March 13, 2024 Environmental Planning Commission

Video

Transcript

Segment 1

[00:07:35] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Good evening everybody. Welcome to the Environmental Planning Commission special meeting of March 13th, 2024. I will call the meeting to order at 7:02 p.m. For those joining us in person, please note, oh, it's 7:05. For those uh joining us in person, please note that due to our hybrid environment, audio and video presentations can no longer be shared from the lectern. Request to show an audio or video presentation during a meeting should be directed to epc@mountainview.gov by 4:30 p.m. on the meeting date.

[00:08:10] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Additionally, due to our hybrid environment, we will no longer have speakers line up to speak on an item. Anyone wishing to address the EPC in person must complete a yellow speaker card. Please indicate the name you would like to be called by, uh, when it's your turn to speak, and the item number on which you wish to speak. Please complete one yellow speaker card for each item on which you wish to speak, and turn them into the EPC clerk, right over there, as soon as possible, but no later than the call for public comment on the item you are speaking on. Instructions for addressing the commission virtually may be found on the posted agenda.

[00:08:49] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Regarding interpretation. This evening, we will have interpretation services in Spanish and Chinese for item 5.1 via Zoom. The Zoom translator function, identified as a globe, is located at the bottom of your Zoom screen. Please click the globe and select the language you prefer: English, or Spanish, or Chinese. If you do nothing, you will hear English deliberation, but you will not be able to hear English translation of Spanish or Chinese speaker public comment. Please welcome Eileen Lee, Ana Jimenez, Jason Walker, and Ivory Zhou who will be providing the translation services tonight.

[00:09:33] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Jason Walker and Eileen uh and Eileen Lee uh will turn it over to you to provide Spanish language and Chinese language instructions on how to set up the interpretation function.

[00:10:53] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Are we good? Okay. Thank you Eric. Um one last note before we get uh to roll call. So recently, regional and local elected and appointed bodies have been subjected to disruptive, racist verbal attacks by anonymous callers during virtual public comments. The City of Mountain View is is fully committed to racial, religious and cultural equity and justice as we strive to create a welcoming, safe and inclusive community for all. This advisory body, this commission, welcomes respectful and non-threatening public comments regarding matters over which the uh commission has jurisdiction. Comments deemed otherwise, pursuant to the council code of conduct and the government code may be grounds for immediately terminating a speaker's comment period.

[00:11:40] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: With that completed, now I will ask the EPC clerk, Clerk Hong, uh to proceed with the roll call.

[00:11:58] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Commissioner Clark?

[00:11:59] Commissioner Chris Clark: Here.

[00:12:01] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Commissioner Cranston?

[00:12:03] Commissioner Bill Cranston: Here.

[00:12:05] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Commissioner Donahue?

[00:12:07] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Here.

[00:12:08] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Commissioner Nuñez?

[00:12:10] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Here.

[00:12:12] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Commissioner Yin?

[00:12:13] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Here.

[00:12:15] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Vice Chair Gutierrez?

[00:12:17] Chair José Gutiérrez: Here.

[00:12:18] City Clerk Heather Glaser: And Chair Dempsey?

[00:12:19] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Here.

[00:12:20] City Clerk Heather Glaser: All commissioners are present.

[00:12:24] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Thank you, Madam Clerk. Oral communications. This portion of the meeting is reserved for persons wishing to address the EPC on any matter not on the agenda. Speakers are allowed to speak on any topic for up to three minutes during this section. State law prohibits the commission from acting on non-agenda items. If anyone in attendance would like to provide comments on non-agenda items, please fill out a yellow speaker card and provide it to the EPC clerk. If anyone on Zoom would like to provide comment on non-agenda items, please click the raise hand button in Zoom or press star nine on your phone. Phone users can mute and unmute themselves with star six. Madam Clerk, do we have any cards or hands up?

[00:13:08] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Uh we do not any have any speaker in person or on Zoom on this.

[00:13:14] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Alright. Having completed that, we may now move on to the main item at hand. Uh item five, the study session, 5.1 specifically, the R3 Zoning District Update, goals, phasing, sub-districts and location criteria. We do have again Spanish and Chinese interpretation for this item. We'll first have staff presentation followed by public comment. At the closure of public comment, the commission will then discuss the item including any questions. Staff presentation uh from our beloved Advanced Planning Manager, Eric Anderson.

[00:13:52] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Thank you very much. Um I will wait just a moment for the uh presentation to come up.

[00:16:24] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Thank you Chair Dempsey and Commissioners. My name is Eric Anderson, I'm joined by Amber Blizinski, the Assistant Community Development Director, and this is a study session regarding the R3 zoning district update.

[00:16:40] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: The R3 zoning district is the primary zoning district for apartments, condominiums and row homes in the city. It covers approximately 15% of the city's area and includes about half the city's dwelling units. It also covers nearly every rent stabilized apartment in the city. The area of the district is currently made up of about half apartments, 37% row homes and condominiums, and about 9% single-family homes and duplexes. The remainder are made up of churches, parks, child care, some commercial uses, and a few vacant properties.

[00:17:15] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: The project started back in 2020. Since then, it has gone through several rounds of outreach and study sessions, with the last study session in 2021. In addition, the project has been put on hold several times to address other city priorities, such as the displacement response strategy and the housing element. A few notes on the displacement response strategy: it is a related project led by the housing department. Because it's related because rent stabilized units are a key focus of the strategy, and the R3 zoning district contains the majority of rent stabilized units. Council in October directed staff to prepare a replacement ordinance that would go into effect when SB 330 sunsets. Another council study session is scheduled next week regarding other elements in the displacement response strategy.

[00:18:21] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: The city's housing element and various state laws must be considered in this project. Housing element programs include prototype analyses, updating definitions, lowering development costs through the reduction of standards, addressing state laws, allowing for live-work units, and incorporating some R2 areas. Relevant state laws include the state density bonus, which is frequently updated, SB 478, which sets limits on the city's floor area ratio (FAR) standards for smaller projects, SB 684, which creates a ministerial pathway for smaller projects starting in July, and of course SB 330, which includes a replacement requirement for rent stabilized units and a prohibition on down-zoning through the year 2030.

[00:19:09] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: A few more notes about state density bonus. Most projects that use it will be eligible for waivers and concessions of development standards that the city has little control over. Therefore, the R3 project cannot realistically anticipate everything that can be built, even if densities are not increased.

[00:19:31] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Since the project has not had EPC or council input since 2021, and staff has conducted extensive outreach since then, staff is seeking direction on the draft project goals, which are based on public input during outreach as well as council direction uh from previous study sessions. The first draft goal concerns opportunities for more diverse unit types. The second articulates key features of the community's design vision. The third reflects the community's support for neighborhood serving uses. And the fourth reflects the city's statutory requirements.

[00:20:10] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: The last goal is about growth, and it has the most significant consequences on how the project is carried out and the remaining questions for this study session. Some considerations for increasing allowed densities: there wasn't clear consensus in the community regarding the amount of growth this project should include. There are opportunities for discretion on a project-by-project basis if the council is interested in increasing densities, but staff would need to conduct more analysis and bring back those options. Increasing densities may also create more opportunities to support other R3 goals, such as increasing the diversity of unit types and supporting more commercial customers. The first question for discussion tonight is what feedback does the EPC have on the goals for the R3 project, and does the EPC support goal five.

[00:21:04] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: The second question tonight is about project phasing. One option would be to take a phased approach to the project, addressing the mandated uh items such as the housing element programs first. The city would then start work on the discretionary items like density increases and the required environmental review. This option would complete the required items quickly, allowing the city to focus on non-required changes at a thoughtful pace. It would ensure compliance with housing element timelines, and the city could conduct density work in tandem with any necessary analysis for replacement requirements.

[00:21:44] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Another option is a combined approach, where the density increases and required elements are done in the same process. This may reduce some duplicated efforts, but it is unlikely we would be able to meet the deadline for the housing element requirements. The second question for discussion is if the city council wishes to increase general plan densities in the R3 zoning district, should the city phase the project by addressing the housing element and state law requirements and other related tasks first, or should the city continue with the full scope of the project.

[00:22:23] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: The third question is to provide uh receive feedback on the R3 sub-districts and densities. To provide context, here are the existing general plan designations that are in the range of the current R3 zone.

[00:22:39] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Each of the proposed sub-districts is associated with an approximate density range. These are tentative and subject to change. These density ranges are also equivalent to an existing general plan designation. This helps provide a framework for decision makers to understand what could result if no density increases are proposed, or if there are necessary uh updates in the general plan. These on the screen now are potential images of the R3A zone, including neighborhood multiplexes and neighborhood townhomes. Buildings in this sub-district would be two to two and a half stories and about 15 to 25 units per acre. This zone could be appropriate for upzoning some R2 areas. It may be a down-zone relative to current R3 standard standards and densities, so it should only be used in existing R3 areas if other areas are upzoned.

[00:23:38] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: These are potential images of the R3B zone, which would be roughly equivalent to the medium density residential general plan designation, which covers about 70% of the existing R3 zone. It includes building types such as neighborhood townhouse, neighborhood courtyard, as well as smaller core multiplexes. Buildings in this sub-district would be three to three and a half stories and about 25 to 35 units per acre.

[00:24:09] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: These are potential images in the R3C zone, which would be roughly equivalent to the existing medium-high density residential general plan designation, which covers about 28% of the existing R3 zone. It would include building types such as core townhouse, core multiplex, and core courtyard. Buildings in this sub-district would be three to three and a half stories and about 35 to 50 units per acre.

[00:24:40] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: And these are potential images in the R3D1 zone, which would allow block-scale buildings up to four stories and about 50 to 75 units per acre. It's roughly equivalent to the existing high-low density general plan designation. It would be it would include building types such as core courtyard and mid-rise.

[00:25:06] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: These are potential images in the R3D2 zone, which would allow block-scale buildings up to six stories and about 75 to 110 units per acre. It is roughly equivalent to the existing high density general plan designation, and would include building types such as core courtyard and mid-rise.

[00:25:31] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: It's important to remember that the city is prohibited from reducing overall development density under SB 330. This means that if the EPC and council are not interested in increasing allowed densities, the project should focus on sub-districts B and C, and sub-district A only in R2 areas. There may be an option to incorporate R4 into the project if the city council is interested in the R3D2 uh sub-district. Existing height overlays and the existing R3D zone will also need special considerations depending on the other sub-districts selected. The third question for discussion is what densities and which character sub-districts should be included in developing alternatives that staff will bring back for EPC and council consideration at a later date.

[00:26:27] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: The last question is regarding location criteria for new densities or commercial uses. In order to bring back sub-district map alternatives for decision maker review, staff is seeking input on the criteria for locating densities and commercial uses. These criteria are based on public comment, council direction, and best practices. The EPC may wish to identify other criteria or provide feedback on how the criteria should be considered.

[00:26:57] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: And these are potential criteria for where to locate commercial uses. The final question is what feedback does the EPC have on the criteria for where to locate higher densities and commercial uses.

[00:27:14] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Next steps for this project are shown here and are largely contingent on council direction on April 9th.

[00:27:24] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: This is a summary of questions before the commission, and this concludes our presentation. We're happy to answer any questions you might have. Also available are the project consultants with uh Opticos, Stefan Pellegrini and Tony Perez. Thank you.

[00:27:40] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Thank you, Mr. Anderson. And I think with that we go to public comment. If anyone in attendance would like to provide comments on this item, please fill out a yellow speaker card and provide it to the EPC clerk. If anyone on Zoom would like to uh provide comment on this item, please click the raise hand button in Zoom or press star nine on your phone. Phone users can mute and unmute themselves with star six. Clerk Hong?

[00:28:07] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Uh we have three speakers in person and one speaker on Zoom. I'll call the in-person speakers first. So the first speaker is Robert Cox and followed by Tony Rath.

[00:28:22] Robert Cox: How many minutes do I have?

[00:28:26] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: We'll be doing three minutes per speaker uh for public comment.

[00:28:30] Robert Cox: Okay. All right. Um ready to go? Chair Dempsey, Vice Chair Gutierrez, and members of the EPC. I'm Robert Cox representing Livable Mountain View. We've already sent a letter on this topic so let me say something about our key point without repeating everything we've already said to you in the letter. We support making our neighborhoods more walkable, enhancing their tree canopy, providing sensitive transitions to existing homes. But we do not believe this is the right time to do a wholesale increase in density in the R3 zoned areas, or an inclusion of the R3D1 or D2 zones which are effectively R4 zones. Here are two reasons we do not favor upzoning R3 now. First, rezoning existing R3 naturally affordable and rent control apartments will displace the existing tenants. The public outreach to those tenants show they do not favor displacement from their homes even if with a right to return years later. Secondly, Covid has made major changes in the way that our tech employees work. Many tech employees now work from home, others work in an office only a few days a week. We have had tech layoffs and corresponding population decreases in the Bay Area each of the last three years. 10% of our newest apartments lie vacant, which is twice the normal level. The scant new housing in the pipeline promises to be more of the same small dense luxury units which are not desirable for people working many days a week from home, especially if they need space to raise a family. We have yet to reach a steady state in this post-Covid world. Mountain View is on schedule if we take the normal cadence of 20 years to writing a new general plan in four years. At that point we will have a better idea of what the post-Covid tech world is and how to plan the next 20 years for our city. Changes in zoning beyond what is required in the housing element can be explored with broad public outreach. The city can write up new precise plans and vet them with targeted public outreach. This would yield a much better outcome for the public than a one-size-fits-all R3 rezoning solution now. Many of my closest friends have left Mountain View because state mandates and some of the people in our city leadership are demanding that new housing be built without park space, parking, and other amenities that make our city a desirable place for current and future residents. We need to change course or residents of our city will continue to vote with their feet and leave Mountain View. Our city deserves a better future than that. Thank you for listening to our concerns.

[00:31:04] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Next is Tony Rath, and followed by Albert Jeans.

[00:31:10] Tony Rath: Thank you for the opportunity to uh comment on this item. Um I'm Tony Rath, I uh live in the R3 zone uh in Cuesta Park. And um I would like to ask you to recommend going with the two-stage approach that uh was uh mentioned in the staff report. So basically first take care of the uh state mandated changes and then consider uh doing R3 upzoning if um desired. Um I am not in favor of a blanket um upzoning in the R3 zone. And um if we are to consider density increases in that zone, we need to make sure that we get it right. And so I would like to ask that it is tailored to the neighborhoods. For example, the neighborhood that I live in looks much closer in character to an R1 or an R2 zone. So it is, it has a lot of single family homes in it, uh fairly small lots, and there are a few apartment buildings, but for the most part, most people would agree that it looks like an R1 or an R2 zone. So it does not match what the staff report shows as uh rowhouses on the low end of the density spectrum. So clearly our neighborhood is lower in density uh than that. Um and so I think it's important for the acceptance by the community that uh you know, the existing character of these neighborhoods is uh being respected and preserved to the extent that it can. Um it is also important that we preserve the ability to course correct if we make mistakes. So Mountain View is already looking to increase the number of dwelling units by 50% or more in the coming years. And so it is important that we learn from this exercise and see where the problems are because we're not really looking at schools, we're not looking at water, we're not looking at electricity, uh just to mention a few. So I think it is important that we uh learn from this and make sure that we have the ability to change course if we make a mistake. And so a blanket upzoning of this district I think could potentially lead to big mistakes that we cannot undo uh especially because the state is tying our hands in terms of turning things back. Um finally I'd like to say that the development standards that we have are important in helping ensure the preservation of the tree canopy that we have, the green spaces, the shaded streets, the inviting uh walkable neighborhoods that we all want. And so it is important that we preserve some semblance of these um development standards so that we can continue to enjoy this great community that it is. Thank you.

[00:33:53] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Next is Albert Jeans followed by Salim Dameji.

[00:35:31] Albert Jeans: Alright. Thank you very much. Okay my name is Albert Jeans. Um yeah I actually agree with both the previous speakers even though I didn't talk to them before this meeting. And so next slide please. Yeah you as you said this was presented to us both in 2020 and 2022. And I remember the 2020 presentation, people were really aghast at the proposed densities that were being proposed. They ended up having things like four story buildings next to one story residential as shown on the left here from Monta Loma and Farley. And so it seemed like staff got the message and the 2022 presentation was much more reasonable, as shown on the right there, where you had, you know, sensitive transitions and all that stuff, and all that sounded really good. So I'm kind of surprised that staff came back this time and said, 'We're going back to the 2020 presentation.' I mean maybe they need the bigger variety in buildings to conform to the different um types of buildings we see in R3 right now, but I think it's definitely gonna have to look more like the right hand side if you're gonna have community acceptance. Next slide please. As the previous speaker mentioned, you know we can't just have unlimited growth in Mountain View without thinking about the consequences. One of those is parkland. This is a little map that I put together which shows city owned parkland and the ratio of parkland to the number of people, which is supposed to be three acres per thousand. And shown in the green is the actual numbers, and this is based on city owned parks, not including the schools, because you know those have all been fenced off now, at least for most of the day. And in my neighborhood which is Stierlin, you know we only have .43 acres per thousand. And yet in the next few years, that is entitled projects that have either been built or are in construction right now, we're adding 3,000 people in that area. And there's only I think maybe a one acre park being built um on the Eaves property. So we're even falling farther behind in that. So if you upzone R3 and start letting people just build willy nilly, I mean this is going to be a disaster. Next slide please. And this yeah, this is just for my area, Stierlin Estates, I mean Stierlin area, you can see in 2020 the population was 10,000, there's gonna be an increase of about 3,000 people because 1400 units are going to be added. You know we should be getting a nine acre park, and yet nothing like that is even on the horizon. Next slide please. And so as with the previous speakers, I believe that any long-term growth should be well planned and should be part of the general plan. I mean you gotta think about how you're gonna do this, you know, schools, parks, utilities, shopping, retail. You just can't keep adding people and expecting the quality of life to stay the same. And zoning should not, should only be used to realize those goals, and not to initiate growth on its own. Thank you.

