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Staff Report 224-08
TO: City of Palo Alto City Manager’s Report HONORABLE CITY COUNCIL 8 FROM: DATE: SUBJECT: CITY MANAGER DEPARTMENT: PLANNING AND COMUNITY ENVIRONMENT MAY 5, 2008 CMR: 224:08 APPROVAL OF A CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT AND A RECORD OF LAND USE ACTION TO ALLOW BEER AND WINE SERVICE, AND LATE NIGHT BUSINESS ACTIVITIES FOR THE "RAMEN CLUB" RESTAURANT AT 3924 EL CAMINO REAL RECOMMENDATION Staff and the Planning and Transportation Commission (P&TC) recommend that the City Council (Council) approve the attached Record of Land Use Action approving the Conditional Use Permit (CUP) as modified to further restrict hours of beer and wine service and onsite customer parking, based upon the findings and conditions of approval in the Record of Land Use Action (RLUA). BACKGROUND The applicant, John Y Chen, applied for a Conditional Use Permit (CUP) to allow beer and wine service and late night business activities for the "Ramen Club" Restaurant at 3924 E1 Camino Real. On February. 26, 2008, the Director of Planning and Community Environment tentatively approved the CUP request, based on the required findings pursuant to Palo Alto Municipal Code, Chapter 18.76 (Permits and Approvals). Within the prescribed timeframe, on March 5, 2008, a neighbor requested a hearing, which was scheduled for the P&TC. The tentative approval of the CUP allowed the requested hours of operation until 2:00 AM, including the ability to serve wine and beer as part of a new Japanese noodle house to be called "The Ramen Club." The restaurant would use the existing facilities, previously occupied by Quizno’s, with minimal physical changes including interior decorations and the installation of a hood in the kitchen area for cooking purposes. During staff’s meeting with neighbors prior to the P&TC meeting, the applicant noted his willingness to explore solutions to neighbor concerns including reducing hours of beer and wine service and limiting late night access through the parking !ot. Further discussion was held with the neighbors about broader issues in the area and problems with adjacent businesses and the private alley that runs behind the subject property, all CMR: 224:08 Page 1 of 3 of which is summarized in the P&TC Staff Report (Attachment B) and P&TC minutes (Attachment C). The proposed plan set is included as Attachment D, for Council only. Section 18.77.060 of the Palo Alto Municipal Code (PAMC) provides for a Council "call up" review of CUP applications that have been reviewed by the P&TC. Instead of the project automatically being heard by Council, the recommendation of the P&TC is placed on the consent calendar of the City Council within 30 days of the P&TC’s review. In the case of Conditional Use applications, a minimum of three Council Member votes are required to remove the project from the consent calendar and schedule it for a subsequent City- Council meeting. Otherwise, the recommendation of the P&TC stands and no hearing is held. If the Council votes to hear the item, a hearing shall be scheduled as soon as practicable. COMMISSION REVIEW AND RECOMMENDATIONS On April 9, 2008, the P&TC reviewed the project and unanimously recommended that the City Council uphold the Director of Planning and Community Environment’s decision to approve the application pursuant to PAMC Section 8.76.030, subject to additional conditions. Five members of the public spoke on this item at the P&TC hearing. All spoke to existing noise, illegal dumping, and other nuisances in the alley behind the property. The neighbors and the applicant presented a compromise during the P&TC meeting that would limit business hours to no later than 11:00 PM an-d~would end alcohol and food service at the same time. Most spoke in support of the compromise, as agreed to by the applicant. The P&TC included the limitations as conditions of approval (Conditions 4 and 6 in the proposed RLUA). Correspondence received prior to the P&TC meeting was attached to the P&TC staff report. Additional changes recommended by the P&TC include: 1. A condition of approval (Condition 8) to require that the business operator post signage inside and outside the building to instruct customers to respect the business’s location near residences 2.A condition of approval (Condition 9) to limit the use of the dumpsters on the property to no later than half an hour after closing. RESOURCE IMPACTS The approval of the modified CUP by Council would not result in any cost and/or revenue impacts to the City. All development review costs have been recovered through permit fees. POLICY IMPLICATIONS The proposed use, as conditioned, is consistent with the Comprehensive Plan in that the business wil! serve local residents as specified in the Neighborhood Commercial designation. ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW The project is categorically exempt from the provisions of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). CMR: 224:08 Page 2 of 3 PREPARED BY: DEPARTMENT HEAD: A~SN I~g~ER CUTLER -~/Assoct.ate Planner ~~~)t~~d Communl~ Environment CITY MANAGER APPROVAL: STEVE EMSLIE/KELLY MORARIU Depu~ Ci~ Managers ATTACHMENTS A. Record of Land Use Action B. Planning and Transportation Commission Staff Report of April 9, 2008 (w/o attach) C. Excerpt of the Draft Planning & Transportation Commission Minutes of April 9, 2008 D. Project Plans, receivedJanuary 18, 2008 COURTESY COPIES John Y Chen, Applicant 3924 E1 Camino Real, LLC, Owner Bob Cool, Neighbor Gloria Sikora, Neighbor CMR: 224:08 Page 3 of 3 ATTACHMENT A APPROVAL NO. 2008-05 RECORD OF THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PALO ALTO LAND USE APPROVAL FOR 3924 EL CAMINO REAL: CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT 08PLN-000!7 (John Y Chen, APPLICANT) On May 5, 2008, the Counci! approved the Conditiona! Use Permit to allow beer and wine service and late night business activities for a new restaurant "Ramen Club", making the following findings, determination and declarations: S~CmT©N i ~-~ .....The=~g:oune.City of the City of...._ %OunCm~___ ~_=~,~i~y Cou~c=~’’±~ )::::as,~" determines, and aec_ares as fo~±~w~: A On January ~8, 2008 John v Chen amo!ied on b-~a~-- of ~m~ Real ar_c3924 ~ C ........., LLC to allow beer -~ ~,.,~= ~e-~;~~ ~ " <~c:~ b~<e~s activities unt~ 2:00=..~ for a new restaurant "Ramen C~=u~m ....( The=:o jeer") . B. The project was deemed complete ~n February 12, 2008. A ~entative Director’s Decision was prepared aoDrovinm the conditional use pe-~i~.~_~ on February 26, 2008. ~_~’ hearing before the m]~n~i~c & Transportation Commission ("PTC") was remues:ed on Harch 5, 2008. The PTC held a public hearing on Aoril 9, 2008 to co~de~ the appeal T~e PTC voted to recommend -~ ...... ] of ~e conc~ona~ use permi~ an~ 50 up~o=d ~he Director s decision. ~- "~ .-’Th=project ~sSmux!O~ 2 Environmental Kev~ew .....’ categorically exempt from the provisions of the California Environmenza! Qua!iZy Ac: (CEQA) . SECTION 3.Conditiona! Use Permit Findinqs i. The proposed use, at the proposed !ocation, wil! not be detrimental or injurious to property or improvements in the vicinity, and will not be detrimental to the public health, welfare, or convenience, in that; The project conforms to this finding in the following manner: the proposed eating seL~vice establishment will meet all curren: zoning requirements. The business wil! be located within an existing building; and ~he use which includes alcoholic beverage service, will be accessory to the full service restaurant operation. 2. The proposed use will be iocaZed and co~_aucceG in a manner in accord with the Palo Alto Commrehensi ve P!an and the purposes of the Zoning Ordinance, in that: The project conforms to this finding in the fo!lowing manner: the subject property is located in an area designated as Neighborhood Co.~merciai, as indicated on the Comprehensive Plan Land Use an@ Circulation Map. ~=~±ng and drinking services are an allowed use in the CN zoning ~ : --and~es±gn~ion =~-= consistent wi:}0 the current us~ designa:ion and the pertinent elements of the Pa!o Alto Comprehensive Plan. There are no restrictions in establishing this use within the existing building. ~=C±ION<~ ~ 4.Conditional Use Permi~ Granted. Conditional ~e Permit No is granted :o ~llow ~ooe, beer, an~ w~ne service until ]~ 00 mM for a new restaurant "~ .... C!ub" SECTION 5.Conditions of Approval. Department of Planning & Community Enviror~ment Planning Division The use shall be conducted in substantial conformance with :he projec: descrip:ion !e::er received on January 18, 2008 that is on file with the City of Pa!o Alto Planning Division. The serving of alcoholic beverages shall only be allowed in conjuncnion winh the operanion o÷ a bona-fide restaurant. A ful! service menu shal! be available at any point ~n~ alcoho! service is prov!eee. This permit does not allow any operations associated with a nightclub-type ~se. 3.T~e _ =~ ~___oD~o~ shal! keep the subject ~ro~ercy free of litter associated with ~he restaurant o~eration. 4.Hours of omeration: The permitted hours of operation shall be from !i:00am-!!:00pm. There sha~ ’ = live or _=~ m~ no amo]ified music played on site without an -~r ....~ amendment to t~oi~ conditional us= permit or a temporary use permit. 6.Hours of beer and wine service: The permit:ed hours of beer and wine service sha!l be from l!:00am-!l:00pm. 7.Hours of customer parking onsite: The permitted hours of customer parking onsite shal! be from !l:00am-!0:00pm. At ~’-k n ~ only_~0:00pm_ un~ ;°ar~ng .........lot use s ,a]! be restricted emoToyee andaes2@enL- ’ ~ ~ oark~ng shall be allowed The business operator sna_! submit a plan for signage to educate matrons that t~e use of r =r~-- on7y p_op~_~y i~permitted under certain conditions, particularly wizh respect for ~he surrounding business a._@ res~c~nL~a~ neighborhood The plan shall direct patrons to reduce noise in the parking ~n@ along Cypress mane, to e!zmznate litter vandalism, and to be respectful of property and residents in the adjacent residential neighborhood. The plan shall include wording for signs on the inzerior and exterior of :he building. The plan shall be reviewed and approved by both the Police Department and the Planning Manager. The p!an shall be submitted no ~ ’-=a~er than !5 days azter the issuance of this use permiZ (May !9, 2008) and implemented zmm=c:=~u±~.., upon =pprov=z unless otherwise spec4~ed. Trash and recycling disposa! and other use of the dumpster behind the muszness sn~±! be zzmz~ee to no later than half an hour aftgr the end of business. i0 ~ : use _ ’_~ app±zc~m±e City codes,¯ ±n_~s shall comply wzzh a7 ~- ’ -~ including Titles 9 (Public Peace, Morals and Safety) and 15 (Fire Prevention/Uniform Fire Code) of ~n~ Pa!o Alto ......Mu~c~ma~_ ..... Code and ~:,~,e~:’~ (Alcoholic Regulations) and !9 (Public Safety) of ~he State of ~alilornia AGminiszrative Code. i!. The consummtion of alcoholic beverage under :his use -~m4~ shall be deemed an agreement on the part of ~= applicant, their ~eir~ Successors and assigns to com~]y wi~ al~ ~-rms and conditions of this ~" ~.__ conGzz_onai use permit. 12.Revocation or Modification of Approvals: The director may issue a notice of noncompliance for any failure to comply with any condition of this permit approval, or when a use conducted pursuant to a conditiona! use mermit is being conducted in a manner detrimental to the public hea!~h, and welfare. 13.A copy o~ this approval letter shall be printed on the cover sheet of any ~!ans submitted for building permit(s). Public Works Engineering 14. STREET TREE: The app!ican~ is required Zo contact Public 3 Works arborist at 650-496-5953 to arrange a site visit so the arborist can determine i{ the empty tree well in the front sidewalk should have a street tree installed, if he determines a tree snou_e be installed then the site plan submitted with the building permit plan set must show the street tree work ~_a~ the arborist has determined, including r~=~__~ tree ~_~±~,~=~ size, staking, grate, a~d._ ’ ’ ’ r~ ~-~ ~ The Dlan must note t~at in orderirr!gaLlon _~qu~=em==.~s ....____ to do street tree work, the applicant must firs: obtain a Permit for Street Tree Work in the Public Right-of-Way from sum!±c Works arborist. ±r the arborist determines a ~ree is not required, then the s±ee~!m must be pazche@. include a note on the mu±!permit o!an se~ that this work mus~ be done per Public Works standards and the contractor performing the work must first obtain a Permit for Construction in the Public Street from Public Works at :he Development Center. Public Works Water Quality i5.Pr-"_<~C !6. 09.106(e) Dummsters for New and Remodeled ~-~;~=_~7~ties - .N=w~ dummster_ areas -..~<~a~__~ be covered. ~_,~:= area shall be designed to prevent water run-on to the area and run-off from the area. i~. AQffC i6 09 - Newly cons~ruc~e@ or improved mu!!dings a!~ or a portion of the space with undes’~n " ~ ~~_iG:_aLeQ uenants or ~uuure use wi!7 neee co meet all ~ ~i~___ r~qu_.e ......s ~nat would have been amm!icab!e ~"-’~____~ur~:g design and construction. such undesignated retai~ space becomes a food .... { ~- facility 5he following requirements must be met: !7.i%~6C Section !6.09.i03(a) Grease Control Devices for Food Service Facilities - ~ g~=~= control d~v_~= (GCD) shall be installed with a minimum capacity of 750 gallons. The GCD must be sized in accordance with the 2007 California .... ~n calculation must m= submittedPlumbing Code. The s~z-~_g ~ ~ with the plans. Al! grease generating drainage fixtures shall be connected to the GCD. The connection of any dishwashers to a GCm is prohibited. All large, ~n-groun@ interceptors shall have manholes to allow visibility of each inlet piping, baffle (divider) piping and outlet piping to ensure accessibility for inspection, cleaning o~ne removal of all contents. 18.P~tfC !6.09.032b(!6) Covered Dumpsters for Food Service Facilities - After January !, 1996, new buildings constructed to house food service facilities shall include a covere@ area for a cumpsuer. The area sha!7 be designed to ~’---~--~~J:~,~_~ water _r~n-o.n__. to the area =n@ runoz_- zrom t]h~-_~ area. Drains ~hat are insza!led beneath dumps~ers serving food =~--~ce facilitiess~:v~ , shall be connected to a grease ,_~mo,~_~ device. T!le area sn~!l include room for all :a!!ow bins. P~{C !6.09.!03(e) Prohibition Agains~ Garbage Disposals The insZa!!ation of a garbage grinder at any food service facility is prohibited afzer January !, 2003. The kitchen canno~ utilize a garbage grinder for food waste disoosa! ~o uhe sewer. 20.PgS~fC i6.09. 032b(’16) Large i~em Cleaning Sink for Food S~:c~ ma~{7{ties Food service facilities shall nave a sink or oZher area for cleaning f!oor mats, containers, and emuimment~ _ , which is connected to a m~=a~=o_~ ~ ~ntercep~or ~ne t~ anit _~ s ary sewer. Fire Department Utilities - Electrical Engineering " -~ ] ~--<not Utilities EnGineer!ng22A~!ican~/De~e_o~ must i{~’’ <Electric) if the proposed renovation/change of use has .... ~ £mpac: on the existing electrical service ~ize, vo!tage, or ioca~ion. ~ .... ~nere are a~v_.~ changes, ~ne’ " Uti!i:ies will mrovide commenzs and/cr condi:ions along wi~h any applicab~==~ _~e~_ and cost estimate. Utilities - Water, Gas & Wastewater PRIOR TO SUBHiTT~.L FOR BUILDING PERMIT ~~ ’~ ~,-z~=~ ao©Tlcant ~a]] submit a com~e~=4 wa~e~-cas was:ewa:=~- ~ervice connection app!~cation - load ~.~=~ zor City of Pa!o Alto Utilities. The am~!icant must provide al! ~he information_ _. recu~s~ee ...... for utility_ service’ @ema._@s~ n" . 24.The applicant shall submit improvement plans ~or utility construction. The plans mus~ show the size and location of all new and existing underground utilities within the development and the public right of way including meters, backfiow preventers, fire service requirements, sewer mai~~ .....other~= c]eanouts, sewer ]i=~ stations ~,~ ~ any . u~=:=@ utilities. 25. Sewe drainage ~:~.g serving ÷~xtu~es ]ocate~ be!ow 5 nex~ unsnream sewer main manhole cover shall be protected by an approved backwater valve per California_ .nT=um~ng .~ ~ Code 710.0. The upstream sewer main manhole rim elevation shall be shown on the plans. .....~RTOR TO lq~~~uz~ OF BUILDING PERMIT 26. For contractor installed water and wastewater mains or services, tke__ amm]icant;: ..... s}~a]] suDm!~~ ’~ to tke__ WGW enqineering section of :__e Utilities Department four cooies_ of the_ . installation__ of .’~=~: and wastewater .... 7ities off-site immrovement plans in accordance the uci!i~ies eep~r~me;;~ d~s_g:; criteria. ~_:~ utility work ~i~hzn ._ mub!ic of way "- ~c _ ~~, t’ : tke right- -_ sh~!: be !ear!y sno~;; on :he plans that are prepared, signed and stamped by a registered civil =nGimee<- The contractor ~ha]] also submit a complete schedule of work, method of construction manufacture’s literature on the materials to be used for approval by the utilities enqineering section. !he a~D!{~’s contractor will not m= a±±owe@ to begin work ....u~-:~o the improvement p!an and other su~miEza_s ~ave been ao~roved ..........by t~= wa~=-~, gas and wastewa~er =ng~ne=r=ng- ’ section. 2~ . Existing. was, .......~e~= laterals that are not plastic (ABS, PVC or OE~ shall be replaced at the -~R-,~.~.!icant’s expense. 28.The applicant shall pay :he capacity fees and connection fees associated with the installation of :he new utility service/s to be installed by :he City of Pa!o Alto ;TZ:~{+ies The approved relocatip.~ of services, me:ers hydrants, or other facilities will be merformed at the cost of the person!entity remuesting the relocation. 29.Each unit or place of business shal! have its own water ~nc gas meter shown on :~e plans. 30.A separate water meter and backf!ow preventer shal! be installed to the approved landscape p!an. Show the ~ ~-~.=o~ .....~ of t~e irrigation meter on :he plans. " - s"~’~’~ -~ion a~count an nometer s~a±:be designated as an ....g=~~__ other water service will be billed on the account.The ir-~igation ane landscape plans subm=~e with the sna!