HomeMy WebLinkAbout1998-12-08 City Council Summary Minutes Adjourned Meeting of December 7, 1998, to December 8, 1998 11. Proposed Changes to be Included in Revising the Historic Preservation Ordinance................................87-359 12. Mayor Rosenbaum re Council Oversight of the Electric Utility in the New Competitive Environment....................87-375 13. Council Comments, Questions, and Announcements........87-375 ADJOURNMENT: The meeting adjourned at 9:40 p.m.............87-375
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The City Council of the City of Palo Alto met on this date in the Council Chambers at 7:09 p.m. PRESENT: Eakins, Mossar, Ojakian, Rosenbaum, Schneider, Wheeler ABSENT: Fazzino, Huber, Kniss UNFINISHED BUSINESS 11. Proposed Changes to be Included in Revising the Historic
Preservation Ordinance (continued from 12/7/98) (Public
Testimony Closed) Director of Planning and Community Environment Ed Gawf said the Council would consider the Historic Preservation Ordinance again on December 14, 1998. He anticipated the City Council would direct staff on those provisions of the draft ordinance to be presented for public review and at least one focus group public outreach effort would be held in December with a larger public outreach in January. The draft ordinance would be reviewed in January by the Historic Resources Board (HRB) and the Planning Commission. The draft ordinance, with public comment, was scheduled to come back to the Council at the February 16, 1999, meeting. Vice Mayor Schneider had several questions asked of her by members
of the community at the prior night=s meeting regarding the community meeting of December 15, 1998, and the community meetings in January 1999. The people wanted to make sure that the information to be discussed by the Council on December 14, 1998, did not preclude information from being added to what was adopted in the final ordinance. Mr. Gawf said the intent to bring the item before the Council presently was to make sure the staff recommendation was not far from what the Council would like staff to present to the public.
It was staff=s understanding that the Council=s direction for the outreach effort in December and January was truly that; staff would receive feedback, comments, and suggestions, which would be presented to the Council. Vice Mayor Schneider asked when the Council would receive the draft document. Mr. Gawf hoped to have the draft ordinance to the Council prior to February 16, 1999. Bob Moss, 4010 Orme Street, said the staff report was good but more categories were needed. A number of people spoke at the prior
night=s meeting about the importance of voluntary compliance. He opposed voluntary compliance and said compliance must be mandatory. He believed that the people who spoke the prior evening in favor 12/08/98 87-359
of voluntary historic preservation were upstanding people who would not do anything bad to their neighborhood and would not build large, oversized homes. Unfortunately, there were others whose only goal was greed who did not care about neighborhood or the community. He urged the Council to make the compliance mandatory but with intelligent, easily understood goals and guidelines. Floyd Gardner, 1755 University Avenue, studied the draft ordinance and found omissions. One was the criteria for inclusion on the Register and Resource List. There were six general headings listed in the ordinance with no backup included. The headings were taken
from the Secretary of Interior=s Standards which included backup
information. One heading was ΑExtraordinary Architecture≅ and
included ≅or a master architect or his high artistic values.≅ That was not enough information to include in an application. An application for the Register would indicate specifically what was extraordinary about the architecture, who was the architect, and why he was a master architect. The ordinance needed strong specifics. Identification of the applicant should be listed on the application. There should be no acceptance of an anonymous application. Martin Bernstein, P.O. Box 1739, recently returned from the Czech Republic and Israel where he was impressed by the pristine quality of some of the old buildings. In considering the great cities of the world, he realized that those cities had the urban design benefit of autocratic rule. When kings and queens decided how a city would look, that was what got done. Laws based on individual rights put urban aesthetics at risk. He believed the City Council should create an ordinance with substance. An example of substance was not having critical elements subject to voluntary compliance of any regulation. Without mandatory compliance issues, properties were at risk. Individual rights in the country died with the individual. Historic resources had the opportunity to move beyond
the current homeowner=s life. The decision made by the City Council would affect the legacy for future generations. Ellen Wyman, 546 Washington Avenue, supported mandatory compliance. The opponents claimed such an ordinance would be insensitive and would limit options, including financial options, and was unfair to the owners of historic homes. She saw the ordinance as an investment in the community and her neighborhood. Many residents recognized Palo Alto would be better off with historic regulations. The consultant hired by the City said the main asset was the character of historic neighborhoods. Prices of homes in Palo Alto had multiplied many times, and it was hard to believe people would lose value on their property. There were people who moved into mature neighborhoods feeling that they bought into a predictable area that offered stability. She wondered whether the people who opposed historic regulations had done their homework and looked at other communities with historic