[00:38:41] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Next is Salim Dameji, followed by Hala Alshawaf-Wani.

[00:38:50] Salim Dameji: Thank you for the opportunity to speak. Um as you know the housing element is a contract, it's legally binding, uh that is HCD's interpretation um, and they're the ones who get to enforce the rules. Uh so one of the things that's omitted um in much of the staff report is analysis of how the housing element program affects uh both the two-phased approach and the optionality of goal five in the remainder of the staff report. Um if you read the housing element program, uh it's drafted quite well. Program 1.3.a uh the city has to conduct a development prototype study, update definitions as necessary, uh revise multi-family development standards in major districts, including R3, and precise plans to ensure projects can at minimum meet their allowed density. And here's the important part: 'are economically feasible, where possible through reductions of physical development standards.' Economic feasibility and cumulative effects of standards will be inputs in the reduction of standards. Okay. So, a number of things. One, you cannot possibly satisfy the legally required elements of the housing element without also reducing the physical uh constraints on what's allowed to be built. Opticos completed a design prototype study in 2020 and identified five constraints to development in R3, and so the city is on record as having identified uh different constraints that currently prevent projects from being economically feasible. Uh development has gotten worse um in the last four years, so uh we will have to do more than what's outlined in the Opticos study. Uh for context, the reason why this program is in the housing element is that staff did not want to add comments about R3 in the constraints portion of the housing element. You'll recall this. Uh and so the reason why this program is here is because there was a it was one way of creating a foothold to make sure that the city actually does what it's legally required to do. Um staff wanted optionality on how they went about making development feasible in R3, uh again this is another dishonest and bad faith attempt to renege on housing element obligations. The last time I was here, um the planning commission voted three to two against regulation uh in favor of regulations against homeless shelters in most of El Camino, uh despite having trepidations about the legality of doing that, and you asked staff to talk to HCD uh about whether that's legal or not. Um so HCD is aware of this now, uh and additionally they'll be made aware of this R3 uh reneging if if this is how the city proceeds. Um but you should just keep in mind the general practice that planning commission does not want to get into. You do not want to get into a general practice of having staff propose something that is clearly legally dicey, and for the planning commission to fall back on asking HCD for what for what they should do. If you do this as a general practice, then there will be like a dozen different programs the city has to act on without first getting HCD's... time is up. Yeah, thank you.

[00:41:58] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Um next person is Hala Alshawaf-Wani.

[00:42:04] Hala Al-Shahwany: Yes, good evening. Um excuse me. Good evening EPC uh Chair and members, thanks for uh giving the opportunity to give input on this this. My name is Hala Alshawaf-Wani, I'm a longtime uh resident of Mountain View. Um I wanted to uh concur with the staff report um that uh we have met the the uh housing requirement, and actually I I think our city has done a a fantastic job in doing that uh accommodating uh you know the necessary changes that we needed to do so we can meet the state requirement. Um however, R3 rezoning would require significant, with really big impacts on almost 50% of the city as the staff report uh stated. Um I support my earlier colleagues uh uh Mr. Albert Jeans and his statement that we should take our time, uh not hurry, and make sure that all the other things that the city are working for, such as um doing developments that would have walkability and pedestrian uh friendly, wide sidewalks, parks, open space, all the infrastructures that we might need or we will need, not we might, but we will need with the increase of the the number of residents. Um the impact on the climate and climate extremes, the current climate extremes, you really have to think about that because increasing density very quickly without any regulations or any uh thought put forward will have extreme and and negative impacts on the residents, on the environment, and so forth. Um I support developments that go through general and precise plans. Those seem to work really well because they address each community and their needs whatever they are. As you know it's different throughout the city, and I think that would be a much better way to do the upzoning um, and I think we have the time since the cycle of 2024 to 30, 32 has been met. Uh and I have to commend the city on on the ability of having done that. Thank you.

[00:44:31] City Clerk Heather Glaser: We still have Zoom speakers. The first speaker would be Bruce England. Uh Bruce you can talk now.

[00:44:49] Bruce England: Thank you very much. Bruce England, speaking for myself although a number of these points come from also Mountain View Coalition for Sustainable Planning and Green Spaces Mountain View.

Segment 2

[00:45:01] Bruce England: And other groups that I talk with. I have eight points, but I'll go through them as quickly as I can. One, please include requirements for robust pass-through opportunities where those walking and biking through project locations can readily move through them. Um, please encourage design... second, please encourage designs that address needs for seniors, those with disabilities, those with small children. One key need is including any means we can to help those age in place that choose to do so and are able to. Third, multi-floor buildings under development should incorporate active design elements. That means emphasizing stairways over elevators. Um, to help encourage active, uh, activities among people who are in Mountain View. Number four, primary goal for any residential project is that housing be affordable, with little or no displacement of current residents resulting. Where displacement can't be avoided, we'd like to see in place robust relocation measures provided to those affected. Also, for new residents, a broad range of transit and other transportation options be made available. This could include providing transit passes and coordination with local transit and transportation agencies. Number five, during construction phases, make sure, please, that sidewalks and walkways are not blocked more than they need to be. This is sometimes really a problem in Mountain View. Signages can be lacking and people don't know what's going on and they have to go around, not great. Six, please accommodate work-from-home environments. Very important to consider. This is a way of working that will not be going away in some form. Seven, please plan on incorporating applicable elements from the Biodiversity Strategy and Urban Forest Plan when those are adopted by the city, which is expected in the near future. The best designs will serve both human and non-human needs. Similarly, adequate park space is needed as was pointed out by a previous speaker. And lastly, number eight, please plan on incorporating elements from the new Dark Sky Ordinances once those are adopted, which is anticipated to happen in the next year or so. Thank you.

[00:47:07] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Next person is Edie Keating, followed by Louise Katz. Edie, you can talk now. Sorry Edie, can you try one more time? Yes.

[00:47:28] Edie Keating: Hello, good to go? Okay. So I would like to speak to the benefits of increased densities. Increased density is what supports, people who live here and shop here is what supports local retail. And when local retail maintains active and vital in the all the different little nooks and crannies of retail areas, then that increases walkability and bikeability. It makes someone more likely to take a shorter walk rather than a longer walk to go get the one or two items they need at the grocery store or to go to a coffee shop. So I think increasing density in appropriate places is a way to vitalize and, you know, continue vitalizing Mountain View. And with more work from home and more people doing food deliveries and from restaurants and from grocery stores. Um, I think it's important to maintain those retail areas with more density. And the, SB 330 has done a great job to slow down, basically stop redevelopment of apartments. And so I don't think that we, there needs to be too much concern especially with Council's commitment to a replacement when SB 330 someday sunsets. And I do care about transitions and I also very much support height. Because when land is redeveloped, that sets it in place for a long time. And when there's height, that allows the green space, the attractive landscape buffers at the edges. Um, you know, keeping those, that greenery and beauty, while allowing the density that that makes this a vital place, it's the people of Mountain View that are using all its facilities and stores. And I think density will improve the city. So I hope that you will support increasing density and height. And I hope you will also... I'm optimistic about stacked flats. My understanding is that they will be a way to let each level have more light entering the units. I would love to have bought a single-family home. I couldn't afford that. I'm very happy with the condo that I did buy in Mountain View. And many families are going to be considering what can they afford. So increased density will give them options. Thank you.

[00:50:44] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Next person is Louise Katz, followed by David Wasson. Louise, you can talk now.

[00:50:54] Louise Katz: Thank you very much and to the EPC for having this meeting. I wanted to address two points. The issue of the lobbying that seems to come forth whenever we have these discussions about density, that there should be no setbacks. And that somehow setbacks are going to prevent us from having housing or enough housing. And I think in particular what the last speaker noted is that, you know, we need green spaces, we want them. But there are parties who are arguing that there should be no setbacks, that should be one of the goals. And of course, I think most will agree, especially considering what's in this staff report and basically every other report that I've seen, which is people do want walkable streets with shade trees. They want green spaces amidst the density that will come. And having no setbacks also means having no space for trees. Somehow that no parking is good and space for trees is bad. That is a very strange equation. And I hope there's none of our governing party, offices embrace that. The other concern that I have is the issue of displacement, that we seem to be creating a vocabulary of very fine and reassuring words that people will get to come back after three years. But I don't see any data that tells us how entire buildings of residents who will be thrown out will actually be able to navigate market rate housing for years while they wait for something to be available for them to come back to. We know there's no real transit on the horizon. And we know that if people have to live far away from jobs that they currently have, it's very unlikely those jobs are going to wait for their return if they don't have private transit to come back and forth. So I would like the commission and others to ask how can we actually have what the council wants, which is to understand how to develop an ordinance regarding displacement. If we don't have the data as to what will actually be the fate of all of these people. I find it curious that Sacramento and the organizations that brought us our housing policies have included volumes of numbers for RHNA, tiny setbacks, fees, parking ratios, etc. But they don't seem terribly interested in giving us data as to how displacement will actually affect the lives of our fellow residents. And I think that is information we should have to guide our council and you. Thank you.

[00:53:46] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Next person is David Wasson, followed by Alex Brown. David, you can talk now.

[00:53:57] David Watson: I'd like to follow up. I think you noticed Salim's comments early on on the city's legal obligations. Those are very insightful, you should really take another look at those comments. I also want to share a personal perspective though on why this is so critical. As a lifelong resident of Mountain View, I've seen friends forced to leave, not because our parks are lacking, but because they couldn't afford our skyrocketing rents. Our city's restrictive zoning laws, tight setbacks, height limits, density restrictions, they're throttling our ability to meet the urgent need for affordable housing. It's not just a policy issue, it's about the lives and futures of our community members. California law compels us to facilitate affordable housing development. But beyond the legal imperative, it's a moral one. Our actions now will determine whether Mountain View remains a vibrant, inclusive community or becomes an enclave accessible only to the highest earners. I urge us to prioritize practical, immediate solutions that increase housing availability. Our friends, families, future generations deserve a Mountain View they can afford to call home. Thank you.

[00:55:17] City Clerk Heather Glaser: The last is Alex Brown. Alex, you can talk now.

[00:55:23] Alex Brown: Hey friends. Like many of the folks commenting tonight, I've been involved in the meeting since the project kicked off. As Eric is definitely aware. Hi Eric. The comments from the public in those meetings was not quite as monolithic as was implied by some of the earlier speakers. There were many participants who called for increased density and height limits, and especially mixed-use developments with ground-floor retail. I am glad we went back to the alphabet plan. I like the slides and descriptions much better than the pseudo-form-based options in the second round of outreach. I'll reiterate my call from years back for R3D 1 or 2, wherever we can. We shouldn't aim for the bare minimum. We should try to do what we can to fix historic injustices and inequities. We should not use previous generations' failures to build housing as justification to block building new housing. The crisis we are in cannot be solved by continuing the patterns and practices that got us into it. If we want parks, we should better utilize land by building up to free up space, not encourage greater sprawl. I also agree with Bruce's call for stairs, but that's mostly because I like stairs. Maybe we can do some single-stairwell plans in R3. I feel like David might appreciate that. I was also sad that Albert had slides but no city skyline simulations. I miss Albert's simulations. And anyway, have fun commissioners, looking forward to the discussion. Thanks.

[00:56:44] City Clerk Heather Glaser: We actually have one more speaker, Ilya Gurin. Ilya, you can talk now.

[00:56:54] Ilya Gurin: Can you hear me? Thank you. My name is Ilya Gurin, and hello members of the Environmental Planning Commission. I believe the main goal of this update should be to enable new housing. The staff report, as well as many of the commenters we just heard from, have expressed a desire for a housing stock that's better than what exists today according to various criteria. The only way this will happen in the R3 zone is if new housing is feasible and actually gets built. We've spent years discussing and rehashing our goals for the R3 zone. It's time to wrap up this process and put forth standards that will increase housing availability and improve our built environment. Over.

[00:57:47] City Clerk Heather Glaser: Okay, thank you. That's all of our speakers.

[00:57:51] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Thank you, Madam Clerk. Okay, having completed that, uh, we may now turn to questions from the commissioners. Um, with the forbearance of, of my colleagues here, 'cause there's a lot to cover and a lot of complexity in this, I want to see if we can kind of break it up into little pieces and, and be orderly as we, as we go through this. So, um, I will, I will try to use straw polling because I think straw polling is a good way to kind of make sure uh, we don't spend too much time on things that we already agree on. Um. Question number one, feedback on the five draft goals. If we can maybe do... Does anybody have questions on goal number one, create opportunities for diverse unit types including middle income ownership and stacked flats? Do you have questions on that first one? Anyone? Commissioner...

[00:58:44] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Is it possible to get the goals like up on a screen somewhere highly visible for the public's sake as well?

[00:58:51] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Great question, I think, um, Mr. Anderson, I believe you have that. Does that answer your question, Mr. Nuñez? All right. All right, well, let's get some questions answered. Um. Commissioners. uh, for number one, creating opportunities for diverse unit types. Any questions of staff or anybody else? We're good? Oh. I gotta look at the screen. Commissioner Gutiérrez. Thank you, sir.

[00:59:40] Chair José Gutiérrez: Yes, thank you, Chair Dempsey. I have a general question, not related to this first though. Albert, is it possible to have his PDF also be sent to us as well? Because I know right now he just presented it ad hoc, but I'm just trying to figure out, could we get a copy of that?

[00:59:56] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Do you, do you still have the copy that you... okay. Uh, it would have to be emailed to the EPC. Yeah, so if he emails it to EPC, I'll send it to you. Thank you, Albert.

[01:00:14] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Yin.

[01:00:16] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Just a quick question. Did the benchmark cities that staff had provided, um, examples of, I know a lot of them were like four to seven stories, were any of those ownership? Or like an approximate proportion?

[01:00:34] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Um, that data came from our consultants Opticos. Um, Mr. Pellegrini, do you have any data on roughly the proportion of tenure for any of those benchmark, uh, studies?

[01:00:51] Consultant Pellegrini: Chair, I I do not. I have that information. Uh, it wasn't requested, but uh, we can follow up with that information if it's uh, pertinent.

[01:01:00] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Okay, thanks.

[01:01:08] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Actually, I have one more if you guys are willing to entertain me. Um, in the slides that you showed for the various typologies, um, or subdistricts, I guess you call them them. Um, there were, I don't know if you can put them up, but in the first couple, I was curious if those are considered stacked flats. Um, if you can pull it up easily.

[01:01:44] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: It's, it's difficult to know specifically from the slides. Uh, it's often hard to tell if it's, if it's stacked, uh, if it's ownership or or if it's apartments. Um, and sometimes it's even hard to tell from an individual image if it's a kind of a shared entrance or an individual unit entrance. Uh, like the image on the left there, those could be shared entrances or they could be individual unit entrances, it's a little difficult to tell. Uh, the the the lower right image, um, uh, could be, um, could also be individual entrances or it could be shared entrances. A part of the, I think, the the benefit of a a kind of form-based approach is that those types of of distinctions can can blend in better with, so so you can have a stacked unit that looks like a a row unit or, you know, um, and and they can blend in better with a a broader range of different, um, kind of building type environments as well. Um, I would say almost certainly the one on the lower left there is stacked. Um, and that could be, there's no reason why those couldn't be condominiums. It's hard to know.

[01:03:19] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Okay, thanks. I just wanted to, to just clarify, um, when we use the term stacked flat, um, whether or not they can be done at various levels of density.

[01:03:30] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yes, absolutely.

[01:03:31] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Okay, thank you.

[01:03:35] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Nuñez.

[01:03:38] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Thanks Chair Dempsey. Um, in the housing element in that program 1.3, there is a reference to the, uh, conduct a prototype study. Uh, so I'm wondering what constitutes a prototype study is any of that underway actively. Um, what's the timeframe, if so, in terms of that being delivered, as much as can be expounded on that might be helpful.

[01:04:05] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Sure. Uh, so we've already done a lot of work on that. And uh, one of the public speakers actually alluded to, you know, information that we've already provided decision-makers around um, kind of the outcome from uh prototype analysis. Uh basically, it's a very simplistic um, uh, uh, designing of of projects, right? So you just do these very block kind of unit locations on different uh lot sizes. And um, we've already done permutations of this of, you know, dozens of different lot sizes and configurations. Um, I think what we can do to um implement the Housing Element program is to uh bring that analysis back to the, the forefront based on this discussion, right? So we're reorienting ourselves to this project based on all the community outreach that we've done and other things that have changed in the community, a new new information. Um, and um, and then we'll go back into that work.

