All City of Alameda boards and commission meetings at City Hall are now open to in-person attendance starting with the Tuesday, March 7 City Council meeting. The city made the announcement on Monday, March 6, on its Facebook page.

The Feb. 27 Planning Board meeting was the first city meeting held at City Hall since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020. However, that meeting was not available for the public to attend in person. Only the Planning Board, city staff and people who gave presentations attended the meeting at City Hall (the meeting was available via ZOOM and the city’s Facebook page). Now, residents can attend meetings and give public comment in person.

The city will use a hybrid model for the public wanting to share comments. People in attendance at City Hall can complete a speaker slip to speak during the public comment section or people watching via Zoom, can raise their Zoom hand and they will be called upon to share their comments. Meetings will continue to be available for viewing on the city’s Facebook Live account and on the broadcast at www.alamedaca.gov/agendas.

The return to in-person meetings comes as California Governor Gavin Newsom ended the COVID-19 State of Emergency on February 28, 2023. Newsom announced he would end the State of Emergency at the end of February on Oct. 17, 2022.

“Throughout the pandemic, we’ve been guided by the science and data — moving quickly and strategically to save lives. The State of Emergency was an effective and necessary tool that we utilized to protect our state, and we wouldn’t have gotten to this point without it,” said Newsom in a press release on Oct. 17, 20222. “With the operational preparedness that we’ve built up and the measures that we’ll continue to employ moving forward, California is ready to phase out this tool.”

The end of the state of emergency came almost three years to the day the COVID-19 State of Emergency began. Newsom enacted the state of emergency on March 4, 2020.
Alameda County also ended its local public health emergency on Feb. 28. Alameda County Health Officer Dr. Nicholas Moss confirmed on Feb. 28 that the county’s local public health emergency for COVID-19 ended in alignment with the end of California’s COVID-19 State of Emergency.

“While COVID-19 continues to circulate in our communities, declarations of local health emergencies are intended to be temporary,” said Moss in an Alameda County Public Health Department press release. “We now know more about the virus that causes COVID-19 and how to protect ourselves and each other than we did in March 2020, and increased immunity in the local population and widely available treatments have rendered the disease considerably less threatening to public health.”

The City Council decided several times not to transition to a hybrid model for its council meetings. At its Aug. 9, 2022, meeting, the council voted 3-2 to continue city meetings remotely. Councilmembers Tony Daysog and Trish Spencer voted against the remote-only meetings. During the discussion Spencer stated that an in-person attendance option would promote more public participation by being inclusive to people with technology issues.

Also, at its Oct. 18, 2022, meeting, council passed a resolution to terminate the city’s declaration of the local emergency in response to the COVID-19 pandemic with a unanimous 5-0 vote. The council’s decision impacted Alameda business operations, powers of the City Manager and renter protections, but did not end remote-only meetings. The council reiterated its stance to continue remote-only meetings until the end of the state emergency.

City leaders asks people attending city meetings in person to be up to date on vaccines and boosters and wear a high-quality, well-fitted mask.