I actually do already have high-speed internet, from both Comcast and AT&T. Comcast has very poor upload speeds. And it's expensive. And although I have AT&T, the faster speeds are extremely expensive. And they're, technically, shared. So, I would like to get the 1 gig or 10 gig service from Los Altos Hills Community Fiber. But I would like to see the Town help with some of the initial outlay for the deployment, and then get there. And then have the Town get their money back over time, as subscribers come forward. Thank you.
0:27:00:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Al. The next member of the public is Robin. [pause] Robin, please accept the unmute. 0:27:20:

Robin Hastings: Can you hear me now?
0:27:22:

Cody Einfalt: Yes, we can.
0:27:23:

Robin Hastings: Perfect. My name is Robin Hastings. And I live on West Sunset Drive. And I appear to be the only person in my neck of the woods who got AT&T at no cost. AT&T Fiber. And I guess the only way I was able to get that was by having AT&T techs come out, hear my description, how Sonic -- I had been on AT&T DSL. I moved to Sonic, which was better. And then I wanted fiber. And a tech came out. He removed my Sonic DSL. Could not install fiber. So, another gentleman came out later that day. He had issues. This was back when you would see all those trucks that AT&T hired to run the fiber along the telephone wires. So, I said what's going on? My needs got bumped up to the Vice President of the Office of the President, all the way in Houston. And I got my AT&T Fiber installed at no cost. And I only pay like $70 a month. So, what I'm wondering is, when you guys come up West Sunset to install the fiber -- and I see that it's a very big, thick orange cable -- is it going to mess up the fiber that I already have by AT&T? Also, who decides where you install the fiber on my property? And then, I'm also wondering, isn't AT&T bound by the California Public Utilities Commission to run the fiber for us? That we shouldn't have to be having to go through a private company, like Los Altos Hills Community Fiber, to get fiber? And then -- um -- I guess that is it. And if you want the phone number to the Vice President of the Office of the President in Houston, [laughter] let me know. "Cause I still have that phone number. [more laughter] 0:29:43:

Cody Einfalt: Preston, did you want to respond to any of them? 0:29:45:

Preston Young: Sure, if I can remember them all.
0:29:46:

Cody Einfalt: I'll go back and list all the questions asked. But if you just want to answer the ones that you remember. 0:29:51:

Preston Young: Yeah. So, the orange stuff you see is conduit. And then, they'll pull a fiber through the conduit. That's HDPE [high-density polyethylene]. It will not -- Well, it SHOULD not affect your AT&T fiber at all. They'll put it in a different spot. In the road. And that's what underground people do. They have to avoid everything. And then, the last thing that I remember was, you to decide where the drop goes on your property. You know, some of them will try to come out and bully you, and say that, you know, they can do it wherever they want. And if they put conduit in, you own the conduit. Just so you know. California State law, anything put in by whoever -- utility company -- you own the conduit. Period. So, if you want them to yank their drop out, they have to. That kind of thing. Is there another question? 0:30:38:

Cody Einfalt: There were a few. But, like I said, I will have a full rundown of this meeting afterward. 0:30:43:

Preston Young: OK.
0:30:44:

Cody Einfalt: The next member of the public is Jim Waschura. 0:30:53:

Jim Waschura: Hello. I hope can hear me.
0:30:54:

Cody Einfalt: We can.
0:30:55:

Jim Waschura: This is the section on what kind of connectivity do you currently have. And I just wanted to comment. I'm so disappointed to hear that people are having difficulties with internet. And I know that's a long-standing issue. But I live near the La Cresta/Viscaino area. And I have 300 megabits of AT&T fiber. It's symmetrical. The latency is in the 3 millisecond range. And I pay $50 a month. And it has excellent availability. ### FCC's broadband map
https://broadband477map.fcc.gov/#/location-summary?
version=jun2021&place_name=26379%20West%20Fremont%20Road,%20Los%20Altos%20Hills,%20California%2094022,%20United%20States&lat=37.383425&lon=-122.13841&tech=f&speed=1000_100&vlat=37.37732643798752&vlon=-122.17110455394965&vzoom=12.44463253198879 shows that Waschura lives on the edge of an area where one fiber ISP can provide 1000/100 Mbps service.

I'm very happy with it. And I wouldn't want to jeopardize this service. I'd like the Town to explore leaning on the AT&Ts, the Verizons, and the Comcasts to serve the further-out areas that are -- ### Of these, only AT&T is offering FTTP. Verizon offers wireless. Comcast offers mainly HFC. (Comcast could offer FTTP, but it would be very expensive.) We are currently thinking of not requiring franchise fees for LAHCF. ### Franchise fees are for traditional TV service. If LAHCF isn't providing traditional TV service, they shouldn't have to pay franchise fees. If the name-brand companies do provide traditional TV service, they should have to pay franchise fees.

Page 534 of 770 ends

And I'd like the Town to consider giving up those franchise fees to these large, name-brand companies. Rather than to create a new small private company to do this service. ### LAHCF is a co-op, not a company. The Town of Los Altos Hills didn't create LAHCF.

If those franchise fees could be used to motivate AT&T and others to serve the further-out areas, I think that would be better. Because I'm a bit worried about a small company having enough economy of scale to support internet service for a long time with, you know, lots of 1-800 number support and to provide it at a good price. I also don't have any need for 10 gigabits per second. And I wouldn't want to burden the infrastructure expense for such high speeds. ### These days, the electronics for 10 Gbps FTTP is not much more expensive than for 1 Gbps, and it will remain competitive longer.

Of course, you would need it for the backbones. But, like I said, I have symmetrical 300 megabits. I'm pretty computer-savvy. Tens, dozens of computers here. ### All supported by one 300 Mbps connection?
And it operates just fine. So, I would like to support the idea of the Town never becoming an internet service provider, never becoming a -- selling that utility by itself, and, instead, relying on the name-brand companies, and leaning on them to get them to help our neighbors. Thank you. 0:33:23:

Cody Einfalt: All right. The next member of the public is Ytsiko Paris. 0:33:31:

Ytsiko Paris: Can you hear me now?
0:33:32:

Cody Einfalt: Yes, we can.
0:33:34:

Ytsiko Paris: Yeah. I've had internet access since the beginning. I started off with an acoustic coupler on my telephone, on a Model 33 Teletype. Then we had a mesh network in Town called Ricochet, by an outfit called Metricom, that did very well. 1200 baud. ### I think he means 1200 bits per second. (A baud isn't always equal to a bit per second.) And both were very reliable. Then we went downhill. We got much higher speeds. We got up to 1200 baud. We got up to 4800 baud. But reliability went to hell in a handbasket. Where I am today, living on Page Mill Road, I have Comcast. I have about 300 megahertz, ### I think he means 300 megabits per second. (A Hertz isn't always equal to a bit per second.) bidirectional. But it's -- I'll be generous and say it's "spasmodic." A couple of nights ago, I only had download. I didn't have ANY upload. And sometimes before that, the whole address-resolution mechanism breaks. So, it's not the hardware, it's the software, where they map it into IP numbers. And we can't go on living like this. I rely heavily on internet, for not just pleasure but for health reasons. Fire connections. The other day, somebody wanted to report to me a sewer problem for some property I own. I really need to have reliability first. Because bandwidth without reliability is absolutely no use. At 300 megahertz, every time I say it's enough, something happens where I need more. I used to love 4800 baud. It was fantastic. But times change. So, with that, I'll subside. 0:35:32:

Cody Einfalt: The next member of the public is Rajiv Bhateja. ### Bhateja is a member of the Town's Technology Committee. https://losaltoshills.ca.gov/542/Technology-Committee
0:35:37:

Rajiv Bhateja: Thanks. This is as really good forum. I just want to make a couple of quick points. One is that Los Altos Hills Community Fiber is not a company. It's a nonprofit. AT&T IS a company. So, I must want to make that clear. The other thing is, I think Ytsi mentioned, you know, he was happy with 4800 baud at one point. I've heard many people say that, at this point, they're happy with the speed they have. And, of course, many people are NOT happy with the speed they have. But, you know, needs evolve over time. When the Metaverse comes out, when things change, we're going to need much higher speeds. And even if we don't need them, the people we -- when we go to sell our property, at some point in the future, the buyer might need them. And so, in any case, I think the need for very high-speed internet -- gigabit -- service is going to come in in the near future. And we need to plan for that.
0:36:40:

The other thing I'll say is, I'm hearing a lot about fiber. I also want to hear what solutions are available for wireless. Twenty years ago, everybody had a landline. Or, many people had a landline. Today, very few people have landlines, because we've gone -- our cell phones -- our phones have gone wireless. I wonder if the same revolution is going to happen with data. And I want to see if we can have at least a level of diversification, in terms of providers, between both fiber, which I understand is going to be the fastest, most likely. But I want to see if we can have a balance between providers, you know, wired and wireless. Thanks. 0:37:28:

Preston Young: Well, can I comment real quick? So, to talk about the wireless portion of it. I'm sure you've all heard of ultrawideband. The stuff that the old FCC sold off -- the old CB radio channels. You know, Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile bought a bunch of that bandwidth. Well, there's some that's set aside that towns and counties can subscribe to and use. And it's theirs. And it's very cheap. You just basically have to register it. It still has some inherent issues of, you know, trees and buildings and things getting in the way. So, you have to have a pretty good line-of-sight for it to work very well.
0:38:04:

The other one you could look at would be satellite. And, unfortunately, satellite -- I don't know if any of you know that -- I don't know, was it two or three weeks ago, they declined Starlink's bid to put another 9,000 or 10,000 satellites up in the sky.