[01:05:33] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: So then in terms of, uh... I'm hearing a lot of work has been done in what would be considered a prototype study, um, and some of that has already gone to decision makers. Um, sorry if it's a redundant or or silly question here. Um, exposing my uninformedness, but uh, what has that progress thus far, um, informed? Like what was it, what has it targeted? Has it been, uh, incorporated into our housing element that was approved? Has it been, um, you know, part of the displacement like, where has that work product thus far been showing up?

[01:06:14] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: So, um, again, one of the public speakers talked about the uh the housing element program, uh, which specifically says, um, you know, reduced development standards in the R3 to make projects more feasible. So it says to, you know, where possible by reducing development standards, uh, support economic feasibility. Um, and so, um, we have that analysis which has identified several development standards which have the biggest impact on development feasibility. And things like open area requirements, which are very high in R3, um, you know, much higher than you need in order to have, you know, a walkable tree canopy frontage, for example. Um, we have a, uh, setback standards that increase with the the height of the building and those standards get very, very difficult to implement and very expensive to implement on especially on smaller parcels. Um, so they're, they're, there are a range of standards that we've already identified that we can continue to move forward on. But these, um, you know, kind of first questions first, we want to kind of reorient ourselves on this project based on all the community outreach that we've done and and and and then we'll go back into that work.

[01:07:48] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Okay, so my last question here just to confirm confirmation of what I'm hearing, and correct me anywhere that I'm wrong. It sounds like we have conducted, uh, if not a prototype study that is complete, um, significant portions of one that have informed the housing element that have informed this staff report here. Uh, and therefore it might be fair to say that that prototype study has yielded, um, in particular within the housing element, uh, constraints that have already been identified as part of the housing element and which also are, uh, for the purpose of us being able to identify the means and ways for us to, uh, in the future by the end of this housing element cycle have the 8-9,000 units that we're supposed to be having per our commitment to HCD. Is that, is that fair?

[01:08:50] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: So, the, the, the housing element sites inventory and our RHNA has we've already met the requirements of the state to identify a sites inventory adequate for our RHNA. Um, we have a few sites that we still have to rezone uh to to be in full compliance with that. Um, but um the uh R3 zoning district was never intended to be necessary to meet our RHNA. And that was clear from very early in the um in the housing element process with the council. Thank you.

[01:09:39] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Gutiérrez.

[01:09:42] Chair José Gutiérrez: Thank you, sir. So, having you just share that parts of the prototype study 1.3.A have been shared with other decision makers, that's great information to have. One of the questions I have is, do you think that would have been beneficial for you to bring that up to us as a resource so that we could also have that in addition to all the other information that we did have to then be able to conceptualize what could be done, right, and then how we can frame the argument of pros and cons so that we can then have an understanding, a greater fuller understanding of specifics, right, so that we can contribute uh at a higher level?

[01:10:25] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: So the, the information that was provided to decision makers was attached to previous council reports, I think probably the October 2020 council report. Um, that, um, uh, and and there was a lot of analysis that was that was presented as part of that council report and study session report, which was linked in this staff report. Um, you know, we we have uh a lot of analysis that we have presented in this report and there's there's a lot of different dimensions on which we're trying to get answers to these questions. Um, if you feel you need more, uh, then uh that is uh good feedback to staff and to the city council and uh that can inform future uh future work on this project.

[01:11:16] Chair José Gutiérrez: Thank you, Eric. And then my follow-up question is, in terms of the community input when it was pointed out to us both by speakers here present and then those who had chimed in through email, uh, especially from that wagon wheel. I think there was a perspective that um, the 2020 feedback session from the community versus the 2022 and that one was picked over the other. Uh, could you explain a little bit more in detail why that happened, what the rationale was for that?

[01:11:42] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Sure. So the, the 2020 approach, which we had two workshops about and the um and and a study session about back in 2021, um, was uh a had a had a broad range of different uh densities and building types that was associated with these different sub-districts. Um, that there was a map that was prepared and presented to council based on the previous public input. And council reviewed that map and said well go touch base with the community some more and get more input and maybe reassess some of the criteria for where you're locating some of these sub-zones. So then we went back to the community and just as a matter of um kind of sparking conversation to see if we could hone in on different um different ideas in the community. We presented a different framework for locating densities and how those densities could their forms could be um organized. And it was a narrower range of densities. So, um, the the A in the 2020 approach was less dense than the A in the 2022 approach. And the D in the 2020 approach was more dense than the C, it only went up to C in the 2022 approach. So, the the narrower range of densities was less meaningful to the community. There were questions about what those different that range meant and how it might um end up um creating differences between neighborhoods. So, as a result we we discarded that framework, but we're not necessarily going back to the 2020 map. We're keeping the 2020 framework of sub-districts, but we're starting again from square one about how should this framework of densities be organized in the city. What are the criteria we should use for locating densities in different locations. Um, so even though we're we're using the framework, we're not necessarily using the 2020 map.

[01:14:09] Chair José Gutiérrez: Thank you, Eric.

[01:14:13] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Donahue.

[01:14:15] Commissioner Paul Donahue: I have a question about something that you uh an answer you gave to uh Commissioner Nuñez earlier. Uh, you said that the the R3 updates were never intended or never necessary to to meet the RHNA numbers, is that... Maybe I'm missing a subtlety here, but the it's in the housing element that we're that we'll update R3 by the end of 2025, right?

[01:14:40] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Right. So um, there, the the program in the housing element was intended to do a couple of things. One, ensure general plan and zoning consistency, right. Just to ensure that the zoning district that a property is in, they can actually build to the density in the general plan. Right, and that is just fundamentally necessary um under state law, under um, and just good planning practice, right. Um, it also has the additional benefit of reducing constraints on residential development. Um, there was a lot of discussion with stakeholders during that process of crafting this language, and the discussion focused on well are you going to reduce standards in a way that improves economic feasibility or not. And so we added that language into the housing element that says okay economic feasibility will be an input, it'll be a factor in how we decide to reduce development standards so that projects can build to their allowed density in the general plan. It's um, it's not related to the RHNA, so the the general plan, the housing element isn't just to achieve RHNA. The housing element is also about meeting state law, um providing other opportunities for housing, um lowering constraints on housing in general. Um so it's not necessarily just about RHNA.

[01:16:28] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Okay. Okay, thank you.

[01:16:31] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: All right. Any further questions on goal number one? Seeing none. Um, questions on goal number two, produce better design that reflects the community's vision through objective form-based standards, including but not limited to pedestrian friendly neighborhoods, respectful transitions, increased canopy, etc. Questions related to that particular goal? Seeing none. Goal three, create questions specific to creating opportunities for neighborhood serving uses. Do we have any commission questions particular to that goal? All right. We're starting we're starting to move fast here. I like it. All right, let's go to question number four, our goal number four, updating R3 zoning districts to be consistent with state law and the general plan while addressing housing element programs and improving development review. Do we have questions from the commission? Commissioner Cranston.

[01:17:43] Commissioner Bill Cranston: A couple. Um, so a question for you specifically regarding the third map in the in the packet. There's a table at the bottom that lists the existing general plan capacity both at current density bonus... no density bonus and with density bonus. The no density bonus assumes doing what the the portion of getting it... it's not constrained by zoning right right that's if we went to the general plan levels and if I add that up it's just under 5,000 additional units of essentially developable capacity within R3 with no change to the general plan.

[01:18:27] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: That's correct. Um, there was a public comment in the um in the correspondence uh that I think is relevant here, which is that the the table there has different ratios in rows. The lower that ratio is, the less likely that actual that capacity is actually to happen right. Because um, nobody's going to tear down a 25 unit apartment complex to build 26 units, right. So um, the a lot of those that that number is on the lower end of that table, but as you get to the higher end of that table, the lower rows in that table, then yes that is legitimate capacity that could theoretically happen under the existing general plan.

[01:19:22] Commissioner Bill Cranston: And then the second column, I understand that density bonus can be a wide range of things anywhere from small amounts up to 100% and you put in a 50% number, my math comes up that says there's a developable capacity of 12,000 additional units if the density bonus is then applied.

[01:19:38] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yes. Again, same same comment applies that anything at the upper end becomes attractive. Yeah. That's not included in the existing housing element and not being counted on as part of our RHNA numbers today, so this is essentially capacity beyond the housing element.

[01:20:01] Commissioner Bill Cranston: That's right. Okay. Question that's question number one. Um, I'm to some extent this is a question three question, but it's relevant to me in this one. In table four on page 17 um you've listed the kind of R's versus the the different general plan areas and I was I guess a little confused by some of the levels in here being well above the the actual general plan numbers, okay. And so I was wondering if you could, when when we're doing this goal number four here when it's if the zoning says and your your ballpark here says from 25 to 35, but the um medium high density goes up to 25. Why would the zoning go from 25 to 35 if the general plan says 25. Why does the why would we use the R3C for which goes up from 50 to 35 to 50 when it's aligns more with the high low which is 50. So I couldn't, so in trying to understand what that goal means, I couldn't quite rationalize it to the examples earlier. I was expecting that the the range would be maybe bracket the number but not be kind of the general plan number and above. So can you elaborate on what that means?

[01:21:42] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Sure. There there are a couple of reasons. One is coming back to one of the other goals which is to ensure that projects in their zoning through the zoning can meet their general plan density right. So if we overestimate the capacity of zoning, then zoning is not the constraining factor, right, the general plan is the constraining factor. And that actually gives developers more freedom and flexibility within the zoning to to build what they want to build. Let's say they want to build larger units, let's say they want to provide more parking, let's say they want to provide commercial. So these are all space-intensive things that if we set the expectation in the community that the zoning envelope is this right then the general plan, meeting the general plan density will ensure that uh they they can comply with all of those with with flexibility, with with opportunities to to respond to um neighborhood concerns or provide more tree canopy in the front yard or whatever, you know, whatever it is that we're looking for. Uh, another reason, and this is a secondary reason because we can't really predict State Density Bonus and and what it means for actual design and character and and standards that are proposed. But it does give a little bit more space in the zoning standards to to provide for some density bonus. And the last reason is simply because if we peg the general plan designation too high relative to the zoning, um there is an argument that can be made that a developer does not need to meet zoning standards at all. That we have to allow the general plan designation, the general plan density, and um and this um uh several new state laws have made it more difficult for cities to enforce uh zoning standards that are difficult or impossible to meet compared to the general plan designation. So um we can continue to iterate on where exactly that general plan designation density lies relative to the building types that we are interested in or um you know the character that we're interested in. Uh but it just should be noted that these are considerations that that we're trying to plan ahead for when the development comes in that we have some flexibility to design projects appropriately when fundamentally what we can enforce is the general plan density.

[01:25:12] Commissioner Bill Cranston: So the short version would be the general plan density is the minimum that we can permit.

[01:25:18] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: The general plan density is um, this is an imperfect way to put it, but the general plan density kind of has to be guaranteed to a developer. Yeah. Okay. All right. Thanks.

[01:25:39] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Any further questions on goal number four? Commissioner Gutiérrez.

[01:25:46] Chair José Gutiérrez: Okay so that's thrown me off a little bit, I'm trying to understand that. So then at minimum, when you compare that, what Commissioner Cranston had just brought up in terms of the comparison in general plan, that requirement then how does that play out with the housing element? If it were, if we're trying to have competing interests at the same time to try and meet standards, are you saying then that when a project is submitted, the developer has to meet the general plan requirement?

[01:26:16] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: The developer has to has to comply with the general plan density. Yes. Plus any density bonus that they may be entitled to. Right.

[01:26:29] Chair José Gutiérrez: Okay. Okay, all right, great. Thank you.

[01:26:33] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Okay, any further questions? All right, so let's finish up our questioning asking with goal number five, create opportunities for increased densities in targeted areas if directed to do so by council. Questions from the commissioners on that particular goal? Not seeing questions, okay.

[01:27:03] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: So um, with regards to the housing element and 1.3, um I think you noted earlier uh in one of your commission responses around uh some of the other goals uh that we committed to our projects, um as well. Um a couple that kind of came to my mind were the the parks, I think it's like 1.8 if I'm not mistaken, the Parkland Ordinance update uh in the housing element. Um so I'll just kind of start with a broad question. In terms of our ability to um maybe within any kind of rewriting of of our R3 standards, um to what extent would we be able to implement uh incentives, I don't know like bonus FAR, POPOS requirements, um whatever that might look like to the extent that we can take that and increase our available park space.

[01:28:10] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yeah, that's definitely something that we are uh planning to study if uh especially if if council is interested in increasing densities. Um, it's a lot easier to do that if you're increasing densities because you can create an incentive structure uh for that those bonuses. Uh, and one of those incentives can be the provision of new public open space.

[01:28:37] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Uh do we have any examples uh within the current zoning code or within our current development standards uh where we've been able to successfully increase uh our delivery of new parkland to the city's residents through such incentives?

[01:28:53] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yeah well we do it through a lot through gatekeepers. Uh and you can think of gatekeepers as a as a um kind of a a discretionary density increase uh and it gives the city a lot of opportunity to ask for things like open space.

[01:29:14] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Okay, uh that that's helpful to know. Um, another project uh in the housing element that came up in mind was that 2.6 I believe, affirmatively furthering fair housing. Um, I understand that this is uh more than just a project, um one of the kind of core components or core tenets of how HCD interprets or approves housing elements. Is that, is that can you expound on that?

[01:29:45] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yeah as part of the housing element we had to show that our uh programs, policies and sites inventory um were uh...

Segment 3

[01:30:00] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: equitably distributed in the city. So we had to show that that we were we were providing housing growth in our highest opportunity areas, that we weren't putting all of our low-income units in the areas of least opportunity. Uh, and so we had to we had to prepare a ton of analysis uh to to support that argument.

[01:30:25] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Okay. Uh, and then I in the objectives and metrics, there's one bullet point in there. Well, I guess uh two highly relevant ones. First two, uh remove impediments to fair housing and provide equitable access to housing and opportunity. And that second, uh improve access to affordable housing in the city's high opportunity neighborhoods to the through the implementation of programs 1.3, 1.4, 1.5, etc., but with 1.3 specifically cited in there. Um, so yeah, it it sounds like it says we will achieve this affirmatively furthering fair housing requirement through the implementation of program 1.3. Leaving out the others for now and leaving out the sites inventory right now, just um it sounds like this is a core commitment we've made. One of the core commitments we've made in terms of a project deliverable to support uh that AFFH requirement.

[01:31:24] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: So so 1.3 has a lot in it. Um, and I don't I don't...

[01:31:30] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Well through the course of our cycle, right? It's a lot and we have eight years to to get there, right?

[01:31:36] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Well most of most of 1.3 we have to do very, very early in the cycle. Um, I think actually all of 1.3 we have to do at least in the first half of the cycle. Um, but there are there are um several sub uh uh projects in in 1.3. And I would have to look again at those to see kind of what what is most relevant to um this AFFH question. Um, I can I can look into that during the meeting but and get back to you, but um there's a lot in 1.3 and I wouldn't I wouldn't necessarily want to presume that um the particular one particular sentence or another in 1.3 is intended to um is is specifically intended to address AFFH.

[01:32:29] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Well, I I would agree I would agree with that because uh it it doesn't state here that it's any one sentence, it's programs in 1.3. Um, so I take that as as that that project. Um, in what way just to kind of further this thinking here, um, well I guess from uh from staff's end, uh in what ways does either minimizing uh density growth in the R3 zone uh impact our ability to affirmatively further fair housing in the City of Mountain View and in line with um our commitment to uh AFFH within the scope of project 2.6?

[01:33:16] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: That's a very complex question. Um, you know as I as I think about it, I wonder if our Housing Director uh might be able to uh help a little bit with that question. Um, and I can maybe think about it while he comes up here. But it's a it's a very, very deep complex question.

[01:33:44] Housing Director Wayne Chen: Good evening, Commissioners. Wayne Chen, Housing Director. Um, Eric is correct. Um, this is a relatively complicated question because fair housing is quite nuanced and there are pros and cons to think about with any particular policy. So on the one hand, AFFH framework could be increased more supply and and add more housing opportunities. On the flip side, if it causes displacement, then there's that aspect to think about. We are also addressing AFFH through other measures as well, for example, through uh modifying our BMR program to explore other opportunities for housing in other parts of the city. And then we are incorporating AFFH pieces really in kind of implicitly as part of our displacement response. So I do think it's um important to take a look at each of the policies and look at the pros and cons for each side and and take a careful approach. It's something that we could potentially bring back with some some more information if we have a little bit more time to think through it through that lens.

[01:34:45] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Uh and within the lens of the AFFH as well, um, my understanding is also that uh part of what HCD looks at is equitable distribution of opportunity for housing. So uh to put it uh, you know, gently, you can't uh necessarily cluster uh certain type of uh population, demographic in one area of the city or, you know, kind of segregation in a way uh if we want to kind of use a a more direct term. Um, can can you confirm whether or not I'm is that...

