HomeMy WebLinkAbout2017-01-11 Planning & transportation commission Summary Minutes1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Planning & 1
Transportation Commission Action 2
Meeting Agenda: 3
January 11, 2017 4
Council 5
Chambers 250 6
Hamilton Avenue 7
6:00 PM 8
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10 11
Call to Order / Roll Call: 6:08pm 12
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Chair Alcheck: Ok, I’d like to call to order the first Planning and Transportation Commission (PTC) 14
of the 2017 year. Why don’t we start with roll call? 15
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Yolanda Cervantes, Administrative Assistant: Chair Alcheck, Commissioner Gardias, Commissioner 17
Lauing, Commissioner Rosenblum, Commissioner Summa, Vice-Chair Waldfogel. All present. 18
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Chair Alcheck: Before I open any Oral Communications I want to welcome the newest additions to 20
the PTC. We are, we have everybody is here tonight that is on our Commission, but Ed and Doria 21
welcome. We're still awaiting one more appointment, but we're really happy to have you and 22
both Ed and Doria have a lot of experience working with our City and I think they're going to make 23
great additions to the team. 24
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
I also want to acknowledge our amazing Assistant Attorney’s departure, Cara Silver, I just want to 1
say and I think I speak for all of us when I say this; it's really a delight to work with you. You've 2
helped us understand really complex issues and you're literally the most delightful person to 3
engage with and I think your presence will be sorely missed; certainly by us. And your note today 4
was really quite wonderful and very thoughtful and I think we all appreciated what you said. So 5
good luck onward and forward and yes you're still a resident so please come to our meetings since 6
you know how much we love to have guests. 7
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Oral Communications 9
The public may speak to any item not on the agenda. Three (3) minutes per speaker.1,2 10
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Chair Alcheck: Ok, with that I'm going to open up Oral Communications. Are there any individuals 12
who would like to speak? We have David Carnahan he’d like to speak for Oral Communications. 13
You have three minutes. 14
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David Carnahan, Deputy City Clerk: Good evening, Commissioners; David Carnahan, Deputy City 16
Clerk. I'm here tonight for two topics. One of which those of you on the Commission can guess is 17
board and commission recruitment. The City is currently looking to fill one vacant term on the 18
Planning and Transportation Commission (PTC), three terms on the Historic Resources Board 19
(HRB) and a total of five terms on the Parks and Recreation Commission (P&RC). The City is 20
accepting applications with a deadline of 4:30 p.m. on January 27th. Applications can be 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
downloaded from the City's website or we also accept them electronically via DocuSign. I'm going 1
to have a few flyers with this information in the back and Yolanda is going to give you each a flyer. 2
The reason the Clerk's Office comes to board and commission meetings regarding recruitments is 3
because you are community members that have a much greater depth of knowledge of members 4
of the public that would be fantastic people to join you and we have members of the public both 5
here watching and at home. So again looking for folks for the HRB, the P&RC, and the PTC with 6
applications due on January 27th; questions can be directed to the City Clerk's Office 650-329-7
2571. 8
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And the second order of business I am here to recognize and share the Council's appreciation for 10
the four of you that were not able to make it to the Board and Commission recognition event. So 11
we have the proclamations which I promise I will not read to you right now since I only have 3 12
minutes not 20, but I would just want to recognize and thank Commissioners Alcheck, Lauing, 13
Rosenblum, and Waldfogel. Everyone else’s appreciation and service was appreciated by the 14
Council. So if you give me just one moment I'll grab your gifts and proclamations. Thank you. 15
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Agenda Changes, Additions, and Deletions 17
The Chair or Commission majority may modify the agenda order to improve meeting management. 18
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Chair Alcheck: Ok why don't we... are there, staff are there any agenda additions or deletions you 20
want to address at this time? 21
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Jonathan Lait, Assistant Director: No. 1
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City Official Reports 3
4
1. Assistant Director's Report, Meeting Schedule and Assignments 5
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Chair Alcheck: Ok. Do you want to begin with the Assistant Director’s Report? 7
8
Jonathan Lait, Assistant Director: Sure, just a couple of announcements. First, welcome to the 9
new Commissioners. It’s great to have you on board and joining the Planning and Transportation 10
Commission (PTC). I also wanted to let the Commission know that the City Council will be taking 11
up on January 23rd two item, transportation related items that the prior Commission had 12
reviewed and commented on. It's the Middlefield Road North pilot project and the Evergreen 13
Park/Mayfield Residential Preferential Parking (RPP) program. Those two items will go to the City 14
Council on January 23rd. On January 30th the City Council will also take up the Housing Impact 15
Fee that the Planning Commission had considered. That was pulled off of the Consent Calendar 16
on Monday and has been scheduled for hearing. 17
18
I also wanted to just spend a quick second to say thank you to Cara Silver for her years of service 19
here with the City of Palo Alto. Actually Cara was one of the main reasons why I made the 20
decision to come from Southern California to Northern California knowing that she was here and 21
that I had worked with her in the past and she really gave me some great information about the 22
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
City and the people that we work with and the community and it all sounded wonderful and darn 1
you for leaving now, but it's been a pleasure working with you. And certainly look forward to 2
seeing you in your post city employment. And while saying goodbye to Cara I want to say hello to 3
Albert Yang. He is the Senior Deputy City Attorney with the City Attorney's Office and he'll be 4
joining us indefinitely until there is a another plan or maybe this is the future, we don't know. So 5
Albert’s going to join us and help us out with our reports and he'll be supporting the PTC in the 6
interim. So thank you Cara and thank you Albert. 7
8
Chair Alcheck: So you mentioned the two meetings that are coming up where they're discussing 9
topics we reviewed. 10
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Mr. Lait: January 23rd, yes. 12
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Chair Alcheck: Do you anticipate that it would be helpful if we had a Commissioner present? 14
15
Mr. Lait: So I’ve given that some thought. I'd, I think that with the representation on the City 16
Council you probably do have some representation. Of course if there were individual 17
Commissioners that wanted to go and speak on behalf of the Commission that certainly could be 18
an opportunity to do so. I thought with Council Members Fine and Tanaka they might be able to 19
represent the PTC thoughts or at least the dialogue that took place. 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Alcheck: Yeah. That's probably very accurate. OK well I'll just piggy back on this. I'll take an 1
opportunity to say how about if, if you're looking at the City Official Reports page here you'll see 2
that we have all the months laid out for the year and typically what we do is we assign a 3
Commissioner a month and that Commissioner is responsible to attend the Council meeting, the 4
Council meetings that take place during that month when they're reviewing topics that we 5
reviewed as well so that during those agendized items you can provide some opportunity if they 6
want to ask a question. So why don’t by the it's Wednesday what I'm hoping is that by Friday you 7
guys can email me and let me know which months you would prefer. Give me your top three and 8
if I don't hear from you I'll just assign them to you. So one, two, three like if you really wanted 9
January, February, and March let me know. And for the new Commissioners why don’t you plan 10
on March being the earliest month because the stuff in January and February you wouldn't have 11
participated in. Ok, alright, are we prepared to begin item number two? 12
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Mr. Lait: Sure just one final announcement. At the moment we don't have anything lined up for 14
your January 25th meeting, that’s your next meeting. The Comprehensive Plan update is 15
something that we would just do it at a regular meeting, your next meeting. The Downtown 16
Parking Management Study is being pushed off. We need to do a bit more work on that. So as it 17
stands right now we're not seeing a need for a meeting, but I'll have a continued conversation 18
with you to see if we want to cancel that meeting. 19
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Chair Alcheck: Yeah, let's see what happens tonight with Item Number Three. If it's, let's see what 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
happens tonight and see if there's any… if we can't pack an agenda for that date we’ll cancel that 1
meeting. Ok. 2
3
Study Session 4
Public Comment is Permitted. Five (5) minutes per speaker.1,3 5
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Action Items 7
Public Comment is Permitted. Applicants/Appellant Teams: Fifteen (15) minutes, plus three (3) minutes rebuttal. 8
All others: Five (5) minutes per speaker.1,3 9
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2. PUBLIC HEARING / QUASI-JUDICIAL MATTER. 670 Los Trancos Road [16PLN-00266]: 11
Site and Design Review to Allow the Construction of a Single Family House and Guest 12
House With a Total of 10,959 Square Feet. Environmental Assessment: Categorically 13
Exempt From the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) Pursuant to Guidelines 14
Section 15303 (New Construction or Conversion of Small Structures). Zoning District: 15
OS 16
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Chair Alcheck: Aright, let's start with Item Number 2 then. Do you want to do disclosures before 18
the staff report or after? Ok if any Member of the Commission has had you know 19
communications with the applicant, I guess the applicant for Item Number 2 would you disclose 20
those at this time? 21
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Cara Silver, Senior Assistant City Attorney: Actually it's the applicant or any neighbor or other 23
public member. 24
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Chair Alcheck: Ok. Any disclosure related to this item? Please. 26
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Commissioner Gardias: So we exchange, I exchange emails with the applicant and received the 28
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
pictures and the presentation that I forwarded to Yolanda and she forwarded to all of you. 1
2
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Yeah, excuse me, I toured the site to see the story poles and met with the 3
applicant. 4
5
Commissioner Rosenblum: I also had email exchanges and got a presentation also with additional 6
pictures and drawings of the plan. 7
8
Chair Alcheck: Ok, staff do you want to kick it off? 9
10
Graham Owen, Planner: Sure, thank you very much. My name is Graham Owen, I'm a Planner 11
with the City and I've been working with the applicants on the project that is before you today at 12
670 Los Trancos Road. So this is an application for site and design review for a new two-story 13
single family house with a detached guest house and associated site improvements and it would 14
be on the property at 670 Los Trancos Road which is an undeveloped parcel in the Hewlett tract, 15
which is a subdivision that's located between Foothills Park and the Arastradero Preserve. 16
17
So just a little bit about the project in general we're going to be going through or have been going 18
through the site and design review process. And that's a requirement that you have for any sort 19
of development in the open space zoning district for any sort of proposal that proposes more than 20
a 1,000 square feet (sf) of impervious cover or a 1,000 sf of floor area. The site and design review 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
application is taken in by staff and is reviewed by the Planning Commission, Planning and 1
Transportation Commission (PTC) for ultimate recommendation to the City Council. So this 2
application is for a single family house. The main house would be 9,363 sf of gross floor area. 3
That does not include a 2,100 sf of basement area which is excluded. It also includes 1,500, 1,596 4
sf for the guest house which is detached. 5
6
So with the site and design review process the purposes of the site and design review process is to 7
provide a process for evaluating development in environmental or ecologically sensitive areas of 8
the City. The open space zoning district requires it for any sort of residential application as I’ve 9
mentioned. So the Planning Commission's purview is basically to review the site plan and the 10
drawings that are included with the proposal and evaluate whether or not it complies with the 11
site and design review objectives. And there are four site and design review objectives and those 12
are contained in the staff report and they are also included here in the presentation. In addition 13
since site and design review is used throughout the City in specific areas it's a combining district, 14
but in addition to the four site and design review objectives in the site in the open space district 15
you also have 13 open space review criteria and these are essentially the findings that you have to 16
make for site and design review in the open space. Most of these findings have to do with view 17
sheds. They also encourage cutting when it's necessary to fit a proposal in with the natural 18
topography of the land and that also includes provisions for natural building materials so that any 19
sort of development does blend in to the degree possible with the existing surroundings. 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
So here is the site and this is a just an aerial photograph, but the Hewlett tract essentially runs 1
from this site right here to the east along Los Trancos Road and I've included the entire tract here, 2
but this is a it gives you a description of what's going on on the site. This area is high and while 3
the Arastradero Preserve to the north is low. There's about a 100 foot drop from the top of the 4
road to the Arastradero Preserve below. So it is surrounded by other open space zoning as well as 5
residential development. And here's the basic outline of the site. It's a 5.4 acre parcel. The other 6
parcels in the Hewlett tract which encompasses ten building sites range in acreage from about 3.9 7
to about 6 acres. This was done intentionally in 1980 when the subdivision was created. It was 8
originally Bill Hewlett’s land constituted about 100 acres and so at the time you had a 9
development standard that required as as we do today a 10 acre minimum lot size. The idea with 10
the Hewlett tract though was instead of doing a 10 acres across each building site to instead 11
cluster the homes in such a fashion that you could preserve the areas that have higher slopes and 12
are a little bit more environmentally sensitive. So those areas are included mostly in that larger 13
tree canopy over on the to the right of the project that have a higher slope. So those as a result 14
the density for the entire subdivision was transferred to these 10 smaller building sites. 15
16
So here is the site in question. So you have as my arrow is pointing out Los Trancos Road and 17
access to the site would be off of a single driveway. The guest house would have a Hollywood 18
strip that would take you to the site where the guest house is located. Most of the house would 19
be located about midway down the hill and would constitute as I described about 9,300 sf of gross 20
floor area. The guest house would have about 1,500 sf of floor area and it would be surrounded 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
on three sides by an oak forest. The area where the main house is situated is mostly a rolling 1
grassy hillside although there are a couple of other additional value oaks and live oaks there that 2
are present in the vicinity. 3
4
And so here are some drawings that show the elevations of the house. This would be from the I 5
believe the west, the west elevation right here so you could see the garage, it’s a four car garage, 6
as well as the first and second story. One of the interesting things about this proposal is that a 7
good amount of the gross floor area is actually tucked into the hillside. About 1,900 sf or so is 8
tucked into the hillside in a sense that you have the natural topography and with the grading 9
that's proposed for the site the grade would go up to the roof level for the garage and about I 10
think 800 sf of the main house. And that gives the impression that it's subterranean although it 11
does have a green roofing system it's not just grade, it's going to have its own roofing system that 12
has the capacity to have natural vegetation. This would be the northern elevation so the view 13
that you would see from the Arastradero Preserve if you're able to see the entire site. And here 14
the elevations for the guest house which is smaller of course. 15
16
So there are a couple of key issues that we wanted to focus on in our staff reports the most 17
important is the impacts or the potential impacts, views from the Arastradero Preserve which is 18
directly to the north. There are some trails that are in the immediate vicinity and we've taken 19
some photographs of the story poles that were installed on the site to simulate the view of the of 20
the building envelope. The other key issues and this is kind of part and parcel with both the with 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
the views and with the impervious cover that's proposed is the landscaping. In order to have a 1
Floor Area Ratio (FAR) of five percent which is what is proposed on this site the applicant has 2
proposed to restore or maintain 90 percent of the landscaping either by restoring it or excuse me 3
by retaining it in its in its current configuration in the downslope areas and also in the areas that 4
have trees, but then and also in the areas that have been regraded to restore those with natural 5
vegetation. Impervious cover that used to be the more limiting development standard in the 6
open space district, but in I believe 2006 the FAR standard was included as well. And so that's it's 7
important for ecological purposes, environmental purposes, controlling runoff and what we have 8
is about 15,000 sf of impervious cover across the entire site. So we are recommending 9
continuance of this application for the purpose of evaluating the views and we wanted to seek the 10
PTC’s input on the views and with that I'll take any questions that you might have. 11
12
Chair Alcheck: Staff will you remind us after you're finished we're going to allow the applicant to 13
do their presentation and then there will be an opportunity for public comment. We don't have 14
any cards from members of the public who want to comment on this item. Are you guys 15
comfortable with us taking questions after the applicant’s presentation? Ok. Why don’t we do 16
the applicant’s presentation and then that way we can have questions addressed to staff that 17
might be released by the presentation. 18
19
Guy Gecht: Good evening Commissioners. Ok, I got a... 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Alcheck: Ok. Yeah, you guys have 15 minutes to present. 1
2
Mr. Gecht: Sure, I’ll speak fast. Good evening, Commissioners. Thank you very much for the 3
opportunity to present our project. We’re very passionate about that and so we can talk about it 4
for more than 15 minutes, but we can limit it to 15 minutes. I'm going to talk about just a bit of 5
the background of the project then I’m going to introduce my hardworking team and we're going 6
to present landscape and an architectural. This is a unique project when the landscape actually 7
determined the architecture so we go in kind of reverse order. And then I'm going to spend the 8
rest of the time and really have the topic that they brought up the view from the areas in the 9
preserves that you can see the house. 10
11
In general as you can probably detective fairly tiny accent. My wife and I came from Israel, but 12
our kids were born here in Palo Alto. We've been raising them here. We lived here 25 years and 13
we've very excited about the area. We're passionate about two things: technology and nature 14
and this place is really reflecting that. We’re very excited about can't wait to start to work and 15
move there. It's probably our last house we're going to hopefully grow old there, not too fast, and 16
we have grandkids and we like to do a lot of fundraising so hopefully we'll be [unintelligible] to 17
show people the great view and what we're doing fundraising. The story is that and I see that 18
unfortunately it’s not full scale. Hopefully you can see the rest of it. The story is that as 19
[unintelligible] mentioned this is Bill Hewlett the founder of Palo, the founder of H.P. land and in 20
1980 he entered into an agreement with the, with Palo Alto and California where he donate about 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
one third I think of 150 fifty acres to the parks and then one third became common area to create 1
additional buffer from the parks and then the rest of it the other one third was divided between 2
10 residential properties. Each property got a good view, but still with the buffers from the park. 3
And so Bill was loved nature and worked both the residential nature into this. 4
5
This is the Hewlett tract. As you can see that's not the only residential on the park. We’ll show 6
you I think we worked really hard to make sure that one, ours would be one of the least view from 7
the park. There's no way to have zero visibility of the house from zero percent of the park, but we 8
got pretty close. 9
10
So I'm not going to go too much into this for interest of time. I just want to say that this is more 11
than 18 month’s journey for us. We took we started actually to talk to the City before we bought 12
the property. We took a very serious approach to the code to the 14 design criteria. We worked 13
very closely… we evaluate over 50 different models and types to try to solve the criteria, the 14
neighborhood, the landscape, and our own preference for our house and you can see we actually 15
did hard models for most of those fifties to try to figure out how it works. It was fascinating and 16
we're very happy that we have an opportunity to show you the conclusion of this journey. We 17
also are very thankful to the City, Graham, Dave Dockter, and many other people worked very 18
closely with us again from before we bought it we had many meetings including on the site before 19
we submitted plants. Graham you can feel free to correct me later if you want, but I believe we 20
implemented 100 percent of the City comments so far and tried to move that along so we can get 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
to this opportunity. 1
2
So let me introduce the design team and you can see that we tried to put a team together that 3
will accomplish the ideas that we have. So we have here Paul McClean from McClean Design and 4
Paul has fabulous designs, but one of his… the main reason we picked him is that he does a lot of 5
hillside houses. And in often time we need to take into consideration public viewing. And so 6
actually we hired him after we visit his house that he built a couple of years ago that is facing a 7
preserve on the downhill where he worked the same thing and you can see I think Paul and his 8
team did a great job on this. 9
10
Landscape is really important. It's part of our mitigation, it’s part of the preserve. David Dockter 11
was very passionate about trying to restore to native. The most of the grass today is not native 12
there. And so the Number 1 goal if you go research some of you probably heard the names Paul 13
Kephart give a lot of presentation, presentation on restoration. We brought Paul and Paul will 14
talk in a little bit about all the things we do for restoration. And then we hired and arborist that 15
worked with Palo Alto quite a few times and he did a fabulous job. 16
17
I'm not going to go over all the points here. Just really take away that we tried to do, we put big 18
portion of the house below the ground. Now that's beyond the basement. We're not actually… 19
we counted [this in] FAR. It doesn't consider basement in Palo Alto, but it's below ground. And 20
then we took the rest of the building, a big portion of what's left and put it beyond trees. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Unfortunately we don't have as many trees right now so the part that's left [unintelligible] we 1
worked really hard to create new trees around the blue [ox or box?] and with the grading to mask 2
as much as possible and you will see that. So let me turn it over to Paul Kephart on the landscape, 3
I'll come back to talk about the view angles in a minute. 4
5
Paul Kephart, Rana Creek Design: Thank you. Good evening, I'm Paul Kephart, I'm a restoration 6
ecologist and landscape architect and our focus here is on working with nature and integrating the 7
site and structure. I'll share with you some of those goals. We've had about 30 years’ experience 8
in this area. I have done grassland restoration on Windy Hill Preserve. We've done view shed 9
analysis and mitigation planting trees on a nearby ridge. We’ve specialized in habitat restoration, 10
sustainable landscapes, and urban ecology. 11
12
Some of these landscape goals that Guy referred to are a reflection of their values. The living roof 13
that integrates the site and structure we're going to use natural materials, focus on impervious 14
surfaces. We have an aggressive tree mitigation program and planting plan for screening the 15
house in the critical view areas. Rana Creek also specializes in in the production of trees and 16
specimen trees and native plants. We have a 30 acre nursery. You've probably seen some of our 17
vegetation recently on the Facebook living roof. 18
19
One of the key design issues for Rana Creek is the water and just how precious potable water is 20
and we're going to employ a strategy of storm water harvesting from the roof scuppers and 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
combined with drought tolerant and native vegetation we're going to take that water store it 1
underground and then deploy it in the summer months when we don't have available water. And 2
this will potentially decrease the potable water needs by 60 percent. And now I'm going to turn it 3
over to Paul McClean and he's going to describe the methodology that was utilized for constraint 4
analysis on the way in which the house was placed and how we came about. 5
6
Paul McClean, McClean Design: Thank you very much. My name is Paul MacLean. I’m the 7
architect for the project. I have Michael Anglisano with me tonight as the project manager. And 8
first of all and thank you all for your time and also thank you for the energy and time you put into 9
your community. 10
11
I'm just going to take you through this diagram here which kind of changes as I click the slides, but 12
as you can see right now we're seeing the whole lot and as we do have five and a half acres I 13
thought it would be useful to spend some time and explain where we located the house and why 14
we had to locate it where we did. So if we move to the next slide this is the setbacks which the 15
City requires which is pretty self-explanatory, but now we're introducing the trees that need to be 16
protected and you can see how that limits the areas we have to work on the site. This blue area is 17
the ridge, ridge line and we're required to be below the ridge line with our structure so that 18
becomes a critical maximum height for anything we do. This area in purple is the very steep part 19
of the lot leading down towards the preserve which is too steep for us to build on in terms of 20
gaining access. And this area in light blue is the area between the street and where we can 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
actually build. We have to utilize a 10 percent driveway slope per the Fire Department so by 1
locating the house essentially to 25 feet building envelope has to be below the ridge line we have 2
to work our way down to that area. And then finally this area in orange is a problem in terms of 3
its steepness, but also its adjacency to the neighbors and potential impact on privacy. 4
5
So it leaves us with three basic areas that we can work with and as you'll see in the design and 6
what you’re presented we’ve utilized those. The one to the left, out to the bottom towards the 7
street we've tucked the guest house in between the trees and then we bridged between the two 8
other areas to locate the house where we can. And our goal with this house is to create a house 9
that's sustainable, but also use a palette of materials that's natural and reflects the palette that 10
you see in the adjacent and landscape. This particular slide is of the single-story part of the home 11
which is in the critical view shed area. We chose to try and locate that in the critical view shed 12
area so that we would minimize the impact from the preserve below. So we were able to take 13
what we're describing is a two-story section further to the left behind the tree where it's not 14
visible from below. And interestingly that's actually the two-story section there as you walk 15
across the top of the garage so it's a bit of a misnomer to call it a two-story structure. It's really 16
integrated as it steps down the hill. 17
18
Apart from the palette of materials using natural materials we want to utilize we tried to make 19
that section of the home that was visible as transparent as possible. If it's transparent on both 20
sides it will become minimal in its impact. And I think I will leave it at that for now and hand it 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
back to Guy to talk about those impacts and the critical view shed a little more. Thank you. 1
2
Mr. Gecht: Thank you both. So I want to talk about the view from the [unintelligible] and just 3
going to give the highlights. We did a lot of research in the last 18 months, but essentially if you 4
look at that because way below the ridge there’s a big portion of the trails is not going to see the 5
house and Foothill Preserve is most of it. So I'm not going to get into this. 6
7
I'm actually going to focus on the area where the some part of the house can be seen. And that’s 8
0.36 miles which is 1.2 percent. So essentially 99 percent of the trails in the parks cannot see any 9
of the house. In that area some parts can see some part of the house and you can see those 10
dotted this is the area where the house is kind of disappearing, part of the house disappearing not 11
just showing because of the mitigation trees that’s already in the park. So that part you can see, 12
the single story part of the house. And we provided you with the way we look at the experience 13
of where you go and how we got to this number of 1654 total yards in the trails as you can see it 14
and we thought about the expenses. 15
16
So to be honest it's not showing a lot of photos where the house has not been seen; I'm going to 17
focus on where it's the most critical part today, where we had to do the most mitigation. So you 18
can see that’s a low mitigation area. You see a small part of the house with the trees we’ll be 19
adding the 10 oak trees and we will be able to mitigate. That's not my concern. This is the really 20
the area where the most we spend the most time because that's the vertical part this is 500 feet 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
where you walk toward the house [unintelligible]. And that's the toughest one to be honest. We 1
spent a lot of time on this and we… wonderful work by Rana Creek and Paul and then with some 2
cuts mitigation I think we really were able to maximize the [shining] and I’ll show you that in the 3
second. I just want to be complete with the neighborhood because that was also very important 4
to us to make sure that we're not infringing on anybody’s privacy. You don't see it that high from 5