=app!ica<ion for a grading or building permit ~ -~ conform :o ~he City of Pa!o Alto water e~{ciency standards. 31.An approved reduce pressure principle assembly (RPPA backf!ow mreventer device) shall be installed for all existing and new water connections from ~aio Alto U:i!ities to comply with requirements of California administrative code, title i7, sections 7583 through 7605 inclusive. The RPPA shall be installed on the owner’s property and directly behind the water meter. Show the !oca~ion of the RPPA on ~he plans, inspection by the u~iliSies cross connection inspector is required for the su~!y ~i~e between the meter and the assembly. 32. An aonroved double detector check valve shall be installed for =he or new wa~er connections for the sys:em to com~!v winh re@uiremenrs of California -m~{<{-~-~-~-~= code, ~t~e !7 sections 7583 Zb:-ouc:n 7605 inc!us~ve. Doumie check< eeZector c_~ec.< valves sha~_ =_l be ip_sEa::~~ __ u~:= owner s s~De:~, ae3a to r}~= line. Show :he location of :he double detector check a~=mb~’,, on ~me mlans !n~meot~on by t’~e u=i!i:ies cross connecZion inspec:or ~s recu~ree for zne =um~=. pipe ~=~.a:~.m-~:;-=n ~ne" City connecZion ~e-~ " the assembly_. ~~’~N exist:water ~nd ’==_~ng ___wastewater services ~ w~l~ not be reused sha!]be m " "___a~an@one@ a~ the main per WGW Uti]ties procedures. 34 A!_ u~ility i~ta~!ations shall be i< accoreance wz~._ the City of Pa!o A!zo U~~itv s,~andares for wazer, gas & SECTION 6.Term of Approval. if Zhe Conditional Use Permi~ granted is noz used within one year of the date of council approval, i: shall become nu!l and void, mursuant Municipal Code Section !8.77.090(a) . PASSED: AYE S : ABSENT: ATTESTS:>mmROVED: City Clerk ~mmROVED AS TO FORM: Director of~=~’anning and Community Environment Senior Ass:. City Atzorney sHO0~CT DESCR!s~ON REFERENCED: i.The ~r ~__ ~ ....C~~,’ ing of~_o_~ect description prepared by jo~n Y .....cons!st one page, dated January 16, 2008 and received January ~8, 2008. ATTACHMENT PLANNING & TRANSPORTATION DIVISION STAFF REPORT TO: FROM: AGENDA DATE: SUBJECT: PLANN~:G & T}L~NSPORTATION COMMISSION Jennifer Cutler Associate Planner DEPARTMENT:P]anning and CommuniD; Environment April 9, 2008 3924 El Camino Real [08PLN-000171: Review of and recommendation to the Ci~,’ Council on a Conditional Use Permit and Record of Land Use Aqtion to allow beer and wine service and late night business activities until 2:00 AM for a new restaurant "Ramen Club". Environmental Assessment: Exempt from the provisions of CEQA. Zone District: CN. RECOMMENDATION: Staff recommends that the Planning and Transportation Commission (P&TC) recommend that the Cib; Council (Council) approve a record of Land Use Action approving the Conditional Use Permit as modified to further restrict hours of beer an wine service and onsite customer parking, to allow the establishment of a new restaurant "Ramen Ctub" open after 10:00 PM seven days per week., based upon the findings and conditions of approval in the Record of Land Use Action (Attachment A). BACKGROLi D A conditional use pem~it application was received on JanuaU 18, 2008 and tentatively approved by the Planning Manager, on behalf of the Director of Planning and Communib.’ Environment, on February 26, 2008. On March 5, 2008.. within the request for hearing period, a request for hearing was made. No comments flom the public were received during the 2]-day comment period after the receipt of application. Concerns and a request for this hearing were received after the tentative approval was published and are summarized below and included as Attachment D. Subsequent to the hearing request the planning manager conducted a meeting on March 10, 2008, with the applicant and neighbors to better understand the issues and concerns and to taT to find solutions to these various issues. It appears to staff that the issues are beyond the scope of this application. City of Palo Alto Page 1 Project Description The conditional use permit application requests extended hours until 2:00 AM, and the abilib; to serve wine and beer as part of a new Japanese noodle house to be called "The Ramen Club." The restaurant would use the existing facilities, previously occupied by Quizno’s, with no physical changes except for interior decorations and the installation of a hood in the kitchen area for cooking put-poses. The applicant’s description of the business is a location where busy workers, nearby residents, and late night studying students could enjoy a warm meal. During staffs recent meeting with neighbors the applicant noted their willingness to explore solutions including reducing hours of beer and wine service and limiting late night access through the parking lot. SI_ MMARY OF LAND USE ACTION: Background information related to the project’s details and history has been included within the Record of Land Use Action, which contains findings and conditions of approval. The action required of the Planning and Transportation Commission (Commission) is a recommendation on the Conditional Use Permit. The Conditional Use Permit is required as follows: The fol!owing regulations restrict bnsinesses that operate or have associated activities at any time between the hours of 10:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m., where such site abuts or is located within 50 feet of residentially zoned properties. (1) Such businesses shall be operated in a manner to protect residential properties flom excessive noise, odors, lighting or other nuisances flom any sources during those hours. (2)For properties located in the CN or CS zone districts, businesses that operate or have associated activities at any time between the hours of !0:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. shall be required to obtain a conditional nse per:nit. The director may apply conditions of approval as are deemed necessary to assure that the operations or activities are compatible with the nearby residentially zoned property. (Palo Alto Municipal Code (PAMC) Section 1S. 16.040(b)) Procedure for review by the Commission upon request for hearing is as follows: Hearing and Recommendation (Upon Request) by the Planning and Transportation Commission (1) Within 45 days following the filing of a timely hearing request of a proposed director’s decision or rex ised proposed director’s decision the planning and transportation commission shall hold a hearing on the application, unless the request is withdrawn as described above. (2) Notice of the revised director’s decision shall be given by mail to owners and residents of property within 600 feet of the property, by publication, by e-mail, and by posting in a public place. Notice shall include the address of the properb..’, a brief description of the proposed project, and the date, time and location of the hearing. (3)Follox~ ing the hearing, the planning and transportation con~nission shall make a recommendation on the application, which shall be forwarded to the city council. (Palo Alto Municipal Code (P.~MC) Section IS.VT.0d0(e)) City of Palo Alto Page 2 Procedure for review by the Council upon recommendation from the Commission is as follows: The recommendation of the planning and transportation commission on the application shall be placed on the consent calendar of the council within 30 days. The council may: (1) Adopt the findings and recommendation of the planning and transportation commission; or (2) Remo~ e the recommendation from the consent calendar, which shall require three votes, and: (A) Discuss the application and adopt findings and take action on the application based upon the evidence presented at the hearing of the planning and transportation commission; or (B) Direct that the application be set for a nexx hearing before the city council. following which the city council shall adopt findings and take action on the application. (Palo Alto Municipal Code (PAMC) Section 18.77.060(f)) SI. MMARY OF KEY ISSUES: Standards of Review The draft Record of Land Use Action, upholding the Director’s approval (Attachment A), includes a determination that the p.roposed conditional use permit meets all requirements of the Cib;’s Municipal Code and Comprehensive Plan. The following findings must be met to grant the conditional use permit. Staffbelieves that both findings can be made and each is discussed below: The project, as conditioned, conforms to this finding in the following manner: the proposed eating service establishment will meet at1 current zoning requirements. The business will be located within an existing building; and the use which includes alcoholic beverage service, will be accessory to the full service restaurant operation. The sale of alcoholic beverages will not be conducted in a manner that will be injurious to propm~, or improvements in the vicini~ or detrimental to the public health, safegv, and general welfare, or convenience. Conditions would limit late night impacts to neighbors. 2.The proposed use will be located and conducted in a mamter in accord wid~ the Palo Al~o Comprehensive Plan a~d d~e purposes of the ZoM~g Ordinance. The project conforms to this finding in the following manner: the subject proper%; is located in an area designated as ./YeighboH, ood Commercial, as indicated on the Comprehensive Plan Land Use and Circulation Map. Eating and drinking smwices are an allowed use in the CN zoning designation and are consistent with the current land use designation and the pertinent elements of the Palo Alto Comprehensive Plan. As conditioned, the use is restricted in the service of beer and wine and late night parking for customers. Neighbor Concerns The concerns expressed by the residential neighbors to this project include the impacts resulting City of Palo Alto Page 3 from the late night activity and the beer and wine service, as well as concerns about larger issues caused by the use of the alley, Cypress Lane, by customers of both the Ramen Club and the adjacent Happy Donuts, which is open 24-hours. The twelve emails received, two of which include requests for this public hearing, are included as Attachment D. Hours of Operation and Alcohol Service The concerns expressed by the neighbors stem from either the beer and wine service or the late night activities. Concerns stated in writing suggest that the restaurant should not be open later than 1 lpm. In the March 10, 2008, meeting the discussion focused more on the limitation of the hours that beer and wine would be served and the hours of access to the alley, and particularly, existing conditions related to the alley and its use by Happy Donuts customers. Concerns about the beer and wine service were connected with historical problems in the area \vith other businesses serving liquor and resulting violence, noise, and police activib:, as wells as the cunent existence oft\\ o liquor stores in the vicinity; of the site. Noise Neighbors are concerned about loud music in connection with this late night use. Questions were expressed about whether loud music would be part of the new business, and whether the late night use would result in noise disturbance from car stereos in the parking lot, as reportedly occurs at the Happy Donuts parking lot. An additional source of noise is the loud banging ~hat results fiom customers driX~ing over a broken water meter cover in the alley behind the building at 3886-3898 t~l Camino Real. Additional infom~ation about the context of this property was provided by the neighbors’ comments, including descriptions of the state of the private alley, Cypress Lane, that runs along the rear of the prope~V,.~ and adjacent to the rear tot lines of residential properties on La Selva Drive. The state of the alley as private land partially owned by the commercial properties, and partially owned by an unknown heir to the original Barron estate, has resulted in virtually no maintenance of the alley. Parl,tin~ Concerns were also expressed about the limited amount of parking spaces available for the use, and the potential for parking on Cypress Lane and within the neighborhood. In the March 10, 2008, meeting staff raised the possibitit?’ of designating a segment of short terns, 20-minute, parking along E1 Camino Real directly in front of the building for take-out customers. This proposal could be implemented on a trial basis, designed to reduce the number of customers parking on-site and exiting the site via the alley. Permanent implementation of this parking solution would require approx al by, Caltrans and Cib,~ Council. Smffhas added conditions of approval 6 and 7 to alleviate the concerns of most of the neighbors in regards to this project. The conditions would have the hours for serving beer and wine end at 9:30 PM and limit access to the parking lot and alley after 10:00 PM. The applicant expressed acceptance of such conditions at the March 10, 2008, meeting Use of the Alley City of Palo Alto Page 4 The existing neighborhood issues center around the maintenance of the alley and the nuisances caused by late night acfivW. Staff met with representatives from Police, Fire, Public Works; Transportation: Code Enforcement, and the Attorney’s office to discuss the issues and potential solutions, includin- workin~ wifl~ existin~ businesses and installation of signs limitim, use office alley after 10:00 PM. The Happ) Donuts business was pem~itted prior to the requirement of a conditional use permit lbr late night activitT within 50 feet of residential property. In the year 2007 the police received 59 complaints related to the propelS, due to excessive noise or other disturbances caused by patrons. This number of complaints and the resulting police response has a significant resource impact that should be addressed. Staff also discussed the concern about the broken water meter over in the alley adjacent to another properb’. The Utilities Department has agreed to go out and look at the broken water meter cover to assess what needs to be done. The requirement by the Fire Department for use of the alley way is very limited. Currently they can access al! buildings on E1 Camino Real sufficiently without the use of the alley, though a short fire easement for a small section of the end of the alley would be needed if the Happy Donuts: parking lot xxere to be closed offto the a!lev after 10:00 PM. Additional research is neF~ted to determine existing easements and feasibility of changes on the sites accessing the alley, and to assess the feasibiliB’ of restricting the use of the alley to maintenance, utilib: and emergency access. These uses, however, \xi!l not be materially affected b\ the applicant’s proposal. POLICY IMPLICATIONS: The proposed project is consistent with the Comprehensive Plan and staff believes there are no other substantive policy implications. TIME LINE: Application Received: Application Deemed Complete: Tentative Approval: Hearing Requested: End of Hearing Request Period: Date: JanumT 18, 2008 FebrumT 12, 2008 FebruaW 26, 2008 March 5, 2008 March 11:2008 ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW: The project is categorically exempt from the provisions of the California Environmental Quali~, Act (CEQA). ATTA C HMENTS: A.Draft Record of Land Use Action B.Location Map C.Project Description City of Palo Alto Page 5 Tentative Approval Letter Request for Hearing Correspondence Project Plans (Commissioners’ only) COURTESY COPIES: John Y Chen, Applicant 3924 El Camino Real, LLC, Owner Bob Cool, Neighbor Gloria Sikora, Neighbor Prepared by:Jennifer Cutler, Associate Planner Reviexx ed by: Amy French, Manager of Current Planning Department/Division Head Approval: Curtis ~,~illiams, Assistant Director City of Palo Alto Page 6 Attachment C 1 2 3 6 7 !0 12 14 i5 16 17 24 25 ’)7 ~9 32 36 39 40 41 42 45 46 Planning and Transportation Commission Verbatim Minutes April 9, 2008 DRAFT EXCERPT 3924 El Camino Real’~’: [0SPLN-00017]: Review of and recommendation to the City Council on a Conditional Use Permit and Record of Land Use Action to allow beer and wine service and late night business activities until 2:00 ,<\,i for a new restaurant "Ramen Club". Envirom~-~ental Assessment: Exempt from the provisions of CEQA. Zone District: CN. ),,"is. ,lennifer Cutler. Associate Plarmer: Good evening Commissioners. This project involves a Conditional Use Pem~it t’or a new restaurant called The Ramen Club at 3924 E1 Camino Real. The restaurant will be a sma!l noodle house as described in the project description letter and menu attached to the item’s Staff Report. The building previously used for Quizno’s requires o13I?; miF~or interior decorative changes and a new hood in the kitchen. No other physical changes are proposed. The Conditional Use Pern-~it is required for two distinct items. The first item is beer and wine service. Currently the proposed conditions limit this to end at 9:30 PM and the applicant has agreed to this condition. The second element that requires a Conditional Use Permit is the request for late night hours within 50 feet of residential properties. There is a proposed condition, which restricts the parking access to the alley behind the property that is between the property and the residential after 10:00 PM. The applicant has agreed to that as well. The application was submitted January t 8, 2008. No comments were received during the 21-day public comment period and so a tentative approx al letter was mailed on February 26, 2008. Numerous comments were received between March 5 and March 1 ! during the 14-day request .