Reasons for that is 1) the observatories can't start -- you know, keep looking out into deep space when they have all this clutter up in space. So people don't like it. All this space junk. ### On 08-10-22, the FCC rejected Starlink's bid to use public funds to provide satellite service to something like 643,000 rural premises. https://muninetworks.org/content/ltd-and-starlink-booted-rural-digital-opportunity-fund-fcc https://spacenews.com/spacex-loses-900-million-rural-broadband-subsidy/ The reason was that the FCC doubted that Starlink could deliver the promised speeds (100 Mbps down, 20 Mbps up). ### I don't think FCC worried about the space junk.
2) they're all low-orbit. You know. Most of them are 23,000 -- or whatever it is -- out.But the low-orbit ones are like 300 miles up. ### Geosynchronous satellites are 22,236 miles above the earth's equator. Starlink's satellites are more like 340 miles up. https://www.space.com/spacex-starlink-satellites.html
Those have a higher propensity to just kind of fall to earth. You know. They're just -- They don't know what it's going to do. So they've been declined that permit. Well, you can't get good satellite unless you have a whole lot of satellites. Just like wireless down here. If you want 5G, it only goes about 1,000 feet per tower. So, you have to have a whole bunch of towers. ### No, that's not the reason you need multiple satellites. It's so that as one disappears from view, another comes into view. Incidentally, a Starlink customer needs to be able to see a large portion of the sky, to connect to the satellites, wherever they are at any given moment.

Ultrawideband, you don't. Ultrawideband goes for a really long distance. Unless something gets in the way. You know. It's a very viable option. ### This source says ultra-wide band is a short range technology (10 meters). https://www.everythingrf.com/community/what-is-ultra-wide-band-uwb-technology ### This article says 5G Ultra Wideband is a marketing name used by Verizon. https://www.techradar.com/news/what-is-5g-ultra-wideband 0:39:10:

So, like, fiber -- why is fiber so great? The fiber itself doesn't change. A fiber is a fiber is a fiber. ### Fiber can be single mode or multimode. FTTP needs single mode. (Multimode would be too slow.) There are various kinds of single mode fiber. G.652.D is a good choice for FTTP. https://community.fs.com/blog/what-kind-of-single-mode-fiber-should-you-choose.html There are more nuances that I won't talk about.

If you want 1 gig, 10 gig, whatever, it's the equipment that you put on the end of it. That's what makes it different speeds. And why is fiber better than coax? Well, coax has, you know, upload issues. ### Coax has bandwidth issues. It's the electronics (for example, DOCSIS 3.1) that chooses to give more of coax's limited bandwidth to downloads than to uploads.

They have DOCSIS 4.0 coming out. Well, they say every other month. But it's probably another year out. And that will help increase the upload speed a little bit. ### More about Comcast's DOCSIS 4.0 futures.
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2022/09/comcast-teases-milestone-in-plan-to-offer-multi-gigabit-cable-upload-speeds/ But the problem with digital signals on copper is, it's truly shared. ### AT&T DSL uses twisted-pair copper wires, that are not shared. But, yes, Comcast's coax is shared.

You're sharing that exact -- Everybody's using that same, exact signal. Fiber doesn't do that. ### PON (passive optic network) electronics shares the fiber. AT&T Fiber uses PON. Active Ethernet electronics does not share the fiber. LAHCF is using active Ethernet.

Fiber, they split it, and use splitters, and -- you know, you'll probably hear that term sometime. Well, it's still all based on time signature. ### In other words, most kinds of PON (including GPON and XGS-PON) use time multiplexing to share the fiber. In theory, a PON could use different colors to provide multiple simultaneous data streams, but that would be expensive.

So, you know, the guy over here, A, he gets time signature 1-10 milliseconds. Next guy gets 11-20 milliseconds. ### GPON divides time into 125 microsecond frames. So, no, no upload gets to use 10 milliseconds all at once. (XGS-PON also uses 125 microsecond frames.) That's all it needs. You can have a 100 gig circuit that just, you know, needs a very short amount of time to actually communicate. To actually transmit that amount of, you know, information.

So, fiber, itself is -- they call it futureproof, even though nothing's futureproof. Right? But for our foreseeable future, it IS. Because you don't have to change the fiber. ### "Fiber is the only technology that can handle the broadband demand today and for the next fifty years." https://potsandpansbyccg.com/2021/02/01/why-fiber/
Once it's in the ground, it's in the ground,
### Some fiber is on poles.
and it's going to work. You just have to change the equipment, and what's on the end of it, to get out the different stuff. 0:40:42:

Cody Einfalt: Just to let you know, we're about 40 minutes into the conversation. There's seven hands raised. So, I just wanted to let you know, with your presentation -- 0:40:50:

Preston Young: This is how they usually go.
0:40:51:

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Cody Einfalt: OK. The next member of the public is Leo Tucky. 0:41:03:

Leo Tucky. OK. So, hi. My name's Leo. I'm a Los Altos Hills Community Fiber student. And, as a student, I can kind of empathize. 'Cause Wi-Fi is very important. And in Los Altos Hills, historically, the Wi-Fi is kind of sub-par. And it hinders students' studying. I talked to a lot of people -- a lot of students. I don't actually live in Los Altos Hills. But I talk to a lot of people there. And they all give me the same feedback. And I'd also like to say that fiber is very efficient. It will be financially worth it. Especially, when name brands have let Los Altos Hills residents down in the past. 0:41:42:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Leo. The next member of the public is Hendrik. 0:41:48:

Hendrik Dahlkamp: Hi. I live at 11475 Summit Wood Road. And, to me, fast internet is, like, one of the basic utilities that a community MUST supply. It's like water, electricity, internet. Probably more important than electricity, because you can make your own electricity with solar. But you can't make your own internet. So, I bought my house just three months ago. And before putting in an offer, like, I double-checked and triple-checked that, like, Comcast gigabit was available. And otherwise, I just wouldn't have bought a house. I could not imagine somebody paying millions of dollars and then not having good internet.
0:42:28:

So, that's one thing. And then after I moved in, I actually discovered that LAHCF does have an existing cable that went in front of my house. And it sounded kind of cool. So, I literally got out my shovel, dug for 20 feet, and hooked myself up to this service. And I must say, it's been fantastic.

Like, I went from 1 gigabit to 10 gigabit, up and down. And even more important than that is that -- the latency. It's like noticeably faster than even gigabit Comcast. So, I've become a true believer in it. And I hope that Los Altos Hills gets to like lay this fiber on every street. I feel like it's a fundamental service that we should provide. Thank you.
0:43:17:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you. The next member of the public is Sara and Bill Nowlin. 0:43:24:

Sarah Nowlin: Hi. We live at 10300 West Loyola. And I -- We have Comcast. It is adequately fast. But it -- And right now, it's working. And so, I feel a little bit like I might be jinxing us. But we have had literally over a year of reliability problems. And I would like to strongly disagree with Jim Waschura, who wants us to rely on the name-brand companies. Because our experience of dealing with Comcast -- And we had a neighbor who was also having connectivity problems at the same time, because it turned out it was actually a piece of equipment on a pole. Getting them to come out and identify it and find it -- They would come out and go, ah, I don't know. Seems fine. Walk away. Over and over, many months. Close to a year. Finally, somebody found the piece of equipment that wasn't working, and fixed it. And we've been OK. But Comcast's -- Getting though to a large company is a non-trivial proposition. I have no desire to be reliant on the name-brand large companies and their service organizations. We tried to get AT&T to come out. And we were ready to switch. And AT&T said, yeah, we can't give you anything better than what you have. So, fundamentally, we have been big -- We have read with interest of the Los Altos Hills Community Fiber project. We are signed up as people who are interested. Neither one of us right now has time to be a champion. But we are ready to pony up the money to -- for our neighborhood, if we get to that point. If we get enough interest in our neighborhood. We're very, very interested in having this happen. That is all. 0:45:09:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you. The next member of the public is Hendrik. 0:45:14:

Hendrik: I already talked. Thank you.
0:45:17:

Cody Einfalt: Sorry about that. The next member of the public is Gautam. 0:45:23:

Gautam Agrawal: Hi, there. My name is Gautam Agrawal. I'm on Olive Tree Lane. One thing I'd like to just state, and re-state, is this concept of community. Right? This is who WE ARE. This is EVERY PERSON in Los Altos Hills. WE ARE the community. And Los Altos Hill COMMUNITY FIBER is US. This is not a private company. This is us, as citizens, bring this type of service to each other, for our own benefit. And part of that includes being able to control the costs ourselves. This also includes the ability to control the upgrades. You know, I have Comcast as a backup connection now. I used to have AT&T and Comcast. And once LAHCF allowed me to kind of hop on their network -- I mean, I've not looked back at AT&T, but -- You know, I have Comcast still, as a backup. And I cannot get them to fix their network. Their network problems, their latency, their packet loss, all sorts of things. And it's taken them over a year to fix and upgrade a node. During the course of a critical, you know, pandemic crisis. And I practice emergency medicine. Telemedicine. And telehealth. And this is going to be a massive explosion of health care. Right? That we're experiencing right now on the healthcare side. And I couldn't operate with Comcast or AT&T. Right? I NEEDED something better. And so, you know, this has been a godsend for me. Speeds are off the charts. And I can actually utilize those speeds. And it actually helps me clinically with my patients, and my workload, and stuff. In addition, the symmetry's been fantastic. I mean, you know, all these asymmetric networks have just gotten wiped out. Because no one ever planned on this level of upload. Zoom calls, this, that, and the other. Right? In order to download, you need to be able to upload the request. So, this kind of symmetry is actually crucial. And this is a permanent -- this is a secular need, that is going to be needed for here on out. 'Cause, you know, this type of hybrid work environment, especially in Silicon Valley, is going to be universal. Right?
0:47:14:

I think another thing is that -- and it's been stated over and over -- the incumbents have really dropped the ball. And they're not interested unless there's a profit motive. That's a big difference between the community and an incumbent. As a community member, I don't need to profit off of this. We self-fund. We do this as a community, together, as a group. This is us. This is us, as a group, as Los Altos Hills, making this available for ourselves, and controlling our own destiny. In addition, hooking up the Town -- Right? -- the Town gets leverage against incumbent providers.