people’s houses and I think we're very successful with this; all the neighbors very supportive of 6
this. We kept them in and I think that all told us they saw, they sent you letters in support. 7
8
So back to this notion if you see the trees we’re proposing I can't say where we got to 100 percent 9
invisible house, but this is a rendering from the worst [unintelligible] on this one percent where 10
it’s visible. And that's what the worst situation would be and I think we, we're very happy [at this] 11
and hopefully you will share it with us that we got to really mitigate as much as possible and when 12
the code asked us to minimize we did a lot on minimize in the 18 months of work. 13
14
So this is other houses that we took photos when we were going to preserve our goal was always 15
to be one of the least seen house and also it's important how what percentage of the trails you 16
see it. Obviously we lot of those been seen for much more than one percent. We were clearly 17
out and I think we're very successful at this to be a lot better than the average house in the 18
preserve. So we have what we call the Ten Commandments actually 14 commandments the 19
guideline we achieved all of that, we did not ask for any variance, we accomplished we 20
accommodate every one of the City requests so far and we very appreciate the work that 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
everybody put so far and we’re eager to move forward. We have the window of April to October 1
where you are allowed to do the grading and that's the first thing we have to do here so we 2
hoping we can move forward and do it this year, not delay everything to 2018. Thanks a lot. 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Ok, we have one comment card for Agenda Item 2. Do we want take that now? 5
Yeah, let's take that now. Herb Borock you have three minutes. 6
7
Herb Borock: Thank you and good evening. The project indicates it has a second residential unit 8
called a guest house of over 1,500 sf and I don't see anything in the analysis in the staff report 9
comparing that to the site development regulations. I know that in other zones that are 10
essentially a single family residence which is what this is there is a limit on the size of the second 11
residential unit. As I recall in I guess R-1 and RE it’s 900 sf. And I would think that in the site 12
development regulations for the OS zone that there would also be a size limit, but I don't recall 13
since I don't see anything in the table of conformance or compliance with that to indicate what it 14
is. Instead it’s just adding up the structures the way it would if it was a garage or a barn or a silo 15
rather than a residence unit which may have a separate allowable floor area in it. 16
17
The one thing they noticed as I recall and that when this site was, when the subdivision was 18
created we had the same rules that we have now which is that subdivisions of four or more lots 19
are required to cluster them and that's why we've got this, this arrangement in terms of the 20
transfer of development potential from the common open space area. And I see that the 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
recommendation is to continue it and I think it would be helpful to do that so that you could 1
actually see site views from high points in trails. It's unclear from what's provided in the staff 2
report it looks to be taken from roads and doesn't indicate you have viewpoints from the trails 3
within the Arastradero Preserve there are some places even Foothills Park such as… there's a high 4
point off of one of the trails like a little ridge line to that also could look down, but I think it's 5
mainly from the Arastradero Preserve. Thank you. 6
7
Chair Alcheck: Ok, staff do you want to quickly respond to the any of those assertions before we 8
get started? 9
10
Mr. Owen: Yes I would. So the guest house is not considered an Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU). 11
The reason for that is that it doesn't have a kitchen with an oven. So it's not considered an ADU, 12
dwelling unit is living, sleeping, and eating and that requires the kitchen. 13
14
Chair Alcheck: Great. Ok. 15
16
Mr. Owen: And it does conform to the code. We don't have a specification in the code saying that 17
you can't have a guest house in the open space. It's actually quite common. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Ok. Ok, what I'd like to do now Commissioners is sort of combine our question and 20
comments. Why don't we start on this side and we’ll just go down and if we need to go two 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
rounds we can. 1
2
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah, I’m going to be pretty lightweight because I think that the 3
applicant and team have done a really nice job in working with their neighbors being very 4
systematic about matching each of their efforts against each of the requirements, the 14 5
commandments so to speak. I want to ask the City are there any outstanding concerns 6
whatsoever? I didn't see anything highlighted in the staff report around things that remain to be 7
done from the City's recommendations, but I want to give you a chance to bring up anything that 8
is remaining. 9
10
Mr. Owen: When we developed the staff report we were the real reason for the continuance was 11
the views, the impact from the Arastradero Preserve. I went out with another staff member took 12
photos and I have some of the photos here today from the Arastradero Preserve if you’d like to 13
see them. And when we went to the Meadowlark Trail in particular we noticed that it's a visible, 14
it's a visible site. The story poles indicated that it would be silhouetted against the sky. Obviously 15
one of the things that you can't see now is the trees that we would be planted. I believe that 16
they're proposing 10 trees to mitigate the loss of 1 that's going to be cut and it's dying and 17
diseased. We have an arborist report for that. And so that's one of the things that we weren't 18
100 percent on is what is the impact going to be once the trees are there because it's as it is it's a 19
grassy knoll. It doesn't have the benefit that some of the other sites in the Hewlett tract have 20
which is established [unintelligible] basically. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah so I'm, I appreciate that comment because I think as a PTC body 2
the reason that you have us have to look over these things is that the subjectivity I think is largely 3
in how you perceive the view and how disruptive it is and how mitigated it is. And other things I 4
think are more... it's an easier standard to measure whether or not they preserve trees of certain 5
diameter or whether or not they adhered to the recommendations of the arborist, whether or not 6
the water use requirement is excessive, etcetera. But this is the one, is it a disruptive view? And 7
based on the report and based on all of our enjoyment of the open space it seems like the 8
applicant has done a very good job and if the views represented in the presentation are 9
representative of what you would get in the worst case on the Meadowlark Trail then as a hiker 10
myself I would be comfortable with that especially given the existing houses, but I wanted to ask. 11
So it seems like the City spent their time mostly on the view and view mitigation so I appreciate 12
that. I have no further questions. 13
14
Commissioner Summa: Hi, well I wanted to thank everyone for the presentation and it looks like 15
you put a lot of thought into restoration, retention of landscape, and also this specific sighting of 16
the structures on the house. That being said I did appreciate that staff still had some reservations 17
about the views so I just want to make that comment. I'm kind of confused about the second 18
unit. It says in the staff report on packet Page 10 that a second unit is only permitted in the open 19
space district on properties in excess of 10 acres. So I don't think… well how big is the 20
kitchenette? So it looked like it was like fourteen by maybe six or seven or eight feet. Because I 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
mean I don't think the oven is a significant issue that would mitigate whether or not it's meeting 1
that requirement. So and I'm not sure how staff would recommend dealing with that. 2
3
I also had a question about the changes the ordinance and variance changes since the subdivision 4
was made and I'd like staff’s advice on this. Would a new subdivision have to be submitted and 5
approved because of the two ordinance changes 3345 and 5062 I think and the one variance 6
which was just I think two years after the subdivision. So that's something I'd like advice on. That 7
being said I mean since we do allow buildings here I understand that may not be 100 percent 8
possible to mitigate the view and I really appreciate the outreach of the neighbors; however, it's 9
not the neighbors I'm as concerned about it's people who don't have the benefit of living in an 10
open, beautiful open space area like that who live in a more urban area and need to use the park. 11
I think a lot of people in Palo Alto appreciate that we have stricter requirements than some of the 12
neighboring communities to preserve views. So I wouldn't mind being more convinced that the 13
views were being, weren't going to be impacted too much. 14
15
So oh the other thing I wanted to say I wanted to make sure that the tree that was being removed 16
I think it's a valley oak or white oak so it wasn't susceptible to Sudden Oak Death (SOD), but I just 17
wanted to make sure that that's accurate and that any tree material that was infested with that 18
would not be removed from the site. So that was just a comment I wanted to make and let me 19
see... did you, do you have the exact dimensions of the kitchenette by any chance? 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Jonathan Lait, Assistant Director: Looks like it’s 19 by 9 feet the kitchenette? 1
2
Mr. Owen: Correct, yeah it's 13 by 9. It's 13 by 9 so… 3
4
Commissioner Summa: Ok, so I guess I would still need to be convinced that an oven was really 5
going to change that, but from being a full kitchen. 6
7
Mr. Lait: So if I may Chair? One of the… one of things that we use for our guidance on whether we 8
would classify this as a second dwelling unit is the definition of a dwelling unit in the zoning code 9
and the I'll just restate or I’ll state what the definition says. It's in [Chapter 1804030 number 46], 10
dwelling unit means a room or group of rooms including living, sleeping, eating, cooking, and 11
sanitation/bathing facilities constituting a separate and independent housekeeping unit occupied 12
or intended for occupancy on a non-transient basis and having not more than one kitchen. So 13
when we look at the floor plan for the second, for the accessory structure it checks I would say 14
most of those boxes, but the one that it doesn't check is the ability to have independent cooking 15
without the range or without the stove that's a function of the cooking part of it. So in the past 16
what we've done consistently is you can have a kitchenette, you can have a wet bar and a sink, 17
you might even have a microwave in there, but if it doesn't have an oven or a stove component 18
we've not considered that a dwelling unit. And so the Commission may have some thoughts 19
about that, but that's what went into our and has gone into our thought process previously. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Alcheck: Ok, thank you staff. You know an interesting side point you can't get a mortgage if 1
there isn't a range and like a stove. You need a construction loan. So I'm satisfied with that 2
definition. So I won't I’m just going to cut to the chase; would you mind putting the slide up with 3
the criteria that we need to review? That's number three on the staff presentation. 4
5
While you're doing that I'll just say that I think that this satisfies all 4 of the criteria and all 13 of 6
the open space review criteria. To my fellow Commissioners the objective is not invisibility it's to 7
minimize visibility. And that's a really tough balancing act. It's almost laughable that slide that 8
shows all the different complexities of the property and the three spots that you guys can build 9
on. It's almost like it's almost funny if it wasn't potentially so costly. I think some of the things we 10
heard tonight are sound very cutting edge and I think it's worth sort of recognizing that those the 11
implementation of let's say the water recycling process. I mean these are things that only the 12
most fortunate of homeowners get to really implement and they stand as sort of as a guideline for 13
people all over the country when they have an opportunity to develop something and how can 14
they make it more friendly to the environment your average homeowner will never expend the 15
funds necessary to recapture water the way that you're considering. And I want to applaud you in 16
that effort for doing that because it's not entirely clear how much of that you would be required 17
to do. 18
19
So again I'll just say that I found that the four criteria were satisfied. I will, I'm prepared to 20
support a Motion that recommends that we that this project be approved with basically standard 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
development conditions that we typically incorporate into… I know that we don't have in this 1
packet those standard development conditions, but they're pretty straightforward and they get 2
incorporated into most of our open space reviews. It's worth noting that as a Commission we 3
typically don't review this. We don't frequently review projects like this maybe once a year, 4
maybe once every two years we get a project in the open space. So it's not something that we do 5
very often, but the development conditions are typically pretty standard and even though we 6
don't have them here tonight I'm comfortable moving this forward with the incorporation of 7
standard conditions without having to bring it back to the Commission. But I'll let my other 8
Commissioners sort of opine on whether or not they feel that the criteria up on the on the board 9
is needs greater mitigation. 10
11
And then I'll just say that I interpreted the staff report as just being a little gun shy. I feel like 12
everything's there and you want a little bit more time to say yes. And I'm guessing the applicant 13
wants to get started in April because they probably have from April to October to do their grading 14
before they probably can't grade based on the grading limitations in the City. And so their 15
timeline is I'm guessing, but you can let me know if that's true. Yeah. So considering that they've 16
been in this process for a long time I'm hoping that we can make this, we can be efficient with our 17
time. Ok, Asher would you like continue? 18
19
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Yeah, just a couple of quick comments. I also want to thank the applicant 20
and the team for a careful, thoughtful, analytical process. I do actually want to thank staff for 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
bringing this forward in this way because there is a judgment call here and I'm glad that you raised 1
the judgment call and brought it to us. I am in agreement with my several of my colleagues in 2
supporting this moving it forward with standard conditions. I would like projects like this to come 3
to us sooner in the process in the future if that's possible, but I won't stand in the way of this one 4
kind of given where it is in the process. 5
6
Commissioner Lauing: Ok, thank you. This definitely did not come to this Commission half-baked. 7
It was very well baked and very well prepared. It is a very large structure so what comes to mind 8
is if this were continued and you were asked to do something a little bit different to make it even 9
better in conformance if there are contingency plans as to what would happen. I mean the 10
obvious thing would be to make it smaller than almost 15,000 fifteen thousand sf of living space 11
including the basement. Another thing that obviously comes to mind is that we could say you 12
have to put up big trees not small trees because it takes a long time for trees to grow. So there 13
should be, could be some specification on that one. 14
15
The question maybe to the staff in general is do we think that we would might want some more 16
public comment on this? Would this be a reason to continue it? I don't see a lot of cards tonight, 17
right? 18
19
Mr. Lait: Yeah I would say to that point we don't typically get a lot of public comment on open 20
space homes in the hillside. It's 600 foot radius and that usually encompasses only a few 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
properties in the area. We did provide notice to Portola Valley as there might be some trucking 1
routes through that City. We've advised them. We did the standard mailing. We posted on the 2
website and posted it on paper. It's not the lack of public participation which at least from our 3
perspective would be the reason to push the item forward. It's more of the Commission's 4
deliberation and whether or not you would feel like you would need some more information 5
because we believe that we've got it adequately noticed. We certainly have done it in compliance 6
with the code and then some. 7
8
Commissioner Lauing: Ok. I think of all the criteria the one in the Comprehensive Plan that is 9
going to be a gray area or subjective area as you said is this issue of is it low intensity 10
development enough. But that's a sliding scale that's not put together with 14 criteria. So that's 11
where the whole size of the project is the question that comes to mind and the size of the 12
landscaping to obscure some of that. I do want to just underscore what one other Commissioner 13
said which is that is the citizens even more so than the neighbors and there's only so much open 14
space granting that there are other houses there. So it's not like it's an empty canvas that you're 15
putting the first structure in place. 16
17
The… and I just I do think that the particularly the mitigation plan on tree protection is very well 18
done. So I'm cautious on these kinds of things because it's huge. So it's kind of borderline to me 19
in terms of what you think might be the right thing to do, but if it's just to get our opinion as 20
opposed to the public opinion then I could be persuaded to support moving forward. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Mr. Lait: And just if I can just clarify that point? We certainly value and welcome the public's 2
opinion. There is an opportunity and a forum for that and you just had it with your when you 3
open up the public hearing you heard from Herb Borock and some of the comment letters that 4
have come in. So it's not that we're just interested in it's the Commission that makes that gives 5
the recommendations that would that's what we move on, but obviously there is the public input 6
that is valuable to the Commission and its deliberation. 7
8
Commissioner Lauing: And just a follow up on one of my own questions; is it would be possible to 9
specify the size of the landscaping when it went in? 10
11
Mr. Lait: That is within the Commission's discretion. We would probably want to and maybe you 12
already understand what size options are available. 13
14
Mr. Owen: In terms of the amount that needs to be restored and/or to remain in order to have 15
the FAR that they're requesting they need to restore or retain in its natural state 90 percent of the 16
lot. And so what they've proposed in the landscaping plans conforms to that requirement. 17
18
Mr. Lait: What about size trees? 19
20
Mr. Owen: The size of the trees we do have standard conditions of approval for mitigating the loss 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
of a tree. We have a replacement ratio that adheres to a tree technical manual that is City policy. 1
I believe that the current (interrupted) 2
3
Commissioner Lauing: It's very minimal. I think it's very minimal, the master plan, Forest Master 4
Plan. 5
6
Mr. Owen: Ok, so and that was what I was going to get to is that I believe that the mitigation 7
requirement that Dave Dockter had recommended is above and beyond what is standard 8
[foresee] for the replacement for the one tree that's being removed. 9
10
Commissioner Lauing: I see. Ok, thanks. 11
12
Mr. Lait: And again Dave Dockter is the City is one of a is a member of the City's Urban Forestry 13
Division and if the Commission felt that additional because the findings that you need to make if 14
additional landscaping were warranted or larger specimen trees if available could be established 15
that's within your discretion. 16
17
Chair Alcheck: Excuse me. Just to be clear is Dave Dockter’s above and beyond recommendation 18
incorporated into the plan as is? 19
20
Mr. Owen: Yes it is. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Alcheck: Ok, Commissioner Gardias. 2
3
Commissioner Gardias: Thank you. So I'd like to have this conversation more… I mean between 4
this different parties I will have different questions so, but let me start with this, right? We talk 5
about this in the past and before I just get to it, Cara we’ll truly miss you, right? So if you just 6
want to come into another session we’ll accommodate you and I don't know how we can move 7
forward without you. I mean probably we should shut down for one year or maybe you're going 8
to consider another position so. 9
10
But just remind me we had this conversation when we reviewed prior Los Trancos development 11
and I asked this question if this goes to Architectural Review Board (ARB) and I believe it does not, 12
right? There reasons that I'm saying this and I'm just bringing this again I think that with the 13
whole respect to the seniority of my colleagues on this Commission I think that the process is 14
broken because this Commission is not equipped with the knowledge and with the process of 15
looking into the projects like this. So my recommendation is that we need to change the 16
municipal code to either have additional review by ARB to address some other items that are out 17
of our purview or just remove it totally out of our hands. Currently it's a mixture of the because 18
there is a traffic impact, but you have also visibility, some privacy, aesthetics so it's just not a disco 19
mission. It's and it's a purview of the other Commissions. So I think we need to add it to our 20
omnibus or some other items that would allow us to correct this process. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
So with saying this let me just get to the, to this project. So as I said I have a couple of questions 2
that are to staff and to the applicant and before I get them thank you very much to the applicant 3
for just preparing a presentation and just making this additional effort to provide us with 4
additional pictures of the site, of the stakeout from the trails. I appreciate this. Thank you. 5
6
So now let's get to some detailed questions and they will be coming from random items, from 7
random areas. So the Number 1 is that there is a portion of the building that's underground that's 8
beyond the roof parameter. Does this area count toward impervious area square footage? 9
10
Mr. Owen: Which area in particular are you referencing? Because the garage does count towards 11
the gross floor area and the portion (interrupted) 12
13
Commissioner Gardias: I’m not talking about the, not talking about the gross floor area, I'm talking 14
about the impervious area. There is a portion underground portion of the building so that is 15
beyond that parameter of the story that's above it. I don't know what is that because the plans 16
are not maybe labeled readably or at least I couldn't read them, but (interrupted) 17
18
Mr. Owen: Can you tell us the page number that you’re on? 19
20
Chair Alcheck: I haven't closed the public hearing. Does it make sense to invite the applicant up 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
and help bring clarity to this? 1
2
Mr. Lait: Absolutely. That's you’re certainly welcome to do that. 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Ok. Do you guys want to sort of approach the podium and provide clarity on any of 5
Commissioner Gardias’ questions? 6
7
Mr. Owen: Are you referring to the garage that is buried? 8
9
Commissioner Gardias: Yes, there is a portion of the building that's underground and my 10
apologies I should have marked this on the plan, but I recognize that there is a clear portion of the 11
building that is beyond the walls of this structure super… that's on top of this. It just goes beyond 12
that the parameter. 13
14
Mr. Kephart: Yeah, I think I can address that. That's the area above the garage and that has two 15
to two and a half feet of soil on top of it and it's blended into the natural landscape and it's 16
completely pervious in its nature. 17
18
Commissioner Gardias: So it doesn't count to the impervious… I understand because you have the 19
management of the water, right, and so this is living roof from your perspective so, but it doesn't 20
count toward the impervious area because of this fact. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Mr. Kephart: Correct. 2
3
Mr. Lait: So staff has I think a different take on it. 4
5
Mr. Owen: My understanding was that the garage area did count towards the impervious, oh 6
excuse me, pervious. I'm sorry. Sometimes I get them mixed up. 7
8
Commissioner Gardias: Ok, so pervious. So yeah, so there is a limitation of the impervious area. 9
So I’m asking about impervious area not the pervious area. 10
11
Mr. Owen: So the garage area and the other below grade area that have soil on them would be 12
pervious. 13
14
Commissioner Gardias: Would be pervious, ok. So doesn't count toward the impervious area. 15
And where does the water drain from that area? 16
17
Mr. Kephart: That living roof the growing media will attenuate 60 percent of all rainfall during 18
peak flows and then the rest of the water will be collected in the below ground cistern so they'll 19
be a zero runoff condition. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Gardias: Ok, but from that portion of the garage that’s buried where does the 1
water drain to? 2
3
Mr. Kephart: Into the cistern. 4
5
Commissioner Gardias: So there are some drains, area drains that collect the water from 6
(interrupted) 7
8
Mr. Kephart: Absolutely, yeah. 9
10
Commissioner Gardias: Ok. 11
12
Mr. Kephart: But 60 percent of all the rainfall that falls on that site will be adsorbed into the 13
growing media during peak flows and then the remainder will go into our cistern for reuse. 14
15
Commissioner Gardias: So you collect 40 percent. So let's talk about water for a moment, right? 16
So you collect 40 percent you retain 40 percent on the site. You allow runoff along the existing 17
run off areas of 60 percent of that water. How does this when you work on this you must of asked 18
yourself a question how this compares with the natural soil saturation and the runoff. How much 19
this site retains currently when you compare it to your residence, to your project, sorry. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Mr. Kephart: Well we don't have a baseline as yet, but the idea is to create topography and 1
topographic relief, use best management practices such as bio swells and rock line channels. 2
We’ll want to infiltrate as much of the water as we can. We've also matched the contours and 3
drain lines, natural drainage patterns on the site so that we're going to minimize runoff 4
completely on the site. 5
6
Commissioner Gardias: I understand. The reason why I asked this question is because not like the 7
flat area of Palo Alto where we can where we would have a propensity to retain the water 8
because this is the water that belongs to that lot here you have a natural run off. So somebody 9
may raise an argument that this is not your water, right? You retain portion of it, but the question 10
is does the portion of the water that you retain would be same or similar to the portion retained 11
naturally? 12
13
Mr. Kephart: Absolutely and it's retained during short duration high frequency events. 14
15
Commissioner Gardias: And then what the water is used for landscaping? 16
17
Mr. Kephart: Reused in the landscape or returned to the natural topography and allowed to run 18
off. 19
20
Commissioner Gardias: I see. Ok, thank you very much. If you don't mind I have since you’re 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
there, right, I have a question about the spreader. I think that this is your design. 1
2
Mr. Kephart: About which? 3
4
Commissioner Gardias: I can tell you which spreader I’m looking for this is the one that’s on the 5
northern portion of the lot where the [feel/fill?] occurs and this is on Page… this is on Page [a C 6
2.0]. 7
8
Mr. Kephart: Ok let me reference it. I'll have to take a look. 9
10
Commissioner Gardias: Ok, so yeah so please take a look at this. [C.2] you have two spreaders 11
that are on the north end of the field. 12
13
Mr. Kephart: [Unintelligible – off microphone] 14
15
Commissioner Gardias: So when you have a front when you have a most northern part of the 16
building, of the residence, that extends with the I think that it extends with the flat area or just or 17
some area that extends with a field and at the bottom of the field there are two spreaders as they 18
should have been there. And then my question is about is I couldn't (interrupted). These two, 19
this one and these two. Ok? So my question relates to the water run off management. I didn't 20
see on the landscape drawings any swales or any landscaping that would work in tandem with the 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
spreader. 1
2
Mr. Kephart: I understand what you’re saying, yeah. Those will be infiltration or slope 3
interrupters and that water will go down into a swale and then vegetation will be planted within 4
those areas. 5
6
Commissioner Gardias: Ok. So I couldn't observe it on the drawing so maybe it will be there or 7
just or maybe I missed it so. 8
9
Mr. Kephart: As our landscape plans are developed all those details will be developed as well. 10
11
Commissioner Gardias: Ok, so they're not there yet, but I have your word that they will be there? 12
13
Mr. Kephart: Oh yeah, absolutely. 14
15
Commissioner Gardias: Very good. Thank you very much. And then just a comment, right, but it's 16
please don't take it personally. It's just about the quality. When we look at the plans like this 17
we… the plans are more finished. Some of the drawings here they look like they are still work in 18
progress. And then when I was looking at the civil drawings some information about the water 19
run off that the slopes and the treatment of the water specifically that the drains of the access 20
road it's not information it's not there. So because to fulfill our mandate we need to have this 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
information to make sure that this is done properly because sometimes the design is not up to the 1
standards, but I'm just raising this question because I know that staff is noting this and I hope that 2
they will look after those civil drawings to make sure that water management is done properly. 3
4
Mr. Kephart: Ok, I'll talk to the civil engineer about those specific requests. 5
6
Commissioner Gardias: Thank you. And another question is about the soil management. I don't 7
know who can answer this. What's the soil (interrupted) 8
9
Mr. Kephart: Oh soil. Sure, erosion controls and (interrupted) 10
11
Commissioner Gardias: No, no. This is about the soil management. So you’ve had to get to build 12
this beautiful structure you excavate and then you fill. How much of the soil that's on this lot will 13
go to the waste, how much would be retained on the site? 14
15
Mr. Kephart: I don't have the, do you have it? Ok. But our strategy is to harvest the top six inches 16
of the topsoil of course and retain that to put back on the site because that's where most of the 17
seed bank is and the fertility. That's part of the soil management plan and I believe the 18
calculations are on the drawings for the cut and fill balance. 19
20
Commissioner Gardias: Ok. So just a quick question; so how much soil would be taken away from 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
the site? 1
2
Mr. Kephart: Like I said the cut and fill calculations are on the drawings. 3
4
Commissioner Gardias: Oh, they are there? Just the number please, yeah. One number. 5
6
Mr. Gecht: So the natural thing of the cutting they allow for the mitigation and be below the 7
range, it’s probably going to be somewhere in the 12,000 to 14,000 cubic foot. We’re still trying 8
to work it down because it’s expensive to get it out, but that's what you need to do in order to 9
bring the entire house below the ridge which is the what the 14 commandments of the open 10
space. 11
12
If I may just 10 seconds there was a question about public notice which was very important 13
question. The code that requires the two weeks of story [boarding] we actually did six and for a 14