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preservation. During a recent visit to Boulder, Colorado, she found that the prime residential neighborhoods where visitors were taken to were the historic neighborhoods. She asked the Planning staff in Boulder whether the concept had been controversial, and the answer was no. Most residents loved Boulder and recognized that historic preservation benefitted everyone. The key element to the residents was that historic regulations provided stability and predictability. Donald D. Snider, 788 Forest Avenue, considered the ordinance an infringement on his personal and property rights. He believed the ordinance would have an effect on the price of his home, and the amount of people who might consider buying his house with such restrictions would be limited. He questioned who was driving the ordinance effort. He believed there was a small group of preservationists who had the driving force. Compliance should be voluntary. Elsie Begle, 501 Forest Avenue, said historic preservation got off on a crisis basis from its inception because there was such commotion about two historic houses that were torn down. She had a great respect for truly historic houses, but she could not support premature ratings. Putting the ordinance together had divided the town in a way she had not seen in the past. She supported homeowners against preservationists, but bureaucracy got in the way to a dangerous extent. She favored a reasonable, limited approach of keeping the National Historic Register workable for Palo Alto. Shirley Wilson, 509 Hale Street, was surprised that so little had been made of the ombudsman report which she felt should have been the first page of the staff report. The present proposal was frightening. Undue emphasis was placed on pre- and post-World War II history with little concern with the history that was being created in the current dynamic times. Clearly, that the exploits of a few developers were resting on the shoulders of all individual homeowners. Viable suggestions which had been made to regulate commercial residential development versus private residential development had consistently been ignored. A simple amendment to the existing HRB ordinance would do the trick. She speculated that 95 percent of the building activity would be caught. The ongoing search for perfection in the preservation process was obsessive. To get to the proposed ordinance, with all the justifiable concern with the infamous lists, no one paid attention to the grand gesture to sweep all Category 1 and 2 structures onto a Landmark register. Those structures were becoming the bedrock of the new register without the property owners having any due process or notice from the City. Prior to the interim ordinance, review was mandatory and compliance was voluntary. Category 2 had not been a Landmark status for documented reasons. She associated her comments regarding Landmark status with those of Gail Woolley. Too broad an interpretation of the category would be counterproductive. To claim that Palo Alto had hundreds of Landmark quality residences when other larger and older municipalities designated only a
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handful was ludicrous. The goal of the register should be true Landmark quality buildings, using broadly recognized criteria. Simply being old, big, or having curb appeal was not enough. There
was no room for Αfeel good≅ structures in the Landmark category. The Council had two choices: pass the ordinance immediately as it existed; or revert back to the original historic ordinance which was clear, fair, and good spirited. The loss of structures so often invoked in the Council Chambers was not due to the lack of an ordinance but to the fact that they were not listed on an inventory. The good people of the community did not deserve to be treated as they had. Karen Holman, 725 Homer Avenue, punctuated what Leannah Hunt
commented at the prior night=s meeting, thanking the Council for separating out design review from historic preservation. The resource list and design review of major alterations should be by HRB review rather than staff review because HRB review would allow for public process. There should be a notice requirement for affected property owners. She emphasized the importance of protection for Categories 3 and 4 on the current inventory. Historic districts were comprised of contributors and noncontributors. The purpose of contributors and noncontributors was that it addressed the adage that the whole was greater than some of the parts. She found it curious that some people in Professorville did not want an updated historic ordinance. She wondered what Professorville would look like if not for the interim ordinance given that demolition delay did not seem to work in the
community. Page 2 of the staff report (CMR:454:98) said, ΑStaff recommends a somewhat different level of regulation for minor alterations, major alterations and demolitions of historic
structures on the Register.≅ She questioned how demolition of historic structures could be allowed.