The fastest way to get leverage against these incumbent providers, and get them to do what we want, is to help facilitate competition. I can guarantee you they don't have it right now. And that's why you've seen what you have for -- not the last one year or two years -- the last 20-30 YEARS.

I'm going to emphasize and re-emphasize. There has been NOTHING done in 20-30 years. This could have been done DECADES ago. And they CHOSE NOT to do this. This is -- This why, when you say let the brand names do it, I would pose to you that this an absolute farcical concept.

You have no bat. You have no lever to do this.
0:48:28:

Los Altos Hills Community Fiber gives the Town four strands of fiber to do with what it needs. Right? Which means we can have ubiquitous, widespread Wi-Fi throughout the town. For free. Exceptionally high-quality service. No incumbent -- no name-brand provider will ever give you those strands. It can also allow us to leverage to get 5G cellular everywhere. Very easily. Right? And somebody had mentioned how bad the cell phone service is here. Well, guess what. If the Town hooks up into this network, where it already has these strands, 'cause Los Altos Hills Community Fiber has been laying those strands down everywhere it goes -- for the Town -- you now, again, have another lever point. Right? There's safety and emergency issues. These are crucial things. And the Town has control of it's own safety destiny. Right? So, this whole thing about name brands, I think -- And, you know, pardon my French, but this is BS. Right? The Town needs leverage. And we, the community, can provide it to the Town. And that's what I'm really interested in doing. And I'm going to work my tail off to make sure every person in this Town has this kind of access.
0:49:33:

So, I just wanted to say that piece. And thank you for, you know, giving me a moment 0:49:39:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Gautam. The next member of the public is Brandon Lane. 0:49:44:

Brandon Lane: [hard to hear] Hi. Brandon Lane. I'm from a high school in Mountain View. And I'm part of the group in Los Altos Hills going door to door, trying to pitch fiber. Some of you may have seen us in the neighborhood. And just here in ** today, ** among the people in the meeting right now, I know everyone is waiting for fiber. Just waiting to have a small part of this project. It has the potential to have a huge impact on Los Altos Hills and the nearby communities. ** Thank you. 0:50:16:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Brandon. The next member of the public is Mir. 0:50:22:

Mir: Hi, everyone. I'm Mir Bari. I go to school at Harker. And I'm super, super thrilled to be here. Over the past months, you know, with Brandon and Leo and other high-schoolers who talked, I've actually obtained a solicitation permit from the Town. And went door-to-door, to hear out the broadband concerns of residents. And we talked to a LOT of students. And we honestly heard an insanely overwhelming amount of excitement about Los Altos Hills Community Fiber. And a strong wanting to have it in each of their homes. The biggest thing we got back was the huge amount of students -- and also adults -- that want to have -- that have expressed that their current internet is not adequately meeting their internet needs. It does not work for them. And they strongly desire to switch. As a high-schooler, I know firsthand how important it is to have fast and steady internet. Quarantine proved that. The fast upload speed that Los Altos Hills Community Fiber provides is the reason that so many students across Los Altos Hills are excited about this local project. I've also personally lived in Los Altos Hills, since, you know, I was about two years old, and I'm about 18 now, And me and my neighbors have been just hoping to get Comcast and AT&T for so long now, trying to get them to improve their services in their -- in this Town. But their inadequate response to our requests prove that they're simply not invested here. The truth is that name brands have failed us. This is more than just fast internet. also. It's about community. And this community has a great opportunity to invest in itself, and make a difference in the lives of its residents. 0:51:54:

Just the last point I want to touch on is that I've been a member of the Los Altos -- of the Town's Youth Commission since 6th grade. Where we've met at the Town Hall twice a month, to discuss Town initiatives. So I know firsthand how important it is to improve the internet in that area.

Especially since it allows the utilization of fiber throughout the Town, potentially more 5G availability, and townwide Wi-Fi in public spaces. And I think these are incredible benefits, that each will have tangible and direct impacts on the lives of each resident. Each of whom, I've learned, really desire better internet. The most common phrase me and my student team heard was, "Yes, I'm interested, and I want this in my house. How fast can I get it?" And, yeah, I just want to end off by saying, you know, if you can get a group of high-school students to work on this project, highschoolers who, you know, have lived in Los Altos Hills for a long time and understand the need for better internet, and, you know, spend their free time advancing Los Altos Hills Community Fiber, and working to provide a better broadband services, then clearly there's a strong need for, you know, better broadband services throughout the Town. So, yeah, thank you so much for the time. Yup. 0:53:03:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you. The next member of the public is Ron Deangelis. 0:53:09:

Ron Deangelis: Thank you for the opportunity to speak. My name's Ron Deangelis. I live at 10331 Magdalena. I am a Comcast -- a grateful Comcast customer. I don't love it. I agree completely with the reliability issues. But my background is more on the commercial side. I've been helping startups and small businesses with internet -- with IT outsourcing and internet connectivity for 25 years. So I deal with all the carriers all the time. And, you know, yeah, I have lost a lot of faith with them. I'm the guy you call when you want to beat up the incumbents. And I have used -- the Office of the President of AT&T used to be the golden ticket to getting your issues solved. I have recently had issues with them. I have a friend who works at AT&T who is saddened to see where they're at as a company. He gets into the Office of the President all the time. And, unfortunately, the Office of the President is pretty horrific now. My commercial customers can't get help. I don't think we have much of a choice. I love the idea of the community fiber, and making it happen. I really appreciate that you commented that not everybody needs a gig. You're absolutely right. Yeah, 1 gig or 10 gig, that would be nice. But I'll take 100 [Mbps] or 300 [Mbps] any day of the week. I would like to ask, in terms of -- There's been huge advances in wireless. I'm wondering if there's some -- You know, laying fiber takes time. I'm not sure if the -- you guys were looking into wireless ways to deploy, as well, 'cause that might serve our needs even faster. I love the concept of the fiber. But I know it's going to take time. So, thank you for your efforts. And I appreciate the opportunity to help out if need be. 0:54:36:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you ...
0:54:36:

Preston Young: One wireless technology that a lot of companies -- actually smaller ISPs are doing. It's called fiber to the neighborhood. So, they'll build fiber to a neighborhood. And then they use -- If you've ever heard of Terragraph. It's a mesh network that -- a house will communicate with the next house. Right? And the whole network can get one -- I think it's even up to 5 gigs now. I don't think it's 10 [Gbps]. But up to like 5 gigs. Wirelessly. But it has to be fed with fiber. And every house has to be working. If one, you know, house loses power, then the system suffers. And it's a good system. And especially for going quick. Because you can deploy it.. I get it to the neighborhood. Everybody just uses, you know, antennas. You can connect to it very quickly. And it becomes very cost effective, because -- what's called the last mile is going from your street to your house -- that gets very expensive. It can be $500 up to $5,000. For every drop. You know. That gets expensive. And if you have a wireless deployment method, you don't have to have that. And that's one thing that Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, with their ultrawideband -- or 5G to the home, I think a lot of them call it -- that's what they're doing. They're trying to help you -- Right? -- eliminate that last mile cost. 0:55:51:

I used to work for Verizon when they were doing a lot of roll-outs up in Sacramento. ### 2017-2019.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/preston-young-srprogmgr
And the problem: it's a very sensitive line-of-sight situation. We would be doing apartment buildings. And the west side could get it, but the east side couldn't. Or the north end could, and the south end couldn't. Right? There's a lot of limitations to it. But if planned out properly, you CAN make it work. It can be a good thing, to effectively -- and quickly -- deploy fiber -- or, fast broadband. 0:56:24:

Cody Einfalt: There are four members of the public left with their hands raised. The next member is Matthieu. 0:56:31:

Matthieu Devin: Hi. Thank you for taking my turn. I'm Matthieu Devin. I'm in the neighborhood at the bottom of Page Mill Road, close to Arastradero, close to 280. And I'm the champion for LAHCF for this neighborhood. And it's been interesting as a process to see how we, as a community, like Gautam was saying earlier, get together to try to deploy a system like that. And we started by doing a survey. A third of the people were extremely dissatisfied in the neighborhood -- about 60 people. Extremely -- About a third of 60 people were extremely dissatisfied with their internet. And mostly had DSL. And -- So, ones with Comcast were more satisfied, but complain about the qualities, reliability, and the slow upload speed. And a third were -- declare themselves extremely interested in the fiber. And we've continued discussions with those people, to try to figure out which path we should lay down fiber with LAHCF. And so, this was the first part.

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0:57:38:

The second part is raising money. And this, again, is a community, where we come together with another neighbor project. We've raised -- Well, we've pledged -- we got pledges for almost $300,000. Right? From the community. To see -- To lay down fiber. And now, we're at the next step, which is to talk with Next Level and LAHCF, to get an actual quote, and function of the street we want to lay fiber down. It's a very interesting process. And we love the fact that LAHCF is very technical, does not involve any of the ISPs that we've all learned to not like at all, because the way they deal with us.
0:58:25:

One thing I wanted to add is that -- about the wireless question is that LAHCF has a reverse wireless setup to what you were describing earlier. Which is, they would put a tower in a high-level property in the neighborhood, and pull wire from there to the local house. And this tower gets connected to another tower. So, you get maybe 10 gigabit to the tower, wirelessly, from a far away point in another Los Altos Hills area. And then you use fiber to distribute to the local neighborhood. Right? So, that's kind of the reverse of what you're describing. Right? It avoids the high cost of putting two miles of fiber to go to your neighborhood. It's -- They call it a wireless island, or something like that. So, it's great. I wish -- The problem is the up-front money you have to raise to dig and install the fiber in the street. It would be great if the city would help with that. Or, you know, would sponsor some of it. Thank you.
0:59:34:

Cody Einfalt: The next member of the public is Emaan.
0:59:39:

Emaan Heidari: Hi. My name is Emaan. I'm also a high-school student, along with Mir, and Brandon, and some others, living in Los Altos [Hills]. And I'm a part of the student group LAHCF. Helping to catalyze interest in fiber with a social media campaign, and going door-to-door with our city permits. And I became interested in improving upload speeds, after constant buffering in Zoom videos, for both myself and my friends. As Mir said, as a student, and even after quarantine, I'm very often in Zoom calls. Not only for my classes but also for club meetings and office hours.