~b,c hearing period. This included two specific requests for public hearing,, which brings us here today. Staff held a meeting with some of the interested neighbors on March 10 to better understand their issues and concerns. These focused on the noise and other nuisances in the alley at night that are currently going on and concerns that this would be increased by this use. At the end of the meeting all but one of the neighbors attending seemed willing to forego the public hearing if the approval was conditioned on the 9:30 PM end time for beer and wine, and blocking off of the part,:ing lot to prevent traffic at the same time. Both of these conditions are currently proposed in this evening’s StaffRepo~-t. Based on this feedback Staff recommends that the Commission recommend approval with the proposed conditions. Tlqe remaining neighbor was concen~ed about the larger issues and al! of the neighbors were but specifically concerned that we come to this public meeting to discuss some of these larger issues. They center around the use of the private alley called C)gress Lane and the use of the Happy Donuts property which is adjacent to 3924 E1 Camino Real. These issues are beyond the scope of the Conditional Use Permit but Staff feels that this is a valuable opportunity to discuss them. Page 1 l 0 7 10 13 10 ~0 30 _31 32 36 ~0 As a result of this neighbor meetin~ Staff held a meeting with representatives fiom Fire, Police, Transportation, Public Works. and the Attorney’s Office to discuss these larger issues. Further discussion was also held with Code Enforcement, Utilities and the Real Property Division of the Administrative Services. As a result of these discussions the Utility Department has agreed to go out and look a broken water meter to assess what must be done. This was one of the major noise issues with cars driving tl-nough the alley. Staff has also scheduled a meeting with the owner and mal~agelS of Happy Donuts. That meeting was held on April 1 with staff Kom Planning, Transportation, and Code Enforcement. The Happy Donuts managers’ experience is that college students who use the donut shop late at night are very quiet and want to study. It seems that it is high school students that are noisy and hang out in the rear of the parking lot causing the problems. For this reason the manager was more than happy to try and find some solutions to these problems. The owner has a~eed to install additional lighting in the rear of the property as well as signage to discourage loitering or label the area as a quiet neighborhood or something similar since this would help their business as well. Staff has also suggested that we might request an increase of police presence in the area on a few Friday or Saturday nights to try and discourage the students fiom con~-e~ating in the location. In addition the owner has a~eed to look into installing a tl~ee or four foot wall alon~ part of the rear property line to delineate the edge of the property though not restricting access to the alley. It is hoped that the combination of the lighting~ sig.nage~ and increase in police presence as well as the wall should reduce the nuisance caused by the loudnoise near to the residential neighbors. Staff has put responses to the written questions from Commissioners at places and the applicant ’,\as here earlier to make a presentation. I believe he had to go pick up his kids but his sister is here to speak on his behalf. If you have questions I am here. Chair Holman Any clari~’ing questions for Staff? Mr. Larkin: If I could make a real quick comment. There is a lot of information about Happy Donuts is provided by way of background. The Commission understands this Conditional Use Permit if for the noodle restaurant it is not for Happy Donuts. So it is important to lca~ow what is going on because you can consider whether or not the addition of the noodle house would exacerbate and create conditions to prevent the noodle house from exacerbating any existing condition but probably can’t work by any change to the existing condition. However. those things are going on. Chair Holman’ There are ligtnts flom Keller and Fineberg. Are these literally clari~,ing questions? Commissioner Keller. Commissioner Keller: Yes, the first clari~,ing question is I just want to make sure that your comment about a wall at the back oftlne property referred to Happy Donuts and not to the subject p -opet-t v.., Ms. Cutler: Correct. Page 2 2 3 20 23 2~ ~ Q 32 34 3S 36 39 40 42 43 46 Col.qmlss~oner Keller: The second question is in response to the questions of somebody flom April 9, t’or 5-b it says give that Happy Donuts has angled part,:ing do you mean Happy, Donuts there or do you mean the sub,ject propel-ty? R!ls. C’utler: I believe that both properties do ha\e angled parking. Commissioner l,Celler: So which were you refening to there? Chair Holman: That was my question and I was refer~-ing to Happy Donuts because there was talk about limiting the use of the alleyway. I know we are not talking about Happy Donuts but there was talk in the StatTReport about limiting that use and Happy Donuts’ parking points you to go out the alleyway. Commissioner lSeller: Okay. Is there sufficient space for the subject property for turning around? ! am riot sure there is. Cutler: No. there is not. Commissioner ICeller: Ol<ay, thanl,: you. C’hai~- Holn’,an Commissionei Finebe~-g and then Commissioner Lippe~u Oommissioner Fineber~: I am a bit contMsed by 3our description tonight and the statement in the StatTReport that there \~as the installation of a new hood in the t,:itchen area but no physical changes except for interior decoration. I went out today to the subject property and did the best I could to peek in the windows and what I saw was a new hood with an ansel system and I saw what looked like a gas range and deep tat fryer both of which are heavy duty cooking equipment that typically require permit. Quizno’s does not use a deep fat fryer in their menu so unless this ~as the only location that they had preexisting equipment that hadn’t been pulled out and their happened to be stub-ins, did they install this and was there a pent, it? .N,’Is. Cutler: I believe that the applicant, or the applicant’s sister who is here, could ans~ er that question. Chail Holman: \Ve \vii1 get to you ma’am. Commissioner Lippert you had a clarifying question? Commissioner Lippert: Yes. Has ownership of Cy~press Lane ever been detem~ined? N4s. Cutler: N~es, over the years there has been a lot of discussion of this issue. The understanding is that half of Cypress Lane actt ally belongs to the commercial properties and the other half belongs to an unl<nown heir of the Barton Estate. Commissioner Lippert: Okay. Chair Holman: City Attorney, would you care to clarify that? Page 3 1 4 5 7 9 10 I1 12 13 15 16 17 18 19 23 25 26 29 32 DD 35 39 40 4! 42 43 44 5It. I_arkin: I haven’t looked at the exact map but it is a very old subdivision. Typically the way the oxx nership interests goes when a property is subdivided like this is tlnat it is owned jointly by all of the members of the subdivision. So I don’t !~ow exactly how many units are in the subdivision but each unit has one share of ownership in that alley. We would have to go back and look at the actual subdivision map to determine how that ownership was done and if there is a map. Commissioner Eippert: Okay, but at least it has been determined that there is ownership in that. I remember reviewing this several times and nobody knew who owned what. ’~. Cutler: A title report was performed in 2002 and it did find that it is still owned by Jones or tlneir heirs and is what we have noted here. Connmissioner Lippert: Okay, and then with that I guess the alle)-,vay would be restricted after certain hours. How would the parl<ing lot be able to be used? \Vould cars pull in and then back out onto ~1 Camino Real’? I don’t think that is a safe condition. iX,is. Cutler: The proposed condition is actually that the parking lot be blocked off from use except by emp!oyees or the residential unit on ttnat property so after ten o’clock any customers would use the parking along ]El Camino Real. Commissioner LiL~l_~ert: Thank you. Chair Holman: Commissioner Sandas, you have a clarit3dng question? Commissioner Sandas: I do. l just wanted to clarif.v~ can you please tell me what the concessions were again that the owner had made in terms of stopping the sale of beer and wine at 5’is. Cutler: There \vere two conditions that are recommended that \vere not part of the original tentative approva!. They are that beer and v, ine would only be served until 9:30 PS/I and that a rope or similar would be placed across the parking lot to prevent entry and therefore use of the alley at ten o’clock. C’ommissioner Sandas: So there was no consideration for closing the restaurant when the parking lot was closed off and the beer and wine sales v,;ere stopping7 :\’Is. Cutler: That is not currently recommended by Staff due to the desire of the business owner to be able to be open to Stanford students studying late at night but that is up to you for your recommendation. Chair Holman: Ot,:ay. It doesn’t appear that I have a card fl-om the applicant. Page 4 1 6 1 () 13 16 17 19 ~3 ~6 ~9 30 3~ 3~ 3~ 36 37 38 39 g3 d ~ Mr. Larkin: A couple of reminders before you open the public hearing. I know there was one site visit. This is quasi-judicial so Commissioners should make disclosures prior to the public hearing. The second is under you process the appellant actually goes tSrst. Clnair Holman: This was a request for a hearing it is not really an appeal, right? Mr. Larkin: ~t is the same. The person requesting the hearing goes first. Ulqair Holman: J~lst tO try to speed things along here just a site visit if there is no interaction it does not need to be disclosed, conect? Mr. Larkin: Under the rules that the Commission adopted it does. Chair Holman: Okay, Commissioners, disclosures? We wit! just go down the line, Commissioner Fineberg. Commissioner Fineber~: I visited ttne site. I did not speak with the applicant or anyone on the p -o p e t y Chair Holman: Commissioner Keller. Commissioner Keller: I visited the site but did not speak with anybody. Chair Holman: Commissioner Gather. ;ce-Chmr Garber: I have not visited the site for this pmticular project but I am very familiar ,,xitlq it having gone to Happy Donuts before. Chair Holman: Commissioner Sandas. Commissioner Sandas: I visited the site and drove past by car. I did not stop or speak xxith anyone. Chair Holman: Commissioner Lippert. Uonqnnissioner Li~)>ert: I didn’t visit the site but I am familiar with the site because I reviewed it wlnen I was on the Architectural Review Board and have visited the site several times subsequently. Clnair Ho]man Commissioner Tuma. Commissioner Tuma: I live in the neighborhood, drive by the site every day, been to Happy Donuts a few hundred with my kids and visited Quizno’s, but I have not talked to the applicant in this context. Page 5 6 9 10 ii 14 16 19 20 22 2f 2~ 27 D- ~7 ~9 40 41 42 44 C!nair Holman: I did not visit the site on this particular occasion, as I am very familiar with the site for a number of reasons. Given that now have we decided Staff if we are going to treat this as an appellant or how are we going to do this? Mr. Larkin: Semantics aside it is an appeal. The amount of time that is given is at the discretion of tlne Chair, 15 is standard but it is 15 divided among all of the people appealing and that may not make sense. Chair Holman: I only have one card that indicates Appellant and I was going to question that. As Appellant I ha~e list Bob Sikora. So you will speak first and if you wish you can have 15 minutes and if don’t need it. So you are up first to be followed by the Applicant and I don;t seem to ha\e .... can you bring your card forward then? Thank you very much. *’it. Sikora. Mr. Bob Sikora. Ap~)ellant: Hello. I live on the street parallel to E1 Casino just behind the subject property, in the spirit of green, the last agenda item, there are only tbur copies for you to share. I am representing a group of residents some of them who were at the previous meeting on the topic and few others who were not able to make the meeting. I lnave a statement here that lists our concerns. We appreciate your consideration of our concerns and the Stafffs recommendation of restrictions to the proposed Conditional Use Permit to respond to these concerns, -We also appreciate that Mr. Chen is proposing the kind of establishment that the neighborhood will patronize and xxe want Mr. Chen as well as our commercial area in general to be successful. The preliminar) meeting on March 10 \~as our first invoh’ernent in the Conditional Use Permit process. The meeting was limited in time and not all concerns were fully presented. We realize that fine temps of this pennh will set precedent for future Conditional Use Pem~its. Since this meeting \\e have met as a group to prepare our concerns as a neighbofl~ood. This presentation xxiI1 detail our common concerns and recommendations for compatible business operations in our Neighborhood Commercial zone. We have two significant concerns with the permit as recommended, hours of operation and policy on the use of Cypress Lane, which we refer to as ~tlne alley.’ Number one, hours of operation, although the March 10 discussion i’ocused mostly on the hours of beer and wine service and alley access the hours of operation are of equal concern. Primary concerns regarding hours of operation are noise and other disturbance. Limiting the hours of alcohol service does not eliminate our concern for noise to the adjacent homes. The most significant problem with noise in the neighborhood is currently generated by Happy Donuts, which does not serve alcohol. The noise from Happy Donuts resuhs flom customers smoking, socializing, and playing music fiom car stereos outside the building. Police received 59 complaints in 2007 due to excessive noise or disturbance caused by patrons of Happy Donuts. The second item is compatibility with the neighborhood. The site is zoned Neighborhood Commercial, which defines it as serving the immediate neighborhood, and assuring maximum compatibility with surrounding residential area. Late night hours of operation would not serve the needs of out neighborhood. Patronage of the estabtist-~nent by the immediate neighborhood Page 6 7 9 I0 1} i4 17 19 ~0 -D 3~ 35 37 40 41 42 43 44 45 would likely cease by ten to eleven at night. The norm for all other restamants in the area is to close at or before eleven o’clock. Happy, Donuts’ hours are an exception that we do not support. These extended hours of operation were not open to public review or comment. Number three, historical experience. Late night business in this area has proven to be a problem in ~Ine pas~. Annando’s Bar operated at the same address and the ka Cmnbre Night Club previously locmed across the street were both closed down due to a long history of police intervention in the early morning hours. The late hours also serve to attract regional rather than !ocal patrons. In consideration for the adjacent homes and compatibility with the neighborhood we strongly feel that the restamant should cease operation by eleven o’clock at night. At the N,’iarcln 10 meeting closing by’ eleven o’clock x’,as proposed and the applicants indicated some willingness ~o agree to this. The applicants were very responsive to our concerns in general and willing to work with us. We appreciate this greatly and wish to work with tl~em as well. If ~lne lnoma of operation were limited to eleven o’clock we would be willhng to agree that that alcohol service contink~e until eleven o’clock. This would allow ~he applicant the additional opportunity to generate revenue and would also eliminate the difficulty of having to manage the end of tlne alcoho! service in the normal operation. The second item of concern is the policy of use of Cypress Lane or the alley,. We appreciate StalTs response by recom_~)?ending limited access to the alley after ten o’clock. However, we are concerned about the continued use of the alley at all hours not just after ten o’clock. The current use of the alley, is a signit]cant concen~ to the well being and safety of the neighborhood. The prima,o~ concerns witln the alley affecting tlne neiglnborhood are as follows: illegal activity in the alley including dumping mattresses and other items. As of today there are four mattresses in the alley. These are fire hazards. Homeless persons and vagrants loiter and camp in the alley and leave open alcohol containers and trash. 5~lultiple fires start in the alley from m~,ntown sources most likely smoking. Abandoned, non-operative vehicles parked in the alley for over 72 hours. Customer traffic fiom Happy Donuts and the I~aundromat as well as teens joyriding through the allev at all hours aith loud music playing. Open dumpsters with food creating a rodent and health problems. Then proximity to homes of course, the alley runs only 20 feet front the bedrooms of some of the neighborhood residents and some are even closer. The items above expose neighbors to increased incidents of theft, property damage, noise, and health issues. There is a continually deteriorating condition at present in the alley with an absence of accom~tabilitv and responsibility for these problems. This needs to be addressed and resolved and will be exacerbated by additional use of the alley for customer traffic especially late into the evening hours. Many of us have tried to resolve problems tlvough contacting police, Utilities, and bnsiness ox~ nets, and the City but to date these efforts have had little if any affect. We feel very strongly that this is something we cannot do alone. It itlust be addressed at the City policy level. We respectfully request that the City of Palo Alto develop consistent policy regarding the alley ~ha~ ensures the safety,’, health, and welfare of the neighborhood. At the March 10 meeting we requested a hearing to address the issues of the alley, before the pem~it hearing. Due to the scope of the alley’ issue it did not seem reasonable or fair to the applicants to delay their process any further. We support the restaurant and would like to see it Page 7 t 3 4 5 6 7 9 10 14 15 16 17 19 2!) 