Emily Renzel, 1056 Forest Avenue, agreed with Judith Wasserman=s,
Tom Wyman=s, and Ellen Wyman=s comments of the prior evening. She
also agreed with Gail Woolley=s suggestion of the two-tier division along the lines of the National and California Registers. The Council needed to receive feedback from the HRB with respect to the
staff proposal in order for the Council to obtain the HRB=s experience dealing with historic preservation. The HRB had reviews of the existing ordinance and the interim ordinance. The State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) raised an important point with respect to Board membership. Because of the design review aspects that were expected to be applied, there was a suggestion that more architects and design professionals be on the Board. The SHPO refined that by suggesting that the professionals have historic structure background. SHPO held a conference where she learned that every structure on the National Register was automatically placed on the State Register. She pointed that out because the Resource List which addressed potential California and National Registers, it was necessary to clarify that the California Register had less
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criteria than the more encompassing National Register. She did not
agree with Larry Klein=s comment that there was no problem because she believed the demolitions were random. Attachment A to the
staff report (CMR:454:98) said ΑDemolitions may be delayed.≅ She questioned the mechanism that implemented that. Clarification was necessary to explain how the mechanism worked. Roger Mansell, 550 Santa Rita, spoke about provisions in the Constitution to protect property against unlawful seizure and current efforts to restrict property rights. Kent Stormer, 175 Byron Street, moved to Palo Alto in 1980 because the presence of older homes in an established, quality neighborhood were important factors in deciding where he purchased his home. The home he selected was built at the turn of the century. He remodeled the house over a period of more than ten years with a careful eye to preserve the architectural character of the house. His efforts caused other neighbors to remodel in ways that preserved the character of their homes. He and his neighbors preserved and improved the character of the neighborhood and collectively increased property values in the process. As a result of his experience, he welcomed broad protections for older homes and was willing to shoulder the burden of meeting the necessary requirements. Broadened protections would allow more people to take advantage of incentives that would be accorded the appropriate remodel under the new ordinance. Demolition was a one-way street. A home could be cherished for a century by many generations and admired by hundreds of people, but without a strong preservation
ordinance, it would take only one owner=s whim to tear down a house. The invaluable architectural legacy should not be squandered. Regarding voluntary compliance, his experience suggested that the importance of voluntary efforts was consistent with the optimistic hope expressed by some that purchasers of older homes would preserve them voluntarily. K.C. Marcinik, 4046 Ben Lomond Drive, encouraged the City Council not to separate out the former Category 3 and 4 properties for the review process for the Landmark and Contributing properties. Any property owner who went through an additional review process deserved to benefit from the incentives program. Having to present her project at an HRB hearing meant she had to do additional research. She considered design decisions more carefully, and the result was a better project. She urged the Council to include Category 3 and 4 properties in the HRB review process and incentive program, along with Category 1 and 2 properties. Jim Culpepper, 2121 Amherst Street, was one of the College Terrace residents who asked the Council in September 1996 to declare a moratorium on demolitions in the College Terrace neighborhood. The request followed the demolition of the Tucker House, a Victorian residence on College Avenue built in 1899. The response from the Council was to declare a moratorium on the demolition of any
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residence built prior to 1940. He was concerned that trying to apply a moratorium across the entire city would create an enormous political controversy and the highly specific concerns of the College Terrace neighborhood would get lost in what would be an enormous shuffle of paper and flood of rhetoric which might not end. That proved to be the case. If the Council adopted the historic preservation ordinance with the changes proposed by staff, the beneficial effect on College Terrace would be nil unless the Council simultaneously designated College Terrace a historic district. Only four properties in College Terrace fell into the Landmark category. The rest would be subject to demolition. The Council could prohibit the demolition of any property on the proposed Resource List without a notice of public hearing, or the Council could accept the staff recommendation regarding the Resource List and start the process of designating College Terrace a historic district. His personal preference was that the Council continue the demolition moratorium in the College Terrace neighborhood until the Council could make a decision as to whether or not College Terrace was a historic district. He distributed the
second subdivision map filed in the neighborhood known as ΑCollege
Terrace.≅ The first subdivision map was entitled ΑPalo Alto.≅ The
description under the title read, ΑThis map is intended to take the
place of and as a substitute for the map called >Palo Alto= the residence town of the Leland Stanford Junior University, recorded in the office of the County Recorder of Santa Clara County on the
21st day of May 1988. The name of said town of >Palo Alto= having been by mutual consent of the property owners thereof changed to
>College Terrace.= The original map was filed on October 5, 1891, which reminds people that College Terrace had a long history, and the present residents would like to preserve as much of it as possible. Reine Flexer, 595 Matadero Avenue, owned an old house in Barron Park with one small floor heater which she was having difficulty replacing because of the size and City regulations. Her one bathroom needed remodeling which would require four City inspections. She would appreciate getting help to remodel her house or having someone advise her how to repair it. In France, state and local governments contributed to maintaining historic houses. She felt an undue burden was placed on owners of small houses who might not have money to remodel their homes. If she were to sell her house, two types of people would buy it: people from Professorville who had lots of money, or people who would replace the house. Tom Wyman, 546 Washington Avenue, said the high pressure real estate market compelled home demolitions. The historic ordinance attempted to avoid demolitions. Developers, spec-buyers, and spec-builders hovered over properties waiting for them to go on the market in order to capitalize on the opportunities. Voluntary restraints with respect to historic preservation were out of the