And one of the most important parts of fiber for me is upload and download symmetry. Currently, I have Comcast, which -- my family and I have all expressed are stability and reliability issues, especially at particular times of the day. I also want to agree with what Gautam and Mir said about this community-owned aspect of LAHCF. Brand names can't compete with the productivity of a community-owned nonprofit. So, my family and I, as well as lots of my friends in the Town, have an intense desire to switch. Thank you. 1:00:47:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you. The next member of the public is Luzzi. 1:00:51:

Luzzi: Yeah. Thank you. I'm Luzzi, a student from Harker, who's also part of the student group working with Los Altos Hills Community Fiber. From my experience, I've very clearly seen the dissatisfaction with internet in the Los Altos Hills area, as I've surveyed and interacted with members of the community. Whenever I've gone out and canvassed with the other members of the student group -- Mir, Emaan, you know, etc. -- and asked residents the simple question, how do comment on the quality of your internet, without even indicating I was working for Community Fiber, or mentioning potential dissatisfaction, I consistently received immediate responses that people had distaste with their current service, or that they wanted replacement services. Or how they felt that they'd been repeatedly let down by the current providers. And I think the reason for that is really quite simple. It's because the interests of private name-brand corporations will always -- are fundamentally be misaligned with those of the general population. Because private corporations like AT&T and Comcast have duopoly control in the area. And with a low population density, as a reason for it, it's less profitable. So, they have an incentive to provide slow, unreliable, inconsistent service, which may work in a few isolated areas, but will always be far, far inferior to a by-the-community, for-the-community solution. Which knows what its needs are, and has a motive to genuinely serve the population. So -- And, realistically, consumers don't really have any negotiating power or leverage to force providers to step up broader quality of service. So, infinitely waiting, and holding out hope that Comcast will get their stuff together is, in my opinion, an infeasible and unsustainable solution to this issue. Thank you.
1:02:24:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Luzzi. The last member of the public is Dave. 1:02:31:

Dave Pefley: Yes. Hi. My name is Dave Pefley. Thanks for the opportunity to speak here. I live at 26169 Maurer Lane in Los Altos Hills. And I'd agree with the earlier speaker who said that it was really, you know, just disappointing and outrageous that a Town like Los Altos Hills, in Silicon Valley, you know, in this year -- 2022 -- could be, you know, not having fast and reliable internet. It's just really surprising and disappointing. But, that being said, it sounds like the way forward that's being proposed is sort of a neighborhood approach, where we independently get together and figure out who needs what. And then, individually and in small groups, try to get things coordinated and paid for. And that may make some sense. But I sense that Los Altos Hills, as a Town, might be able to play a little bit more of a role than they are. I wonder whether it would be appropriate for them to have a database of all the residents, and, you know, what they have -- the speeds, the -- just a very good database. And then Los Altos Hills could be doing the -- you know, in a sense, the championing, as far as, like, you know, here's -- there's logical -- this is a logical grouping. Rather than having individuals try to figure it out, and sort through who their neighbors are, and what they want, and getting a hold of that, and trying to figure out, well, what priority do they get versus someone else. It would seem like the Town would be able to get a database, put in a sort program, and just figure out there's logical blocks here that should go -- The first five installations should go here, here, here, here, and here. And, you know -- And then, the cost, you know, get bandaged in certain coordinated ways. Well, anyway, that's just sort of my thought on what the roles could possibly be.
1:04:34:

I have Comcast. I get 100-150 megabits connection. Not always reliable. You know. Somewhat OK, but, you know, definitely would be in favor of getting the gig speed with fiber. I think that's, you know, absolutely necessary today. So, anyway, thanks again for the opportunity to speak.

And I hope that we'll be able to fast and reliable internet to our community quickly. OK. Thank you. 1:05:03:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Dave.
1:05:

Preston Young: He brought up a point -- good thing. We're actually going to be putting out a survey online. We weren't at first. But we're going to be putting out a survey. Um. I don't know. Probably next week sometime. I think. 1:05:15:

Cody Einfalt: In the upcoming weeks.
1:05:17:

Preston Young: In the upcoming weeks. I think you'll be able to get online, and fill out a lot of the questions we've talked about tonight. But there'll be a speed test in there. You can click the button. It will do the speed from where you're at. And it will record that back. So, like the gentleman just said, if the town had a database of what speeds people had at their homes, it's very useful. Well, we don't have that. And I would love to have that. But that is one of the best ways that we can go out and find federal money. You can find state money. Because it's all based on need. It's based on who's underserved, who's not served at all. Right? They don't care if your served and you have lots of money and you have a gig service, they won't give you any money. So, when you look at these maps, and it shows that Los Altos Hills has the opportunity of getting gig service everywhere, we know that's not true.
### FCC's broadband map does NOT show that all of Los Altos Hills can get gig service (or even 1000/100 Mbps service) everywhere. https://broadband477map.fcc.gov/#/location-summary?
version=jun2021&place_name=Los%20Altos%20Hills,%20California,%20United%20States&lat=37.379663&lon=-122.137464&tech=acfosw&speed=1000_100&vlat=37.37651785549113&vlon=-122.19595772003424&vzoom=11.85513251215159 But it does show that most of Los Altos Hills can get 100/10 Mbps service from multiple providers. And that may mean that federal money will be hard to get.

And the way we can prove that is through these speed tests. Through some mechanism that can show that -- you know, they don't know that you live at the end of the block, and four people have it, and the last two don't. They think the entire street is served. So, if we can document, and we can get that stuff together, then that helps make the case for building, helping. Right? 1:06:22:

Another thing I need to make very clear is, 1) we've already talked with Comcast. We're talking with AT&T next week. I've talked with LAHCF quite a few times now. So, we're reaching out to the providers as well, and saying, what are your plans for Los Altos Hills? Do you have any? Where do you have fiber? Where do you not have fiber? AT&T and Comcast don't share maps. They don't give us very much detail. But they usually let us in on what some of their future plans are. We're under NDA for a lot of that stuff, so I can't say a whole lot. But I am saying that we've got a whole lot of information. About the providers. Right? What they want to do, where they're going to go, and in situations like that. 1:07:00:

And the last point I want to make fairly clear is, the Town, as a governing body, can NOT give any one company, individual, group, whatever a competitive advantage over anybody else. So, the Town can't just go give LAHCF a whole bunch of money and say, here, build it. They can't.

Right? They have to loan it. They have to -- There's ways you have to go about it, to make it very, very clear, and very legal. Because if they go give one group a million dollars, they have to go give AT&T a million dollars, and they have to give Comcast a million dollars. They can't create these, you know, competitive advantage for any one company. And that's one thing that we're really trying very hard to figure out. How do we support who, and, you know, make it legal. So, that's one thing that I want to make clear, that I hear, you know, the excitement for LAHCF, and the Town needs to get involved. Well, there's only some very managed ways that the Town can really get involved. So, I just want to throw that out there, and make sure everybody understands that we can't just, you know, give somebody an advantage. All right. ### But see Hendrik's comment at 1:12:42 about favoring Comcast. 1:08:07:

Cody Einfalt: There are two members of the public with their hands raised. If anyone here also wants to make another comment, you can raise your hand. We can take that comment from the Chambers. 1:08:16:

Preston Young: OK.
1:08:22:

Steve: Hi. My name is Steve. I live around the corner here. I appreciate you asking for input. We had a house in Southern California that was analogous in a sense. And this is a very dense community -- Manhattan Beach. And the city stepped up and said we're going to it into X quadrants.
### According to this 2007 pamphlet, there were 15 assessment districts. https://www.manhattanbeach.gov/home/showdocument?id=3648 And each quadrant could vote on whether they wanted to pay for undergrounding. And if one quadrant was selected -- and then, each homeowner had a choice of either paying up-front or putting it in a property tax bill. And by creating that flexibility -- a size that was manageable, and a choice of how to pay -- caused it to be passed very quickly. And it was very successful for the quadrant that I was in. I don't know about all the other quadrants. So, from a policy standpoint, I don't know if there's a philosophy that it has to be ALL of Los Altos Hills. Or it can be done in quadrants. But one way to facilitate is, give people choice to -- on how they would pay for it. 1:09:26:

Preston Young: So, I think it's the Hawthorne district, up in Tiburon. They did that. They -- Yeah, Tiburon did it, too. This whole area of the community called the Hawthorne area. They got together and they undergrounded it. And when they did, the city made them put in conduit. So, now they have some extra conduit, that they can use. So, yeah, there are other ways of going about it. 1:09:41:

Bill Wong: I just have one -- I'll ask you a question. When will Los Altos Hills City Hall will have their own fibers here? You can -- You can acquire one. Right? You don't have to be shared with a different company. I mean, isn't that an advantage for you to have one? Who you going to pick to implement fiber in City Hall?
1:10:12:

Preston Young: I don't work at City Hall. I don't know. I could give them recommendations. 1:10:16:

Bill Wong: Yeah. Exactly. So, if someone could lay a cable, like this -- that will benefit a lot of residents around this neighborhood. 1:10:30:

Cory Einfalt: I'm one of the staff members of Town Hall. I don't know exactly where the line is. But we have been told the Town Hall is on fiber, with AT&T. We have a specific level of service from AT&T. It's a government level of service. So, it's different from the residential service that AT&T may provide. But from what I have been told, Town Hall itself is on fiber. 1:10:51:

Bill Wong: 'Cause I recently hook up AT&T ...
1:10:53:

Cody Einfalt: You need to give him the microphone.
1:10:56:

Bill Wong: I just look up AT&T website. They already say, hey, Los Altos Hills will get fiber coming. Now, I don't know how true it is. But we need to talk to AT&T next time, because -- story about this.