[01:35:24] Housing Director Wayne Chen: Yes, that overall framework is correct. Um, for example, in the housing element, there was a a section, I I believe it's essentially a new section in the housing element that has this AFFH component and part of that required doing data analysis and doing a series of maps. And part of the maps is to look at high opportunity areas. Those maps are particularly important typically for larger cities where different parts of the cities may be uh much more segregated or disenfranchised or have very unequal levels of development or investment. Mountain View, just geographically a smaller city, tends not to have that situation or the same level. I believe our AFFH um AFFH maps show that generally Mountain View does not have these low, low opportunity areas. It's um sort of um high opportunity area areas and and pretty good opportunity areas. I forget what that middle middle term is is. Um, but as an example, just by way of illustration, in the BMR um updates that we will be bringing back to Council, we have looked at connecting that housing element program to other parts of the housing element program to create um other opportunities in high opportunity areas such as south of El Camino. So it is being incorporated in other parts of the program. Um, I think with regards to R3, it's a useful lens to think about. R3 is is in the in the areas that um it's located in, um but we are also addressing AFFH to see if there are other opportunity and high opportunity areas where there may not be as much affordable housing opportunities where we can identify opportunities to to bring you know, units in in those locations as well.

[01:37:06] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: So then in terms of affirmatively furthering fair housing versus maintaining current levels of not low opportunity zones. Um, and given that R3 in along with R1 being, correct me if I'm wrong here, um, one of our two most with regards to the city broadly, geographically spread out zoning designations. Is it fair to say that by increasing opportunity to housing within one of our two broadly, geographically spread out zones. This could be looked at as part of our efforts to deliver on this goal?

[01:37:56] Housing Director Wayne Chen: I mean I think part of this will be, for example, taking a look at the AFFH maps and just just making sure. I I believe probably parts of the um R3 um zoning designation may straddle areas that are higher opportunity and there are other parts of R3, because it is a relatively larger uh geographic area proportionally speaking with with the zoning district, there could be other areas where it straddles uh more of the moderate opportunity areas. So I I think it can be difficult to generalize and I think um part of um staff's thinking through this is how to address those different parts. And it can be a little bit nuanced just simply because the AFFH mass may be showing different things in different parts of the exact same zoning district. So I I think if um the Commission wanted us to take a take a look, maybe bring back some additional information, we can we can share some of that.

[01:38:51] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: I guess what I'm trying to understand is if we did nothing, would we be closer to having delivered on that goal?

[01:38:59] Housing Director Wayne Chen: If the city did not increase density, would it have delivered...?

[01:39:04] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: If we did not provide, regardless of density. If we did not provide more opportunities for housing housing opportunities, would we be closer or further from delivering on 2.6?

[01:39:25] Housing Director Wayne Chen: I think probably some kind of a balanced approach that has the ability to add some increased capacity, which is what the R3 project is proposing. And then combining it with other efforts in the housing element may may be the way to address your question. It may not be able to be fully achieved through this item but it could be partially achieved. And to the extent that there may be some um trade-offs or other impacts, those could be addressed for example through program 3.2, which is the displacement response, as well as program I think it was um 1.9 regarding BMR updates.

[01:40:03] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: And and just to follow up from from a question that you had earlier, uh program 1.3 includes the item that we will uh take some R2 zones and upzone them into R3. Uh and it specifically says that we would use an AFFH approach in selecting those R2 zones. Uh and so that is um that I believe is the element of R of of when 2.6 references 1.3, that's what it's referencing.

[01:40:44] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Thank you. Um, since Mr. Chen was our Director Chen was there, I thought of something else. Um, I forgot where I read this, but it was regarding the potential for community trusts. And I didn't know if you had information on that regarding um how close we are to realizing that, um how many opportunities are actually going to move in that direction, and what the timing of that might be.

[01:41:19] Housing Director Wayne Chen: Yeah, thanks for that question. It's a great uh preview for what we will be sharing with Council uh next Tuesday. The uh study session on the next phase of displacement response. It will be available um once the agenda packet is published on Friday. And it will, I believe, discuss what you're looking for, which includes information about a recommended approach for acquisition preservation. The Community Ownership Action Plan, and in there, it will talk about um potential recommendations or recommendations for um helping to enable uh organizations like Community Land Trust to participate in those programs. Um, so, not able to share too much of the details, but it will be out by Friday.

[01:42:04] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Okay, no, that's great. Thank you. Um, so I know there's always a I don't know if this is questions or discussions. Um, I'll just throw it out there and tell me if not. There's always a balance the city has to to go through with um redeveloping old things in order to get higher densities versus what we're talking about like Community Trusts. And I guess for me, the positive of Community Trusts would be that you have ownership and it is geared towards um potentially people who are not at the highest income bracket. Um, so I guess I look forward to seeing the information on Friday. But um, in general if the timing of that is not, I guess that was the other question timing-wise. Um, if we increase density possibilities and we say that it's going to occur in these potential properties. If there's a group looking to do a community trust at that property, does it make it more expensive for them to do so?

[01:43:16] Housing Director Wayne Chen: Uh, apologies. I we can share some information which is already in the housing element. So for example, the Community Ownership Action Plan has a uh time frame of um June of 2025. So we will be making a recommendation to achieve that time frame, um, and uh, out of that process, um, ideally we'll we'll be able to um, hopefully, get get the funding and help enable organizations who want to undertake that work. Um, but to that sa- your your next question, we believe that, um, it could very well increase the, the, the cost of um, acquiring the, the, the units. And uh, there has been some um, evaluation done in terms of the transactions that have occurred over the last few years and the, the per unit cost could be anywhere from 4 to $600,000 per, uh, unit, just at the, the current density. Uh, if the densities were to be increased and there is development potential that is significantly added, then that could um, certainly impact the, the, the value of the sites.

[01:44:24] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Thank you very much.

[01:44:27] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Cranston.

[01:44:31] Commissioner Bill Cranston: So um, when you look at the original scope of R3, um, it kind of falls into the items 1 and 2 and 3. Um, the housing element piece falls into number 4. This would clearly be going beyond either the original scope or the um, what's required in the housing element. Um, as you note in the initial thing here, it says the scope represents a major point of disagreement in the community. Um, so I was I was curious why this question is being asked. Um, is there has there been communication from Council that they want to do this already or um, it's it's beyond the scope of what's what the original scope and what's required, so it it wasn't clear to me where this source of this was.

[01:45:28] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Uh, I wouldn't say it it wasn't part of the original scope. Um, it the the questions that we were trying to resolve in the in the original scope were related to increasing density. Um, and maybe I can ask Mr. Pellegrini with Opticos to talk a little bit about the the council direction and and council questions and and kind of initial impetus of the project um and how it related to increased density. Because the the that initial map that was prepared to address council comments and and everything was a pretty substantial increase in density.

[01:46:10] Consultant Pellegrini: Thank you Eric. Uh, yes when the project was conceptualized, uh there was uh a significant request to explore how uh an increase in stacked flats in R3 uh primarily could be produced. And that was in response to, uh, prior to SB 330 and, uh, um, other actions that the city had taken at the time, uh, that, uh, there were, uh, townhouse projects that were being proposed in R3 that were actually resulting in a net loss of units, uh, through redevelopment. And that was a big concern. So there was a question to understand what regulatory barriers were existing, uh, that were preventing those kinds of projects instead of being proposed with townhouses to be proposed with stacked flats. And, uh, a key part of that we found in our initial analysis of, uh, uncovering what some of the issues were with the existing zoning, uh, included some of the, um, things that Eric had mentioned around setbacks and open space requirements. Um, but we found that density was a key factor, particularly because there are a lot of parcels in R3 that actually are quite small. And so you actually hit the density limitations, uh, very quickly, uh, through only achieving sort of two to three units on a parcel. And, uh, we understood that sort of these sort of moderate or modest increases in density would be necessary to sort of unlock the potential, uh, that the general plan saw, particularly on these, uh, smaller parcels.

[01:47:53] Commissioner Bill Cranston: Okay, so clarifying question. So my interpretation of the first round was if we wanted to incur- to outright encourage the tearing down existing buildings and putting up stacked flats and said this is what it would take. That was my -- is that -- and that sounds kind of like what you're saying, that if we actually want to intentionally tear down rent-controlled units -- they weren't rent-controlled at the time -- and and turn them into stacked flats, we would have to do that kind of density in order to make that happen.

[01:48:29] Consultant Pellegrini: I would say that the uh, the 2020 alternative, it look- it did look at a variety of considerations in terms of the input that went into that map. Uh, but development feasibility was an important priority and key consideration that went into that map. And development feasibility at the time, there was a concern to think about how zoning could actually promote the redevelopment of sites particularly that were seen to be at the end or nearing the end of their development life. These older projects that were going to start to have issues with renovation and upkeep and sort of needed kind of a sprucing up in the community. And so this sort of uh window of looking at those sites through this feasibility question, uh really sort of helped inform that 2020 alternative.

[01:49:24] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: And and I would just, sorry, I would just add it's it's um, the the discussion at the time was not specifically, you know, envisioning tearing down these buildings. It was creating opportunities. Um, and we did not get into the uh details of with the with the council around um, the which are the kind of opportunity sites for new density and new development. Um, and so the um, yeah, it's a whether or not the um, you know, existing rent stabilized units for example um were existing on sites that we might have um on say the 2020 map proposed upzoning for, uh, that was um based on a much larger analysis of feasibility and um and neighborhood character, rather than specifically targeting buildings.

[01:50:43] Commissioner Bill Cranston: And a guess a a related question, it was I don't remember whether it was stated explicitly or whether this is my impression, that your predecessor at that time believed that this would this might be required in order to meet the housing element and that part of that analysis was done that if for some reason we were not able to achieve the housing element through other means that what other avenues did we have. Is that accurate?

[01:51:10] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yes, that is accurate. At the time that we started R3, we uh thought that maybe it could be a kind of a um a backup approach for for achieving the housing element in case in case other avenues didn't succeed.

[01:51:27] Commissioner Bill Cranston: Thanks.

[01:51:33] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: And for my own part, I have just one question. It's a somewhat obscure question um here on five. The staff report says that redevelopment to higher densities would create opportunities for diverse unit types. Does that include, hopefully, a greater availability, greater frequency of like three-bedroom units, like the kinds of apartment units that are good for families with kids? That's one of the things I know we underproduce. I'm concerned about that. Should we expect that we will see... do the economics support when you go to greater density more of those types of larger units? Is that a reasonable expectation?

[01:52:16] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Uh it depends on so many factors besides density, it really does. Um, we actually have a few projects that um are proposing more larger units in a stacked configuration. Um, but it a lot of times those tend to be ownership projects uh that that tend to prioritize the larger units. Um, also they tend to be because they're ownership projects, they tend to be smaller like, you know, fewer than 50 units developments. Um, although we are seeing some that are larger that are um again condos and and larger numbers of bedrooms. Um, again, we also have our affordable housing program which, you know, targets money towards um unit sizes that that the community uh that the community needs. Um, you're right that the apartment projects that we've been seeing do tend to be in the, you know, studio, one-bedroom range. Uh, that's that's true in apartment projects that we're seeing these days. Um, I don't know the economics of um you know, apartments at larger unit sizes. I don't know if Mr. Pellegrini knows anything about that, those development trends.

[01:53:44] Consultant Pellegrini: Um, I would just say that uh, just to echo Eric's comments, uh it is uh typically there are challenges to producing large numbers of family units, and that sort of many developers will trend toward maximizing the number of units versus sort of going towards larger units particularly in uh rental projects. Um, there are many cities that um incorporate regulatory requirements to sort of push some of those and uh there are sort of measurable impacts to uh including some of those requirements.

[01:54:23] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: So it sounds like targeted interventions are how we're going to make progress on that, not increasing density per se.

[01:54:29] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: No, yes. That's a that's a good way to say it, yeah.

[01:54:32] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Thank you, Eric. All right. Um unless there are any other questions, I'm going to provide a time check, we're at an hour and 50 minutes. Uh and we still got to get through question one here. So having done questions, now we can do deliberation and votes. Um I'm going to hope that we can identify quickly what the low-hanging fruit here is that we all kind of agree on so we can set that aside and focus on the anything that we'd like to change if there is any such thing. Um, so with the forbearance of my colleagues I'll probably ask that straw poll question a whole bunch of times. Um, going through our draft goals. Is there deliberation on draft goal one? Anything in particular anyone wants to say, anything in particular that anybody wants to change, or are we just good with it? This is create opportunities for diverse unit types. I'm seeing that everybody looks okay with that. Okay. Moving to number two, uh producing better design that reflects the community's vision through objective form-based standards, including but not limited to pedestrian friendly neighborhoods, respectful transitions, and increased tree canopy. Um is it the general consensus of the commission that we're okay with what we've got in the staff report? Fantastic. Number three, creating opportunities for neighborhood serving uses. Am I seeing consensus we're happy with what we've got? Fantastic. Number four, updating the R3 zoning district to be consistent with state law and the general plan while addressing housing element programs and improving development review. Uh, do we have general consensus that we're happy with what we have in the staff report? Okay. Four for four. And to five. Creating opportunities for increased densities in targeted areas if directed to do so by Council. Is there any deliberation that we would like to have pertaining to goal five? And by the way, once I we get through one through five then we can if we want to have general deliberation about question one, then we'll go to a vote. So this won't be your last chance to say anything. Uh, Commissioner Cranston.

[01:56:44] Commissioner Bill Cranston: The way this is worded, what are we, we have to vote on?

[01:56:47] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: This says creating opportunities if directed to do so by council. What's to vote on? Are we being asked to say, are we recommending to council that they do this or not? Because this as worded, this is not a choice that we this is more informational than a question.

[01:57:11] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yeah semantically yes, yes you're you're absolutely right. Uh, I would say the the intent of the question before the commission is um do you want this project to include density increases? And if you do, then forward that recommendation to the city council and the goal will be, one of the goals for this project will be include density increases in targeted areas. So it is actually a question.

[01:57:47] Commissioner Bill Cranston: Okay.

[01:57:48] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Give everybody a minute. Looks like uh Commissioner Cranston, you're first.

[01:57:52] Commissioner Bill Cranston: Um, I'm I'm not supportive of this myself. Um, it's it's not necessary to meet the housing element. Um, there's considerable capacity within the general plan already. Um, the fact that it's so so divisive in the community. Um, I I don't know why we would do this now uh ahead of something like the general plan or other activities down the road. Um, it's just it's not apparent to me why why this is something we need to do at this point in time. So I would I am not inclined to support this as if it's actually a question.

[01:58:35] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Thank you, Mr. Cranston. Um, Commissioner Clark.

[01:58:39] Commissioner Chris Clark: So I I am supportive of including this. I think um there's really not much of a point in doing a lot of this if we if we don't at least look at um targeted increases in density, not a wholesale everywhere across R3 has increased intensities, but I think there are um key areas within R3 where it makes sense to at least study increased intensities uh to allow a greater mix of housing types and and uses and um look as folks have pointed out before, we're we don't have any more land. The only way to go is up and the most sustainable way to grow is going up and it doesn't have to be super super high and we have to be sensitive about transitions, but at the end of the day, um the way that we're going to get um additional open space and all the things that we're talking about as we grow and develop is to at least look at increased intensities in certain areas within R3. So I think it makes sense to to include it into and to study it as part of this overall project.

[01:59:48] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Nuñez.

[01:59:49] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Yeah I am also uh supportive of the uh the goal uh for increasing density in a targeted manner in the R3. Uh additionally I'm very curious about ways that we can uh incorporate uh some incentive structure uh to be able to provide for more parks. Um continuously hear uh residents asking us to uh prioritize uh delivery of new parks. And I think that uh you know, sustainably growing upward again with respect to uh you know, sensitivity around uh kind of like height levels and such um but fundamentally being able to make sure we're opting uh creating more opportunities for housing uh and for parkland would be uh a fantastic uh thing in my book. Uh another thing I just wanted to note uh with regards to uh Commissioner Yin's uh uh question earlier around uh the uh Community Community Land Trust uh getting tongue-tied today. Uh yeah so I uh work very closely with the uh Mountain View Solidarity Fund who right now is actively one I would say the leading group in regards to uh you know efforts to bring a you know community-owned uh housing uh in Mountain View. Um I can tell you from you know working with them every single day that they want we want our community wants an all of the above approach to housing, which incorporates supply, growth, in addition to funding and pathways for community ownership, not at the sacrifice of the other. So I just wanted to make sure to whatever extent that was helpful I was able to provide um some uh behind the scenes insight on on that front. Um but again, fully supportive of this and also would like to see uh if it's feasible to explore opportunities for this to uh lend itself towards uh new uh new parkland.

[02:02:23] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Vice Chair Gutierrez.

