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HomeMy WebLinkAboutItem 11a - Annual Law Day Event DATE: June 6, 2023 TO: Honorable Mayor and City Council FROM: Dominic Lazzaretto, City Manager By: Justine Bruno, Deputy City Manager SUBJECT: REPORT, DISCUSSION, AND DIRECTION REGARDING THE ANNUAL LAW DAY EVENT CEQA: Not a Project Recommendation: Provide Direction SUMMARY At the Regular City Council Meeting on May 16, 2023, Council Member Kwan received support to place the topic of reviewing Law Day on the June 6 City Council Meeting Agenda. This Staff Report will provide a brief overview of the annual Law Day event, including its purpose, history, and the City’s role in the event. At the conclusion of the discussion, it is recommended that the City Council provide direction regarding the City’s involvement in the annual Law Day event. BACKGROUND Law Day has been held in partnership with the Arcadia Chinese Association (“ACA”) and the City of Arcadia for more than 22 years. Law Day aims to connect local attorneys with Arcadia residents who seek legal counseling. For a few hours each year, community members can receive free legal counseling through a 20-minute meeting with a local attorney. The event was the brainchild of then-Council Member Gary Kovacic, who remains highly involved in organizing the event and attracting attorneys. The Arcadia Chinese Association (“ACA”) is a 501(c)3 service organization that seeks to serve Chinese residents by bridging cultural gaps, enhancing the understanding of government, citizenship, and civic affairs, and serve the community through volunteerism. Since its inception, on the day of the event, the ACA provides significant energy and resources to organizing the workloads of individual attorneys and queuing the attendees. This remains the most complicated part of the event with 20-30 ACA volunteers assisting with this effort. Following the event, the ACA hosts a free luncheon for all participating attorneys as a token of their appreciation. Report, Discussion, and Direction – Co-Sponsorship of Law Day May 2, 2023 Page 2 of 3 The attorneys that participate typically specialize in the areas of family law, immigration, estates and trusts, real estate, business and labor law, bankruptcy, criminal law, and landlord-tenant issues, among other areas. The attorneys volunteer their services pro bono and are not permitted to market their services to attendees through participation in this event. Historically, the City covered any direct expenses related to this event. The majority of the costs for Law Day were staff time in the City Manager’s Office to prepare and mail letters, design flyers for the event, and print handout materials, if needed. In addition, the event is advertised using an over-the street banner that needs to be updated annually and replaced it deteriorates. There were some minor overtime costs each year from hourly staff in the City Manager’s Office attending to help coordinate the event. During the May 19, 2020, Study Session, former Mayor Roger Chandler introduced a discussion about the City’s involvement with the annual Law Day event. Specifically, Mr. Chandler expressed his belief that Law Day provided more benefit regionally than to Arcadia residents, and thus, the City’s financial support of the event should be discontinued. Following this discussion, the City Council learned that the ACA sought sole responsibility for the Law Day event, including any associated expenses. Based on this information, the City Council proceeded to eliminate the City’s sponsorship of the annual Law Day event during its June 2, 2020, meeting. The City Council accepted the offer from the ACA to transfer over the administration and direct costs of the Law Day event and to waive any costs for the use of City facilities. The motion was made by former Council Member Tom Beck and seconded by Council Member Paul Cheng; this change was projected to save the City approximately $2,000 annually. The annual Law Day event was paused in 2020, 2021, and 2022 due to the Coronavirus Pandemic, making 2023 the first year the Law Day event will occur since 2019 and the first time under this new model. DISCUSSION Historically, the Law Day event has been held at the Arcadia Public Library. Through the use of a City facility, the room rental can be offered as in-kind services. The expectation for 2023 is for the room rental fee of $375 ($125 per hour) to be waived as part of the City Council’s directive, issued on June 2, 2020. Additionally, the City helps promote Law Day through its print and digital platforms as it has done for other events like the Arcadia Festival of Bands, Downtown Holiday Fair, Patriotic Festival, Halloween Haunting, Derby Day 5K, Chamber of Commerce events, and Menorah Lighting and Geld Drop. The City may choose not to offer this support if it wishes to stop supporting the event altogether; there would be no discernable savings for doing so. Report, Discussion, and Direction – Co-Sponsorship of Law Day May 2, 2023 Page 3 of 3 Any direct costs for this year’s event have been absorbed by the ACA, who are also overseeing the administrative details for the event that were previously handled by the City Manager’s Office. To date, the only known expense to the City is a cost of approximately $75 to update the street banner, which the ACA will cover. The installation of the banner was handled as part of the normal rotation of the banners by City staff and these costs were not charged to the ACA. If the City Council has a desire to eliminate all in-kind services provided for the Law Day event, the City could require installation and removal be done by a private company and a $165 fee could be charged for permitting the banner. No staff from the City Manager’s Office will be attending the Law Day event, since the administration is now handled by the ACA. ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS The proposed action does not constitute a project under the California Environmental Quality Act (“CEQA”), and it can be seen with certainty that it will have no impact on the environment. Thus, this matter is exempt under CEQA. FISCAL IMPACT The City no longer incurs any direct costs related to the Law Day event; however, it is possible for the City to charge the ACA for the in-kind services that are currently waived. Should the City choose to take over Law Day completely, costs would likely exceed the $2,000 that was once budgeted for the event. The increase in costs would be a result of additional staff time incurred to replace the volunteer efforts of the ACA during the event. The exact additional cost is unknown at this time, but it is expected to be less than $5,000. Alternately, another civic organization would need to be identified to provide the support staff for the event. RECOMMENDATION Based on the information presented in the staff report, it is recommended that City Council provide direction regarding the City’s involvement in the annual Law Day event with the Arcadia Chinese Association.