25 26 27 2~ 3O 32 34 35 36 39 40 4i 42 43 44 45 46 be successful if this is possible without significant negative impact to the neighborhood. If the restaurant could be successful without allowing traffic into the alley this would be the best option. In lieu of addressing the alley tt-uough the pemait application we are asking for a commitment from Planning and Transportation or other appropriate City departments to conduct an inquiring and !nearing on the use of. and the responsibility and maintenance for the alley, and to work aith us to ensure the safety, health, and welfare of the neighborhood. Until this issue is resolved we request the Conditional Use Permit include language that allo\~ s the terms of alley access to be subject to change in the future. Thank you for your consideration of our concerns. We hope that we can come tO a solution that ’,\ill \xork for ex e~-yone, and that this business is a positive and successfu! addition to our neighborhood. \Ve look forward to working with the Plmming Department to improve conditions, safety, and quality of life in our neighborhood. Thank you. Chair Holman: Thank you very much. \Ve will next here from the Applicant, Julie Chen, and you also \\ill have !5 minutes. Ms. Julie Chen. Palo Alto: I just want to start by saying that my brother and I tha~,: the neighborhood for the \xarm welcome and we are really looking fora ard to hopefully come to an ag~eement and making this all possible. What they have proposed for the eleven o’clock hours of operation as well as being able to serve beer and wine until that time we are in agreement to that. In terms of the access and using the alleyway we are open to having our employees park in those spots except for the handicap spot to kind of avoid any traffic going to the back. However there is a residential unit right behind our building so we can’t block it off completely. They need to be able to access their home, their parMng garage from our driveway. Other than that we are new neighbors, x~e are going to be neighbors with these great people behind us, and we are hoping no\~ that being there we see that the alley\\ ay does need some attention. It is really needed. Now that we have invested our time and money in building this business the last thing we want is our building to be vandalized or have people loitering in the back. We are hoping to bring a positive and great business for the neighborhood to make it l~m~il.v-fliendly. So tlnat is all we have to say. Chair Holman: Thank you so much. NIs. C’lnen Also regarding the pem~its we did attain all the required pem~its in getting all of the things installed. So we have everything cleared and today was the final health inspection and everything has all been cleared through to answer that question. Chair Holman: Thank you very much. Commissioner Keller has a question for you. Commissioner Keller: Thank you. I am looking at this diagram, just so people know and people have seen this. It looks to me like this property has five parking spaces. What I am wondering and maybe I am redesiN~ing it or whatever, but I am wondering if you put parallel parldng along Page 8 3 4 6 8 9 ~0 13 16 19 !0 28 29 3O 3! 94 35 36 37 39 4O 41 49 44 45 46 the adjacent Happy Donuts and parallel parldng along the 60-foot long property.’ I could imagine that you could probably tit six parking spaces and allow people to turn around. \Voutd that work or l~ot work? Ms. Chen: In our parking lot I don’t think it would be possible because of the residential unit that is right belnind Commissioner Keller: Maybe sornebody .... Clnair Holman: Commissioner Keller, I thinl,: this maybe a question for later and our job isn’t necessarily to redesign it. It is just to approve a use or not. I t,:now we have some considerations about the alley but hold that question if you would please and we will address that later. Commissioner Keller: Sure, thanl,: you Chair Holn~an: Thant,: you. Thank you very much, Ms. Chen. \Ve have other members of the public who like to speak, Bob Henshel to be followed by, James Thalmann. Thank you for bearing with us this evening. Mr. Bob Hensbel. Pa!o Alto: I am happy to be here and happy to hear this. I grew up on L.a Selva, my mother’s house is still there. It backs up to the alley,’ and apparently no one has responsibility for the alley that we could find. No one will take the responsibility for it. I o\xn property at 513 Military and it fortunately/unfortunately the side yard of this property is at the alley so I have a double whammy. It has always been a problem and while it is not part of tiis hearing because of liquor stores it is a great problem. My wife and I certainly welcome a noodle shop. \Ve go up to University Avenue now so having someone in Bahon Park like that is kind of nice. Eleven o’clock my tenants complain to me now, eleven o’clock they like to be asleep. It is pretty late. Many restaurants historically aim to close at nine. You want something you can go to the donuts but you want a dirmer you have to get in there before nine. So I don’t 1,mow why they have to be open until eleven. That is nay only objections. I love the idea of having a noodle shop there. So you will have nay business. Thank you very much. Chair Holw.an: Thank you sir. James Tl~almann to be followed by’ John Benza. Mr. James Thalmann, Palo Alto: Good evening. I am a 22-year resident and homeowner. I \x anted to brief you on my personal experiences with the alley of Cypress Lane so you could make a more informed decision. The permit as it is setup for approval here requires protection for residential properties from excessive noise. So I wanted to speak to that in terms of my personal experiences that we have had so far. It has been my experience that these businesses can sometimes act as a catalyst for noise. That is something that we should consider as we are \vorking througl~ this. My next-door neighbor had an interesting relation to tell me the other day. His five-year-old daughter came out of her bedroom at eight o’clock at night on a weeknight and she came out to say she couldn’t sleep. Why, not? It was because of these booming car stereos Page 9 1 3 4 5 6 9 10 11 13 14 15 t7 18 19 20 23 2S 30 3i 32 36 ~’ "7 39 40 41 43 44 45 46 actually parked in the parl,:ing lot of the business. They are not driving tt-~ough the alley they are just parked there. The building is so immense ~ha~ ~he entire ~’ound is shaking, the entire house is shaking, and it is a nightmare. If you are ~rying to sleep ~l=ough that you are going to wake up every 45 minutes or so if you are a light sleeper or you are just not going to get a good deep nights sleep. So the booming car stereos are a big problem no matter where they,’ are and as ~hey go driving by they are getting within 20 t~et of my bedroom making the bedroom pretty useless. .-ks they are crossing the alley if they hit it at just the right time they hit this water cover that you were talking about. Actually’ what it is is a big metal grate that covers the water meter for the Latmdromat and it is imbedded in the alley, and the cement is cracked a little bit so it doesn’t quite lie flat. So when someone goes over it it goes ha-bum ha-bum and makes a huge noise like somebody knocking on )’our door. So we haven’t been able to get people to fix that. Laundromat customers go through the Happy Donuts, they could go through other businesses, and they park behind in the alley rum~ing the stereo waiting for their laundry to t~nish. It has been one thing after another with the alley,. How much more time do I have? Chair Holman: You lna\e about 30 secol~ds. Mr. Tbalma~-m: I guess in the future the permit of two o"clock in the mortring seems a little bit inconsistem to n~e \’,ith the Neighborhood Commercial zone as was pointed out earlier. It doesn’t really serve ~he immediate neighborhood I don’t believe in order to have something open at tv, o o’clock. It does se~:ve the Stanford students but we are not Stanford we are Bahon Park. The Noise Ordinance is not really, a priority for the Police Department. You might be able to get the unit now but it wanes off eventually. That goes for the repair of the water meter cover too. Thar~l< you. Chair Hohnan: Thanl< you so much and again thank you for your forbearance with us. John Benza to be Ibllo’,ved by, Bob Moss who I do not see here. John Benza. Palo Alto: Yes, Bob left. Chair Hohnan: So our final speaker ,,’,,ill be Peter Eng. Mr. Benza: Good evening. I am a resident of Barton Park and I have lived in my house for 14 years. I do own a copy of the map of the parcel deed that is available from the county offices. I would be ~ i11ing to share it. I have probably done most if not all of the research in that area on that and would dispute Bill Feldman’s - in fact-Bill and I ,,:,,ere in agreement in t99.4 when we l~rst raised this issue on the alley;. Before I get to the alley I would like to tha~. the applicant. I am looking for\~ ard with my family to the eleven o’clock liquor and c!osure after that. It sounds like there is soFne semblance of agreement on that. I brought a few photographs that I will flip through as I talk about the alley These are the mattresses tbr example. They; show up better with the light dim but we n-my not be able to do that. The biggest concern about the alley, and the two properties in question the old Quizno’s /’acility, which used to be Armando’s Tavern, bar, v,.’llatever you call it, before that. When Armando’s closed and Quizno’s moved in there were modifications nmde to that property, that opened the access to the alley,. There is passion about the alley, because never before and never Page 10 ! 9 t() 11 13 1 1 15 17 19 20 ~4 25 26 29 3 (? 32 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 on Cypress Lane has the alley been used for ttnough commercial traffic. It has always been closed. You can see business. That is great, tha~J< you. So you can see this Happy Donuts right about over here so their driveway comes out here. These things just get dumped by people who are there at late hours or whatever. As we scroll tl-nough you will see others. Neither Happy Donuts nor the Armando’s property ever had traffic passing through this alley. These are typically the business owners conserving the spaces in the strip mall. You can see there are containers here of chemicals, just stored, ~his is problematic to the alle\.’. These are some of the otlner businesses. Often this business here, Barron Park Florist, which used to be an automotive shop that was rezoned. They will abandon vehicles in the alley quite flequently. He has recently installed this. I have to tall,: faster because I only have three minutes. They have recently installed this. I don’t know if that was permitted but this is the edge of the alley right here, the edge of his property and the beginning of that 20-foot lane called Woodland Avenue lane. This is ~lne conner, Military Way right here, and this is an exposed liquor store. When A-1 was rebuilt ii \vas not requi~ed to have an enc!osed garbage container. Don’t know why. This is often left out here in the curb line. Moving down to the other side of Cypress Lane. I see my time is running if I may have a few seconds more. This is an unpaved access road. There is not one bt~siness on this alley that has open access to it. The fear of the neighborhood is that by setting precedents aith Happy Donuts, if I might continue jus a moment, setting a precedent with Happy Donuts and with the Quizno’s and now the noodle shop having access what is to stop Taco Bell flom opening theirs, which they once tried. You can see their shopping carts. Here homeless people will sleep in these areas. Chair Hotman: I do need to ask you to wrap up, sir. 5!It. Benza: Okay, I wil!. The biggest problem on this portion of the road is many of these bu~sinesses can open up and you can see the road is t~tlly deteriorated xxith huge potholes tha~ result in mud on buildings. This was a recently repainted building. I am scrolling through. A car bottomed out on the road you can see the oil spil!, leaking contaminates atl in the area. This is the access wav to the Taco Bell shop. So our concern is that Celia’s restaurant, which is also tigh~ on parking, could theoretically open up because we now have precedent to Cypress Lane, Taco Bell could put in a drive-through, etc. It really does need some attention. I appreciate the e×tla time. Chair Holman: Thank you sir. So at this time the Applicant can make closing comments. You l~a\’e ktp to three minutes and then the Appellant will close with also three minutes. I apologize I overlooked the last speaker who is Peter Kng, and I do apologize. 5~ir. Peter En~. Palo Alto: Thank you. My family is the property owner of the property adjacent to the proposed noodle club. We have owned property for over two years. I had observed a lot of changes positive as well as negative and become familiar with the neighborhood. I am a very active owner. I go there to cleanup. I recently, last year, become a parking lot attendant because Quizno’s customers invariably drive into our parking lot and say oh, I am just going to go over there for a few minutes. I say no, this is private parking you cannot do that and they camaot understand why. Page 11 1 6 7 9 10 12 13 14 15 16 17 1S 19 20 23 24 26 31 36 37 39 40 4! 42 43 44 45 46 As far as parking is concerned I really don’t understand how a restaurant can be built with five parlcing spaces. What is the requirement for eating establishments as far as parking requirements :t,,e conce:-ned’? I think that is wa,,i under the standard. Who created ~his problenl? I thin!,: it goes bacl< ~o the Building Department. Allowing such a small number of parking spaces for an eating establishment. Parking flom my experience the Building Department can inte~-pret whatever they want to however they want to even if it is not written in the book. They might have adjusted it so you can get by,’ with five parking spaces. Let me give you an example. Under the ordinance we were allowed, permitted, to have a tenant on the second story operate educational offices. They will lqOt permit us to do that. You have to have an elevator. \~q~ere is it on the zoning ordinance that ,,\e are supposed to lqave an elevator for this? No~xtqere to be found. Fred He~-nqan and the Staff decided ~his and the requirement is nowhere to be Found. I suspect that the parking, the so-called subscanda~-d number ofparl,:ing spaces at this location was a result of the Building Deparm~ent’s o\ ersight. I appreciate tile neighbors voicing their concerns. I concur with them. The alley has been really a nightmare. \Ve don’t us it. Our lot has a gate to c!ose it. We don’t want our people to access through the alley nor allow people from other establishments to come through our parking lot to get on E1 Camino Real. That gate is always locked and we only need to open it for our access. I ~, \ to keep tlae alle\; as clean as possible through our due diligence we keet~ the area clean. Tlqank you very much fo~ you time. C!nair Holman: Thank you. Sir, there is a question for you. Comnlissioner Keller: Just for the record could you identify which property; you said that you own? ~’I~-. End: It is 3944 El Carnino Real. Commissioner !,2eller: So that is the property that has a couple of buildings and the laundry, is that ~-ight or is it a different one7 ~Ir. End: No, no as )’ou are facing the Ramen Club restaurant it is to the left side. Commissioner Keller: Towards Los Robles? ~:.’I~-. End: x,’es, co~-rect, next to the driving school. Comn~issioner I,Celler: Thank you. C’hair Holnqan’ Tlnank you. So the Applicant will have tt~ee minutes, Ms. Chen and then tile ~kppellant will have three minutes, Mr. Sikora. h/Is. Chen: I just want to end by, saying that we are going to do our part in making sure that doing our due diligence and making sure the area is clean mad doing our part in making sure that Page 1 ~ i 6 1~) 13 14 16 17 18 !9 21 24 25 26 2S 3I 32 34 39 40 41 42 43 45 46 the alleyway doesn’t get much traffic. We are going to try to block it offthe best that we can. addition, again tt~e whole beer and wine until eleven we can promise our customers that it is purely just for the pleasure of our clients who are dining-in. We are not there to promote drinking or parties or anything like that. It is purely just to eajoy with their meal and we can promise that. I ~hink that is all \\e have to say. We are going to do our best and hopefully we can al! come to an agreement. Chair Hoh-nan: Ms. Chen there is a question for you. Commissioner Sandas. Commissioner Sandas: I just wanted to clarify I thi~,: you said earlier that you will hold your hours of operation until eleven. .’Ms. then: Preferably, yes. Commissioner Sandas: Okay,. I had one other question. I don’t t,mow if you know the answer to this and maybe it is for Staff. In talking about the ownership of the alley and that each of the commercial businesses that backup to the alley are responsible or they own a portion of the alley. Would that include the Ramen Club because there is a house behind the Ramen Club? Ms. Chen: That I don’t know because we just lease the building. So we don’t know how that o\x nership works. ~ ...... Ms. Cutler: It is one property that has the residential and the commercial on it. So Iwould assume that it is attached to that prope~-ty. Chair Holnqan: Okay, thank you. Thank you *,’is. Chert. Commissioner Fineberg, did you have a question for the Applicant? I am so sorry Ms. Chen. Commissioner Fineber~_: Yes I do. Could you clari~ for me if there is a chain hung to close access will it be between the parking lot and the alley or from E1 Camino to the parking lot? Ms. Chen: That is going to be kind ofdiftYcult for us. I can’t say just because we haven’t really talked to the resident that is living behind. We can’t just block it offbecause if they want to use it as their way out we can’t obviously restrict them from it. We will do what we can to keep our patrons flom parking in that parMng lot excep.t for the handicap so they don’t go tlnough the a!leyxx ay. But in terms of the resident I can’t say. Connmissioner Fineber~: Okay, so I guess at some point we are going to have to come to some sort of closure of if your operations are until elex en at what hour would liquor stop? When would the chain go up and then would it be front or back? How do you practically implement that because if you are putting the chain up at El Camino so new cars can’t come in how do the patrons who are eating their noodles leax e? Do they just lower the chain and then the next car comes in? Or do you put it on the alley in the back and then cars will continue to come in because they don’t know they are not supposed to? I don’t know that I understand how that would be ila~plemented. Page 13 1 3 4 5 6 9 10 1i 12 13 14 19 20 21 23 24 27 29 31 32 DD -’ 35 36 38 39 4O 4! 