variety of reasons. And so I think it's also speak to the fact that six weeks it's out there and if it 15
was too big a problem you probably would have heard much more. 16
17
Commissioner Gardias: Ok, thank you. Let me see if I have any other questions. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: While you're thinking I just want to reiterate something and staff, correct me if I'm 20
wrong, but in this site and design review stage the applicant hasn't submitted any of their plans to 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
the Building Department yet. And so I think it's important for us to just all be aware that the next 1
step for them once they're completed with this process is to prepare their themselves for that 2
submittal and bringing themselves into compliance with all the requirements of the Building 3
Department; for example, with respect to grading and some of the drainage questions that you're 4
discussing right now. So for example, whether I don't know that you have a civil engineer yet, but 5
they have a civil engineer. The next step will be to prepare civil engineering plans that not only 6
the Building Department will review, but they have to approve and sometimes there's a back and 7
forth. 8
9
So elements of the current plan that you're reviewing that may seem unfinished are 10
understandably unfinished because they have to get through this process before they can prepare 11
those finalized plans. And preparing finalize plans at this stage would potentially be redundant if 12
for example you felt that the site was located in a place that didn't satisfy our requirements and 13
then they had to move it then they would be essentially creating a second set of finalized plans. 14
So anything that you see unfinished doesn't necessarily suggest that it won’t comply with the 15
code as it's written it just hasn't, they haven't taken it to that stage yet. And they will still be 16
subject to all the requirements of our current building process. I just want to make sure that 17
we’re all aware of that. Ok. 18
19
Commissioner Gardias: Alright just for the record I want to disagree with this comment because if 20
there is information not provided to us we just cannot relate to it. So it's not about not having 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
trust in the process, but we need to receive the information like we would receive on another 1
project. So that's I think it's a normal submittal and review process and that's the only thing I was 2
looking to this because the projects come to us at a different quality levels. Sometimes they are 3
better. Sometimes they are not up to the code. I just I said clearly that I entrust staff just to 4
follow on this process, but I just wanted to make the architect and designer aware as they may 5
come back to us another time. But also staff may be in the position to enforce the quality of the 6
submittals. 7
8
So I have another question may I? So in terms of the now it's to staff so we have new regulations 9
about the basement dewatering. Does those regulations apply to the in the to this Los Trancos 10
area? And will there be any dewatering for this site? 11
12
Mr. Owen: I don't know the answer to that question. I would (interrupted) 13
14
Mr. Lait: So yeah, if there was dewatering required it would be subject to the City’s dewatering 15
requirements. I’d be very surprised if dewatering was required as part of this development. 16
17
Commissioner Gardias: There will be no dewatering? Can you confirm this? 18
19
Chair Alcheck: No I don't think he can confirm it. I think what he's suggesting is that he would be 20
very surprised and the reason why is because it’s at the top of the hill. And so typically the 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
dewatering regulations apply if for example their grading consultant or there earth soils 1
consultant determines that there’s water at a level that their structure would potentially I think 2
it's what is it, seven feet with? I don't know what the criteria is, but they dig and if the water table 3
exists at a height where they will reach then they'll have to create a dewatering plan. And correct 4
me if I’m wrong that would only be determined at the time that they submit their plans to the 5
Building Department or how would that work? 6
7
Mr. Lait: We typically discover that during this phase. We do send the plans to other departments 8
for review and comment that we would probably get back from Public Works is A) you’re near the 9
flood zone or you're in the flood zone or you're near the flood plain and dewatering it would be 10
anticipated and there are these regulations that apply. 11
12
Chair Alcheck: Right. 13
14
Mr. Lait: I’ll look to Graham. I don't we don't have any of those comments in the record from our 15
Public Works Department for this property 670 Los Trancos. 16
17
Chair Alcheck: Ok. 18
19
Mr. Owen: With the standard conditions of approval for any sort of residential development with 20
a basement you'll have a standard condition of a dewatering plan just in case there is ground 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
water that's penetrated when you get to the basement. 1
2
Chair Alcheck: Ok. So there's a failsafe. 3
4
Commissioner Gardias: Otherwise thank you very much. 5
6
Chair Alcheck: Ok, I have a light from, sorry hold on a second, from Commissioner Rosenblum. Go 7
ahead. 8
9
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah just briefly because we've had a long discussion. I appreciate 10
Commissioner Gardias doing the due diligence on this, but I would argue that a lot of the 11
questions are outside of what our purview is which is pretty clearly stated. And I think it's useful 12
to link each area of our concern to a specific area that's called out in our PTC purview. And so this 13
is with regards to the quality of design I think it's important to look at what stage things are 14
coming to us. Commissioner or Vice-Chair Waldfogel made the point that he'd like to see this 15
coming even earlier. 16
17
So this is much earlier than many other things that come before the PTC. It's a much different 18
kind of project. It gets captured and brought before us because of its situation in the open space 19
and therefore we're seeing it at such an early stage to basically make sure that this that the sight 20
lines for the users of the parks are not disturbed. And I think that's almost the main purpose for 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
us as an advocate for the residents of Palo Alto to make sure their enjoyment of the open space is 1
not disturbed. And so to the extent that they meet the other statutory requirements around the 2
cuts and fills, around the replacement of trees, etcetera, things that are easier for the City to 3
measure I think that our role I just want this on the record is around our role as stewards for the 4
open space for the citizens of Palo Alto. And that has to do with the sightlines. That's my opinion, 5
but I also think that is reflected in how they defined our purview. So while I appreciate your 6
comments on the architectural drawings and understanding every aspect I would argue this is a 7
different kind of project than many that get put in front of us. 8
9
Commissioner Gardias: I understand and appreciate this comment, but when I read a paragraph of 10
Municipal Code 18.30.G it says that in order to assure that use and development will be 11
harmonious with other uses in the general vicinity will be compatible with environmental and 12
ecological objectives and those clearly pretty much address questions that I asked. But then as I 13
said at the beginning I’d rather just pass my mandate onto ARB because I think that there are 14
better equipped. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Ok, alright Commissioner [Note-Vice-Chair] Waldfogel. 17
18
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: I may need some help on this because I'd like to propose a Motion and 19
given what we have in the packet can I propose a Motion to recommend approval of the standard 20
conditions or do I have to, does the Motion need to be to bring it back to us with standard 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
conditions? Which of those two is available to me? 1
2
Mr. Lait: If you just give us one second on it? Ok, so (interrupted) 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Before you respond I'm going to take this opportunity to close the public comment 5
portion of this hearing and let that be noted. 6
7
Mr. Lait: So thank you. We just wanted to make sure we were giving you the right guidance on 8
this. So we do believe that you could take an action on the item this evening to forward a 9
recommendation to the City Council it sounds like approving the project or at least that sounds 10
where the Motion is going. And we don't really have a whole lot of standard conditions, but we 11
do have and this is nuance, we have typical conditions that we apply to projects and it’s the type 12
of stuff that we get for from every department about applying the standard issues that we see in 13
the code. We don't have any, do not anticipate any special conditions that we would apply; if the 14
Commission were interested in a special condition regarding trees that would be a special 15
condition. So yes, I guess the short answer is you could draft a you can make a Motion and if 16
there's a second and support for it, it could go forward to the Council. And there's going to be a 17
public hearing at the City Council as well so if there is anybody who was aggrieved or concerned 18
about our typical conditions there would be a forum for a dialogue about that at that time. 19
20
Chair Alcheck: Ok, why don’t before you make the Motion I'd love to follow the same sort of 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
program we've been utilizing the last two sessions which is that you make a standard Motion and 1
then we can treat let's say any additional conditions as Unfriendly Amendments that would 2
essentially get a up or down vote by the Commission and to determine whether or not they’re 3
incorporated into the Motion. Ok? So. 4
5
MOTION 6
7
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Ok, so I'd like to recommend approval with typical conditions. 8
9
SECOND 10
11
Chair Alcheck: Ok and a second? I'll second that Motion. Before I let you speak to it are there any 12
proposed amendments? 13
14
Commissioner Summa: Ok, I'd like to make some amendments. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Let’s do them one by one. 17
18
Commissioner Summa: One by one? Ok. One is is that I cannot be comfortable with the second 19
unit status it is not analyzed in any depth in the staff report and it seems to rely on that sometime 20
in the future there may be a change in the law about second units. The law clearly states to have 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
a second unit here you have to have 10 acres and I don't find the oven issue to be rigorous or 1
compelling enough. So I would like that to be examined further. So I'd like to take that off for 2
now until that is resolved. And I would like also to mention with regards to making the Finding 3
Number 4 that the use will be in accord with the Palo Alto Comprehensive Plan, the 4
Comprehensive Plan requires that projects be legal with regards to their consistency with the 5
municipal code. 6
7
And one thing I'm embarrassed that we did, not embarrassed, that I'm not happy with one of the 8
13 criteria for the open space is that building should use materials and earth tones or subdued 9
colors. They also I understand should be reflective. We haven't seen I had asked staff and I 10
thought we would have a materials board. Oh. Well we didn't see it. 11
12
And I would also ask that some consideration be given by the applicant and the applicant’s team 13
to further reducing the views from the preserve. And I wonder I don't think we've got too much 14
specificity with all the trees that are screening it will they be deciduous or non-deciduous trees? 15
And I think one of my colleagues brought up the fact that there could, could there be bigger trees 16
and would it work even a little better? With that being said I wish we could resolve these issues 17
for you very quickly so you can move ahead on schedule with starting in April when you would be 18
allowed to. Those are my main concerns and I also I had a slight concern about the access road to 19
the guest house and somebody had a term for it I forget if it was staff or the applicant. It was a 20
holiday something? 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Mr. Owen: Hollywood strip. 2
3
Commissioner Summa: Hollywood, thank you. I wasn't familiar with that term. So Criteria 4
Number 4 says developments should be clustered or closely grouped, blah, blah, blah. Make it 5
less conspicuous and minimize access roads. I had a slight concern that that was a pretty big road 6
on the site and I didn't know if that had been explained fully. Am I right in thinking it's two 18 inch 7
tracks that are paved and the rest is native plants? So I don't know if any other colleagues are 8
interested in that, I just wanted to get on the record. But I feel that the particularly the other 9
issues I mentioned have not been resolved. 10
11
Chair Alcheck: Ok let me just get some clarity here. Let's assume for a minute there was 12
consensus that the kitchenette created some problem. Is that within our purview? Could we 13
create a condition that suggested eliminating the kitchenette from the guest house? 14
15
Ms. Silver: So you obviously need to make a finding that this is consistent with the zoning code 16
requirements. So to the extent you find that the second unit does not meet the zoning code 17
requirements for an accessory unit then that certainly is within your purview. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: So just to be clear if we were going to make a finding like that what happens if it's… 20
let's say that contradicts the staffs, let's say that contradicts the interpretation by our Building 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Department. Like how do we, how would that be resolved? 1
2
Ms. Silver: Right. So you know I don't know that it's necessarily a finding it's a recommendation to 3
Council that this does not comply with the zoning code is one way to frame it. Another way to 4
frame it is perhaps as a condition that the accessory unit is you recommend approval of it, but 5
that it be built in a way to meet the definition of an accessory unit i.e. it shall not have any kitchen 6
facilities. 7
8
Chair Alcheck: Ok. 9
10
Ms. Silver: So two options. 11
12
Chair Alcheck: Ok so what I’m going to do is I'm going to go to Ed and do you have an amendment 13
to the current Motion? 14
15
Commissioner Lauing: Yes it might have been commented on. 16
17
Mr. Lait: So just [unintelligible] there I don't know that the Motion has been seconded. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: I seconded it. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Mr. Lait: Did you second it? 1
2
Chair Alcheck: Yeah. 3
4
Mr. Lait: Ok, thank you. 5
6
Chair Alcheck: And I'm looking for a specific amendment. So essentially for example if you wanted 7
to suggest that a specific condition be added (interrupted) 8
9
Commissioner Lauing: That's what I was going to do, but I don't know if you put a Unfriendly 10
Amendment on the table or you were just making comments? 11
12
Chair Alcheck: I heard comments, but if you want to make a specific… 13
14
Commissioner Summa: I’d like to clarify; I'd like to help the applicant get their guest house they 15
want by having staff come back to us with a way that I can understand that it's legal. And I don't 16
know what the process would be, but I'd like… that's what I'd like to see because I, they want to 17
have a guest house. So… 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Yes. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: What is your concern relative to the lot size? 1
2
Commissioner Summa: That it's not legal to have that guest house unless the lot is 10 acres and 3
that other people in these situations are expected to applicants are expected to follow the code. 4
That's all. 5
6
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Right, but the so maybe staff could clarify this; the total parcel is 10 acres 7
including the share of the common land and do we count that in this case or not? I mean I 8
noticed some notes on Page 1 of the plans that there is some disagreement here and could you 9
clarify that? 10
11
Mr. Owen: The site is 5.2 acres I believe. It's either 5.2 or 5.4; 5.4 acres. So that would be the 12
area that we consider to be for zoning purposes the site area. I believe that the property owners 13
also have a 1/10th ownership in the common areas, but for the purpose of applying development 14
standards we would use that 5.4 acres for FAR, for impervious cover (interrupted) 15
16
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: That’s not what we do in the Research Park. 17
18
Mr. Owen: But that Stanford owns the entire parcel. 19
20
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Right, but I mean I just want some clarity here because there's ownership 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
on these other 4.52 acres. 1
2
Mr. Lait: Right. 3
4
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: And I'm just unclear on whether that's whether that's germane or not. 5
6
Mr. Lait: So the subdivision for this property clearly delineates the property with property lines 7
and that's been recorded with the map and that's the 5.4 acre site. In the Research Park there’s, 8
there aren't the property lines that you see on this condition, it's lease lines. And there is a 9
another property or properties that are held in common ownership and that is a separate law and 10
would not be considered part of the square footage for this parcel. 11
12
Chair Alcheck: Ok… 13
14
Commissioner Lauing: But did we clarify that this ADU does not, is ok? 15
16
Chair Alcheck: So right now what's… if I could sort of summarize the current situation the staff's 17
interpretation of this the City's interpretation of this application is that this is not a second 18
dwelling unit because it doesn't have all the requirements that we require. And just to be really 19
clear you can't build a home in this City without a range and an oven. Even if you, if they had 20
come with just one structure and it didn't have an oven and a range that would be problematic 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
because it wouldn't have a kitchen according to our definition. So right now what we're dealing 1
with is I believe Commissioner Summa’s sort of un-comfort with that being the only reason why 2
the guest house isn't deemed a second unit, but so that's where we're at with that. I, my read is 3
that she's not prepared to support the Motion because she's not comfortable with that, but I 4
don't have a specific amendment so I want to move on and see if I can get an amendment and the 5
objective here is to see if we have a majority of individuals to support a Motion so. 6
7
Commissioner Lauing: My amendment would be on the tree size. 8
9
Chair Alcheck: Go ahead. 10
11
Commissioner Lauing: And not being an arborist I'm not quite sure how to phrase this, but if we 12
could specify that the mitigated mitigation trees and trees in general would obscure the building 13
in five years or something along those lines. So it would specify kind of the size of the trees that 14
would go in at this point hence they wouldn’t be five gallon trees, they would be large ones 15
requiring heavy digging. 16
17
Mr. Owen: Just to clarify the mitigation trees that have been proposed for the loss of the one are 18
currently proposed at six feet in diameter at the time of, of the crown diameter at the time of 19
planting. So it's just a baseline. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Lauing: Are these the ones that would be going in front of the high elevation that 1
would be viewable from Arastradero trails? 2
3
Mr. Owen: Yes. Yes they are. 4
5
Commissioner Lauing: Ok and do we know how long that would take to pretty much obscure the 6
house? 7
8
Mr. Lait: Yeah. We're talking oaks and these are slow majestic trees and it would take some time 9
to obscure. And part of the challenge the applicant I think has a landscape person here obviously 10
that could speak. We don't have the City's arborist here. That could be something we bring back 11
to the next meeting if this is something that is needing to be (interrupted) 12
13
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #1 14
15
Commissioner Lauing: Right that’s why I don't know exactly how to specify the Motion, but you 16
understand the intent of obscuring that most almost all of that building over time in a reasonable 17
time not two decades. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Ok I'm going to treat that as an Unfriendly Amendment for the purposes of this 20
process. Do I have a second for that Amendment? 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
SECOND 2
3
Commissioner Summa: I'll second it. 4
5
Chair Alcheck: Ok, great. So we don't really have a specific Amendment, but the idea is essentially 6
to create a condition that would there's one tree that's being removed? 7
8
Mr. Owen: Correct. 9
10
Mr. Lait: If I may? 11
12
Chair Alcheck: Yeah. 13
14
Mr. Lait: My concern is that's going to write… I would like for maybe the based on the comments I 15
heard from Commissioner Summa and Commissioner Lauing I know there's an interest in wanting 16
to move the project forward. We can be back at the next Planning Commission meeting in two 17
weeks on the 25th with some specific information that addresses what size tree should be planted 18
and where if that's the Commission's interest. I feel a little uncomfortable just kind of winging it 19
at this point trying to say within two decades we want to see it screened. I just don't know what 20
that translates to or how feasible that might be. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Alcheck: I can appreciate that. 2
3
Mr. Lait: And I can also (interrupted) 4
5
Commissioner Lauing: So can I. 6
7
Mr. Lait: Provide some written responses to some of the inquiries that have come up. 8
9
Chair Alcheck: I guess what I would like to know and I really am opposed to straw polls, but let me 10
put it this way from my perspective Mr. Dockter’s above and beyond tree assessment satisfies my 11
sensibilities here. And so if for example this amendment even in its vagueness didn't have enough 12
support then in theory I could move this Motion on with it's typical conditions without having to 13
come back. And so what I would like to avoid is having to reschedule another meeting here to 14
discuss the idea of planting a slightly larger tree if there isn't sort of enough support for that 15
particular thing. So aside from the two Commissioners that are currently supporting this 16
amendment will you guys just chime in real quick and let me know if you're, if that's, if this tree 17
issue is something you feel like you'd like to address at the follow up hearing. 18
19
Commissioner Gardias: May I just? Sorry, I was trying to I'm not one of those that proposed this 20
amendment, but may I? 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Alcheck: Yeah, I just want to understand if this is a concern you have about this particular 2
(interrupted) 3
4
Commissioner Gardias: It's in the same topic, right? Because the commonly done trick in terms of 5
the property screening is pretty much that you plan low growing trees, slow growing I’m sorry, 6
slow growing trees and then next to it you plant [weed/wheat?] trees that pretty much obscure. 7
They grow very quickly and they obscure the view very quickly, but then they could be removed. 8
So my question would be to the staff or to the arborist is are there any trees in that area that can 9
be planted that would do the requirements and then they could be removed after certain sizes 10
which (interrupted) 11
12
Mr. Kephart: Yeah, you have the process down correctly. 13
14
Mr. Lait: Sorry, so Chair if you wanted (interrupted) 15
16
Chair Alcheck: [Unintelligible] sorry, I closed the public hearing. So at this time we really can't 17
take comments from you. 18
19
Mr. Owen: If I may speak to the record for that? So as a part of the site and design review process 20
in the open space district one of the requirements is that you have a mitigation basically or 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
landscape monitoring program and you check in basically every five years on the screening 1
capacity and the landscape that was installed in the area that was disturbed. So that's a standard 2
part of the open space site and design review process. 3
4
Mr. Lait: And as far as any quick growing trees I mean we would want something that was native 5
to the area and natural as opposed to something that may do well, but not native to the area. 6
And just also to speak to Dave Dockter’s review or the City's Urban Forestry review I believe that 7
review is more about a replacement mitigation. If you remove a tree you plant 10 more, 8
whatever the standard is and that's different than a view shed analysis of impacts from trails. So 9
I'll just add that to the Commission's dialogue as well. Right. 10
11
Chair Alcheck: Right. Ok, so let me reiterate my question. Is there enough interest among the 12
Commissioners to discuss a planting plan that would further screen this home at a future date? I 13
mean go ahead. 14
15
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah. I'm for me the answer would be no and specifically again I think 16
this is within our purview. I don't think we're to play arborist from the dais. I think that the 17
arborist’s recommendations there are standards, they are working with the City's approved 18
arborist, and I think that as again fellow Palo Alto residents interested in preserving views in the 19
open space… taking into account the recommendation and views of our arborist with all of the 20
site photos and pictures of the story of the story poles I don't personally feel comfortable that I 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
can override or recommend a better arboreal plan than our City's arborist. 1
2
Chair Alcheck: Ok, why don't we do this, why don’t we do this so that this is just a textbook 3
version of this process. We can treat your amendment as a Substitute Motion if you’d like which 4
would essentially be the following: you would like a Substitute Motion that would delay this to 5
our next meeting where we would have an opportunity to review a staff prepared planting plan 6
that would further screen the house. You can see if someone will second that Motion and then 7
we can vote on that Motion immediately. If that Motion fails to gain a majority then the original 8
Motion that's on the floor will be back up and we can have a vote on that Motion assuming there 9
are no other specific amendments to the current Motion. Because I agree with staff that your 10
Motion is a little vague; we don't really know what you want to add to this Motion and so it would 11
not be practical to move forward a Motion without sort of more precision. So are you 12
comfortable sort of changing it to a Substitute Motion? 13
14
Commissioner Lauing: Yes I am. All I’m saying is that the only thing that we have to show and I'm 15
speaking to Eric what you said is that this is all about the views. And the only thing we have is a 16
rendering right now in some year as to the maximum and just trying to figure out how long that’s 17
going to take. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Yeah. So why (interrupted) 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #1 WITHDRAWN, SUBSTITUTE MOTION #1 1
2
Commissioner Lauing: I would make that Motion. 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Ok, so (interrupted) 5
6
Mr. Lait: And before you vote that would be a continuation to the January 25th meeting. 7
8
SECOND, VOTE 9
10
Chair Alcheck: So there's a Substitute Motion currently on the table to come back to this body to 11
review a staff prepared planting plan that would further obscure the home. And are you 12
comfortable seconding Motion? Ok. Can we have a second to the Motion? Ok, let's quickly take 13
a vote. All those in favor of that Motion? Ok that's two. All those opposed to that Motion? 14
That's three. All those abstaining? Ok. That Motion fails. The previous Motion is on table. I’m 15
going to give anybody else an opportunity to suggest an amendment to the current Motion as it 16
stands. Go ahead. 17
18
SUBSTITUTE MOTION #1 FAILED (2-3-1, Commissioner Gardias abstained) 19
20
SUBSTITUTE MOTION #2 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Summa: So I probably wasn't very clear and I apologize for that, but I wanted to 2
continue it for, I want to amend the Motion to continue it to resolve the issue and I would like 3
staff to come back with a way to provide the second unit, the guest unit, that has the appearance 4
of being more reliably consistent with the code. 5
6
Chair Alcheck: I'm going to treat that also as a Substitute Motion. 7
8
Commissioner Summa: That's fine. 9
10
Chair Alcheck: Is there a second on this issue of the guest house? 11
12
SECOND 13
14
Commissioner Rosenblum: I’ll second that. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Ok there's a second. I’ll treat that Substitute Motion as the Motion on the floor. 17
All those in favor of that Motion? 18
19
Commissioner Rosenblum: Can I speak to that? 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Alcheck: Yes. 1
2
Commissioner Rosenblum: So I actually think Commissioner Summa I disagreed originally when 3
you were making this, but then went back and read their report along with the additional 4
comments. I had thought that the Hewlett tract had taken 10 acre plots, but in accordance with 5
the City's wishes had concentrated the plots and made common ownership of a greater area so 6
that the average ownership size would still be 10 acres and therefore be compliant. However, if 7
you are only using the 5.42 acre as a definition for zoning compliance then Commissioner Summa 8
is right. Is it is if this were an ADU it’s not technically compliant. So then the question is: is it an 9
ADU or not? And it certainly looks a lot like an ADU. And so it's hard for me to say in good faith 10
that this isn't if I built this thing in my backyard that looked exactly like this it would look and feel 11
and act a lot awful like an ADU. 12
13
At the same time I think it's a little absurd. I do think the spirit of this whole thing was to 14
concentrate the houses, have a shared open space, and to penalize the families for that action is 15
what the effect of this is, is a little bit absurd. But I think that this is technically correct that if the 16
zoning rules apply to 5.42 acres and therefore they would not be eligible for an ADU and this looks 17
like an ADU. I understand Commissioner Summa’s concern and I agree with it. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Ok. All those in favor of this (interrupted) 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Lauing: Well wait, is it… can I ask, I thought we had talked about that and the 1
opinion was that it is legal because in open space that's ok. So I thought we already got the view 2
that that was legal because my question was is it legal and I thought you guys more or less said 3
yes. 4
5
Mr. Owen: Our position is that with the lack of an oven then the kitchenette is not a kitchen and 6
so therefore you don't have the ability to have cooking facilities which is our code definition. One 7
of the code definitions (interrupted) 8
9
Commissioner Lauing: Which makes it legal even in the five point something acreage? 10
11
Mr. Owen: Correct, right. 12
13
Commissioner Lauing: And that's consistent with how that is applied across any area. So it seems 14
like it's legal. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Yeah ok. I don't disagree with you. I think there's (interrupted) 17
18
Commissioner Lauing: I just wanted to get clear on that answer. 19
20
Chair Alcheck: Yeah. Just to be clear what is your definition for a kitchenette? I mean are we 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
talking about a sink and a garbage disposal? If you don't have any cooking appliances what can 1
you do? 2
3
Mr. Owen: So typically and this is you see this more often in the R-1 neighborhoods where you 4
have like a wet bar down in a basement for example. You can have a microwave, but once you 5
have a gas hookup. You know a range for example that's a red flag. That's usually our trigger for 6
considering something to be an actual second unit. 7
8
Chair Alcheck: Ok. So I think we're on the same page here, but I'm going to process this Motion. 9
10
Commissioner Gardias: Just to if one moment if I just may ask about the clarification not about 11
what would be the action item after this amendment, what is the proposed action item? 12
13
Chair Alcheck: I think the current (interrupted) 14
15
Commissioner Gardias: [Unintelligible] Commissioner Summa could speak to it and just advise 16
