| Time | Speaker | Text |
|---|---|---|
| 00:01:18.67 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:02:17.90 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:03:27.02 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:05:55.10 | Mayor (Chair) | sir. Good evening and welcome to the Tuesday, July 23rd, 2013 meeting. And can I have the roll call, please? |
| 00:06:08.65 | Unknown | Councilmember Pfeiffer? Here. Councilmember Theodorus? Present. Councilmember Withey? Here. Vice Mayor Leone? |
| 00:06:11.38 | Mayor (Chair) | Present. Here. here. |
| 00:06:15.35 | Unknown | Mayor Weiner. |
| 00:06:15.45 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. Weiner. Jeff, you want to lead us in the pledge? |
| 00:06:26.38 | Mayor (Chair) | pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you, Jeff. |
| 00:06:41.13 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:06:43.02 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, we met for a closed session item, and that was on the Lisey School. And at this time here, is there any public comment on that closed session item? |
| 00:06:54.99 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:06:55.00 | Ray Withy | That item is going to be up. |
| 00:06:55.22 | Mayor (Chair) | THAT I CAN. Thank you. |
| 00:06:56.07 | Unknown | agent. |
| 00:06:56.51 | Mayor (Chair) | Yeah, okay. All right. At this time here, I'd like to move approval of the agenda and also to agree that |
| 00:06:56.56 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:07:05.03 | Mayor (Chair) | within reason that we stay on the schedule that it is, the time schedule. So can I have an approval of the agenda? |
| 00:07:12.30 | Ray Withy | So move. |
| 00:07:13.09 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:07:13.53 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 00:07:13.63 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:07:13.79 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 00:07:13.94 | Mayor (Chair) | you |
| 00:07:14.11 | Thomas Theodores | Second. |
| 00:07:14.90 | Mayor (Chair) | All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Okay. This time here we have special presentations and |
| 00:07:15.85 | Thomas Theodores | Bye. |
| 00:07:24.60 | Mayor (Chair) | I'd like to get an update from Leon Hunting on the Butte Street property because I haven't had enough. Thank you. |
| 00:07:30.27 | Unknown | . |
| 00:07:30.54 | Mayor (Chair) | Yeah. Thank you. |
| 00:07:32.10 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:07:32.50 | Mayor (Chair) | you |
| 00:07:32.75 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:07:34.80 | Leon Hunting | I want to thank Herb for that. Whenever Herb sees me in town, he says, had enough? This is my campaign slogan. A question mark and an exclamation mark. |
| 00:07:48.41 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:07:48.46 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:07:48.55 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:07:50.42 | Leon Hunting | I want to thank Mayor Weiner and the council members for entertaining really the task force approach for discussing the Butte Street issue. And I want to recognize my fellow task force members because I think that Herb selected a great group, a truly outstanding group that represents Sausalito in the finest way. What good minds. I would ask. |
| 00:08:20.46 | Unknown | And thank you for really stepping up to do this. |
| 00:08:26.20 | Leon Hunting | I do that when a gun is pointed at my head. So I think the first thing to do is clarify in quote what our task was. And can you hear me okay in the back? Okay, good. This task force is being tasked with delivering a recommendation to the City Council on how best the city could be served by this property, if at all. Well, we've met several times in open session, open to the public, noticed properly, and we have received participants from the public at some of our meetings. We discussed in detail the various alternatives of how the city could be served by the property and arrived at the following recommendation. A city is a community of people, but Sausalito is truly very special. It's a community that respects the extraordinary assets that complement its beauty, especially our views and open space. In fact, these assets are so important to our community that they are preserved in our general plan and have withstood brash attempts that would violate the precepts set by our citizens. Our decision and recommendation is unanimous. It's a decision that respects the immediate neighborhood our general plan, and the character of our town. Because this specific area is one of the most densely populated in our community, the citizens of the neighborhood are really passionate about maintaining the Butte Street property as permanent open space. And we believe the property can be saved as permanent open space while not having a financial cost to the city, and I underline that. With this in mind, we're recommending that this task force be allowed to negotiate the purchase of the city's co-owners' undivided interest in the property. And for those in the audience who are not familiar with the property, it's owned by the city and another party in an undivided interest, 50-50 undivided interest. The funds for this purchase would come from a neutral third party. The new co-owner in the city would then deed the entire property to a conservation land trust to be held as solely dedicated to permanent open space. We're in negotiations with neutral prospective benefactors to secure this financing, and we are actively pursuing this, and we are encouraged by our status so far. We would then approach the city's current co-owners to accomplish the sale of their undivided interest so that the property as a whole could be transferred as proposed. The property was deeded to the city as a gift, so the only thing that the city would be losing is its current liability exposure. We believe the city would be best served by accepting and consummating this recommendation. Therefore, we are asking for your concurrence by vote, if possible, tonight regarding our recommendation so that we can continue our negotiations and bring this opportunity to a positive conclusion for all parties. Any questions? |
| 00:11:59.78 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you, Leon. |
| 00:12:03.11 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Mr. Mayor, can I start with just putting a motion on the table? Well, we'll see if we have questions. |
| 00:12:06.70 | Mayor (Chair) | Well, let's see if we have questions. I want to – he wants questions. |
| 00:12:09.55 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Okay, so a question I guess for me would be to clarify that and I support the task force, part of the task force. And just so it says that neutral third party, do you mean one person or foundation or do you mean multiple like neutral third parties like plural would contribute to the purchase of this, the other co-owner? |
| 00:12:23.38 | Unknown | Yes. |
| 00:12:36.18 | Leon Hunting | the other countries. Quite frankly, we've received indications of interest to contributions to the cause. So in that case, it would be plural. But essentially, it would go to one receiving land trust. |
| 00:12:42.53 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | in that. |
| 00:12:43.00 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:12:44.59 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:12:44.62 | Unknown | Okay. Thank you. |
| 00:12:50.41 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:12:50.56 | Leon Hunting | for permanent open space reservations. |
| 00:12:54.37 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Okay, great. |
| 00:12:55.13 | Leon Hunting | And again, emphasizing the no cost issue to the city. |
| 00:13:00.57 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Okay, great. |
| 00:13:01.31 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, let's roll around. Ray, do you have any questions? |
| 00:13:04.09 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 00:13:04.20 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:13:04.23 | Unknown | you |
| 00:13:05.33 | Mayor (Chair) | Do you have any questions? |
| 00:13:06.12 | Ray Withy | Not over. Okay, good. |
| 00:13:08.06 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, no questions, no? All right. |
| 00:13:13.91 | Ray Withy | I have a question of staff. |
| 00:13:14.76 | Mayor (Chair) | Any, the public have any questions? |
| 00:13:14.98 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:13:15.10 | Ray Withy | any, uh, |
| 00:13:15.65 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah. And afterwards I have a follow-up question. |
| 00:13:21.00 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, Jen, you want to come? You have to come up, Jen. |
| 00:13:25.85 | Ray Withy | Wait, wait, wait. You got to wait to come up. |
| 00:13:26.37 | Leon Hunting | Good night. She asked which land trust. Right now, we would prefer not disclosing that at this point, but we are in discussions with two or three land trusts, and individuals also who have a history of donating for such a cause. |
| 00:13:33.36 | Mayor (Chair) | Worked out well. Yeah. |
| 00:13:51.80 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | And Mr. Mayor, I have a question. |
| 00:13:52.75 | Leon Hunting | Thank you. |
| 00:13:53.52 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | And so I'm reading into this the donation to the land trust means that it would not be owned or controlled by the city of Saucyut. Okay. |
| 00:14:02.80 | Una Kavanagh | of salsa. |
| 00:14:03.34 | Leon Hunting | Thank you. |
| 00:14:04.29 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Okay, great, for preservation in perpetuity as open space. Perfect, great. Okay, thank you. |
| 00:14:07.63 | Una Kavanagh | Thank you. |
| 00:14:07.64 | Mayor (Chair) | Open space. Yeah. Okay, any other questions from the public? Okay, let's bring it up here. |
| 00:14:16.54 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 00:14:16.59 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:14:16.61 | Ray Withy | Thanks. I just have a question. |
| 00:14:17.82 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:14:17.84 | Ray Withy | Thank you, by the way, very much. Thanks for all your hard work up to this point. And thanks for offering to do more. You're a sucker for punishment. |
| 00:14:18.43 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. Mm. Thanks for all your hard work. MR. Great job. |
| 00:14:23.96 | Unknown | at this point. |
| 00:14:28.84 | Ray Withy | Bye. THE FAMILY. My question, Mary, it's obviously a presentation and it's not a noticed item on our agenda for even if the concept is a good one. What is the proper course of action? |
| 00:14:38.38 | Mary Wagner | I'm going to go. |
| 00:14:42.17 | Mary Wagner | Well, staff would actually recommend that if you want to agendize it for a full discussion in September. and then we can actually incorporate the process for the city's acquisition of property, which I think would be an important part of that discussion. |
| 00:14:57.19 | Leon Hunting | Okay. The city would not be acquiring the property, though. |
| 00:15:02.79 | Mary Wagner | I think it would be useful to be able to to flesh out how that process would work. If the city council is being asked to authorize an acquisition, by whomever. I think we just need to flesh that out for you guys and bring it back to you in September Thank you. |
| 00:15:19.80 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Bye. |
| 00:15:19.87 | Mary Wagner | THE FAMILY IS |
| 00:15:19.94 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | you. |
| 00:15:19.96 | Mary Wagner | you. |
| 00:15:19.97 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | . |
| 00:15:20.00 | Mary Wagner | Clarification, Mr. |
| 00:15:20.97 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | there? It's my understanding that city acquisition of land is not on the table with this proposal. Is that correct? True, true, yes. So city acquisition is not being recommended by the task force. In fact, what is being recommended by the task force, what I see is that they're going to raise money in a grassroots manner to purchase the other 50% and work with a conservation land trust and then poach the city for donation as a whole to open space for this land trust. And I guess my other question follow up is |
| 00:15:28.56 | Unknown | so since |
| 00:16:02.92 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Is there anything that prevents us from taking a motion on this tonight and voting on this? |
| 00:16:07.41 | Mary Wagner | If the city's not participating in the acquisition, there's no need to take action. |
| 00:16:09.62 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:16:12.88 | Leon Hunting | If I could clarify that point, in fact, it's the task force's recommendation that you not acquire |
| 00:16:13.97 | Mary Wagner | Yes. |
| 00:16:14.34 | Lana Ralston | Thank you. |
| 00:16:23.51 | Leon Hunting | the other half. Thank you. |
| 00:16:26.80 | Thomas Theodores | Well, I think it's, Leon, thank you, and I think it's a wonderful idea. I mean, just procedurally, though, we will be deeding our are interested in it, so we'll have to agenda. So we're going to have to approve that and agendize that, I would imagine. I'm not sure. |
| 00:16:39.34 | Mary Wagner | That would be a completely separate item. |
| 00:16:41.80 | Ray Withy | I think the question is, if I could, and Mary, you interrupt me if I'm getting off, The land trust is free to buy the other property owner, half the property owners at any time. They don't need our blessing, yay or nay, to do so. So we don't need to endorse that or not endorse it. It's up to them whether they want to act on that or not. |
| 00:17:00.61 | Leon Hunting | The clarification, I think, is as a task force, are you allowing us the opportunity to continue to move ahead in this procedure? as a task force. |
| 00:17:17.61 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | If I may, for clarification. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. What the task force is asking us is do we agree as a council with the spirit of the strategy they are pursuing? Obviously, we would, you know, agendize the, you know, the Butte, you know, the city's half, you know, of the Butte property. But the spirit, from what I understand, is we have consensus with respect to open space and with the community outpouring, and that they would like to pursue the purchase of the privately owned half. |
| 00:17:59.05 | Mary Wagner | Mr. Mayor, if I may. The council can certainly endorse the concept. The issue that I'm trying to avoid the council's |
| 00:18:02.22 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Of course, then. |
| 00:18:06.43 | Mary Wagner | um, Well, it's an item that's on your agenda, so you can talk about it. It's not agendized for action. But the other piece that's important to keep in mind that there are going to be items coming back to you for action. And it's important not to predetermine those items, whether they be legislative changes to zoning or whether they be determinations to sell or donate publicly owned land for some other Purpose, so all I'm suggesting to you is that in order to that the process can move forward in the way that you want it to? that we just be cognizant of those issues and that if the Council endorses the concept and that would be them. if you are going to take any, that would be appropriate tonight. But it's also appropriate just to give your feedback to the task force and say, Thank you so much for your hard work. we like this concept, keep moving forward, and not take any formal action. |
| 00:19:03.77 | Ray Withy | sufficient for you okay okay that sounds reasonable it's great all right thank you |
| 00:19:03.84 | Unknown | sufficient for you. |
| 00:19:10.79 | Ray Withy | Are we going to |
| 00:19:11.65 | Mayor (Chair) | VOTE ON THE |
| 00:19:12.10 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah, I move to endorse the recommendation. |
| 00:19:13.07 | Mayor (Chair) | to endorse By the task force. Liam, do you have enough to go move forward now on that? |
| 00:19:16.51 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | by the task force. They have an Well, I have a motion on the floor. |
| 00:19:22.08 | Mayor (Chair) | You have a general consensus. |
| 00:19:24.47 | Leon Hunting | I think I need to defer. |
| 00:19:27.41 | Mayor (Chair) | We can't make a motion. Thank you. |
| 00:19:28.66 | Mary Wagner | Yeah, I mean, staff is actually recommending that the council provide any feedback to the task force on this item. It's not necessary for you to take a formal... |
| 00:19:28.69 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. I mean, stuff is... |
| 00:19:29.89 | Leon Hunting | Thank you. |
| 00:19:29.91 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:19:38.85 | Mary Wagner | action and in fact in order to preserve the process moving forward it might be better for you not to take a formal action tonight. |
| 00:19:46.33 | Leon Hunting | Okay, everybody wink. |
| 00:19:46.85 | Mary Wagner | Thank you. |
| 00:19:48.42 | Leon Hunting | I think that's a good one. |
| 00:19:49.62 | Ray Withy | I think no one's raising any strong objections. I think that's a good sign. Thank you. Thank you, Leon. Thank you, Leon. |
| 00:19:54.46 | Unknown | Thank you, Leandra. |
| 00:19:55.73 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:19:55.79 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:19:55.81 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah. |
| 00:19:55.93 | Unknown | All right. |
| 00:19:55.94 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you very much. Thank you. |
| 00:19:56.08 | Unknown | . |
| 00:19:56.13 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. Now have you had enough? |
| 00:19:59.57 | Ray Withy | that. |
| 00:19:59.76 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I'm not. |
| 00:20:00.03 | Unknown | Okay. |
| 00:20:00.42 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | you |
| 00:20:01.73 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. Next item that we have on there is the introduction by the Hospitality and Business Development Committee on the Sausalito app. And... That's Mike. Mike and Nuna show. |
| 00:20:16.38 | Mike Langford | Thank you. H.F. And Jeff. Good evening, City Council members, Mayor Weiner. In addition to my role as Park and Recreation Director, booking agent for various bands at jazz and different music festivals we have here, and all around general laborer, I am also the City Liaison for the Hospitality Business Development Committee. The Hospitality Business Development Committee consists of members that are from the hotel industry, two members from the restaurant industry, and two members from the Chamber of Commerce, as well as myself, a city liaison, and Councilmember Ray Withey. The committee was formed when the city proposed to raise the TOT tax. The hoteliers did not think this was a good idea until it was discussed that a portion of those funds would go into committee such like this and do things to promote Sausalito tourism and get more people to come to Sausalito, thereby increasing their stays as well as the TOT tax. So over the past year, I've had the pleasure of working with this group, and actually I've been working with them since I got here. But over the past year, we've been working very hard on a Sausalito app. And I will turn it over now to Jeff Shiroz, who is one of those committee members, as well as Linda Cavanaugh from the Chamber. Thank you. |
| 00:21:42.31 | Jeff Shiroz | Thank you, Mike. Definitely things have changed in the last 20 years in regards to phones. We use phones in different ways. I mean, remember this little phone here? Definitely it's a little different, a little corded device. |
| 00:21:53.75 | G. Paul Minnihart | Do you still use it? |
| 00:21:54.95 | Jeff Shiroz | We still use it, yes. |
| 00:21:55.64 | G. Paul Minnihart | Yeah. |
| 00:21:57.21 | Jeff Shiroz | I couldn't send Una a text earlier as I wanted to, but I tried. But things are definitely different from 10, 20 years ago, how we use phones. We communicate differently with phones now, most of the time not actually calling people, but it's texting, emailing, getting gathering information on the web. It's definitely using things that we never thought we would 20 years ago. And oh yeah, they do make phone calls, but we don't use it as much as we used to. A billion people have access to smart phones today. One billion. So with that in mind, definitely people are utilizing it for many different things. And this usage, of course, comes to apps. And of course many of you use apps for different things. You know, we all have the smart phones and we can even learn how to boil water. We can do many different things on these phones here. And many people spend more time on their phones than they do on their personal computers. So definitely staying on the forefront, Sausalito, we want to make sure that we can gain our visitors and get people's attention to come to Sausalito to utilize our great services and things we offer here in town. Definitely. creating tools for mobile strategy, showcasing our visitors and our residents the services and products that we have to offer here in our unique community. Creating a simple, fast, and easy way for people to gain information. People want information now. They don't want to wait for things. They don't want to wait to find somebody in the park or in front of a bus stop to ask questions. Herb, I was referring to you, of course. But of course, Josh, you and of course our mayor here. But the point of it is that they want to go on their phones and really find that information as quickly as possible. Um, And of course, they want to know what things to do here in town. And Una Kavanagh, our CEO of this Oscillator Chamber, is now going to show us these great things and tools that we have to really showcase our community and show the visitors and residents what we're all about. Una. |
| 00:24:10.59 | Una Kavanagh | the city through the hospitality did provide some seed money The total cost of developing this app is 13,000. and the hospitality committee gave 3,000 seed money and I personally went out and raised the other 10,000. I would like to mention some of the members that of the Chamber that helped to finance this, Jeff from the Spinnaker, the Casa Madrona, POGEOs, the Inn Above Tide, Studio 333. So I'm very happy that the hospitality is working as it should. for seed money and then it's up to us to go out and get our businesses to support it. So thank you very much for that. And the other point I want to mention is this is a Saucelido app, not a chamber app. And that made the development even more difficult because I have lots of databases for our members but Cheryl Popp who worked alongside the developers had to do a lot of work to get out there and look for the other businesses. So let's show you what it looks like. So this is the homepage of the app and |
| 00:25:13.90 | Unknown | This is... |
| 00:25:22.58 | Una Kavanagh | if I can show you, that's businesses A to Z. So that's a real nice, quick way of looking at businesses. And you'll see, for instance, Tommy's walk, if I put in T, Oh. I accept my, yeah, I'm going to put M-M. them. Yeah, there we are. Tommy's Walk, they are not chamber members, but they are listed here on the app. so people have some contact information for them. But Chamber members are listed. Our sponsors, people who gave like 2,000 and 3,000, are allowed a certain kind of extra benefit, and that would be that let's say we go to dining, and we go to view all restaurants, The Spinnaker, Sushi Ram, Coggio, and The Trident. As usual, our restaurants are there putting their money where their mouth is and they're all sponsors. So they get in a photograph and they get top listing, which I think is pretty fair. But let's take Sushy Rang. This is kind of nice. So Sue Chiran gets nice photographs, description. Okay, legendary locals, Japanese restaurant, contact information. Okay, so that's under restaurants. What we like about the restaurants, the other thing, if I go back to dining, is a bit like our directory, we have waterfront views. We have all the restaurants that have waterfront views. That's kind of cool. Then we have under where can you go for breakfast, where dog friendly places which is kind of cool again. Then we've got late night venues. We do have them. I'm sorry. Smitty's, yay, way to go. |
| 00:27:02.21 | Unknown | Smitty's, yay, way to go. |
| 00:27:07.30 | Una Kavanagh | coffee shops, cafes, we've got lots of them which is really, really cool. So it's very nice like that. We're figuring it is focused at the visitor. because they're the ones that are downloading the app. I mean, we might want to too, but primarily we are focused on the visitors. So we have a lot of information that is appropriate for them. We have shopping. antiques and vintage, whether you are candy munchies or not a chamber member, so they're right up there in their own little category, which I'm so delighted about. And. antiques and vintage, so it goes through like that. Then we've got another nice area, nautical. We have a lot of nautical businesses here in Sausalito. So it's really cool. We've got boat and yacht charges, a lot of those. We've got marine recreation, marine services. So it's a lot of information, and it really shows that our focus is there, which is great. We've also got another nice section, what to do in Sausalito. Singles, biggest question that's asked when anyone goes to our visitor center. That's what they're asked. So we have tours and activities. I really like this. This is cool and thank you to Mike Langford. He worked real hard on this one. Cruise the bay. Look at all the cruises you can take. It's really fun. Lots of information on Empress, that kind of thing. Rent a kayak. We've got walking tours. I've got a couple of walking tours, so that's really fun, and that's something they're really interested in. Itineraries, these are the brochures that the hospitality, again, helped. finance and develop our two hours, two days which is a really, really popular guide where if a tourist comes up and says you've got two hours to spend, what is there to do? They've got two days to spend, what is there to do? So These itineraries are all on here. A full day, two days, you'll have even more time to savor. local. So that's kind of fun. There's lots of updated things. And we are updating that at the moment with the hospitality. So that's good. Any other ones we've got here, we've got visitor information centers, the Social Leader Visitor Center, the kiosk, the Social Leader Chamber of Commerce, so that's great. Another one that Mike did a lot of work on is parking. So what I really like here is if you go to lot one, The chief of police should be happy. We've got a lot of information on parking. If you go to the description, You get a full description of where it is, which is really cool. and so lots of information on it. So that's a really nice feature, that's something that Mike worked very hard on, so thank you for that. RV parking, which we do get asked about. I'm going to click and hope to God there's something in there. Yeah, there's RV parking description. recreational Lot 3 I love it. It works. Yay. OK. |
| 00:30:08.26 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. I did something down there. |
| 00:30:10.26 | Una Kavanagh | Yeah, no, so, um, So I just wanted to give you the high and wide on it. Please download your Saucelito app on your iPhone or your Android and check it out. And let me know what I'll put a little Kaviash in here. I did not develop this app, the chamber did not developed this app. If there's some mistakes, though, we have the enviable job of maintaining the app. So I get to get all the problems. But please let me know. It's not perfect. But it is... a real asset to our town. and we're hoping our visitors will enjoy using it. So thank you very much for supporting this with seed money, and thank you to our Chamber members who supported it with their money. Thank you. |
| 00:30:56.67 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, we have any questions for that, Jonathan? |