42 ~D 44 45 46 iNJfs. Chen: I think what we are going to try to do is have our employees park in these designated spots so that obviously there is not going to be any parking available for our patrons that way there won’t any traffic going tMough. In terms of the chain that was something that was mentioned in our first initial meeting but again I do~Tt thi~fl,: that will work unless the resident is willing to agree to it because if we close up and put a chain up and they work at six o’clock in the morning obviously it isn’t going to work. Commissioner Kineber~: So which designated spots would your employees park in? ),’Is. Chen: In the 15re spaces that are noted in the photo that was shown. There are tSve parking spaces. Commissioner Kineber_m So there would be no onsite customer parking? .%’is. Clnen: \Ve \xould try to have them park along E1 Camino. Chair Holman: Commissioner Keller, you had a question for the applicant and then let’s move to the Appellant. Commissioner Keller: Yes, just be clear. I think that what you agreed to just to clarity, Commissioner Sandas’ question, I think what you agreed to is the idea of closing the restaurant at eleven o’clock and not serving alcohol beyond eleven o’clock. Is that what you are suggesting? ’~I~. Chen: That is correct. Commissioner Keller: Okay. And just to be clear t am going to ask the question of the Appellant if the restaurant closes at eleven o’clock is there a need for a chain because I am not sure if that is needed or ]not. That is one thing that we need to do. I am wondering to the extent and probably there is not enough time to explore this but the idea of if the parking lot .....Mr. City Attorney. Clnair Holman: Commissioner Keller, we have the Applicant standing at the microphone so if you have a question for Staf£ Commissioner Keller: \Veil, I would like to ask the question of Staff whether we could condition this on restriping the parking lot. Chair Holman: That is a question for Staff. Commissioner Keller: But then I would have to ask the Applicant whether they would be agreeable to that if it is feasible. Chair Holman: I do~Tt think that would necessary. I think that is a question for Staff. Commissioner Keller: Okay; thmt( you. Page t 4 9 !0 11 12 13 14 i5 16 17 ~t _%.) 27 ~9 32 34 35 36 38 4@ 4~ 4~ 44 45 46 Chair Holman: Commissioner Lippert, you have a question for Staff later. So Ms. Chen I thit; that is the last question for you. The Appellant, Bob Sikora, you will have three minutes. Mr. Sikora: Thank you very much. I want to thank you for the opportunity to present our concerns. I want to thank you for the tln-ee hours for us to get more familiar with the Applicant. I think we can work something out whell it comes to parMng. I am not exactly sure. It seems like we have something here that is workable either by employees parking in the spaces or a chain across at ten o’clock so that customers can exit out the back hopefully before eleven o’clock. Something can work but I think that we also want to make sure that the broader question of access to the alley is something that we would like to get your commim-~ent to help us with because it is not going to - working at it on our own does not seem to work and some policy on future use of the alley as well as current is justified. Thank you very much. Cb.air Holman: Commissioner Tuma, is your question for the Appellant or for Staff? Okay. Thanl,: you very much. So I will close the public hearing and come back to questions by the Commission. I have Commissioner Sandas first. Commissioner Sandas: I have a couple of questions. This one is about the previous tenant, Quizno’s, what time did they close? Does anybody know? Ms. Cutler: They didn’t have a use pemit so we don’t 1,mow. Commissioner Sandas: Does anybody in the neighborhood have any recollection of \~hat time they might have closed? About trine, okay I was just wondering because I would thii~: that they would have a noisier crowd than the Ramen Club would. Clnait Molman: Commissioner Fineberg, questions. Commissioner Fineber__,: I am still a bit troubled by the question of the Staff Report indicating that there would be no physical changes except for interior decorations and the installation of a hood. That paints to me a very different picture than the installation of a kitchen that costs probably with equipment 525,000 to $100,000. To me it goes to painting a picture that I don’t understand what happened in reality versus what is described and I do~Tt know whether that is flom the applicant or a misunderstanding with Staff. The Applicant indicated that they got their heahh permit today but I am still left with the question of did the installation of the kitchen equipment require a permit being pulled. I had asked a Staffmember earlier and without giving much time for preparation his indication was a quick look, no. Does anyone in Staffhave information about whether there was a requirement for building permits to be pulled? ,~d then it~they’ \\ere required, were they granted? Ms. Cutler: If so, they were not routed to me. So I am not aware of them. t do know that there was a requirement flom Fire for a permit for the hood. Ms. French: \Ve wouldn’t necessarily get routed a plan that wouldn’t call for planning review such as a TI kitchen improvement. It could have escaped our notice in Planning. In other words, Page 15 1 just have been handled at the counter or something, except for the hood, if there was some other kind of" improvement. They can open a restaurant there without any pem~it. Commissioner Kineber~: But not with heavy equipment. E’Ir. Earkin: .N-one of that relates to a Conditional Use Permit. Commissioner Fineber~: It relates to the integrity, and the past perfom~ance of compliance. 5*it. Larkin: ~;~ou can’t consider past perfom~ance or compliance except if you are going to re\ oke an existing use pem~it but since there is no use permit there is nothing to revoke. Commissioner Fineber~: Aren’t we counting on the promises made by, the Applicant for the CUP? ?,’h. Earl<in: No, we are counth]g on our own code enforcement efforts, police, and alcohol and beverage control. Chair Holman: Commissioner Keller you have a question? Commissioner Keller: Yes,- To what extent are we allowed to condition as a condition of approval for the Conditional Use Pem~it closing access to the alley? 5I;. Karl<in: To the extent that you make finding that the proposed use could exacerbate problems in the alley and you can make those findings based on substantial evidence then you can make t!~at consideration only ibr that section of the alley that is accessed tl-n-ough this property. Commissioner Keller: I mean closing access to the alley, from the subject property. 5.’Ir. Larkin: E~es, to the extent that you can mal<e findings based on substantial evidence that access is or that that is necessary to prevent problems for the neighborhood then you can do that. ),.’Is. French: However, I would like to add that Transportation Staff/Planning Staff we don’t thin!,:~ that closing the alley - you need to get out of that parking lot and the way to get O~_tt of that is pretty much the alley the way it is designed currently. Comnnissioner t<eller: Hence my question about whether it is possible or feasible to restripe the parl<ing lot h~ order to provide entrance and exit through the driveway to allow it to leave. I am wondering whether that has been explored. Nls. Cutler: Staffhas taken a look at the size and space on the property and there is not sufficient space in some other configuration to do two-way driving and keeping the five spaces. Commissioner Keller: Have you analyzed parallel parking along both sides of the alley? Page 1 6 9 12 1(3 17 2O 21 25 2d 22 29 o t) 32 D’-+ 39 41 42 43 44 .his. Cutler: \Ve have not considered any parking on the alley. Commissioner Keller: I am sony, I mean along the driveway. I don’t mean along the alley, mean the drix eway. Have you considered parallel parking on both sides of the driveway of the existing parl(ing lot in between tlqe Ramen Club and the adjacent Happy Donuts? h’Is. French: \Ve don"t have recollection of all of the possibilities that were discussed in this one meeting we had but it pretty much would seem that you would lose at least a space if not more. !t would probably likely result in a reduction in the total number onsite and that was a concern. Cutler: It could also provide difficulties in access to the residential unit in the back and aettina through there. Copnmissioner Keller: I am sorry I didn’t think of this earlier to provide it but according to the design that [ have the building with the tZarnen Club is 63 feet and two inches which as far as I understood is suf*fcient for three parking space adjacent to that and the adjacent Happy Donuts is approximately the same width which would be able to handle tl:nee parking spaces. So I am not sure about the width of this particular driveway and whether the driveway is wide enough to provide two-\\ av access plus a row of parking on either side but if it is my calculation would indicate that that is sufficient for six parking spaces so I don’t quite understand. :Ms. Cutler: The difficulty is that there is no space at the rear of the property for cars to turn around once they have entered so there would be no way for them to exit the property, once entered unless they have access to the alley, because of that residential building in the back. Comnaissioner Keller: Okay, so the problem is not being able to turn around. Thank you Chair Holman: Commissioner Lippert. Commissioner Lippert: I have similar questions on the parking. If we xxere to grant the request here and were to chain offthe parking lot, doesn’t that create problems? Aireadv \xe are talking about it being substandard in terms of the amount of parking there. The number of spaces doesn’t comply with the F.-MP,_. I thirJ,: the building is like 1,800 square feet and if you divide it by 200, which is what we normally would do, you would need about nine spaces I thi~<. Cutler: Yes. Commissioner Lippert: So it doesn’t comply. We often times have what are called offsite parking agreements. Would they need to then enter into some sort of offsite parking agreement? It is a requirement t!nat we haxe this square footage parked generally and in this case it is not compliant. N."Is. Cutler: Though this building is grandfatlnered in because of the age of the building. Page 17 1 2 9 1 D 14 1< l f) 20 30 32 33 3S 36 3~ 39 40 43 46 Commissioner Lippert: Right, but it is grandfathered in for the number of spaces that it has. Cutler: Correct. Commissioner Lippert: So what we are doing is increasing the noncompliance. Mr. \\qlliams: How? Commissioner Lip~)ert: By, denying the use of the parking that is there. ),:Is. French: They are still provided. I think the intention was after hours when the spaces on E1 Camino are certainly more freed up that it is more of a concession to the neighborhood. The parking is still there it hasn’t been eliminated it is where they are directed. It will still be used by the employees and the resident there. So they may be mostly full any~vay. I don’t know how many employ’ees would be there at that point in time. Commissioner Lippert: Okay. Then the second question that is a follow up to that is there is a handicap accessible parl,:ing space there. Again by’ chaining off or closing off the parMng lot we are denying access to a disabled individual. French: I think it could be chained off in a way that doesn’t block off an .~MDA space. I thinl,: we may need to look at where that is located with respect to the door and sort of thing. ),h. L, arldn: I don’t think the Commission is being asked today, to decide exactly how access \vould be blocked off. I think now it is a condition that it not be used for customer parking after certain hour. Chair Holman: Commissioner Tuma is next. I am a little troubled by the question about the parking but also I thin],: the concerns are about what Commissioner Lippert talked about as increasing a noncon%m~ance because personally I have questions about allowing required parking to be on the street, and this is an under-parked site. So I think that is why these questions. Commissioner Tuma. Commissioner Tuma: I have a couple of quick questions and then I would like to do something e!se. If the hours of operation that were being proposed were until ten o’clock and if there were l-to beer and wine being served would we be here? Would there be any CUP application? !vlr. Williams No. MOTION Commissioner Tuma: Okay. So it seems to me that this discussion really, is about an hour later ~md beer and wine. I think clearly there are some ... well, with that said I would like to make a motion that Planning and Transportation Commission recommend that the City Council approve a Record of Land Use Action approving the Conditional Use Permit as modified to further restrict hours of beer and wine, onsite customer parking to allow the establishment of a new Page 18 i 3 7 9 11 !-~ !3 15 16 17 19 20 -3.~! ?? 25 26 2~ 29 30 .31 32 33 36 ".7 -~o 40 42 43 44 45 46 Ramen Club until eleven PM seven days a wed,: based upon the findings and conditions of approval in the Record of Land Use as modified to reflect alcohol and Closure to happen at eleven PM. SECOND Commissioner Lippert: Second. Chair Holman: Comnfissioner Turna, would you care to speak to your motion? Commissioner Tuma: Just briefly. I think clearly there are some issues that are going on in the alley and the neighborhood, t live not too far from there but far enough not have a conflict. I spend time in that area. I think the issues that you folks are talking about are very, very valid and need to be addressed through the process. However, the Conditional Use Pemfit that is being applied for here is simply to go one hour later than would nonTmlhbe required and to allow them to serve alcoholic beverages. I don’t see those two things as being something that sounds terribly objectionable to the neighborhood. I am impressed by the Applicant’s willin~~ess to \~ork with the neighborhood, wants to be a good resident, came here tonight asking for two o’clock, i’olks said ele\ en o’clock, the)’ said they would be willing to do that. To me this should just go through. Commissioner Lippert: In seconding this I want to say that this site is very similar to ,~tonio’s Nut House. \Ve have already doin_e this one before. They had a similar situation where there was ’,noise being propelled onto the neighboring residential neighbor and it was problematic. The on!y difference is that instead of an alleyway behind the proposed site as with the site here there was a public parking lot. The solution was simply to chain off or restrict parking in the parking lot after hours. As an amendment I would recommend similar sorts of things where there is no parking in the alleyxx ay after hours and that it be patrolled by, Palo Alto Police. There was one other condition, I asked for a friendly amendrnent on this condition, which is that in a year the Comnaission reviews this again. If in fact, there are rmmerous complaints we could revoke the Ramen Club’s Conditional Use Permit. 5ir. Larkin: A Conditional Use Pemait is an entitlement that can’t be revol,:ed without a public hearing. So you can’t automatically set a review. Commissioner LiDpert: Correct. It would be rescheduled, it would be noticed, and we would review it again. Mr. karMn: Well, you wouldn’t reschedule a notice and review again unless there was cause to do so. So if there were code enforcement complaints then it could be brought back for review. Commissioner Lippert: Correct, that is what they did with Antonio’s Nut House. I am sorry. So that would be my friendly amendment. Chair Holrnan: I don’t know that that requires an amendment. Page 19 Commissioner Lippert: It doesn’t? Mr. karl,fin: That is how it works. If there are code enforcement complaints it comes back for either alteration or revocation of the permit. Commissioner LiDpert: That is fine and we haven’t seen ,~M~tonio’s Nut House so they have complied. Chair Holman: Commissioner Sandas, comments. Commissioner Sandas: Yes. a couple of comments. Ihave a comment and a question. I am moved by the Applicant’s willingness to bend with the neighbors. I think it is wonderful that you have conn.e to an agreement together to limit your operating hours to eleven and serve alcoholic be\ erages up until that point in time. \Vhat I am worried about is I would hate to see the Applicant bending so far that you bend yourself right out of business. What little I 1,mow about the restaurant industry and any food business is that the profit margins are very low and I am not sure that the people who are living witlnin walking distance are going to be enough to support your business. I believe that you will need to have people coming flom a little distance out of tl~e neighborhood and they will be coming in their cars and they are going to need a place to park. We hope that they can be as respectful as possible to tl~e neighbors but I would hate to see you putting conditions on your business that will cause your business not to succeed. So I don’t have a recomnn.endation but I am just urging a little bit of caution in blocking off your parking lot and chaining things and putting your employees’ cars in the parking lot doesn’t offer a space for a cash-paying customer to park. So this is just anote of caution. The second thing is that a lot of this discussion In.as centered around that darn alley. We know an heir to the Bahon Estate owns part of the alley but who is this person? What can the City do to ensure that this alley is maintained and that it is safe and that it is not a dumping ground for old mattresses and a playground for rodents? Especially when there are children who’s bedrooms border on the alley and who live so close. So my question is what happens now to fix this situation, to remedy it? I don’t know what the process is and who would initiate whatever it is? Mr. Larl,:in: It is a lengthy ans\x er and it probably, isn’t directly related to tin.is topic but we will come back and we cain_ talk about that at a future meeting. Chair Holman: \,:ice-Chair Garber. Staff, will you update the neighbors on progress? Ms. Cutler: Yes, we can send a notice. Chair Holman: Thanl,: you. Vice-Chair Garber. \."ice-Chair Garber: i thi~l< my comments have been covered by the previous Commissioners. I wil! be supporting the motion. Page 20 8 9 10 Ii 12 13 14 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 2~ 30 31 32 DD 35 38 39 40 46 Chair Holman: Comrnissioner Keller. Commissioner Keller: I am wondering if I can request a fiiendly amendment that we get a report on the number of complaints that have occurred as a result of this property after one year independent of the revoking of the permit. I just think it would be helpful to get that out in the public record. Chair Holman: City,’ Attorney M,,. I_arkin: Yhat probably wouldn’t be part of the Conditiona! Use Permit because I don’t thir~ we can require the Applicant but if you want to make that request we can forward that onto Council.’ Commissioner Keller: It is a request of Staff to apprise the Commission and the Counci! if they \\ish \xith the number of complaints so that we can evaluate the effectiveness of this. ?,i~. Larkin: This would be a direction to the Police Deparunent Staff, which is not something the Commission can do directly. So we can forward that recommendation onto Council. If Coutncil wants to direct the City Manager to direct the Police Department Staffto do that then they can do that Commissioner Keller: Yes, number mad nature, please. ~d that is what I want added to the motion appropriately Will the maker accept? Chair Holman: Maker? Commissioner Tuma: My only hesitancy to doing that is beginning tlnis process of micromanaging Staff and asking Council to micromanage Staff on a CUP. It just seems excessive and I am not sure that it is our place to do that. I am open to talking about it but it just doesn’t seem like what we ought to be doing. Commissioner Keller: Well, my reason for that is in some sense we are asked to make a decision. We don’t get feedback in terms of making the decision and my understanding of total quality mana_em~.nt and continuous improvement is that the way we can make better decisions is to get that feedback. I am basically requesting that we close the loop and gh.~e us that. Chair Holman: I think the City, Attorney has said that if there were complaints that it would be a code enforcement matter. If there is an action or a requested action or an indication that an action by the City, Staff to revoke the Conditional Use Permit and if that is appealed then that would come to us. Mr. Larkin: If such a report were created it would be information only,. The Commission would not be able to act on it because the Commission carmot direct Staffto do code enforcement. The Commission can make a recommendation to do code enforcement they can’t direct Staffto do code enforcement. Page 21 1 4 5 6 7 10 11 !2 13 14 15 16 lV 19 2O 23 25 Commissioner Keller: Yes. Mr. Lar!cin: So it would be pure in%rmation only. Commissioner Keller: My intent is to get information for us to understand how effective the measures we put into place are. h,l~. Williams: If I could just add. t appreciate that. I am concerned that it is one more thing for us to sort of put on a list to try, to record somewhere and remember and come back in a year xx ith. If every use permit has to have this kind of reporting requirement it just detracts from and we just don’t have enough Staff’to keep up with what we have to try to do this. We have a process where if we start having a lot of complaints about that I am sure that you are going to end up getting a report from us and letting you know that. But if we have one or two, for us to come back in a year and tell you we have had one or two and why where those, and have that discussion just seems to me to divert our attention from other things. M,:. Larkin: As a practical matter it will be nearly impossible to distinguish which complaints are coming fl-om the Ramen Club versus which are coming fl-om Happy Donuts versus which are coming just off E1 Camino. Commissioner Keller: Okay, t will withdraw it. Let me say two other things. One is that in contrast to what some of my fellow Commissioners have identified it seems to rne that what I understand about restaurants is that very little profit is made on the food and most of the profit is made on the beverages, especially alcoholic beverages. As a result of that it is actually beneficial ~o the restaurant to close at eleven o’clock and to serve alcohol through eleven o’clock, for an hour and a half extra of alcohol service than it is to stop alcohol service at 9:30 and keep the restaurant open for food only until two. So while this is a concession of the restaurant owner I believe it probably accrues financially to the benefit of the restaurant owner for that particular accommodation. I appreciate the fact that the Appellant and the community is proposing that because I think that is a good accommodation between both of them to try to work it out together. I am not sure how this should be related but with respect to the parking lot and such I am not sure exactly \vhere we left that in terms of the parking lot being closed off or the parMng lot being left open. I just obserxe that is you close it off at the alleyx\ay after ten o’clock people will enter and it aill be like the roach motel, you can get in but you can’t get out, especially since I have been told that you can’t get out that way because othe~avise we would have people get out that way. The other thing is that if you closed it at the E1 Camino side people might thil~,: that the restaurant is closed unless there is appropriate signage saying ’parl,: on E1 Camino.’ So I thil~,: there might be some concern about that. I hope that the Applicant would work with the neighbors to figure out that nature. Page 22 1 4 5 10 13 15 !8 20 ") ] 24 31 33 35 37 39 40 42 44 45 Tlnen finally, to the extent that the neighbors have shown that the upkeep of that alle3,avay is in some sense a public nuisance [ am wondering what cause of action could be brought agaiust the all%avay owners and who would bring that action? Chair Holman: COlnmissioner Keller, that is not a part of this action. It is an item of interest but i think you can follow up with that separately. Mr. Larkin: That is exactly what we would bring back for discussion in response to Commissioner Sandas’ question. Commissioner Keller: Yhank you. Clnair Holman: Commissioner Fineberg. Commissioner lCineber~: I think the troubling aspects of this project have more to do with conditions on the alley than the, I will characterize it as, the wonderful compromises I have seen bet\x een the Applicant and the Appellant. I think the neighbors are welcoming the restaurant and the owners of the restaurant are working to satis~.. the needs of the neighbors and I just think that is great. That is what we would want to see to have comfortable neighbors and a successful, \ iable business in place. I ann seeing on this project a property that is substandard with regard to parking. That is not any t;ault of the Applicant. They are leasing a building that is coming to them that way. I am seeing that maybe it is an opportunity for us to look, and it is beyond the scope of tonight, but to come back and look at lnow should we be handling that kind of property. It is a discussion for another night \vlnether \xe allo\~ the conditions to become worse within that property or we somehow change the codes and the regulations when we haxe properties that are substandard, over-built, tmder-parl<ed. \x hate\er the standard is. I think it is an opportunity for us to come and fix places where we ha\e those deficiencies and in certain situations like this might be making it worse. So the code has guidance for us on how to make our decisions. Gixen that I think the closure at eleven, the removal of alcohol and the late night hours where I think it would cause the most problems with noise and disorderly conduct, I would be comfortable approving the application. The last thing for the residents who have stayed here so late thank you for being here, thank you for sharing your voices, and I would urge you to continue to share your voices when it is appropriate. If there is a fire in the alley call the Fire Department. If there are noisy people call the police. Your voices will only be heard in the numbers when the incidents occur. So please continue to stay active, stay on top of it, it is all of our homes. Thank you. Chair Holman: I wil! be brief and quick in my comments. I do have a couple. I am going to s~tpport the motion. I am going to ask for one change to the ordinance ifI could. Section tlvee, number one, Conditional Use Permit Findings. It is similar to a comment I have made before, strike the last sen~:ence, please, which is the sale of alcoholic beverages will be conducted in a manner that will injurious to property or improvements in the vicinity or detrimenta! to public Page __~ 1 9 l0 11 12 14 1"7 !9 20 21 32 39 42 43 44 45 health, safety, and general welfare, or convenience. It basically states that it is compliant because it is compliant. So if you would please strike that sentence if the maker and seconder would approve that change? Commissioner Tuma: It is fine. Chair Holman: Seconder? -m~ssioner Lippert: Accepted. Chair t~olmal~: Then I am going to approve this and just quickly with the eleven o’clock and elex en o’clock. As much as I absolutely appreciate and understand and have experienced the difficulties in the alley one of the question I asked of Staff is what jurisdiction or what kind of conuol do \re haxe over the alley and the response was verb, little. So I don’t think it is feasible to try to block offthe alley. I would ask one other quick amendment which is very similar to what we did with A~tonio’s Nut House because there were noise problems there. Staff can call up the language but to ask the Applicant to post signage inside and also outside of the building to ask patrons to respect the location and proximity to the neighborhood so when they are leaving the premises late at night. Staff will remember that language or something similar to that. Do you recall it enough to be able to repeat to Commissioners? You get the drift though. It is basically it is just asking the patrons to be good neighbors. Commissioner Tuma: I think that is fine and appropriate so I will accept it. Chair Holman: Seconder? Commissioner LiDpert: I accept that. I think maybe they should just look in the file for Antonio’s Nut House and see what the language was there. Chair Holman: Yes, would Staff be amenable to that? Then one last thing, I am being quick here. One last thing is that the dumpster at the back, it is one of the conditions of approval under Public \,. orks. actually this isn’t Public Works it’s Water Quality. What we have on other projects, and I think Antonio’s Nut House may have been one of those, is said that the garbage and recycling not be done after let’s say eleven o’clock, or if they close at eleven maybe 11:30, nothing later than 11:30. So we limit that too so we don’t have staff cleaning up at midnight and throwing stuff out in the recycling containing. Is the maker amenable to that? Commissioner Tuma: How about if we just raise it as within a half-hour of closing? Chair Holman: That is fine with me. Commissioner Tuma: It is fine with me then. Chair Holman: Seconder? Page 24 6 9 I 0 12 13 14 15 17 19 2 ) 23 24 25 26 37 31 32 34 35 36 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 Commissioner kip~eru Agreeable. Chair Holman: \Vith that I am complete except one thing. Do we need to at all comment on the 20-minute parldng in fl’ont which also to me seems qnite problematic. It is not included in the ordinance so is that nothing that Staff is going to pursue then after this? Ms. Cutler: We will look into it but it is independent. It was not a condition of approval. Ms. French: In that meeting we had the Applicants were amenable to and interested in having the City, look at doing the 20-minute parking. So we are worldng with our Transportation and we will work with police and all that. Chair Holman: Okay. Good. French: It is on El Camino so we have to make sure to check our bases bnt that is the plan. Chair Holman: Okay, very good. Conamissioner Keller. Commissione~ Keller: I realize we have closed the public hearing and whatever. I am just wondering whether 30 minutes is the right amount. MOTION PASSED (7-0-0-0) Chair Holman: It doesn’t matter. They will make it work. Don’t you think. StaY? Tl~ev will mat,:e it work. Otherwise we are going to be back here again with a lot of complaints. So with that we will vote on the motion to approve the Conditional Use Permit to allow operations of the Ramen Club including service of alcoholic beverages until eleven PM seven clays a week with a change to the ordinance, section tl=ee, item one, striking the last sentence and adding the signage that wil! be pulled akin to the ~tonio’s Nut House asking and 30 minutes after close of business for use of the dumpster and recycling facilities. With that all those in favor of the motion say aye. (ayes) Opposed? So that passes on a seven to zero vote. Good luck to you all. Staffx~ill report back to the neighbors about the alley and what can be done in that situation. Tlnank you all very much. With that we will take up again item number two and hopefully quicldy conclude that. I will wait just a monqent until fine members of the public leave. Okay I believe we are ready to take up item number two again. So if Commissioners would take their seats. Not to spring it on yon but Commissioner Fineberg I believe you were the next speaker to speak to the motion. We are again back on item number two, the Green Building Code. Commissioner Fineber~: It is a good thing made notes. I just need to find them. Page 25 1 3 6 9 1@ 11 12 t3 t4 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 23 28 30 31 32 DD ~4 n--7 38 39 40 41 42 ’1 I 45 Chair Holman: If we could ask members of the public to take tlneh conversation out to the lobby that would be most appreciated. Thank you. Commissioner Finebers: Could I ask that the motion be repeated? I think that would be a good place to start this discussion. .Mr. \Villiams: The motion is to approve the ordinance and resolution tables with I have eight amendments. One is lnistoric, that exemptions related to historic structures be reviewed by the HRB and recommended to the Director. Secondly that the Director have the flexibility to provide tlne appropriate checklist I thinl,: we would say particularly related to reuse or historic structures. In tlne section about the transition and ramping up the ordinance that the Director have discretion to allow self-verification when it is determined that there is lack of Green Building Inspectors. The fourth is to add the whereas!findings regarding AB32 and sea level rise. The fifth one was to report after one },ear regarding the status and progress of the ordinance. The sixth one is ttne on multi-family on Table B we include an asterisked reference that if there are over 30 units in the multi-family project that they complete a LEED ND clnecl<list. Or homes? Oh, ND or LEED for Home. The seventln one was to restructure the definkions so that it is New Construction, Commercial and New Construction, Residential. The eigMn one which I don’t consider a change to the ordinance but still a recommendation is to develop data and cost infomnation flom Built It Green and pass that along to the Council at the time they hear this ordinance. Chair Holman: Thank you, Curtis. Connnissioner Fineberg. Commissioner Fineber~: I like the amendment to the resolution a lot. I thirtk they will answer many of the questions ~hat are still open in my mind. At my core I believe that the Green Building Criteria will move us in the right direction. My only hesitation is whether it is the right time or a little too soon to do them. IG~owing that we have the abilky to lead gets me over some of those reservations. I still think we need ~o understand more fully the implications of dewatering and whether these criteria need to disincent dewatering more than they do now. I think the potential negatives impacts if the anecdotal evidence we are hearing is indeed conect or if there is subsidence or other negatives down the pike if those are indeed real we are not taking them as seriously as we should to protect property and protect ~he future enviromnent. So that is one of my big reservations about the criteria that we have now. I like them as a start. I Hke that they will be adaptable as for instance the new LEED N~ Criteria come up to speed. I like that ~hey can be layered and I xxill be voting for this tonight. Thank you. Chair Holman: \:ice-Chair Galber. Vice-Chair Garber: I will be supporting the motion. I do have a couple of comments. Not as any part of the motion, but I would be interested in the growing checklists of criteria that will be evaluated during the testing period. There are a number of things, which I think my comments and the other