what she's asking the staff. 17
18
Commissioner Summa: Well once again I am sorry if I'm not being clear. I was asking for a way to 19
really help this applicant get what they want which is a guest house and have it be consistent with 20
the code. It's as simple as that. And I don't think the code can rest on whether there's an oven. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
People you know ADUs now where they're legal like in RMD and R-2 second units typically have 1
kitchens or kitchenettes and are still called second dwelling units. So I just I guess if staff could 2
convince me tonight I will let it go, but I would like the at least to recommend that Council 3
consider that and be aware of it. And I also think it gives the applicant an opportunity come back 4
very quickly and having resolved all my concerns. 5
6
Chair Alcheck: Ok. 7
8
Mr. Lait: Just for the Commission’s consideration? 9
10
Chair Alcheck: Sure. 11
12
Mr. Lait: We do have a definition of kitchen if you’d like hear it. 13
14
Chair Alcheck: Yeah, go ahead. 15
16
Mr. Lait: Also in [1804030 Number 75] kitchen means a room designed, intended or used for 17
cooking and the preparation of food and dishwashing. Kitchen facilities include the presence of 18
major appliances or utility connections and the ability to store, prepare, cook and clean up of food 19
or food preparation. So that major appliances and utility connections are areas that we have in 20
this case and in previous cases seeing that they’re not there and therefore not a kitchen and 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
therefore without a kitchen not a dwelling unit. 1
2
Chair Alcheck: Ok and can I just ask you one more point of clarification? Assuming we didn't weed 3
into these details the Building Department would be all over this because they in theory would 4
flag any utility hook ups in that accessory unit. 5
6
Mr. Lait: So it's a combination of the Planning Department and the Building Department and 7
Utilities. It's a review process. 8
9
Chair Alcheck: Right. 10
11
Mr. Lait: And so if this didn't come to the Commission we would still be having this conversation 12
at a staff level. 13
14
Chair Alcheck: Yeah. Ok, alright. So we have a Substitute Motion. 15
16
Ms. Silver: I'm sorry if I could just chime in on one more issue. You know I think if there is a 17
consensus that you do want to move this forward tonight one way to address this issue to help 18
Council is just to recommend a special condition that very clearly says no kitchen facilities will be 19
permitted and that second unit. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
VOTE 1
2
Chair Alcheck: Yeah, no I understand that. I don't particularly feel… I want to just get a sense of 3
whether there's any support for this at all. I'm not entirely sure how staff would come back and 4
make their case at the next meeting, but we have a Substitute Motion on the floor and I want to 5
sort of give it its process. So all those in favor of this Substitute Motion to have staff come back to 6
us regarding the legality of the current layout of the guest house please say aye, but raise your 7
hand. That's three. All those opposed? That's three. Ok that Motion fails for lack of a majority. 8
We have still the current Motion on the floor which is essentially to move forward this application 9
with typical conditions. Are there any other amendments? 10
11
SUBSTITUTE MOTION #2 FAILED (3-3, Chair Alcheck, Vice-Chair Waldfogel, and Commissioner 12
Lauing against) 13
14
Commissioner Lauing: An amendment could come forth along the lines of what Council [Note-15
Staff?] just recommended. 16
17
Chair Alcheck: Like what? 18
19
Commissioner Lauing: To the main Motion that a recommendation to make sure that there aren’t 20
any kitchen facilities in the particular house. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Alcheck: Are you suggesting that the applicant couldn’t have a wet bar or that they 2
shouldn’t have a range or oven? 3
4
Commissioner Lauing: However specific it needs to be to address the... 5
6
Chair Alcheck: Are you interested in making that amendment or are you just suggesting it? 7
8
Commissioner Lauing: I was suggesting it to the original maker of the other Motion. 9
10
Chair Alcheck: Ok. 11
12
Commissioner Lauing: Commissioner Summa. 13
14
Commissioner Summa: I don't think that achieves what my goal was and my goal was to have it 15
not be a controversial issue that they have the guest house they want and that there be a legal 16
way to do it. And I was looking for staff to come back with so I don't think, I don't think I need to 17
do that. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Ok. I'm going to put this to a vote. So we have a Motion on the (interrupted) 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Gardias: I was going to follow up on your question about amendments. 1
2
Chair Alcheck: You have an amendment to the current Motion? 3
4
Commissioner Gardias: Yes. I would like to suggest an amendment to my colleague that proposed 5
amendment before that failed. If you consider making amendment along the same idea that you 6
made initially about proposing a screening yet as opposed to providing this plan to us would you 7
consider amendment that would entrust the screening, accelerated screening and then just allow 8
this project to move forward tonight. 9
10
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Accelerated screening from the applicant? Is that what you’re saying? 11
12
Commissioner Gardias: No as opposed to just having the trees that are six feet in diameter to 13
request the applicant to provide screening that would reach the screening objectives much faster. 14
And how this would be done it would be done it would be up to the arborist’s discretion and 15
negotiation with the applicant. 16
17
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: That sounds to me like the same as what we previously discussed. So I think 18
we’d rather leave it at a sense of the Commission of we'd like as much screen as fast as possible 19
then to try to legislate it. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Alcheck: Ok here's what I'd like to do. I'd like to have a vote on the current Motion unless 1
someone has an amendment they want to make themselves. Barring that I really appreciate the 2
effort to encourage our new Commissioners to make amendments, I do, but let's do this. We 3
have a current Motion on the table to move this forward with typical conditions of development. 4
All those in favor of this Motion please say aye and raise your hand. Ok. Five in favor. All 5
opposed? One. The Motion passes. I want to take a five minute break and then we'll pick up on 6
Agenda Item Number 3. Thank you. 7
8
MOTION PASSED (5-1, Commissioner Summa opposed) 9
10
Commission Action: 11
Motion: Recommend approval of the project to the City Council, subject to typical conditions of 12
approval. Motion made by Vice Chair Waldfogel, seconded by Chair Alcheck; motion PASSES 5-1, 13
Commissioner Summa against. 14
15
Substitute Motion: Continue the project to January 25, 2017. Motion made by Commissioner 16
Lauing, seconded by Commissioner Summa; motion FAILED 2-3-1, Chair Alcheck, Vice Chair 17
Waldfogel, and Commissioner Rosenblum against, Commissioner Gardias abstaining. 18
19
Substitute Motion: Continue the project to allow staff time to demonstrate the legality of the 20
legality of the accessory structure. Motion made by Commissioner Summa, seconded by 21
Commissioner Rosenblum; motion FAILED 3-3, Chair Alcheck, Vice Chair Waldfogel, and 22
Commissioner Lauing against accessory structure. 23
24
The Commission took a break 25
26
3. Recommendation to the City Council for the Adoption of an Ordinance Making 27
Permanent Interim Urgency Ordinance 5330 (Limiting the Conversion of Ground 28
Floor Retail and Retail Like Uses), With Some Modifications; Extending the Ground 29
Floor Combining District to Certain Properties Located Downtown and in the South of 30
Forest Avenue Coordinated Area Plan; Modifying the Definition of Retail; Adding 31
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Regulations to Improve Pedestrian Oriented Design Standards; and Related Changes. 1
The Proposed Ordinance is Exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act 2
(CEQA) Per Section 15308. Continued from 12/14/16 Meeting 3
4
Chair Alcheck: [Note-starts in progress] retail preservation ordinance. I have speaker cards 5
here. I have four speaker cards. If you have a speaker card for this item can you please just 6
bring it up to me? Ok I'm going to give we have six or so speakers I'm going to give you each five 7
minutes time to speak on this item. Do we want to start with comments first or how do you 8
want to do that? 9
10
Jonathan Lait, Assistant Director: We thought we'd just do like a little two minute recap just to 11
sort of frame the discussion and if you're ok with that I’ll ask Jean to make that presentation. 12
13
Chair Alcheck: Ok before you sort of start I just want to sort of let the rest of the Commissioners 14
know we begin a very quick sort of discussion on this before the new year and we didn't really 15
have a lot of time that meeting so we pushed it and there was also this sensibility that the 16
Commission’s make up was going to change a little bit and we might want to wait till the new 17
Commission members who are here to sort of jump in and go in-depth. And so with that please 18
staff take it away. 19
20
Jean Eisberg, Lexington Planning: Ok, thank you. Good evening, Chair Alcheck and Members of 21
the Commission; I'm Jean Eisberg, Planning Consultant with Lexington Planning. As mentioned 22
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
we were here back in December on the 14th. Staff didn't have an opportunity that night to 1
respond to the Commission's questions and comments. We've done that in the staff report 2
that's before you tonight. I'm just going to recap a couple items. I'm not going to repeat the 3
presentation from last month. 4
5
So in December the Commission made some comments recommending policy measures that 6
could help support retail. This included housing production, retail incentives, parking 7
management strategies. So those topics could be addressed in an area plan, in a economic 8
development strategy, and they're currently being addressed in the Comprehensive Plan and in 9
a parking management study Downtown. But this draft ordinance is very narrow in that it’s a 10
zoning intervention, a very narrow zoning intervention to address one issue affecting retail. It 11
responds to Councils concerns about office and non-retail uses replacing retail and installing 12
window shades and films reducing the vibrancy particularly Downtown. So as a result the 13
Council directed staff to revise the interim ordinance to permanently protect retail spaces from 14
converting to office or non-retail uses citywide and to add provisions to the GF ground floor 15
district Downtown to require window transparency in all ground floor spaces including non-16
conforming uses. 17
18
In terms of outreach the Planning Commission also asked about the outreach efforts. The City 19
Council directed staff to conduct informal community outreach. And so what we did was a 20
number of stakeholder interviews. At this point we've met with 23 individuals to gain their 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
perspectives. This includes some of Palo Alto’s largest commercial property owners Downtown, 1
a commercial brokerage firm representing over 90 properties citywide, architects, residents, 2
and a number of small business owners and retailers. And this feedback is summarized in the 3
December staff report. 4
5
Additionally in front of you you should have received a memo today it's also in the back of the 6
room with an additional staff recommendation to allow property owners in the South of Forest 7
Avenue 2 (SOFA 2) the southern tip of SOFA 2 and the RT-35 district to replace retail uses with 8
private educational facilities. The Council had expressed support for this specific provision this 9
fall and staff is now recommending including that in the draft ordinance to provide some 10
additional flexibility in this vacant retail area outside of the Downtown and SOFA 2 core. 11
12
Lastly just a reminder about timing; so the interim ordinance expires April 30th, the intention is 13
to have a permanent ordinance in place at that time. So we're aiming to go to Council for the 14
first reading in February and are requesting tonight that you review and consider a 15
recommendation to the Council that protects retail conversion citywide, adds design standards 16
in the Downtown GF and California Avenue combining districts and modifies the ground floor 17
boundary Downtown. That concludes my presentation. I’m happy to answer any questions. 18
Thank you. 19
20
Chair Alcheck: Thank you. I'm going to open in the public hearing now and invite our 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
community members to speak. You’ll each have five minutes and Vice-Chair Waldfogel will call 1
you up. 2
3
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Great. Let's start with Benjamin Cintz followed by Terry Shuchat. 4
5
Benjamin Cintz: My brother will also be speaking and is it possible for me to defer for now and 6
then add my time to his? His name is Simon Cintz. 7
8
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Yes absolutely. Let's see where do we have… I think fourth in the list, is 9
that ok? 10
11
Mr. B. Cintz: That's fine. Thank you very much. 12
13
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Ok. Great. So it’s Terry Shuchat followed by Christian Hansen. 14
15
Terry Shuchat: Good evening, I'm Terry Shuchat. For the last 51 years I've owned a retail 16
camera store Keeble & Shuchat in Palo Alto. Having had that many years’ experience in retail I’d 17
like to kind of share with you the state of retail today and it's not good. If you had asked me a 18
year ago if I would retire someday due to my old decrepit age I would say absolutely never. I 19
like my business. I love it there. I've got great people working there. I have no reason to retire; 20
however, we've been put out of business basically by the Internet and by the smartphone. So 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
technology has raised havoc with the camera industry. A good portion of the cameras that we 1
used to sell were replaced by smart phones. A lot of our business has been taken away by the 2
Internet. So I think you need to be quite liberal when you when you look at retail. And I built in 3
1977 a two-story 16,000 square foot building for my business. At one point we had seventy 4
employees. So we were the largest camera store in all of greater Northern California. 5
6
The second story is an office area. We've always use it for offices and right now I'm trying to 7
rent the building. So our plan will be to separate the first floor from the second floor. Let the 8
second floor continue as office space as it's been and the first floor will continue as retail. I am 9
deluged with calls from realtors who are very, very interested in the office space. I have 10
received hardly any calls regarding the retail space. 11
12
If you ask people in Palo Alto what would you like to see in retail? Oh, I'd like to see the local 13
hardware store back. I want to see the jewelry store back. Why did you close your camera 14
store? Well the reason all these stores have closed is because they're not getting support. And 15
I think you're going to find if you make retail on the first floor difficult to fill that Palo Alto is 16
going to have a lot of vacant space. And I think the City would be much better off with that 17
space filled with some type of business, so extending the concept of retail would be a really a 18
great idea to encourage people to open businesses. Because if you look at companies like 19
Macy's, Sears, even Wal-Mart their businesses are suffering and they're suffering because of the 20
Internet. Now they're in the Internet business also, but they're in the process of closing stores 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
or reducing the size of their stores. So what you can't expect to see in Palo Alto is what we used 1
to have in retail with lots of small locally owned stores. 2
3
I was born in Palo Alto so I have seen huge, huge changes here in retail and as I was growing up 4
so many of the small retail businesses were locally owned and a large portion of those people 5
also owned the buildings they were in. Today on California Avenue I own my building. Bob 6
Davidson who owns the paint store owns his building. There's about two other businesses that 7
are owner occupied. All the rest of the retail stores are either owned by developers who have 8
moved in and have redone the business or the buildings or by large concerns so that it's 9
unfortunately also the cost of retail space in Palo Alto is extremely high. And due to that cost 10
small retail or even medium sized retail or even like my store which was a large store really can't 11
survive. So I would like to encourage you I mean I'm all for the second story as I said. I get calls 12
from realtors every day, every few days inquiring about our office space upstairs. So office 13
spaces is really very easy to occupy and that's why so many people would like to convert their 14
first floor retail to office space. I am all for having retail, but I think you have to be realistic as to 15
what type of retail if any retail is going to fill certain spaces that are available. Thank you. 16
17
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Thank you. Christian Hansen followed by I’m not sure which Cintz, 18
Benjamin or Simon. 19
20
Christian Hansen: Good evening, Commissioners. My name's Christian Hansen. I just wanted to 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
share with you my experience in a building that we own on 999 Alma which is the Anthropologie 1
building. We purchased that building a couple years ago and fully knowing that Anthropologie 2
was not getting the business that they wanted and they were talking about moving. We know 3
now that they've moved to the mall to a much larger building where they get more foot traffic. 4
5
I've been marketing… when we bought the building we had some flexibility in how we could 6
market the space. We knew that because they were struggling in retail it would be difficult for 7
us to get another retail in that space, retailer. So with the SOFA 2 zoning you're allowed some 8
additional flexibility to market; for example, you can have up to 5,000 square feet (sf) of office, 9
but you have to maintain a retail component. We've been marketing that space for a year now 10
strictly as retail and I have not yet received an offer on the full space. And I hate coming here 11
and telling everyone that because that really makes it difficult for me to be competitive when I 12
go negotiate with prospective tenants. I have received an informal offer for a portion of the 13
space along Alma which would leave the alley space behind the Alma frontage to lease which 14
would be extremely difficult. Again I, we would love to lease the space. We've been trying to 15
market it to any tenant at an undisclosed price because we wanted to see all offers and it’s been 16
very difficult. 17
18
We did receive some interest from a school and I know one of the things discussed here tonight 19
was to fold in education use as a retail like use. And we've been working on this for… with the 20
school to try to get this through the City for a year or six months. I don't know, because it's 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
taken so long I don't know if the school is still going to be a round in a viable option for us, but 1
as you look at what to do with this retail ordinance I would just let you know that time, the time 2
it takes there's a waiver provision that's proposed to say if you're struggling like we are you can 3
come in, you can submit a waiver, and you can approve or deny it. But as you know as tenants 4
are looking for space they don't always have two, three, four, six months to wait around for us 5
to figure out with the City if we can lease up the space and the use that they want. So we again 6
start back at square one. So I hope the education use is still around when this goes through. 7
8
But the other thing I would just want to mention is that SOFA 2 was a very well thought out 9
zoning plan. There was a lot of thought, a lot of study. I mean the packet I know is 200 pages 10
thick and they seem to have thought of almost everything and this ordinance blankets the 11
whole City saying that no, there can be no change from retail. And specifically in the SOFA 12
ordinance it retail is protected on the Homer and Emerson corridors there's no conversion of 13
ground floor retail. It's not allowed. You're not allowed to convert ground floor retail to any 14
other use. It's protected in the SOFA 2. The southerly most tip like where we're at on Addison 15
where there's virtually no retail was excluded from that for good reason, to give us some 16
flexibility so that we can lease our space. 17
18
And I call it luck that we just happened to buy this building right around the time that this 19
emergency ordinance came through and we had a tenant vacate, but this is something that not 20
everyone is feeling now, but as spaces roll and tenants move out this is going to be something 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
that's that a lot of the tenants on the periphery are going to be faced with. So I would just 1
encourage you to remember that when these specific areas of the City that are on the outskirts 2
when the zoning ordinances were constructed they were done with a lot of thought, a lot of 3
study, and I would urge the Council to leave or the Commission to leave that as is. And I agree 4
that it's important to preserve the livelihood of certain areas and retail corridors, but they… it's 5
not the whole City. There are certain areas. Thank you. 6
7
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Thank you. Simon Cintz followed by John Goldman. 8
9
Simon Cintz: Hi, my name is Simon Cintz. My brother and I our family has been in Palo Alto 10
since the early 1950s. Our family owns four small commercial properties in Palo Alto, two in the 11
SOFA area, two along El Camino. 12
13
I wanted to say I really hope that this Commission will listen to the last two speakers Mr. 14
Shuchat and Mr. Hansen. I have bought cameras at Keeble & Shuchat. I have gone in there 15
many times for various photographic things. You know I really do wish that they could stay, but 16
that's being nostalgic and I hope this Commission will stop being nostalgic and become realistic. 17
And that's what these two people are really saying, what's realistic given the changing 18
environment is not what's in front of you as a proposed ordinance. 19
20
The blanket citywide prohibition against any and all ground floor retail conversion is a one size 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
fits all approach to retail preservation. I'm referring specifically to Section 5 of the proposed 1
ordinance. It doesn't matter what type of retail. It doesn't matter where the retail is located. It 2
doesn't matter whether or not the retail is viable in this location. It ignores most of the issues 3
that should be considered in a carefully thought out process. Is this the way Palo Alto wants to 4
do zoning and city planning? It's important to note that almost all of Palo Alto’s existing retail is 5
currently protected by current zoning ordinances. This ordinance only serves to protect a very 6
small portion of Palo Alto’s existing retail including retail properties where retail is no longer 7
viable. What is the real benefit added by this ordinance? 8
9
It's also important note the ordinance mentions that there 70,000 sf of retail has been lost since 10
2008. Let's put this in perspective; I asked Miss Jean Eisberg how much retail there was in Palo 11
Alto, she looked it up said 2.6 million sf of retail in Palo Alto. This means that 2.7 percent of our 12
retail has been lost in about six or seven years. This isn't much considering the changing nature 13
of retail. So let's put this thing in perspective and what retail really is available to the citizens of 14
Palo Alto. 15
16
In our own family situation we converted an auto garage that was built in the 1960s by my 17
parents into the ground floor into dental/medical. There’s about 3,300 sf. We have a two 18
dentists and a doctor there. Most of their patients are Palo Alto residents. It serves Palo Alto. 19
Would the residents rather have the benefit of these medical offices/dental offices or would 20
they rather have the auto garage that was there which had a chain link fence around it and the 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
old junk cars were parked against the fence because they weren't going to go anywhere. Now 1
we have a really a very attractive place. It benefits, it certainly looks a lot better and I think it 2
provides much more benefit to the citizens of Palo Alto. 3
4
One might argue that the ordinance provides for an appeals process. As pointed out earlier I 5
think by Mr. Hansen it sets a bar that’s way too high for a realistic exception for a conversion. It 6
would take forever. Conversion should be allowed in those areas with a little pedestrian traffic. 7
I mean the ordinance and the staff report often talks about encouraging pedestrian traffic. Well 8
you’re not going to encourage pedestrian traffic by sticking in a retail use in the middle of a 9
place that doesn't have pedestrian traffic. The area around Anthropologie and what used to be 10
the old Addison Antique is a good example of an area that I could literally lie down on the 11
sidewalk there and nobody's going to step over me, ok? 12
13
I hope that you would consider medical, small medical and dental as an appropriate 14
replacement for retail and the last thing I want to say is if you really want to help retailers, if you 15
really want to help the City of Palo Alto’s residents with retail, fix the parking problem. 16
Everybody will cheer. The residents will cheer, the store owners will cheer, the property owners 17
will cheer. That's really the problem. That's really where the focus should be to make retail 18
successful is fix the parking problem. Thank you. 19
20
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: John Goldman followed Brad Ehikian. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
John Goldman: Ok, hello. So I've been in property management and leasing in Palo Alto for 20 2
years. In fact this month is my, will be my 20 year anniversary. So I've been highly involved in 3
managing retail tenants and doing retail leasing. I've been friends with retailers and talked to 4
them many times over the years. I was on the ground floor retail stakeholder group in 2009. By 5
the way our firm we manage about 65 buildings in Palo Alto including 43 in Downtown and no 6
one asked me my opinion or invited me to a stakeholder group. 7
8
The 2009 process was very productive. I mean there were groups from retail, building owners, 9
regular unaffiliated citizens and it was very minor changes, but we had at least 6 probably two 10
hour meetings and everyone left shaking hands and felt… and some of that was to tweak the 11
thing I’m going to talk about is vacancy. Like people were seeing these boarded up buildings on 12
Alma Street in and other areas that had… no one views that as good and productive for retail to 13
have a bunch of vacant buildings. If you went to the mall and every other store was closed 14
you’d go to a different mall. Like I used to go to the one down in Cupertino that was falling 15
apart and it was like it was depressing. 16
17
So, so I talk regularly to retailers and interestingly the two things that they've been absolutely 18
panicked about was when they started hearing about the… well, I'll just talk about one. The 19
other one is too political, but the legislating of tech out of Downtown as discussed by the Mayor 20
last year I had so many people calling me saying what's going to happen, I'm going to be out of 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
business, this is insane. So they… I don't know how this ordinance is supposed to help the 1
retailers. There's not a lot in it for them that they're seeing. Their biggest concern that they talk 2
to me about is foot traffic and they don't want more retail. They want a consolidated customer 3
base in a shopping district like University Avenue. They don't want people running around onto 4
Everett Street trying to find, to buy some clothes over there. They want to force people into 5
where they are. 6
7
So let's see I just wrote a couple thing… yeah, they don't want vacant buildings breaking up the 8
district that they're very happy now. And whenever we have a vacancy that's one of the 9
common calls I get is: when are you going to lease the building next door to me? It's making my 10
block bad. People don't walk here anymore. And at one time I read a study from a retail 11
consultant who said one section a 100 foot of vacant block face can destroy an entire block that 12
people won't walk there anymore. 13
14
So just one other note, I mean really the retailers that are succeeding in the current 15
environment with all the things that everyone else already talked about are restaurants that 16
serve a lot of booze or expensive coffee, cell phone retailers and hair salons. There's really not 17
the vacuum cleaner store and the penny candy store is just people are ordering all that stuff on 18
Amazon. And the retailers this they have a lot of pressures whether it's the minimum wage, 19
California laws like paid time off, workers comp, medical insurance, liability insurance, license 20
and compliance. I mean just a new retail or small retailer comes in they have to get a use and 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
occupancy permit for about $450 and they have a number of other requirements. A business 1
registry is $300. The costs of their employees being able to park; I mean the Transportation 2
Management Association (TMA) has done some things to give free bus passes and other things 3
to the employees of these retailers. That's helpful to retailers because hiring for Downtown 4
Palo Alto is very difficult. Our office is next to Spot Pizza and that's the Number 1 problem he 5
has. He can’t hire people and giving them free bus passes that's something that actually works. 6
That's the kind of thing the City can do to help the retailers. 7
8
So yeah that's pretty much my observations. I’ve been around a long time. I'm always happy to 9
talk to anyone about what I know and introduce other friends and people who've also been 10
around and seen a lot of things happen in Downtown Palo Alto. Thank you. 11
12
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Thank you. Brad Ehikian followed by Chop Keenan. 13
14
Brad Ehikian: Hello, my name is Brad Ehikian and I’m a partner over at Premier Properties. So 15
we as John mentioned we've managed about 43 properties Downtown and I think we're 16
averaging about sixty leases a year in Palo Alto. Just as a kind of some a personal anecdotes we 17
are seeing retail environment change right before our eyes. I would probably say 90 percent of 18
the calls I receive are from restaurants. This is a similar trend we're seeing in other downtowns. 19
It makes sense because restaurants are coming to our area to take advantage of our very robust 20
office environment. That's built in clients for them. It's created this symbiotic relationship 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
between the office and the restaurant and they've been able to thrive under that environment. 1
Retailers on the other hand are shedding space to provide more show room type of 2
environments and they're essentially distributing a lot of their goods to help reduce overhead 3
and inventory. You know just name few we got FLOR, West Elm, Rejuvenation, Restoration 4
Hardware, Design Within Reach, The Shade Store, I mean I can go on and on. These are the 5
changes and trends we're seeing in the retail environment. 6
7
In my experience in discussion with retailers the biggest killer is vacancy. Vacancy will destroy a 8
block. If our intent is to help promote and protect retail we need to really ensure that we're 9
creating a vibrant area and protecting our core business districts which would allow for really 10
maximum foot traffic and exposure. Let's take our current environment in Palo Alto right now; 11
we have a very thriving market. With that said we just lost two of our major retailers to 12
Stanford Shopping Center. We saw, lost the North Face and Anthropologie. I use those two 13
because those are probably the most well-known, but those are on the outskirts. In both cases 14
rent was not the issue. They're going over to Stanford and they're paying probably three X the 15
rent but they're getting 100 times more the foot traffic. This to our retails is key. That's the 16
most important part to our retailers. So now University Avenue may come close, but are out… a 17