| 00:30:58.96 | Ray Withy | Thank you. Uma, I just might suggest that, and you would have to work with Rhett here to do this, that through the parking lot Wi-Fi, that this come up as an option to download if you hook into that Wi-Fi system. But it's kind of funky right now because the Hodgson sort of control it, and so that needs to be sorted out. |
| 00:31:07.55 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:31:18.72 | Ray Withy | which shouldn't be the case, but we don't have the money in the budget to take it back from them, but that's something we need to |
| 00:31:23.42 | Una Kavanagh | Yeah. I'm glad you mentioned that. That's the other thing we want to do is start promoting it. And you deliberately haven't seen it everywhere because I wasn't happy with it. And I had to personally sit down and go through the database. |
| 00:31:24.41 | Ray Withy | And I'd like... |
| 00:31:35.94 | Una Kavanagh | and make sure information was correct. But now I feel we're getting there and we're pretty much there. So I really want to get the message out there. put up posters, advertise it to people, tell them about it, but There's nothing worse than an app or anything not being the way it should be. So we're pretty confident that it's looking good. There's a lot of information there. So, yeah, we will be promoting it. So thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:32:00.09 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah, I just want to say congratulations, Una and Jeff. And Mike, you guys, just your whole team, you know, is just really taking it up a whole other level here. And it's just really great to see this. So I just wanted to say a big thank you. I think this is going to benefit the businesses in town. at a time when it's really most needed, so thank you. |
| 00:32:26.16 | Una Kavanagh | Thank you. And we're happy that it's non-chamber members too because, you know, we want to be there for the whole community. And also I did want to say BSSP, Butler, Shine, Stern and Partners, helped us a lot with the visuals, they made it look the icons and stuff. Very inviting looking. It is. It's very nice. So, yeah, they helped us a lot with that. |
| 00:32:39.78 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:32:39.83 | Jeff Shiroz | Thank you. |
| 00:32:39.88 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 00:32:40.03 | Mayor (Chair) | and stuff easy. |
| 00:32:45.04 | Mayor (Chair) | The only... |
| 00:32:46.41 | Jeff Shiroz | I just want to mention we also do have a paid person making updates, making changes. Pam Huff is going to be working with us on this. It's a living document for us. It's an ongoing thing as businesses come in and go out, we'll make those changes or any updates that we may need to do. One thing also great about the app is with Sausalito and the cell coverage, sometimes you can get cell coverage or spotty wifi. Once you've downloaded it, it's on your phone. |
| 00:32:50.07 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:32:50.12 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:32:50.14 | Unknown | . |
| 00:32:56.40 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 00:33:13.05 | Jeff Shiroz | You don't have to worry about trying to load a program or load a, whether it be open table or trying to Google a restaurant. Once you have that on the phone, whether you come on the ferry or however you get here, it's on there, which is great. It really allows for people to really visit Sausalito on their phone as they're here. |
| 00:33:15.60 | Unknown | or load. |
| 00:33:25.44 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:33:25.46 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:33:32.59 | Mayor (Chair) | The only suggestion I also have maybe under parking and transportation taxis. |
| 00:33:39.29 | Una Kavanagh | You love those taxis, don't you? |
| 00:33:42.18 | Mayor (Chair) | Well, I- |
| 00:33:42.62 | Una Kavanagh | Yeah, I think, I thought we don't have... |
| 00:33:45.72 | Mayor (Chair) | you know. |
| 00:33:46.11 | Una Kavanagh | I thought we were going to put... Oh, sorry. You forget. |
| 00:33:48.25 | Mayor (Chair) | There is one cab company that does do a lot of the local... |
| 00:33:51.04 | Una Kavanagh | We have taxis, but I know we had a little bit of a problem. Yeah, I don't think we've, yeah, we do. We do have taxis. |
| 00:33:58.23 | Mayor (Chair) | We do have taxis. All right. |
| 00:33:59.68 | Una Kavanagh | Yeah. |
| 00:33:59.76 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. Thank you. Okay, good. |
| 00:34:01.06 | Una Kavanagh | And they have their phone numbers. |
| 00:34:01.57 | Mayor (Chair) | And they have to do it. |
| 00:34:03.46 | Una Kavanagh | Which is very nice. Which is cool. I actually... I was taking that... winging it there. |
| 00:34:03.64 | Mayor (Chair) | to the world. |
| 00:34:03.83 | John Donovan | Very nice. |
| 00:34:04.37 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:34:06.75 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I'm not winging it there. |
| 00:34:08.62 | Una Kavanagh | It's working. I like it. And we have limos and buses and ferries. |
| 00:34:08.67 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | It's working. |
| 00:34:09.80 | Unknown | I like it. |
| 00:34:11.09 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. Mr. Mayor, I have a comment too. Since we're throwing comments out too, I noticed there was a bicycle icon. If you click on it, does it show rules of the road? It does. It does. I checked that one earlier. |
| 00:34:14.22 | Una Kavanagh | You don't know. |
| 00:34:20.70 | Una Kavanagh | Yes, click on it. It does, it does. Writing on sidewalks. I checked that one earlier. |
| 00:34:26.44 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Bye. |
| 00:34:27.13 | Una Kavanagh | It has rules of the road. I love it. Wear a helmet. This is really nice, actually. |
| 00:34:29.87 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I love it. Oh, wonderful. Yeah. I won't ask for the multi-language because I know that's going to be in the future versions. Oh, yeah. I am so impressed with this. This is fantastic. Oh, good. Thank you. |
| 00:34:38.37 | Una Kavanagh | Oh, yeah. Thank you. |
| 00:34:43.05 | Una Kavanagh | Thank you very much. Thanks, everyone. |
| 00:34:44.31 | Unknown | Thanks, everyone. |
| 00:34:44.78 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:34:45.01 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:34:48.73 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. Okay, at this time here, this is the... Time for City Council to hear from the citizens regarding matters that are not on the agenda. Except in very limited situations, state law precludes the Council from taking action or engaging in discussions concerning items of business that are not on the agenda. So at this time here, is there any public comment on items that are not on the agenda? Okay, let's bring it back up. Thank you. I'd like to at this time hear the action minutes of the previous meeting, minutes of the July 9, 2013 meeting. Can I have a move to approve it or any questions on it? |
| 00:35:33.91 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:35:33.93 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:35:33.98 | Thomas Theodores | Well, I had some questions. As distributed, there was an error, and I believe that Debbie's distributed the correction. So I move to approve the minutes as amended. |
| 00:35:35.46 | Mayor (Chair) | as |
| 00:35:39.68 | Mayor (Chair) | Correct. |
| 00:35:40.17 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:35:48.25 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 00:35:48.32 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:35:48.37 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. I'll second that, but could you just clarify what the change was? I'm struggling to see what... |
| 00:35:55.96 | Unknown | I was... |
| 00:35:56.74 | Unknown | In item 6C, |
| 00:35:57.97 | Thomas Theodores | Yes. I'm sick. |
| 00:36:01.57 | Unknown | A section of 6B actually got copied down into 6C, and so that section that the top of page seven. where it started off with Mayor Weiner's motion. The mayor didn't make any motions under 6C. And so that was the error, that whole section with the motion and the vote. was actually a 6B Vote. |
| 00:36:28.03 | Thomas Theodores | Basically a typo. Thank you. |
| 00:36:30.42 | Unknown | it. |
| 00:36:30.69 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:36:30.84 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:36:31.03 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:36:31.15 | Unknown | you |
| 00:36:31.42 | Mayor (Chair) | you |
| 00:36:31.50 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:36:31.54 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:36:31.66 | Unknown | So I just... |
| 00:36:32.03 | Mayor (Chair) | SECOND. |
| 00:36:32.28 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:36:32.31 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:36:32.51 | Unknown | That's... |
| 00:36:32.60 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Okay. Let's move right along now to the consent calendar. Removal of items from the consent calendar. Matters listed under the consent calendar are considered routine and uncontroversial, require no discussion, or expect that they have unanimous council support and may be enacted by the council in one motion in the form listed below. |
| 00:36:34.39 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:36:34.46 | Thomas Theodores | I'm not. |
| 00:36:34.66 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:36:58.42 | Mayor (Chair) | Mm-hmm. |
| 00:36:59.24 | Thomas Theodores | Well, I have a comment on 4D. and I'm not sure whether we need to pull it or if there's just a clarification, but it says file and receive And it, It refers to a proposed amendment of the Sausalito Municipal Code relating to sewers, and I would Uh, prefer that our direction is to refer to the Legislative Committee or the sewer committee for review and proposed, um, determination if any is warranted rather than just file and receive. Because I'm a little confused about it. It's a proposed amendment, but we're filing and receiving it. |
| 00:37:34.34 | Mayor (Chair) | Can I get a comment from maybe Jonathan Goldman? Sorry. |
| 00:37:39.20 | Jonathon Goldman | Thank you. |
| 00:37:39.27 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:37:39.29 | Jonathon Goldman | Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I'm Jonathan Goldman, your Public Works Director and City Engineer. Certainly the purpose of the item was to inform the council, to remind the sitting council members who were sitting at the time when this item was last heard and to inform the new council members of the rationale behind considering a sewer ordinance amendment at that time as well as the amendment that was considered and also the knowledge that staff intends to bring an amendment or proposed amendment back at some point in the future and certainly we will accept council's direction to refer that to committee just by consensus if it pleases you. |
| 00:37:39.37 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Thank you. |
| 00:38:29.75 | Jonathon Goldman | Mr. Mayor, I would say... |
| 00:38:30.52 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Mr. Mayor, I would support Councilmember Theodora's recommendation. |
| 00:38:38.03 | Thomas Theodores | Okay, to do what? |
| 00:38:40.36 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. To refer it to the Legislative Committee for further review. |
| 00:38:40.97 | Thomas Theodores | to me. |
| 00:38:43.80 | Martin Bernstein | Before the reason. |
| 00:38:44.82 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 00:38:44.85 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:38:44.90 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:38:44.97 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:38:45.49 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah. Thank you. |
| 00:38:45.89 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:38:47.01 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:38:47.03 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 00:38:47.04 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:38:47.06 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 00:38:48.48 | Mayor (Chair) | Is that the direction that we have? All right, so let's... We'll just pull that out. |
| 00:38:54.16 | Ray Withy | Thank you. No, you can still receive and file it. Okay, direct staff to send it to the appropriate committee, probably the legislative committee in this particular case. |
| 00:38:56.91 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, direct. |
| 00:39:02.21 | Unknown | Oh, no. |
| 00:39:02.28 | Mayor (Chair) | I can't. Perfect. |
| 00:39:07.01 | Ray Withy | that don't have to. |
| 00:39:07.04 | Mayor (Chair) | Is that okay with you? Yeah. Is that all right with everybody? Yeah. I have a question for Steph. |
| 00:39:10.55 | Ray Withy | I have a question for Steph. Where did he go? Jonathan, I have a question. on F. I'm sure that you don't have to pull it. I'm sure you can just answer it. I mean, not happy with your answer, but at least you just had to answer. |
| 00:39:24.56 | Unknown | Okay. |
| 00:39:25.62 | Ray Withy | With the transfer of that money out of the one park project to another, will that prohibit the structural integrity study from going forward on Southview Park? No. So there's enough money in there in your mind to keep it to see it to completion as far |
| 00:39:38.82 | Jonathon Goldman | No. |
| 00:39:45.08 | Ray Withy | And the purpose of that project is just to give findings as to what needs to be fixed structurally for that part. Is that correct? |
| 00:39:53.19 | Unknown | Um. |
| 00:39:53.72 | Jonathon Goldman | and also to provide enough details so that we can have an accurate estimate of what it would cost to do that. To fix it, okay. But there's enough in that. We've got adequate resources. Okay, great. Okay, so then we'll move on. |
| 00:40:00.65 | Ray Withy | to do that. But there's enough in that. |
| 00:40:03.32 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:40:03.37 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 00:40:03.44 | Unknown | for. |
| 00:40:07.39 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Mr. Mayor, yeah, I had a question regarding 4I, the EIR and the Valhalla. |
| 00:40:08.13 | Jonathon Goldman | Mr. Mayor, yeah. |
| 00:40:09.19 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 00:40:15.97 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. And I don't know if we should pull this for further discussion. I just had a question regarding |
| 00:40:16.31 | Unknown | Mm-hmm. |
| 00:40:16.65 | Unknown | and the other side. |
| 00:40:25.37 | Unknown | Chairman. I just wanted, I wanted to. |
| 00:40:25.63 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I just wanted to more fully understand what was going on, and I think if this topic would benefit from a full discussion, full public discussion. |
| 00:40:37.20 | Mayor (Chair) | Why don't you just explain what you're asking? |
| 00:40:37.95 | Ray Withy | is quite |
| 00:40:38.43 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | you So we've received a revised application from Alex Kacheff regarding the Valhalla project. The project that was submitted last fall was a 20-room hotel in January. They withdrew that project. The applicant withdrew that project. And then in May, I believe, they submitted a revised project, which was a seven-unit residential condominium project. And so the first step of the city's review of that would be for the preparation of the environmental review document. And so what we are asking the council at this point is to authorize the city manager to sign a contract with an environmental consulting firm for preparation of that document. That document would go through public hearings in front of the Planning Commission and copies would be distributed publicly with a 30-day review period. And at the conclusion of that, the document would be revised and public hearings on the project itself would be commenced in front of the Planning Commission, eventually culminating in the Council's consideration of the environmental review document and the several approvals that would be required for the project. |
| 00:41:06.77 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:41:16.34 | Unknown | So, |
| 00:41:47.54 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you, Jeremy, and I understood that with, you know, reviewing and the staff report, What wasn't clear was that Is this an environmental impact report that they're exploring or a negative report? you know, declaration, you know, is it EIR That's what I was confused about. |
| 00:42:09.78 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | At this point, we are anticipating that it will be an initial environmental study mitigated negative declaration. We do not anticipate it will be an environmental impact report. |
| 00:42:21.64 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah, and that's me. I guess I had questions about that. the process of deciding whether or not it should be an EIR or a mitigated negative declaration, is that being recommended by including this in consent that we are recommending it not a full EIR not be conducted but rather the mitigated negative declaration be conducted instead? |
| 00:42:48.09 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Well, from staff's discussions with the environmental consultant, From what we know right now, we think a mitigated negative declaration would be appropriate, and so that is the way the consultant contract is set up. However, if as the consultant gets into their analysis, it turns out that there are significant, unavoidable adverse impacts that cannot be mitigated, that then would be a trigger for preparation of the environmental impact report, and the consultant would come back to us and say, you know, we started out with a mitigated negative declaration and as we got into it, it became apparent that an EIR is required. We need to revise the contract for preparation of an EIR. |
| 00:43:25.26 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah. Thank you, Jeremy. |
| 00:43:29.46 | Mary Wagner | Mr. Mayor, my personal opinion. |
| 00:43:30.17 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah. |
| 00:43:30.19 | Mayor (Chair) | Yeah, wait a minute. I want to get a comment from the city lawyer. |
| 00:43:32.67 | Mary Wagner | I just wanted to add to that and to kind of summarize and clarify what Jeremy responded to Councilmember Pfeiffer's question. All you're being asked to do tonight is approve the city manager entering into an agreement. Because it exceeds the city manager's contract authority, the dollar amount. And because the city is the ultimate party responsible for the contract, you're being asked to allow that action to go forward. And that, action allows the consultant to then determine what the appropriate environmental documentation which will then be brought back to the to the Planning Commission and the City Council, Planning Commission for recommendation to the Council and the Council for action. If there are concerns about the type of document that's been prepared, the council have the opportunity well, the public will have the opportunity to weigh in one during the public review period under CEQA Also during the Planning Commission consideration and the Council consideration on that. Thank you. |
| 00:44:30.40 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 00:44:30.97 | Mary Wagner | Thank you. |
| 00:44:31.53 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yes, Mr. Mayor, I still feel this is a historic property. It's on sensitive waterfront. It could impact views and I think that to spend the money now going forward on the potential of a mitigated. |
| 00:44:45.59 | Ray Withy | At this point you just need to decide whether you want to pull it or not. That's the purpose of it. |
| 00:44:49.23 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I want to pose it. |
| 00:44:49.97 | Mayor (Chair) | I would like to pull it. Can we put this on a business item? |
| 00:44:50.82 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:44:51.05 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 00:44:51.24 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 00:44:51.26 | Ray Withy | Thank you. Yes. |
| 00:44:54.80 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, let's move it to... This is item B, 6B. Alright? |
| 00:45:03.51 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:45:03.52 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. you Okay. All right, let's get into it. Is there any other questions on consent calendars? Can we move along on that now with these two changes? |
| 00:45:13.16 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | And Mr. Mayor, could we make it 6C so it follows after the two private hearings, I mean the other hearings? |
| 00:45:19.72 | Ray Withy | It follows the. There's only one item. Oh, oh, 6B. I'm sorry. |
| 00:45:23.18 | Unknown | Absolutely. |
| 00:45:23.47 | Jonathon Goldman | Thank you. |
| 00:45:23.86 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Oh, oh, 6B. I'm sorry. I was looking at 5. Sorry. Okay. Thank you. |
| 00:45:27.07 | Unknown | Okay? |
| 00:45:27.42 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 00:45:31.97 | Ray Withy | So we want to make a motion. |
| 00:45:32.94 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 00:45:32.97 | Unknown | THE END OF |
| 00:45:33.04 | Thomas Theodores | Please. I move that we approve consent items 4A through H and with the caveat that on item 4D that we refer to the legislative committee for review and determination if further action is warranted. |
| 00:45:50.88 | Ray Withy | And move item 4i to item |
| 00:45:52.83 | Thomas Theodores | for. |
| 00:45:54.96 | Mayor (Chair) | Second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Okay. Thank you very much. Now we go to item |
| 00:45:59.55 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:45:59.57 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 00:46:06.08 | Mayor (Chair) | on the public hearings, the Appeal of Planning Commission decision and approval of encroachment agreement at 22 Atwood. At this time here, I would... have to recuse myself because I live within the 500 foot zone of distance. Tom, would you slide over here and take it? |
| 00:46:31.24 | Ray Withy | Yeah, and I as well live within 500 feet of 22 Atwood, and I live within 500 feet of the next item on our agenda, 6 Josephine, so I have to accuse myself on both these items. Will somebody get us out of the library when Herb can come for 6, I think, Josephine? Yeah. Thanks. Have fun. |
| 00:46:49.68 | Mayor (Chair) | No yelling. |
| 00:46:56.15 | Mayor (Chair) | You can read my notes. |
| 00:46:58.02 | Unknown | Thank you. I don't know. |
| 00:46:58.76 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:46:58.88 | Unknown | No. |
| 00:46:58.95 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. Okay, so first time with the gavel, so please bear with me on this appeal. I think according to our agenda, Um, The first item is disclosure of ex-party communications. And so can we poll the staff in the ex-party communications on this, Councilman Pfeiffer? |
| 00:47:19.42 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I'm sorry, say that again. Oh, ex-party committee. |
| 00:47:20.65 | Thomas Theodores | Oh, ex-party communications. Have you discussed this matter with any of the parties? Oh, I'm sorry. |
| 00:47:24.40 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah. |
| 00:47:26.29 | Thomas Theodores | I've had none on this, man. I have none on this either. And I think now the next item is that we have presentation from the, okay. |
| 00:47:36.75 | Steve Padman | Thank you, council members. |
| 00:47:38.10 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | This is 22 Atwood, right? Yes, we're on 22 Atwood. |
| 00:47:39.89 | Steve Padman | Yes, we're on 22. Thank you. My name is Steve Padman. I'm a contract planner with the city of Sausalito. This item is an appeal of a design and review variance and encroachment agreement that was approved by the Planning Commission on September 5, 2012. |
| 00:48:00.07 | Steve Padman | The project site is in the Hill neighborhood. This is a view looking southeast. It's a small lot, about 1,460 square feet. It fronts two streets north on Atwood Avenue. And it is in the R3 zoning, which is multifamily. I'm going to start with when Mr. Tomasini got involved and purchased the property in 2010. There were some previous iterations of the property before that by the previous property owner, but this is where it pretty much comes into play. Mr. Tomasini bought the property, then in October 2010, he filed an application for variance design review and an encroachment agreement. The Planning Commission approved that project in December 2010, and then he started construction. At a certain point, when he was finishing construction, he wanted to sell the property. He found a person that was interested in buying it. That would be Mr. Fidel. And so in December 2000, he asked the staff, the community development director, about an agreement for a temporary occupancy. This would allow him to finish, put a bond down, or a deposit down, that would cover the finishing of the work, but it would allow somebody to occupy the property because Mr. Feigl wanted to occupy the property as soon as he fought it. This agreement was signed in December 2011, and as part of that agreement was a $45,000 bond, or $45,000 deposit, check deposit, that was given to the city, and it required certain timelines be met for the project to be completed, so that the occupancy would |
| 00:48:20.52 | Unknown | 10. |
| 00:48:35.20 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:49:29.83 | Steve Padman | As time went by, the current owner, now Mr. Feigl, submitted an application in 2012. This application was to do additional improvements to the property and as part of that, there was a retaining wall involved that was part of the original agreement and as that retaining wall was now going to be affected by this current application that Mr. Feigl and the had submitted. So as part of that approval that the Planning Commission did on September 5, 2012, that supplanted some of the, or basically the whole wall that needed to be replaced. Then as part of that, because the deposit was still on hold, Mr. Walsh, who was the attorney for Mr. Tomasini, filed an appeal because he stated that there wasn't appropriate findings made or there wasn't appropriate notification made and also the findings weren't made because he was involved. The property owner, previous property owner, Mr. Tomasini, was involved in the project and this now changed the options that he had for getting his wall finished and then getting his money back. Basically, the Planning Commission approved, again, modifications to the outward frontage and a two-car garage and retaining wall. Some variances were approved for the side and rear yard setbacks. And then building coverage, floor area, and surface areas were also variances. A tree removal permit and an encroachment agreement to allow for these encroachments in the mechanical room, stairwell, retaining walls, garage, and landscape planners. And this kind of describe a little bit of what's going on here. This is the house. Here's the garage where it's going to be along North Avenue, so you can see the encroachments here. Here's this existing retaining wall that was required to be replaced as part of the original crew that Mr. Tomasini had gotten and put the deposit down to cover the replacement of that retaining wall as part of his filing the occupancy of the home. As you can see, there's a new retaining wall that's proposed as part of Mr. Feigl's approval that would supplant that, and there was no need for that retaining wall. In the Planning Commission discussion, they did look at Mr. Tomasini's retaining wall issue and agreement for temporary occupancy. They also looked at the substandard law and justification for the variance, adequate access to provide the new two-car garage. There was also a proposal for improvement over the existing development. This proposal was an improvement over the existing development and most of the variances were already circumstances that did exist. So they felt it would positively benefit the community and they approved the project with a recommendation on the encroachment agreement. Now Mr. Walsh, who's working with Mr. Tomasini, again stated that on September 17th he submitted his appeal and he stated that the reasons for the appeal were that they were not notified on the 300-foot mailing list and that the improvements that were as part of the recent application that Mr. Feigl approved, that got approved, those affected his ability to finish this wall and get his $45,000 back. So on the first ground was regarding proper notification. |