[02:02:26] Chair José Gutiérrez: Thank you Chair. So when it comes down to this issue of targeted areas, I can see why we would be interested in doing that to be able to study this and try and figure out feasibility. Um but at the same time I want to I want us to remember why it is that we're here in the first place, where you have I think up to a point competing interest between R3 proponents of advancing that versus housing element or both at the same time trying to do more of a holistic approach to try and figure out the housing situation that we have which is in crisis. And I think we've got to be respectful of both the community members who have come in and said hey I don't want a big developed tower next to my single family home. I get that. We went through that a lit- uh on the school board when we proposed teacher housing at Cooper Park. Uh and that was brought up to us by Tamron Walton as well when she submitted her email to the to the commission. Um but at the same time let's not forget that displacement issue where when we've had per- persons living in Mountain View, they were displaced, they had nowhere to go, and some who have still stayed very few are in uh uh shelters. So the reality of that dichotomy is real. That's not going anywhere. For those of you who have property, congratulations, that's great. You made the right choice because you could afford it. For those others who didn't have that chance for whatever reason or who are new immigrants, their reality is completely different. So the more we can try and reconcile those differences and that dichotomy of how we live here in Mountain View and consequently in the United States or in the state of California and Santa Clara County specifically because it's so darn expensive, if we can try and have that partnership between both elements to try and tackle housing at that higher level of discourse, then you get to being able to expand on partnerships to try and figure out how can you promote green space in parks or schools. Future uh opportunities for growth will require uh you would think those types of necessities, expansion of libraries as well and infrastructure as a whole. And that's where it gets dicey because we've got these competing interests and frankly when you look at it from that perspective, in the end you're still I don't want to say beholden to but it's up in the arms still of the developer on whether or not they want to go ahead and propose something that's going to be beneficial for a certain part of the community. We don't have that much say in that. And I think that's where I get nervous right because you can propose to do XYZ but in the end if it doesn't happen then what? And I and I bring this up not to instigate but just to bring everyone together around the common cause of affordable housing. Look what happened with Google. In the first 5 years they said that they were going to pitch in to do XYZ. Their relationship with the developer ended, those targeted goals of having certain types of housing or parks are gone until they get that established partnership going again, we may not be able to make that targeted uh um uh goal into a reality. So now we've got to let the HCD know, hey guess what, we're a little bit behind the eight ball. So I think having said that and use that as an example I think we ought to also be prepared to try and figure out when those setbacks happen, how are we going to address that with HCD and how will we stay true with the housing element plan when we had a lot of feedback from the community. But also take the feedback from those who are going to be affected if there's more density because their neighborhood situation completely changed. And finally, having lived in Florida and Miami for a little while, I can tell you and even Houston, that's a nightmare when you have a single-family residence and then a six-tower residence of apartments or condos next to each other. There is no neighborhood feel to it right? There's no the there's no rationale for building you would think that there would be rationale for building consistently, positively, but in those cases there isn't any. And that's not what we need here in Mountain View either. Thank you.

[02:06:48] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: So I just I'd like to ask maybe a clarifying procedural question. Mr. Anderson, do you would you like the commission to take a vote to give you a sort of a sense of the commission, I know we're not taking any official action but is that what the city would like to have from us or do you feel like just by hearing the deliberations you're getting what you needed?

[02:07:11] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: So the the question is does does the EPC support goal five? Um, you know, I think if there is nuance to that that the EPC wants to collectively uh communicate to council then we will absolutely communicate that. But um you know, I we are we are looking for an answer from the commission.

[02:07:38] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: You do want a sense of the commission.

[02:07:39] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yes.

[02:07:40] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Okay. We can do that. Um, so unless there are any other comments that my my colleagues here would like to make... Commissioner Donahue? Go for it.

[02:07:52] Commissioner Paul Donahue: I um, this is a tough one that I've been thinking about. I didn't really come in with any kind of preconceived notions. Of course, everyone has their own lived experience and and kind of uh biases to some extent. But um I've been tossing this around for a a week here. And um the reading through a hundred pages of, I mean I read through all that stuff, the hundred pages of of of comments, yes this is great, no this is terrible and and it it didn't really help. Um uh but a lot of the discussion tonight uh has helped and some of the questions I think. Um, I think one of the interesting things is that it sounds like this uh goal five started out as kind of a backup uh plan for potentially meeting the uh the RHNA numbers. The um, one thing that concerns me is that the we're not done. In another seven years we're going to be back uh having to uh go through this again. And if we um we need to have something left I think. Um, so I guess I agree with Commissioner Cranston that uh if if it's not required at this time I I would uh not not be in support of it. Thanks.

[02:09:41] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Yin.

[02:09:45] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Yeah thank you colleagues. Um I think the the discussion has been very helpful. I think from a for- I I was really sitting on the fence on this one a little bit. Um and I actually am leaning towards Commissioner Cranston and Commissioner Donahue's um take on this one. But there is nuance. I I do see all the benefits of having density. Um I do worry a little bit that if we're taking away some of the development standards that like open space and setbacks that typically developers will then maximize what they can do. Um given the timing of the Community Trust, I think I am not in any hurry to jump towards density. A city is a living breathing thing. It lives on beyond us. And if it is not necessary, it wasn't purported to be necessary as part of the housing element. I can see why we would wait on that, get some feedback, get council's input. If they really feel like they want to move forward on it, then you know, I I would say we do a precise plan because if we're going to do higher density and I see all the benefits of that, I would like to be thoughtful. Well thought out, well planned and holistic based on the community that it's in. We have large swaths of our two oh sorry R3 and there are chunks enough to form like enough land for a precise plan I think. Um and they are very different throughout the city and what they touch. So I am all for a city growing, it doesn't have to be here and now right now. Um it does take time and I think it takes thoughtfulness and a precise plan is like the most thoughtful way of doing so, that may ensure um as much of the benefits that we can get out of density I guess I'll put it that way. So um given that if I were to just say yes or no on this, I'm leaning towards no. Uh but that's not to say we don't do so in the future, that we can take a look at it and if we do so then we do it in a very thoughtful way. Does that help? Okay.

[02:12:18] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Thank you, Commissioner Yin. So um... this is a hard one. Um I almost feel like I'm being asked to answer two different questions. Um, there's the question as written here in the staff report and then there's this larger question about how do you feel about uh sort of voluntarily pursuing additional density. So I I let me let me answer both. As as the question is written here in the staff report... it this is a for me a fine way to think about increasing density if directed to do so by the council. If the council would like that, the council should have it. And I think what you've got here, yeah that seems reasonable enough to me, if that's the if that's the conversation the council wants to have. So if that's the question you're asking me to answer, that's my response is this is a fine way to do it if the council asks for it. If you're asking that larger question about how do we think about voluntarily pursuing additional density, beyond what's required in order to comply with state law and the and what we think is in the housing element, um this one's tough. This one's really tough for me. Um because additional density it has a cost. It has a real cost, and displacement is one of many types of costs that come with it, because I think as a lot of folks, you know you have to leave for three years while they work on the building, your kids are going to be in a new school district potentially, you're not going to want to move them again. Like we lose people when you when we do that. Um for the folks that aren't moving, you know traffic is a real thing. I saw when I read the 120 whatever it is pages worth of comments, um there's a lot of folks worried about congestion and traffic and all these other not being able to find a parking space, all these other things. So there there is a cost to density. And maybe we'll talk about this later but I I I wish I hope that when we're thinking about criteria... I'm kind of jumping ahead and breaking my own rule, but like when we talk about criteria for density, I hope one of the things we talk about as a criteria is what some of the costs are that come with that. So um, having kind of spoken out of both sides of my mouth here, I guess I would probably fall lightly on the side of not being supportive of more voluntarily uh pursued density. Um, I'm actually totally open to it, I just would like to see it a little bit more grounded about exactly what it is we'd be getting. Um, that's enough from me. You ask, you said that you wanted to vote. I'm willing to entertain a motion. Or um... yes, sir?

[02:14:50] Commissioner Paul Donahue: I wasn't clear if the Vice Chair actually voiced an an opinion one way or the other. I didn't understand if you did.

[02:14:58] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Yeah, well that's the situation...

Segment 4

[02:15:00] Chair José Gutiérrez: situation that I find myself in, right? Because it's a, it's just what you brought up, it's like, why ask the question? I don't get it. No disrespect intended, Eric. I don't, don't get me wrong, but because I figured, well, if it's directed to do so by council, they're going to do what they're going to want to do. So why ask us? 'Cause we're just here, you know, I don't know, trying to figure this out as best as we can. So, you know, I don't know how to answer that, right? If I were to, and I don't want to be a weasel about it, but if I'm thinking about Robert's Rules of Orders and I'm looking at this question, I abstain. Because I'm not city council, they're going to let me know what they want to think. So the question is already kind of like, why answer it if it's already being told that if they want to go this way, I don't see how, I don't see how we could affect the way that they're going to think about that.

[02:15:52] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Nuñez, go ahead.

[02:15:54] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Just a quick question, just functionally speaking, just bouncing off Commissioner Gutierrez, Vice Chair Gutierrez's comment, I'll get used to that. Is it functionally, like are we within our realm or scope of considering the question almost as if that if directed by council part, we could almost like for our purposes here redline that and if we were to either support or not support it in whatever transmittal we send to council, like just is that, is that, you know, can we consider that a typo in essence?

[02:16:36] Public Works Director Dawn Cameron: If I may, thank you. Dawn Cameron, acting assistant city manager and community development director. So, again, the intent of the question was to allow you to advise the city council on whether you recommend they include this goal as part of the R3 project. Apologies that the way the question was worded led to this kind of confusion. I think what staff was, I know what what we were trying to say here was that this goal is a discretionary decision that will be made by council as indicated previously, it's not part of the housing element in terms of meeting our RHNA requirements. So we were trying to be clear that ultimately the council is going to have to make a decision and give direction to staff. As you're seeing here, it's going to be a challenging decision and there's a lot of factors for council to consider. So what staff has placed before you tonight is to give you an opportunity to advise council, make a recommendation to council, and again, this is a study session, so it's not really a formal motion, it's more what the consensus is of whether you would advise council to include this goal in the future work for the R3 or not include it. I hope that helps clarify.

[02:18:27] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Thank you very much, Dawn. Commissioner Cranston, go ahead.

[02:18:32] Commissioner Bill Cranston: So the actual question, number one, says what feedback does EPC have on the goals for their project? And the second part is, does EPC support goal five? So that is in fact an explicit question as opposed to the wording of bullet five. So if I interpret that as what we were asked, then we are being asked to provide a specific opinion back, and so I think we're okay, Commissioner Nuñez, if we actually answer that question.

[02:19:04] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Okay. That seems like a fair enough reading to me. You've definitely gotten our feedback for sure, so that's settled. You did say you wanted a vote. I think everybody's had a chance to talk. I'm checking to see if nobody else has more they want to add. I am willing to entertain a motion. As I, just you want to straw poll it? Okay. I, as I was taking notes, it sounded like I heard four commissioners that were not interested in sort of supporting goal five, you know, I'm sure there's a lot of nuance in there but just at its base I heard four. Is that sound accurate to everybody? So we'll call that one sort of a, a three to four in support, so... Oh, do we, did you want to abstain as well? We'll call that a three three, a three three and one. You know what, let's go, let's go person by person. I want to get this, I want to get this right since I'm a new chair and I don't want to screw up my first night on the job. Commissioner Clark. Can I, can I just call you by name and we'll go through and people can tell me what they... we could do, we could do hands. Okay. Everyone in favor of including... I see two. Against... I see four. Abstain... and that's the abstain. That's one.

[02:20:30] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Thank you Commissioner Clark, that was helpful. Eric, did you get what you need?

[02:20:34] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yes, thank you.

[02:20:35] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Fantastic. All right, time check, we're two hours and 15 minutes in and we got three left. Let's do question two, project phasing. Commissioner Clark...

[02:20:46] Commissioner Chris Clark: It was about phasing.

[02:20:48] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Oh, let's... Let's do questions and then we'll do deliberation.

[02:20:53] Commissioner Chris Clark: I think we just greatly simplified the rest of the meeting. But let me know if I'm wrong. So I guess the phasing here is, the combined approach, which was if we were increasing densities, I assume you'll... I guess... is there any point in considering number two in case the council like does go another direction?

[02:21:26] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yeah, the council might go another direction, I'm sure they'd like to hear your...

[02:21:30] Commissioner Chris Clark: Sure. So then I do have a question about that, which is, the combined approach adds it looks like 3ish months to everything, 18 to 24 versus 15 to 20. And you'd noted that that might extend beyond the end of 2025 when we were hoping to have this done at least from an HCD perspective. So my question is, if we demonstrate to HCD that we're pretty far along, we're making progress, are they going to be somewhat forgiving if we decide to take this approach or is it like a no, how dare you sort of thing?

[02:22:19] Assistant Community Development Director Lindsey Hagen: So, it's our goal to reach out and to figure out the answer to that question and, you know, just generally the answer to that question. Oh, and I think our City Attorney has her hand raised so I will turn it over to her.

[02:22:44] City Attorney Jennifer Logue: Hi everyone, um, let's see I can turn on my camera but I can't tell if I'm showing or not. I can only see on my screen I can only see the the question two. But I just wanted to say that that's a very difficult question to answer and a common question. I think that what we'd like to say is that yes if we are making progress and working in good faith to achieve the housing element goals that HCD would be willing to work with the city and wouldn't want to just cut us off you know when we're when we're very close to reaching a goal. But you know right now we're in a new area and it's really hard to say what type of enforcement action HCD will take and how harsh or lenient they may be in that context. So I don't think that it's intended as a scare tactic, it's sort of intended to just let you know that it's a possibility that we might go past a deadline and we will have to work with HCD and hopefully we will be able to impress upon them that we are working in good faith to meet that deadline or and very close and we will be okay. Um but I think that's the best we can give you right now as we're as we're working with HCD and trying to get you know more information.

[02:24:12] Commissioner Chris Clark: That's helpful, thank you.

[02:24:16] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Donahue.

[02:24:21] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Unlike the previous question, I did have kind of a preconceived notion on my thoughts on this. I'm a process guy and I think I want to be sure to follow the correct process and I think missing deadlines that are in the housing element doesn't sound like a good idea. If the soonest that the combined approach could be done is I think 20 months and the deadline is 20 and a half months from now or something like that, that's not a recipe for success. So I would be in favor of splitting it. The splitting it also was described as allowing a more thoughtful process and... Yeah, a more thoughtful and and it meets the housing element timelines. Of course, the combined approach would save money, but I think that I think it's important to do things the right way even if it costs a little more money. Thanks.

[02:25:54] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Cranston.

[02:25:58] Commissioner Bill Cranston: So, I guess I'm worried about hitting the deadlines as well. The other factor that comes to mind is one of the things we've seen as we talked about the housing element is as soon as people think, 'oh it's next to me', they freak out. Okay? And even if they don't know what it's going to be, and my worry about the combined approach is when will you know what areas you're going after? It strikes me that it would be difficult to have rational discussions about the things that we, the form-based approach, what do we need to do to meet the R3 standards to the general plan. If it's combined, somehow you've got to take that step early to say in that first bubble that says you know, 'where is it going to be', somehow that has to happen sooner, otherwise it'll be very difficult to get through the rest of the stuff in my view. So it's not clear to me if the combined approach, how you do that. Because I think the other stuff that's in the mandated tasks actually can probably happen in a relatively orderly manner. I'm actually a little surprised it's going to take as long as it will. And so my biggest worry is that we get distracted on the stuff that we have to do because everybody's like, 'wait, is that next to me? Wait is that', and if we don't know yet, it means that we have longer meetings because we're answering questions that we don't actually know the answer to. So that's my biggest worry about the combined approach is that until we get some clarity on where you might look and how you might approach it, it will become a distraction on the required tasks. If you can get into the time, I'm not comfortable missing the timeline, the dates, but that's my biggest worry about the combined approach is are we going to we still need to get the required stuff done, and how do we make sure we do that? So.

[02:28:15] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: If there's not more questions we can just go straight to deliberation for this item. Anybody have anything they want to say? Commissioner Yin.

[02:28:28] Commissioner Joyce Yin: I was going to reiterate what Commissioner Cranston was going to say. Normally I do appreciate efficiency and that seems to be the benefit of the combined approach. However, my concern is similar to yours and really when I look at table two, the benefits of the phased approach allows for what I was talking about earlier, to do something like a precise plan for the different areas so that we're really getting into what works. And if we are going to move around the densities, we could do a very, very more thorough approach and thoughtful approach to the communities that are surrounding them. And I think, you know, you'd be surprised if the density is farther away, you might get more than you expected central and lower or closer to the single families than if you just whole hog up the zoning in that area. So I think there are a lot of potentials if we go with a very thoughtful approach in phased. Phased.

[02:29:42] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Thank you Commissioner Yin. Any other deliberative comments before we straw poll this? I, maybe I'll just say a couple of things. Legal compliance is a very big deal for me. As a lawyer, like that's the kind of thing that gives me cold sweats and stuff. Um, and the, you know, the comment 'would likely not meet the housing element timelines' was probably the thing I circled most in the staff report. I take that very seriously. I do wish I had more, sort of a more fulsome discussion in the staff report of why exactly we thought that was true. I know it's we could probably get real close to the deadline, but in general I think things like this tend to always take longer rather than come in, you know, under budget and with extra time. So I would be worried that this could easily end up being five, six, eight months in arrears and that again, that kind of thing sort of terrifies me. Conversely, there's a number of projects and stuff that have been significantly delayed. And I know there's folks that are very anxious to see those done. And, you know, COVID intervened and delayed some of that work and there's only so much that that staff can do. So I'm mindful of that, but I also know there's some impatience about getting some of these things done. I think I'll always pick caution first. And so that, I would probably sort of regretfully find myself in the phased camp because I think that's safer. But I really would like to see us get all this stuff done and get it done quickly and I almost wish we could have a separate conversation about is there anything we have to like, pull out of it that's not really important so we can streamline what it is we need to get done. I wish it didn't take that long. But I guess that's, that's sort of my feelings. I would regretfully put myself in the phased camp. Commissioner Yin, did you have anything else you wanted to add? Commissioner Gutierrez.