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question. Mandatory regulations were necessary. There were people who are focused on individual property rights, but they should be reminded that there were also community benefits and rights to enjoy a neighborhood. He encouraged the Council to give staff the guidance to move ahead with an ordinance that made sense and had mandatory provisions. Mark S. Hooper, 627 Webster Street, was dismayed by progressive and shocking changes in the surroundings. One of the concerns was excessive building, traffic congestion, and air and noise pollution in the Bay Area. He did not advance the proposition that there should be no restrictions on building patterns for large projects. As to small properties, there were adequate restrictions already in place in the form of zoning laws. Zoning laws provided protection against overbuilding, were not arbitrary, and applied equally to all. The laws provided restrictions and protection for the homeowner in that a building permit could not be denied to a homeowner who complied with all zoning rules. He opposed the arbitrary and oppressive power of the architectural and or historic reviews. If those reviews were allowed to become a prerequisite and a part of the building permit process, homeowners would be placed at the mercy of a few individuals on the HRB who would decide what houses must look like. Unlike zoning rules, decisions dispensed by the reviews were subjective and arbitrary. If one or several members did not like proposed plans for a house, they had unrestricted power to deny the homeowner access to the building permit procedure, and therefore had the option to paralyze a project. A property placed in the shadow of burdensome and/or unnecessary restrictions lost its market value because it would be bought only by those who had no reason to fear the reviews. Reviews would place upon the homeowner needless additional expenditures of money, time, and effort, and would deprive the homeowner control over his/her properties. He distributed copies of letters, dated June 30, 1998, and August 3, 1998, addressed to the Council and staff, which were never acknowledged or given consideration. Jim Smith, 1527 Byron Street, spoke about a neighbor who owned a Contributing residence and wanted to remodel the house. The neighbor wanted to tear down and rebuild his garage, but the HRB told him he could not because the garage was a historic resource. The HRB would allow the neighbor to replace the roof or two walls, which he did. The City inspector said the floor should be removed because there was no reinforcing steel in the garage floor. He
urged the Council to bring the HRB and City building inspector=s office into conformance. Greg Vander Veen, Yale Street, concurred with remarks by Pria Graves and Gail Woolley from the prior meeting. When the house
known as ΑBig Blue≅ was demolished, people were angry because they felt that was the last straw. Big Blue was a Category 3 historic listing, subject only to voluntary compliance. The neighborhood
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had suffered many Αscrapes≅ in the neighborhood which primed the residents to anger. Many of the scrapes were not homes that were historically listed but contributed to the fabric and feel of the neighborhood charm. The first time the Council heard from the College Terrace Residents Association was during Oral
Communications the week following the destruction of ΑBig Blue.≅
The neighbors= initial outcry was not only because landmarks were inadequately protected but more fundamentally that lower classes of historic homes and other homes that might be historic or contribute to neighborhood fabric had no protection. Patricia Villemain, 530 Melville Avenue, said the selection process for worthy buildings justifying preservation was not obvious. There was certainly a place with some type of standard for judging architecture that did not become bureaucratically intrusive and
injurious to property owners= concerns and rights. In one instance of an error in architectural standards, it was inappropriate to dismantle a charming little house designed by Julia Morgan on the corner of Webster Street and Kingsley Avenue and substitute the present Taco Bell monster. She was deeply shocked about the home at 1527 Waverley Street. The destruction began the prior week and she called the Planning Department asking whether they could stop the destruction. She did not hear back from the Planning Department. The craftsman house was built in 1907, was magnificently maintained, and was listed in two positive categories in the historic landmark buildings. She was puzzled as to how the dismantling was allowed to happened over an extremely short period of time. She did not believe any applications were submitted prior to July. There were only two homes on Melville Avenue listed for preservation and Landmark status. One of the buildings listed to be preserved was an inauspicious adobe-type house. The house was not an unpleasant piece of architecture but certainly not one of great merit. The second house was a unique, small Victorian which she could understand why it was chosen to be saved. Palo Alto needed a form of sensitive oversight, not an intrusive big brother approach to what was a real zoning problem. Colin Mick, 2130 Hanover Street, said his house was deemed worthy of contributing ambiance to his neighborhood. He did not believe the aggressive push which he observed over the prior two days necessarily represented the views of all College Terrace residents. Big Blue would have been a monstrous task to renovate. He was not opposed to historic preservation, but he did not believe that every old building was historic. He urged the Council to support the statement of former Mayor Larry Klein the prior evening, that enough was enough and the Council needed to back off the ordinance. A simple project of historic preservation was amplified into something that was far too complex to be well defined or articulated in an ordinance or enforced and managed by the City staff.