lot of the side streets don't have that kind of traffic. 217 Alma, the former North Face, that's 18
going on vacant a year. We don't ask a price. We're trying to find everybody. We're looking for 19
anybody who's out there. It's a very challenging site for us to get leased. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
So really at the end of day we're asking really what are we trying to do here? What's the end 1
goal? Very little of this ordinance does anything to really help our retailers. TMA as John had 2
mentioned was a kind of really the first step in providing some assistance to our retailers, but by 3
adding more retail and expanding our district will only hurt our existing businesses. So I would 4
recommend going back to the original 2009 ordinance and keeping things the way they are 5
without any retail citywide protections. Thank you 6
7
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Chop Keenan please. 8
9
Chop Keenan: Good evening, 700 Emerson, Chop Keenan. I want to call this the retail 10
enhancement ordinance not the retail preservation ordinance because I think that's what we're 11
all about. I started buying property and improving them in Downtown Palo Alto in 1972. And so 12
we've done Whole Foods and Aquarius and the Varsity Theater twice, all of the 600 block where 13
Dan Gordon is and the corner of University and High and on and on. I mean I'm a retail nut and 14
I've got a retail centers all around the Bay Area, almost two million sf of them. So I'm in that 15
game all the time. I know what works. 16
17
Parking certainly works. We're in a parking district in the core Downtown. SOFA has no parking 18
district and SOFA was a three and a half year specific plan with an Environmental Impact Report 19
(EIR). If you go to alter that I would suggest you're going to need an EIR. I noticed and also in 20
the Comp Plan discussions the reluctance to get into another specific plan area because there 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
are so forever and to what end? 1
2
So what's good short of just shelving this plan? What's the enhancement? I sent all of you an 3
email that was from John McNellis which expanded allowable uses in the retail core. Banks are 4
a perfect example. They are high traffic generating. Anything I have in my shopping centers in 5
San Ramon and San Jose, Berkeley I've got dentists and I've got tutoring and I've got financial 6
banks. So rather than expanding that out of the core I would expand that in the core. It was 15 7
percent vacancy on University Avenue in 2009 when that last update on the retail ordinance 8
was done. We went building by building looking at which are appropriate for retail and which 9
are just functionally not. And west of High Street was very problematic; Zebra Copy, everybody 10
laments their Zebra Copy left. They were always six months behind in their rent. They just 11
weren't making it there. And if I hear one more time about everybody crying about Rudy's, 12
nobody here has ever been to Rudy's Pub, but ok Doria; says a lot about you. 13
14
So I can… there's not much in this ordinance that I think is good. Eliminating that 25 percent 15
office ground floor exemption is terrible. I would say that the Downtown and SOFA are highly 16
regulated already. One size fits all I can guarantee Downtown is different than SOFA. SOFA’s 17
different than Midtown. Midtown is different Cal Ave. As long as we're talking about the whole 18
City one size fits all, eliminate the chain store restriction in Cal Ave. It’s their finally their day in 19
the sun comes. Cal Ave. used to go across the tracks, it was a very vibrant district. Put in 20
Oregon Avenue and it died. It's having its day in the sun because it too is mixed use. Every time 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
I have an office user that's also a customer. This is what… we’re the envy of every city in 1
America is Downtown Palo Alto. We’re working hard on traffic, on parking and I urge you to 2
step back from this ordinance. 3
4
The outreach that was made by Ms. Eisberg was very superficial and one way. Just it wasn’t 5
engaging. I’d love to have a working session with this Council [Note-Commission] and talk to the 6
users and property owners particularly in the Downtown and in SOFA to get more than a five 7
minute sound bite. So you know what's happening to retail in America. Putting our finger in the 8
retail dike with this ordinance when there's a tsunami on the other side is not constructive. 9
Thanks so much. 10
11
Chair Alcheck: Ok. What I'd like to do now is have our Commissioners weigh in. Let's start from 12
the other side and we’ll go down the line and everybody please incorporate your comments and 13
questions into your time. 14
15
Commissioner Gardias: Thank you. So let me think about this how to start. So I think that at 16
first thank you very much for those from the property management and owners, property 17
owners, and merchants and Mr. Shuchat. You’re the legend of Palo Alto and you are. You are, 18
yes. So thank you very much for taking your evening and coming here to us. And with saying 19
this I think that we would be extremely interested in having this gentleman and all other men, 20
merchants, systemic and deep perspective of this on this how we can improve retail in Palo Alto. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
So I'm saying this because when I look at this ordinance and I'm just asking ourselves the 1
question that somebody raised here: what are we trying to achieve here? And I'm not really 2
sure if this document conveys or convinces me to any idea that we want to have with preserving 3
or expanding or just making changes to a retail merchants in Palo Alto. 4
5
First of all I'd like to understand what's the strategy? I’d like to understand the broader picture. 6
I can tell the staff and my colleagues what I think about this, but there needs to be some sort of 7
consensus and the greater understanding what's our end goal of this and other retail 8
ordinances. We agreed that we want to just preserve it. We want to have it thriving, but this 9
means nothing. So this documents lacks greater understanding and consensus of the 10
community what we're trying to do. That's Number 1. 11
12
So with this I hope that with these comments that maybe besides of the discussion on this that 13
staff can make an effort to engage with the discussion with the community of the merchants 14
because this topic will not go away. There's going to be the recession. There will be a change of 15
minds. There will be change, there is already ongoing change toward in the attitude toward the 16
malls that are not thriving as used. There is a youth population that recognizes the value of the 17
stores long the streets. So I think that the winds are changing across America the way I see it, 18
but we have to think this through because there are of course other Internet forces as 19
somebody said here that we are have to overcome in order to make this gentleman wealthy, 20
right? Because that will thrive as long as they are wealthy and their businesses will be wealthy 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
to overcome also the cost that's associated with running the businesses. But then with this 1
there needs to be a set of the planning decisions that will bring the foot traffic, that will make 2
that will bring the lower cost skilled employees, that will allow them to for flexible 3
arrangements, that will maybe ease up on the regulations. So that's in terms of the larger 4
perspective. 5
6
So with saying this I'm just asking because I have number of the detailed questions, but it may 7
take a while. So are we going to have a couple of rounds? Because now I can just stop and just 8
allow somebody else. Ok, thank you. 9
10
Chair Alcheck: Yes, please. 11
12
Commissioner Lauing: Ok, thanks. The staff's intent here is for this to be basically very narrow 13
and some of the comments that I read in the last minutes from December and here tonight are 14
very worthwhile, but I'm not sure that all of them or many of them apply to the narrow issue of 15
preserving ground floor retail. And the second thing is that we're talking about this of course 16
for merchants and of course for developers, but we're talking about this with respect to the 17
vitality of the area in mixed use area for our citizens. So that needs to be the focus here. 18
Anything that we would recommend with respect to this ordinance doesn't preclude a lot of 19
these other things like more parking and how to do promotions which I saw in the minutes from 20
the last meeting and so on. It doesn't preclude that, but it’s just not quite the same subject as 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
what we're dealing with here. So I think more the question is, is this ordinance what we need or 1
is it does it need to be added to or subtracted from? 2
3
Two comments that I wanted to make that were prepared and I don't know if we're just all on 4
the same page or many of the speakers were looking over my shoulder, but one of the things 5
that was there in the 2009 ordinance and is still extremely important is this issue of where is 6
there marginally viable retail locations? And the three businesses that I put in my own notes 7
where the three that you mentioned which is over by Addison Antiques and Anthropologie on 8
the one hand on Alma and then also the ski shop, what’s the name of it? North Face, thank you. 9
So it does seem to me that there is room for defining some areas that in 2017 we might now 10
define as marginal, marginally viable and address that maybe even going overboard and saying 11
those can now be offices. We can't deal with that tonight so in terms of the methodology City 12
staff can give us advice on how to proceed with that, but I think there are some areas that may 13
need to be exempt from the one fits all kind of regulation. 14
15
And the second thing is that and this is been mentioned so I would just since I currently have the 16
floor say I do think that small medical offices can make some sense. It's all about traffic, 17
pedestrians, getting services and getting an eye exam and getting my glasses taken care of and 18
going to the shoe repair guy on the same street on California Avenue sounds… I do it. It’s fine, 19
should… that seems fine to me. So those two are examples of things that we could consider as 20
amendments to what's in front of us. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
I do think that the last staff that we got was there's only about two percent vacancy and that 2
may be old, but relative to when this report was published, but that was November of 2016. So 3
it seems like except for these more marginal areas that there are retailers that want to move 4
into the vacant space, thank goodness not like 2009, with some notable exceptions that we just 5
heard from Mr. Shuchat as well. So in some sense what I'm saying is I don't feel like it's broken. 6
That preserving ground floor retail for citizens to walk by and see all of the options is terrific. 7
Clearly I actually cut my teeth in retail. I was in it for about 10 years. It's all about traffic. It's 8
what you sell and where you are. So there has to be some issues around that that we can look 9
at as well again I think sort of outside the narrow definition of what we're dealing with right 10
now. 11
12
One comment that would make just on the wording is that we're trying to get a much more 13
broad definition of what retail is. I'd be very supportive of that as long as it doesn't get 14
ambiguous because then somebody’s going to have to be making the decision on a lease by 15
lease basis. So I think that for a first round is all I have to say. 16
17
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: So this proposed ordinance responds to direction from the City Council 18
and my view is that we should forward this more or less as written to the Council. And if Council 19
the current Council wants to provide us different direction then they can send us new direction 20
and we can move forward on that basis. But I think that a lot of speculative deliberation tonight 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
on what the Council may or may not want that's different from what the Council previously 1
directed to staff and previously directed indirectly to us is potentially a waste of time. That said 2
I agree with my colleagues with Commissioner Lauing’s view on medical and dental office 3
particularly outside of the core retail districts. So I wouldn't want to see a lot more of that on 4
Cal Ave. or on University, but in the periphery I think that would be potentially a great thing. 5
6
I think there's an open question whether ground floor office particularly with shaded windows 7
creates the same hole in the street that a retail vacancy creates. So I think we just want to be 8
careful as we think about and when we talk about vacancy and talk about the risks of vacancy 9
that we're cognizant that there are occupancies that create the same effect on the street as a 10
retail vacancy. And retail may be in a crisis, but we happen to be in or near zip codes where 11
retail is working. And we know that retail is working in the Stanford Shopping Center and in 12
Town & Country. Retail appears to work in Downtown Los Altos. It appears to work in Los 13
Gatos. It appears to work in San Carlos. It appears to work in Belmont. And not all of those 14
cities have heavy office conditions to drive that retail. So I think that understanding why it is 15
that retail works in some of those communities is something that's important for us to explore 16
and to understand better. But as I said my general view is that we should just forward this 17
forward this to Council and see if Council has any new direction for us. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Ok. Well I'll start by saying that I found the inclusion of the 2009 minutes and 20
notes to be particularly informative. I think one of the main things I sort of took away from that 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
was the notion that there was a really exhaustive effort made to engage a members of the 1
community in a process that wasn't necessarily self-serving, but really City serving. I appreciate 2
that there was a Council direction here, but I consider our appointment to this Commission to 3
be not necessarily an appointment to essentially enact the Council's direction, but really to give 4
Council perspective. Maybe it's a perspective they share and maybe it's a perspective they 5
don't, but if for example we find many aspects of this ordinance problematic I think now is a 6
great opportunity to let them know. 7
8
And I'd say the number one thing that I find problematic about what we're what we have in 9
front of us is this notion that we didn't engage the community the way we did in 2009. And just 10
so we're clear here 2009 was just the beginning of our recovery. So that engagement essentially 11
was on the heels of a crisis. I think we're in the 82nd or 83rd month of our recovery. We've 12
never had a 10 year recovery. I don't know that we've had a nine year recovery. So we're four 13
months away from eight years. I don't know. Or that mean that we're going have a crisis in 4 14
months or 8 months or 12 months or 14 months or 16 months? I can guarantee you it's coming. 15
I just don't know when. I'm not going to put money on it, but it's not going to we're not going to 16
have a 10 year recovery. 17
18
And so the question is are we about to essentially codify something that doesn't speak to what 19
potentially is looming, in which case we'll be in a crisis let's say in 2019 or 2018. And then we're 20
going to want to get together with everybody and figure out well what can we do to help you 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
because we've got vacancies everywhere. I feel you were telling me about your camera store. I 1
swear I felt really guilty because I the last camera I bought was on Amazon and it was an single-2
lens reflex (SLR) because I had a kid and I wanted to take pictures of them and it's the absolute 3
truth. We're buying everything online. And one easy thing that I'd love to see staff come back 4
to is essentially what could only be described as the broadest definition of retail. I'd like to see 5
an ordinance that essentially had a definition of retail that someone would be like how is that 6
retail? I'd like to see the broadest definition on the table that we could pare back as opposed to 7
sitting here and saying well what about if added dental offices? Which aren’t included or what 8
if a yoga studio or what… I don't want to… I don't think any of us are qualified to just call it off 9
the dais. I’d rather have a definition that would be really broad. Frankly if there are shopping 10
malls that have dental offices and financial planners and tutoring centers then our definition of 11
retail should incorporate those because I assume that anything that generates foot traffic for a 12
shopping center like Stanford or its competitors is probably worth consideration. 13
14
I don't know, I'm really uncomfortable moving this forward to Council as is and I take a little 15
solace in the fact that the Councils’ make up has changed dramatically in the last election. So 16
maybe the direction that we've given is… it's not enough I think to just say this is ready for their 17
vote. And I would I mean I would like to hear everybody's thoughts before we sort of delve into 18
the specifics, but I would argue that the most concerning issue is that I don't think any of this 19
addresses a potential crisis that's coming in the next 18 months. And the worst thing that could 20
happen is if this accelerates problems in our town that would have come anyways because it 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
wasn't sort of sensitive. 1
2
I'd argue that in 2009, I don't even know if the 2009 ordinance if we can just rest on that alone. 3
I don't even know if that's a good fallback and I'll tell you why. Let’s just put some context here, 4
right? iPhone is 2007. The whole retail framework has changed. I do most of my retail on my 5
phone now. Like literally all of it. I don't even use my computer for retail. I literally buy 6
everything I buy on my phone. And that the retail landscape has changed so dramatically 7
between 2009 and 2017 that I don't I don't know that even the 2009 framework is enough. I 8
think we need to essentially understand what it is that we're doing. 9
10
I think the argument about parking is persuasive. I think we don't acknowledge how valuable 11
the business users are to the retail operators. When we talk about getting business, getting 12
tech out of Downtown I can imagine the retailers getting scared, but again I want to hear from 13
everybody else. My biggest concern remains the sort of looming economic conditions and how 14
are we addressing them without input based on the last seven years of experience. So I’m going 15
to pass it to Doria and we’ll come back. 16
17
Commissioner Summa: So I'll keep my comments general and I want to thank everybody from 18
the public that came here to speak. And I'm sorry if you didn't think the public outreach process 19
was good enough. And I also notice that there aren't any small business operators here tonight 20
which kind of surprises me and including any traditional retail, well Terry, but… so that was kind 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
of striking to me. I want to agree with a lot of my colleagues and especially with comments that 1
this is kind of a narrow ordinance that the Council wants us to take a look at that they felt was 2
important. And I don't think it's so, I don't think we're going through this ordinance solve the 3
parking problem for sure and other complicated issues. I think the idea of this ordinance was 4
kind of a quit the convert, to stop the conversion of what had been retail to office uses basically 5
and to support creative ideas to a certain extent about retail zones. 6
7
So I have some specific ideas here, but oh ok. So and I'm kind of interested in sending this to 8
Council quickly because I know you guys saw it before. I don't want to get into specific things, 9
but I don't want to try to solve other bigger problems with this ordinance. What I want to do, 10
what I think the Council intended to do and what I'd like to support is stopping the conversion of 11
ground floor retail. And I think that another one of my colleagues made a very good point that 12
conversion of office to ground on the ground floor to as a use can be as devastating as a 13
vacancy. I think that's an interesting point. 14
15
And another thing that I always like to do when I'm considering these issues is to be fair to 16
everybody and I think that it's so important how retail uses to support one another. And I'll very 17
believe briefly use as an example the Anthropologie store and Addison Antiques. That was 18
beginning to create a really cool little retail area out of unusual buildings that were kind of 19
warehouse buildings. It could have… I mean I really like that. I went to both of them every time 20
I went to one of them. I'll probably never go to Anthropologie now that it's at the mall, but I'm 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
sure they'll make more money and that's fine. But I would also like this ordinance and I think 1
that's the intent to encourage rather than limit creative uses of retail. And I think many of the 2
uses that were that some colleagues would like to broaden I think that the description of retail 3
is broadened here and many of the uses that have been mentioned are already at least available 4
as conditional uses. So I'm going to leave it at that for right now. 5
6
Commissioner Rosenblum: Great. Yeah, since this has come to us a couple times also we can 7
kind of start in the middle, but I did want to just bring it back. I've said this before, but as a 8
meta point I do agree the retail protection ordinance is focused on the wrong side of “loving 9
retail and wanting to encourage retail.” When I talk to retailers it's not even among their top 10
five concerns is protection for ground for retail. They bring up always how they find employees. 11
Even before foot traffic they say it's difficult for me to get employees, it’s difficult for me to 12
retain employees. Next is foot traffic and they worry about the consistency of the 13
neighborhood. They don't want vacancies. They don't want a dead zone. It also does feel like 14
an overreaction I think the point was well said, 2.6 million sf of retail in Palo Alto. The reason 15
cited in the report for triggering this urgency ordinance is 70,000 square feet that had been 16
converted over the previous eight years. It feels a little bit like taking a bazooka to swat a very 17
annoying mosquito. 18
19
And I also agree with Vice-Chair Waldfogel that the Council the new Council may have very 20
different direction and so overly debating this before getting that new direction may be 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
premature. Having said that a couple things that are between the general and the specific; so 1
first there have been many people talk about the makeup of the stakeholder group. This was 2
brought up in our last meeting. I was not that happy with the involvement of the stakeholder 3
group at that time and I'm still not. And I don't think the new report really addressed it. 4
5
A couple of things super minor, but the very least in the report you should bucket who is who. I 6
had to go up and look up every person and see who are they, how many property developers, 7
how many property owners, how many retailers, what type of retailer are they? You have five 8
retailers of which one is a restaurant. One is laser hair removal, etcetera. If the majority of our 9
retailers that are coming in are say restaurants then they should have proportional 10
representation. You don't want to have just Spot Pizza represent the entire restaurant industry 11
of Palo Alto. When you read the notes from 2009 it did indeed seem to be a very vibrant 12
stakeholder group that did block by block walking. And it was a tight group and I agree with our 13
Chair that the inclusion of the notes from 2009 I found very enlightening: their process, the 14
participation, etcetera. It also included by the way a quote from Cicero from Mr. Chop Keenan. 15
So next time we can up the game and get more Latin quotations. But the quote was good. He 16
said Cicero said not knowing your history is like looking at the world through the eyes of a child 17
and I think that's a good thing. So looking at 2009 was really enlightening for me. 18
19
So second I think that we're very premature to extend what we have to citywide. I think what's 20
going on in the Downtown corridor and preventing conversions is a good thing, but there's no 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
way we can apply this the rest of the City. I agree that Midtown is different from where I used 1
to live in South Palo Alto is different from many other many neighborhood types shopping 2
areas. If we want to look at those we should look at them one by one. I don't think this 3
ordinance is anywhere near a good tool for citywide and if the point of this meeting was to say 4
do we extend it citywide then I would be a strong no. 5
6
I also don't agree with extending the map of the protected 2009 boundary. I do think that the 7
original intent of the of the emergency ordinance to basically halt anything that was violating 8
the spirit of what we had done so things that were not in any way retail suddenly taking over a 9
ground floor and pretending somehow to be retail absolutely that should be stopped. But 10
somehow believing that extending our boundaries of protected retail towards really marginal 11
cases I think is poor. I live very close, I live three blocks from that North Face store and it breaks 12
my heart. It's a great location for an apartment building right across from Caltrain. It's part of 13
our neighborhood. It breaks my heart to have this this wonderful space that's been unoccupied 14
for a year and I was always wondering why there's retail there. There's nothing else around 15
there. It's just other apartment buildings. And so it's something that seems odd that we would 16
want to expand to these marginal cases. 17
18
And so and then finally to the extent that we should do our job, bring this back to Council as as 19
instructed I agree that if there is useful comments to put forward it would be what they already 20
have expanding it to include the whole City is certainly premature. Taking what they currently 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
have and enforcing that within the boundaries that had previously been established I have no 1
problem with. I think that having a two percent vacancy doesn't show that we yet I have seen 2
any ill effect of the previous ordinance and would be supportive of continuing. But with that I 3
agree with Vice-Chair Waldfogel they may have different direction for this whole retail area, but 4
certainly extending this to the citywide is premature. And I’ll end my comments with that. 5
6
Chair Alcheck: Ok, let's go to the lights. If you have sort of a second round of comments just 7
turn your light on and I’ll call on you and we'll continue this discussion for a little longer. Ok, 8
Commissioner Gardias and then Commissioner Summa. 9
10
Commissioner Gardias: Thank you. So I believe that we have at least one supporter on the City 11
Council to strengthen our mandate, Greg Tanaka, who was saying many times that he believes 12
in the greater and stronger role of the Planning and Transportation Commission (PTC). So I 13
think that that with this I would be leaning toward having a discussion on this ordinance. And 14
this would extend our perspective this way extending our perspective to the City Council not 15
necessarily awaiting their directions. I'm sure that they would appreciate our perspective. And I 16
have more comments if we agree on this direction. Thank you. 17
18
Commissioner Summa: So I had some specific comments. One of them is about in the 19
conditional uses the first one which is business or trade school. So I'm assuming by business or 20
trade school you don't need mean business school as in Columbia Business School or Stanford 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Business School. And I'm wondering if business school and trade school as a ground floor retail 1
use is maybe archaic? And I think that most trade schools probably don't want to be in such 2
expensive retail buildings. The three so trade schools and those kinds of things are regulated by 3
the state and we only have three. One of them is Downtown. It's the Berlitz and the other two 4
are kind of like on San Antonio in general manufacturing. And I worry that this business school 5
and trade school conditional use is A) archaic and also might be used as a loophole by 6
businesses that really aren't retail. So I would like to make a recommendation that we look into 7
that. It's a very specific thing, but I think it could improve the conditional uses. 8
9
And then I also when it comes to the waivers and adjustments and I don't mean this to sound at 10
least the least bit insensitive, but having economic hardship be listed as a reason for a waiver or 11
adjustment is kind of troubling to me because I wouldn't like it to encourage people to ask to 12
have a waiver just because they know they can make more money currently by renting retail 13
space versus office space. I don't consider owning a property that has a zoning use restriction to 14
be an economic hardship. So I found that kind of troubling and I think that having it happen at 15
the Director’s level without any public hearing makes it very difficult for adjacent businesses to 16
know that it has happened. And everybody on both sides today has stressed the importance of 17
what's happening down the block, 100 feet of a vacancy can be destructive to thriving retail. 18
19
So I think that there should be a public hearing for a process like this and in fact I don't know 20
why it shouldn't just be a variance. Because I'm worried that on the one hand under the 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
documentation required. There's a very strict suggestion that people would have to provide a 1
map of 2,000 foot radius of every business use, but I don't think the process as proposed would 2
allow for I don't know how a business would know if somebody next door was in time to appeal 3
the Director's decision and I think that can have a real effect on businesses nearby. So those are 4
my two comments for now. 5
6
Commissioner Lauing: So basically the point that I want to underscore because I still think we're 7
not aligned on this and maybe we can't be, but we're not being asked by this ordinance or by 8
the Council to come up with a what I’ll call a comprehensive master plan for retail vitality for 9
retailers themselves, for retailers and developers. What we’re asked specifically about should 10
we protect ground floor retail with glass for new tenants coming in? That's basically what we're 11
being asked for. All these discussions about other things we could do for retailers are 12
completely valid. Totally valid in my judgment, but it's not part and parcel of this right now. So 13
one option I think is to take this back to Council and say that we can generally support the intent 14
if we do of first floor retail, but we would like you to consider reduction. Not expansion as this 15
one currently does, but reduction of some of the non-viable retail areas focusing on the more of 16
a core is what I'm saying. We can use the broader definition of retail that cities already put in 17
here as an example of the broader definition that we would like to see and ask for more 18
guidance. Because that way we kind of get a couple of things that I think we're mostly aligned 19
on and still ask for the guidance without getting into a whole comprehensive study of lots of 20
different things that could make retailing better. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Alcheck: Yeah. I so let me respond to that. I think you make a very, very valid point about 2
sort of the intent of the review. I think that you're acknowledging one of the issues that I'm sort 3
of dealing with which is that we're reviewing this interim ordinance, but it incorporates a lot of 4
changes that are expanding its reach. And it's and those expansions are intended to enhance 5
the retail, but no one's really spent a lot of time evaluating them. And so there is concern that 6
maybe that's a mistake. And I agree with you that we weren’t asked to essentially come up with 7
a retail enhancement program. I don't dislike your suggestion actually. I think it might be one 8
route which is essentially to encourage the removal of the elements of this that are technically 9
expansive until such time as we're given to review their broader impacts and potentially include 10
a community oriented approach. I'm going to, let's hear from everybody else and see what they 11
think. Commissioner Fine. 12
13
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Not present. 14
15