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1:11:13:

Cody Einfalt: Yes. There are two members of the public who raised their hands. Dylan, you have the permission to speak. 1:11:20:

Dylan Han: Hi. So, I'm Dylan. I'm a high-schooler. I'd just like to say that, like, I think it's really quite a stretch to say that like current providers have provided equal coverage. Right now, I think the internet in Los Altos Hills is really failing us. I have a lot of friends who need their video for school, or, you know, just to hang out. And it's pretty much impossible for them, because of the internet. I just want to say, I'm grateful for what you guys are doing. I think that this project is going to have a pretty big impact. So, I'm excited. 1:11:58:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Dylan. Just a note to all the members in the public. If you want to submit your comments via email, I could also accept those. You could send it to Cody Einfalt. My email is attached to the calendar link on the Town's website. And we could follow up with answers, after the fact. The last member of the public with their hands raised is Hendrik. Hendrik, I do see that you unmuted yourself. Are you there? 1:12:40:

Hendrik Dahlkamp: Can you hear me now?
1:12:41:

Cody Einfalt: Yes, I can.
1:12:42:

Hendrik Dahlkamp: OK. Sorry. So, I would say, of course AT&T and Comcast will say that we're getting fiber everywhere. Because by saying so, they avoid like actual competitors springing up. Right? Like, it's a tactic. It doesn't mean they'll actually make it here. And the other one -- I heard somebody say that the Town is not allowed to prefer one company over the other. ### Consultant Preston Young said this, at 1:07:00.

I think, right now, the Town has an exclusive agreement with Comcast, to subsidize new Comcast connections with 30 percent. So, if you get your, like, $200,000 quote from Comcast, Los Altos Hills will pay $66,000 for your connection. But they only do it with Comcast. Not with LAHCF.

Not with AT&T. So, not only are those things possible. They are existing right now. ### The Town of Los Altos Hills has a franchise agreement with Comcast, dated 11-18-04, apparently for its HFC network. https://www.losaltoshills.ca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/1160/Cable-Internet-Broadband-Service-FAQs?bidId= (This document says LAH will contribute 25 percent, up to a maximum of $15,000. There's probably another document that updates this to 30 percent up to a maximum of $25,000.) ### The Comcast franchise agreement expires 11-18-24. LAH doesn't have franchise agreements with other ISPs. http://www.losaltoshills.ca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/4496/List-of-Major-Contracts-and-Agreements8132021?bidId= 1:13:30:

Cody Einfalt: I can respond to that. The one correction to that is that it does only go up to $25,000. There is a limit to the City Manager's signing authority. If you did want to ask the City Council to go over that, there's a process in doing so. But the policy is written in a sense that they will match up to 30 percent, limited to the City Manager's signing authority of $25,000. 1:13:52:

Hendrik Dahlkamp: OK. Fair enough.
1:13:58:

Cody Einfalt: All right. There's no more members of the public with their hands raised. 1:14:00:

Preston Young: OK. We can go through more questions if you want. [laughs] 1:14:04:

Cody Einfalt: There's about 15 minutes left scheduled for this meeting. 1:14:09:
### Slide 6 -- DO YOU FORESEE A NEED FOR HIGHER BANDWIDTH IN THE FUTURE? We have more slides to prompt more conversation in the community. And we do have one hand raised in the Chambers. 1:14:17:

Jeff Lewis: Cody, do you mind if I -- I just want to make a couple of points from the conversation I've heard. 1:14:23:

Cody Einfalt: Yes, Jeff. One second. On the screen is Jeff Lewis, the other member of Gov Tech Group. Jeff, you have the floor. 1:14:31:

Jeff Lewis: Hi. Good evening. Sorry I came a little late to the meeting. I was out of town. But I did -- From hearing what everybody's saying, we do want to make sure that we're working with Los Altos Hills to look for the best solution for the entire community. So, that's something we're going to look at. We'll take a look at different models. And some of them may include working with a local community group. There's other models where you work with the providers that are already in place. And there's other models where you look for private-sector partners. And another one where, you know, some government agencies build it on their own. So, we're going to take a look at all those. 1:15:05:

And different methods of communication. So, someone made a good point. You know. Can you use wireless to the end? They're already working on 6G, which will provide high-speed communications to the home. If you have fiber placed to a certain point. And I'm on a few broadband committees. And they're even working on 7G, which will provide super-high speeds over wireless, without degradation and latency. ### This 05-25-22 article, "7G -- Really?" provides some perspective. https://potsandpansbyccg.com/2022/05/25/7g-really/
### In this talk show about telecom, Travis Carter, CEO of U.S Internet, a FTTP provider in Minneapolis, says (0:54:35) in jest, "My current stance on wireless is, what I'm really fearing is 14G. That's where, I think, it's really going to compete heavy with fiber. So, since we're only at 5G today, I'd say we have some time."
https://muninetworks.org/content/join-us-thursday-january-20th-5pm-et-talk-about-fiber-2022-episode-30-connect-show 1:15:33:

The other thing is, when Preston mentioned that we're going to be putting out, in a couple weeks, a survey, I want to just reiterate, if you take that survey -- we hope you do -- please try to use it from a wired line in your house if possible. That will give us the best possible information. And it's going to ask for address. And we will map that out. So, that's going to help us, as people mentioned, to find out where, if there are any slow spots. And we're also going to ask some questions on reliability. Please ask those, ### Answer those?
so we can gather, by address, where people think they're doing good, bad, or indifferent. ### For people who subscribe to multiple ISPs for the sake of reliability, it would be nice to report on that, and get performance data on each ISP. 1:16:07:

And so, that was what I wanted to provide. Cody. If that helps. 1:16:13:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Jeff. Council Member Mok.
1:16:17:

Council Member Mok: Thank you. Thank all of you for attending this meeting today. And I do share your pain. I've been in that pain for a long time. 25 years. And it's very frustrating. I, too, had to have AT&T and Comcast as my providers. And even with that, it was not sufficient to meet my needs. So, our goal in the Ad Hoc Committee, Kavita and myself, the goal, basically, is to get everyone in Los Altos Hills up to the standards where we should be. We are in almost like the headquarters of Silicon Valley, the most highly technological area in the entire world, and we can't get internet. I could be in Brazil, or in Mexico, or any place else, and I could still have a better connection. So, those are my frustrations. And our committee was set up about, oh, maybe six months ago. So, we're dedicated to this. We're going to work on it. We're going to work on it, up to the time that the problem's taken care of. Or solved.
1:17:27:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Council Member Mok. City Manager Peter Prenjad. 1:17:31:

City Manager Prenjad: Hi, everybody. Thanks, Cody. I just wanted to just thank, again, everybody for attending. And the conversation is just starting. You know, I want to be respectful of everybody's time. But -- And I also don't want to end the conversation early. I would encourage anybody who was not able to speak, or has additional ideas, to submit their emails. Submit their emails to Cody, and we'll follow up on those. This is really a listening session. So, we can understand what people's sentiments are. We're not trying to solve the problem, or explain what we're going to do at this point. So, we're, at this point, just collecting. The Ad Hoc Committee, made up of Council Member Mok and Council Member Tankha, were appointed by the Council to collect information and help guide the conversation. Once it gets ready to come before the City Council, the Council will act and take appropriate action. But we're still very much in the data gathering stage. Before we send out the survey, I want to be clear that we will be sure that the population understands what it is that we're asking. We won't send the survey out prematurely, to avoid any confusion about what we're asking. We want the survey to be well-timed. And we'll be sure to work very closely with Council Members Tankha and Mok on the appropriate timing of that survey. Because there are a lot of people that don't even know this conversation is happening. As much as we tried to advertise. We sent a postcard to every resident in town. We put this on my City Manager weekly report. If you haven't subscribed to that, I encourage you to. But, again, you know, I'm trying to get the word out. And hearing from the entire community -- or as much of the community as we can -- is a continuous effort that we're pursuing. So, that being said, those are my comments. But I encourage you to stay engaged, continue to communicate with us, share your ideas with the email. And we'll be sure to notice every time both the Ad Hoc Committee is discussing this item, as well as when it comes to Council. So, those are my comments. Thank you. 1:19:32:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you. Council Member Tankha.
1:19:34:

Council Member Tankha: Thank you, Cody. I, too, want to thank all the residents for coming out today. The students who took time out of their evening to weigh in. The reality is that this is about digital equity, at a time when it really matters. Given that so many students, so many professionals, and so many elderly people are -- and just about everybody is now on Zoom. And that regular business is done on the internet from our homes. This is about making just basic things available to our people. It's almost like clean drinking water and electricity. And I think we will be left behind as the Town if we do not focus on this very basic need, to connect our residents to the world and beyond. And, again, thank you for coming out today. Thank you for making your voices heard. Thank you for elevating this issue. And it is incumbent on us to do something about it. We're just getting started. We're grateful to hear from you. And once Gov Tech reports comes back with a recommendations, the City Council is committed to enforcing whatever it takes to make sure that there is digital equity in this Town. So, thank you again for coming out today. 1:20:54:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Council Member Tankha. This meeting has been recorded. It will be uploaded to the Town's website. I'll be going through and listing all of the questions that were asked, as well as the answers. As Peter had mentioned, if you did not get your question, you could always send it via email to Cody. Or you could send it to the City Clerk. It will get routed to the correct person. So we'll get your answers listed online. Do you have any closing statements, Preston? 1:21:24:

Preston Young: I really -- I think I -- I hope I made it clear. Like I said, I'm the private-sector guy. And Jeff, my partner, is the diplomatic government guy that knows how to work things better than I do. Thank you for joining, Jeff. I appreciate it. Peter, thank you for letting us come on.

Council Members Mok and Tankha, appreciate you getting on the call -- or, on the Zoom. And [I'm] here to support everybody. Thank you.