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Council Member Ojakian asked staff to review the two categories, the Resource List and the Palo Alto Register, and place numbers to the subcategories. Using an example, he mentioned the potential National Register under the Resource List was 300-400 homes. Mr. Gawf said that was correct. Referring to the Historic Preservation Decision Matrix, Attachment A of the staff report (CMR:454:98), he cautioned the Council that the Dames & Moore Study would not be complete until mid-January. The Resource List was divided into two areas: (1) Potential National Register which included properties that were evaluated against the criteria for the National Register and included approximately 300-400 properties; and (2) potential California Register which included approximately 1000 properties. The California Register included all properties on the National Register. For the purpose of the Resource List, only potentially eligible properties were considered. Category 1 and 2 properties were being proposed under Landmarks and included 87 properties. Category 3 and 4 included 231 properties. Included were 169 properties in the Professorville Historic District and 8 properties in the Ramona Street District. The 169 properties in the Professorville District reflected Contributing structures. There were an additional 33 that were viewed as noncontributing. Council Member Ojakian commented that the original 1979 inventory included approximately 400 structures and asked how many of those homes no longer existed. Senior Planner Virginia Warheit said staff knew how many Category 1 or 2 houses in Professorville were demolished which she believed was less than 20. She did not know how many Category 3 or 4 houses were demolished because there was no control. Council Member Ojakian was aware that in early 1996, there were at least 32 homes from 1940 or prior which were torn down. He asked whether there was any way to know where those houses were located in terms of the inventory. Ms. Warheit said staff did not know where the houses were located. Council Member Ojakian wanted to see something on the inventory to that effect. In order to be eligible for the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), two things were emphasized. One was that the property was on the California Register, and the other was that the property was on an eligibility list. He asked whether a property could be eligible for CEQA in some other way and whether the homes on the current Dames & Moore Study List were potentially eligible or fell under CEQA. Mr. Gawf said the homes could be. The graphic he presented at the
prior evening=s meeting included a section from the State Guidelines that stated historic resources could be one that had
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been determined to be a historic resource. The house did not have to be on the list or the California Register. If it was determined that a house met the criteria for eligibility for the California Register, then it should be considered a historic resource. City Attorney Ariel Calonne said the California Register created a presumption that a property was historically significant; however, it was incumbent on the City to evaluate any property if there were a discretionary decision. Council Member Ojakian clarified any property that might be declared potentially eligible under CEQA would still have be processed through the City. Mr. Gawf said any property that was a potential historic resource and where CEQA applied, took two things: 1) the guideline he mentioned and 2) application only when there was a discretionary decision on the part of the governmental agency that affected land use. Council Member Ojakian questioned how CEQA requirements were satisfied with a property potentially under CEQA, but not on either the eligibility list or actual register. Mr. Gawf said minor projects could be an exemption, more significant projects could be negative or mitigated negative declarations. Demolition of a Landmark property could be an Environmental Impact Report (EIR). Mr. Calonne said the impact of the Resource List on a homeowner was not the result of listing, but the result of whether there was a discretionary decision. Council Member Ojakian did not want to get into the CEQA area if that could be avoided, and apparently the way to do that was either have a mandatory compliance within the ordinance and/or an EIR for the ordinance. Mr. Gawf said that was correct. The CEQA implications would be considered for individual decisions. There was a need to make sure there were no unintended consequences when looking at the final makeup of the ordinance. Council Member Ojakian referred to the demolition definition and said the original draft revision of the ordinance referred to demolition as anything greater than 30 percent. Mr. Gawf said the footnote of the Matrix, Attachment A, of the
staff report (CMR:454:98) indicated ΑDemolition means 50%
destruction.≅ Thirty percent had been used to give the homeowner more leeway and still have a reasonable definition.