Chair Alcheck: [Unintelligible] Commissioner Rosenblum. 16
17
Commissioner Rosenblum: Thank you. I think we can take this in two ways. We can do the 18
narrow assignment that Council gave to us and I think they're asking us A) to approve a map. So 19
there's the existing 2009 outline and then there's a number of properties designated in yellow 20
in the Downtown corridor that would be added to that. So it's University Circle. There's a 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
couple of blocks along Hamilton, etcetera. And so they're asking us… it's attachment, it’s 1
Proposed Ground Floor Commercial District Additions. 2
3
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Page what? 4
5
Commissioner Rosenblum: Exhibit A. 6
7
Mr. Lait: I believe we have an at places memo with color maps at the (interrupted) 8
9
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah. Yeah so it’s Exhibit A. And so one we're being asked to 10
approve a map I think. Number two we're being asked to think about the same restrictions 11
being applied citywide. Is that not the case? 12
13
Mr. Lait: There's more to it than that. There one is the expansion of the ground floor area as 14
you noted on Exhibit A. We've modified on in the GF area some of the permitted uses. 15
16
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yes. 17
18
Mr. Lait: And on University Avenue specifically we've even made some other refinements to 19
that. The existing interim ordinance already applies citywide. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah. 1
2
Mr. Lait: What this ordinance does is codify that ability to convert existing retail where it exists 3
as of March 2015 to be converted to a non-retail or non-retail like use. 4
5
Commissioner Rosenblum: Ok. Thank you. And so then number three was I was going to lump 6
several things together which is the categories of retail that are acceptable and the wavers. So 7
basically how do you apply to get out of it? And so in the narrow task of giving feedback my 8
personal kind of votes on these things would be first on the map as proposed is too expansive. 9
That I don't really understand how even buildings like University Circle which by the way was a 10
big part of the 2009 PTC discussion about whether or not it should be eligible and why it’s not 11
eligible, etcetera. But when you look at these buildings they just weren't built for retail. I don't 12
even know what you would do if their tenants move out. I mean I… you punch a hole and 13
rebuild the ground floor. I honestly don't know what they would do. One my questions for staff 14
in a moment what would happen? 15
16
But so first my answers in order would be the map expansion or adding a property seems ill 17
advised. Number two so I had actually thought we were being asked if this should also be 18
expanded to citywide, but we were saying that was already in the interim ordinance for this is 19
outside of that, but any expansion I think of anything that we're considering for the Downtown 20
corridor to apply citywide I think is also ill advised. And then finally around the waivers and uses 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
I didn't have a problem with the set of waivers. The definition of permitted uses I always think 1
is a can of worms. I always think it's easier to exclude uses rather than dictating every category 2
under the sun of creatures that can get on the ark. And I just think it's leading us down a bad 3
path although I have to admit when I looked at it it seemed logical, no major red flags. So 4
putting that aside those would be my couple of votes around if we're talking about what we 5
want to get back to Council to fulfill our assignment. 6
7
But more generally following up on Commissioner Gardias’ comment people like Council 8
Member Tanaka really do want us to take this job a bit more expansively. And so I would love 9
for Council to say we'd like you PTC to come back with a more comprehensive retail vitality 10
study that includes everything from parking to the map itself to how does Transportation 11
Demand Management (TDM) relate to the Downtown retail area. And I think that would be a 12
median relevant assignment. So that would be my vote for how to pursue this in a less 13
piecemeal fashion. 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Yeah, alright. Let me ask a question to my fellow Commissioners here. So it's 16
sort of my impression that we and correct me if I’m wrong, it’s sort of my impression that this 17
interim ordinance was put in place in what could be described as a response to concerns over 18
excessive office uses. And the sort of notion behind it being interim was this idea that it would 19
come back and during that period of time we would actually review it and give it maybe a more 20
in-depth analysis before codifying it. And I think that the concern and I want to hear from you 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
guys, but I think one of the concerns that you're hearing from some the Commissioners here is 1
that I don't know that we did the analysis during the interim period to justify putting this into 2
law. And you know one option could theoretically, I hate the notion that we are operating with 3
a time line, it's so arbitrary. They've got to prove it before it lapses in April? Alright, well then 4
one suggestion could be extend it for six months. And let's take six months and figure out 5
whether or not this should be codified. 6
7
Let’s just be clear here, everything that we're talking about is here is just a recommendation. So 8
anybody that showed up tonight to participate has to show up at City Council because this may 9
not necessarily translate. And I think one of the questions we have to ask ourselves is do we 10
want to recommend maybe a six month continuance of the interim ordinance and request that 11
they allow the Planning Commission and the staff to work together to analyze the greater 12
impacts as opposed to expand and codify permanently what is potentially an unanalyzed 13
interim ordinance. I see a staff light. 14
15
Mr. Lait: Well I just wanted to respond to the question about the what's been done in the 16
interim since the interim ordinance was adopted. Because the suggestion was that there hasn’t 17
been any analysis that's been done since then (interrupted) 18
19
Chair Alcheck: No. I don't want to suggest there hasn't been analysis. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Mr. Lait: No, but I mean there's specific things that have been done and I think it's important at 1
least to articulate some of those. 2
3
Chair Alcheck: Please. 4
5
Mr. Lait: You're absolutely correct that when you, when the City, when cities adopt a an urgency 6
ordinance the idea there is to immediately stem the problem and stop what's happening and to 7
take that time for how [ready] how many months or years up to two years to study and 8
evaluate how you might adopt some permanent regulations to address it or maybe decide that 9
the issue is not urgent and you let it lapse. Since this interim ordinance was adopted there was 10
we heard reference to it this evening in an unfavorable way, but there was a reference to the 11
California Avenue regulations and the change doors and some other issues to address small 12
businesses on California Avenue. There was another regulation during this time that we studied 13
and that the Commission made recommendation on having to do with the California 14
commercial neighborhood and neighborhood commercial areas where we addressed a loophole 15
in some of those issues that were resulting in retail spaces being converted to office. We have 16
also gone to the City Council and we have sought their guidance on the next year which was sort 17
of this Downtown and the rest of the ordinance of the interim ordinance and we got guidance 18
from the Council. And we believe that the guidance that we got from the Council is reflected in 19
in this ordinance. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
So I don't think we're just simply changing the date and now running through the system again. 1
I think there has been some guidance and thoughtful dialogue that has been granted. Now to 2
the public outreach I hear the comments that have been made about that and I don't take 3
objection to that. I will note that when we did get City Council direction on this and I think we 4
reported this in the staff report it was pretty clear to us and maybe we got it wrong, but they 5
did want to do an informal outreach. It was our impression that there was not the expanded 6
outreach of 2009 that they were seeking. And so we'll find out when we go to Council whether 7
we got that right or wrong and certainly there's always an opportunity for more dialogue on 8
such issues. But I do think that I'm hearing some of the comments about moving this forward to 9
Council I think that is important and I do appreciate the constraint that you're expressing 10
relative to the deadline and wanting to have a more robust dialogue about that. 11
12
Chair Alcheck: Ok, I appreciate that. Let me ask you just a quick question. There's sort of a 13
difference between community outreach right now everybody has an opportunity for five 14
minutes and what I would call a much more involved process which was the 2009 process. And 15
I guess my question is I'm not for one minute suggesting that you didn't get the Council 16
direction correct. I'm just curious if in your professional opinion this ordinance could be 17
improved if it, if we incorporated a more exhaustive community involved process. If we 18
followed the parameters of the 2009 process do you think this could be improved? 19
20
Mr. Lait: Well I think any time you allow for open dialogue and conversation then yeah you can 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
probably address some of the issues that are problematic. I mean we've heard the Commission 1
express concerns about some of these marginal areas. I've also heard how some of these 2
marginal areas can actually turn into something kind of neat and exciting and that's great, but 3
then what's the economics behind that? So yeah we have not done a, not consulted with an 4
economic consultant to talk about feasibility of retail in certain parts of the City and if we 5
wanted to get that fine grain analysis that's an opportunity. And I think I've heard some 6
comments about the interrelationship of this and the customers that you have through office 7
and the housing opportunities and how all this stuff comes together. That is definitely a much 8
more expansive effort and would result in some more information, but I think that… well, so I 9
think that answers your question. 10
11
Chair Alcheck: [Unintelligible] Commissioner Gardias. 12
13
Commissioner Gardias: Ok. Thank you, but I would like to talk about the so there are two topics 14
one is the greater perspective so let me just relate to this. If we pursue so in regards of pursuing 15
that greater aspect and retail strategy and greater study if we decide to take this route in 16
addition what I understand would be also looking into this ordinance so doing two at the same 17
time that's what Commissioner Rosenblum suggested and I liked it very much. In regards to the 18
first item I think this should be related to the works on the Comprehensive Plan. So however we 19
formulate this there needs to some be some relationship to the team that formulates polices on 20
the Comprehensive Plan. Otherwise there was going to be conflict of work pretty much. They 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
will be just doing their work, there is going to be another work done by Commission, and then it 1
will result with the confusion. So ok, please. 2
3
Mr. Lait: If I… so I, yes. I would agree with that. And I think just so we understand procedurally 4
how this would happen as I'm understanding some of the as the dialogues emerging there may 5
be a recommendation on the ordinance itself and then there would be also this 6
recommendation to the Council requesting that they direct the PTC to further examine these 7
issues. And so the Council's going to think about that recommendation in the context of the 8
Comp Plan effort that's under way. And they will think yes and in fact I think that the Comp Plan 9
is now entering into a new phase and looking at the business economics side of it. So all the 10
stuff is sort of coming together right now and we recognize that there is these different 11
elements that need to feed into the dialogue, but we believe and I think some of the 12
Commissioners have reflected this, this is a much more narrow focus. Yes, there's a broader 13
conversation that ought to take place and should take place, but we still need Council direction 14
on when and where that's going to take place whether that's the Comp Plan or another effort. 15
16
Commissioner Gardias: And I agree. And in this regards I can I am ready just to start looking into 17
the ordinance itself if my colleagues agree because I have prepared a set of comments to this. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Why don’t you let me get through the remaining lights and then see where they 20
go. Commissioner Summa. Go ahead. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Summa: Oh, I wasn’t sure I hit my light. Yeah, I kind of agree that what the 2
Council's looking for us to do tonight is a comment specifically on this ordinance and many of 3
those broader issues will presumably be dealt with in the very, very comprehensive 4
Comprehensive Plan. And that I think if we just punt it I don't feel like we’ll be doing our job this 5
evening. I've already and I've already made some specific comments. I have some more to 6
make, but that's just kind of where I'm going with the larger process. 7
8
Chair Alcheck: Ok, so basically we have two different tracks here. We have a number of 9
Commissioners who don't believe that it's worth the time to delve into these, to delve into the 10
issues that they find troubling because they want greater Council guidance. And there are some 11
that would like to delve into the issues that they find problematic and ask for greater Council 12
guidance. Is that sort of where you are you? You want to get specific and move it along? 13
14
Commissioner Summa: Yeah. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Right. 17
18
Commissioner Summa: I think so. I think that's what Council wants from us. 19
20
Chair Alcheck: So those are sort of two different paths and I'm prepared to shelve it. So I how 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
do you want to proceed? Does anybody... I’m open. I'm open to getting specific. I think I'd 1
rather get specific and talk about the issues that we find problems with then simply pass it 2
along. So why don’t we go in order? Commissioner Gardias why don’t you kick it off and… 3
4
Commissioner Lauing: I was going to say that I'm not sure tonight in any amount of time we can 5
get through all the specifics. If we're going to talk about we recommend this with these changes 6
to the staff presentation and we have to go into what geographies we're recommending and I 7
just don't know how we can get there tonight. So I think there is merit, no is what I'm saying, I 8
think there is merit in getting a little bit more time from the Council, but to give them sort of a 9
preliminary indication that, if this is true, that we generally do support maintaining first floor 10
retail glass for new tenants. But we need further time to look at this because we actually think 11
that it should be a more constrained amount of geography than what's in the current memo, 12
etcetera, etcetera. 13
14
Chair Alcheck: Yeah. 15
16
Commissioner Lauing: So we would like to have some more time to do that and in the meantime 17
when you send this back to us and hopefully give us more time you can also give us more 18
direction. So it just doesn't seem to tonight like we can get deep enough into it without 19
spending hours on it and maybe still have it defeated I don't know. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Alcheck: So here's where I'm interpreting your suggestion and I'm assuming Commissioner 1
[Note-Vice-Chair] Waldfogel’s probably on board with that suggestion. And so we have two 2
Commissioners (interrupted) 3
4
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: [Unintelligible] question for staff. 5
6
Chair Alcheck: Got it. So but I assume that you're sort of on board with that so we have two 7
Commissioners that are prepared to not discuss the details. I have two Commissioners that 8
would like to talk about specifics. [Unintelligible – people talking off microphone] And one 9
suggestion to potentially continue it to another meeting where you could I don't know that we'd 10
have support for that here either. At some point we need to have a Motion and I'm afraid I 11
don't know that we have enough consensus on how we want to proceed. So yeah, please. 12
13
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Is so the current ordinance is an urgency ordinance that has a two year 14
time frame. Is that correct? 15
16
Mr. Lait: [Unintelligible] 17
18
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: And is it possible to extend that or do we need to we need to bring in a 19
replacement? 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Mr. Lait: Yeah there's no further opportunities to extend that urgency ordinance. It expires on 1
the 30th of April and I think the Council is interested in having a new set of regulations in place 2
before that happens. 3
4
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Yeah, so if we want to keep what's in place we have to move something 5
forward in a timely fashion is what I'm understanding. I mean that said I agree with a lot of the 6
comments that we've heard that there's a deeper question here about what really supports 7
retail, but I feel pretty strongly that we just have to move this forward and then we can delve 8
into what direction we want from Council on the process. Whether it's Citizen Advisory 9
Committee (CAC) or the Comp Plan process or whether we should set up a subcommittee to 10
explore this further even if we don't have another ordinance in front of us. But I just feel like we 11
have to move this forward. 12
13
Commissioner Lauing: Are you suggesting that for tonight or maybe if we met in two weeks and 14
retackled it? 15
16
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Well I think there's some hard deadlines here because this needs to go 17
through what is it? Two readings at the Council and if you walk this back and look at the 18
schedule to agendize it first reading, second reading we're pretty much at three minutes to 19
midnight. Am I close to right there? 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Lauing: So two weeks from now is not an option? 1
2
Mr. Lait: Well I'm not going to say it's not an option, but I will tell you that we're very nervous 3
about giving the Council enough time. So the Commission feels pinched on time I also don't 4
want the Council to feel pinched on time. If they want to take another meeting to discuss the 5
issues I'm concerned that if the Commission continues it they may not have that luxury of doing 6
that. 7
8
Chair Alcheck: Ok, I have a light from Commissioner Gardias. Do you have, you want to 9
comment on this? 10
11
Commissioner Gardias: As I said I’m ready to dive in and start discussing the ordinance itself. 12
13
Chair Alcheck: Ok. Ok what I'm going to do is I'm going to allow any light to proceed with their 14
comments and if a lit light proposes a Motion then we'll hear it, but I can't put words in your 15
mouths. So I have a light from Gardias and now I have a light from Commissioner Rosenblum 16
and I'll go in order of the lights as they see them. So if you'd like… 17
18
Commissioner Gardias: Since I just spoke maybe Commissioner (interrupted) 19
20
Chair Alcheck: Ok. We’ll start with Commissioner Rosenblum and the next light I have is 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Doria. So let's start. I keep switching. 1
2
Commissioner Rosenblum: Well so I'd like to make just a base Motion and then see if we can 3
build off this. So that the we're looking to extend this emergency ordinance into an official 4
ordinance. So I'd like to make a Motion to adopt what the Chair suggested which is to extend 5
the current ordinance, is this permissible for six months? Are we allowed to recommend this? 6
7
Albert Yang, Senior Deputy City Attorney: So the interim ordinance is limited to two years and at 8
that point it's really meant to be adopted either as a permanent ordinance or for some 9
permanent regulation to go into effect. 10
11
Mr. Lait: That said though the Commission could recommend could it not to the City Council 12
that they adopt this ordinance for a limited term? 13
14
Mr. Yang: Yes, I think that raises a question of how that differs from an extension of the interim 15
ordinance. 16
17
Chair Alcheck: Can I ask for some clarity here? Is there a sort of is it forbidden to essentially 18
implement a new interim ordinance that is very similar, but called version two? 19
20
Cara Silver, Senior Assistant City Attorney: So we're kind of threading the needle of the 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
distinction between the emergency ordinance that was actually adopted as a moratorium which 1
banned retail conversion versus a brand new set of regulations that more clearly prescribe what 2
uses should be there and which should not. So if you compare side by side the interim 3
ordinance the interim urgency moratorium ordinance with the new ordinance that we're 4
proposing you'll see that the language is very different. So you can certainly as Albert 5
mentioned you can't legally extend the moratorium for longer than two years. That's off the 6
table under state law, but you can adopt an interim ordinance. So you could recommend that 7
Council accept this ordinance that we're proposing for say a six month period and then do 8
further study during that time period. 9
10
MOTION #1 11
12
Commissioner Rosenblum: Ok. Yeah so this, thank you for that option; so just to explain where 13
my head is there's two things that we could do if we want more time, but also want to fill our 14
obligation to Council then we can make this a limited interim ordinance. Where my heart is 15
though is to give more clear direction which is that they basically roll back to the 2009 16
boundaries with stricter protections because I think where people went wrong were retail 17
spaces converting into uses that really were not retail that should have been protected. And 18
people came and rightly said this is wrong, people are pulling a fast one on us. They said that 19
this should be retail, but this is clearly not a retail use. And so I think part of the work that staff 20
did was define much more clearly what constitutes retail, what is eligible and so to me it's a 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
matter of being better enforcers and clearer, but I think that the boundaries that have been 1
established in 2009 are very logical and they did exclude areas that are fairly marginal and other 2
areas if retail could thrive there I think retail will find a way, but I think we want a very good 3
dense corridor. 4
5
So where my heart is is to give advice to Council to go to the 2009 boundaries, but include the 6
clear definitions of retail and retail service that has been provided by staff. So that would be my 7
Motion is to adopt the boundaries prescribed by the 2009 retail ordinance with the permitted 8
uses being outlined in this ordinance over a permitted retail and retail like services. 9
10
Chair Alcheck: Do I have a second? 11
12
Commissioner Lauing: Well I’ll second it at least for discussion purposes because I have a 13
question about what I seconded. 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Ok. I'll second the ordinance and you are feel free to ask a question. 16
17
Commissioner Lauing: Ok, thank you. So let me (interrupted) 18
19
SECOND 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Alcheck: I mean I'll second the Motion. 1
2
Commissioner Lauing: Ok what you're saying is this regulation wording except the 2009 3
boundaries? 4
5
Commissioner Rosenblum: I'm saying that I the thing I dislike about this ordinance are the 6
boundaries. That clarifying the definition of what is retail and retail like service making it easier 7
to enforce I like. What I think we got wrong was making it too expansive and so I think that the 8
goal of this was noble which is to make a high functioning dense area of retail and not have 9
offices sneak their way in, but I think they that we cast too wide a net. So yes, it's I'm saying 10
constrict the boundary, but otherwise the definitions of permitted services and waivers I would 11
adopt. 12
13
Commissioner Lauing: Ok. 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Yes. 16
17
Commissioner Summa: So I'm a little confused. Does that mean you just want it to be 18
Downtown? 19
20
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah, I think it should apply to the Downtown area. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Summa: So I really want the Downtown core as our chief retail area to be very 2
strong and I agree with that, but there's other areas that are very important for people who 3
want to have something they can walk to particularly for retail all over the City that have been 4
like the CN zones have been fairly ravaged by illegal conversion. So I would like to extend it and 5
I don't think this ordinance is going to kick anybody out. It's just going to say once this is 6
available again to a new tenant it will have to become what it was meant to be. So I don't want 7
to just take care of Downtown I really want to take care of the whole City. 8
9
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah if I can, if I can address that? 10
11
Chair Alcheck: Yes. 12
13
Commissioner Summa: Yeah. 14
15
Commissioner Rosenblum: I agree with this. I think there are lots of retail areas in Palo Alto that 16
are important. My point is that the I think Council looked at Downtown when they crafted this 17
initial urgency ordinance and thought about the situation we face there and then took the same 18
prescription and painted the rest of the City. And I just think that each area is somewhat 19
different and I have experience personally with a couple of the retail areas in Palo Alto and so I 20
go to Town & Country. I used to live in South Palo Alto so went to Charleston Shopping Center 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
area and Midtown. So I know some of them, but I'm not sure what prescriptions should be for 1
each of these areas. And so I feel like even Cal Ave. I don't know what the boundaries should 2
be. And I feel like the Downtown area was well studied in 2009. They went block by block by 3
block and you can read that the discussion and so I'd be very supportive of a similar process in 4
Cal Ave. and South Palo Alto and Midtown and come up with what the ordinances should be in 5
those areas. I just don't think that that anyone did that. 6
7
Mr. Lait: So Chair? I have some information that may be informative to your deliberations. So 8
as I'm understanding the Motion. It's move the staff report, the recommendation and staff 9
report with the exception that the GF boundary not be expanded and in fact restored to the 10
2009 boundaries which you have on your map here. Ok. And just so we're clear that would not 11
include the 2013 expansion. Ok, very good. 12
13
So I wanted to just clarify a point that I heard from Commissioner Summa and maybe for the 14
rest of the Commission in areas where there is a ground floor protection today or expanded if 15
there is existing non-retail or retail like uses in that space. Let's say an office is in that space, 16
that office use can leave and a new office use could be established. This ordinance doesn't 17
require the immediate transition when one office leaves it has to now be retail. Our code has a 18
non-conforming provision that says when a use is abandoned and I think it’s 12 months then if 19
you are in a GF area and you're an office use and the sites been abandoned for 12 months that's 20
when the GF standards of now you got to be ground floor retail would kick in. So practically 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
speaking the GF boundary where the rest of the ordinance already would protect any property 1
that has retail on the ground floor. So for example we've got the 2013 map here which 2
Commissioner Rosenblum is suggesting not be included in the GF boundary in each one of these 3
areas where there is retail that retail is still protected under the ordinance. 4
5
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah and I to respond to that also I understand that and thanks for 6
the clarification. And my colleagues could say no I disagree I want to also include the 2013 or 7
even the new suggested areas as well. I'm reacting to a lot of the at least petitioners tonight 8
that the state of retail is changing and I think having an area that we're really going to protect 9
and do a great job of making sure that every single store front is protected for retail and exciting 10
and vibrant is better than trying to expand the footprint and possibly have to make 11
compromises. And so I would like to see us adopt quite strong protections in that in the areas 12
we really want to see retail thrive. And so to me the 2009 boundaries were very well 13
established. 2013 my only issue with it again is actually my issue with it is that it's not as well 14
defined as the 2009 corridor, it’s just a it's an appendage. I don't have a strong feeling about it 15
to be honest. I have a stronger feeling about extending what we've done to the more marginal 16
which were designated in yellow in Attachment A and to take the same implications for 17
everyone I think is premature. The 2013 versus 2009 I my feelings are less strong. I feel like the 18
2009 boundaries were better defined, but I don't have a strong feeling about including 2013 or 19
not. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Alcheck: Ok, yeah I wanted to speak to the second and then to the Motion as well. I think 1
one of the challenges here is this look, it's incredibly sort of eye opening that we had a 2
commercial property owner sort of testify tonight that they are unable to lease a space and 3
they're not even advertising a price they're just asking for anybody to make an offer. And it's 4
not inaccurate to suggest that by doing that that individual is sort of putting themselves in a 5
tough financial position because in theory it's public knowledge now that there's no 6
competition. That's not where you want to be when you're a property owner, right? What 7
happens to that Anthropologie space? How do they fill it? 8
9
And one of the concerns that I think you're hearing from some of us on the Commission here is 10
without engaging a process like the 2009 without having a process like the 2009 maybe on Cal 11
Ave. and maybe on some of our other areas where we really want to focus on a core how can 12
we simply codify this? I think that's our discomfort. Our discomfort is not with the sort of heart 13
of this notion it's why are we doing this blind? When we clear, you know what's funny about 14
this a little bit? The individuals that participated the 2009 process are all still in in the 15
community and they're eager to participate. And the staff level we have a lot of new members. 16
And so we have the same community that was involved in 2009, some of the same Planning 17
Commissioners that were in 2009 are now on the City Council, and we have an entirely new 18
staff essentially make up. And so the notion that we wouldn't maybe draw on those community 19
members to participate in the process again now seems like a mistake and I think that's what 20
you're hearing from us tonight. I have two lights. We have a Motion on the table. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Mr. Lait: Can I clarify the Motion? Because I think what I stated is not what I'm hearing stated. 2
So just to be clear the Motion is I thought the Motion was move the staff report which includes 3
implementing the interim ordinance which applies citywide that if you have retail you cannot 4
convert that to a retail a non-retail or retail like use. And but what the dialogue is that I'm 5
hearing is that no, what you want is forget about the expansion citywide, restore the 2009 6
boundary, keep this definition of retail and retail like though I don't know what the significance 7
of that would necessarily be, and yes or no on University Avenue changes with the yoga studios 8
and things of that nature? That maybe we don't have the answer to that question right now, 9
but so in essence the change I mean and this isn’t precise, but in essence what we're saying is 10
let the ordnance expire. But before it expires change the map back to the 2009 standard 11
instead of the 2016 standard that we have today. 12
13
Chair Alcheck: [Unintelligible] the clarity if the ordinance expired that's exactly what would 14
happen except it wouldn't incorporate maybe some of these new definitions. 15
16