[02:31:44] Chair José Gutiérrez: Thank you Chair Dempsey. So I would rather do the combined approach if we could, but I'm understanding of the phased approach. The thing is that, you know, the last meeting that we had in terms of meeting compliance for legality, you all voted on something that I wasn't able to participate in, and that was kind of sketchy because we were not too sure about the legality behind the wording and the phrasing behind the homeless shelters perspective. So I'm not sure how these are, how we can take into consideration the issue of legality to when in general we're hypothesizing the best we can on how to answer a question. So having said that, look, there's no guarantee that either approach is going to make it on the timeline space here. So what's the plan in case we realize either with the phased approach or the combined approach that we're not going to make the deadline? Are we still going to reach out to HCD and if so by when? By when will we know? Because if we're not going to want to be not compliant with a set deadline, then we better have a plan for either one to be able to detect by said date, it looks like we're not going to make it. What's the plan on that front?

[02:32:58] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Any other comments from the commission? Eric?

[02:33:05] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Oh I was just gonna say you know these projects move forward in kind of iterative ways that makes it hard to predict those scenarios. Um but you know we take the comment to heart that we should be planning for the potential of delays and having a strategy for the potential of delays. So thank you for the comment.

[02:33:33] Chair José Gutiérrez: So, so as a follow up, either way, if there is a delay, there'll be a plan for you all to then notify EPC, City Council, 'Hey, we're not going to make a targeted date, we're going to reach out to HCD and this is what we're going to do.' When you realize that you may not make the deadline. In other words, when will you find out whether or not you're going to make a deadline? By month 18, 16, 14, 12?

[02:34:00] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: I don't think we can answer that question right now, but it's certainly something that we, you know, we we will continue to have discussions about through the course of the project implementation.

[02:34:14] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Okay. And just for clarification Mr. Anderson, you would like a straw poll so you can get the numbers here about phased versus combined?

[02:34:25] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yeah, that'd be great. Although I think I heard four phased already, but a straw poll would...

[02:34:29] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Let's, let's, everybody who wants phased approach? One, two, three, four. And combined? One, two, three. There you go. All right, on to question number three. Find my notes here. All right, questions related to item number three, let me look and see what that question was. What densities and which character sub-districts should be included in developing alternatives that staff will bring back to EPC and Council for consideration at a later date? Do we have questions of staff? Commissioner Cranston.

[02:35:17] Commissioner Bill Cranston: I kind of read this as this is the phase one stuff and the question four is the phase two or combined stuff. Is that or is this, do we have to be answering both phases at the same time?

[02:35:34] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Um, so yes, we are, you know, in case council directs us to do the combined approach, uh, having this direction or having this recommendation from the EPC now on if you know, if we are increasing densities, if we are doing a combined approach, is there input on the range of densities that might be appropriate? So this only applies if they decide to move ahead with the increased opportunity. We're not talking about how we look at it on the on the normal stuff.

[02:36:14] Assistant Community Development Director Lindsey Hagen: Um, sorry, repeat the question.

[02:36:19] Commissioner Bill Cranston: I just want to make sure I'm understanding what we're, what we're gonna tell you here. Okay? Is, 'cause some of these things I look at this like, okay, these might apply in the required items, and some of the, I might answer them a different way if they're part of the additional items. And so I'm not clear what question you're actually asking us to answer.

[02:36:40] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: These, so, D1 and D2 are essentially discretionary densities. Um, if, if the commission, um, you know, if the council is supportive of increasing densities, is there, you know, would the, would the commission want us to cap it at D1? Would the commission want us to cap it at D2? Would the commission want us to go higher than D2? Um, to East Whisman or, or North Bayshore type densities? Um, I mean maybe the commission, you know, we already know what the commission would say about this, but, um, and so it might be a little challenging to provide this comment. But it may also help if you have feedback or questions about the districts themselves that can kind of help clarify, um, as we iterate on this, what these districts mean, what they include, um, and, and is this the right way to organize districts in the R3 zone.

[02:37:52] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Okay, and just I'm gonna interject here for a second, are, so would you be content if you hear us out, we'll have our comments individually about each of the different types. Would that give you what you need or, again, do you want us to go through and provide you with a vote for, you know, D1, for D2, for low medium density. I want to make sure that we know exactly what the question is being posed to us so we can answer correctly and knowledgeably.

[02:38:17] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: I think, I think you can go through some comments and see if there are salient themes that come out through the individual commissioners' comments. Those, you know, if you can develop those into, you know, a recommendation to council, uh, there may be themes around specific sub-districts to include or densities to peak at. Um, and so we might just want to start with seeing what the commissioners have to say and then see if there's anything any kind of collective commission recommendation in there. That sounds fair.

[02:38:57] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Nuñez.

[02:38:59] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Is it fair to then interpret this question as in the event that regardless of what the commission said, council wants to do higher density in R3, here's what the EPC thinks about the... that's a fair interpretation. Yeah. Okay. All right. So then, uh, in that vein, uh, I'll go ahead and provide some commentary on that. Um, one of the neighborhood, a neighborhood I happen to live in, uh, Shoreline West, um, it's uh, a particularly interesting neighborhood I think, uh, for the reason, and, and I guess old map interview too, but um, Shoreline West, you can walk down the street and uh, the height envelopes uh, are, are, they feel very well blended in. Um, there are plenty of single-family homes next to 6 to 12 unit uh rental uh buildings. Uh, and uh a lot of foliage. You can't really... there's no... I went to Houston one time and uh the hotel I was staying in was across from a gas station, which was across from a single family home, which was across from like a barren lot. So um, that is not what the Shoreline West neighborhood feels like. Um, uh, and so I think in terms of having that inform what the outer peripheries of the R3 as it's edging towards like R1, uh if we're uh thinking about sensitivities of uh residents there. Um, that might be one thing uh that we might want to think about. Um, from my less uh sensitive vantage point, um I'm very happy to say you know, hey uh R3D2, what can you get out of developers? If you can incentivize that, what can you extract? Um, what can you um put into the city coffer um if you're maximizing uh opportunities of that type in return for something that the city can get. Um, aside from that, I'm also happy with that um, that D1 uh as as a kind of more uh kind of like regular higher tranche with the D2 being that kind of like incentive tranche, um, probably uh maximized towards the cores of R3, again away from um the kind of like peripheral nearing R1 uh zones. So that's my commentary on that.

[02:41:50] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Donahue.

[02:41:53] Commissioner Paul Donahue: So I have a question about R3D2 versus R4. Um, what, what are the difference, I mean, R4 is a floating zone, but what what are the differences kind of you know, if something were developed how, how would they be different?

[02:42:16] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Well we haven't gotten there yet. Um, you know, they'd be about the same density. Um, and so there might be um, there might be criteria or um, or benefits or streamlining or something like that that could happen in the R3 zone. Um, once we develop the R3 zone... So there's there's kind of two paths that could happen, right? One path could be council simply says get rid of the R4 zone and just do R3D2, right? You know, we're we're gonna we're gonna change how we're doing these high these these high density zones. Another possible path is, well, do the R3D2 zone, look at it, compare it to R4, see if there are still benefits to having them both around and then keep R4 as that kind of still that floating zone that somebody could elect to uh, or to or could ask for or do a gatekeeper in order to use.

[02:43:24] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Okay, so if they're if they're comparable, it's just basically sounds kind of like just taking the R4 zone and just applying it to specific like not making it floating. I mean it could still be floating but but you'd have some specific things that are not floating.

[02:43:44] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Right, but we'd be, we'd be developing standards specifically within the R3 rubric. Right? So a form-based set of standards that's based on building types, that's based on um, you know, the, the definitions and standards that we develop through this process. Um, you know, through and and that would be applied to the R3D2 zone. The R4 zone has an FAR, it has a a um, you know setbacks, it's got open area requirements, it's got all of these things that's going to continue to exist if if ultimately council decides that they want it to continue to exist.

[02:44:27] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Okay.

[02:44:30] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Yin.

[02:44:33] Commissioner Joyce Yin: I had a question, I think I know the answer but I'll ask it anyways. Um, if an area is looked at, like we take R3, is looked at in total for each property owner they've got a certain amount of development rights. Can we look at the whole area in total as how much development is on it and move it around regardless of property?

[02:44:59] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Um, so there's a couple of different ways to answer that question. One is um, the SB 330 question um, which is yes SB 330 prohibits us from doing downzoning. Um, but we are allowed to downzone if we also upzone somewhere else. Um, I'm not sure if you're also asking about say a strategy of distributing density within a site or you know, doing some kind of um, you know, like let's say you want, you want somebody to build a park and kind of focusing density that all the density for that site in one portion of the site so that you can build a park on the other portion. Is that...

[02:45:48] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Something like that, or if the area next to let's say a different zone, you want it to be less than and you can move it over to a different place and they get higher density than they would have otherwise been allowed.

[02:46:05] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Okay, well transfer of development rights is another strategy that has been used to preserve buildings and and do other things. It can be very complicated. Um and I think the, um, you know, if that's something that the commission and the council is interested in us looking into, we can look into it. Um, and there those complications tend to make it difficult to do in in uh circumstances like this, but it could be a possibility. Um, I think the, the the probably the most effective transitions approach if that's a concern that you're you have is really just having your general plan designations be sensitive to the adjacent zoning districts, the adjacent general plan designations. Um, and we can do that by um, you know, by um, you know, we may be able to downzone in some places if we upzone in others, we we don't want to create non-conforming uses, um, you know, non-conforming densities. There are some drawbacks to that, um, but, um, we can, um, uh, we can certainly look into that as a strategy.

[02:47:28] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Okay, thank you, because I was just thinking that, um, yeah, I'm not sure about the very last R3D2 or 1, but I do, I do kind of like the variation from the very first. If we do get from council that they want to add density for sure, this is where we're going regardless of the recommendations from EPC, I think having a variety works well if we're moving around in order to get what the community would prefer utilizing the different typologies.

[02:48:17] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Cranston.

[02:48:21] Commissioner Bill Cranston: So what's the impact to staff if we say R3D2 and R4 become the same thing? Does that change your timeline, does it make it easier, does it make it harder?

[02:48:34] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: No, doesn't change anything.

[02:48:35] Commissioner Bill Cranston: My own, you know, I like the sense of order. We're doing R2 plus all the way through R3 and we got this thing out there called R4 and like, and we got something that kind of looks and smells like R4, it's like, if it's easier for you to say, hey, we got some standards that you can kind of marry into it and maybe it becomes, maybe it's actually easier. I'm kind of looking at it like why would we not just make R4 part of this and D2 becomes R4? And it's the high density zoning project not just R3. If council decides that they want to do that, I'm...

[02:49:14] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: If we recommend that, does that, does that give you heartburn?

[02:49:19] Assistant Community Development Director Lindsey Hagen: Yeah. I mean I think, it doesn't give me heartburn, no. I think, I think that's, that is certainly an option. And if the EPC wants to make that recommendation and if council wants to go in that direction to just say hey, notice this like you are turning all the R4s into R3D2s, right, you know, um, talk to all the R4 property owners as though they are eventually going to be rezoned into R3D2. I think that is a is great direction that we can move forward on and and take action on. It doesn't change the fact that in the end once you're looking at the two districts side by side and creating and looking at opportunities for incentives that might be associated with one district or another, there may be a reason to to keep R4 and we can we can make that decision at the end of the line. We don't need to um, uh, we don't need to pre pre-determine that. Um, but if the intention is to replace R4 with R3D2 it'd be good to know that so that we can work with the property owners and and notice appropriately.

[02:50:41] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: And I just have one question. I think I already know the answer to it but I'll ask it anyway. Um, the story description for each of these, um, that's that's not counting density bonus right?

[02:50:58] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Um, sorry which description?

[02:50:59] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: So for for D1 and D2, four story, six story. Those are that's not counting density bonus, right?

[02:51:05] Assistant Community Development Director Lindsey Hagen: Um, no it would not count density bonus, although as I said before, uh part of the goal here is to um create some breathing room within the standards for density bonus so um you know hopefully again can't promise anything because developers can basically ask for whatever you know whatever waivers they want. Um, but hopefully it's not like a proportional height increase, because they can be flexible in other ways on the site.

[02:51:42] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: If there's no more questions we can just go straight to deliberation if anyone has any comments, um, insights that they'd like to share. Commissioner Cranston.

[02:51:53] Commissioner Bill Cranston: I think R3D2 and R4 should be the same thing. So the rest of the table four, if we're gonna head down this path the what you've outlined in table four makes sense to me in its general outline and I just to me it would change as R4 and R3D2 becomes the same thing. That would be my recommendation.

[02:52:18] Chair José Gutiérrez: Uh, agree with Commissioner Cranston.

[02:52:26] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Commissioner Donahue.

[02:52:28] Commissioner Paul Donahue: I agree as well.

[02:52:30] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Okay, roll on that together. Okay. Further comments? Anybody else? Going once, going twice? I'll just say I too like the idea of consolidation. Um, if it looks and smells like an R4 maybe it ought to be an R4. Uh Commissioner Nuñez though, go ahead.

[02:52:50] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Yeah, I mean my like meant, I'm still now I'm gonna be the one saying what are we even answering here? Um, excuse me for getting lost in the sauce. Um, yeah, I mean uh that R3D2 is pretty ugly I think, I mean I think there's like nicer R3D2s that uh you know I think we could have in our uh city. Um and um you know like I don't think anyone here would be surprised if I said I was in favor of an R5. Uh so yeah that's where I'm at.

[02:53:29] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Further comments. Commissioner Yin.

[02:53:33] Commissioner Joyce Yin: I think if it makes everything easier and there's no difference, go for it. Um I don't quite understand yet the benefit of the R4 to be done in the future but uh if it allows you guys some flexibility in doing things then um I'm okay with it.

[02:53:54] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: So it sounds like we have pretty clear consensus that there's that combination uh or elimination of redundancy would be appropriate. I don't know if you want to straw poll that Eric.

[02:54:08] Commissioner Chris Clark: Oh, Chris, did you... I don't have anything to add, I I'll just I'll wait and see whether there's at the end of this whether there's any reason to keep R4 around. I don't want to prejudge that. I feel like we're a year from that but I I do agree with the sentiment that you know simple is better and in that particular case. I just don't know what the implications of eliminating R4 and and just doing R3D2 would be. Um I am I am fine with um with the other questions that you'd asked uh if council does want to go into you know additional density and intensities looking through you know D1 and R3D1 R3D2 probably not beyond that. Um that was one of the questions that was in here. Um I think we'll probably we may need to look at some of those overlay areas. I don't know how legacy those overlays are and maybe there were very good reasons for them but um I'm not sure we need to get into that tonight. Um but um yeah those are all my comments.

[02:55:10] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Thank you. And I'll just say for myself I generally favor simpler is better. I like internally consistent rather than something that to folks who aren't professional planners might be confusing as to why are these two different things that kind of do the same thing. Um I will also say and I think Commissioner Yin you said this earlier, I generally I'm in favor of of more options and more flexibility and giving more choices, um putting more choices forward to council for when they they start deciding how they want to do things. I think the more options and building blocks they have to play with the better. So. Yes sir, Commissioner Donahue.

[02:55:48] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Well I I know Commissioner Clark didn't want to to go there, but I I do actually at the risk of going back to questions, the the overlays um are those going to be re-evaluated or eliminated as part of this process even if it's a Goal 5 is rejected? The state mandated process, will that uh change the overlays?

[02:56:20] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Um, at this point it's difficult to say that you know kind of at the fine grain of those overlays how they might end up. Um, if as I said you know under SB 330 we can downzone areas if we also upzone areas and um if the council determines that those overlay areas are important enough to preserve, uh then we would have to identify enough areas to upzone to to compensate. Um the the challenge with the overlay areas is that um those one story overlays are very difficult to enforce with state density bonus and with the um uh the kind of consistency standards between the existing general plan designation and that one story overlay. Um so from a character perspective and setting standards that are based on that intended character you would have to lower the general plan designation in order to maintain that one story overlay.

[02:57:40] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Okay, and the one the yeah the one story overlays are there to be compatible with adjacent R1 uses which are I believe allowed in generally to be higher than one story which seems kind of backwards. Yeah, I...

[02:58:00] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: I made a quick map, uh I don't know how well you can see this, it's a little hard to see. Sorry about that. Um but you can see the yellow areas are the R1 one story overlays and they're actually not adjacent to any of the R3 one story overlays which are in kind of a salmon color. Um so yes, the um uh with the exception of a little area um on Whisman drive but there it's also surrounded by um by R1 that is allowed to go two-story on that site. So pretty much all of these one story overlays are adjacent to single-family homes that can go to two stories. Single-family home sizes.