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1:21:49:

Council Member Tankha: Peter, before we go, I just got a text message from a resident, Cheryl Mathews. Apparently she's had her hand raised for the entire evening but has not been called upon. And we'd be remiss if we did not make sure that every voice was heard. So, I'd like to call her out if she is still online.
1:22:09:

Cody Einfalt: Yes, I do see her. And I'll give her the permission to speak. Cheryl, please accept the unmute. 1:22:12:

Cheryl Mathews: Great. Thank you so much.
1:22:14:

Cody Einfalt: We can hear you.
1:2215:

Cheryl Mathews: OK. Terrific. First, I just want to thank the Town for putting together this forum and Ad Hoc Committee. You know, I was really shocked to hear that some residents still don't even have cell service. And there's somebody that spoke that was on Summerhill. And I'm not sure they even know there's an actual cell tower on Hilltop. And it brings up the point that we have no less than 30 cell towers in Los Altos Hills. Yet, no one seems -- we don't have adequate service to everybody. So you really have to say, who's benefitting from all these towers? And how it ties with the fiber is, you know, the Town continues to operate under a decades-old policy of a 10-year renewal for these cell towers. And we're basically just rubber-stamping them, for the cell companies to come in. They say they're doing maintenance. And what they are actually doing is, they are upgrading these towers to 4G. And I'm wondering why we are not leveraging, and changing policy, where they have to help us with the fiber, before we're -- going through and renewing their permits. I think -- You know, nobody's denying -- It's super important that we all have fiber.

I would like to say that I think it's important that we look at burying the fiber. When we're looking at undergrounding utilities. I'm not sure what we're doing with that in the Town right now. But, you know, considering the danger of fire, and whatnot, I would really like to see us look at -- when we're looking at fiber -- undergrounding those utilit- -- with the utilities. And that's really all I have to say for right now. But thank you again for putting this forum together and I look forward to hearing where it goes. 1:24:23:

Cody Einfalt: Thank you, Cheryl. All right. With no other member with their hands raised from the public, I'm going to adjourn the meeting. Thank you all for attending. 1:24:35:

City Manager Prenjad: Thank you, everybody.
1:24:37:

Council Member Tankha: Thank you.

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INTERESTED IN HELPING THE TOWN
EXPLORE BETTER BROADBAND OPTIONS?
Take This Survey
AND BE HEARD!
The purpose of the survey is measure internet speed, gauge current/future needs, and rate satisfaction with the current provider. Help the Town determine if it should explore better or more options in broadband service. This survey will provide valuable information that will help the Town in the preparation of a Broadband Needs Assessment. The information will help us explore options on how or whether to support new or improved broadband options for the Town residents.

The information you provide will inform our research and potentially help us apply for available grants.

Please visit bit.ly/Fiber_Survey to take the survey.

Survey will be live until Friday, December 7, 2022.

Attachment 6

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TOWN OF LOS ALTOS HILLS
26379 Fremont Road
Los Altos Hills, CA 94022
Presorted Standard
U.S. Postage
Paid
Los Altos, CA
Permit No. 306

JOIN YOUR NEIGHBORS AND SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS

ABOUT THE FUTURE OF BROADBAND IN LOS ALTOS HILLS
Questions or Comments, please contact
Cody Einfalt, Management Analyst II
[email protected]
Please visit bit.ly/Fiber_Survey to take the survey.

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Report for Los Altos Hills Online Broadband Survey
Los Altos Hills Online Broadband Survey
Attachment 7

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Response Statistics
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350
Disqualified
Partial
Complete
Disqualified
Partial
Complete
Count Percent
Complete 290 76.9
Partial 87 23.1
Disqualified 0 0
Totals 377

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2.How is this location connected to the internet?

89.4, 89%

9.8, 10%

0.3, % 0.5, 1%
High-speed, Always-on broadband service
Low-speed service, Including cellular, dial-up or
satellite
This location has no internet service
Unsure / Don't know

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3.How is the device used for this survey connected to the internet? 37, 37%

60.3, 60%

1.6, 2%

1.1, 1%
Direct wired connection
Wireless router
Cellular
Not sure

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5.Do you find your internet access at this location adequate?

18.6, 19%

56.4, 56%

16.6, 17%

8.1, 8%

0.3, %
Always
Usually
Sometimes
Rarely
Does not apply - No internet at this location

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6.What company is the internet provider(s) at this location? 22 72.5

1.7 1 1

4.7 0
10 20
30 40
50 60
70 80
AT&T Comcast/Xfinity LAHCF Verizon Starlink Other - Write In Percent
AT&T
Comcast/Xfinity
LAHCF
Verizon
Starlink
Other - Write In

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10.How many, of each age range below, individuals use the internet in your household? 1 2 3 4 5 Responses
Count Row % Count Row % Count Row % Count Row % Count Row % Count Under 17 26 37.1% 37 52.9% 5 7.1% 1 1.4% 1 1.4% 70
18-30 31 44.9% 31 44.9% 6 8.7% 0 % 1 1.4% 69
31-45 20 34.5% 34 58.6% 2 3.4% 1 1.7% 1 1.7% 58
46-60 35 34.3% 61 59.8% 3 2.9% 2 2.0% 1 1.0% 102
Over 60 45 22.5% 147 73.5% 4 2.0% 1 0.5% 3 1.5% 200

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11.What devices are connected to the internet at this location? Check all that apply.

97.3 76.2

25.9 94.2

71.8 45.2

68.4 0
10 20
30 40
50 60
70 80
90 100
110
Smartphone Tablet,
ereaders,
Gaming
consoles
connected to
interent
Laptops Desktop
Computers
Alexa, Echo,
or other
Internet
connected
Smart Home
Devices
(securty
systems,
cameras, etc)
Percent
Value
Smartphone
Tablet, ereaders,
Gaming consoles connected to interent
Laptops
Desktop Computers
Alexa, Echo, or other
Internet connected Smart Home Devices (securty
systems, cameras, etc)

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12.Is there a reason you chose the services you have?

43.4, 43%

10.1, 10%

4.4, 4%

30.6, 31%
3, 3%

8.4, 8%
Best, Fastest option available
Other available services are too slow
Other available services too expensive
No other available services
Do not need other available service
Other - Write In

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12.Is there a reason you chose the services you have?
Value Percent Count
Best, Fastest option available 43.4% 129
Other available services are too slow 10.1% 30
Other available services too expensive 4.4% 13
No other available services 30.6% 91
Do not need other available service 3.0% 9
Other - Write In 8.4% 25
Totals 297

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Reasons why the current provider was chosen – respondent write-in • AT&T was the only service available at the time, but now Verizon is also available. • One of two cable companies/cellular because it's cheap • ATT DSL was too spotty; Comcast speed was better for the same price. • Package deal with Comcast TV • BGP4 + High Speed • Previously there were not other options. • Convenience • Used to Comcast
• DSL connection from the start through the phone line • Was only service available 30 years ago • Google subsidizes Comcast bill by $200 (already subtracted from price listed above)
• although we paid for Comcast on the street, we did not want to pay from street to home
• Great customer service • comes with video services
• Hardwire connection has no EMFs and its more secure • Got it long ago and have kept it. Seems to work up here most of the time. Some connectivity issues.
• Have had it for years, never looked into others • House was already wired for AT&T • Monopoly • inertia
• Most reliable • inexpensive, high speed, low latency, symmetrical • OTHER SERVICE LESS RELIABLE • satellite and cable were unreliable

12.Is there a reason you chose the services you have?

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13.How often is the internet service to this location out or slow? Never Every Few Months Every Few Weeks Every Few Days Total Checks Checks Row Check % Checks Row Check % Checks Row Check % Checks Row Check % Checks Service is Slow 55 20.3% 65 24% 72 26.6% 79 29.2% 271
Service is Out
Briefly
41 14.6% 135 48% 66 23.5% 39 13.9% 281
Servic is Out an
Hour or Two
66 24.6% 163 60.8% 31 11.6% 8 3% 268
Service is out a
Day or More
187 73% 63 24.6% 2 0.8% 4 1.6% 256
Total Checks 349 426 171 130 1076
% of Total
Checks

32.4% 39.6% 15.9% 12.1% 100%

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15.Does anyone in the household regularly do or need the following? Please only choose one for each row.

Daily Couple of times a Week Once a Week Not at all Total Checks Checks Row Check % Checks Row Check % Checks Row Check % Checks Row Check % Checks Telecommute, work
from home as an
employee
153 56.7% 40 14.8% 15 5.6% 62 23% 270
Online schoolwork or
training at home
72 29.1% 42 17% 27 10.9% 106 42.9% 247
Conduct home-based
business
102 41% 24 9.6% 12 4.8% 111 44.6% 249
Online gaming 47 20.8% 34 15% 20 8.8% 125 55.3% 226
Online shopping 150 55.4% 92 33.9% 23 8.5% 6 2.2% 271
Social Networking 145 55.6% 55 21.1% 19 7.3% 42 16.1% 261 Telehealth 23 9.3% 31 12.6% 89 36.2% 103 41.9% 246
Total Checks 692 318 205 555 1770
% of Total Checks 39.1% 18% 11.6% 31.4% 100%

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16.What would better broadband mean to you and your family? The area? Do you have any questions about broadband, comments, or concerns? Please share any additional thoughts you may have.