Mr. Lait: Yeah. It wouldn't include the retail definition. 17
18
Chair Alcheck: Right which we heard tonight and some Commissioners had mentioned that they 19
are interested in expanded definition of retail. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Mr. Lait: Ok so the Motion then just for clarity of the record is to amend the GF boundary back 1
to the 2009 and adopt the new retail definition that we have. 2
3
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah, I agree. It's very close to just letting it expire. 4
5
Mr. Lait: Ok, thank you. 6
7
Chair Alcheck: Hold on. 8
9
Commissioner Rosenblum: The thing that I wanted to keep though was I think the community 10
reaction if I read the community reaction correctly was that there were ground floor properties 11
which had been converted from retail to other uses that shouldn't have been or that they're 12
pulling a fast one that it’s not actually retail. And so that the extent that we can get clarity 13
around what is permitted retail versus not I think would give people comfort. That if we say this 14
is a protected area that we actually will get retail that the community wants to see there. I do 15
think that's important. What I think we did poorly was in saying in addition we want to expand 16
the geographic boundaries of where retail is because even in the core retail areas our retail is 17
not thriving. And so it's not a problem of having too little or expanding the footprint it's a 18
problem of making sure that what exists is healthy and contiguous of good retail so we don't 19
have blank spaces of stuff that people don't consider to be retail. So we want to keep offices 20
out of there or offices disguising as retail. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Alcheck: Ok I’ve got lots of lights; Commissioner Gardias then Commissioner [Note-Vice-2
Chair] Waldfogel then Commissioner Summa. 3
4
FRIENDLY AMENDMENT #1 TO MOTION #1 5
6
Commissioner Gardias: Just want to make a comment about the 2013 area. I think that this is 7
viable commercial area and if there was going to be if this Motion on the floor was going to 8
move I will try to amend it without adding this because I go there all the time. I sometimes eat 9
at those restaurants and it's a nice place to go. So I think that it should be within the 10
boundaries. 11
12
Commissioner Rosenblum: I would accept that. 13
14
Chair Alcheck: Would you like to make an amendment? Can you just be specific about the area? 15
16
Commissioner Rosenblum: Add the 2013 expansion of the beyond 2009. 17
18
Commissioner Gardias: Yes. 19
20
Chair Alcheck: Ok. Do you accept that? 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yes. 2
3
FRIENDLY AMENDMENT #1 TO MOTION #1 ACCEPTED 4
5
Chair Alcheck: Alright, I will accept that. Commissioner [Note-Vice-Chair] Waldfogel. 6
7
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: So I think that a lot of good points are being raised that retail needs to be 8
looked at citywide, but I think that until we do that we really need to keep some version of what 9
we have in place right now. If you think about retail outside of the Downtown core you think 10
about areas like Midtown where a big parcel just traded and who knows what will happen as 11
that evolves. You think of all parcels like the SummerWinds Nursery down on San Antonio 12
which I believe traded sometime in the last year or two. And I think that there are valid 13
questions that can be that should be studied about what are viable districts for retail and what 14
can happen in the in these districts, but I think that until we know the answer to that we 15
shouldn't just abandon all of these districts and just say hey let's just take away all the 16
protection and let whatever happens happen. I think that we have a responsibility to look out 17
for the interests of the residents of Palo Alto and I think we should study these questions, but I 18
just don't think that tonight is the time to try to sort out which districts are and aren't viable and 19
which ones are and aren't worth protection. I mean that's not what the City Council directed 20
and if they want something different I really think that they should ask for it. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Summa: Thanks. I won't be supporting the Motion. I don't see it as a one size fits 2
all solution because there's different zones and different zones have different development 3
standards that respond to what they're what's in that zone, what they're adjacent to and so I 4
don't see it as one size fits all at all. And for that reason I cannot support the Motion. 5
6
Commissioner Lauing: Yes I just wanted to comment that keep going back to we're trying to get 7
a focus on a simple thing for tonight and we're under time constraints because it's the Motion, 8
I'm sorry, and ordinance that’s expiring. But we're trying to figure out if it's logical to have first 9
floor retail with glass be reserved for retailers. And I think we can opine on that and give 10
Council probably our endorsement for that. Given the time constraints I think we have to do it 11
in a different way which is to say yes let's go ahead with that given the time constraints, but 12
number one we actually think it's a little bit too broad. Because now there's some non-viable 13
retail that we should take a look at and in fact what that means is we should take a look at all of 14
the corridors with the emphasis being on Downtown. I think we all agree with that. That that 15
has to be maintained in its vibrancy and anything outside of that is a whole different set of 16
Motions, discussions, what I called earlier a master plan for retail. That's a whole different 17
other assignment. So I don't think we can just roll back to 2009 and start feeding back in 18
Emerson Street and Midtown and so on to just get there in the time frame that we have. 19
20
Chair Alcheck: Ok, well we have a Motion on the floor, but I would I am I and it may not get a 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
consensus, but one assuming it does… regardless of what happens when we take a vote on this 1
Motion I would like to suggest that it's possible that we could make a recommendation that 2
regardless of where we fall on this particular Motion could theoretically be unanimous which is 3
that we would very much like Council to give us the opportunity to explore this topic in greater 4
detail. And what I heard here tonight is that almost everybody wants to dive into this. The 5
question is whether they want to do it tonight or not. 6
7
Commissioner Lauing: You're speaking specifically about the geographies for this? 8
9
Chair Alcheck: I'm talking about the whole thing whether or not it makes sense to open up a 10
community outreach involvement and go block by block in California Avenue or whether it 11
makes sense to eliminate the 25 percent office space that currently is a part of the… I mean 12
we're not even really getting into the specifics, but this ordinance eliminates the 25 percent 13
office space that you can currently use. So when we do that what happens to the flexibility? Do 14
they get to have back office for your… we haven't explored any of it. 15
16
Commissioner Lauing: But just you, just for clarity your comments are specifically on this topic 17
not the broader issue of what can we do for retailers in a master plan kind of like? 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Yeah. So… 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Lauing: Ok. 1
2
Chair Alcheck: So what I'm trying to say it would be disingenuous to sort of suggest that we at 3
least in my opinion the maker and the seconder of this Motion is suggesting that we simply roll 4
back and that there is no issue and that's perfectly fine. I think the question is what elements of 5
this current draft ordinance that we see are potentially problematic? So you're right, there's a 6
broader question of how we enhance retail. But in this specific ordinance there's a specific 7
clause that says we're eliminating the 25 percent. Is that going to help any retailer? And are 8
the retailers in our community going to say hey guys, that's a really important part of what we 9
do every day and if you eliminate that… nobody's vetted this the way that we did the 2009. And 10
that is from my perspective the biggest problem with it. It’s not that it can't or won't help, it’s 11
that it hasn't been vetted properly. And so my point is that regardless of where we go on this 12
Motion I would very much be in favor of a follow up recommendation that could sit aside and 13
adjoin the report that maybe the, we could have a greater number of members support which 14
would be like please let us explore the items in greater complexity. And frankly it's for the City 15
Attorney's Department to figure out how we can do that in a legal way, but I'm uncomfortable 16
with this notion that simply because state law forbids us to enact an ordinance for a few more 17
months that we have to enact a bad one. That's where I'm at. So that's all I'm saying. 18
19
So I'm, I'd like… we have a Motion on the floor and I'm ready to vote on it. And my preference is 20
that immediately following that vote we can also see if we can make a recommendation that 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
represents where all of us stand despite maybe differing opinions on what we should do with 1
this specific ordinance at this time. I think all of us are in agreement on what we feel is needed 2
and maybe that's something we could unanimously support in conjunction with whatever 3
happens in this next vote. Does anybody want to make another comment before I take a vote 4
on this Motion? 5
6
Commissioner Lauing: I just think we should specify exactly what it is. Just read it one more 7
time if somebody’s written it down. 8
9
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah so now we are forwarding on the ordinance in so far as it 10
defines permitted uses for retail and retail like services, waivers so it prohibits conversions 11
within a specified area. What it's adjusting is the boundary of the GF area to the 2009 plus the 12
2013 extension. So it's only applied to the Downtown core. So essentially the protections given 13
to the rest of the City would expire or we’re recommending to Council to let that expire. I agree 14
with Commissioner [Note-Chair] Alcheck that then the next step would be for us to look at the 15
rest of the City and probably enact a series of measures around some specific areas. But that 16
what we're talking about right now is essentially what was given to us with a contraction of the 17
boundary so it no longer applies to the whole City. It applies to the 2009 plus 2013 expanded 18
boundary. So it's the Downtown core. 19
20
Chair Alcheck: Any other clarifying questions? 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Gardias: If I may, right? So I just want to understand when SOFA became part 2
was SOFA ever a part of those boundaries or this is the recent addition? 3
4
Ms. Eisberg: No. So SOFA 2 is not the ground floor boundaries shown on that map do not 5
include SOFA 2. No. 6
7
Commissioner Gardias: So it is recent it is this time staff recommendation to add SOFA. 8
9
Ms. Eisberg: So the ground floor overlay is not recommended for the SOFA 2 district. The 10
ordinance this moratorium getting carried forward the requirement that retail be replaced by 11
retail or retail like would be applied in SOFA 2 just as it would be applied elsewhere in the City 12
where those underlying uses are permitted uses. 13
14
Commissioner Gardias: Thank you. 15
16
Commissioner ?: [unintelligible-off mike] 17
18
Ms. Eisberg: The ordinance would, but the ground floor districts that are shown on that map the 19
ground floor combining overlay is only what's shown on that map. So there's the ground floor 20
overlay and then there's the separately this ordinance that would apply citywide where the uses 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
are permitted in the underlying zone. 1
2
Chair Alcheck: Ok, so 3
4
Commissioner Lauing: I clicked. 5
6
Chair Alcheck: Do you have another? 7
8
Commissioner Lauing: I just wanted to speak to what I understand the Motion to be. It seems to 9
me the trade off at base here is that we leave some retail areas under protected by 10
recommending the Motion that's on the table. If that were to be accepted by Council that 11
would mean that those areas would be unprotected for an unknown amount of time because 12
there would have to be another whole Motion in place. Whereas if we didn't do that and 13
instead voted for the City staff presented Motion we would be overprotecting some areas that 14
maybe most of us think are not all necessary anymore because of some non-viable retail. But 15
without the latter people tomorrow could start converting retail to offices. 16
17
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah, I think that that's the correct interpretation. So I think that 18
this [unintelligible] aspect of the ordnance is why I have an empty building, the North Face 19
building, in my neighborhood. And it's been empty for this length of time. So I think it's these 20
sorts of things so you’re right, it’s a tradeoff of having more of those versus unfortunate 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
conversions versus unfortunate vacancies. So I agree I think that you’ve framed it nicely. 1
2
Chair Alcheck: Yeah I would add that overprotecting the overprotection option is codifying it. 3
It's not an interim overprotection it's a permanent overprotection. And the look again it's just 4
my perspective there's no saying what Council will do. They could ignore our recommendation 5
completely and pursue the interim ordinance and enact it. I think what we're really doing 6
tonight is not necessarily deciding what Council is going to do. We're suggesting to them that 7
among the six of us we had tremendous concerns about the expansiveness of this and many of 8
us didn't feel comfortable without greater time. And I think what this Motion suggests isn't 9
necessarily what we think they should do it suggests that we think that overdoing something 10
permanently is worse than potentially under protecting something and giving us time to do it 11
right. I think that's what we're suggesting that there's a slight preference there. Again we… 12
13
Commissioner Lauing: It just seems to me that if we think it's the worst of two evils that all of us 14
have to vote on the worst of two evils then we do have to say we need more time to do a bit 15
more research. And if that’s two weeks from now or a week from now or whatever that's what 16
we have to do. 17
18
Chair Alcheck: Sure Summa go ahead. 19
20
Commissioner Summa: So I don't see it is the worst of two evils. I take your point that throwing 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
the baby out with the bathwater at this time seems very drastic and that's what the waiver is 1
for; the waiver is actually for the North Face building and I can see them being successful in 2
applying for it. So I think we have to remember that built into this recommendation by staff 3
which I have some little [nigli] thing problems with some of which I have already expressed, but 4
I cannot support rolling it back, the rolling back the protection and I think the waiver really 5
contemplated that there are situations when it will not be viable. 6
7
VOTE 8
9
Chair Alcheck: I see no more lights. So we have a Motion of the floor. I'd like to put it to a vote. 10
All we have six Commissioners tonight so we will need four for this Motion to pass assuming 11
that no one abstains. Ok. All those in favor of supporting the Motion as outlined say aye and 12
raise your hand. That’s two. All those opposed. That's four. Ok that Motion failed. The floor is 13
open and anybody that would like to make a Motion is welcome to. 14
15
MOTION #1 FAILED (2-4, Vice-Chair Waldfogel, Commissioners Summa, Lauing, and Gardias 16
against) 17
18
Commissioner Summa: Oh, go ahead. 19
20
MOTION #2 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Lauing: I was going to move that we adopt the City presented Motion, I'm sorry 2
ordinance, to Council with the reservation that there has to be some relook at some of those 3
areas because they may no longer be viable retail. 4
5
Mr. Lait: And maybe before there's a second on that can I ask the Motion maker if that also 6
might include the at places memo where staff is recommending private schools along a certain 7
stretch of Alma in the RT-35 zone? 8
9
Commissioner Lauing: Given that it was at place I didn’t even read it yet so. 10
11
Mr. Lait: So maybe I can spend a second just to explain what this memo does. 12
13
Chair Alcheck: Let me ask a question before you start. Is this related to the conversation that 14
one of the speakers mentioned about the tenant that may or may not be interested anymore 15
because of the amount of time it's taken. 16
17
Mr. Lait: Yeah I believe that was part of the conversation. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: It's that space. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Mr. Lait: Well it's a number of properties on Alma. It would include the one that was discussed 1
this evening. 2
3
Chair Alcheck: Ok. Why don’t you go into detail about it so that everybody's aware? 4
5
Mr. Lait: Ok I'll just briefly summarize. During the Council's review of a waiver request under 6
the existing interim ordinance a property owner had requested a waiver. There was a public 7
discussion about the ordinance and an interest from the Council in fact direction to staff by an 8
8-0 vote to prepare an amendment to the urgency ordinance to allow schools, private schools, I 9
think its south of Channing Street, Avenue? 10
11
Ms. Eisberg: In this case south of Channing. 12
13
Mr. Lait: To allow in the RT-35 adjacent to Alma south of Channing private schools to be a 14
permitted use. So there would be retail, retail like, and private schools for this discrete several 15
block area on Alma. Staff went through that process presented the ordinance the City Council 16
and while it had a majority vote of 5-4 it required a supermajority and therefore failed to pass at 17
the Council meeting. The ensuing dialogue it was suggested at least our read of the 18
administrative record suggests that there is at least that time Council interest in having that 19
ordinance be implemented into this effort that is before the Planning Commission tonight. So 20
that was inadvertently left off of the ordinance that's included in your packet and so we're 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
trying to correct that and by way of this at places memo ask the PTC as part of your Motion that 1
you include for the RT-35 areas adjacent to Alma south of Channing that private schools also be 2
a permitted use. And then there’s some protections where if a private school does go in there it 3
cannot then convert over to office. 4
5
Commissioner Summa: So I have a question about that and that I guess for staff and so I'm a 6
little confused. So if it requires a supermajority and it failed then it failed. So I'm not sure why 7
that is so significant really. And then I'm a bit uncomfortable with this for two reasons. One I 8
don't know that you can, I think you would have to amend SOFA not change it through this 9
process. So I'm not sure that would be the correct way to do it and it does feel a little bit like 10
(interrupted) [unintelligible-man off mike] and so and then it does feel a little bit like a situation 11
where there should be a waiver or variance because it's applying basically to two buildings I 12
think and I don't I see a sense of unfairness when an ordinance is written that has an exclusion 13
for one property owner. That should be, that fall under the waiver and/or because I don't think 14
it's a legal process too SOFA would have to be amended. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Let me cut you off for a second. I think it's more important if I could just find out 17
from the maker of the Motion if he three wishes to include that. 18
19
Commissioner Lauing: Well I didn't know until seconds ago what it was so that's the problem. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Alcheck: Ok. 1
2
Commissioner Lauing: We should probably get a legal opinion on this or can it just go back to 3
Council on its own for them to add it to it? 4
5
Mr. Lait: Absolutely. You don't have to include it [unintelligible] Motion. We’ll highlight the 6
issue for Council and there may be some interest in advancing it or not so, but that does not 7
need to be part of your Motion. 8
9
Chair Alcheck: Ok so your Motion as is. 10
11
Mr. Lait: Yep. 12
13
Commissioner Lauing: We don’t have a second yet. 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Do I have a second? 16
17
Commissioner Summa: Can you restate it? I'm sorry. 18
19
Commissioner Lauing: Did somebody write it down? 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Mr. Lait: I think was to move the staff report with also a recommendation that the Council direct 1
the PTC to examine the request that the PTC have the opportunity to examine the ordinance in 2
more detail. Is that correct? 3
4
Commissioner Lauing: Well no, specifically that we be able to look at the geographies because 5
there may now be some of those areas that are nonviable retail which actually has a definition 6
from 2009. 7
8
Mr. Lait: So to examine the geographies of where the ordinance would apply. 9
10
Commissioner Lauing: Well right now the way it's written it applies everywhere. 11
12
Mr. Lait: That's right. 13
14
Commissioner Lauing: But we want to have the opportunity to come back to them and 15
potentially recommend areas that should be trimmed because they're nonviable. That's the 16
Motion. 17
18
Chair Alcheck: Do I have a second? 19
20
SECOND 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: I’ll second. 2
3
Chair Alcheck: Ok. So we have a second of the Motion. Would you mind restating it one more 4
time so that I can make sure Commissioner Gardias has heard it? We have a Motion on the 5
floor that's been seconded and the Motion is… 6
7
Mr. Lait: Well so as I understand it and I’ll I may not get the precise wording, but it's basically to 8
move the staff report, adopt the ordinance, a recommendation to City Council to adopt the staff 9
recommended ordinance and a corollary request that recognition that there may be some 10
properties that this net is cast widely and that there was there would be interest presumably 11
after the ordinance gets adopted that would allow the PTC an opportunity to reexamine the 12
geographic areas where this ordinance applies and maybe pull it back in some of these marginal 13
areas. 14
15
Commissioner Lauing: If it's considered that they're nonviable retail. 16
17
Mr. Lait: Nonviable retail. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Ok at this time I'm going to see if there's anybody interested in making 20
amendments to the current Motion? I have an amendment from Commissioner Gardias. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Gardias: Well so what I would like to do because I think that what I'm going to 2
say is supported with the reason that we didn't vet this ordinance. So amendments that I will 3
propose will pretty much. 4
5
Chair Alcheck: Let's do them one at a time. 6
7
Commissioner Gardias: Be ok (interrupted) 8
9
Chair Alcheck: And let’s treat them as Unfriendly. 10
11
Commissioner Gardias: [Unintelligible] of this be maybe changed because of certain reasons. So 12
I will do them one at a time. 13
14
Chair Alcheck: Let’s do them one at a time, treat them as Unfriendly, and we’ll vote on them 15
right away. 16
17
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #1 TO MOTION #2 18
19
Commissioner Gardias: Ok. So the first one is you can go to packet Page 57 and that is 20
18.30A085 design standards. So Amendment is to remove entirely this this paragraph. And the 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
reason if you ask is pretty much that what I already said at the prior hearing that this is just a 1
piecemeal standard and there should be for me to support this there should be comprehensive 2
standards if at all. But then for this specific area I don't believe that we need to have any design 3
standards if you just told me about [meet down] or Charleston or some other Center I would say 4
yes that's different area. But for the Downtown I believe that we should minimize restrictions. 5
So for this reason I want to propose to remove entirely this paragraph. 6
7
Chair Alcheck: Yeah just to be clear you're entirely removing A and B or just A? 8
9
Commissioner Gardias: This is Section 3. 10
11
Chair Alcheck: Section 3, [18.30A.085] this paragraph? Starting with external? Exterior. 12
13
Commissioner Gardias: That's correct. Yes. 14
15
Chair Alcheck: And what about Paragraph B? 16
17
Commissioner Gardias: Yes. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Ok. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Gardias: Entire paragraph. 1
2
Chair Alcheck: The entire part. Ok I'll second that Unfriendly Amendment. I'd like to put it to a 3
vote (interrupted) 4
5
Mr. Lait: And just for clarification this only affects California Avenue. 6
7
Chair Alcheck: Basically we're omitting a section of the ordinance that he thinks is unacceptable. 8
9
Commissioner Gardias: So just a moment. So I didn't understand that. So it relates to the 10
California Avenue? 11
12
Mr. Lait: It only relates to Cal the R combining district which is located on California Avenue. 13
This does not apply to Downtown. 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Is there a section that applies the same sort of regulation to a part of Downtown 16
it’s just separated? 17
18
Ms. Eisberg: Yes. So beginning on the bottom of Page 58 in your packet [18.30C.035] those 19
design standards and what are identified as C, D, and E below that. Those would apply to the GF 20
combining district in the CDC sub district which is Downtown. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Alcheck: Ok so let me just ask the maker of the amendment (interrupted) 2
3
Commissioner Gardias: Just a moment, could you give me, could you refer me to the page 4
again? 5
6
Ms. Eisberg: It starts on the very bottom of Page 58, design standards, and then the top of Page 7
59. 8
9
Chair Alcheck: It's the next Page 59. Top of 59. It’s essentially the same. 10
11
Commissioner Gardias: Yes, it’s same, same story. 12
13
Ms. Eisberg: Similar, yeah. 14
15
Commissioner Gardias: So we were going to go one at a time, but I just flipped the page and I 16
have exactly the same comments. So (interrupted) 17
18
Chair Alcheck: Ok so just let me clarify. You would like to remove Paragraphs A and B on Page 19
57 and Paragraphs C, D, and E that the 18… Paragraph C, D, And E at the top of Page 59. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Gardias: Correct, but I will provide you different reasons for the record if you're 1
interested because they are totally two different reasons for why I would like to remove them 2
for Downtown and for California. 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Let me do this, let me just second the… I'm going to second, does anybody want 5
to second this Unfriendly Amendment? 6
7
Commissioner Rosenblum: I have a point of order though. 8
9
Chair Alcheck: Ok. 10
11
Commissioner Rosenblum: If I am opposed to the underlying Motion and now we're on 12
amendments I have no issue with the amendment per se I would support the amendment. I 13
have problem with the whole underlying Motion and so how do I address that? 14
15
SECOND 16
17
Chair Alcheck: Let me tell you how I feel this process is going because it’s not particularly 18
smooth at this point, but essentially we had a Motion and it failed and now we have an 19
alternate Motion and in order for me to support this Motion I've got to change the 20
recommendation as it is which means that and it sounds like there are other individuals who are 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
interested in some changes which means we're getting specific. Which is something a number 1
of us suggested they didn't want to do today, but I'm with you I don't feel comfortable 2
supporting the current Motion as is and so I am trying to give in order to get some majority here 3
I'm trying to give Commissioners an opportunity to make a Motion that they could support. And 4
so we have an amendment that what may be a series of amendments and I want to give 5
essentially if Commissioner Gardias can amend this then he may support it. And if he supports 6
it then that's three people that may support it and that's one more you know anyways. So you 7
get it. 8
9
Alright, so we have an Unfriendly Amendment to remove these design standards. Do have a 10
second? I ok, fine. I seconded it. Are we prepared to take a vote or does anybody want to ask 11
anymore clarifying questions. Let's take a vote. All those in favor of (interrupted) 12
13
Commissioner Rosenblum: Last time we had people speaking against the Motion. So can I have 14
an opportunity to do that? 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Yes. Wait, no, no, no. We're not voting on the Motion. We're voting on an 17
Unfriendly Amendment. 18
19
Commissioner Rosenblum: Ok, alright. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
VOTE 1
2
Chair Alcheck: I will give you an opportunity to speak to your dissent if that makes you feel 3
comfortable, but for this particular amendment all those in favor of this Unfriendly Amendment 4
please say aye or raise your hand. Ok we have two. All those opposed to this Amendment? We 5
have three and clearly an abstention. I think that means it fails. Ok, what’s your next 6
Amendment? 7
8
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #1 FAILED (2-3-1, Commissioner Rosenblum abstained) 9
10
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #2 TO MOTION #2 11
12
Commissioner Gardias: Second Amendment is to remove the burden... just a moment I will give 13
you the specific paragraph. This is on Page 60. And this is the last line item on that page 14
number, page number of the packet 60 that talks about the radius of 2,000 feet radius that 15
needs to be where the study needs to be provided by the applicant. So I proposed to reduce it 16
to a City block as opposed to 2,000 feet. 17
18
Chair Alcheck: Ok. Is anyone that would like a second that Unfriendly Amendment? 19
20
SECOND 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Rosenblum: Second. 2
3
Chair Alcheck: Great. Ok, do you want to speak to your second? 4
5
Commissioner Rosenblum: No. Just it's more logical unit for people to be able to deal with. I 6
think that it makes sense. 7
8
VOTE 9
10
Chair Alcheck: Ok. Alright, let's put it to a vote. All those in favor of this Unfriendly Amendment 11
please raise your hand. Ok that’s five in favor. All those opposed? One opposed. Motion is so 12
amended. 13
14
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #2 PASSED (5-1, Commissioner Summa against) 15
16
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #3 TO MOTION #2 17
18
Commissioner Gardias: So next one is on Page 59. And this is in regards to paragraph 19
18.30C.040 in the middle of the page that talks about annual monitoring of ground floor retail 20
use. And I proposed to amend it to add words “and use” after a Downtown retail vacancy 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
survey… a Downtown retail vacancy rate and use survey. And this is due to pretty much to 1
broaden the survey to bring to the Commission more meaningful material as opposed to only 2
vacancy rate because without the structure it doesn't tell me anything. So I need to know the 3
structure of the vacancy rate. 4
5
Mr. Lait: Ok so we’re on packet Page 59 which is Page 6 of the ordinance and you're looking at 6
1830C.040 and you would like to insert the words what after what? 7
8
Commissioner Gardias: And use after vacancy rate. 9
10
Mr. Lait: And use [unintelligible]. 11
12
Commissioner Gardias: A Downtown retail vacancy rate and use surveys. 13
14
Mr. Lait: And use survey. Ok. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: So essentially when you say use do you mean like not just retail you want the 17
specific use that vacated if it’s vacant? 18
19
Commissioner Gardias: I simply just want to know that something… I simply want to have the 20
besides of the vacancy rate I want to have some structure in the survey that would just bring us 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
square footage, what was so that retail that abandoned this property, this space, and some 1
other uses. 2
3
Chair Alcheck: So like if it was a restaurant that abandoned or a clothing shop? 4
5
Commissioner Gardias: Exactly, yes. 6
7
Chair Alcheck: You want specific? Does that make sense to staff? 8
9
Mr. Lait: Yeah, you want to know the uses. 10
11
Chair Alcheck: Yeah I mean the use is retail. I think what he's suggesting is he wants a little… we 12
heard tonight for example that 95 percent of the calls they get are from restaurants and not 13
from clothing shops if you will. And so I think what he's suggesting is he would like a more 14
specific distinction on the vacancy rate. So if… that somehow reflects the abandoned user. 15
16