[02:58:45] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Yeah, that that seems kind of that that seems at least strange to me. Um I mean I could see an argument for a for a two-story overlay I guess, but um but anyway yeah, re-evaluating the the overlays uh seems seems reasonable to me. And Commissioner Cranston go ahead.

[02:59:08] Commissioner Bill Cranston: I guess in my mind if the if the zoning includes transition elements in it on how do you deal with transitions from an area that the overlays would effectively become unnecessary. If the if there's components in it that say this is how you transition from one zone to the next, I would hope you could essentially describe how the overlays are no longer needed. So I wasn't as wasn't particularly worried about the overlays because I've seen other, um I think in El Camino precise plan they have transition elements, others have those and those accomplish something similar to what the overlays do. I'm familiar with the little weird one in in Monta Loma and it's really just there to ensure step-ups and so if other...

Segment 5

[03:00:00] Commissioner Bill Cranston: other plans have done that so I'm not super worried about it myself because I think I'm confident our planning team can deal with the transitions. So that's my comment.

[03:00:16] Chair: And perhaps I'll just say for myself I'll plus one with what Commissioner Donahue's talking about here. I have to admit my my the question that came up for me is listening to this and looking at this map is why do we have these? And transitions that's that's one good reason to have it. Um I just hope that again in the spirit of keeping things simple and and and intelligible to folks on the outside um we're using these we keep these around because they're useful not because they're historical artifacts. I'd love to know one day the history of why we have a overlay map that looks like this. So that's enough of that. Um staff, did you get everything you need from us on this question?

[03:00:57] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: So I I did get a lot of comments uh well um certainly the uh the commission kind of a a a majority of the commission agreed with Commissioner Cranston's um sentiment that um if the council wants to include our 3D2 then it should take the place of our four uh or at least that should be our intention through the project. Um the um and as far as answering the question specifically you know some commissioners uh touched on it and and others did not. Um the I don't see any other kind of the themes uh with the majority of the commission. Does...

[03:02:00] Public Works Director Dawn Cameron: Can you bring back up slide 2 that showed the five? Um I would like to suggest that one thing that may be helpful is this is the the range of densities and character sub-districts that staff is saying could be then used and put together the alternatives eventually leading to the maps. So one way to look at this is does this look like a good set of densities and subdistricts to work with to give you enough puzzle pieces as you put together the map, knowing that R3 D1 and R3 D2 will be more dependent upon the concept of council saying yes we want to look at increasing densities overall. But do you feel that this is a good range to be looking at and considering or would you have feedback on you know additional or less or you know in terms of what we bring to council?

[03:03:10] Chair: That's helpful Dawn, thank you. Commissioner Nunez.

[03:03:13] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Yes.

[03:03:17] Chair: Commissioner Cranston.

[03:03:20] Commissioner Bill Cranston: So what I'm looking at is Table 4, which is this explained. If that's what you mean, then Table 4 I'm comfortable with. I can't tell what you mean by just this chart, but Table 4 says in the R1 in the medium low density R2 it will become R3A in general. If you look at the medium density residential it will become R3B in general. That mapping is what I'm looking at in my interpretation of it. So if that's what you're asking then...

[03:03:53] Public Works Director Dawn Cameron: That is a correct interpretation. This was meant to just be a cheat sheet to Table 4.

[03:04:00] Commissioner Bill Cranston: But Table 4 is what I'm actually asking.

[03:04:03] Public Works Director Dawn Cameron: What you're asking, what we're asking, yes.

[03:04:07] Chair: Well clarified. Any other comments? Maybe we'll straw poll this. Is everybody okay with what's in Table 4 given the clarification that uh I almost called you Senator. Commissioner Cranston. It's getting late, it's 10 o'clock. Uh you got promoted. Um uh subject to the the clarification about R4 that uh Commissioner Cranston raised, is everybody okay with Table 4? Let me see some hands. Boom. We're good. That's 7 all. Uh the time is now it's time check 10 o'clock. We're in three hours and uh let's get to Question 4. Alright, I'm gonna read the question and then we're gonna answer it. Question 4, what feedback does the Planning Commission have on the criteria for where to locate higher densities and commercial uses? Questions from the commissioners. Commissioner Cranston.

[03:05:08] Commissioner Bill Cranston: So it's it's alluded to in the little list of things in page 23. Realistic growth capacity. Um one of the maps that you included in here at my request, thank you, was map number one and because when you simply look at R3 there's this big there's some of these really big blocks that oh by the way when CSFRA was passed all of a sudden landlords went out and said I'm going to turn them into townhomes and all of a sudden you now have an area that's actually much more heavily townhomes and actually could be very difficult to develop. And so the idea here on this this realistic growth capacity to me is something if I were a council saying I want to do this, I would suggest that they look at and say where can you actually get what you want to do. And if you've got an area that's there's a a little spot here that's an apartment, a little spot here, surrounded by all these townhomes, your ability to actually get that density would seem to me to be limited. And it's not called out in your tables but the realistic growth capacity seems like something that they should consider when they're looking at these and saying okay if it's if there's places where you could do a bunch of this together, that makes more sense than something that's very very fragmented where an area that's like all super small lots. Okay, it's hard to bring lots together. So those areas that are that are divided into a lot of little small parcels or those that are have before SP330 kicked in became you know very heavily townhomes and I mean the city attorney can tell me but as far as I know effectively an HOA never can go away because you'd have to have a majority vote of everybody in the HOA to say tear everything down and start over, which is never going to freaking happen. So HOAs are there, they're never going to redevelop. So if you're going to do this, pick an area that you actually have a shot. Would be my that's it was just one little three little thing in here and it doesn't feel like it was a I would have made that a bigger a bigger deal.

[03:07:25] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yeah, so if I understand you correctly.

[03:07:26] Commissioner Bill Cranston: Is that something we can include?

[03:07:28] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yeah, so you're basically adding a criteria of for increased density of a neighborhood where the preponderance of parcels could feasibly redevelop into that increased density.

[03:07:46] Commissioner Bill Cranston: Right. So that we could include that?

[03:07:49] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yep, absolutely.

[03:07:52] Chair: Vice Chair Gutierrez.

[03:07:55] Chair José Gutiérrez: I'm good, I'm good, yeah. Go on. I was listening to what the Senator was saying and and I liked the perspective but I wanted to ask your a question while I can here. So what's your take on overall growth capacity? Would you why would you just focus in on realistic growth but not also include overall growth? What what's your take on that or would you...

[03:08:15] Commissioner Bill Cranston: I think they're combined, but if you look at when I looked at map one, okay, the the pure R3 map shows big sections that are all orange, okay. When you then drill underneath it and say what can't be redeveloped, all of a sudden some of those big blotches of orange are like well okay you got a little piece here and a little piece here surrounded by a bunch of HOAs and a little piece here. Can you really get much out of that because it's it's going to be hard to do. So overall growth yes, but if you're going to if if if they're going to say we're going to do this, then you should do it somewhere where you can actually achieve it. So overall growth yes, but also achievability of what you set out if you're going to have staff go off and look at it and they say okay I mean there's there's one neighborhood that's like everything looks like it's a single family parcel size, right, and trying to get that to all agree to turn into something you know R4ish it's consolidating lots as we've seen is really hard to do. So the the chances of that happening, if you look at it just as a big orange box it could be, but it means you got to get half a dozen HOAs, single family homeowners, all together to say I want to do that whole thing, which so it's probability of success seems lower.

[03:09:35] Chair José Gutiérrez: Okay. See, and the reason why I asked that is because when I looked at it I thought uh the flip side, which was alright so if I'm in an HOA and I got like a condo or a townhome or what have you and there's like a certain number of us, and then all of a sudden there's an ability to just you know agree to something and sell, make a little bit of a profit and then move to the other side of town, why wouldn't I want to do that?

[03:09:54] Commissioner Bill Cranston: I've been on an HOA board and trying to get members of the community to agree on...

[03:10:00] Chair José Gutiérrez: Things is tough. Yeah. Language.

[03:10:03] Commissioner Bill Cranston: Language. Totally agree. Agree on things is really hard. Okay. I apologize to the community for my language. But I just I mean we have another HOA member here. He can probably tell you whether what it's like to corral the cats to get a decision. I mean they won't even agree on hey we got a leak in the roof we should fix the roofs.

[03:10:22] Chair José Gutiérrez: Well no no, I get it. But because I saw him shaking his head too, Chris, like thinking maybe what I was thinking, but I don't know what he was thinking. So could you share why you...

[03:10:33] Chair: Commissioner Clark.

[03:10:35] Commissioner Chris Clark: Oh sure, there would be instances where... so the the very first tiny little condo that I owned was in a soft story structure that's probably, well say where, um but you know, it's not in great shape. Um the amount that they will have to collect and spend to upgrade it eventually will be too much for them, and so they would probably be open to a redevelopment opportunity someone to come in and and buy out the. Also what you see happen with some of those older units is someone will start buying up the units to get to 50 plus 1 percent um and then they control the HOA. So it's not impossible, but I I do agree with you that um it's highly unlikely if it's not a 60-year-old building or something like that.

[03:11:14] Chair José Gutiérrez: Oh thank you. I'm done. I'm good. Thank you.

[03:11:20] Chair: Commissioner Nunez.

[03:11:22] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Alright, clearly HOAs bring out the best in humanity. Um but I I do have some uh questions around uh the criteria one and two. I'm just kind of trying to reconcile those. Are you asking us to pick do we like criteria one or two or like are we saying we like all of this as options for council to have on the table? What's like the you know just point of clarification on that.

[03:11:52] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Yeah, I think the most meaningful input from the EPC here would be um you know feedback on the individual criteria and as Cranston identified additional criteria. So if there is a criterion that you think is not important let us know. Um you know this is this is uh going to be most beneficial when we can um you know weed out the unimportant ones and and promote the important ones.

[03:12:28] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Okay. Uh along those lines then, um with regards to neighborhood commercial, I love the idea of um major like artery road uh facing, right? Um kind of like the California Street market um being one example. Um I'm really uh supportive uh of the uh public transit component. Um employment areas not so much. Um I think that it's possible to have uh you know people go to the corner store or like a coffee joint and that doesn't necessarily have to be uh next to some industrial park uh in my view. Um and then with regards to uh Commissioner Cranston's uh uh point around the the parcel component, I agree with that sentiment. Um is is a general concern around um viability of uh development when it does require uh consolidation of of multiple interests into one. So um however that gets resolved, um I'd be supportive of finding uh solutions for that, uh especially as it pertains to making some of the higher densities uh more viable.

[03:13:43] Chair: Commissioner Donahue.

[03:13:45] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Um I agree with Commissioner Nunez on on some of these things. Uh access to public transit I think is is more important than say access to employment areas. Um I think that people change jobs, uh people uh need access to commercial areas, but uh people need access to a kind of a multitude of commercial opportunities, right? They go to the grocery store but then they need to go buy you know clothing or something. So I think the public transit is what enables them to get to something that's beyond what what is uh you know very close and walkable. Um so I I would highly uh favor the the public transit uh item over somewhat over commercial areas and definitely over employment areas. Uh major corridors as as he said, I I agree with that. And I think most of the other uh comments that he made.

[03:14:49] Chair: Vice Chair Gutierrez.

[03:14:51] Chair José Gutiérrez: So I I like the idea that that Commissioner Cranston uh mentioned in terms of realistic growth capacity because I was looking at at overall growth capacity originally and I thought well maybe I could combine that with realistic growth capacity. So but once he brought that up I figured well I should ask for clarity sake because then the goal here is to try and create something that's more positive and that can be uh a higher level impact so that City Council can ponder anything yay or nay on what we suggest. Um so having said that, I I'd rather go all in with realistic growth capacity. Um I thought about units near transit and commercial, I can see the value in that, but uh so my car broke down a couple of a few months ago, right? Uh and I I took it to the shop, right? Okay, no no problem, whatever, go get 'em. And I I wait, I'll take public transportation, I'll take the VTA, because I used to when I used to go to De Anza College and then you know I had no car so I had to go to community college, take the 22, take the 23, bam I'm there. Um nobody rides VTA. I was shocked. I went throughout several days of the week and the ridership when compared to 4, 6, 10 years ago is significantly smaller. The folks that I used to see on VTA aren't there anymore. Uh a certain part of the community isn't there anymore. I would see a lot of Raza there, I'd see a lot of hard-working people that would work at Hobee's, Denny's, going to school, whatever. I don't see that as much because everyone's doing offline studying or because those types of jobs or those folks that used to be in those positions aren't here anymore because it's so darn expensive. So I I literally got really bummed out and I thought units near transit, mm it's nice to say, but I don't see a lot of folks riding their bikes. I don't see a lot of folks taking the VTA. So symbolically speaking I get it, but I'm bummed out to say that right now I'm disappointed. Um I I could see more of of a value with and and that's not to criticize Paul or or anyone on the commission that thinks of that way, I'm just sharing my opinions on that because I think that when you observe all these things and you're on a commission, you have to look at it from a different vantage point, though you have to fight through your biases, right? Because you have your own um interests that you think of as important and this is the way it should be. But you've got to be flexible to all this stuff too. And so when I looked at units near commercial, I could see that more as a value add on because yeah if if if you do have opportunities around that area or those areas where you can build on uh density and promote a certain type of housing, that could be equitable for those folks that need it the most and you have a developer that's all in to want to do that, why not? Right. Um so so I hope that gives you some perspective on my thoughts, if that's clear enough.

[03:17:38] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: If I understand correctly, you you like number 4 on the on the left side over number 3 on the left side. Okay. Yeah. Yep.

[03:17:53] Chair: Commissioner Yin.

[03:17:55] Commissioner Joyce Yin: I was going to just say that I find it a little bit difficult to answer this question because these are huge chunks of land and I I'm always in favor of doing things holistically and well planned and well thought out. These are big proportions of the city that we're looking at and we're just gonna you know go through six bullet points. I would say in general like these six bullet points all have merit. But each area is very different. Where is the realistic growth? Where is the transit? Where's the commercial? Each one is a little different and I wouldn't want to just lay it down across all of R3 and say we're doing it just here, prioritize that. I I'm still sticking with each area is its own unique little neighborhood. It's a big chunk of land. I'd rather plan it holistically. Um and this would be a good start to bring towards the community and say hey what do you guys think? I I don't want to do it.

[03:18:58] Chair: Okay. I'll um let me add one comment of my own and then maybe we can I s- I'm starting to see a couple of themes here and we can straw poll those and maybe we'll be done. Um so for me what jumped out when as I was trying to think through you know the you know the game in my head of where do you where do you put density and and what not. Um something I don't see mentioned here but I think is really important is actually congestion. Right. I let me put it this way, density has a cost. And if you have a section of town where it's already really congested and people are, you know it's taken people a long time to just you know get 10 blocks, go drop their kid off at school. Maybe the school's congested and that there a third grader has you know 33 kids in that class. That's really important. And I think if you have an area where the traffic's already really bad, I'm not sure that it's fair to say ah yeah let's put it over there because it drops that the additional burden on folks who already have to carry a significant burden. And I think that there's an in a way there's an equity lens here that's missing if we're not talking about areas that are already heavily impacted and heavily congested because you know we're not always talking about adding another lane to you know to California, like we're not gonna do that, right? So I just my hope would my hope is is that we could consider congestion both from a you know a transit standpoint, possibly a a school district standpoint, there's probably some others that I'm forgetting, but I think that the the cost of additional density absolutely should be part of uh how we think about where where it ought to be next. So that's just the only comment I had. Um Commissioner Yin, did you have anything you wanted to add or... Okay. Commissioner Cranston.

[03:20:43] Commissioner Bill Cranston: And I I don't necessarily disagree, but I guess I'm conditioned by VMT. That I can't consider traffic anymore. Um vehicle miles traveled is is a criterion if they you know if if it if it's all within the city and it's a VM VMT neutral then I can't really consider it. So I'm I don't know how I when I I stopped looking at traffic impacts as much simply because the state has said you can't do what we used to do on you know on neighborhoods and on on traffic lights and stuff, there's still something, but as you're picking this, I guess I'd be I don't know how you reconcile that with this this requirement for using vehicle miles traveled as a basis for determining whether the traffic has an impact or not.

[03:21:38] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: You absolutely can continue to use LOS or whatever traffic metric you want to use as a basis for a discretionary action, you know like a rezoning. You you absolutely can do that. There is a uh a an analytic challenge that we could probably figure out with the help of our consultants. Generally, you know, you you study the growth and then you figure out how much traffic it causes, and so you have to do kind of a feedback loop in order to answer that question. But we can do traffic counts to see where there is traffic, and we can orient um you know growth away from those areas. Um you know the distinction with CEQA is that uh we cannot consider traffic as traditionally categorized in our CEQA documents. Um and you know you can use CEQA documents to, for example, um uh evaluate projects that are zoning compliant, right, that you maybe have less discretion over. Uh but you can certainly use the location of traffic congestion in an evaluation of a purely discretionary action like a a zoning um like a zoning amendment like this.

[03:23:07] Chair José Gutiérrez: Okay, so having heard what you said, how does that work? So if you 'cause I thought like Bill, I thought that there was something that that that I thought it was explained to me by by someone that you couldn't take traffic into consideration. So and I get how it relates to CEQA, I totally understand that part, but prior to that part...