ID Response
6 We are quickly falling behind the technological curve. A stable, high-bandwidth optical fiber connection should be standard throughout the community. Current Xfinity offerings to the neighborhood, while decent on paper, fail to deliver. Poor uptime coupled with even poorer customer service can make working from home very problematic. We should strive to make 1 Gbps up 1 Gbps fiber-tohouse connectivity readily available throughout Los Altos Hills. 18 I have had to invest in a higher quality fiber connection due lack of options with ATT or comcast. Dedicated fiber runs have been cost prohibitive or not available. Currently, we're RMA'ing our antenna, should be back up to 9 Gbps up and down in the next few days. 22 We do not need better broadband.
36 We are an affluent community in a high tech area. We should have reliable internet and good cell phone service. We sometimes can't work from home due to poor internet and cell connections. That needs to be fixed.
51 Reliability is paramount. Willing to pay more $$ for reliability. 55 Would not change anything
60 I would get community fiber if it were available to us. I would like for it to be available. We live on the edge of town so cannot find the cost to bring it all the way here but would be happy to pool resources to help if required.
63 We would like faster internet but not enough technical knowledge to answer question 13. 68 reliability most important, Comcast cable is very poor and customer service is a nightmare. 71 In this digital world, we are second-class citizens. No 5G signals, slow 4G, slow broadband, and no choices. 76 Uninterrupted connectivity at a lower price.
83 We don't need "better" broadband. What we have is excellent, inexpensive, fast, and supported by top-tier large company capable of large capital investments, with large reputation at stake necessitating good service and multiple means to provide support and service while adhering to local municipality rules. I would not want to jeopardize access to this service, or to have it go up in price, or be threatened by untested, unprofessional, homegrown amateurs with nothing to lose if they fail. Requirements to provide multi- hundred megabits/second to remote sections of town should be accomplished with new 5G cellular or by pushing top-tier companies to reach these locations as a cost of having the local franchise. 88 We need much higher upload bandwidth. It's insane that people only ever quote & discuss download bandwidth. I really, really want true broadband service, which to me means symmetrical download & upload speeds. Also, it's really upsetting to me that in the absolute heart of Silicon Valley, my household has exactly 1 choice of broadband provider. That's the definition of a monopoly, and I hate it. I absolutely cannot wait until the Los Altos Hills Community Fiber project is available in my neighborhood, and I will gladly pay the installation cost. 116 Stability and speed FIBER!!
128 It is critical to have fast internet for everyone. It levels the playing field for knowledge 129 It is crazy for us all to have to find different solutions. The town should help provide a consistent service. 161 I dont know what broadband is.
260 We live online! This is the highest priority for us. Xfinity is so bad that I have recently bought a Verizon wireless modem as secondary internet service, and put a load balancer between Xfinity Verizon and my home Eero network. But still I get brief outages! Please work with LAH Community Fiber to give us the internet we deserve! 364 At present our requirements are met. Even so I would change to community owned fiber if the cost was less or comparable, and local tv stations and foreign news channels were accessible. Telehealth used occasionally but will clearly increase
372
Hard-wired broadband provides a "future proof" technology, according to Tom Wheeler, Esq., former FCC Chairman and CEO for 12 years of the Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Communications Association (CTIA). In his testimony supporting The Leading Infrastructure for Tomorrow's America (LIFT) Act in March 2021, he said he champions a "fiber first" policy (i.e. over wireless), stating that earlier transmission speeds are "completely unacceptable now" and "far from adequate for tomorrow's usage." https://energycommerce.house.gov/sites/democrats.energycommerce.house.gov/files/documents/Witness Testimony_Wheeler_FC_2021.03.22.pdf Thank you for your service to our community!

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16.What would better broadband mean to you and your family? The area? Do you have any questions about broadband, comments, or concerns? Please share any additional thoughts you may have.

There was an incredible 162 responses with comments offering a great insight to the thoughts of the public in Los Altos Hills.

In general, there were 4 main thoughts shared among most of the respondents:

1. The top comment was for more reliable service

2. Services, all types, need to be more affordable

3. Fiber is needed for knowledge and keeping up with the rest of the world. The town needs fiber services

4. LAH lacks competition, local providers have horrible customer service, and more competition is needed Some of the other comments worth noting:

1. LAH is an affluent community and they don’t understand being so close to Silicon Valley why they don’t have reliable high-speed Internet throughout the City. This includes high-speed reliable wireless and broadband and cellular services

2. There is a lack of understanding towards broadband technology and how they are different

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Given the cost and timeline for covering the town with fiber, the Technology Committee recommends:

1. Forming a broadband advisory board as suggested in the GovTech Report. Appointing some residents with deep subject matter knowledge to help steer the process.

2. Extending fiber to Town Hall and the three towers on town property: Town Hall, Purissima Park, and Westwind Barn. This may be done via an RFP.

3. Extending fiber to as many additional locations as feasible (e.g., Purissima Hills / Cal Water facilities, Foothill College, Emergency Operations Center). Helps with emergency communications.

4. Conducting a pilot program with a fixed wireless provider (like Tarana Wireless or similar) to assess the technical and business feasibility of a wireless broadband option for the town.

5. Directing the advisory board to develop a roadmap to implement phases beyond Phase

1. 6. The business model for utilizing the fiber/conduit in items 2-3 needs to be defined.

7. Implementing items 2 & 3 with ARPA and/or PEG funds as far as possible.

Attachment 8

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Town of Los Altos Hills
Emergency Preparedness and Response Committee
Regular Meeting Minutes
Tuesday, June 6th, 2023 6:00 pm. PDT

1. Call to order (start recording) [6:01pm]
The meeting was called to order by Chair Kearney.

2. Roll call of members [6:02pm]
Member Status Comment
Chair Terry Kearney Present
Vice-chair Ben Gikis Present
Secretary Dave Stewart Present
Jim Basiji Present
Phil Harter Present
Amita Sachdeva Absent Notified in advance
Sam Wood Present
Associate Victoria Bebee Present
Associate David Gilmour Present
Associate Neil Katin Present Arrived 6:04
Associate Bill Lattin excused
Associate Andy Kirk absent
With 6 of 7 voting members attending, a quorum is present.

2.a Other attendees
Name Comment
Peter Pirnejad LAH General Manager
Cody Einfalt LAH Interim Assistant to the City Manager
Melissa Elian LAH Project manager for Heritage House upgrade Preston Young Government Technology Group

Page 1 of 5 ends

Attachment 9

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3. Public comment on subjects not on the agenda [6:05pm] Melissa Elian. Looking for feedback on the new plans for the Heritage House remodel, balancing needs of History Committee, EPRC, community and staff. Have met with Katin, Latin, Wood to go over EPRC recommendations for radio room needs. Showed HH_20230531_FP_revised.pdf. Gilmour: Will everything be hooked up and ready to go? Elian: yes, the fold-out desks will have the equipment.

4. EPRC Chair remarks [6:16pm]
Kearney: Would like to have each subcommittee think about recommendations, specific to the subcommittee, that can be made to the town council. This will help focus our work.

5. Review, correct and approve minutes of the prior meeting [6:18pm] MOTION to approve the minutes of the April 4th, 2023 meeting.

Member Moved Second Aye No Abstain Recuse Absent
Chair Terry Kearney x x
Vice-chair Ben Gikis x
Secretary Dave Stewart x
Jim Basiji x
Phil Harter x x
Amita Sachdeva x
Sam Wood x

6. Emergency Management Consultant’s Report, (Hepenstal) [6:18pm] Ann Hepenstal was asked not to appear.

7. Report from the Strategic Communications Working Group (Gilmour) [6:19pm] Working group asked the question, “do we have everything we need for emergency communications for the town”.

Starting with 20 use cases, grouped into infrastructure facilities, who it serves, and use cases. Detailed slides available at https://www.losaltoshills.ca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/6180/EPRC-Infra-Recommendsations-Draftv5-25-23b Brief summary below. • Hardened Internet Access from EOC / Town Hall, serves modern communication needs of EOC personnel and support personnel to communicate with county, public safety, utilities, CERT, public. • Up to date list of public infrastructure contacts in as many modes as possible: websites, phone numbers, email addresses, etc. for county EOC, public safety, utilities, CERT. • Radio links supported and tested regularly between EOC and County EOC, CERT Ark. Operators identified and ongoing training.
• Explore feasibility of direct access, not through County communications, to public safety agencies. • Ark to CERT Recon (field surveys) currently amateur, possibly moving to internet based. • Public communications. Public problem reporting, Town outbound communications: warnings, resource information, outages.

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Wood: Need people to go out and look for problems. Amateur is good for that Kearney: possible to reorganize into 3 simpler categories: amateur assets, EOC improvements, public information. Stewart: this helps to frame other recommendations & work.

Gilmour: LAHEG is open to rethinking the composition, purpose and governance to meet the town’s needs and resources.

Pirnejad, Bebee, Einfalt, Kearney: positive response to the report.

8. Report on Strategic Broadband Feasibility Study (Preston Young, Government Technology Group) [6:54pm]
Report on the current broadband environment. Mix of haves and have-nots. Comcast 72%, ATT 22%, LACF 1.7% 7% other. Top need was better reliability. Proposes a high level design plan over 6 phases, serving the slowest areas first. Slides at https://www.losaltoshills.ca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/6221/LAH---EPRC-PresentationRecommendations:
• Create broadband advisory board
• Create policies and workflows
• Create Technology Enterprise Fund
• Create Public-Private Partnership
• Incrementally build town-owned Broadband Infrastructure • Evaluate Wireless Solutions
Stewart: What is being asked of the EPRC with this? Pirnejad: Informational, especially that if this goes forward, the initial phase would link LAH EOC to the town’s antenna towers and could provide an emergency communications infrastructure. Wood: ATT is installing aerial fiber west of 280, near Westwind barn. Pirnejad:

LAH has had NDA conversations ATT and they are more engaged than they have been. Public information coming.

Wood: observes that 2 of the towers are optimized for cell traffic on 280 and may not cover the town well.

Pirnejad: Our efforts have piqued the interest of the commercial providers, got them more engaged in. Wood: Fiber to the La Cresta tanks would have additional value. Pirnejad: Water tanks under different management have additional issues.

9. Receive proposal for formation of an Amateur Radio Club (Associate Lattin) [7:22pm]
Not presented due to time. Will revisit in the July meeting.