Mr. Lait: Probably use like [Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE)] codes or however it’s set 17
up or we can just draw from the retail type of uses versus office uses versus, right? I mean 18
that’s what you're, the categories is what you're looking for. 19
20
Commissioner Gardias: Exactly. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Mr. Lait: Ok. That’s understandable. 2
3
Commissioner Gardias: Something that would allow me to understand what this vacancy rate 4
(interrupted) 5
6
Chair Alcheck: Let me just ask question do we need to amend that or can that just be 7
incorporated? 8
9
Mr. Lait: No, I’d amend it. 10
11
Chair Alcheck: Ok, let’s amend it. 12
13
Mr. Lait: If that’s what you’re interested in. 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Ok. Do we have a second? 16
17
SECOND 18
19
Commissioner Gardias: Second. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
VOTE 1
2
Chair Alcheck: Great. Let’s vote on it, all those in favor of amending the annual monitoring of 3
ground floor retail use provision please raise your hand. Oh, it’s unanimous. Great. The Motion 4
is so amended. 5
6
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #3 PASSED (6-0) 7
8
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #4 TO MOTION #2 9
10
Commissioner Gardias: Ok so next one if you go to Page 58 then this is part of the paragraph 11
permitted uses that starts on the prior Page 57 and that lists all the permitted uses and then it 12
within those permitted uses there is a point seven and eight and one talks about entrance lobby 13
or reception area serving non-ground floor uses, all other uses permitted in the underlying 14
district provided such uses are not on the ground floor. So I propose to remove both. And the 15
reason is that pretty much that is that should be part of the design standards or farther 16
understanding how truly the retail would work in conjunction with other uses on the lot. In 17
other words point seven and point eight don't mean anything it just provide confusion in this 18
ordinance. That's how I see this. 19
20
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Should we get staff to respond to that? Is this what enables non-retail 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
use on upper floors? Isn't doesn't Bullet 8 allow the non-retail uses on upper floors? I mean 1
without that you wouldn't be able to use the underlying say office use (interrupted) 2
3
Commissioner Gardias: Or [unintelligible]. 4
5
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: That’s how I read it, but… 6
7
Commissioner Gardias: On the upper floors? 8
9
Mr. Lait: That's correct. 10
11
Ms. Eisberg: Right, that’s correct. 12
13
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: I think what that says, but I would like staff to respond to that. 14
15
Commissioner Gardias: Does it relate to the upper floor (interrupted) 16
17
Ms. Eisberg: Right so this is just in the ground floor overlay district. So this is not a citywide 18
application. So what Bullet Point 8 says and this is existing today is that other uses that are 19
permitted in the underlying district which in our case may be looking at Downtown that's going 20
to be the CD district would be permitted on upper floors. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Gardias: Ok, so I would throw this, right? But so could you comment on the on 2
your perspective because I would still strike Number 7. 3
4
Ms. Eisberg: So seven would just then if you struck that you couldn't have a lobby, a lobby area 5
that served those upper floor uses. 6
7
Mr. Lait: So if you have retail on the ground floor and you want to change your building or make 8
some changes what we're trying to do there is allow for a small lobby to allow for that transit. 9
[Unintelligible] would the ordinance talked about not losing square footage of retail, but here 10
we would say well you could lose a little bit of retail square footage to accommodate a lobby 11
serving a, oh sorry, serving a upper floor. 12
13
Ms. Eisberg: But just be clear so this is just in the GF so if you think about University Avenue 14
there are several places where you have a lobby entrance. 15
16
Commissioner Gardias: Right. 17
18
Ms. Eisberg: That's not retail (interrupted) 19
20
Commissioner Gardias: And I totally understand, right? So but logically the way that I just so I 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
can withdraw it, but let me just tell you a logical argument why it should not be there, right? 1
And this is the reason why I just wanted to strike out the provisions about the design because 2
it's a piecemeal, doesn't mean anything, right? It's going to be there comprehensive and it's 3
going to mean something and it's going to just address the height, the glass clearance, the 4
distance from the floor, from the window pane or the facades to the back wall and then 5
entrance, how much of the area is dedicated to the retail versus entrance to the second floor. 6
It's a separate paragraph, right? That was the reason that I didn't like the design that was just 7
talking about 70 percent of the transparent window because it just didn't look to me as properly 8
done homework, right? This item about entrances/lobbies should have been regulated by the 9
design because otherwise it's just it's not doesn't mean anything, doesn't say specifically how 10
large it should be, how or what would be the relationship to the retail area and so forth. 11
12
Mr. Lait: So I with the possibility of me being corrected here I think I agree with your point that 13
Number 7 should be struck and maybe instead of having it there we add a Letter C in that 14
section that uses words to sort of articulate what we're trying to get at which is retail… you 15
know we’ll have to quantify this maybe somehow, but a small amount of retail may be removed 16
in order to accommodate an upper floor, a lobby or upper floor access or something like that. 17
And just rather than establish it as like a used as permitted which seems kind of odd. 18
19
Commissioner Gardias: Right. Yes, exactly. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Mr. Lait: We’ll say we’ll recognize in a new Letter C that some retail may get lost a small amount 1
to accommodate a lobby. 2
3
Commissioner Gardias: That’s fine. 4
5
Mr. Lait: Ok. 6
7
Commissioner Gardias: I totally agree, right? But again, right, I hope that are we going to revisit 8
it again. I recommend you that you read some other ordinances of other cities how they 9
resolve it. Every ordinance that just looks into this properly it just has a proper it either has 10
nothing because the retail is thriving or it has a beefed up and analyzed logically categorized 11
section about the design standards. And then pretty much it's clear for the architects for the 12
plan there's what truly should be done. 13
14
Mr. Lait: And just one clarifying point. We're not trying to establish any kind of design criteria. 15
What we're trying to do is say it is ok to lose a little bit of retail because elsewhere in this 16
ordinance it says you shouldn’t, thou shall not remove a square foot of retail, but here we're 17
saying we recognize that you may remove a little bit of retail in order to accommodate this 18
entry or this lobby serving other parts of the building. 19
20
Commissioner Gardias: I agree. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Mr. Lait: Ok. 2
3
Commissioner Gardias: Ok so with this words sorry for the long discussion. 4
5
Chair Alcheck: That's a good one. We’ll this, I think we’ll treat this proposed amendment as 6
incorporating language in as a Letter C that addresses I don't know if the word access is the right 7
one, but access to upper floors. And we’ll just rely on staff to make that language work. So do I 8
have a second for this? 9
10
SECOND 11
12
Commissioner Lauing: I’ll second that. 13
14
VOTE 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Great. Ok all those in favor of this Unfriendly Amendment please raise your 17
hand. It’s unanimous. Ok the Motion is so amended. Commissioner Gardias do you want to 18
continue or can maybe we see if there's other amendments from other individuals? 19
20
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #4 PASSED (6-0) 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Gardias: Yeah so let's see if anybody else has some amendments. I may have one 2
or more too. 3
4
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #5 TO MOTION #2 5
6
Chair Alcheck: Alright I've got a couple amendments. I'd like to suggest that we return the 25 7
percent office use on the ground floor retail. So the ordinance used to allow that 25 percent of 8
the ground floor could be utilized as office and I'd like to return that because this ordinance just 9
removes it and I’m unclear on why that's a good idea. So I'd like to 10
11
Commissioner Lauing: Is there a place that's written down here anywhere? 12
13
Chair Alcheck: It's not in the... 14
15
Commissioner Lauing: Not in the ordinance. 16
17
Chair Alcheck: It's not in the ordinance because the ordinance essentially doesn't carve out the 18
opportunity. Essentially you’d have to add it to the ordinance. Is that right? 19
20
Ms. Eisberg: Right. You can see it as a strike out under on Page 58. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Mr. Lait: Ordinance Page 5. 2
3
Ms. Eisberg: Ordinance Page 5 just under where we were just talking about (interrupted) 4
5
Chair Alcheck: It says notwithstanding Subsection [unintelligible] not more than 25 percent of 6
the ground floor area not fronting on a street may be occupied by a use permit in the applicable 7
underlying CD district. So that used to be a component of this. it allowed ground floor retail to 8
utilize some of the space for back office or office in general. It's been removed and it's unclear 9
sort of why that’s (interrupted) 10
11
Commissioner Lauing: Could we get staff to comment on that? 12
13
Chair Alcheck: Sure. I guess my first question is do I even have a second? 14
15
SECOND 16
17
Commissioner Gardias: I will second it. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Ok, great; staff do you want to tell us why you removed that in the interest of 20
potentially informing the vote? 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Ms. Eisberg: So one that was a specific advice from the Council as a way to encourage more 2
retail and essentially more, promoting more retail rather than allowing office. 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Alright so I think the reason is Council direction. I would just argue that this is an 5
area that I don't know has been properly vetted and I'm concerned about it. But I'd rather not 6
spend a whole round going through it. I'd rather just sort of see if there’s support for it so do I 7
need to restate the Amendment? Ok, alright. So all those in favor of unstriking Paragraph B at 8
the top of Page 58 please raise your hand. I have three in support. All those opposed? I have 9
three opposed. OK that Motion that Unfriendly Amendment fails. Are there any other 10
amendments? 11
12
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #5 FAILED (3-3, Vice-Chair Waldfogel, Commissioners Lauing and 13
Summa against) 14
15
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #6 TO MOTION #2 16
17
Commissioner Gardias: Yes, please. So please refer to Page 57 and that is Paragraph 18
[18.30C.010]. This is just a general statement. So what I'm proposing is to remove after word 19
“promote” which is on the third line, third row under this paragraph under specific purpose to 20
say “promotes local commerce” and then strike out the rest of the words after that through in 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
the same sentence. So pretty much it would read that “promotes local commerce,” the ground 1
floor combining district is intended to provide design guidelines and blah, blah, blah… and sub 2
districts to promote local commerce. There reason that I'm just doing this although I'm typically 3
indifferent about this preambles is that I think this is the this is what we should be doing other 4
things I'm not really finding intuitive and understanding, understandable, so I think that the 5
commerce should be the key of this ordinance. 6
7
Mr. Lait: So the rest of the sentence gets struck? 8
9
Commissioner Gardias: That’s correct. 10
11
Chair Alcheck: Ok can we get a little clarification here? What section of the sentence are we 12
eliminating? 13
14
Commissioner Gardias: This is Page 57. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Yes. 17
18
Commissioner Gardias: Paragraph specific purpose [18.30C010] (interrupted) 19
20
Chair Alcheck: Yeah. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Gardias: And after word promote which is the one, two, three, four, the fourth 2
line. 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Yeah. 5
6
Commissioner Gardias: Under this specific paragraph there is a word promotes. 7
8
Chair Alcheck: Yes. 9
10
Commissioner Gardias: Which says, “promote active pedestrian oriented uses with a high level 11
of transparency and visual interest,” but I would strike out the whole the rest of the sentence 12
after the word “promote” and I would say, “promote local commerce” instead. 13
14
Chair Alcheck: Ok. Do I have a second for amendment? 15
16
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: I’d second it if you kept the end of the sentence, I mean after “with.” 17
With a high level of transparency [unintelligible]. 18
19
Commissioner Gardias: I accept. 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: So you want to make that Motion [Note-Friendly Amendment]? 1
2
Commissioner Gardias: Yes. So pretty much we’ll insert the (interrupted). 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Local commerce instead of active pedestrian oriented uses. 5
6
Commissioner Gardias: Exactly. We remove “active pedestrian oriented uses” and instead we’ll 7
just insert “local commerce” and then the rest of the sentence will remain. 8
9
Chair Alcheck: You guys with us? 10
11
Mr. Lait: Yeah. 12
13
Chair Alcheck: Ok, alright, let's put it to a vote. All those in favor of this Unfriendly Amendment 14
please raise your hand. I’ll support it. That's three in favor. All those opposed to it? Three 15
opposed. Ok, do you have any other amendments that you'd like to propose? 16
17
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #6 FAILED (3-3, Vice-Chair Waldfogel, Commissioners Lauing and 18
Summa against) 19
20
Commissioner Gardias: No, but there is a couple of probably editorial errors. I don't know, it 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
may be beyond the boundary of this, but I would just recommend that you go through this. 1
There are some like for example on Page 55 (interrupted) 2
3
Chair Alcheck: You mean like typos? 4
5
Commissioner Gardias: Yeah. There is on Page 55 it refers to the section, Section 2 it refers to 6
the Paragraph 125.2 which I couldn't find and maybe I just couldn't find it. Maybe it’s 7
somewhere, right, but maybe it doesn't exist. And also on Page 57 there is another issue like 8
this. So I'm sure that some (interrupted) 9
10
Chair Alcheck: Ok I’ll just request that if Commissioner found any typos or sort of clerical errors 11
let's email them to Director Lait, Assistant Director Lait, and hopefully they'll get incorporated. I 12
think that’s a better use of time. Ok, do I have any other amendments to the… Commissioner 13
Summa. 14
15
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #7 TO MOTION #2 16
17
Commissioner Summa: I mentioned this in, whoops, sorry. I mentioned this in my comments 18
earlier, but I'm wondering if anybody is interested in pursuing my idea that waivers and 19
exceptions, waivers and adjustments should be handled in a public hearing not at the Director’s 20
level. And my thinking behind that is I don't know how people would know that a decision like 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
that was made to appeal it in a timely fashion and I think that can really change the viability of a 1
business to have the adjacent business change from a retail use. But if no one's interested I'll 2
drop it. 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Do I have a second? 5
6
Commissioner Gardias: May I propose something? 7
8
Commissioner Summa: Yeah. 9
10
Commissioner Gardias: [Unintelligible]. 11
12
Chair Alcheck: [Unintelligible] are you proposing an amendment to her (interrupted) 13
14
Commissioner Gardias: I’m proposing I would if you modify it in a certain way I would accept 15
your proposal. And if you consider that applicant may appeal Director’s decision to the PTC I 16
would support such an amendment, as opposed to the Council. 17
18
Commissioner Summa: I actually think that the City by policy an appeal of that nature goes to 19
the Council so I mean I'm not looking... 20
21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Alcheck: Ok, hold on. I want to do this in an organized way. We have a proposed 1
Unfriendly Amendment. You're suggesting an alternative. I don't really want to debate the 2
alternative. I want to… if, are you willing to second her current Unfriendly Amendment? Ok 3
and the assumption is you don’t want to edit with his suggestion? 4
5
Commissioner Summa: No. 6
7
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT #7 FAILED FOR LACK OF SECOND 8
9
Chair Alcheck: Ok. So do I have a second for this Unfriendly Amendment? Ok, seeing none are 10
any other Unfriendly Amendments or Amendments? Ok, alright. So we have a Motion on the 11
floor as amended. I don't think it's wise to read through all the amendments since we voted on 12
each one I assume we're all very sort of knowledgeable about them. 13
14
Commissioner Lauing: Or can I just summarize since I made the Motion? 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Yeah well [obviously] I would actually prefer if staff did that. So what I’d like to 17
do is have staff sort of run down them quickly and only the ones, only the amendments that 18
were passed. 19
20
Mr. Lait: Ok. Just [unintelligible] we’ve got the standing Motion. The amendments that passed 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
were going to change the 2,000 foot radius to be a city block. And we’re amending Section 4 1
[180 or 30C040] regarding the Downtown vacancy rate and use survey to get data on the use 2
survey. And the other amendment that passed it was the one having to do with amending 3
Section [1830C020]. We're going to remove line Number 7 and add a new Letter C that would 4
allow for the loss of some retail square footage to allow access to other levels of the building. 5
And there was actually one other one that passed and that I believe and that was the let me ask 6
question, the one about the local commerce, did that pass? Ok so local commerce being added 7
to Section 4 [1830C010] [unintelligible-lots of talking]. Ok so that one failed. Ok. So everything 8
up to that point. So there were three amendments. 9
10
Chair Alcheck: Ok would the maker or the seconder like to speak to their Motion? 11
12
Commissioner Lauing: Yeah just briefly to summarize. 13
14
Chair Alcheck: Please. 15
16
Commissioner Lauing: The ideal would be not to have to vote tonight, to have some more time 17
to spend on looking at the specific geographies that we think should be covered by this, but we 18
can't do that because we're out of time relative to the expiration of the temporary law. So the 19
alternative is to overprotect some retail where maybe it's not needed or to under protect and 20
therefore in the latter case offices could go into retail spaces starting tomorrow. Hence my 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
preference for the Motion made to overprotect in the short term and work it later to look for 1
nonviable retail. 2
3
Chair Alcheck: Would the seconder like to speak to the Motion? 4
5
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Just to agree with those comments. 6
7
Chair Alcheck: Ok at this time I'd like to put this Motion as amended to a vote. 8
9
Commissioner Rosenblum: I’d ask for opportunity to speak to a dissenting voice. 10
11
Chair Alcheck: Ok so (interrupted) 12
13
Mr. Lait: Yeah after the vote. 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Yeah typically I let anybody speak to their dissent after the vote. 16
17
Commissioner Rosenblum: All due respect with my Motion we had several people express their 18
concern prior to the vote. 19
20
Chair Alcheck: Ok I will if you'd like to comment on this vote go ahead. 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Rosenblum: Yeah. So I think this is a really sweeping ordinance. It's protecting 2
retail across the City and I think that the original ordinance was done as an urgency ordinance. 3
It was done in a hurried fashion. We've heard from stakeholders from 2009. We know who the 4
stakeholders were. Very few people were involved, especially retailers. I'm kind of shocked 5
that we're even considering bringing this from interim ordinance to a permanent measure 6
because we feel there is time pressure. I don't think this was ever a great ordinance and 7
certainly there was very little community involvement in crafting this ordinance. And so I think 8
the responsible thing to do would be to let it expire. And by the way it's not the end the world it 9
brings us back to the state of the world 15 months ago that… so it's not that we're actually going 10
to a Lord of the Flies land, we're going back to the world before this interim ordinance. And 11
then give us the time to actually work on each of our other valuable retail areas. 12
13
So I don't feel the same time pressure I guess, but if I did I certainly wouldn't want to pass this. I 14
would want more community involvement and specifically I’d want retailers to get involved. I 15
think that we're trying to balance retail vitality i.e. setting up that atmosphere for them to 16
succeed against the interest of the community i.e. having good retail to enjoy and I think that 17
we want the people involved that can make us something really great. So I would far prefer just 18
to see this expire. 19
20
VOTE 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Alcheck: Ok, thank you. At this time I’d like to put the current Motion as amended to 2
vote. All those in favor please raise your hand. We have four in support and all those opposed? 3
And two opposed. 4
5
Do you want to speak to your dissent? Ok. I'll speak to the dissent real quick. I agree with 6
Commissioner Rosenblum. I think it's a lot harder to undo something than to do something. 7
We do a lot of things right in the City, but I never think sort of the pressure of time is a good 8
reason to sort of pass something that we're uncomfortable with. And so my hope is that when 9
the Council gets this topic on their agenda I hope that the biggest takeaway for them from our 10
deliberations tonight is just how dissatisfied we are with the ordinance. In fact it sounds to me 11
like the majority of individuals on this Commission actually oppose the ordinance as written. 12
There just a, there's just isn't a majority that’s willing to see it lapse during the interim that 13
they'd like to have to fix it. So that Motion passes. 14
15
MOTION #2 PASSED (4-2, Chair Alcheck and Commissioner Rosenblum against) 16
17
MOTION #3 18
19
Chair Alcheck: I would like to suggest a Motion right now to recommend that the City Council 20
grant the PTC the opportunity to review the impacts of this retail preservation ordinance in 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
conjunction with the community and retailers specifically at a later date and amend the 1
ordinance in such ways as recommended at that time. 2
3
SECOND 4
5
Commissioner Rosenblum: I’d second. 6
7
Chair Alcheck: Ok does anybody, do you want to speak to your second? 8
9
Commissioner Rosenblum: I think that would be natural given the way our last Motion was 10
structured that recommended that we go back and look at properties that may be or areas that 11
may be problematic that that would be the natural result is that they would send this back to 12
us. 13
14
Chair Alcheck: Ok I'd like to take a vote. 15
16
Commissioner Lauing: Can I just ask a question about your intent? This is the one again about 17
sort of the geography just like what you said. This isn't the sort of [unintelligible-talking off 18
mike] could be other things as well? 19
20
Chair Alcheck: I'm suggesting that we go back involve the retail… my ordinance, my 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
recommendation is that City Council give us an opportunity to get in depth on this topic. And 1
hopefully that could involve a dialogue with some of the retail owners and something akin to 2
what took place in 2009 to identify what we really could do to enhance retail the way that I 3
think was the intent. It's a suggestion. 4
5
Commissioner Lauing: Ok, great. Thanks. 6
7
VOTE 8
9
Chair Alcheck: Ok and all those in favor of this recommendation please raise your hand. Ok all 10
those opposed? Ok it’s 5-1. Would you like to speak to your dissent? 11
12
MOTION #3 PASSED (5-1, Commissioner Summa against) 13
14
Commissioner Summa: Just super briefly, but I don't think that was exactly on the agenda 15
tonight and I think you're asking for a huge citywide complicated study and I'm not sure that 16
staff even has the time right now to do that. So it didn't seem practical to me. 17
18
Chair Alcheck: Ok. 19
20
Commission Action: 21
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Motion: Recommend approval of an ordinance to the City Council that restores the ground floor 2
retail protection boundary to the 2009 boundary and amend the retail and retail like definition 3
recommended by staff; reject all other staff proposed amendments. Motion made by 4
Commissioner Rosenblum, seconded by Chair Alcheck; motion FAILS 2-4 Vice Chair Waldfogel, 5
Commissioner Summa, Commissioner Lauing, Commissioner Gardias against. 6
7
Amendment: Restore the 2013 ground floor retail protection boundary. Amendment made by 8
Commissioner Gardias and supported by original motion makers. 9
10
Motion: Recommend approval of the staff proposed ordinance and forward a request to the 11
City Council that it direct the Planning and Transportation Commission to further study 12
refinements to the ordinance, including evaluating non-viable retail areas that may be removed 13
from protection in a new ordinance. Motion made by Commissioner Lauing, seconded by Vice 14
Chair Waldfogel; motions PASSES with applicable amendments below 4-2, Chair Alcheck and 15
Commissioner Rosenblum against. 16
17
Unfriendly Amendment: Remove 18.30(A).0A5. Motion made by Commissioner Gardias, 18
seconded Chair Alcheck; motion FAILS 2-3-1 Vice Chair Waldfogel, Commissioner Gardias and 19
Commissioner Summa against, Commissioner Rosenblum abstaining. 20
21
Unfriendly Amendment: Amend 18.40.160 (c) (2)(B) Waivers and Adjustments as follows - …A 22
map that indicates all the existing surrounding uses, both residential and non-residential, within 23
one city block a 2,000-foot radius; include…Motion made by Commissioner Gardias, seconded 24
by Chair Alcheck; motion PASSES 5-1, Commissioner Summa against. 25
26
Unfriendly Amendment: Amend Section 4 18.30.(C).040 to include the following addition ‘A 27
downtown retail vacancy rate and use survey…’ Motion made by Commissioner Gardias, and. 28
seconded by Commissioner Rosenblum; motion PASSES 6-0. 29
30
Unfriendly Amendment: Amend Section 18.30(C).020 by removing number seven (7) and add a 31
new letter (c) allowing the loss of some retail square footage to allow access to other levels of 32
the building. Motion made by Commissioner Gardias, seconded by Commissioner Lauing; 33
motion PASSES 6-0. 34
35
Unfriendly Amendment: Amend Section 4 18.30(C)010 Specific Purpose, as follows ‘…promote 36
local commerce, active, pedestrian‐oriented uses, with a high level of transparency and visual 37
interest at the ground level. Motion made by Commissioner Gardias, seconded by Chair Alcheck; 38
motions FAILS 3-3 Vice Chair Waldfogel, Commissioner Lauing and Commissioner Summa 39
against. 40
41
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Unfriendly Amendment: Amend the ordinance to require the request for a waiver to be 1
considered at public hearing. Motion made by Commissioner Summa; motions FAILS for lack of 2
a second. 3
4
Motion: Request the City Council direct the Planning and Transportation Commission to meet 5
with retailers and members in the community for an opportunity to get more in depth feedback 6
on this topic and suggest future amendments to this ordinance. Motion made by Chair Alcheck, 7
seconded by Commissioner Rosenblum; motion PASSES 5-1, Commissioner Summa against. 8
9
Approval of Minutes 10
Public Comment is Permitted. Five (5) minutes per speaker.1,3 11
12
4. November 30, 2016 and December 14, 2016 Draft Planning & 13
Transportation Commission Meeting Minutes 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Alright let's move on to approving the minutes. Let's start with… actually let's just 16
do them together; November 30th and the December 14th minutes. Can I get a Motion to 17
approve the minutes? 18
19
MOTION 20
21
Commissioner Rosenblum: I move to approve the minutes. 22
23
Chair Alcheck: Second? 24
25
SECOND 26
27
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Second. 28
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Alcheck: Thank you. All those in favor approving the minutes from November 30th and 2
December 14th please raise your hand. That's three. All those opposed? All those abstained? 3
Ok. That's four in favor, two abstains. 4
5
MOTION PASSED (4-0-2, Commissioners Luaing and Summa abstained) 6
7
Commission Action: 8
Motion: Approve the minutes for November 30, 2016 and December 14, 2016. Motion made by 9
Commissioner Rosenblum, seconded by Vice Chair Waldfogel; motion PASSES 4-0-2 10
Commissioners Lauing and Summa abstaining. 11
12
Committee Items 13
Commissioner Questions, Comments or Announcements 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Ok the last piece of business tonight is I need to make an appointment to the as a 16
representative to the Citizens Advisory Commission (CAC). And in discussing it with Vice-Chair 17
and the Planning staff we felt that Commissioner Summa would be the best person to sit as our 18
delegated liaison. That is in light of the fact that she is currently been serving on the 19
Commission, she's familiar with it, though her role would change slightly now it would go from a 20
voting role to a non-voting role, but we felt that your experience there would provide sort of 21
invaluable so the… invaluable insight. And the assumption moving forward is that when those 22
meetings take place you can sort of provide us input and updates and status updates from those 23
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
meetings and involve us. 1
2
Ok, are there any other items? Ok. With that I'd like to close this hearing. Time is 10:57. 3
Adjourned. 4
5
Commissioner Doria Summa was appointed to the Citizen Advisory Committee for the 6
Comprehensive Plan Update. 7
8
Adjournment 10:57pm 9
10
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair,
provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Palo Alto Planning & Transportation Commission 1
Commissioner Biographies, Present and Archived Agendas and Reports are available online: 2
http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/boards/ptc/default.asp. The PTC Commission members are: 3
4
Chair Michael Alcheck 5
Vice Chair Asher Waldfogel 6
Commissioner Przemek Gardias 7
Commissioner Ed Lauing 8
Commissioner Eric Rosenblum 9
Commissioner Doria Summa 10
11
12
Get Informed and Be Engaged! 13
View online: http://midpenmedia.org/category/government/city-of-palo-alto or on Channel 26. 14
15
Show up and speak. Public comment is encouraged. Please complete a speaker request card 16
located on the table at the entrance to the Council Chambers and deliver it to the Commission 17
Secretary prior to discussion of the item. 18
19
Write to us. Email the PTC at: Planning.Commission@CityofPaloAlto.org. Letters can be 20
delivered to the Planning & Community Environment Department, 5th floor, City Hall, 250 21
Hamilton Avenue, Palo Alto, CA 94301. Comments received by 2:00 PM the Tuesday preceding 22
the meeting date will be included in the agenda packet. Comments received afterward through 23
2:00 PM the day of the meeting will be presented to the Commission at the dais. 24
25
Material related to an item on this agenda submitted to the PTC after distribution of the 26
agenda packet is available for public inspection at the address above. 27
28
Americans with Disability Act (ADA) 29
It is the policy of the City of Palo Alto to offer its public programs, services and meetings in a 30
manner that is readily accessible to all. Persons with disabilities who require materials in an 31
appropriate alternative format or who require auxiliary aids to access City meetings, programs, 32
or services may contact the City’s ADA Coordinator at (650) 329-2550 (voice) or by emailing 33
ada@cityofpaloalto.org. Requests for assistance or accommodations must be submitted at least 34
24 hours in advance of the meeting, program, or service. 35