[03:23:35] Public Works Director Dawn Cameron: So thank you for the question. I think the best way to explain this is currently how we do review development proposals. So as explained, per state law under CEQA, we cannot consider level of service, we must look at vehicle miles traveled in terms of whether there is an environmental impact for which there would be a CEQA mitigation. However, the city also, as we review development projects um where there is discretion and so on, we conduct now what's called a multimodal transportation analysis. And there is prescribed scopes of work for that based upon the size of the project in terms of the scale of that. And as part of that analysis, we're bringing in data about um you know what the current traffic conditions are, what how this development may add to those traffic conditions, what this development uh in terms of the bike and ped facility needs in the area, what can this development bring forward in terms of transportation demand management programs to um curtail or reduce their vehicle trips. Are there also other what we're now calling instead of mitigations, we're saying operational improvements that should be considered that could help then the development go in without bringing the road to a standstill, you know like adjustments to the traffic signals or other operational changes that could be made. And then we have to do that through conditions of approval as opposed to CEQA mitigation. So providing this in parallel, a you know I a similar analysis could be done because we wouldn't just look at traffic congestion, we would look at you know what are the other opportunities to serve the travel needs in this area. You know is it are we getting a well developed bike network out of this, a pedestrian network, good connections to transit. An example I want to say is you brought up California Street. The city right now is in design for a pilot project to actually do a road diet. We're going to reduce lanes on California. But in exchange for that, we're putting in protected bikeways, we're putting in major pedestrian improvements, and there is transit already on California. So what can we do in you know in terms of meeting multiple of our goals including mobility to uh foster alternatives to the car and you know so definitely if we do you know if the recommendation is to look as you're saying at the cost of congestion in terms of where there may already be congested areas and traffic, um the suggestion would be yes we look at that but we also look at our you know what other opportunities do we have with our transportation system to help address that. So that it's it's not the sole determinant in terms of traffic congestion.

[03:26:58] Chair José Gutiérrez: Great, thank you for the explanation because especially for the news about California because I I was also there when I was part of the group that went and suggested hey how about we do this on California blah blah blah blah which is wonderful. Because I think that was my my other concern which is why I was surprised that we could do this, right? I didn't know that we we could, because my concern was well wait, if then you're going to then try to go to certain R3 areas where they're next to areas that are already dense in population and with vehicle usage, then how do you curtail that? Because it seems like it's a like a vicious little cycle that if you're going to have more buildings and more density and more opportunities with different types of housing, naturally you're going to get traffic, more traffic, it's just going to compound on itself, right? So now that you've explained that, then I would like to also include this as a suggestion so that we can also have this as an option for them to study and take into consideration when we do look at zones. Thanks.

[03:27:15] Chair: Are you asking for a straw poll for that? Okay. All right. Staff, you sure? You're sure? Okay. I thought I saw you shake your head no. So.

[03:27:25] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: I you know those types of like incentives or what we'd be looking for would come later in the in the process. You sure you can you can you can make that recommendation as a group but you know that's something that we'll revisit later in the in the process.

[03:27:42] Chair: Commissioner Donahue.

[03:27:44] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Well is it um additional parks being built as a result of some Quimby Act type uh well the Quimby Act still still applies to these things we are our uh park land dedication ordinance would uh yeah okay. Then um one thing that we could potentially do I'm is uh consider proximity to kind existing park infrastructure as as similar to proximity to some of these other things or or uh you know consider impacts on schools. I don't know if we would I I'm just thinking on the fly here. I don't know if we would want to uh focus development next to existing parks which would then put a burden on those parks for the existing users uh or if we would want to have it um not next to existing parks. So um does anybody have any thoughts on that?

[03:28:58] Chair: Commissioner Cranston.

[03:29:01] Commissioner Bill Cranston: I guess I'm just not clear what we're talking about here. I mean are we talking about the criteria for the potential sites to be selected or just overall concerns about R3 in general? Or I I I'm just I'm not sure how to provide feedback. There was R3 was identified as part of the housing element. Another part of the housing element is the Parks and Recreation Strategic Plan. And the strategic plan has to take into account the housing element and all of its doing and including the R3 analysis. So I'm assuming that someone in Parks and Rec is talking to the Parks and Rec Commission and all those folks and they're looking at how what does that mean for the city as a whole and yeah I'd love to see it and we should pass it on to them that people are still talking about it but I'm personally relying on the Parks and Rec staff and the Parks and Rec Commission to have to do that analysis to say what's the parks and parks were identified as one of those feasibility problems okay so there's this conflict between I want more parks but it's more expensive to have parks and I want more parks and so I just I'm not I'm comfortable letting that Parks and Rec strategic plan answer this question rather than us trying to come up with a separate...

[03:30:27] Public Works Director Dawn Cameron: I was just going to add that I think the way I heard that was it was a potential criteria on one way or the other. I don't think you had an opinion on if it should be a criteria or if it shouldn't necessarily but should it was I think what I was hearing.

[03:30:44] Commissioner Paul Donahue: That that was my intention. I'm thinking on the fly about whether I agree that it should be one of the criteria and I was soliciting other people's thoughts on that to try to help solidify my own uh thinking.

[03:31:00] Public Works Director Dawn Cameron: Thank you. I'm not certain it would add value to make that a criteria for selecting where there would be increased density. I you know the folk I think personally the focus in terms of needing to provide more park land needs to focus more on as mentioned by Commissioner Cranston not only the Parks and Rec Strategic Plan but our opportunities to acquire additional open space and develop more open space and park land options and and focusing more on that so um you know looking at this different criteria for increased density um but as part of that and good planning as this increased density goes in saying okay now how are we going to provide them uh additional park and open space to serve them as well as the existing residents in the area. So this gets back to as um you know um the assistant director was saying that this could come back later in the process in terms of you know how we might be able to if there's going to be increased densities use that to incentivize opportunities to get more open space as well as mentioned before um these projects will be subject to the the park land ordinance as well and how we use that to strategically locate open space and parks.

[03:32:35] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Okay, I'll I'll withdraw my my suggestion. I was just I was on the Parks and Rec Commission for a while so I'm like I'm the park guy so I don't know I had to throw in a parks uh comment after after it was brought up.

[03:32:49] Chair: Commissioner Yin.

[03:32:51] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Thank you I'd now I just going to make this fast I'm sorry I didn't mean to confuse things I was just putting it out there as a potential you guys have said you didn't really need to take a vote that could be added in later but I was just bringing it up as something that the community had actually wanted that's not even on here which makes just the whole discussion I guess it was just making my point that if we really wanted to try to get everything we wanted as much of it as we could then we would be looking at it more holistically because there are so many things on here I think that could be added. Um so I I just you know heard something from the public comments, it was a big one, put it in there, and already it's kind of difficult, so that's just my point that's all, thank you.

[03:33:37] Chair: Okay. Further comments from the commissioners? Seeing none. Staff, did you get what you needed from us? Wait. Vice Chair Gutierrez, go.

[03:33:45] Chair José Gutiérrez: Yeah okay and I'll be quick and I think that's the that's why I had mentioned before that we have to look at this from a higher perspective right where we try and limit our biases because I think when you have these competing interests and they're so personal to you whether you're a homeowner or a renter you've got to look at the bottom line which is what's in the best interest of the city how can we best do a model of housing affordability in the city that's going to be compliant with the state and with the needs of what the communities already express with the housing element and then what the City Council has as priorities. And so you factor all this you factor in traffic you factor in schools you factor in parks you factor in a different way of thinking about progress and that's the hardest thing you can do so you know for what it's worth I want to thank everyone here for pitching in chiming in agreeing to disagree but then still moving forward so you know great job.

Segment 6

[03:45:13] Chair José Gutiérrez: Hold on. I'm waiting. Commissioner Donahue.

[03:45:17] Commissioner Paul Donahue: So I went to the uh, Planning Commissioner Academy uh last week, and it was fantastic and um, yeah, it was great. It was very educational.

[03:45:30] Commissioner Paul Donahue: I mean, I I learned a bunch of things, there were a bunch of things that as the new guy went kind of over my head. So, you know, maybe if I go back in the future, I'll, I'll understand what what some of that stuff was. But yeah, it definitely um was very helpful and uh um yeah, so I'd like to thank the city for for uh sending me. It was great.

[03:45:53] Chair José Gutiérrez: Thank you for the report out. Um, Commissioner Cranston? Oh, um, that will be answered by Ms. Pancholi.

[03:46:47] Principal Planner Diana Pancholi: Thank you Chair and the commission. Diana Pancholi, Principal Planner and staff liaison to EPC. So our next meeting, this was a special meeting, our next meeting for March 20th is gonna be canceled because we don't have anything on the agenda.

[03:47:03] Principal Planner Diana Pancholi: Um, but please note Wednesday, April 3rd, the EPC will hold a facilitated retreat, uh, at the community center. Um, that will focus on team building, improved communication, and roles and responsibilities of the commission, and it will be a public meeting. So the next meeting will be April 3rd.

[03:47:24] Chair José Gutiérrez: Thank you ever so much. Um, my personal thanks to everybody that that stuck it out this whole three, three hours and 40 minutes of study session. My, my particular thanks to staff for staying this long, for commissioners for all this great discussion, great input.

[03:48:24] Chair José Gutiérrez: Um, and with that we will adjourn, the meeting is adjourned at 10:42 PM. Thanks everybody. Good job.

Gap between 'Segment 5' and 'Segment 6'

[03:34:34] Chair José Gutiérrez: Okay. Staff, if you got what you need from us.

[03:34:36] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: Um, are there, I guess I'll just ask, are there any criteria on either side, we heard a couple of commissioners say that, you know, they wanted to deprioritize some, one or more of these criteria. Um, didn't hear it consistently, but I just kind of wanted to put that framing out there to see if there was broad consensus around removing any of these criteria from the list.

[03:35:04] Chair José Gutiérrez: Commissioner Dempsey.

[03:35:05] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Uh, the one I brought up was, um, with regards to, uh, criteria for commercial, and my, uh, understanding of this is that we're, uh, really kind of in large parts thinking through, uh, you know, ground floor retail, community-serving, uh, commercial services, uh, that they not necessarily need to be next to employment areas, whether that be office or some sort of business park, um, necessarily.

[03:35:36] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: So deprioritization of employment areas.

[03:35:39] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Deprioritization of employment areas, yes. In the furtherance of community-serving retail.

[03:35:44] Chair José Gutiérrez: Okay. And that's for, is that for both, or just one?

[03:35:48] Commissioner Hank Dempsey: Uh, criteria for commercial.

[03:35:51] Chair José Gutiérrez: Criteria for commercial. Okay, for the second one. Okay. Um, let's straw poll that. Folks who want to see that deprioritized. I see one. I see one. Uh, uh, against? And then abstentions? Looks like six abstentions on that. Okay. Anyone else like to recommend any other, um, concepts for straw, to see if we've got a sense of the commission? Any other additional issues? Staff, anything you think we forgot? Anything you consider to be missing?

[03:36:31] Planning Manager Eric Anderson: No, I think if that's, uh, what the commission can, uh, has spoken, that's, I think that's what we'll bring forward.

[03:36:44] Commissioner Joyce Yin: One quick thing. I, um, heard a lot of public comments say that if densities go up, they'd really like to see more parks and open space. I know that, you know, we're, yeah. I'll leave it at that. So, maybe that's something that should also be considered.

[03:37:09] Chair José Gutiérrez: Are you asking for a straw poll for that?

[03:37:13] Chair José Gutiérrez: Okay. Alright. Um, staff...

[03:37:17] Chair José Gutiérrez: You sure?

[03:37:21] Commissioner Joyce Yin: We don't need to. I mean, we don't need to.

[03:37:23] Chair José Gutiérrez: I saw you shake your head no, so...

[03:37:26] Assistant Community Development Director Lindsey Hagen: You know, those types of, like, incentives or what we'd be looking for would come later in the, in the process. You sure, you can, you could make that recommendation as a group, but, you know, that's something that we'll revisit later in the, in the process.

[03:37:41] Chair José Gutiérrez: Commissioner Donahue.

[03:37:43] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Well, is it, um, additional parks being built as a result of some Quimby Act type, well, the Quimby Act still, still applies to these things. Or our, uh, parkland dedication ordinance would, uh, yeah, okay. Then, um, one thing that we could potentially do is, uh, consider proximity to kind of existing park infrastructure as, as similar to proximity to some of these other things. Or, or, uh, you know, consider impacts on schools. I don't know if we would, I'm just thinking on the fly here. I don't know if we would want to, uh, focus development next to existing parks, which would then put a burden on those parks for the existing users, uh, or if we would want to have it, um, not next to existing parks. So, um, does anybody have any thoughts on that?

[03:39:00] Chair José Gutiérrez: Commissioner Cranston.

[03:39:02] Commissioner Bill Cranston: I guess I'm just not clear what we're talking about here. I mean, are we talking about the criteria for potential sites to be selected or just overall concerns about R3 in general? Or I'm so I'm not sure how to provide feedback. There is, R3 was identified as part of the housing element. And another part of the housing element is the Parks and Recreation Strategic Plan. And the strategic plan has to take into account the housing element and all of its doing and including the R3 analysis. So I'm assuming that someone in Parks and Rec is talking to the Parks and Rec commission and all those folks and they're looking at how, what, what does that mean for the city as a whole? And yeah, I'd love to see it and we should pass it on to them that people are still talking about it. But I'm personally relying on the Parks and Rec staff and the Parks and Rec commission to have, to do that analysis to say, what's the parks, and parks were identified as one of those feasibility problems, okay? So there's this conflict between I want more parks, but it's more expensive to have parks and I want more parks. So I just, I'm, I'm not, I'm comfortable letting that Parks and Rec strategic plan answer this question rather than us trying to come up with some case.

[03:40:23] Commissioner Joyce Yin: That's up to you if you want me to, then...

[03:40:41] Commissioner Paul Donahue: That, that, that was my intention. Should it be, I, I'm thinking on the fly about whether I agree that it should be one of the criteria. And I was soliciting other people's thoughts on that to try to help solidify my own, uh, thinking.

[03:40:58] Chair José Gutiérrez: Let's solicit Dawn's thoughts.

[03:41:01] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Thank you.

[03:41:04] Public Works Director Dawn Cameron: I'm not certain it would add value to make that a criteria for selecting where there would be increased density. I think, you know, the, personally, the focus in terms of needing to provide more parkland needs to focus more on, as mentioned by Commissioner Cranston, not only the Parks and Rec Strategic Plan, but our opportunities to acquire additional open space and develop more open space and parkland options. And, and focusing more on that. So, um, you know, looking at these different criteria for increased density, but as part of that and good planning, as this increased density goes in, saying, okay, now how are we going to provide them, uh, additional park and open space to serve them as well as the existing residents in the area. So this gets back to as, um, you know, um, the assistant director was saying that this could come back later in the process in terms of, you know, how we might be able to, if there's going to be increased densities, use that to incentivize opportunities to get more open space, as well as mentioned before, um, these projects will be subject to the parkland ordinance as well. And how we use that to strategically locate open space and parks.

[03:42:35] Commissioner Paul Donahue: Okay, I'll, I'll withdraw my, my suggestion. I was just, I was on the Parks and Rec Commission for, for a while, so I'm like the park guy, so I don't know, I had to throw in a park, uh, comment after, after it was brought up.

[03:42:51] Commissioner Joyce Yin: Thank you. Oh no, I was just going to make this fast. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to confuse things. I was just putting it out there as a potential. You guys had said, you don't really need to, but that could be added in later. But I was just bringing it up as something that the community had actually wanted that's not even on here. Which makes just the whole discussion, I guess I was just making my point that if we really wanted to try to get everything we wanted, as much of it as we could, then we would be looking at it more holistically, because there are so many things on here, I think, that could be added. Um, so I just, you know, heard something from the public comments, it was a big one, put it in there, and already it's kind of difficult. So, that's just my point, that's all. Thank you.

[03:43:45] Chair José Gutiérrez: Wait. Vice Chair Gutierrez, go.

[03:43:46] Vice Chair Alex Nuñez: Yeah, okay, and I'll be quick. And I think that's why I'd mentioned before that we have to look at this from a higher perspective, right, where we try and limit our biases, because I think when you have these competing interests, and they're so personal to you, whether you're the homeowner or a renter, you've got to look at the bottom line, which is what's in the best interest of the city? How can we best do a model of housing affordability in the city that's going to be compliant with the state, and with the needs of what the community has already expressed through the housing element, and then what the city council has as priorities. And so you factor all this, you factor in traffic, you factor in schools, you factor in parks, you factor in a different way of thinking about progress. And that's the hardest thing you can do. So, you know, for what it's worth, I want to thank everyone here for pitching in, chiming in, agreeing to disagree, but then still moving forward, so, you know, great job.

[03:44:34] Chair José Gutiérrez: Thank you, Vice Chair. Alright. Any other comments from the commissioners? Any further requests from staff on this item? Alright. So I'm going to declare, um, the study session item 5 complete. Yay. Um, we'll go to item 6, Commission Staff announcements, updates, requests, and committee reports. No action...

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