By Julie BUTCHER

“This pool matters to our whole community. Closing it three days a week for over five months would take away something really important,” Emmanuel Steele and another student from Incarnation Elementary School’s swim team addressed the Glendale City Council at its meeting on Tuesday night. They urged the council to reconsider plans to shutter the Pacific Community Pool on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays from November to April of next year due to budget cuts.

“Pacific Community Pool is more than just a place. It’s where our seniors stay healthy, where kids learn a lifesaving skill, where our special needs neighbors find a place that welcomes them and our local businesses nearby stay open,” Steele urged. “I’m asking tonight: Please find a way to keep the pool open.”

The pool closure and reduced hours at several Glendale libraries were the results of closing a budget hole in the city’s FY2026-27 budget. City finance director Jack Liang reported ongoing updates and introduced plans for increased public engagement in the budgeting process overall, responding to council instructions initiated by Councilmember Alek Bartrosouf at his first council meeting.

As described, the 2027-28 Budget Development Public Engagement Plan draws upon best practices in comparable agencies and is aimed at broadening participation, increasing transparency and fostering a more inclusive budget process informed by council priorities and public input.

Liang added that while plans are being developed to increase and improve public engagement, the finance staff is working on process improvements including a deep dive into the city’s fee schedule and working to improve existing information and budget information sharing, specifically.

First, next year’s budget study sessions will be scheduled during typical after-work hours between 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. Next, finance staff is working on a Budget-In-Brief, a two to four-page “budget at a glance” document to summarize the city’s overall budget, the general fund and enterprise funds, major revenue sources (where the money comes from) and major expenditures (where the money goes) as well as department fact sheets specific to each department. Additionally, plans are underway to develop digital engagement tools such as a budget simulation exercise to collect input on budget priorities and to solicit actionable ideas from the public on ways to eliminate the budget gap and balance the city’s budget.

From January to March 2027 the city plans on holding budget workshops to gather input and ideas from geographically diverse parts of the city and plans to participate in community meetings and events across the city.

Councilmember Vartan Gharpetian objected to spending money on this.

“We’re closing the pool three days a week to save $30 or $40,000 and we’re going to spend another $97K on this? I’m not against the plan, just concerned about the cost,” he said.

On Sunday, Oct. 4 from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. Glendale will host its inaugural Cultural Festival along the Artsakh Paseo, 125 N. Artsakh. Sponsored by Glendale’s Sister Cities, the event is billed as “a celebration of the many cultures, traditions and communities that make Glendale such a vibrant and welcoming city.” The free event in downtown Glendale will include live music, cultural performances, global flavors, face painting and more, organizers boast. More information is available at GlendaleCA.gov/CulturalFestival.

Cooling Centers will open throughout the city for the anticipated upcoming hot weather days from Oct. 2 – 8. Information on the cooling centers and other resources can be found at https://www.glendaleca.gov/government/departments/community-services-parks/beat-the-heat.

The La Crescenta Street rehab project ribbon-cutting will take place on Wednesday, Oct. 7 in conjunction with the school district’s Walk to School day festivities and community events, including a bike train starting at Montrose Community Park, 3529 Clifton Place at 7:40 a.m. It will head to Fremont Elementary School and a ceremony for the rehab project will be held at the Sparr Heights Community Center, 1613 Glencoe Way, at 8:30 a.m. with light refreshments reportedly served there.

In response to questions from council regarding the city’s plans to be ready for the storms of El Niňo anticipated beginning in late November, Fire Chief Jeff Brooks and City Manager Roubik Golanian reported daily internal and external coordination in active preparation. 

Several community meetings are planned throughout October to inform the public about proposed rate hikes to Glendale Water and Power’s (GWP) water rates, including a dramatic 53% increase slated for January 2027, and to solicit input and feedback. The meeting details can be found at https://www.glendaleca.gov/government/departments/glendale-water-and-power/rates/water-rates/proposed-water-rates.

GWP has created a water bill estimator, a tool residents can use to estimate the impact of the rate increase on their own bills. It can be found at https://www.glendaleca.gov/government/departments/glendale-water-and-power/rates/water-rates/proposed-water-rates.

At the beginning of Tuesday’s council meeting, the city issued a proclamation declaring October as Filipino American Heritage Month, recognizing Filipino Americans “who live and work in Glendale and their contributions to the community … [it] also recognizes the Filipino America Business Association of Glendale (FABAG) for its ongoing expression of arts and culture, history and heritage, education and outstanding community service.”

Mayor Ardy Kassakhian added a tribute to Victoria Manalo Draves, the first American woman to win two gold medals in diving and the first Asian American to win Olympic gold medals. After the London 1948 Olympics, Draves and her husband operated a swim and diving program in Montrose at Indian Springs, which is Vons now (the site has a plaque honoring this local history).

Mayor Kassakhian noted that Draves operated here because so many places had segregated pools and she was not allowed to swim there.

FABAG president Edith Fuentes and a large group of organizational and community representatives accepted the proclamation, thanking the council for its “unwavering support” of the Filipino American community and noting that “positive change is achieved when we unite around a shared cause.”

Also on Tuesday night, the council amended its anti-scavenging ordinance and reviewed pending updates to its sign ordinance to allow animated signage near the Galleria and Americana shopping malls.