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Council Member Ojakian asked how Palo Alto compared with the State Register standard on demolition. Mr. Gawf said he would research that and return to the Council with the correct information. Council Member Ojakian said people were concerned about being on the State Register. Apparently, if a property was on the National Register, it automatically defaulted to the California Register.
He asked what was driving people=s concern. Mr. Gawf said if the issue was on the Resource List, the City used the potential National Register and California Register criteria. Some people could confuse that with the idea that Palo Alto might be proposing to actually designate properties as National Register or California Register. The purpose of using the two sets of criteria was to give some factual basis for determining what should be the inventory of potential candidates for local register. Mayor Rosenbaum suggested that if the criteria for being on the Resource List were the same as for eventually being added to the Register, all properties on the Resource List would eventually be on the Register once the City got around to considering that addition to the Register. Mr. Gawf said no. The first reason was the Resource List was based on a preliminary analysis. Before the City proposed to take a property from the Resource List to the Register, the City would do further analysis to make sure the preliminary analysis was correct. The second reason was the Resource List was intended to be a reservoir of potentially eligible properties. There was a limitation of how many would be considered in a year based upon the processes proposed of individual properties going to the HRB for recommendation and the Council for individual consideration and designation. Eventually, if all the potential properties met the criteria for the California or National Register, and the Council considered all of them, that would be the case. The intent was that City staff work with the HRB to identify the major properties that would be added to the Registers and focus on those. He reiterated the importance of working with property owners for commitment from them prior to designation of the property as a Landmark. Mayor Rosenbaum asked whether a fair comment was that absent mistakes in the information from Dames & Moore or the provision of new information by a property owner, eventually when the City got to a property, there was a good chance if it was on the Resource List, it wouldbe put on the Register. Mr. Gawf said yes, assuming the Council wished to designate the property.
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Mr. Calonne said the criteria were vexing because they required the exercise of judgement to apply them. The criteria were not on/off switches; they had a range. While the properties met the preliminary factual requirements to possibly be listed, there was a significant degree of discretion left to the HRB and Council that would never be reduced to a verbal description. Mayor Rosenbaum referred to the Decision Matrix on the wall and noted under Resource List, Demolition, there was a sentence that
read, ΑFor replacement buildings, Mandatory Compatibility Standards
review by staff and Mandatory Compliance.≅ The difficulty was how the City would get to that point and assumed that if someone came in to do something serious with a building on the Resource List, the City would invoke a delay of some length. During that delay period, the City would attempt to evaluate whether the property belonged on the Register. His understanding was if someone were selected for the Register, the house could not be demolished. A property owner not selected for the Register, should be free to do whatever the owner wanted. He asked under what condition the City would be concerned about a replacement structure. Mr. Gawf said the concept could be separated out and attached to the review of replacement building structures. He agreed the second sentence on the Matrix could be separated out to indicate that a decision was made whether or not to designate the property as a Landmark. Mayor Rosenbaum asked if the intent was a home on the Resource List, would it still require mandatory review for a replacement structure. Mr. Gawf said the statement made it consistent. Mayor Rosenbaum asked about the process in a case where someone with a Contributing house in a historic district wanted to demolish the house. Mr. Gawf said the idea was that there would be a one-year delay. The delay would provide a disincentive whether or not to demolish the house. Many of the Contributing properties in a historic district might not be individually significant enough to be a Landmark. Unlike other points on the Matrix, Attachment A of CMR:454:98, the idea of the delay was to consider the building for Landmark designation. There was no reason why it could not be done if the building was individually significant. Since the building was Contributing, and there was a discretionary action proposed, CEQA would apply. Mayor Rosenbaum suggested during the delay period, that the house could be evaluated to determine whether or not it was a Landmark because that would not have been done previously.