| 00:52:18.82 | Unknown | I mean, |
| 00:52:41.75 | Steve Padman | Staff looked at the list, the three-unquote list. Yes, Mr. Walsh and Mr. Tomlinson were not on the list. However, they did obviously learn of the project going forward on September 5th and did submit a letter which, again, the Planning Commission fully reviewed and there was a lot of discussion on it. Mr. Walsh wasn't at that hearing, but again, they did fully discuss all the options available and did not consider any additional modifications to the project. |
| 00:53:02.12 | Unknown | But again, they did full of |
| 00:53:09.29 | Steve Padman | As for ground two of failing to properly address impacts upon agreement for the temporary occupancy when the Commission granted approval of the project, the approval of the new project does remove the need for the original retaining wall. And so basically his argument is that because it's going to be supplanted by that, why not give me my money back? He is now, Mr. Feigl is now responsible for replacing that wall and put the burden on him and have my money come back to me. Also, the timeline for the temporary occupancy agreement has passed. If you look in the section under the temporary occupancy agreement, this is in section 3, page 7, you can see that there is a timeline list of milestones that the completion of the construction of the final inspection was actually put to occur in September 2012, 1st of 2012. So Mr. Feigl didn't even get the approval from the Planning Commission until September 5th. So basically there has been the timelines have been exceeded for the agreements, so that's his argument there. |
| 00:54:05.55 | Unknown | it. |
| 00:54:05.94 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:54:06.04 | Unknown | So basically there has been. timeline. |
| 00:54:16.65 | Steve Padman | Again, staff's response is that, yes, the dates and milestones of the agreement have passed. FIGL is not a party to the agreement. The agreement does talk about having the applicant, which was Mr. Tomasini, finish the, meet the timelines in that plan or the future property owner, but Ms. FIGL's technique is not named in the agreement. And any decision to transfer deposits or allow construction to train the role, retain the role the staff and it wasn't an issue that the Planning Commission should review. The retaining wall issue was properly reviewed by the Planning Commission and findings to support the project were made. So basically when they looked at the new project, it met all the findings that were required for variance and for the design review and for the encroachment and the recommendation of the encroachment. One other issue is that FIBLE is actually considering modifications which would likely modify discretionary approvals further, which would be then change obviously the situation even more. |
| 00:55:12.93 | Jonathon Goldman | further. |
| 00:55:21.15 | Steve Padman | Basically, the bottom line on the appeal is that the appellant is asking for his money back because of the delay in getting the project that was approved back in September 2012, getting that built. He feels that the city is holding on to his money for an extended period of time and that because of this project, either the burden should be transferred to Mr. Five-Womeny Property Owner because of his project, or he should just get his money back. The other issue here is if you do decide to deny the appeal, there's the encroachment agreement that does need to be approved by the City Council. So I just want to quickly go over that. The encroachment agreement involves removing the existing parking deck, which is, sorry about that. |
| 00:55:57.68 | Unknown | We involved them. |
| 00:56:03.05 | Steve Padman | There's a parking deck right here now that's going to be removed and put against the walkways, staircases, and there's also a low grade mechanical room that's going to be placed in there. That's the Adwood Avenue encroachment. And then down in here on North Street, you have a garage encroachment in this area, stairwell, and then there's that retaining wall that is in this area right here. So and some landscaping. So those are the encroachments that are proposed. Basically, staff feels that the findings can be made because the project will not diminish the public enjoyment or use of the public right-of-way. The project will not negatively impact pedestrian or vehicular circulation. And other properties on Atwood and North Street have received similar encroachment agreement authorization for the private use of the public right-of-way. So our recommendation is that you deny the appeal and uphold the Planning Commission decision for the project, and that you approve an encroachment agreement to construct the two-car garage, mechanical room, stairwells, retaining walls, paths, and related site improvements in Atwood, Avenue, and North Street Public Railway. That concludes my presentation. We are available to answer any questions. |
| 00:57:01.20 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 00:57:08.78 | Thomas Theodores | Okay, now we have time for Questions to staff from the council? |
| 00:57:14.31 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | So this actually is a question from a resident who is not present right now. But it's to confirm that there will be no plans for, or no loss in on-street parking and, or plans for additional red curb, you know, designation on North Street as a result of granting the encroachment. |
| 00:57:41.36 | Steve Padman | Yes, I'm sorry. I did get that email. And yes, the idea is there is a plan. I can hand this out. There's a design that they have for the parking that shows the existing driveways and the red curb that's existing and shows how the vehicles can get in and out. |
| 00:57:59.12 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | So the answer is that there's no real change to the situation? |
| 00:58:04.45 | Thomas Theodores | I'd like to expand on that question. Do you mind going back to the slide and show us the existing parking and then all the the changes, because I'm not clear on what parking will go away and what parking will be added. |
| 00:58:18.35 | Steve Padman | See you. |
| 00:58:22.28 | Steve Padman | Thank you. Okay. Okay, if we could have the applicant's architect present that, he's the one that presented that diagram and I think he has some additional |
| 00:58:37.12 | Thomas Theodores | If an appeal had not been filed, As our normal course of business, presumably this encroachment agreement would have come before the City Council some short period of time after the Planning Commission, within a month or so, I imagine. Is that correct? So the City Council dealt with this, I don't know, whenever, way back. |
| 00:59:04.32 | Steve Padman | Yes, if they're handled as consent items many times. |
| 00:59:07.46 | Thomas Theodores | Right, and so that was my question. Routine, perhaps it's of, I don't know, Jeremy or Mary, Routinely, if the Planning Commission recommends the approval of an encroachment agreement. There is no appeal filed to the actual design review. Um... As a normal matter, of course, would we put that encroachment agreement on the consent calendar? |
| 00:59:37.43 | Mary Wagner | If no appeal had been filed? |
| 00:59:38.91 | Thomas Theodores | if no appeal had been filed. |
| 00:59:40.21 | Mary Wagner | Typically, yes. |
| 00:59:41.24 | Thomas Theodores | Okay, and that's our normal practice. |
| 00:59:43.99 | Mary Wagner | Yes. |
| 00:59:44.69 | Thomas Theodores | so therefore deemed to be non-controversial. |
| 00:59:48.45 | Mary Wagner | Thank you. |
| 00:59:48.47 | Thomas Theodores | Yes. And to be clear, the encroachment is not part of the appeal. |
| 00:59:53.38 | Steve Padman | No, it is not. It was only a recommendation from the Planning Commission, the Encrushment Agreement, so technically it hasn't been approved yet. You're the only ones that can |
| 01:00:00.11 | Thomas Theodores | And it hasn't been appealed, though, so that's not part of the appellant's issues. |
| 01:00:04.13 | Steve Padman | The application was appealed, so obviously if that gets denied, the Incrush for permits, no, the negotiation agreement is not valid or we wouldn't bring it forward. Thank you. Any other questions? |
| 01:00:18.82 | Thomas Theodores | Time for the appellants. presentation. |
| 01:00:23.01 | Mary Wagner | And Councilmember Theodorus, their team is allotted 10 minutes, as is the applicant's team. And then you'd open it for... Regular public comment of three minutes apiece, and then both the appellant and the applicant have an additional five minutes at the conclusion of that. |
| 01:00:39.28 | Thomas Theodores | So Debbie, are you keeping track? Mary, take. Keep track of the time? Yes. Okay. And remind me when we... Get in each stage. |
| 01:00:48.44 | Mary Wagner | I'll run the 10 here, and then when it hits three, I'll turn that one off, and the five. |
| 01:01:17.62 | Martin Walsh | Martin Walsh Good evening, council members. My name is Martin Walsh. I'm here on behalf of the applicant, Tomasini Development. City staff gave you a brief overview of where we are in this process. Been quite some time that we've been involved in this. As you can see, we're going back to December 2011. So we've been in this for greater than a year and a half up to this point. I'd like to give you just a little bit of background from my perspective. As we can see, this project Originally the residence was constructed back in 1935. It was owned by another local family who had done some work from 2000 through 2007, 2008 approximately. My client purchased the property from that owner, went through, as you saw, got approvals to finish construction on the property, did so. And then the property was marketed for sale. The buyers came in. We needed to get a agreement for temporary occupancy because the retaining wall issue was still outstanding. The reason we came to the Community Development Department for that is because the buyer had expressed an interest in doing a potential garage project which would have in fact made the retaining wall a moot point or significantly reduced the retaining wall that would have been necessary at the project. To make a long story short, the temporary occupancy agreement was entered into between the city and Tomasini. It required that Tomasini put up a security deposit in the amount of $45,000. The $45,000 cash deposit was put up with the city by Tomasini. At that time, the property was sold. Thank you. and the timeframes in the temporary occupancy agreement, which you have a copy of the staff report provided, I think it's attachment three, have all expired. Nobody's denying that. Nobody's saying it hasn't happened. It's clear. We're way beyond the time limits, way beyond anything that any of the parties, the city, my client, ever anticipated. Quick background, that's kind of where we got to. I'd like to go into the agreement for temporary occupancy a little bit more in depth than staff did just for your edification. It's a two-party agreement. It's between the city and my client, not between the current property owner, although there makes reference to the current property owner in the document. They're not a party to the agreement. It required us to put a security deposit. And I stress the words security deposit, not a cash deposit of $45,000. We did that. The primary purpose of that deposit was to construct a retaining wall. That retaining wall was estimated to cost $35,000. $10,000 was extra to cover Overidge's unforeseen construction issues in the event the city had actually call upon the deposit and construct a wall on its own accord. That's clear from the document. It's clear from correspondence. It's clear from the original city staff report that was presented to the Planning Commission back in September. The retaining wall is the key. to that temporary occupancy agreement. |
| 01:05:02.00 | Unknown | that's it. |
| 01:05:07.17 | Martin Walsh | We've touched on, I'll refer to it again, all the dates have expired. We've asked to be allowed to do what we were obligated to do under the agreement, which is go in and install the retaining wall. It's in the city's right of way. We've been denied that opportunity. THE APPLICANT being Mr. and Mrs. Feigl, have demanded that the city not release our deposit, not allow us to construct anything on their property, although approved plans and permits were already granted for the construction of the wall in the right-of-way. And they've also objected to us trying to attempt to replace our cash deposit with another form of security being an irrevocable letter of credit from Wells Fargo. |
| 01:06:05.89 | Martin Walsh | City staff did a good job of synthesizing our grounds for appeal. There's two main grounds. One, we weren't given notice. We're an obvious stakeholder in this property. We had obligations of things that we had to do per contract with the city. We weren't given notice of the Planning Commission meeting until the day before. That notice only came because I was following up with city staff to determine where we were in the process. And I got a responsive email that said, oh, by the way, Feigles have submitted an application that's going for the Planning Commission tomorrow. at such time I quickly shifted my day. and had a couple conversations with city staff. had a conversation with counsel for the current property owners And. We couldn't come to a resolution in the matter of hours, so I submitted an objection to the Planning Commission. Unfortunately, I couldn't attend the Planning Commission meeting because I had other obligations, and I had learned about it the day before. So city staff is correct. I wasn't there, but I did submit our written objection to preserve our rights by not having been noticed. Not having my client on the notice list involved in those proceedings it prevented a full and proper adjudication of the issues. My client has got money on hold with the city I can't. He's not allowed to do what he was told to do. He's not allowed to get his money back. And he's being forced to sit by and wait. while the current property owners change their plans, submit modifications, take their time to do what they want to do with their property. The second ground. We feel it wasn't properly analyzed by the Planning Commission. City staff submitted their report to the Planning Commission glossed over the temporary occupancy agreement, gave it, I think, a one-paragraph treatment in the report, and said, go ahead and approve this. This is an administrative responsibility of city staff. However, the city staff has failed to do anything administratively to help adjudicate the problem. That's why we find ourselves here tonight in front of the council. We need some adjudication. We need to be able to get the wall built to get our deposit back. or to replace our deposit of cash With another form of security, that's just as good as cash for the city's purposes. |
| 01:08:53.93 | Martin Walsh | This temporary occupancy agreement that's been entered into has been an issue for all parties involved. We've tried to make numerous resolutions administratively to no avail. We've tried to make a resolution with the current property owner to no avail. That was backed out on the last minute. We had drafted agreements, exchanged back and forth. We're going to get it done. Then we've tried to substitute our cash deposit with a letter of credit from Wells Fargo, irrevocable letter of credit for two additional years. We've already had our money held for a year and a half, which is way beyond the expected timeframe of up to nine months. and Each time, we keep getting stagnated through the process. We get initial agreement. City staff says, yes, that will be great. You can submit a letter of credit. We submit the documents. We submit the application. We submit a draft of the letter of credit. And then time stalls. Months go by. Nothing happens. So from our perspective, we have no choice but to maintain this appeal to preserve our rights when the city is holding our cash deposit and preventing us from doing what we're obligated to do. And we're talking about we should have had this done by September 1, 2012. It's July 23, 2013. And as we heard from city staff, the current property owner has modifications and amendments they want to do. We're talking about another year at a minimum before they get out to the property to start and complete their construction. We have a real problem with that. We can't do what we're supposed to do. You've got our money. City staff makes reference to this being a two-party agreement. However, in their staff report to you, They reflect the fact that Mr. and Mrs. Feigel have strenuously objected to us substituting our deposits. I'm not sure that they can have it both ways. They can't say that it's a two-party agreement on the one hand, that the city and Thomasini are only parties and can only contract with one another, and then let the Feigls, on the other hand, make objections and threats and demands. It doesn't work that way. if we're going to have a three-party agreement It needs to be modified. Is that three minutes left? |
| 01:11:28.04 | Martin Walsh | OK. All right. Well, I'll save my final for rebuttal. And if you have any questions, happy to answer. |
| 01:11:37.05 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 01:11:43.95 | Unknown | Is that the discretion of the council? |
| 01:12:06.66 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I do, but go ahead. |
| 01:12:07.98 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:12:08.00 | Thomas Theodores | A question for you is, Thank you. Pardon me, I have to put my mic on. At one point, you said you were denied the opportunity to build a retaining wall. Now, is part of the relief that you're seeking is the ability to build this retaining wall with the $45,000, or are you only seeking to have the $45,000 returned to you or substituted with a letter of credit? |
| 01:12:32.08 | Martin Walsh | At this point, We would do either. It would be a duplicative effort in our opinion and I think in city staff's opinion as well because the applicant is planning to build a retaining structure there. So if we went in and built it, it would be torn down when their project went forward. We're happy to do that. It seems to be a duplicative effort in the grand scheme of the project. |
| 01:12:55.45 | Thomas Theodores | the grand scheme of the program. That's one form of relief you'd be willing to accept. It is one form of relief. Okay. |
| 01:12:58.03 | Martin Walsh | be willing to accept? It is one form of relief that we would go in and build the wall and then we'd get a release of our deposit after it was done. |
| 01:13:04.61 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 01:13:04.65 | Alan Mayer | Thank you. |
| 01:13:08.27 | Alan Mayer | Right. |
| 01:13:13.08 | Thomas Theodores | Could you you Thank you. Give me the time sequence. Thank you. from |
| 01:13:22.18 | Thomas Theodores | the of the temporary occupancy agreement. And then... presumably a purchase and sale. agreement that the two parties entered into to sell the property. What came, presumably one came before the other. What was the order and what was the timeframe? |
| 01:13:43.83 | Martin Walsh | What? |
| 01:13:48.00 | Martin Walsh | Yeah. You got it. Thank you. Purchase and sale agreement came first. Purchase and sale agreement came in the beginning of December. I believe approximately the 3rd of December, roundabout, a couple days here or there. The temporary occupancy agreement was immediately brought to the attention of city staff. It was ultimately executed on December 19th. That's after some negotiations, some discussion. That's the date it was executed. |
| 01:14:19.18 | Thomas Theodores | Was it a condition of closing? |
| 01:14:21.61 | Martin Walsh | Say that. |
| 01:14:22.15 | Thomas Theodores | Was it a condition of closing? |
| 01:14:26.62 | Martin Walsh | Yes, it was. We couldn't close the property without some sort of ability to have the purchaser occupied. Thank you. |
| 01:14:33.04 | Thomas Theodores | Okay, thank you. |
| 01:14:36.94 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | You mentioned that the assessment for the retaining wall was 35,000. Is that correct? Did I hear that right? |
| 01:14:43.09 | Martin Walsh | Is that right? The estimated cost of the retaining wall to build was approximately $35,000. |
| 01:14:44.95 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | The bid. |
| 01:14:50.76 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | And you got that, did you get multiple bids or just one bid? |
| 01:14:54.62 | Martin Walsh | I believe there was one bid submitted to the city for review and approval. And then, as I mentioned, the $10,000 was set aside for contingencies or unforeseen additional costs that may have developed as time was going on. I mean, we were talking about nine months down the road, there could have been material increases, what have you. |
| 01:15:10.40 | Martin Bernstein | about. |
| 01:15:10.77 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 01:15:14.75 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. OK, thanks. |
| 01:15:18.68 | Thomas Theodores | A question on your ground one, the notice. You did get one day actual notice, and my question is, when you submitted your letter to the Planning Commission, Were there any arguments that you were not able to include to the planning commission that you have raised subsequently or was the plan did the planning commission consider both grounds one and two? |
| 01:15:40.03 | Martin Walsh | the I believe the only argument that we've bringing to your attention that wasn't brought to the attention of the Planning Commission is the ability for us to substitute our cash deposit for an irrevocable letter of credit as that became another alternative subsequent to the Planning Commission and that was something that was discussed at the city staff level between us and city staff. |
| 01:16:06.96 | Thomas Theodores | So you had limited time, limited notice, but you were able to make your arguments and have them before the planning committee. |
| 01:16:13.32 | Martin Walsh | I was able to make a partial argument, I would say. I was able to write a two-page letter, approximately two and a half pages, whatever it was, to the Planning Commission, but I was not able to present it live to the Planning Commission. Thank you. |
| 01:16:25.24 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. So once again, it's public comment. According to our agenda, it says public comment now, but I'm happy to have the rebuttal. |
| 01:16:34.23 | Mary Wagner | It says applicant, appellant and applicant, 10 minutes apiece, so now it would be the applicant's opportunity. Okay. So there are 10 minutes and then public comment. Okay. Thank you. |
| 01:16:37.66 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 01:16:40.90 | Thomas Theodores | Okay. |
| 01:16:41.32 | Alan Mayer | Thank you. |
| 01:16:41.34 | Unknown | THE FAMILY IS NOT |
| 01:16:42.38 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 01:16:42.40 | Alan Mayer | Okay. |
| 01:16:42.82 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:16:50.45 | Alan Mayer | Good evening. My name is Alan Mayer. here in San Rafael and I'm representing the Feigles the applicants. Thank you for the opportunity to be heard. I will be brief. First of all, we're here on a review of a Planning Commission decision. You haven't heard a single word against the plan that was submitted by the Feigles for the construction of this house. You haven't heard a single word by a neighbor. There's a total support by the neighbors. This plan fits within the character of the neighborhood. You haven't heard anything concerning the encroachment permit. Mr. Bernstein, the architect, will speak to the parking issue. Uh... for you. What you've heard. is Mr. Tomasini's counsel here before you saying, hey, we want our money back because of this retaining wall issue. If you take a look at the temporary occupancy, permit. There are many, many conditions to be satisfied other than the retaining wall. That retention of the $45,000 is not solely for the retaining wall. even if it were. It's an administrative matter. It has absolutely nothing to do with the review of the Planning Commission decision. |
| 01:18:27.21 | Alan Mayer | That's pretty good. If you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer them. |
| 01:18:38.23 | Alan Mayer | and I'll have Mr. Bernstein address the parking issue |
| 01:18:41.37 | Thomas Theodores | Okay. |
| 01:18:48.81 | Martin Bernstein | Thank you, Councilmember Theodores, and Councilmember Pfeiffer, and Councilmember Withey. Martin Bernstein, architect retained by Mr. and Mrs. Feigl for the design of their remodeling of their home. Response to Councilmember Pfeiffer's question about the notice about the concern about parking. I have a diagram that carefully, and I'll pass this out, we were pretty careful in putting the location of the two-car garage, which is in response to the city's ordinance, as you know, for two-fall street parking, to be sure that absolutely no additional red curbs or blocking of driveways would result in any removal of additional parking. |
| 01:19:36.94 | Thomas Theodores | Pardon me, sir. For further clarification for the public, is there a chance that we could put the slide back on with the parking so that you can point out to us what parking was there before, what was changed, and then we can all take a look? Sure. I believe there's a slide with this information. Is that correct? |
| 01:19:37.48 | Martin Bernstein | Yeah. |
| 01:19:48.40 | Martin Bernstein | Sure. Can I also hand out this diagram showing you how? |
| 01:19:53.15 | Thomas Theodores | Yes. |
| 01:19:58.98 | Martin Bernstein | Thank you. |
| 01:20:02.67 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 01:20:21.25 | Martin Bernstein | We're waiting for the pointer here. |
| 01:20:35.73 | Martin Bernstein | Thank you. |
| 01:20:36.15 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:20:38.72 | Martin Bernstein | There we go. So currently, in this area right here, there is a parking deck. This plan has deleted the parking deck because we wanted to provide all the two parking spaces all street here. So right now there is a parking deck here. So there is no parking here, so there's no change. And the handout that you see that I've placed shows there's a driveway right here, and there's an existing red painted curb here because that's blocking parking to head down 2nd Street. And then you can see from the diagrams that are in front of you, there's the turning around radiuses that I'm cursing here. So that would indicate there's no change in parking. |
| 01:21:16.47 | Unknown | Amen. |
| 01:21:31.86 | Thomas Theodores | I do have a check. The old deck was for one car or two cars. |
| 01:21:35.55 | Martin Bernstein | One car. |
| 01:21:36.01 | Thomas Theodores | One car. So now you're going from you're eliminating one car on the outwards side and you're putting in a garage with two cars in the other. |
| 01:21:42.45 | Martin Bernstein | in conformance with the city's requirements. |
| 01:21:45.27 | Thomas Theodores | Okay. And would you also, I'm sorry, could you also address the red on the curbing? Any changes that will be made? |
| 01:21:53.52 | Martin Bernstein | We'll make- Zero changes. |
| 01:21:54.72 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. Thank you. No changes. Thank you. |
| 01:22:03.95 | Thomas Theodores | Okay. Now it's time for public comment. |
| 01:22:09.30 | Thomas Theodores | Anyone from public like to make a comment or have a question? you Okay? We were better for now it's time for rebuttal. And we now have the appellant again. |