Commissioners’ comments sort of point to as the sorts of criteria that will end up det:ining what tlnis wil! be in tl~ee years. Page 26 1 3 4 5 6 1 (~) 13 14 16 17 19 20 "~1 23 25 26 28 ~9 30 34 .35 39 40 42 43 44 45 46 Let me just list a couple of the ones that I have here right now. One of which is the whole verification process versus certification, creating so~t of a new industry of reviewers of the project that are not specifically focused on Buildin~ Code but are focused on looking at project documents in the same manner but for a different set of criteria, obviously ~reen criteria is new, and whether we can find that in the marketplace, whether we have to build it ourselves, what the real burden of that is on the City is unclear to me and I think we will find out in the next couple of)’ears. The whole issue of fees, fees is one thing there are also consequent costs for the industry both to learn how to do this, so there are startup costs for architects, contractors, and other consultants to get up to speed with this, but then there are also the costs that are not related to fees but are related \xith the ongoing management to make this happen. One of the big differences been Green Point and LKED at least in our office is the amount of paperwork that has to be submitted t’or the LEED projects in order to demonstrate that the certification can be made. That is not a part of any fee but that is something that is either borne by the consultants or the builder in some cases or passed onto the clients. So there is an imbedded cost there that is not always seen. Then there are the operational pieces and what I mean by that are the operations of the City. Does the green review of the documents end up as part of the conditions of approval and get added to the document and does that get iterated and add to the process or is it simply a yes!no? I am not looking for an answer tonight but I am sort of curious as to how we address that. I suspect that that’s only the tip of the iceberg. Then just a caution in terms of grammar and syntax. Con-unissioning is not certification commissioning is a very set set of activities that occurs around building systems but is only a portion of the overall certification process and is only a subset of the overall costs. So being careful about when we are using those terms and when they are used in the process is important. I will stop there. Thank you. Chair Holman: I have a number of comments and frankly I an-t not quite sure where I am going ~o end up on this. It depends on what the Commission might be willing to entertain or not. A couple of data points. One is that 50 percent of the homes that get built have basements using the eight inch wall or using the !6 inch wall and that is not the maximurn that I have been told by architects, but just using those numbers that is 200 to 400 tons of concrete that is rnanufactured. If >’out look at the manufacture of concrete and its enviromnental impacts if you go online and look the numbers are everything flom 40 percent to a one-to-one ratio of pollutants created with the manufacture of concrete. The Commissioner to my right has just said it is the highest carbon J:botprint of any of the materials. So it is an enormous, enom~ous impact that we are essentially incentivizing in Palo Alto because we don’t count it as square footage and I thi~fl( it is an environmental impact that - it is one of the places where LEED and Green Building just don’t get the big picture. I think that is one of the areas. It may be because not all part of the country, of course Build It Green is California, but some parts of the country don’t have this kind of situation although much of this area certainly does. So if you look at how much pollutant carbon that puts out in the atmosphere on the low end it is 3,200 tons a year and on the high end it is 16,000 tons a ),ear. That is just the concrete that goes into basement construction in Palo Alto in one year. So how environmentally friendly is that? How green is that? Page 27 1 2 9 10 11 14 15 16 19 20 21 23 24 25 26 2~ 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 3~ 38 39 4O 41 42 43 44 45 46 In 2006 there were 85 single-family home demolitions, and this is just the single-family homes, and 78 in 2007. The 2006 Waste Characterization Study that was put out 78,000 tons of waste was created in Pa!o Alto. Almost half of that was C & D and ahnost half of that were problem materials that there is no recycling potential for. None. There is no market. If you read the \Vaste Characterization Study it clearly states that. So where this leads me is I have at least one issue about basements. I actually have more but I ha~,’e at least tha~ one issue that is quantifiable in ~em~s of its impacts. In terms of demolitions all along I have been absolutely supportive and lna\e been wanting the City to go towards a green building-like point system for granting pennits for several years. However, I am still very disappointed that even though it is coming, it is very slo\v in coming, and it isn’t included here to any real measurable way, giving points that really are representative of the embodied energy in existing buildings. I really do worry For a few reasons that exempting buildings will send the wrong message. We are exempting them which means you don’t have to satisfy any green points so we are essentially telling them that your building isn’t green you just get an exemption. That sends a wrong ~essage to people. I have heard people say that they want to restore their building and rehab tlneir building but they can’t make it green so they ~ear it down. That is the message that we are going to further impress upon people if we pass what we are looking at tonight. Also, the people who are, it.is not their fault. It is because of the systems, the LEED and Build It Green systems, the people who are going to be trained to evaluate these projects are going to lna\e no training and no information as far as I can tell in historic preservation or in adaptive reuse or in the energy that is actually saved by using existing windows but doing other treatments like interior storm windows and those sorts of things that are alternatives. So I thi~k we are going to lose buildings by just not having the proper training for people to deal vdth our community’s aheady built resources. i mentioned earlier that we don’t count basements as part of square footage. Actually I very, very much like the language that was on the presentation. Curtis, I thought you did a great job on the presentation tlnis evening. On the first page it says that Green Building means a whole s\ stems approacln to the design, construction, and operation of buildings that substantially mitigates ~he enviromnent, economic, and social impacts of buildings. I think that is much better stated than how the ordinance is written, frm~,:ly I thi~k that language really hits the nail on the head when it comes to the more broad goals of a Green Building Code. So I am actually going to suggest some language changes there. Under the Purpose of Draft Ordinance, again in your presentation this evening Cm~is, the second, third, and fourth bullets say, encourage water and resource conservation, resource conservation is not used in the ordinance that I could find at least. I thinl,: that term speaks much better to what the overall goa! of sustainability is that the Council passed. The third bullet is, reduce waste generated by construction projects. Again adaptive reuse would do a great deal to satis~, that goal but that isn’t included in any significant way in what is before us this evening. The fourth is provide durable buildings that are efficient and economical to own and operate. Probably a few of you have heard me say before when I have been on my little perch is that what we are doing is tearing down smaller homes, I know we are going to have a study, session about Page 28 1 7 9 10 1l 14 15 1(5 17 19 2O 24 25 2~ ~9 30 3! 34 D- 39 4O 41 42 ~D 44 45 lnousing here before long, but we are not having a discussion here about house size at all. It is going to be a difficult one to address but I thilfi~, enviromnentally, socially,, economically it is one we have to take up and where we land is something else. But we are not addressing that at all and again, it is part of the purpose of this ordinance. We are tearing down smaller homes, it says that since you have been keeping track it is something like 1,575 square toot homes, and that doesn’t include the garages, and we are tripling the cost or the sales price of the homes where we teardown houses and build new houses with basements. It is easy to see a property go on sale for $1.3 to $t .5 million and it comes back on the market for $4.5 million rebuilt with a full basement. That is not sustainable. It is not socially responsible. It is not economically feasible. We talk about jobs/housing imbalance and it is all relative in terms of what people can afford here but we are making it harder and harder for people to be able to live and work in our communhy. The C & D Ordinance, salvage is referenced here but there is not much focus on it. We have had the C & D Ordinance in place for some time and the salvage aspect of it is still not very well implemented. I am not trying to blame anyone for that. I don’t know if it is availability of Staff or training of Staff or what but it is still woefully lacking. A great deal still gets chipped up and we can’t look at recycling as being as good as salvaging or reusing buildings. It just simply is not. I think one last comment and then I will try to make a handful of changes here. Actually, other people have comments so I wil! go to them next. Two things actually. Under ’Incentive’ and I couldn’t find it although I l,mow I read it in here somewhere it talks about reduced parking. We just did the Zoning Ordinance Update and as a part of that we looked at parking requirements. So personally I would not favor in any fashion parking reduction in exchange for Green Building compliance. The other is and this is not in the ordinance but since this is going to be passed by, resolution it is a concern I think I need to bring up. Renovation on a couple of occasions was referenced as interior improvements or remodeling. Renovation when it comes to existing buildings, historic or not, can often times affect the outside too. So to limit it to just interior by definition is \ery, very difficult I thi~ to apply in the real world. The last thing I will say; at this moment is the exceptions are listed separately, so you have to - they are part of the ordinance but they are not obvious. They are certainly not a part of Table A and Table B. So if you have an historic home and you go in and you ask for these checklists you are not going to know that you are eligible for exceptions that I can tell. It sound like you want to con-ect me there and I am happy to be corrected on that. Mr. Williams: If all you are looking at is the table it is our job to tell you that it is not the table. It is just like if you look at the tables in the Zoning Ordinance for CN it tells certain height things and everything but there are sections after that that tell you more about it. We started out with a table that if somebody got a hold of it they would just be overwhelmed by the amount of information trying to fit it in a table. If you try to sort of get everything in there and in the lbotnotes and it had 12 footnotes and more. So I understand that but I think is our responsibility to tell them if they have an historic home that we have an exception process and lead them to understand this is all one thing. It is not just the tables that they have to comply with. Page 29 4 5 6 12 13 t4 15 16 17 2O 22 23 ~4 25 26 "~7 29 3i 32 34 38 39 41 42 43 44 Chair Hol,n~an: In a perfect \,, orld I agree with you and I do trust Staff\\ill do due diligence but people are going to go online and down!oad these Tables A and B and they.’ are not going to see that. They, are going to be talking to their architects and contractors and they are going to be down the road and come in with decisions made, I fear. Two otl.1er Commissioners have lights on Commissioners Sandas and Keller and now COmmissioner Tuma I see you have a question. Did you want to say something right now as a follow C’o~qqnqissioner Tunna Just to your point. Cou]d~Tt the concen-~ that Chainnan Holrrmn has o11 this particular issue be addressed if.you put just some sort of notification i1.1 bold at the top of the table that pointed the applicar~t to make sure to review the \vhole thing and not just this page? .\’i~-. Williams: Yes, we certainly.; can a bold disclain.1er essentially that this relates to that ordinance and please review all of this as or~e package. Chair Holn~an: Commissioner Fineberg. CoP.qmissioner Fimeber~_: Can I suggest some wording on that? N’Iaybe sornetl~ing lit<e °historic homes or-1-~ornes with signitYcant adaptive reuse may be eligible for extra points at the discretion of tl~e Director,’ so that they get what it is for and that answers your sel-nantic issues that it is points, it is green, it is not exemption. b,’l~. \\Titlian~s: We could probably do that as a footnote. Then this \viii be kind of overriding at tl~e top or way at the bottom. The reference we are making here is to rnucl~ more than the Historic part of it. .~,’I]-. \Vi!liams: We mean looking at tl.1e whole ordir~ance wt~en you are comsidering v,;hat is in the tables. Chair Hoh-nan: It was wl.1y I asked the question earlier of Staff and also of David Kaneda earlier this e\ ening about how points were determined and tl.1ere didn’t seem to be a good answer available. So I don’t know why we couldn’t use some kind of rational point system for adaptive ieuse o~ restoration of building. N.’ir. Williams: \\Tell, I think the answer to tl.1at is it depends o11 whether we want somebody to ~et son.1etl.1in~ that thev can have certified through a process or not. 1Ki_~ht now LEED and Built It Green are not going to recognize those points. \Ve can’t write points for them. Chair Holman: But if you are tal!,:ing about single family residential and sometimes they are goir~g to want to get accredited to but a lot of people are not going to want to go to that level, don’t thi nit.. Page 30 1 6 9 10 11 12 !3 14 16 19 20 22 27 2~ 31 32 36 3~ 3~ 39 40 42 43 44 45 46 E4r. \Vi!liams: Yes, so we can’t artificially change the rating systems. \Vhat we could do is consider doing something separate that recognizes those buildings in a special way as green if you do something as far as reusing the building and then maybe comply with certain ones of these items on the remodeling checklist or something like that. [ think that is a customized process of creating our own list, which we have sort of been directed frmd<ly not to do at this point so we can get out and get on the train moving forward on these Green Building checklists. There is no~ a reason why we couldn’t on a separate track here get something else going regarding acl,:nowledging and recognizing and do our oxxn, some kind of, program for the kind of building that you are talking abouk The \x hole ~est of it as far as disincentives for basements and all that I think you know is a big economic issue in the community and in the region. \Ve have started that discussion on a couple of occasions and it has not gone to a point where changes have been made. So I don’t know hov,; to address that. Chair Holman: I said t certainly acknowledge that it is a difficult discussion but I don’t know lnow we can not have the discussion. This body certainly has~Yt had that discussion, t believe Commissioner Sandas was next. Commissioner Sandas: t am going to apologize ahead of time because I am only half awake. There are a couple of things, The first thing is that Chair Holman is just remarkable. I am so tired I am so sorry I am having a hard time saying this. You are remarkable. All those things that vou have brought up I share those concerns and I didn’t even realize it until I heard from ’,;ou. As tlne mal,:er of the motion however, and I am not sure that I am saying this out of expediency so that this can get to Council, should it go to Council considering some of the points Chair Holman has brought up this evening? On the hand on the other hand, I am kind of toying in n~y own mind. I think that this is a starting point. I think we are talking about progress and no[ pert’ection, l am curious about our ability to revisit this ordinance as time goes on. I Commissioner Lippert has mentioned that LEED won’t be the only game in town at some point so \xe should be prepared to readdress the Green Building issues when there are competitors in the marketplace to LEED. So I am thi~fldng that we haxe had a lot of amendments to the motion. I think you said there were eight of them and they have all been accepted. How many? h’1r. \Villian~s: Ten if you include the two footnotes. Commissioner Sandas: Okay, so I don’t know ifI can re-move the motion, say it again, but I think that let’s go with this starting point. Are we okay with going with this as a starting point? We have everybody speaking to their support of the motion and make sure that we have the opportunity to address these other issues that Chair Holman has brought up. Does that make sense to everybody at this late hour? It doesn’t make sense to Commissioner Keller. Chair Holman: Commissioner Keller you had your light on too. Commissioner Keller: Yes, thank you. Firstly with respect to Chair Holman’s comments I believe that Built It Green certificatior~ requires 50 points. Is that correct? Page 31 1 3 4 5 6 7 9 10 11 12 !3 14 15 16 17 19 2O "? ? 