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Mr. Gawf said the concept was that many of the Contributing buildings might not be Landmarks individually, but the delay period could be used for that purpose. Mayor Rosenbaum asked what was the difference with respect to architecture between the National and the California standards. Ms. Warheit said the wording in the criteria for National Register and California Register was different. Attachment G in the staff report (CMR:454:98) gave the wording for the differences. In the
California Register criteria, the words Αlocal,≅ Αstate,≅
Αregional,≅ and Αculture of California≅ appeared but were not included in the National Register. The materials prepared by the State office indicated that the purpose of establishing the California preservation program was to recognize properties and resources that were important to the culture of California. Mayor Rosenbaum said the subcategories of the National and California Registers were basically identical. Ms. Warheit indicated the words used to explain the two Registers
were Αparallel≅ and Αsimilar.≅ Mayor Rosenbaum asked for an explanation of the difference between National significance for a architectural feature of the home and local or California significance. Ms. Warheit said in Palo Alto, part of the historic survey was to
prepare Αhistoric context≅ which were small essays on various aspects of the development of the community to provide a context within which to assess what was significant to the development of the community. Mayor Rosenbaum suggested a tour with Dames & Moore to look at ten houses in each category to get a feel of what was going on would be helpful for the Council at some point, since Dames & Moore had a good idea what the differences were. Ms. Warheit offered to bring examples. Council Member Eakins was impressed with the usefulness of the matrices that were provided to the Council. She asked whether a matric could be prepared for CEQA with respect to the ordinance. Mr. Calonne said the ordinance would be produced over the next several months and anticipating the result was difficult. Staff intended to use the document as a master EIR to lessen or eliminate the burden on individual property owners who took actions consistent with the policy direction enunciated in the ordinance by the Council. Staff would not be able to be customer friendly in
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regard to the application of the environmental law to actions that were inconsistent with the policy objectives of the Council.
Vice Mayor Schneider referred to Mr. Gawf=s comments regarding
Αreservoir≅ of potential properties and assumed there were 1,300 homes. She understood that the trigger for putting the property on the Register would be an application from a homeowner to make a change in the house, or would the 1,300 homes gradually be placed on the Register. Mr. Gawf said the properties on the Resource List would be considered over a period of time to determine whether they were eligible and desirable to be placed on the Palo Alto Register. There would be an impact on staff and the Council on how many properties could be considered. There were 300 to 400 houses eligible for the National Register. Vice Mayor Schneider said the 1,300 homes could end up in the reservoir and asked whether the homeowners would be prohibited from doing something with their property. Mr. Gawf responded that the Matrix identified as clearly as possible what requirements affected the homeowner. The idea was that homeowners with property on the Resource List knew exactly
what applied to them. Part of the Council=s decision was to determine the right amount of regulation, if any, for being on the Resource List. One of the options was that no regulations were on the Resource List. The Resource List would be a pool of potential candidates. If a building were to be demolished, the demolition permit could be delayed for one year in order to consider the property for the Register. After consideration, the Council might elect to place the property on the Register as a Landmark. The more common way would be that staff, working with HRB each year, would check with certain property owners to see if they would like to be nominated and placed on the Palo Alto register. Staff would talk to the property owner, try to secure his/her agreement, and take the proposal to the HRB and the Council. The properties would be looked as to which were the most significant to be placed on the Register and which had property owner support. Vice Mayor Schneider said the Council heard from a number of College Terrace residents and asked what enabled a district to be recognized as historic. She noted that Pasadena required 60 percent agreement among residents. Mr. Gawf said there needed to be a fairly high percentage; 60 percent was at the low end. The range should be 75 percent. Vice Mayor Schneider noted in one of the definitions that a historic district did not have to be contiguous which she found confusing.
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Mr. Gawf said his experience with historic districts was that they were contiguous. Council Member Mossar said 1527 Waverley Street was a property that came up in conversation. An EIR was not done on the property; however, the Council heard testimony that it was eligible for the National Register. She asked why an EIR was not done on the demolition of the Waverley Street property. Mr. Calonne said action was ministerial rather than discretionary. Council Member Mossar said the proposal shown in the Matrix changed from ministerial to discretionary. Mr. Calonne said that was correct. There was a wide array of practice among his colleagues and among planners about how to deal with ministerial decisions wrapped up with discretionary decisions, and there was not a lot of case law on it. Council Member Mossar asked whether demolitions had always been ministerial in Palo Alto. Mr. Gawf understood the City previously required a replacement building prior to obtaining a demolition permit, but that was either modified or deleted. He was not sure that was viewed as discretionary. In most cities, building permits traditionally were ministerial. Council Member Mossar said there appeared to be a lack of confidence in government to administer regulations such as Palo Alto was looking at. She asked whether the Council would see a staffing plan when the final ordinance returned to the Council. Mr. Gawf said yes. He recommended a monitoring program and a report to the Council on how staff did. As part of the monitoring program, he would include a survey of people who had used the service to see how they viewed the service they received. Council Member Mossar commented Mr. Culpepper felt College Terrace would not receive the protections they had hoped to obtain. She realized there were lists of buildings that were not grouped in any way to help understand where they were, to differentiate commercial from residential. She asked whether there was a way to organize the list to say the effects of the regulation on Professorville were..., the effects on College Terrace would be..., and some way to take the largest groupings of historic properties so the Council would know what the impacts were. Mr. Gawf said when the ordinance returned to the Council in February, staff would give the Council the implications of the staff recommendation and what it meant to specific areas.