| 01:22:33.05 | Martin Walsh | Thank you. Mr. Mayor. Council for the Feigls Thank you. made a point that we don't argue anything regarding the Planning Commission approval or any of the conditions. I would say that's to the contrary. We argue exactly that the Planning Commission's approval caused an unjust burden to Thomasinny. by in effect approving the project it rendered the temporary occupancy agreement meaningless. and it meant that the city continues to hold our deposit for an indefinite period of time. We can't even have an estimated period of time when our deposit would be refunded. So yes, do I have a problem with the encroachment agreement or the parking situation that you just asked about? No, I don't have an issue with that. I have an issue with the overall approval which is infringed upon my client's rights and my client's rights to return of the money. or at a minimum a substitution of his deposit which in no way impacts or changes the status quo to the city but benefits my client by getting a return of the capital and you guys are still in the same secured position that you were the day before. That's the exact argument that we're making is one, We were prevented from doing what we were contractually obligated to do. Two. The Feigls have interfered with that contractual obligation, even though the city claims that it's a two-party agreement. listen to those demands and They've heeded those demands. City staff. has come to tentative agreements with me on two separate occasions to allow for a substitution of the deposit in the form of cash versus a letter of credit In each time. The process took months and months and months after repeated follow-up Nothing came out of it. So, The argument that Mr. Mayer makes that it's an administrative matter I can't get any change to happen administratively. That's why I'm here tonight to seek the City Council's assistance in helping resolve this issue which has drug on beyond anyone's wildest imaginations. There's no other. way for me to bring an action to the city other than to appeal this decision which impacted my clients' rights. It's our belief that we're sitting here tonight in, a situation that could easily have been resolved administratively. We've been prevented from doing that. That's why I'm here to ask your assistance. There is no problem that Tomasini has with the plans, what the new owners want to do. It's really none of our concern. What is our concern is the ability to either do what we are obligated to do or get a return of our money At a minimum, besides those two, which we believe is the case, at a minimum, to replace our security deposit which has no negative impact on Thank you. the city. There was another argument made that There's many conditions in the temporary occupancy agreement. I don't know if many is a proper characterization. other conditions involved in the temporary occupancy agreement. But if we look at the entire scope of this transaction, we see that the deposit was put on hold with the city for the retaining wall. That's why the money was put up. The numbers work out when you look at the amount of the deposit. The city staff's report, if you look at attachment five in your current staff report, It's the staff report to the Planning Commission. It references. The retaining wall is the sole issue remaining. Everybody knows that that's the big ticket item. to get the temporary occupancy agreement final sign off. We've tried to install that. Been denied. We've tried to remedy it administratively, been denied. We've tried to substitute our security deposit in the form of cash to a letter of credit. It's been denied twice. We're here seeking some redress from the Council to be able to perform our obligations or to modify the contract to get a release of our deposit early so that we're not sitting unjustly burdened by new property owners' desires to do whatever they choose to do, and we don't really care what they choose to do. We just don't want that to impact our money being on hold with the city. And that's why I ask for the council to take action tonight, either to uphold our appeal to allow for our release of our deposit. Thank you. |
| 01:27:49.64 | Alan Mayer | Simply stated, We were ready to go ahead with this project almost a year ago in September 2012. The only thing that has stopped us from moving forward with this project is this appeal. This appeal has been pending since September 2012. It is now the end of July 2013. It's my client who's the one who's been abused. by this appeal, you haven't heard a word against the project itself. Mr. Walsh has come here and said, give me back my money. He hasn't gone through the provisions of the temporary occupancy permit that have not been complied with. There are many of them. Staff can confirm that with you. But that's not what we're here about. We're not here about Mr. Tomasini's $45,000. We're here to try to get a project built to try to get, which will include securing North Street That's what we're here for. We're here to review a Planning Commission decision. Thank you. |
| 01:28:53.58 | Thomas Theodores | Now it's back up to Council. And it's time for our comments, but are there any other questions we have before? I think that's correct. No questions? OK, now it's time for comment. Councilman Withey. |
| 01:29:15.41 | Jonathon Goldman | Thank you. |
| 01:29:17.98 | Thomas Theodores | Okay. |
| 01:29:23.90 | Thomas Theodores | Is there a member of the public who... |
| 01:29:27.34 | Thomas Theodores | Yes, all right. We'll open it up for public comment. |
| 01:29:35.65 | Joan Cox | I appreciate it. Joan Cox and I was on the Planning Commission when this was decided, and I just wanted to share My personal perspective, I was listening to this on the computer. And I want to let you know that indeed the Planning Commission did look at the issue of the three-party agreement And from a fairness perspective, we struggled with it, and I think we wanted to address it, but it was very clear to us from the staff perspective and from the city attorney that it was not a matter before us. I'm not even certain that it's a proper subject of the appeal because indeed the appellant is not appealing the decision of the Planning Commission he's raising with you, and he has said this is his only forum for doing so, He is raising with you an objection he has to the way that this issue is being managed by staff. That was not something that the Planning Commission was empowered to address. even though we were concerned about the fairness issue of somebody's money being, you know, at, on hold. It's a shame that the project has languished for an additional year. But in terms of notice, we were apprised of the issue. We did consider the issue, but we were not empowered to act on the issue. So just that clarification. Thanks. |
| 01:31:02.08 | Thomas Theodores | This is really quite unusual in that at least when I was preparing for City Council to do this job, I was assuming that these sort of appeals would be between neighbors who were objecting about the design of a particular project. project. Thank you. And that's not what we have here. I almost feel like were part spectators, part un- unforced actors in a dispute between two parties that we don't belong in the middle of. And I actually completely agree with Joan's perspective. This has absolutely no point, no part of a proceeding in which, in my view, we are reviewing the appropriateness of a Planning Commission action for a design review permit which has very clear criteria. This has nothing to do with it. It seems to me that you know. This is an administrative matter with staff and that the Now, there are presumably other mechanisms for you to resolve that matter with the city, and it's not as part of these proceedings. |
| 01:32:41.44 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I would concur. It does seem very an administrative issue for me that, you know, is rather sticky, and I'm also a bit perplexed as to why it's before council. |
| 01:33:03.41 | Thomas Theodores | Well, we're sorry to see these private disputes brought before us, and obviously this is between the buyer and the seller and the appellant and the applicant. On the grounds, I mean, there are really two grounds. One is on the notice. we found that they basically had actual notice. They were able to get the arguments that they were going to make to us. basically before the Planning Commission. And of course, they get to make these arguments again at the City Council. There's really not a notice issue, And on the appeal itself, I mean, they are not appealing the Planning Commission's decision. This is, again, an administrative dispute. Uh. It's actually a dispute between the two parties, but also our city staff and our city is caught in the middle of it. I recommend that. they get together and work it out. From a technical point of view, this was not raised in the Planning Commission. proceeding and so it's not part of our appeal. So I am not inclined to side with the appellant on this. Are we ready to take a vote? Are we going to vote separately on the appeal and the encroachment? |
| 01:34:14.10 | Mary Wagner | it. Do two motions? Yeah, two separate motions, please. |
| 01:34:22.05 | Thomas Theodores | So I make a motion to adopt a resolution denying the appeal. and upholding the Planning Commission's decision to approve the design review permit with heightened design review findings, the variances, the and we'll stop and leave the encroachment for a second motion. |
| 01:34:43.68 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. Thank you. Second. |
| 01:34:45.74 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 01:34:45.79 | Thomas Theodores | All in favor? |
| 01:34:46.75 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Hi. |
| 01:34:46.79 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 01:34:46.87 | Thomas Theodores | Hi. Thank you. |
| 01:34:47.24 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 01:34:47.26 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 01:34:47.28 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 01:34:53.20 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Okay, move to adopt the resolution. Approving an encouragement agreement? |
| 01:35:01.37 | Thomas Theodores | Yeah, which I second. |
| 01:35:03.21 | Thomas Theodores | All in favor? Aye. |
| 01:35:04.12 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Hi. |
| 01:35:04.57 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 01:35:07.44 | Thomas Theodores | I think that's it. Okay, can we take a five-minute break and Mayor Weiner will be back? |
| 01:36:51.39 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:37:15.22 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, we're back and I'm back. At this time here, we're going to the appeal of Planning Commission decision and approval of the encroachment agreement at the Jane Woodman residence, 6 Josephine Street. And we have a contract plan of Steve. Go ahead, you're on. |
| 01:37:36.28 | Steve Padman | THE END OF THE END OF THE Thank you, Honorable Mayor and Council Members. Again, my name is Steve Bader. I'm a contract planner for the City of Sausalito. Again, we have another appeal here. This item is an appeal of a design review, variance, and encroachment agreement approved by the Planning Commission, but this is on June 26th, so this was only a couple or a So this is the project site. It's right down the front North Street stairs and Josephine Street and actually drops all the way down to Bridgeway. It is a high density residential, again similar to the Atwood property and it is R3 zoning. And it is a large hillside lot so there's not as much of an issue with regard to all Just a quick background. The application was submitted in February 2013. Planning Commission review and approval occurred on June 26th and the appeal was filed on June 8th within the time period required. The approved project was for a new 5,046 square foot two-family residence. The house being used now is what's used as a single-family residence. doesn't attach garage and parking deck. There's a conditional use permit for the tandem parking. There's a garage with a parking space in front required to have two spaces for each unit, so there's no driveway per se. And then there's an encroachment agreement for the encroachments of the garage and the parking deck. and also some other improvements along the North Street frontage and for some light poles that they wanted to put at the top of the stairs. And there's some additional improvements in landscaping and such, so they recommended approval of those improvements there. The Planning Commission discussion focused primarily on visual impacts relative to the adjacent properties public views. There was a lot of, they did a lot of neighborhood outreach. There was meetings with the neighbors, the neighbors' concerns. They made every effort they could to try and address some of these concerns. So there was a large outreach and the commission commended them on that. They tried to reduce some of the height of the structure and some other things to, again, improve views. And it ended up that they felt that the new structure would positively benefit the community and was an improvement from what was there. They did make conditional use permit findings. And these findings, again, were for the tandem parking. So you can see there's a garage space with a parking space in front of it. So there's no driveway. There's just an open parking deck for each unit. It's a parking deck space and an enclosed space. They felt that it is consistent with the general plan and zoning, which allows this type of arrangement. It provides four parking spaces where there was limited on-street parking before and a parking deck before. And so there was the doubling the parking. And then they're not going to impact the roadway circulation or existing on-street conditions. There was already a driveway here for a parking deck, and this is, again, the public right-of-way, so there wasn't any existing parking that was being removed because of this. Now, the appellant filed an appeal on July 8th, Now, the appellant was at the public hearing on June 26th, and he did voice his concerns about some of the issues that you're going to see in the grounds for appeal. But again, most of the concerns that he had were for construction, reducing the property value, because this is going to be a long period. You're going to tear down the existing house. You have to build a new one. That involves, obviously, a lengthy construction period, and he feels that this would significantly affect his earnings potential or income potential from the property and he felt that that wasn't really addressed by the Planning Commission. So again, one of his grounds is that the finding of the project will not materially adversely affect the nearby property, cannot be made. He's saying that the construction does materially affect his value and that the loss of income without compensation is, again, not showing that it's not following the finding that can be made. In staff's response, we feel if the finding relates to the Conditioned Use Permit, findings related to the Conditioned Use Permit for the TANF parking. Thank you. and not the designer view permit. So he specifically in his appeal chose to select that finding of the conditional use permit. Now there are findings that are for the designer view also, and they do look at a project that does blend with the environment, blend with the, you know, blend with the community, be a positive factor and it's not specifically the findings that are the same as the conditional use permits because one's a use and the other one's for the structure itself. We also found that the benefits of the neighborhood by providing additional off-street parking in a constrained area was obviously a very positive benefit and that would be to do the tandem parking that provides additional parking. garage and parking deck are designed to minimize visual impacts. There was concern about as you're walking down towards that area that the new garage would block some of the views from the street and the public view down the stairs. And so they minimize this by reducing heights of the garage and obviously creating the space so that there is still a view corridor down through the stairway and through that public right-of-way down into the ocean there. And then as construction impacts mitigated through existing municipal code regulations. The musical code already understands. In fact, I am. I have the code sections here, that there are findings that were made when the city chose to look at limits and concerns about construction impacts And so they looked at construction hours, noise impacts, and then there's actual timelines, because they realized that construction does obviously affect the neighboring properties. So for construction hours, basically you're limited to Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. And then on Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. So they limit the hours there, and then Sundays are prohibited. As for noise, you are prohibited from making or having machinery and compressors and things that run for extended periods that exceed the noise decibels in chapter 12 of the noise section. And then finally, the most important is the timelines for construction. This is a significant section in our design review municipal code, or in the design review section of the zoning ordinance. That states findings for why these timelines came into being. And there's penalties for if you exceed those timelines. So these are actually part of our municipal code already. It was understood that there would be impact from construction, and this is how the city chose to address it in these code sections. |
| 01:44:32.08 | Steve Padman | The other ground for appeal was that the general welfare standard in relation to use permits doesn't exclude from consideration economic impacts or separate use from construction. The general welfare standard that The appellant is discussing is in California, there's been some Thank you. land use. cases where You need to take into account general welfare standards as some of the court cases have He's indicating that the municipal code, these regulations that we have, aren't adequate to cover the construction impacts, even though they're directly related to construction impacts, and that it doesn't address the loss of income. While he's correct, these do not address loss of income. has provided some additional information for how he how there may be a potential loss of income, there's a piece of, or a letter that he submitted today that is in front of you. And there's some additional information about, that he has provided for showing how there is some loss of income on his property. That was in response to our comment that there wasn't, it didn't seem to be that included in the appeal. He also has indicated that because of these construction impacts that he may not be able to rent or that renters would. negotiate lower prices for renting his property. So that's his argument. We understand that the general welfare standard is from a court case. It's not a state guideline per se. The findings that we do make in our use permit and in our design review do equate to some of those standards or do meet in general what the welfare standard is, which is to not be detrimental to surrounding properties, to not adversely affect them. These are all conditions that are included in the findings that were made by the Planning Commission. We also understand that construction impacts and operation impacts are not similar. And it's not reasonable, and it would be reasonable to apply different standards to each. That's why we have separate requirements for construction because obviously when you're building something that's going to have much different noise than once it gets occupied by a house, completely different. One has a lot of noise for a temporary period and it's understood there's no way you could build it without doing that. The other one, once it's finished, obviously then you have to comply with the rest of the noise standards that are just for uses. Um, Again, we have, as I said before, construction impacts are mitigated through existing municipal code regulations and conditions of approval which do cite those regulations. Financial compensation between parties for temporary impacts seem to us to be a private Um, It would be similar to, you know, When Caltrans does something, building a road and they have to buy a piece of property, that's negotiated between them. It isn't something that would be dealt with on this type of level. And then the Planning Commission gave proper considerations of construction operational impacts. It's understood that in our municipal code we do have regulations that apply to construction, And these have been tested and there's construction all the time and this is their best way to deal with those. Now again, this also involves an encroachment agreement, similar to the previous one. So we have brought that forward also because it would have to go to the City Council. So again, it's a proposed encroachment for removal of existing landscape and hardscape improvements with the exception of rock and retaining walls. Portion of the garage deck and two car garage, which is encroaching. That's this area in here. from. property line right here so you can see a portion of the deck. and the garage here, mostly in there. There's a new guardrail along here that's also in the encroachment, new landscape plannings, and the installation of two streetlights at the top of the stairs there. So we believe the findings can be made for the encroachment agreement. The project will not diminish the public enjoyment or use of the public right-of-way. And the project will not negatively impact pedestrian or vehicular circulation. And I just wanted to go again over... on Mr. Rawlson's submission, he did a reply to our staff report. That's what you have in front of you. The ground one appeal that our contention that only applies to the particular use. Again, we addressed what the appeal was. The appeal was for that specific condition or that specific findings that we addressed. But we do have specific findings for designer view also. Those weren't asked or he never requested those be in the appeal. But there are specific findings made for the designer view also. And those were made, again, along with the use permit. He also indicates on the citation of the court case that that we should take these into when we evaluate a project. And we do. These are addressed in the Planning Commission findings for the use permit. Again, not detrimental to neighboring properties. does not harm property values, things like that. Basically, we feel that... The grounds for the appeal are... are not valid. So we recommend denying the appeal and upholding the Planning Commission decision, approving the project, and approve an encroachment agreement to construct an elevated garage, parking deck, and related site improvements in the North Street public roadway. Thank you. That concludes my presentation, and we're available for questions. |
| 01:49:41.77 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, let's bring it back up here then. Any questions? |
| 01:49:49.16 | Mayor (Chair) | At this time, do we have any questions from the public? Michael. |
| 01:49:56.48 | Mary Wagner | Mr. Mayor, so the process would be 10 minutes particularly for |
| 01:49:57.38 | Mayor (Chair) | I'm sorry. |
| 01:49:57.84 | Unknown | THE END OF THE END OF THE |
| 01:49:59.93 | Mayor (Chair) | you |
| 01:49:59.96 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:50:00.03 | Mayor (Chair) | So about particularly |
| 01:50:02.27 | Mary Wagner | in the order which staff would recommend is the appellant then the applicant. You can rearrange that if you choose. No, that... |
| 01:50:07.94 | Mayor (Chair) | No. |
| 01:50:10.07 | Mary Wagner | take public comment the three minute apiece and then have five minutes rebuttal again appellant and applicant |
| 01:50:15.15 | Mayor (Chair) | an applicant. Thank you. Okay. So you're on. |
| 01:50:24.95 | Monty Georgeson | Good evening. My name is Monty Georgeson. I'm an attorney in San Rafael and I'm representing Mr. Raulston. If you would do me the kind favor since we are limited to five minutes, if you would beat me at five because Mr. Raulston would like to make a preparation as well. Sure. Presentation. |
| 01:50:25.63 | Mayor (Chair) | Thanks. |
| 01:50:37.46 | Martin Bernstein | Thank you. |
| 01:50:37.48 | Unknown | Perfect. |
| 01:50:37.83 | Martin Bernstein | It's a great story. |
| 01:50:38.02 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:50:38.03 | Thomas Theodores | as well. |
| 01:50:38.74 | Unknown | presentation. |
| 01:50:41.36 | Monty Georgeson | Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for letting this matter be heard. Mr. Ralston is trying to be as respectful as possible in this process, and I also want to commend to a degree the Woodman family that they tried to accommodate the concerns of the neighbors. |
| 01:50:55.06 | Leon Hunting | Okay. |
| 01:51:01.94 | Monty Georgeson | I've had a meeting with the neighbors and discussed matters with them. The problem is that they a lot of their attention on the surrounding neighbors and people down the block and people up the hill or down the hill. Have a few. chimed in with their reactions to it, but as Mr. Raulston said in his presentation, it really would have been nice had they come to him, had he known with more time to prepare that this process was underway and that he needed to get responsive to it and interact with them. the... I'm going to give him the floor in a few minutes to go into the lengths to which the financial impact of the construction during the course of construction is going to not only impair the rentability of the property, and the income value of it, but it also, because of the position he is now in, and I'll explain that briefly and he'll amplify it, is that he has recently sought, as he described to you, some refinancing of the property. The impairment of rental value of the property during the course of construction, and that's an issue that I want to highlight, and I'll get back to it in a minute, will not just be to diminish the rental value of the property, but to actually decrease the value, because as the council is, as I'm sure, aware, a lot of times with commercial properties, multiple family rentals like this, it's all about the rental income. If you knock down the rent for a period of time by some percentage, that isn't just reflected in a loss of income, it's reflected in the loss of value of the property because of the cap rates and the multiples of rentals that are taken into consideration by buyers. When he tried to do a refinancing, he ran into some obstacles of an unwillingness or at least in some... marginally more reluctance to grant refinancing because of the possible impact of the construction and where the where this problem manifests itself is because the property is less valuable now and during the whole course of the next two years and because he has been denied refinancing, he may well be in the situation that he describes, which is that he's got to sell the property. And so, saying, well, he'll just get through this rough time and maybe there can be an accommodation to the loss in rentals between himself and the Woodman family over a period of time just isn't going to solve the problem. He is imperiled. now with a potential significant loss of income. The long and the short of it is that if the Council does not grant the appeal. and deny the approval, then what we would like to have is to have it sent back to the Planning Commission on the condition that an agreement be made between the Woodman family. and Mr. Raulston. for compensation during the period of time that the construction will be in place, the impact that's going to have on him, which will do a couple of things. It'll have a salutary effect on whether he has to sell the property or not. If he can increase his income by some form of ongoing Thank you. increase that the Woodman family is willing to discuss. Mr. Padovan mentioned that it would be up to the city then to assess penalties on the Woodmans if they exceed the period of time that they are allotted for construction. Well, the person whose ox is being gored by that is not the city, it's Mr. Ralston. So it's all that much more important that if there is not an outright grant of this appeal, that a condition of approval be, and I think it can be reasonably stated, make the parties financial agreement a condition of approval. And that could be subject to review by the Planning Commission and by the Town Council if necessary. One of the things that Mr. Ralston's going to get into in a minute here, if I have about 30 seconds left, I estimate, is that The Planning Commission seemed to have considered these subjective criteria that Mr. Padovan described, but then they just swept them aside. They didn't really quantify how they made findings in the face of those important considerations. And that, I think, is an element that's missing in this approval process. of |