10. Standing Reports

10.a Town Council Liason Report (Council member Schmidt) Notified committee they would be unavailable to attend

10.b City Manager Report (City Manager Pirnejad, Assistant to City Manager Einfalt) [7:22]
LAH has budget issues requiring cutbacks. Have scaled back Hepenstal contract from $100k to $75k. Working with Los Altos to hire a permanent full-time Emergency Manager, DSW employee, available during emergencies, but shared between jurisdictions. Cost share based on population. Einfalt: retaining Hepenstal to finish the HMP, update the EOP, and work on the Safety Element and Evacuation Plan after the County provides their plan, likely in

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2024. Pirnejad: money has been put in both city’s budgets for the position, but budget not yet approved. May take a few more months to complete. Having an emergency manager can handle the day to day of preparation.

Pirnejad/Einfalt reporting on Emergency Manager Consultant position. Town extended Hepenstal’s consultancy contract but reduced it by 25% because of budgetary constraints. She will continue to work on Hazard Mitigation Plan and updating the EOP. It’s expected at this point that she will also work on the Evacuation Plan—which will not commence until the completion County's Safety Element/evacuation plan (likely in 2024). In the meantime, Town is looking to create a permanent, full-time DSW Emergency Manager position to be shared with Los Altos on a cost share basis (to reflect relative population size). The position is the both city managers’ budgets and the timeline will take a few more months to complete.

10.c County Fire District Liaison’s Report (Associate member Bebee) [7:32] Completing 3 miles of fire hardening on Page Mill Road (both sides), working with Fire Safe Council Automating the Home Ignition Zone assessment request.

Fire Safe Council awarded coordinator role for Community Wildfire Protection Plan. FSC looking for resident input on CWPP.
5 Firewise Communities started off the safety dinner. Recommend that we consider redoing something similar.

CERT will be exercising Recon function Saturday June 10th. CalCOP/Haystax review in progress. Teen CERT academy postponed to August.

Recommends the EPRC have a table at a LAH Safety event Sept 30th. Kearney: recommends Bebee follow up with Sachdeva and Schmidt.

Sheriff’s office will be conducting an active shooter and silver alert training for CERT on August 14th. The EPRC is invited.

10.d EPRC Standing Subcommittee Reports [7:40pm]
Kearney: each subcommittee should be working towards recommendations to the EPRC and Town Council. d.1 Community Outreach (Member: Sachdeva/Council Member: Schmidt) d.2 Medical & Environmental Health (Members: Harter/Kearney) d.3 DSW Groups/Programs (Secretary Stewart) [7:42pm]
Stewart: We’ve spun up Strategic Communications, Outreach, contributed to Firewise, created Medical & Environmental Health, and seem to have used up all the available volunteers to work on them. I recommend we declare victory and end the subcommittee to focus on the created groups. d.4 Town Emergency Plans (Secretary Stewart)
d.5 Mass Notification (Associate Member Katin)
d.6 Emergency Communications (Member Wood/Associate Member Katin) Kearney: prior report is a shining example of the work we should be doing.

11. Review action items from the meeting [7:43]
Einfalt to provide a link to the GTG Broadband Survey slides.

Sachdeva, Schmidt to work with Bebee on having an EPRC table at the LAH Safety event, Sept 30, 2023.

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12. Discuss future agendas [7:45]
Amateur radio club.

Next EPRC meeting moved to July 6th. First Tuesday of the month is a holiday: July 4th.

Next phase of the Emergency Communications strategic plan, if available

13. Adjournment [7:47 pm]
Chair adjourned the meeting without objection.

Common abbreviations and jargon used above:

LAH Los Altos Hills
SPECS South Peninsula Emergency Communications System
LAHCFD Los Altos Hills County Fire District
LAHEG Los Altos Hills Emergency Group, trustees of the W6LAH repeater EOC Emergency Operations Center
EPRC Emergency Preparedness and Response Committee
EMC Emergency Management Consultant (Hepenstal)
FSC Fire Safe Council
Ham Amateur radio
HMP Hazard Mitigation Plan
EOP Emergency Operations Plan
IRU Indefeasible Right of Use
MRC Medical Reserve/Response Corps
DHV Disaster Healthcare Volunteers
DSW/DSV Disaster Service Worker/Volunteer
EmComm Emergency Communications
GTG Government Technology Group

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TOWN OF LOS ALTOS HILLS August 17, 2023
Staff Report to the City Council REVISED (with changes in redline) SUBJECT: CONSIDERATION OF AN ORDINANCE AMENDING TITLE 9 (SUBDIVISIONS AND PLAN LINES) AND TITLE 10 (ZONING AND SITE

DEVELOPMENT) OF THE LOS ALTOS HILLS MUNICIPAL CODE TO ADD ARTICLE 16 TO CHAPTER 1, AND ARTICLE 15 TO CHAPTER 1,

RESPECTIVELY, ESTABLISHING REGULATIONS FOR THE SUBDIVISION AND DEVELOPMENT OF QUALIFIED SENATE BILL PROPERTIES.

FROM: Elaine Ling, Senior Planner
APPROVED: Peter Pirnejad, City Manager
RECOMMENDATION: That the City Council take the following actions:

Waive reading and introduce an Ordinance (Attachment 1 and 1.a) amending Title 9 (Subdivisions and Plan Lines) and Title 10 (Zoning and Site Development) of the Los Altos Hills Municipal Code to add Article 16 to Chapter 1, and Article 15 to Chapter 1, respectively, establishing permanent regulations for the subdivision and development of qualified Senate Bill 9 properties.

BACKGROUND
Introduction and Procedural History
Pursuant to duly noticed public hearings, the Town adopted an interim urgency ordinance pursuant to Government Code section 65858 initially on December 16, 2021 and further extended it for an additional twenty two (22) months and 15 days to establish certain regulations for Senate Bill (SB) 9 units in light of the need for the immediate preservation of the public health, safety and welfare.

The urgency ordinance and the regulations therein are currently set to expire in October 2023, and state law provisions under SB 9 will govern unless the Town adopts a permanent local ordinance prior to that date.

The purpose of the ordinance, as documented through the urgency findings adopted by the City Council and noted above, is to address certain concerns which present an immediate threat to public health, safety, and welfare through interim regulations while the Town considers permanent regulations applicable to facilitate SB 9 units construction and subdivisions. The interim ordinance sets forth objective standards and establishes a streamlined process for ministerially approving SB 9 projects consistent with state law. In particular, the interim ordinance amended the Town’s Zoning Code to be consistent with the then-newly adopted Government Code Sections 65852.21 and 66411.7, and expanded the types, size, and number of residential units that may be permitted and constructed in single-family zones, thereby resulting in a larger number of residential units than under the then-current zoning regulations.

SB 9 units continue to remain an important part of the Town’s housing strategy to meet its regional housing obligations in conjunction with other programs and policies to facilitate housing supply growth. Adoption of a permanent ordinance would further the Town’s efforts and establish longAGENDA ITEM #6.A Revised and Posted 8/15/23

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Staff Report to the City Council Page 2
Introducing SB 9 Permanent Ordinance
August 17, 2023
term regulations consistent with state law. For instance, the Town’s 2023-2031 Housing Element, adopted by the City Council and certified by the California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD), states that the Town’s overall housing strategies for the Sixth Planning Cycle is to, among other things, adopt “new [Town] policies and creating programs to facilitate increased ADU production, SB 9 production, and increased density in the R-A zone.” To implement strategies and achieve housing goals, the Housing Element included several programs to encourage and facilitate SB 9 development and utilization. To illustrate, Program B-10 of the Housing Element commits to preparing a permanent SB 9 ordinance inclusive of the following:
• Default Unit Size: a portion of Program B-10 commits to “allow SB 9 units constructed on newly created SB 9 parcels to have default floor areas greater than 800 square feet as currently stated in the interim ordinance, and require compliance with the Town’s objective design standards which will be prepared as a part of a permanent ordinance. • Incentives: Program B-10 also commits to “allow SB 9 units the ability to obtain additional floor areas based on availability of Maximum Floor Area for the parcel and/or adherence to standard setbacks and easement dedication requirements as incentives. Maximum size of SB 9 units constructed on existing parcels will be determined through the Town’s MFA/MDA formula applicable to single-family residential developments in Town.” • Affordability Restrictions: remove affordability restriction to promote development of units of all income levels, rather than only affordable units.

Other programs in the Housing Element also includes outreach and market to applicants, homeowners and tenants to facilitate SB 9 construction and utilization, with the target of constructing at least 32 SB 9 units throughout the planning period and achieve 50% occupancy.

The Town has continued to work towards adopting a permanent SB 9 Ordinance during this interim period, including extensive outreach and public participation opportunities. On October 6, 2022, the Planning Commission formed an ad hoc committee consisting of two commissioners to initiate the ordinance effort and present draft concepts and language for the Planning Commission to consider. On December 12, 2022, February 15, 2023, and July 27, 2023, the Planning Commission held three (3) SB 9 Ordinance Study Sessions regarding the permanent local ordinance, focusing on a review of the State Legislation, other jurisdictions’ SB 9 ordinances, and the proposed development and development standards for the permanent ordinance. In addition, surveys were conducted during the meetings to collect initial feedback on providing incentives to SB 9 projects that meet the Town’s development standards.

On February 3, 2023, the Town launched a new SB 9 Information webpage, which can be found via the following link: https://los-altos-hills-ca.civilspace.io/en/projects/senate-bill-9-sb-9. The webpage includes an introduction to the State Legislation and the progress of the local ordinance update. In addition, a questionnaire for SB 9 development incentives has been open until July 18, 2023.

On July 25, 2023, the Planning Commission Study Session on the draft SB 9 Permanent Ordinance was continued to July 27, 2023, due to technical difficulties. At the July 27’s meeting, Planning Commission considered the first version of the draft SB 9 Ordinance and provided the directions to staff (Attachment 2).

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Los Altos Hills City CouncilAugust 17, 2023

Los Altos Hills City Council
August 17, 2023