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Council Member Mossar said the Council had interest in individual buildings, and the reality that much of what the Council was trying to protect was in groupings.
Mr. Gawf said Mr. Culpepper=s point regarding College Terrace was because it was not a historic district, preservation was dependent upon how many individual landmarks there might be in that area. He recalled that Mr. Culpepper did not believe there were very many landmarks. Council Member Mossar confirmed the Council would see at a later time the recommended process for forming new districts. Mr. Gawf said yes. Council Member Wheeler said one of the requests made earlier in the meeting related to the review of major alterations on the Resource List, and the speaker suggested that the review be performed by the HRB in a public setting rather than by staff. Mr. Gawf said the overriding thought was that properties on the Resource List were handled much more at the staff level, and properties on the Register were handled more by the HRB. The question of who handled it was a policy decision on the part of the Council. The Council might want to have some kind of appeal process to HRB. Mr. Calonne said the purpose of having the public aware should be looked at. The City might publish a monthly list of properties that were on the list where alterations were sought, and citizen advocates would protect the property if they wanted. Council Member Ojakian said much of what the Council had discussed in the recent meetings focused on the inventory classifications and regulatory requirements. The SHPO sent a letter, dated October 30,
1998, which said, ΑOften the impression that the Secretary=s Standards are a very strict standard with little flexibility is a
result not of the standard=s content but of overzealous
application.≅ His question was that at some point, a discussion was needed regarding administration. The heart of some of the discontent was the ways the ordinance was administered. He asked when the Council would discuss administration in the process and whether it was shaped in a way the Council would get what it wanted.
Mr. Gawf was informed that the Secretary of Interior=s standards could be flexible in rehabilitation. The Council would direct him, and he would manage the process fairly with a reasonable application. He would monitor and receive feedback on how well the staff was doing or not and would be happy to share that with the
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City Council and the community. He was committed to a fair administration of whatever regulations the Council set.
City Manager June Fleming said the Council=s role was to set the policy and to inform staff what was expected from the administration of the policy. Once that was done, her intent would be to return to the Council with an information report on how staff would administer and monitor the policy. Monitoring mechanisms would be set up such as budget or annual reports. She was obligated to see that once the policy was in place, staff would return with an information report on how it would be administered. Council Member Ojakian said he would look for a mechanism in which the Council was sure there was a comfort zone that things were working well. MOTION TO CONTINUE: Council Member Schneider moved, seconded by Ojakian, to continue the item to the December 14, 1998, City Council Meeting. MOTION TO CONTINUE PASSED 6-0, Huber "not participating," Fazzino, Kniss absent. COUNCIL MATTERS 12. Mayor Rosenbaum re Council Oversight of the Electric Utility in the New Competitive Environment (continued from 12/7/98) MOTION TO CONTINUE: Council Member Schneider moved, seconded by Ojakian, to continue the item to the December 14, 1998, City Council Meeting. MOTION TO CONTINUE PASSED 6-0, Huber "not participating," Fazzino, Kniss absent. 13. Council Comments, Questions, and Announcements Mayor Rosenbaum noted on Wednesday, December 9,1998, on Channel 6,
Mike Cobb=s show would feature an interview with Mary Jean Place, President of the Friends of the Library. Her topic was "What Makes a Good Library Commissioner." Council Member Wheeler reminded her colleagues of the Special City Council Closed Session scheduled for December 9, 1998, at 6 p.m. ADJOURNMENT: The meeting adjourned at 9:40 p.m. ATTEST: APPROVED: 12/08/98 87-375
City Clerk Mayor NOTE: Sense minutes (synopsis) are prepared in accordance with Palo Alto Municipal Code Sections 2.04.180(a) and (b). The City Council and Standing Committee meeting tapes are made solely for the purpose of facilitating the preparation of the minutes of the meetings. City Council and Standing Committee meeting tapes are recycled 90 days from the date of the meeting. The tapes are available for members of the public to listen to during regular office hours.
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