| 01:55:45.65 | Monty Georgeson | Well, and I think the presentation Mr. Rawlsson is going to make is going to trump the discussion by the Planning Commission about the lack of evidence of a financial impact. And the last thing is, Mr. Paterman discussed the, The case that Mr. Ralston cited and that that's not really incorporated into the regulations or anything, a city that's as progressive as Sausalito, it takes so many things into consideration when it grants approvals for projects, especially in-field projects like this. It seems to me ought to take input of all sorts and consider things whether or not they are by the book, black letter, in the ordinances or not. And the case citation is relevant. It's a relevant consideration that... or not they are by the book, black letter in the ordinances or not. And the case citation is relevant. It's a relevant consideration that should be made, and it's not too late for the town council to make the city council, I mean, to make that additional finding and add that subjective evaluation to the conditional approval when it goes back to the planning commission. |
| 01:56:49.50 | Lana Ralston | Good evening, I'm Lana Ralston, 12 Josephine Street. I'm here because the impact on my family is severe. I cannot afford to two or more years of construction and survive. I have a lot of repairs that need to be done. I have a lot of conditions on my property that I would like the city to address in the process. For instance, I mentioned in my letter, the amendment that the Construction will be excavating right next to my property line. I want insurance on that. There are a number of conditions that need to be addressed. I hope that you guys will say, hey, let's look at this a little further. Let's look at it with a little bit more consideration than I feel like has been applied yet. I think my family's been here for 70 years. I think we deserve a certain consideration. I don't want my family to suffer. Thank you. |
| 01:58:12.98 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. Okay, we have... Thank you. |
| 01:58:18.80 | Mary Wagner | Thank you. |
| 01:58:18.87 | Mayor (Chair) | Let's bring it back. Applicant. |
| 01:58:20.44 | Mary Wagner | Thank you. you |
| 01:58:21.25 | Mayor (Chair) | Mm-hmm. |
| 01:58:21.57 | Mary Wagner | Thank you. Applicant. |
| 01:58:23.44 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. Michael. |
| 01:58:25.03 | Michael Rex | Thank you. |
| 01:58:25.13 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 01:58:25.59 | Mary Wagner | you |
| 01:58:28.46 | Michael Rex | Thank you. I'm Michael Rex. I've been asked to represent the property owners, Dean and Jane Woodman, They've been working on a lot. WISH THEY COULD BE HERE TONIGHT, BUT COULDN'T. And Andrew Skirman, the architect of record, also couldn't be here. but two members of the staff, Ed Watkins and Nicole, are here tonight if you have any specific questions about the architecture. Um, I want to thank Jeremy and Steve for helping with this appeal, in particular thanks to Sonya Hanson who's here tonight who did a lot of the legwork, particularly on the neighborhood outreach. We're here to talk about the appeal and the encroachment agreement, but first I want to mention a word about the neighborhood outreach, which I think has been extraordinary in this case. Every time Sonya and Jane met with a neighbor, if they had a concern, They directed their architect to go back to the drawing board and change the design to respond in a significant way. I want to show you just a few quick examples. This is what was submitted. Carol and Fred Hohner at 30 Adwood up the street complained about the garage blocking a little bit of their view. So the roof line was changed and dropped and there's a letter submitted late mail where they now support the project. Peter Bostock, who lives down on, way at the other end of Bulkley, down near Princess, complained about, The... a garage. being too opaque. And, um, not seeing the view. So we went with more glass. This is what was originally proposed, and that's what was approved. This was what was originally proposed, that's what's approved. It got smaller, and it's basically a glass enclosure. When Mr. Ralston expressed concern about his views, we originally had, this is the downstairs, we had a square building for him on the ground floor, translated up to the master bedroom here, and then up onto the top floor, the roof deck off the living room. He said, could you pull this corner back three to four feet to open up some views? And so back to the drawing board, there's the lower floor. This whole corner was removed on the upper floor and the top roof deck. It came back instead of three or four feet, five feet. And then we added, this is what was originally the elevation facing the Ralston property and this is what was approved. The deck came back five feet and planting the landscape plan was changed. So actually, we won Mr. Ralston's support. He wrote a letter that dated June 18th. It's in your packet. And he states in this letter, the modified design is acceptable to us. I have no objections to the proposed design. We were pleased by that. On timing, he wrote, I hope the city allows the project to proceed with minimal delays. And, um, He actually came to the hearing and spoke in support. He said during the hearing, Jane has graciously accommodated my concern with the overall design of the building. And on timing, he asked that the city make sure that we follow the rules that can be enforced with respect to construction noise. And Chairman Joan Cox assured him that they would. So you can imagine how surprised we were after all that that we're here tonight on appeal. Um, In your packet, I refer you to attachment 10. There is a whole stack of emails in attachment 10. from Mr. Ralston to Jane Woodman demanding money. and particularly refer to July 5th. He puts in there at the end, please respond by 4 p.m. on Monday. 4 p.m. on Monday was the date to file the appeal. I'm actually surprised you didn't put her else. The appeal is appealing the COP for tandem parking, which is on the south side of the proposed home. Mr. Ralston's property is on the north side. Can't have any impact on him. Steve pointed out all the ordinances and policies that Saucido has in place to reduce impact during construction periods, shortening its duration, limiting hours, limiting the sound level. and having an entire construction staging plan to deal with trucks and debris containers. All of these have been memorialized in this project's condition of approval. Six specific conditions, I won't read them to you, but they're number 6, 19, 23, 24, and 39, that this particular project must address to reduce impacts during construction on neighbors. And I'd like to point out that those constructions are temporary impacts. It's distinct from permanent impacts. And we all know property owners throughout town are subject to some noise and disruption during construction when people improve property nearby. And I'd like to say this cuts both ways. Mr. Raulson has stated in his correspondence he needs to do repairs to his property. And Jane and Dean will have to put up for that short duration for the impacts that they may incur. Although they're not asking for money, Um, The city, I think, hardly wants to enter into this new set a new precedent to require applicants to pay their neighbors money in order to improve their homes. Never seen this before. We agree with staff that... that improving property generally increases property value, not decreases values in the neighborhood. So we ask that you deny this appeal, uphold the Planning Commission's action by adopting the resolution as attachment number one. On the encroachment, I'd first like to briefly correct, we're not proposing to construct a new parking deck as The attachment to on page 4 suggests That deck exists. In fact, there used to be a garage there in the 70s. And we plan on keeping the foundation and the structural supports because they're in good order. They were replaced with a building permit back in the 80s by the Woodmans. We propose extending it five feet further down the hill, but pulling it away from the North Street steps. The sole purpose of the extension is to provide those two extra cars for the second unit. Right now there's one unit on this very large lot. We're proposing two to honor the intent of the R3 zoning district. Um, I want to briefly mention there's a letter in your packet from Nola Rocco. She rents a unit just up the street at 213 North Street. She says in her letter that she opposes this encroachment agreement on the grounds that it makes traffic and people walking more dangerous. But in your staff report, Exhibit A, Attachment 2 on page 3, There's two findings, and I'll read them. D says, The project encroaches within the unimproved and underutilized portions of North Street public right-of-way and will not adversely impact any public circulation. Planning Commission was unanimous on that finding. They were also unanimous on finding E that the project would not preclude any future improvements to the pedestrian way. So in conclusion, Um, Both staff and Planning Commission has concluded that the necessary findings can be made for the encroachment permit. We recommend you approve the agreement by adopting the resolution on your attachment We ask that you do that tonight so we can move forward with design development. I thank you for upholding the staff's recommendations. that you deny the appeal. and approve the encroachment agreement. And I'm here for any questions you have. Thank you. All right. |
| 02:07:05.30 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. All right, let's bring it up here. Do we have any questions? Linda? Ready? |
| 02:07:11.92 | Unknown | Maybe personally. |
| 02:07:14.90 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, at this time here, any questions from the public? Kill him. All right. |
| 02:07:25.05 | Alan Mayer | Thank you. |
| 02:07:29.52 | Alan Mayer | film. |
| 02:07:36.25 | Joan Cox | Hi, Joan Cox. And once again, I just wanted to provide my personal perspective as I was one of the Planning Commissioner members that heard this project and voted in favor of it. Contrary to Appellant's assertion, the Planning Commission carefully considered each issue raised including Mr. Ralston's. We did not sweep it under the rug. Having considered numerous projects, we are well aware of the constraints that are placed on every project. Those requirements include construction time limits, construction hours, construction noise limitation, traffic mitigation measures. Each of these requirements is specifically intended to ameliorate the adverse economic and if you will, operational impacts on neighbors. As a practical matter, if you adopt appellant's line of reasoning, you create the potential that every applicant will have to pay their neighbor for the privilege of undertaking construction improvements on their property. Personally, if I were the appellant, I would welcome the economic impact of this improvement. It will replace a dilapidated, uninhabitable house with an aesthetically pleasing project that will also relieve parking issues. Ultimately, this project will improve neighboring property values, including that of the appellant. Thank you. |
| 02:09:01.86 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you, Joe. Thank you. |
| 02:09:03.82 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:09:03.83 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, any of them? Okay. |
| 02:09:08.31 | Unknown | you |
| 02:09:11.81 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 02:09:13.08 | Jesse McCallaghan | Thank you. |
| 02:09:13.13 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 02:09:13.57 | Mayor (Chair) | Yeah, state your name. |
| 02:09:14.09 | Jesse McCallaghan | Hi, I'm Jesse McCallaghan, and my husband and I own the four unit right directly across from the Woodman. Can we go back to the map? |
| 02:09:15.61 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:09:24.86 | Jesse McCallaghan | And so I am a landlord and have been for 30 years. and I... am rather speechless about this concern I would never would never occur to me that to replace our housing stock or keep our housing stock in good order. that one would have to enter into some kind of an agreement to pay their neighbors for the inconvenience. There are going to be inconveniences with this construction, and there are going to be wonderful things with this construction. We are not going to get paid for the inconvenience, nor are we going to compensate the Woodmans for the wonderful things that will happen. in the course of the construction. I live in San Francisco, there was a house built next to me. Building a house actually isn't that noisy. Um. We've owned this property for 30 years, and I dare say, |
| 02:10:25.05 | Unknown | you |
| 02:10:26.03 | Jesse McCallaghan | that I'm not sure we've had two days of vacancies in 30 years. There's a very robust rental market in Sausalito and in the entire Bay Area. and I just don't see how the problem of being a landlord and the slings and the arrows of the economics and what's happening in the neighborhood is the responsibility of somebody that's trying to rebuild their house. So I fully support the Woodmans. Thank you. |
| 02:11:00.31 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. Next, state your name, please. |
| 02:11:03.81 | G. Paul Minnihart | My name is G. Paul Minnihart. I have lived in Sausalito since 1974, and I'm a contractor who is familiar with the project and familiar with Josephine Street, and I'm sure you are also. And while the project is in the process, Bounds and guidelines set forth by the city are very stringent, very specific. I think that it is very tempting to When you're pouring, to block off this street for days, weeks at a time, that's gonna impact everybody who lives in that area. |
| 02:11:50.71 | Unknown | Thank you. you |
| 02:11:55.08 | G. Paul Minnihart | And it's way tempting as far as cost. It's not to say it cannot be done. But when you have subs, you have employees, it is way tempting to encroach and to create problems because the cost that you're, the cost cutting that you're doing by being there three, four trucks at a time blocking the street is just inevitable. I can. |
| 02:12:23.68 | Mayor (Chair) | King. Anybody else? Okay. Let's bring it back up here. |
| 02:12:31.90 | Mary Wagner | Mr. Mayor, the appellant and the applicant each have five minutes now. And the appellant would go first. Thank you. |
| 02:12:35.01 | Mayor (Chair) | and the appellant |
| 02:12:36.31 | Lana Ralston | you for the rest of the day. |
| 02:12:37.81 | Lana Ralston | Thank you. |
| 02:12:42.64 | Lana Ralston | Again, I have to say that I did come to some agreement with my neighbor regarding the view. I was as cooperative as I could possibly be with respect to the design. I said, yeah, okay, we have an agreement. You're gonna cut the... corner off so that my downstairs tenant can actually see something in that direction. We don't have an argument about that. I already stipulated that we are here not about that. We don't have an argument. What has been my point the whole time, every time I've had a chance in front of Heidi, in front of the Commission, I've said there is an economic impact that has not been addressed. whether or not it's in the finding on the conditional use or the use permit of the whole project, That materially adverse effect has not been addressed. to Stress that that's the only thing I'm here about. Not here to... Try to tell anybody that they shouldn't build the building. I'm not here to tell anybody that It's a lousy building or anything to that effect. If I can't... do what I need to do on my property as a result of what my neighbors are going to do It will damage me. That's the bottom line. my financial conditions, is at risk. I'm defending that with all my heart. I want somebody here to listen to that. and go back to their groundwork and say, Is there really a material adverse effect here? And I say there is. If you guys think there isn't, then I think we're going to have to go somewhere else. I hope we don't have to. We could go to mediation out of this if you guys decide that that's appropriate. I would hope that Jane and I can, in fact, come to some agreement. I'm not asking for something that I feel is undeserved or sets a precedent for future actions by the city. I'm just saying in this particular case, and that's almost the exact wording of the Office of the Governor's Planning and Research Department in the particular case. That is this case right now. So please take that into consideration. Send this back to the Planning Commission. and allow me to find a way to get some financing out of what's happening or my property's at jeopardy. |
| 02:15:34.62 | Unknown | Thank you. Michael. |
| 02:15:36.18 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 02:15:37.90 | Michael Rex | There's some very late mail in your packet that came in today. I'd like to use that for a rebuttal. The first one's from Mr. Ralston, where he said, this letter's dated today. It says that he only had two weeks' notice. The facts are that Jane sent out a letter to all the nearby neighbors on May 24th. The polls went up on the 30th, that's three weeks before the hearing. And they had an open house on June 1. And Mr. Loner brought to our attention his view concerns that we addressed on June 11th. So there was plenty of notice and dialogue and meetings with us and myself personally and Mr. Ralston. So we certainly knew what was happening sooner. There's a letter from his tenant. Um, that was received by the city on the 22nd yesterday. And Uh, I think it's important to know that they rented, the tenants rented their unit next to the project site. identifying a building that was in very bad shape. Anybody looking at that building, particularly from that side, could recognize this building was in serious disrepair and would need serious improvements. So that couldn't come as any surprise. Also, in that letter from the tenant, he's exaggerating this two-year-plus bill. It doesn't take us that long to build. A typical house like this could be built in 14 to 15 months, and it is an ongoing noise that whole period of time. Most of the noise is in the beginning with grading and building the foundations and framing, all the hammering. They'll close it in, and half of that duration is going to be done on the inside on the interiors. So I think the letter exaggerates the duration and the impact. The last thing is that Regardless, the bottom line is that The rental arrangement in terms of cost is between the tenant and the landlord. It's not involving the neighbors. I want to just close with, oh, and the other speaker about construction management. There, by a condition of this project, there has to be a full construction management plan submitted to the staff for their approval, and it has to show how it won't impact the neighbors in any significant way. They can't be blocking the street, okay? They have to have the sub and their trucks parked offsite. And that the parking deck will be using as a staging area, not the street. So those concerns that were raised are addressed. I'm just gonna close with a short statement by Jane. She couldn't be here tonight. She asked that I read this to you, okay? We have lived at 6 Josephine Street for 32 years. We raised our family of five children, multiple dogs and cats here, and we used all three stories of the house as our family residence. Debbie, can you get my slides up there again? Thank you. We are looking forward to the day we move back to 6 Josephine with our dogs and cats, and so our children and our grandchildren will be regular visitors. The original house was built in 1892, and over 121 years it has received numerous alterations and additions. She closes with, we love our house and have repaired and maintained it over all these years, but the wood beetles, termites, dry rot finally overwhelmed our efforts. We moved out in 2012. We are now fortunate enough to be able to build a home on the site we love. And I want to show you what what they will be replacing. Um, He did it. Andy's office did a CAD model looking from Um, the water. Here's the existing house. Not very pretty. This is what it'll be replaced with, although the garage will be all glass. This is up close. You can see what a strange and dilapidated condition the house is in. And this is what it will become although this will be glass. We're asking to improve the neighborhood, improve property values, We're asking for your help tonight to allow us to move forward. Thank you. |
| 02:20:22.87 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. Okay, let's bring it back up here. Comment? |
| 02:20:28.79 | Thomas Theodores | Mr. Mayor, I think we may have missed the disclosure of ex parte communications. And so, well, why don't I begin and say that I, in fact, visited the site today and met Sonia Hansen, who was there to just show me if there was no communication about the subject matter. |
| 02:20:36.23 | Mayor (Chair) | Yeah. |
| 02:20:36.28 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:20:52.92 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | And I would also disclose that I also visited the site and also met with representative for Six Josephine, which was Sonia Hanson. |
| 02:21:03.45 | Thomas Theodores | And I also visited the site on Sunday to review the encroachment. and Sonia Henson showed me around and showed me the entire premises, including where the encroachment would be. |
| 02:21:15.01 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. And I also was over the house with Sonia had seen where the condition of the house and the parking garage. Okay, so comments? |
| 02:21:38.40 | Thomas Theodores | As I said earlier, these things are very difficult because their personal lives at stake and who are involved in it matter, and they're very passionate about them. But the Planning Commission did its work here, and Thank you. Thank you. There's no reason to believe that based on all of the information that's in front of us, that the Planning Commission didn't do their work. If you set as a a policy in this city that a house that is structurally unsafe is falling down. essentially can't be repaired and made livable unless You pay your neighbors for the fact that they're going to be impacted by noise is just not viable social policy. It's just not right. And we need to be able to improve our homes. We need to be able to responsibly, and we have a very complex, onerous, Zoning ordinance, building codes to address all of that. I helped put the construction time limits ordinance in place before I ever got involved with politics, and it was a very important step. I imagine that the conditions of approval are filled with all kinds of things to minimize impact. to street closures, to time limits, to noise. This would be a terrible, dangerous precedent to set if we did this. |
| 02:23:42.01 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yes, I would agree with Councilmember with these comments. I agree that the Planning Commission did their homework with this. I did my due diligence, visited the site, confirmed, you know, the parking adequacy, no view impacts, the north stairs ambiance is being protected. And the home is, the design is just beautiful. It truly is. And I'm also concerned about setting the precedent with respect to impact of development next door. And I speak from experience because, you know, and I empathize with what I've heard because I've been there. I mean, I know what it's like to have a structure next to you and there's construction and I had a renter and it was hard. It was hard for her. It was hard for me. So I do empathize, but at the same time, we just, we can't set that kind of a precedence. And I do think that the Woodmans here have done an exemplary job in terms of outreach and in terms of really working hard to accommodate the concerns of their neighbors and the community and in working with city staff in a collaborative manner. And so I would support the Planning Commission's work. have a view on this. |
| 02:25:10.82 | Thomas Theodores | Well, I have sympathies for the appellant. It's never a happy day when you have to live through construction with a neighbor. But I think we've all done it. city vibrant, we have to be able to both to do construction, to remodel, We've all been there. We've all had it in our proximity. In this case, it's striking to me that most of the neighbors welcome the new home, it's going to definitely be a vast improvement over what's there now. It will. While there may be some short-term discomfort, that is definitely going to add to the value of the homes in that area. Without question, I think the Planning Commission did its work, they certainly, besides a thorough review of the project, They made sure that they, Of course, the city has mitigation. measures for noise and timelines and and such and the Planning Commission included those. There's a construction management plan that's going to be in place. So all those things, I think at this stage, we have to assume that's all going to be followed and we'll go in the place we haven't had any of the |
| 02:26:16.04 | Unknown | followed. |
| 02:26:20.62 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. problems that the appellant alludes to. So, and again, from a policy issue, if we did this, including this case, because If we said that... the homeowner had to pay a pellet, then when he did his repairs, we'd be in the position of trying to figure out how much that was worth to the other. And we'd spend a lot of time on that and it just wouldn't work. And we'd certainly discourage the improvement of our properties, so in that case, I would And I think that we will have to deny the appeal. |
| 02:26:55.95 | Mayor (Chair) | Well, I guess I must say I'm kind of living proof of what's going on because I live at 315 4th Street. And for the last 15 months, they've been building a new home that they knocked down a year and a half ago next door to me. And that's a 30 by 60 lot. They enlarged the house I wasn't thrilled. It's on the upper side. I only have one window on the upper side that you could look out on. And they built it. and kind of blocked it. But I really don't look out that way. I look towards the city. So, you have to have some kind of compromising, realizing, and this has been still going on, you can go up there now, And They're inside the house, but You could hear it and things, but If it's to improve the neighborhood, and that's what it does, there's no question about it. And I've been putting up with the noise and the parking. Uh... That's my Boston accent. And if you take Josephine and look at Josephine, Of all the streets up in that area, Josephine, North Street, third, fourth, Josephine down in the bottom is probably the least impacted street for traffic. All right. It is. Well, you can shake your head, but I'm telling you it is because I almost go by it every day. All right. Well, I've had construction trucks on a much worse street, on a much steeper hill, trying to pour cement and everything else and having a greater impact because from your house, you can go back to North Street, and the people next door can go out that way to North Street and 4th Street and have very little impact. I had a street that literally closed, and you couldn't even use it for it. You either had to go all the way up Richardson and around. But these are the things that as we improve these homes and if you really walked into that house, you walk down into that living room in the front and all of a sudden you find yourself going downhill. And if you're scared of heights, you won't even go near the edge because you've got a feeling that the whole thing is going to go. But nonetheless, We all have to deal... I've been dealing with it for a year and a half. with my new neighbor. I don't want to get off on a bad foot with them. And this is what happens during construction. I mean, it's going to be an inconvenience, and I'm on a street where if you add two vehicles on it, you now have a real impact as far as where to park your automobiles. So I really, I can't let this go through, and I know you very well. I've known you for since I came here and I opened up my gas station in 1978. But I do have to make a decision, and I'm probably the best one up here to make it because I'm just going through it. I know what it's like to live with it and everything else, but in the long term, my values will improve. And that's the positive. I'm sorry? |