23 24 25 26 "~7 ~9 31 32 34 35 36 39 41 42 43 44 45 46 Williams: Their basic certification as opposed to what we are proposing, yes. Commissioner Keller: Yes, and therefore to the extent that we allowed points to be counted for adaptive reuse or remodels for the 70 points, to the extent that we allowed for that, if they still got at least 50 points on the official Build It Green scale they could still get that certificate and be happy. So I think that to the extent that we allow additional points for those considerations as long as we didn’t allow more than 20 points it would still work for them to get a nice certificate they could hang on their wall. Chair ttolman: Is that an amendment? Conqmissioner Keller: No~ it is not an an~endment. I don’t think it needs to be an amendment. I think that it is understood with respect to that. I would like a clarification to one of the things that I said, just to be clarified. I referred to sea le~eI rise of houses I also think it should refer to City, facilities which are in the floodplain, commercial property, and Highway t01, which are all endangered by sea level rise. So I am not sure i£that needs to be an amendment or it is_just a clarification of that. \.\Tith respect, I am going to make this as a recommendation but not as a tbnnal amendment, I am going to recommend that as part of this process that the Planning Department basically have a customer survey of some sort and ask the applicants to give feedback on how wetl this is working for them, and that that data be part of the data that comes back to us in a year. I thi~t,: we would like to know how much is this costing them, how much the additional effort is, how much the benefit it, do the houses sell faster, or whatever. At least we will have some sort of data on that. \Vitln respect to whether this is too soon, considering the life of these buildings is 50 years or more, I think it is not too soon. The experts tel! us that we have maybe ten years to turnaround t!ne amount of carbon dioxide that is being produced and start turning that to be lower. Considering x ehicles are turned over much faster than buildings the sooner the better from my perspectix e. So I would like to see this go in the future. One thing that I am not sure is pmt of the amendments to the ordinance but I believe it was something that in a written response to my questions was agree to by Staffis including basements whose height is seven feet or ~eater and including garages in the square footage. I just xxant to make sure that that’s part of the ordinance. Is that okay as an amendment if necessary by the maker? Comnqissioner Fineber~: Is it in the ordinance? Commissioner Sandas: Can you please repeat that? Nh. Williams: It is understood by, us. We don’t object to actually writing that where we have the part about the basements to also mention that attached garages would be part of the .... Page 32 9 10 12 13 14 !5 19 22 9_’. 26 3 32 33 34 35 36 3-- 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 Commissioner t,2eller: Right. That basically basements be included in this, and being explicit that basement \\itln a Ineight of seven feet or greater and attached garages are also included in the square footage. Commissioner Sandas: Does that need to be an amendment, yes or no? Mr. \Vitliams: To specifically put that language in the ordinance yes it needs to be an amendment. Commissioner Sandas: I will accept that even though I said I wasn’t going to take an)~nore Commissioner Fineber~: Clari~.ing question on that. Chair Holman: The seconder first. Seconder? Commissioner Tuma: Fine. ClnairHolman: Okay. Yes. Commissioner Fineber~: For green pucposes why does it matter whether the garage is attached or detached? It is still using resources. h’I~-. Williams: It is but it is not connected to particularly the energy use of the house. My understanding is there are actually some provisions or maybe even a point in one of these systems for detaching garages because then you draft have - there are certain energy losses that happen between the house and the garage if you have an attached garage. So you have to really sea! if )’ou are building above it or right next to it because that is not conditioned space. There a’;e some energy implications related to that that don’t happen if you have a detached garage. Commissioner Keller: I got distracted when you were reading your list of things. Can you remind me what number seven was? :,h. Williams Seven was the definitions, the New Construction that we break it out and call it New Construction, Residential. Commissioner Keller: Thank you ~2 would just like to make two more quick comments. One is I xx ould support not as a part of motion us at some point considering dewatering in more detail and basements. I am supporting that coming back to us at some point. Lastly, in terms of adaptive reuse I third,: that is a very important concern. I am actually collaborating wffh Build It Green on a project that they are doing where they are trying to create a database and system of the measures to correlate with the poin~ systems for Build It Green and try to quantiS, the greenhouse gas implications of doing those measures. I am with an organization that is actually giving them money to help them with this project. As part of that I would be happy to have them try to quanti~’ the idea of adaptive reuse versus teardown and start 9 10 12 15 !9 26 31 39 40 41 43 44 45 flom scratch. Perhaps that can be done as part of this database and system so that we could have better data for future ordinances and for future point systems. Chair Holman: Commissioner Lippe~ you had put your light on. Commissioner Li!~pert: I just want to say this is a first step. This is not a perfect process at all. There are things tlnat I am still unhappy with on this but I thi~fl( that it is prudent and important that we take that iSrst step. There will be time and opportunities for us to improve this in the \Vitln regard to Clnair Holman;s comments with regard to basements the process on basements l~as e\ olved and the net result of that is there have been unintended consequences, which continue to impact the whole issue of concrete and the carbon footprint it causes. One of them is that because you can no longer pump out the foundation around a basement and pump it out to ti~e street those basements actually have to stay within the ground. The groundwater wants to push tlne basement out of the ground so more concrete needs to be added to those basements and ~laose walls need to be made larger and dead weight has to be added so that they stay in the ground. Tlne net result of that of course is that concrete is a gross carbon polluter when it is produced. It can be reduced by using more fly ash in it but then walls aren’t really retaining walls and they are not heavy enough to be 3,000-psi concrete, which is ahat you need for a retaining wall So again it is not a perfect process. I think that the Green Building C,ode will eventually hash out a lot of these issues we just have to be patient with the process and let it play itself out. Until ’Aaen i think the best we can do is ~o adopt this ordinance with the amendments that we have addressed this evening. C’l~air Holman: Commissionec Fineberg. C’omP..~issioner Fineber~: I wanted to follow up a little bit on Chair Holman’s comments about how to handle the reduced parking requirements as an incentive for green. In certain projects where they are located near the urban centers where they are near public transit .... :\~Ir. Williams: I am sorry I am a little confused why- we are not considering any incentives at this point in time. Those \~ere in there listed as things that have been brought up to consider at some point but right now that is just a laundry list of suggestions that have come to us and there is nothing being proposed other than the ordinance has a sort ofplaceholder saying at some point tlne C,ity may adopt incentives. Cornmissioner Finebera: Okay, because I remember having seen it in the StaffReport and at this late hour forgive me if I didn’t distinguish between future so thmJ,: you for that correction. That does answer that. Then I also want to talk a little bit about, C,ommissioner Lippert has talked about the unintended consequences, there are going to be some surprises. \Ve are not going to know where things pop up. We are anticipating possible problems with basements. We are anticipating possible Page 34 9 10 11 14 16 17 19 2O 25 2(~ 29 31 32 33 35 ~6 38 39 41 42 43 44 45 46 problems with how when these are applied maybe historic properties get torn down. ,-~e there any quick releases or triggers that if we are seeing something happening; trends happening, that either really are not green or causing distortions where we don;t want them what is a quick way to get on top of that? Are we prepared or do we have to go tt~rough some long process and continue to have those unintended consequences? .N4r. \Villiams: If there is something that is really egregious for some reason we can bring that tbrward quickly but what I am expecting is we are coming back in a year and frankly I thi~fl( very little will lnave happened probably by that point. Again, we are talking abont going through the planning process, and going through the building review process, so we will not have any homes or commercial buildings constructed to the point of determining their compliance level in that one year. It is going to be probably two-years. I think coming back in one year will be adequate to at least be able to assess what we have learned so far, as tNr as how these chec.l(list work, what kind of additional cost and time constraint is that adding to the homeowner and the architect, and such and sucln? Have ~here been any issues that have arisen that might relate to historic buildings or how basements have been dealt with and trying to flag those things actually before they are out in the field being constructed? So I think one year is a good timeflame for that. We had talked about Inaving this sor~ of one-year transition and ended up with a tao year just because one year isn’t enough time to really be able to see what is happening as far as making the transition. We do want to come back because there will be some things that we lean~ in that year to repo~ back to you. Some new checklists could be out then too. Chair Holman: I have just a couple of wording things to add to the ordinance and then one clari~dng question about Attachment B. Attachment B is the resolution and tlne resolution refers to Attachn~ent A and Attachment B and those attachments refer to LEED NC checklist for instance but those checklists are going to change over time so I am wondering if there needs to be some otlner reference so that we don’t have people getting up~’aded checklists and there be contl~sion. In other words, NC checklist as of X-date isn’t referenced. E"lr. Williams: Oh, yes and we originally had that but our concern was that those are going to change and then it won’t be on here and we will not have updated it and they change and we should be using the most current of each of those checklists. We could put that on here, ’most current version of each checklist,’ or something like that. Chair Holnnan: It is your choice I was just trying to avoid confl~sion. :\lr. Williams’ VVe might be able to put that with the number two footnote that talks about compliance with other checklists. \Ve are going to do a similar one for Table B so it probably wouldn’t hurt. Chair Holman: Okay, ~-eat. Then Commissioner Sandas, as maker of the motion I do have just a small handful of language additions or changes I would like to add if you are so amenable. On Attachment A, the first page, again there is no reference on this page having to do with restoration. So in the third %~d~ereas’ if we could add after °construction’ in that first line add ~restoration’ and in the second line just to the right of that add ~resource conservation’ as opposed to ~et’ficiency,~ which is consistent xxith what was presented this evening. So it would Page .35 1 5 4 5 6 8 10 12 14 19 22 2~ 26 29 31 36 4O 42 4~ 45 read; "\Vhereas green building design, construction, restoration, operation, and maintenance can have a significant positive effect on energy, water, and resource conservation." N4r. \Villiams: So you added restoration and what was the other? Clnair Holman: Changed eftlciency to conservation after resource. Are those agreeable to the maker and seconder? Then the same thh~g on page two, H, because the design: restoration, construction, and maintenance of buildings and structures. So adding the word ’restoration.’ Commissioner Sandas: Yes. Chair Holman: Seconder? Chair Holman: Then on page three, ’the propose of this chapter is to e~J~ance the public health and welfare,’ I really so much like the language that is used on your presentation this evening. It talks about energy eftlciency in building and water and resource conservation and reduce waste gemerated by construction projects, provide durable buildings that are eft~cient and economical to o\vn or operate, promote the health and productivity of residents, x~ ol-l,:ers, and visitors to the city. That language is so good and t am not sure of the best way to incorporate that plus one bullet, this is an easy one, add one letter (f) under the Purpose statement is to recognize the energy in existing buildings. Would that be agreeable to add, Commissioner Sandas? Recognize the energy in existing buildings and this under Purpose, (f). Commissioner Sandas: Recognize the energy or the energy use? Chair Moln~an: \\%11 ~Inere is a lot of embodied energy in existing buildings, \vhich is ~he term ttnat is used lnaving to do with reuse. Con~missioner Keller: Can I suggest how about recognize the energy that was used to construct ~he existing buildings? Chair Holman: That is the embodied energy Curds. 5,Ir. \\’illiams: I was going to say, recognize and conserve the energy embodied in existing buildings. Chair Holman: Fine by me if that is agreeable to the maker. Commissioner Sandas: Okay. Clnair Holman: Seconder? Commissioner Tuma: Yes. Page 36 1 3 4 5 Chair Holman: I don’t want to try to wordsmith this it is too hard at this point but iffthe maker and seconder are agreeable to just trying to get in the Purpose section the language that is in the fourth box on the front page of the presentation, Purposes of’Draft Ordinance, into this Purpose section. It is the front page of your presentation this evening, Curtis. Mr. Williams: The fourth box. Purposes of Draft Ordinance. is that what "~ou are savino’) Chair Holman: You know I am not the night person I used to be it is there. So thank you for that. Yes. it is pointed out to me that the second box, Green Building, means a whole systems approach is under Definitions but it is not under Purpose. t am not sure if that is \vhere it best lies. ~) 10 1! 12 13 There was one correction in the Definitions. It talks about single family and R-2 seemed to be 14 not mentioned, although it is mentioned under T. There was another place where it mentions 15 single family and multi-family but it leaves out R-2 because it talks about tl=ee units or more and 1(~single I~mily. Tlnere is no reference to two units so if you just scan through you will find it. 17 1S Mr. Williams: Okay, because R has it in it too, Residential New Construction, single i~mily or ] 9 txx’o-t~mnily. 20 21 Chair Holman: Some places it is and some places it isn’t. 23 Commissioner Keller: I believe it is in definition E where it says any multi-family or single- ~ ’lhmilv residential new construction. Chai~ H~lman Thank you that ~s it. Thank you Commissioner. 2S Mr. Williams: Or two family. 29 30 Chair Holman: I think that is the end of my windy comments here. 31 32 Commissioner Sandas: .~nenable. DD ~Chair Holman So witln that we have two more. Commissioner Sandas and Commissioner )f Keller you have your liglnts on. Commissioner Sandas: No, no. 39 Chair Holman: Commissioner Sandas not. Commissioner Keller your light is on. 40 41 Commissioner Keller: I just want to make sure that we do not need an explicit amendment to the 42 motion or explicit guidance to you with respect to your being able to do the appropriate 4Z wordsmithing in response to my question seven. 44 45 Mr. Williams: Yes, we don’t need anything more than that. It is just an order issue. New 46 Construction, Commercial and New Construction, Residential. Page 37 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 1 I4 15 16 17 iS 19 20 -)1 25 26 ’)’7 -)9 33 34 35 Commissioner Keller: No, my question seven not your item seven. My question seven had to do with the use of the LEED name and what certification and that. Mr. \Villiams: Yes, we will put the trademark. Commissioner Keller: Also clari~dng the notion of certification versus verification sort of cleanup. Do you need that as part of the motion? MI. \Villiams: No, we ah-eady talked about it. That is just a cleanup item we will do. Commissioner Keller: Great. ?\It. Williams: Another one to mention to you are the two table s where it says mixed use at the bottom refers to using the residential table or the commercial table and they are mixed up. It says Table A for the residential and Table A is actually the commercial so we will change that. Chair Holman: The last thing I am going to say this evening other than let’s vote is I am really torn because part of me really wants to support all of this and I know it is going to pass. It is going to pass at least with six votes. I m~ sorely, tempted to vote against it just because I want to impress the importance of.these other aspects that are not addressed. So Commissioner Tuma. Commissioner Tuma: Let’s call the question. MOTION PASSED (6-1-0-0, Chair Holman voting nay,) Chair Hoh-nan: So the question will be voted on now, the motion as amended numerous times, \\hich I don’t think we need to reiterate at this point. said that up flont. I said I didn’t t<now where this would lead me o1 where I would come down. said that up fl-olqt. I did before, yes I did. Thank you, Commissioner Tuma you are right. So all those in favor? (ayes) All those opposed? (nay) So that motion passes on a six to one vote with Chair Holman voting nay Commissioners Tuma, Lippert, Sandas, Gather, Keller, and Fineberg voting aye. Page 3 8