| 02:30:08.11 | Unknown | I might not make it to the wrong one. |
| 02:30:09.48 | Mayor (Chair) | How long have you lived there now? |
| 02:30:11.65 | Lana Ralston | I've been there soon. |
| 02:30:13.04 | Unknown | personally since I was born. Thank you. |
| 02:30:15.79 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. |
| 02:30:15.91 | Unknown | you |
| 02:30:15.97 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:30:15.99 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:30:16.11 | Lana Ralston | Thank you. |
| 02:30:16.29 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 02:30:17.56 | Lana Ralston | Thank you. |
| 02:30:17.58 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:30:17.63 | Lana Ralston | Well, |
| 02:30:17.96 | Unknown | Please explain exactly. |
| 02:30:20.06 | Mayor (Chair) | Well, let's hope, with me, the only thing I really regretted, very honestly, that I didn't take advantage while they were doing the construction there, when it was on the foundation. Mr. Mayor, |
| 02:30:30.23 | Mary Wagner | Mr. Mayor, if we're going to have reopen public comment, we need to have him come up to you. |
| 02:30:33.62 | Mayor (Chair) | We need to have him come up to you. |
| 02:30:35.75 | Thomas Theodores | Well, Yeah. |
| 02:30:37.54 | Mayor (Chair) | them up. |
| 02:30:38.03 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 02:30:39.34 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 02:30:39.38 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:30:39.40 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:30:39.48 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 02:30:39.63 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 02:30:40.32 | Thomas Theodores | I move that we adopt the resolution denying the appeal and upholding the Planning Commission's decision to approve the design review permit and conditional use permit. So |
| 02:30:50.50 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Second. A second. |
| 02:30:54.13 | Unknown | here are two different things. |
| 02:30:55.02 | Thomas Theodores | Yeah, two different. All in favor? Aye. |
| 02:30:56.17 | Unknown | All in favor? Aye. Opposed? |
| 02:30:57.53 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 02:31:00.44 | Thomas Theodores | and I move to adopt a resolution approving the encroachment agreement. |
| 02:31:06.38 | Thomas Theodores | Second. All in favor? Aye. |
| 02:31:08.18 | Thomas Theodores | Bye. |
| 02:31:08.64 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | . |
| 02:31:40.94 | Mayor (Chair) | That's all sure. |
| 02:33:32.25 | Alan Mayer | No. |
| 02:33:42.32 | Mayor (Chair) | We're back. All right, and let's see, we're going to Fourth Amendment to Lise, France-A-Lise, MLK Park in Lillie. |
| 02:33:54.77 | Unknown | Thank you, Mr. Mayor. |
| 02:33:55.01 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you, Mr. Mayor. 9.30. We're running 15 minutes late. Okay. Thank you. |
| 02:33:59.80 | Unknown | Thank you, Mr. Mayor, council members, good evening. This is a proposal that was introduced at the last council meeting to construct a K-5 playground at MLK Park. The proposal involves a 12,000 square foot area. The first phase would include site work for grading pathways, retaining walls. The second phase would include the installation of the playground equipment. There's also new landscaping proposed, including 11 new trees. And the applicant is the lycée français, and the property owner is the city. Here are just two panoramas of the site, looking towards Ebtide and looking towards Alema Street. And the area where the playground would be is in that brown area where the cursor is right now on the top photo. |
| 02:34:56.69 | Unknown | In terms of background, the OMIC committee, the Parks and Rec Commission, both of them reviewed the lease-ay proposal in June of this year. On July 1st, the lease-ay submitted a design review permit application for Planning Commission consideration tomorrow evening. And on July 9th, the council reviewed the conceptual plans for the playground and continued the item for a discussion this evening on the lease terms. |
| 02:35:24.99 | Unknown | As noted in the staff report, there are a number of items of special consideration highlighted. And the first is the cost to install the playground. This includes the design, permitting, and construction costs, which are estimated at $800,000. And the Lise would be responsible for the entirety of these costs. The second item is who owns the improvements, and they would become the property of the city upon lease termination with the lease-ay. |
| 02:35:58.97 | Unknown | The next item is maintenance costs. Routine equipment and facility maintenance would be the responsibility of the LISEE. Additionally, repair and replacement of the equipment would also be the LISEE's responsibility. The lease specifies that the lease must have at least one annual inspection by a playground inspector for the playground equipment, and this inspection cost would be borne again by the lease. The Public Works Maintenance Division has estimated that maintenance costs to maintain the playground are estimated at $14,000 per year. |
| 02:36:38.39 | Unknown | The fourth item of special consideration is the shared use of the site. There would be separate use periods for the lycée and the general public for a variety of reasons, but most importantly, insurance and supervision reasons. The lycée would use the playground during school hours from 8 a.m. to 3.30 currently, and not on weekends or during the summer months. Therefore, the public would be able to use the playground outside of school hours on the weekends, during school holidays, and during the summer. We did a rough calculation of the ratio of public use time to the Lysay use time, and it came out to be a 70-30 split where the public on an annual basis would have access to the playground 70% of the time and the Lysay 30% of the time. In the context of the age of the children that the playground is designed for, which is K through 5, these separate use periods make sense. During school hours, K through 5 children who don't attend the LSE would be in school elsewhere, and they'd be able to use the playground after their school gets out. |
| 02:37:55.12 | Unknown | in consideration of the significant investment De Lysse would be making which is estimated at $1,080,000 over the course of 20 years. So that's the cost to install the playground and the maintenance cost over 20 years. Staff is recommending that the rent be charged for the use of the playground, by the way, they say be $1 per year. The $1,080,000 over 20 years equates to $4,500 per month, or $0.37 per square foot per month. Other outdoor lease space on the MLK Park site ranges from $0.13 to $0.17 per square foot per month. And therefore staff considers the $1 a year rent amount fair in consideration of the investment that the lease they would be making. |
| 02:38:47.32 | Unknown | In terms of insurance, at least they would provide the city with liability coverage of not less than $11 million. |
| 02:38:57.06 | Unknown | At the last council meeting, Ordinance 1128 was questioned as being applicable to this proposal. Ordinance 1128 in part states that no part of the MLK property should be used for purposes other than park and recreation purposes without voter approval. And the playground use currently proposed here is clearly a park and recreation use and therefore does not violate 1128. |
| 02:39:25.19 | Unknown | In terms of the process, the approval of the lease amendment for the playground would be contingent upon the Planning Commission approving a design review permit for the playground, which they would be considering tomorrow evening. Likewise, any approval of that design review permit would be contingent upon the lease amendment being approved by the City Council. |
| 02:39:47.82 | Unknown | And with that, staff is recommending that the council adopt the resolution attached in the staff report. which approves the Fourth Amendment to lease between the city and the Lise. That concludes our staff report and we're available for any questions. |
| 02:40:02.97 | Mayor (Chair) | Questions? Yeah. |
| 02:40:06.50 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Um... |
| 02:40:08.00 | Mayor (Chair) | Linda, do you have a question? |
| 02:40:08.54 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah. Yes, I do. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Lily, will there be a noise impact study done for this? Is this part of staff's recommendation? No. And can you share what the logic was on that with respect to putting a 12,000 square foot, you know, playground in a... in a residential, you know, so close to a residential community where right now there's nothing. You know, it's open space, quiet. |
| 02:40:43.82 | Unknown | The site is a public park, and the playground would go through the design review permit process, which doesn't require a noise study. If the Planning Commission decides that that's a study that they would require, then that would have to be brought forth. |
| 02:41:01.05 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I have another question, but Mr. Mayor, do you want to spread the questions around? |
| 02:41:09.86 | Ray Withy | I have a question for city staff, just in terms of the insurance dollar amount. How was that amount arrived at, and is that a common amount amongst the park? I don't know. |
| 02:41:24.51 | Mary Wagner | Thank you. It's actually the amount that they currently carry. |
| 02:41:28.90 | Ray Withy | Yeah. |
| 02:41:29.12 | Mary Wagner | And when we submitted it to our insurance pool for review, they were very comfortable that that was an adequate level of insurance, liability insurance. |
| 02:41:33.55 | Unknown | Okay. |
| 02:41:43.00 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you, Lily, and thanks for the presentation. The contract states that the playground will be used by the... the French school operating hours from 8 to 3.30. We have no assurance, do we, I mean, in the future, they might go beyond that or use it in the summer or even the weekends. And I'm wondering why the contract wasn't written to say that the French school would have the playground only between those hours Monday through Friday from 8 to 3.30. period and to just make it clear that, as opposed to reference to current hours. Thank you. |
| 02:42:33.09 | Mary Wagner | Mr. Mayor, if I may, I think that that's to provide flexibility. I think that it's Currently, their school hours are 8 to 3.30 during what we would all consider normal school hours. If they were to have a summer session, they would want to utilize the park during that summer session. and because of kind of the length of the the contract and the desire to provide a little bit of flexibility, that's why it was left as drafted. |
| 02:43:00.49 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I have a follow-up question to the City Council. So with that, sorry, with that rationale, Council is being asked to adopt a resolution based on this, you know, 70, 30, you know, ratio, but by baking in that flexibility, that ratio could change drastically. Wouldn't you agree, or what are your comments on that? |
| 02:43:23.21 | Mary Wagner | Well, I think that the 70-30 ratio was in response to questions that were raised by the discussion at your last meeting about the consideration for the project so it was just an example of the shared use of the facility. |
| 02:43:37.91 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | So in other words, we should interpret that 70-30 ratio as just a snapshot in time, not necessarily what will be the case for the length of this contract. |
| 02:43:47.73 | Mary Wagner | I think that what you should use that for is the current operation of the school. We have not been informed that they will be doing anything other than operating during what is considered to be normal school hours. And that's the information that we have to present to you this evening. |
| 02:43:59.84 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | But as. |
| 02:44:05.14 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Right, but as you said, they could have summer school in the future, and you, specifically flexibility was put in this contract to allow the French school to use the playground beyond those hours. Correct. |
| 02:44:22.17 | Adam Politzer | I would just maybe ask the council if that question would we'd be better directed to the applicant, the representatives of the school here. I know in our discussions those questions were asked prior to bringing it in the first place to Council and I know at this point in time there is no plans for summer school I think traditional schools, which the lycée may not meet the traditional schools, but the hours of schools are relatively the same, and there is no intent to go to school until or on the weekend, so we feel confident that the flexibility is adjusting that time to 345, 335, which are more in the norm of the regular school hours. And if they did choose in the future to look at summer school, then if there was an issue with that, we would bring it back for further consideration. |
| 02:45:07.46 | Unknown | If they could choose. |
| 02:45:15.66 | Adam Politzer | But if the applicant would like to address it, that might be better. |
| 02:45:19.76 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | The applicant can address it, but I believe this is a city contract issue because contracts are meant to anticipate future conflict. And so to me, getting clarity on the hours of the community would be able to use that as public land, to me, is a city contractual issue. |
| 02:45:41.84 | Unknown | first half. I think we had, when the proposal was first proposed, which was in the lease itself, so this is not a new proposal. This has been the intent of Lise from the very beginning, a whole educational experience for their kids. One of the comments that we had in various meetings with staff and then with the OMIC committee was that the The key element here was the definition of exclusive use because you have actually a dual exclusive use going here. You have exclusive use by Lise and you have exclusive use by the public. Um, in a 20-year, period, I think it's very, very hard to either determine or dictate what school hours will be. I think it may be reasonable to look at what the ratio, what the annual ratio would be. Right now you're at 70-30. That may or may not be for a million dollar investment into city land that the public's gonna enjoy. That may not be the ultimate ratio. But certainly there's an annual ratio that could be used. School hours change over time. Lisa has never had summer school. They have no intention at this juncture of having summer school, but they're a school. So boards of directors change, educational policies change. the very practice of education change. But what you may want to look at is an annual ratio or a maximum hours per year or something of that nature. that allows them to have the flexibility within their school schedules, but still gives the public, a relative guarantee of their exclusive use of the property. So I don't know how else to express it. If this was a one-year deal or a two-year deal or a three-year deal, |
| 02:47:47.72 | Adam Politzer | Do you think? |
| 02:47:52.94 | Unknown | then in all probability you could say 8.30 to 3.30 or 8 o'clock to 3.30, whatever it works out to be, and that's fine. but in a potential 20 year deal, you really don't know. So I think that council should deal with either a ratio of hours or a maximum number of hours or days. Right now, the school year is 170 days, which is less than the public school year. and the hours of operation are about the same as the public school day. I would ask for a little bit of leeway in there, even on a ratio. I have a follow-up question. |
| 02:48:30.96 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I have a follow-up question. |
| 02:48:33.98 | Mayor (Chair) | Right, you know what? Thank you. |
| 02:48:36.19 | Ray Withy | Rose, can I ask you a question before you sit down? |
| 02:48:36.24 | Mayor (Chair) | Bruce? |
| 02:48:38.43 | Ray Withy | Thank you. Would you think, and suggest to both of you about your, do you think it'd be, obviously you don't want to have school hours because that limits your ability to actually change your hours during the day. And 8 to 8.30, I don't really care about. Would it be comfortable in sort of wording it more generally that, I don't know if you offer after school care, most schools do now because parents tend to worry. |
| 02:49:00.42 | Unknown | They do, they do, and they're not including that in the playground. |
| 02:49:02.80 | Ray Withy | Right. So I think for clarification, and it's something for you to think about, whether it's comfortable, so obviously after school care can run sometimes 6, 7 o'clock, depending on which entity you're dealing with, so that would be something that might be clarified in the agreement that it's not for normal school hours, not for after school care. That would eliminate any vagary about, okay, limiting the afternoons and weekdays, and maybe also for you to think about it if you're comfortable with if you do end up that would eliminate any vagary about limiting the afternoons and weekdays and maybe also for you to think about it if you're comfortable with if you do end up having a summer program that you would just come back to rather than try to gauge hours that you would... |
| 02:49:39.03 | Unknown | I think there's a provision in there that allows for the tenant to apply to the city for a different arrangement, although I mean, at this point right now, the school operates during fall, winter, and spring. And since they never had a summer school program, that, you know, unless you see any major objection to it, the public actually gets the ultimate hours of use in the facility. I still think we dealt with the ratio and that the tenant needed to come to the city or the city staff or wherever they had to come to. to modify their current hours within that ratio I think that would be reasonable. I don't think the ultimate ratio should be 70-30, though. It's a... and The area that we're talking about right now is virtually unusable by the public as it stands right now. It's going to become very usable by the in the next several months. If there's some flexibilities in the ratio, the ratio generally works, but if we can extend the ratio to 60-40 or something of that nature, and then if the hours change, they have to come back and apply to staff, I would consider that to be reasonable and I would certainly recommend that we say, Um, accept that as a condition. Thank you. |
| 02:51:18.29 | Thomas Theodores | I think. |
| 02:51:18.61 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:51:19.34 | Thomas Theodores | I like the idea of the ratio and give some flexibility. The question I have is, |
| 02:51:20.47 | Unknown | I'd like to say, |
| 02:51:24.82 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 02:51:24.91 | Unknown | Yeah, exactly. |
| 02:51:25.83 | Thomas Theodores | Will the school want access to playground even if the school's in session, meaning I can imagine certain circumstances where they decide they go late, but they might be willing to have the playground be used by the public, even though it may be in session. I'm not sure if that's true. |
| 02:51:39.74 | Unknown | I'm not sure if that's true. The President- I think most after school programs would envision somewhat of a joint use, which would be a public use. You know, the Unless I missed the boat here, the afterschool programs probably don't entail a lot of recreation. |
| 02:51:53.52 | Unknown | of the... |
| 02:51:59.97 | Unknown | But There again, I think if there's some flexibility given within a ratio Thank you. And that flexibility reasonably is given to staff on some kind of annual basis. that I think is probably a workable solution. I've been on the school board. I've started a school. I can tell you that schools evolve in their hours, in their intensities, in various ways as new educational theories evolve. But I don't know. There's certainly no intent here to sell you 30% usage and then jam that up to 50%. So I think if we can find a reasonable mechanism that it'll work for all. Linda. |
| 02:52:56.94 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yes, and I'll withhold my comments on the 30-70 ratio, which I challenge anyway. But I have a follow-up question actually for City Council regarding 11-28. |
| 02:53:12.52 | Vicki Nichols | to be fair. |
| 02:53:13.56 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | you Well, I was thinking it was a legal question, so I would direct it at City Council. We're not Council. I'm sorry, City Council. We can answer it for you. |
| 02:53:17.00 | Vicki Nichols | to the end. |
| 02:53:17.27 | Unknown | Thanks. |
| 02:53:17.85 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. |
| 02:53:17.90 | Unknown | We're not counsel. |
| 02:53:18.93 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. |
| 02:53:18.96 | Ray Withy | With it. |
| 02:53:19.33 | Unknown | Sorry. |
| 02:53:19.55 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. |
| 02:53:20.11 | Unknown | Lianne. |
| 02:53:21.86 | Ray Withy | We can answer it for you, but it probably won't be great. Second counsel. |
| 02:53:22.96 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | but it probably won't be great. I'm thinking counsel in terms of lawyer. So, okay, for legal counsel, that's what I wanted to say. For legal counsel, so, ordinance 1128, as you had the slide up earlier, talked about, you know, the protection of public use. And so, um... |
| 02:53:24.70 | Unknown | I'm sorry. |
| 02:53:25.02 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 02:53:25.04 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 02:53:25.26 | Unknown | or- |
| 02:53:25.63 | Unknown | All right. or |
| 02:53:28.14 | Ray Withy | I would anyway. |
| 02:53:29.00 | Unknown | I'm sorry. |
| 02:53:44.82 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | In my mind, in this deal, the city is giving a dollar, is getting a dollar a year. rent for $12,000, or 12,000 square feet of, um, Thank you. public space that will be used for the bulk of the day by a private school. So can you share with me why, again, why this does not conflict with Ordinance 1128? |
| 02:54:12.39 | Mary Wagner | So I think that the operative language of 1128 is on the screen in front of you. And what it says is, no part of the MLK property shall be used for purposes other than park and rec purposes without voter approval. Staff's opinion is that a playground and a park are kind of the quintessential um, park and rec. Used. in that there has evolved kind of a a model throughout this community and other communities the sharing of park facilities, park and rec and playground facilities with schools. because they kind of go hand in hand. And you see a lot of park and rec uses not only playground uses but also other park and rec uses being operated in that manner. So it's staff's interpretation and opinion that it is consistent with 1128. The city council is ultimately the body that interprets 1128, but staff is comfortable making that recommendation to you. |
| 02:55:13.12 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | So as a follow-up then, I concur with the interpretation of a playground being part of, you know, a park and recreation purpose. But this is a playground that is being built and used during the bulk of the day by a private school. A private school. And we've just heard that we can't dictate what the school hours will be. going forward in the future. So how can we dictate to the extent that the community will have access to this playground. |
| 02:55:45.89 | Mary Wagner | Well, it's a playground that's being designed to be utilized by students in kindergarten through fifth grade. Typically when these students are, when the park is in use by the Lyssey, other K through five students will be in school. And as demonstrated, Previously, we believe the bulk of the use is really for the public, I think you can also analogize it to renting of field space, use of the gym. by other uses that are rented out and utilized for soccer games or other types of uses which prevents other people from the public from using it at the same time. |
| 02:56:36.53 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Wouldn't you agree though that those examples you gave of the soccer game, etc., those are temporary uses whereas this playground is structural and will not change? |
| 02:56:47.13 | Mary Wagner | I don't think the soccer games are temporary. I'd have to talk to Mike Langford about how often soccer teams are out there on the fields. It's my experience in other portions of Marin County. that any playing field is heavily utilized for athletic purposes. |
| 02:57:03.70 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Well, I'm just saying that, I mean, haven't you seen a scenario where the soccer team played and then maybe the next day children were out running and the next day some dogs were being walked. So, I mean, that was my comment with respect to the temporary nature versus a structural permanent use of 12,000 square feet of public land. |
| 02:57:28.73 | Mary Wagner | I think it's ultimately up to the City Council how you want to interpret Ordinance 1128. Staff is comfortable with the recommendation that this is consistent with the language of 1128, that it's a park and rec use consistent with other community models. |
| 02:57:41.42 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 02:57:47.82 | Ray Withy | I'd asked you two things that I've since forgotten that you wrote down in close session concerning the lease. And do you have those? |
| 02:57:59.10 | Mary Wagner | I do. One was that you wanted to be assured that upon the termination of the lease, that the structure becomes the property of the city, and it does. That's consistent with any other improvements that are made under the lease that the city actually has the option to say we're taking them or you have to take them out. The other question that was raised was, What about an inspection of the playground upon lease termination? I actually had the opportunity to speak with the Lisset representatives at a break, and they were perfectly fine with that. |
| 02:58:32.97 | Unknown | Okay, good. Thank you. |
| 02:58:33.80 | Ray Withy | Thanks for reminding me of my own questions. |
| 02:58:37.21 | Unknown | He sits in, waiting until you get back in the morning. |
| 02:58:39.08 | Ray Withy | Well, Bruce just reminded me of Stan about the gray hair. |
| 02:58:40.60 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:58:44.72 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. God be here. |
| 02:58:46.15 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 02:58:46.27 | Mayor (Chair) | . |
| 02:58:46.46 | Ray Withy | MAKING A LITTLE BIT OF |
| 02:58:46.61 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 02:58:46.67 | Ray Withy | Just seeing you reminded me of the last time I saw you, you reminded me of that. And the other... |
| 02:58:48.13 | Mayor (Chair) | and we're all |
| 02:58:48.62 | Unknown | The Press that we saw. |
| 02:58:50.42 | Mayor (Chair) | Any other questions up here? Okay, let's go to the public. On public, anybody like to make a comment? All right, Joan, why don't you come up and then you can get behind. You can stand over here for the sake of time. Thank you. |
| 02:59:04.21 | Joan Cox | Hi, Joan Cox. I actually live right above this playground, and I had the opportunity this evening to speak with the president of my homeowners association about this upcoming project. And the Homeowners Association and I personally are in favor of it because right now the piece, and I'm sure you've seen a little site map, but the piece is in terrible repair at the moment. This is a huge improvement. and is essentially found money for the city. You know, it's a million bucks improvement at no cost to the city, aside from the use of the playground during the school hours, and I will say on the few occasions that I am home during the day, during the week, There is no use of the... I mean, nobody goes to use this area of the... So I don't see it... you know, adversely impacting any of our neighbors or the residents of the town, but I do see it as a huge opportunity for the town. And I believe that most of the members of my homeowners association would agree. |
| 03:00:13.95 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you, Joe. Yes, sir, come up and state your name. |
| 03:00:17.99 | John Donovan | I'm John Donovan and I live just up above the playground too. I think my biggest concern is the tree planting that's going to go on along the perimeter of it, and that we have trees that don't mature so tall that they impede the view that we like to have of the gas station. Thank you. I'll get you a free car wash for that one. In all seriousness, the mature height of the trees is a concern of mine. |
| 03:00:40.58 | Unknown | Amen. All right. |
| 03:00:42.59 | Leon Hunting | I'm not sure. |
| 03:00:42.73 | Unknown | I think. |
| 03:00:43.03 | Mayor (Chair) | Oh, boy. I'll get you a free car wash for that one. |
| 03:00:50.86 | John Donovan | The 12,000 foot playground seems a little excessive, I have thought that there should be a playground built in that area for years. My concerns, my big concerns are the usage. The 70-30 ratio, I don't know what kind of math came up with that. the, The bigger concerns are more with what the city's left with at the termination of the lease, or if we roll into another 20-year lease, are we going to wind up with a playground that's just run out? I mean, an inspection is one thing, but if we're turning this over to the lyse to maintain and use up in their, you know, what is the lifespan of this playground? I mean, do we rebuild it in 15 years and then five years of use and the city gets it for 10 years of a playground in good condition? Or is this going to be something that gets rebuilt, bang, right at the end? Or needs to be rebuilt right after the lease is no longer in possession of the playground? So those are my main concerns. Cost to the city, you know we're going to find another place to put those wood chips. The a lot of wood chips. You got some warm up. |
| 03:02:07.34 | G. Paul Minnihart | You got some room up there at the house? |
| 03:02:09.82 | John Donovan | Maybe. This one here is a little bit of a question to me too. And this is just from a straight from a rule standpoint. And again, I think that I will probably be a huge beneficiary of the playground. My kid will probably climb on that highest play structure. I mean, it'll probably be keeping us out of there at night will probably be the problem. Use at night, extra noise. I mean, I think the noise situation is totally viable, actually, with this. So I think that's something that you guys should definitely address. And then with this, just the wording in the rule and of the law, I'm not sure if that totally holds water because unless education has become recreation, and it certainly wasn't while I was in school, while that's a privately owned playground for the whole time that the school is using it, I don't see that as recreation, I see it as education. So I'm not necessarily against it, but as far as the letter of the law is concerned, for the lease, it may not qualify. So that's what I have to say. It was good time. |
| 03:03:24.77 | Ray Withy | Thank you. Go ahead. Jonathan. Staff, do you want to reply to the two things that I think John, both as a tenant and as a neighbor, brought up the educational use, I think, is permitted, |
| 03:03:26.41 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:03:26.43 | John Donovan | THE END OF THE END OF THE |
| 03:03:26.46 | Unknown | Exactly. |
| 03:03:26.80 | John Donovan | Thank you. |
| 03:03:38.33 | Ray Withy | You can speak to that. And the, what was the other one you brought up? That was- The hours, the nighttime use. The nighttime use, which believe me, I can add a couple cents to it, but go ahead. |
| 03:03:42.22 | Mary Wagner | The hours, the nighttime use. |
| 03:03:49.70 | Mary Wagner | I think nighttime use would be the same as nighttime use in any other city park and then if it's a problem it becomes an enforcement issue. Probably potentially for the police if it's a nighttime post-dusk. |
| 03:04:05.63 | Unknown | Can they ask the educational use on the site? Thank you. |
| 03:04:11.74 | Mary Wagner | It's a playground, and I think that we all got to use playgrounds when we were in school, and it's a to me, it's still a park and recreation use. I wouldn't qualify it as an educational use. |
| 03:04:23.50 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. Also a question, just to clarify for Mary. This is going to, I think tomorrow, isn't it, if this gets approved tonight, go in front of the Planning Commission. So the Planning Commission will be reviewing many of the issues that you concerned about with noise, trees, blocking views, and all of that sort of thing. Is that correct? Correct. Yeah. |
| 03:04:41.47 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. Correct. Thank you. Yeah, Mr. Mayor. Yeah, so question for city staff. But the purpose of the city council review tonight is also to, if we want to direct the planning commission to, with respect to noise impact studies, et cetera, that we can do so, correct? In other words, if there are some things we specifically want them to take a look at beyond the contract, we can include that in direction. |
| 03:05:16.91 | Mary Wagner | The Planning Commission will take up all of the issues related to the approval that's in front of them. I mean, I'm not sure I understand the question. Well, I just didn't. |
| 03:05:24.91 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Well, I just didn't see noise impact study in the materials that I |
| 03:05:31.57 | Mary Wagner | I think if the Planning Commission receives information that leads them to believe that a noise impact study is required, then they can do that themselves. I also wanted to respond further to Commissioner – sorry, that's the old days, Commissioner Leon. Vice Mayor Leon's issue about the education versus recreation use, that education uses, school uses are permitted uses at this site. And I didn't address that when you asked that question previously. |
| 03:06:02.94 | Ray Withy | is the commercial uses that are documented in... Correct. So, but they can't be expanded, I think, is the whole point of this. The area. |
| 03:06:06.39 | Mary Wagner | Correct. |
| 03:06:10.24 | Mary Wagner | The area devoted to commercial use. |
| 03:06:12.26 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 03:06:12.29 | Ray Withy | it. |
| 03:06:12.46 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 03:06:12.48 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 03:06:14.40 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | So I'm going to ask this question again. I'll ask it in a slightly more specific way for city staff. Is there a reason why we didn't specifically state that the community will use and have access to the playground on weekends and between 3.30 and 5 daily? |
| 03:06:20.04 | Mary Wagner | and it's |
| 03:06:39.72 | Unknown | Yeah, yeah. |
| 03:06:40.27 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 03:06:40.29 | Mary Wagner | Yeah. I think it actually says that because what it says is... |
| 03:06:43.72 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 03:06:43.82 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:06:43.93 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | What it says is- It says current Lise Fensage hours. |
| 03:06:47.48 | Mary Wagner | And then it says at all other times and when school is not in session, it shall be available for use by the general public. |
| 03:06:51.04 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:06:51.07 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah, correct. Yeah, but that, it doesn't necessarily, as we learned earlier, that those hours could change in the future. |
| 03:06:58.55 | Thomas Theodores | I thought we talked about when Bruce was up that we might look at the ratio and work on that. So that's another detail that we're going to work on in the contract. Is that correct? |
| 03:07:07.27 | Mary Wagner | Yeah, I anticipated when you fully closed public comment that you would bring it back up and direct staff on any modifications that you wanted to the amendment that's in front of you. |
| 03:07:17.53 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:07:17.57 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. Okay, any public comment? Any further? Sean? |
| 03:07:28.70 | Unknown | Jeanne Pedlin at 501 Ulima Street. And so it comes to my mind that I don't really know what children do on a playground. and there's already tennis courts there, there's hoops and all that sort of thing. Why don't you give approval for an enclosed swimming pool? That's what you really need. |
| 03:07:51.10 | Adam Politzer | Can I respond to that? |
| 03:07:52.09 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:07:54.32 | Adam Politzer | the city for many years when I was the Park and Rec Director, the City Council gave direction to the Park and Rec Commission to form a community center task force. |
| 03:07:55.65 | Thomas Theodores | with. |
| 03:07:55.74 | Unknown | I have a good one. |
| 03:07:55.97 | Thomas Theodores | of water scotties. |
| 03:07:57.05 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:08:03.68 | Adam Politzer | And we had one, and we worked on it for almost four years, and one of the proposed projects was a swimming pool at that site. We did many outreach meetings, workshops, trying to get public input. and there was a debate over if it should be enclosed. Or open. because the Um, The master swimmers wanted to be in an open and cool environment, and the recreational swimmers wanted to be in an enclosed and heated environment. I'm not sure. Eventually the council asked us to stop working on it because the number one priority of the city at that time was to build a police and fire station. and didn't want a competing project. Mike Langford will be coming to the council through the Park and Rec Commission at some point before December 31st to ask to see if there is an interest in pursuing a community center which was supposed to be the machine shop. where the VA is, we were looking to have a performing arts center there with a small stage. and obviously that hope has also disappeared, at least at the moment. So we'll be coming back before the council in the near future. and asking if there's an opportunity to reappoint a task force to look at those two goals, which were a performing arts center and a swimming pool. Thank you. |
| 03:09:28.11 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. Okay, let's bring it back up here for comments. |
| 03:09:31.76 | Adam Politzer | Thank you. |
| 03:09:35.25 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. |
| 03:09:37.06 | Ray Withy | Well, no, if you want to go, go ahead. |
| 03:09:38.67 | Mayor (Chair) | I'm going to get to it. Yeah. |
| 03:09:39.74 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 03:09:42.74 | Mayor (Chair) | time flexibilities I think we have to be flexible on it. It's for education when it comes to that if the and for us to make more scientists and things like that, and the need is to change the hours for longer hours. I can understand that. As far as the noise go, I think you get more noise from the dogs than you'll ever get from the children there. And flexibility has to be built in here. You don't see us charging down there, chasing down all the people that are on that dog in MLK without leashes. All right. And we could. and we should probably And they, those dogs buy too. But nonetheless, we build in a little flexibility because those dogs usually are owned by local people. As far as the... the playground. you If we don't do it now, We won't have a playground. We won't have a playground in my lifetime and maybe your lifetime down there. And there is no playground down in the north end of town. Here is a wonderful opportunity to have a first-class playground. I'm not worried about the kids during the week. Most of the kids, K to 5, they're in school anyway. The idea is the ability is that you have it on holidays and you have it on weekends when the residents can really use that facility with their kids. So I think that we're trying to push something that Thank you. It calls for a little flexibility, and we're trying to narrow it down to an exact, and I don't think the two can meet. |
| 03:11:35.03 | Mayor (Chair) | You won't. |
| 03:11:36.23 | Unknown | I'm doing it. I think you're ready to go. |
| 03:11:39.08 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 03:11:39.11 | Ray Withy | Go ahead, she passed to you. All right. So, again, welcome to Sausalito. I think we can solve some of these problems with signage and other things, which I think we should put dawn to dusk at a lot of the parks to answer John's question before, but I think rather than a ratio, which I don't know who's going to go back and calculate, and that may not be worth anybody's time, if there's a large deviation school policy in terms of hours or... summer school program. And I think by the time you get there as a school, things will have time under our belt as neighbors to be able to deal with it much more you know, easily than we do now just as a hypothetical. If that's something I think that that you folks could live with in more general terms rather than kind of lock you in from 8 to 3 or whatever the hours would be. that would be I think give us some comfort and give comfort to those who are worried that You know, they could show up with their kid at 4 o'clock and then not be available or whatever. I think that would be a reasonable compromise. I think to answer your question about the inspection kind of whole idea is it has to pass inspection up to state laws, and that's what they have to return it, so it's up to snuff as far as if we had any park inspected, what would have to be up to when they return it. So I think that's a great condition. I think with that concession in mind, in terms of the hours, I'm all in favor of it. Sometimes it's, you know, I've certainly commented the last time we talked about this about rent, and I think you've gone through the right analysis to sort of show that Lysay is contributing in a much better way than probably paying rent for that space because of the improvement that's being done there and its value to the community and the likelihood that we'd be able to replace it with something else that performs the same service to the public. so with I think the tweaks that you've been made some something at the planning commission the community and the likelihood that we'd be able to replace it with something else that performs the same service to the public. So with I think the tweaks that you've made, something at the Planning Commission about tree height, I'm not sure why we need trees screen the playground anyway, but if it's something that they're really married to, and if it beautifies the site, great. Just make it of a height that it doesn't grow up and block whoever's view around that bowl, that valley there. So between the trees and limbing it to normal school hours, and if there's a big change, we'll come back to the right body, whether it's parking or rec or whatever, and adjust the use hours. I think that with that, I'd be more than happy to support it. I think it'll be a great addition. It'll be the biggest park playground in Sausalito, which is great, I can tell you from my kids, using the little one up on Harrison Park, or Mary Ann Sears Park now, they prefer to go there even though there are fewer things to do simply because it's new. Because it's new and it looks great and it's in great shape and that'll be exactly what this is. And this will have stuff that's geared to older kids, you know, K through 5, which is hard to find in Marin. So it's great. |
| 03:14:19.48 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:14:30.33 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:14:47.57 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Actually, to me, if this was a playground truly for the community 24-7 with no ambiguity, I would be fine with it. What we're looking at... is... leasing public land 12,000 square feet for $1 a year to a private French school. And it would be easy for this council to tighten up this contract, tighten up the terms by saying that the school could use the playground from 8 to 3.30 Monday through Friday period, but that from 3.30 to 5 in the weekends and the summer as defined by this month to this month. Yeah, 3 to 5 during the week. I mean, during the week for the public use. I just am concerned that we're moving forward with an agreement for private use for the bulk of public land. I don't see that 30-70 ratio here. I really don't see it. I certainly don't see it in the future. I think we run the risk of losing it completely in a lopsided way. And we even learned tonight that we can't dictate what the school hours will be in the future. You know, playground, yeah, but, you know, let's firm this up and make sure that the community truly will be able to use it. |
| 03:16:24.53 | Unknown | you |
| 03:16:24.59 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. Well, I think we've all agreed that the one thing we're going to have to tighten up is on the hours. I mean, I think we're both going in with good faith. I think it's a fabulous opportunity for Sausalito. I do think, as Bruce mentioned, 20 years, school policy changes, maybe they go into rotating shifts. We just need to clarify and whether we do ratio or some timing that the public is going to have significant usage of it. And I'm sure we can come together on that. That's not going to be a hard thing. So that would be part of the approval on this. But I think that It's a great idea. We would not have a park there anyway. I think it's very unfortunate that we use this legal fiction of $1 a year and then people focus on this as the rent. They're spending over a million dollars in 20 years. And we're going to have a park there from day one for absolutely zero. They're going to pay for all the maintenance, all the improvements, the insurance. And actually, part the slide was, if you want to put it in dollar and cents, but certainly we're getting the benefit of it, which is actually the rent. So that's quite misleading. Besides getting the playground and parks and Our commission voted 5-0. I mean, we would not have a park there. But besides that, We are supporting one of our best tenants of school, And it's a school that maybe Sausalito residents will be going to also. So some of the children of our residents will also be able to use this playground during school hours as well as after school hours. So I think it's a great opportunity. I think there's a couple of things on the hours that we have to button up. And of course, the Planning Commission will have to look at it and I got a weed. the tree issue, whatever else that comes up. But I think it's a great opportunity for us. |
| 03:18:13.48 | Thomas Theodores | Very briefly, I agree with everything that has just been said. wearing a financial hat, this is a really good deal for the city. It's just that simple. If we had $800,000 sitting around, to go build a park tomorrow. Um... I bet we couldn't get $2,000 a month rent for it. Maybe more, maybe slightly more, but I doubt it. And that would be for an exclusive use forever, for all hours. So if you actually look at the... 800 plus, the million, so including maintenance into this, that's equivalent to over a 20-year span of over 4,000 a month. Okay, so we get a part. we get our residents' children able to use the park. We actually have to fork out no money. And we're getting an equivalent value out of this of 4,000 a month. And if we had the money ourselves, which we don't, and we built this beautiful park, We couldn't actually rent it for that amount of money. So that is a financially very sound deal. And I agree with the Vice Mayor, a sentence or two in a provision to deal with the flexibility is probably all we need. And I would stay away from the percentage as well. It's too messy. We are doing about calculations for that. |
| 03:19:48.99 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | be art. Mr. Mayor, can I make... Oh, sorry. |
| 03:19:51.83 | Mary Wagner | And Mr. Mayor. Oh, sorry. |
| 03:19:53.48 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 03:19:53.60 | Mary Wagner | Thank you. |
| 03:19:53.63 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I- |
| 03:19:53.67 | Mary Wagner | I... I was going to actually propose some language for council, but if you're not ready for that, it's up to you guys. |
| 03:19:54.31 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I was going to actually propose something. |
| 03:19:58.71 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I just wanted to respond with a comment. I do, Mr. Mayor? Okay. I do think that there is an emphasis here on the 800,000 investment and that's great so long as the community truly has access to this playground. I don't see anything in this contract currently at this time that, you know, |
| 03:19:58.73 | Mary Wagner | I know. |
| 03:20:19.94 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | leads me to believe that the community will have consistent access to what is being developed. To me, it looks like private use by a private school for the bulk of the time. And that's what I'm seeing, and I do think it's in violation of Ordinance 1128. |
| 03:20:38.03 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, fear rather than care. Mr. Could I ask a question? |
| 03:20:40.53 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 03:20:40.55 | Thomas Theodores | Could I ask of our city attorney, you're trying to get approval, you're trying to get a motion eventually tonight to actually approve this lease. So you need to propose some language for that? |
| 03:20:42.42 | Mayor (Chair) | Mayor, City Attorney. |
| 03:20:50.15 | Mary Wagner | at least. I was going to make a suggestion to Council to try and incorporate what I've been hearing and see if this works. If we modified Section 4C regarding use to say that tenants shall have the right to exclusive use of the playground space and playground improvements during |
| 03:21:03.09 | Unknown | Oops. You're done, man. |
| 03:21:15.41 | Mary Wagner | regular school hours, which currently are 8 to 3.30, Monday through Friday, September to June. and that if tenant wants to propose to use the Thank you. |
| 03:21:28.74 | Unknown | Sure. |
| 03:21:29.11 | Mary Wagner | the playground exclusively during other times. They would apply to the park and rec department and pay whatever the applicable rate was for a park for the playground use, And then I would also add that the hours of operation can vary during that school period if they don't exceed that seven and a half hour period. So you get the flexibility. to move, say, to 7.30 to 3.00. or 9 to 4 if school hours change. and that that would be the parameters of their use. So we're locking in. What I'm hearing the council say is regular school hours make sense to everybody. That would exclude after-school programs. It would exclude summer usage unless the school were to say, can we rent it from you like anybody else can rent city facilities. |
| 03:22:19.67 | Mayor (Chair) | You like that? |
| 03:22:21.41 | Unknown | I always have had a chance to run the ride. It's a good chance. It's in our own. |
| 03:22:21.61 | Mayor (Chair) | I've always had a chance to run that right now. |
| 03:22:25.09 | Unknown | I don't object to that, but I'll make a suggestion and make it somewhat easier. Why doesn't the school submit their hours of operation on an annual basis two parks and rec. And if the total number of hours exceeds what they are currently, then it needs to come to Council for confirmation or somewhere for confirmation. But let the Rec Department at least review it and come forward with it. |
| 03:22:51.48 | Unknown | No. or, Thank you. |
| 03:22:57.57 | Unknown | Okay. |
| 03:23:02.63 | Unknown | their kind of staff opinion of whether it's reasonable or unreasonable. I'm not trying, you know, we're not trying to alter the hours here. We're just trying to look to the future. I just think it's prudent not to to have some latitude with staff to say, okay, in July of every year, of August of every year, that we say we'll file with the rec department what their school operation for the playground will be. And if that exceeds the number of hours that it was the prior year, it simply comes to counsel for, you know, confirmation, either on a consent calendar or somewhere else. So it's not a big deal. |
| 03:23:48.01 | Ray Withy | Does that make sense? Well, what we already have here, right, is, at least if I'm not reading correctly, in this Fourth Amendment, you have specific hours already called out in this document. |
| 03:23:48.55 | Unknown | Does that make sense? |
| 03:24:00.02 | Mary Wagner | We have what their current use is, yes. |
| 03:24:00.14 | Unknown | THE END OF THE END OF THE It's what the current use is, what the lease amendment calls for now is that the exclusive year or the exclusive use period. |
| 03:24:11.33 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:24:12.14 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:24:14.01 | Unknown | be equal to the school day. Right. And you probably don't want that to be unchecked. |
| 03:24:22.77 | Ray Withy | But no, I'm with you. I'm just trying to go. |
| 03:24:23.67 | Unknown | So what I'm saying is that if the school files their hours on an annual basis for the next year, because they'll know that in the summertime what their hours are going to be. |
| 03:24:34.37 | Unknown | Mm-hmm. |
| 03:24:34.72 | Unknown | Thank you. with the rec department, that the rec department have latitude within the total number of hours of the prior year. And then if it exceeds that, it needs to come to council. What I'm trying to do is preclude the fact that if they wanted 20 more hours in a year, that they're prohibited by the fact that you limited that hour. |
| 03:24:51.97 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 03:24:52.00 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:24:52.02 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:24:52.03 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 03:24:52.14 | Unknown | Thank you. It just needs to come back with consideration. |
| 03:24:52.79 | Ray Withy | Yes. How about this is sort of in between what you're saying is that I like the language that you had, but change it with terms of summer and other things. but I think you just have it. They submit their calendar every year, and forget how many hours there were last year or this year. If it's in the opinion of the Parking Rec Commission or staff, it's significantly different. It comes back to the council's review. OK. If it's significantly different. |
| 03:25:21.23 | Adam Politzer | Thank you. |
| 03:25:23.18 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:25:23.20 | Adam Politzer | If it's a Yeah, and I'm recommending that that report or that information get submitted to the Park and Rec Commission. It would be agendized if anyone in the community has a concern, then come to the meeting. |
| 03:25:28.87 | Ray Withy | Yeah. |
| 03:25:29.01 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:25:29.04 | Ray Withy | information. |
| 03:25:35.77 | Adam Politzer | And at that point in time, they can say, yes, we think it's significant. push it forward or they can say it looks relatively the same and move forward. |
| 03:25:45.21 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Mr. Mayor, what is significant? Is it five hours? Is it 10 hours? Is it 20 hours? |
| 03:25:45.31 | Adam Politzer | Amen. |
| 03:25:50.96 | Adam Politzer | Bye. |
| 03:25:50.98 | Ray Withy | 20 hours? Seems quite subjective, frankly. Yeah, but many times you trust the residents. The residents sit on the Park and Rec Commission. If they've got a big issue with it, they're going to raise a flag, right? So whether you trust your Park and Rec Commission or your staff or not. Can you rephrase what you said, adding that, not to put you on the spot? |
| 03:25:51.69 | Unknown | Peace. |
| 03:25:51.74 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Just... |
| 03:25:52.55 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:25:52.58 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 03:25:52.63 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:25:52.89 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Quite subject and frankly. |
| 03:26:11.72 | Mary Wagner | Thank you. So, tenants shall have the right to exclusive use of the playground space and playground improvements during regular school hours, which are currently 8 a.m. to 3.30 p.m., Monday through Friday, basically September to June. Tenants shall annually submit their hours of use for review by the park and rec. So what I'm guessing is we can get your, hold on one second, we can get the hours that you're proposing for the coming school year because you know what your school days are. |
| 03:26:37.76 | Unknown | Or is that your... |
| 03:26:41.82 | Mary Wagner | We'll run that so that will be the base number for this school year. Then annually, every year during the term, They will submit the proposed hours of operation to the Park and Rec Commission for review at a notice public meeting. If the Park and Rec Commission determines that they are significantly different than the previous year, it will be brought to the City Council for review. |
| 03:27:06.93 | Unknown | Sounds good. |
| 03:27:07.52 | Mayor (Chair) | you |
| 03:27:07.81 | Unknown | Okay? |
| 03:27:08.30 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 03:27:08.65 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:27:08.98 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 03:27:09.35 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:27:09.36 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 03:27:10.53 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:27:10.54 | Mayor (Chair) | Yeah, sounds good. We live with that? Okay. |
| 03:27:14.34 | Ray Withy | I would just request that you, when you go through the planning commission processes, we're probably not going to see this again, but trees be brought up. You'll be there tomorrow. John will be there tomorrow. The height of the trees. And just signage be put in place so the public understands so there's no conflict when somebody shows up at 1 o'clock. |
| 03:27:30.71 | Mary Wagner | The other issue that you had raised, if I may, was 4A or actually I guess I'll put it under 4D. is that when the lease is terminated, the tenant will submit proof that the playground is in good condition and passed its annual inspection within one month or something of getting it back? That's not it. And, um... |
| 03:27:50.56 | Mayor (Chair) | I have a question. Yeah, I also. Just one quick. Isn't there going to be two gates there? One will be for the LSE to control their students, and then when it goes to the public, it's the other side that opens up. Okay. Thank you. Fine. Thank you. |
| 03:27:51.03 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | question |
| 03:28:10.60 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Will the community be alerted if the hours increase significantly? |
| 03:28:16.91 | Mary Wagner | It will be noticed as an agendized item on the Parking Rec Commission, and that agenda is available to the public. |
| 03:28:22.58 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Will there be proactive outreach? Will there be something out in the currents, in the e-newsletter, something like this? Because I mean, Not very many residents view the city council agenda, let alone the park and rec agenda. |
| 03:28:36.17 | Adam Politzer | Yeah, I think a different way to answer the question is if it gets bumped to the council, then the council can decide that, They want additional notice before they hear it or they can hear it if they choose not to, but we wouldn't call out any additional information unless directed by the Council What the Park and Rec Commission's role will be is that they turn in something that they is excessive or more than what they were the year before and they want the council to consider it, well then it would be the council's decision if they would like to continue the item for additional noticing including The... The currents? or putting a full page ad in the paper, that would be council direction. |
| 03:29:19.94 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah, so I just want to comment on this, Mr. Mayor, that I think the earlier comment regarding trusting the Park and Rec Commission, it's not a matter of trusting. Of course I trust our volunteers and our residents on our commissions. It's a matter of do we have representatives on these commissions necessarily that have children of the age or living nearby who might be impacted by noise or whatever with extended hours or other changes in use of this playground. And to me, it goes back to, yes, transparency and proactive outreach so that the community can weigh in. |
| 03:29:54.28 | Ray Withy | Yeah, I'm sure if Joan or Adam or anybody else has a problem, they will let the city know if they've got a problem. And I can, with some degree of certainty, if people who use the playground notice a big change in what's being used, they will let us know and let the city know as well, because people are, you know, love when they want to know when they can use things. So I'm sure Sausalito is pretty good at letting us know when there's a problem. |
| 03:29:55.23 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | on public lands. |
| 03:30:21.26 | Ray Withy | So I'm sure we can rely on them to do so. |
| 03:30:25.43 | Thomas Theodores | I have one more comment. And what we're talking about is the procedural issue about if the hours change. But I mean, this is a lease that's going to go on for 20 years, and I think that the |
| 03:30:25.52 | Ray Withy | Right. |
| 03:30:34.61 | Thomas Theodores | We should specify that, I mean, if the parties don't agree that they're limited to these hours unless, I mean, unless the city agrees. I mean, we have the procedural thing, but I'm a little concerned that, you know, they may come to park and rec. I mean, what happens if. They want to increase it by you know, all summer from 9 to 5. And then we disagree. I mean, the lease needs to specify who's going to get the final determination. You are the landlord, so we do need to |
| 03:31:00.97 | Ray Withy | in that control. Yeah, we, that's, |
| 03:31:01.78 | Unknown | Yeah, we... I think the intent in the lease would be is that if we have to file with the Parks and Recs Commission on an annual basis, that they have the right to deny that schedule. |
| 03:31:12.68 | Thomas Theodores | Yeah. |
| 03:31:12.87 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:31:13.04 | Thomas Theodores | I know. As long as that's clear. |
| 03:31:15.49 | Unknown | It's understood, but it could certainly be All right, next question again. Okay. |
| 03:31:25.00 | Ray Withy | Is it something that hasn't already been brought up, John? |
| 03:31:25.76 | Unknown | night. |
| 03:31:28.01 | Ray Withy | Wait, wait, hold on. You've got to come up to the thingamajig. |
| 03:31:28.51 | John Donovan | Wait, wait, hold on. |
| 03:31:33.27 | John Donovan | A point that I just wanted to make was with regards to the times of reasonable use for the public of the property. It does extend. It's kind of a shorter window than 70% of the whole time. The public use is going to be the after school time until dinner time. if the If the time use changes at the school to impact that time, it's much more effective to the community than it is, say, earlier in the morning or something like that. These limited times for the kids of that age to actually use that playground are 3.30 to 6. And so that's a valuable time for council to take into consideration. |
| 03:32:13.38 | Mayor (Chair) | Don't forget in the summertime, it can go later than that because it's not getting dark until 8, 9 o'clock. Okay. All right. |
| 03:32:26.04 | Ray Withy | So we... So, Yeah. I'll make a motion just simply restating what the current proposal is with the additional language as submitted by the city attorney. |
| 03:32:44.35 | Unknown | second okay all in favor aye aye opposed |
| 03:32:47.01 | Ray Withy | Yeah. |
| 03:32:47.03 | Michael Rex | Bye. |
| 03:32:47.27 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah. |
| 03:32:47.28 | Michael Rex | Yeah. |
| 03:32:47.30 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 03:32:47.39 | Michael Rex | Bye. |
| 03:32:48.58 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Uh, no. |
| 03:32:49.29 | Unknown | What else is missing? |
| 03:33:43.28 | Unknown | Thank you. you Thank you. Amen. Thank you. |
| 03:33:59.05 | Mary Wagner | Mr. Mayor, if I can jump in at the risk of It's my understanding that part of, and please correct me if I'm misunderstanding this, part of the job of the consultant is to review the criteria that are listed in the initial study checklist to determine the appropriate environmental document to prepare. So if there are considerations that lead it to a mitigated NEGDEC versus an NEGDEC versus an EIR, those will come out as part of the work that the consultant is doing. I think Jeremy, your community development director, was pointing out his belief that it's leading toward a mitigated NIG deck based upon other discussions regarding the property, if that's accurate. |
| 03:34:44.04 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | That would be correct. |
| 03:34:46.20 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | So, because when I was reviewing the materials, my takeaway was that the direction was a mitigated negative declaration and not an EIR. And my question is, if that is an assumption that is being made, is that influencing the amount that we are budgeting for the professional service? I'm sorry, okay. Is that impacting us at all with respect to the timeframe or whatever is being allocated for getting this done and, you know, I guess I just don't wanna get... shoehorned into going down this mitigated negative declaration if down the road it becomes clear we need to do an EIR. |
| 03:35:37.66 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Well certainly the contract, the proposal we receive from DCE, the planning center, is oriented toward the expectation that it's going to be a mitigated negative declaration. And that is based upon, as I said earlier this evening, discussions between the city staff and the consultant looking at the project, the application that the applicant has submitted. And if my review of that set of plans, there was something that stood out in my mind that it looks like there are going to be significant unavoidable adverse impacts, that's a term I sort of roll off there, but those are the terms that that's the, that's |
| 03:35:56.10 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:36:29.02 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | the threshold that is necessary for preparation of an EIR. And so if at the present time the contract is set up or is oriented toward a mitigated negative declaration. However, one tasks in their scope of work is to review the historical documentation that has been provided by the applicant and to determine if there are going to be significant unavoidable adverse impacts to the historical integrity of the project and or will the project comply with the Secretary of Interior Standards for the preservation and the protection of historical resources. consultant that has been retained by DCE, by the environmental, if the historical consultant that has been, will be retained by our environmental consultant determines that the project will cause a significant unavoidable adverse impact. then we will be looking at preparation of an EIR and we'll be, and the consultant will come and tell us, you know city staff, it doesn't look like the project continues to qualify for a negative declaration. We're going to have to go to an EIR route and we'll be back in front of you in a matter of weeks asking for supplemental authorization. |
| 03:37:50.80 | Unknown | uh, |
| 03:38:04.53 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | So follow-up question. |
| 03:38:06.26 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | be. |
| 03:38:06.64 | Unknown | Well, |
| 03:38:06.97 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 03:38:07.79 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Thank you. |
| 03:38:07.81 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:38:07.83 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 03:38:07.98 | Unknown | you |
| 03:38:08.25 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 03:38:08.32 | Unknown | What? Sorry. Thank you. |
| 03:38:11.45 | Ray Withy | Thank you. Is this a consultant selected by the city? Yes. Okay, so it's not a consultant that's being provided by the applicant? Correct. |
| 03:38:19.98 | Mary Wagner | Mr. Mayor, if I can add to that also, you know, it's selected by the city, paid for by the applicant. The city administers the contract and is in control of all that work. It's a very typical way that planning staff operates all CEQA documentation. And the other point I wanted to make |
| 03:38:21.39 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 03:38:39.45 | Mary Wagner | Is this item that the environmental approval is coming back to the Planning Commission and to the City Council? So there's situations that have arisen during hearings where somebody will introduce evidence of a significant environmental impact either during the, the public comment period or during the commission or council consideration of an item And ultimately it's up to you to determine whether you can make the findings when you're presented with whatever CEQA document it is, to justify adoption of that document before you consider action on the project itself. |
| 03:39:15.31 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Okay. |
| 03:39:15.56 | Mary Wagner | Okay. |
| 03:39:15.61 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Mr. Mayor, I have a follow-up question. Was BCDC consulted with respect to the direction |
| 03:39:17.08 | Mary Wagner | Right. |
| 03:39:24.66 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | that we're going with regarding the mitigated negative declaration or is that premature? I mean, in terms of their opinion because the structure overhangs the shoreline. |
| 03:39:38.68 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | The Environmental Consultant DCE, the Planning Center, had a copy of the current residential condominium project for their use when they prepared their proposal that's in front of Jeremy, what? |
| 03:39:51.00 | Ray Withy | I mean, won't this, like all environmental documents, go to the clearinghouse, say clearinghouse for comment? So it won't look like this. |
| 03:39:51.93 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Bye. |
| 03:39:54.86 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | THE END OF THE END OF THE |
| 03:39:54.90 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | It's a great house roof. Yeah. So BCDC will be involved later on is what I'm hearing. |
| 03:40:03.88 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | DCEC. BCDC? I'm sorry, we have a DCE also. Let's call the environment, DCE, the Plan of the Environment Consultant. Let's just call them the Environmental Consultant. BCDC, they have not been involved in the... |
| 03:40:06.03 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | BCD, it's a mycena. Can you see DC? BCDC. I'm talking about BCGC. |
| 03:40:23.30 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | at these preliminary stages where we are now, but they will certainly be involved through the approval process, and the applicant is certainly required to obtain a permit from them. And also, it's likely that BCDC will be using the city's environmental review document for their own compliance with CEQA. |
| 03:40:44.73 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:40:44.85 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Mm-hmm. Yeah, I just can't shake the feeling that I feel like the staff report is, you know, leaning towards the mitigated negative declaration direction, and I just think it should be full out EIR. |
| 03:40:56.78 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Well, that's certainly true. I mean, we've been working, the staff has many years of experience, decades of experience working in environmental review. I think that's an appropriate avenue to go on this project, to begin on the project. And we will be putting this out for public review, and if during that public review period, if evidence comes in that we have gone the wrong direction and it turns out that there are significant unavoidable adverse impacts, for example, on historical resources, we can use the information we've gathered to date and then reformat that analysis into an environmental impact report. This is the first step in the process and we'll see where we go. |
| 03:40:58.97 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah. |
| 03:41:41.75 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Thank you. |
| 03:41:41.77 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. Any other questions up here? |
| 03:41:44.52 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you, Jeremy. |
| 03:41:45.95 | Mayor (Chair) | Any questions from the public on this? Thank you. |
| 03:41:54.88 | Joan Cox | Just to reassure Councilmember Pfeiffer, it comes to mind that the Planning Commission is not shy about requiring and increased environmental review. We've done it on several occasions. where the staff came to us with a proposed negative declaration and we said no, we think significantly more environmental impacts that merit a full environmental impact review. So, and if we don't do that, You will have the opportunity to do that when the environmental document comes to you. So I think there are some built-in procedural protections for the city and the residents in this process. |
| 03:42:26.77 | Unknown | out. |
| 03:42:35.19 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you, Joan. |
| 03:42:42.58 | Michael Rex | I'm Michael Racks. I'm representing the property owner, Alice Koscheff, who's here tonight. I'm the project architect. Just two points I want to make. The whole purpose of this and the initial effort is to do what's called an initial study. It's to look at what we're proposing and determine whether there could be any significant environmental impacts. The only reason why this contract has been prepared to include the negative deck is basically to define a fee and a timeframe. But if the initial study, which they do first, determines that there's some serious impacts that we haven't we're not aware of. then the process would change. So there's... We're just really asking you to help us get started on identifying the potential impacts. The last thing I want to point out is just some clarity, okay? When we were going through the hotel process, we had numerous meetings with BCDC, so they certainly know about the property. When that application was pulled and we proposed a different use, the residential use, we consulted with what I would consider probably the top attorney who deals with BCDC. And through his analysis of what we're proposing, he gave us some confidence to believe that what we're proposing will be consistent with BCDC standards, which is encouraging. But more to the point, he pointed out to us that why the Vahala building is over the water in the sense that tidal action goes under the building. From a legal standpoint, we're not in the Bay. And that's because when the McAteer-Petrus Act was created, I think in 1963 or 1964, The legislature didn't want to create an unknown number of nonconformities. So the legislation that created BCDC determined that the bay isn't where the water is necessarily. The bay goes around the perimeter of structures that were over the bay at the time the law was adopted. And because the Vahala from a legal standpoint isn't in the Bay, it'll be looked at in a very different light and under different standards than what we would normally see being judged for buildings that have water going underneath. So it's a fine point, but a very important legal distinction that you should be aware of. Thank you. |
| 03:45:33.48 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you, Michael. I had a follow-up question for Jeremy, Mr. Mayor. So in approving this and going forward, are we in any way making a judgment call with respect to the use that's being purposed, the seven condos? |
| 03:45:37.06 | Michael Rex | Thank you. |
| 03:45:50.25 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | We're just looking at going forward with looking at the environmental impact, correct? |
| 03:45:55.16 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Correct. Okay. So the staff report identifies the responsibility for the different approvals. And so the different approvals, there's a general plan amendment which requires a recommendation by the Planning Commission to the City Council, final action by the City Council. A zone change which requires recommendation by the Planning Commission, final action by |
| 03:45:56.14 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Okay. |
| 03:46:20.31 | Unknown | Thank you. Okay. |
| 03:46:20.73 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Okay, yeah. So the city, if the city council is not happy with this project at the end, the project |
| 03:46:28.71 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yeah. Thank you. |
| 03:46:29.38 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Thank you. |
| 03:46:29.50 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Okay, thank you, Jeremy. Just wanted to make sure. Thanks. |
| 03:46:34.36 | Ray Withy | Well, this or any other public comment. Go ahead. |
| 03:46:42.80 | Unknown | Yeah, state your name. David Thomas, 208 2nd Street. Mr. Mayor, City Council, thank you for having me here tonight. I have more of a question at this point versus a comment, and I'm looking at item 4i, page 2. where the proposal anticipates detailed analysis of the following issues. It looks like we have six bullets here, and I'm curious, were there other categories that were omitted? You know, is it uncommon to see other attributes such as views, public and private, to be included in the initial study? So just more of a question, just in terms of the process at this point. |
| 03:47:32.63 | Ray Withy | Jeremy, do you want to speak to how any environmental review has to also take into account local zoning regulations as part of the environmental review and views would be |
| 03:47:41.73 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Thank you. |
| 03:47:41.76 | Ray Withy | the |
| 03:47:41.96 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | of |
| 03:47:42.18 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 03:47:42.27 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Thank you. |
| 03:47:42.30 | Ray Withy | please. |
| 03:47:42.81 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Certainly. One of the six points here is aesthetics, and that encompasses views. |
| 03:47:42.89 | Ray Withy | Certainly won't. |
| 03:47:48.61 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Okay. |
| 03:47:49.02 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Jeremy, I have a follow-up question. |
| 03:47:51.68 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Thank you. |
| 03:47:51.70 | Ray Withy | Wait, hold on a minute. Just to clarify, if you would. Just to clarify, so these six things are categories out of CEQA, if I'm not mistaken, which have a very large number of sub-issues underneath them, including views, but that are not necessarily spelled out in your bullet points here. Well, one of the ones that we |
| 03:48:00.39 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:48:00.41 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | THE FAMILY. |
| 03:48:00.58 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:48:06.11 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Thank you. |
| 03:48:11.16 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | So we're the ones that we didn't include agricultural resources, minimal resources, airport land use conflicts. There were some that were solid waste aspects, so there were some that Thank you. I felt from a staff perspective it's better to highlight these. |
| 03:48:25.35 | Ray Withy | But... Thank you. But also, and correct me if I'm wrong, and this is just from my memory of doing this in the past, that part of the analysis in an environmental document, it has to either mitigate or say it complies with local zoning and general planned uses, which we're, in our case, have view ordinances and other things that, and the Planning Commission will have to certify that document to say it complies with those things. The Planning Commission will make a recommendation to the City Council for your certification. Right. So all these things will flush out in the process. And you also can make your own comments, say it's not flushed out in the process when that document comes to the public. |
| 03:48:53.61 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Yeah. |
| 03:48:53.85 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:48:53.97 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Thank you. to, uh, |
| 03:48:55.98 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:48:56.03 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Or your certification. |
| 03:49:08.89 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | And Mr. Mayor, I have a follow-up question for Jeremy. With respect to the views, I recall that at some point during the history of this parcel, there was quite a bit of controversy in the neighborhood because in terms of the environmental impact assessment, they were looking at public views like from the sidewalk or people walking as opposed to private view impact. For example, the Portofino Riviera next door or the other neighbors next door. So can the council at this point make sure that this study is going to also look at private view impact. |
| 03:49:53.77 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | Well, certainly the private view impacts are part of the city's zoning regulations. And as Vice Mayor Leon mentioned, part of the analysis in the document will be compliance with zoning regulations. |
| 03:50:01.13 | Unknown | Amen. |
| 03:50:13.11 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | So the zoning regulations will include view impacts as defined in our zoning ordinance, primary views, secondary views from living rooms, from kitchens, from master bedrooms, which are defined in our zoning regulations. |
| 03:50:28.86 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. So what you're doing, you're confirming that it will be private view impact as well as public. Okay, thank you. |
| 03:50:33.80 | Jeremy (Community Development Director) | as well as public. Okay, thank you. And then, of course, the staff reports that are prepared by the Planning Commission for the designer view permit will be, need to make a determination that private views are maintained. |
| 03:50:48.57 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Okay, thank you, because that was one of the controversies I recall earlier. |
| 03:50:54.12 | Jonathon Goldman | Thank you. |
| 03:50:54.17 | Ray Withy | the point of clarification. So when it does, when this draft, it comes as a draft form to the Planning Commission at whatever the hearing, first environmental impact review, |
| 03:51:03.99 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:51:04.01 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 03:51:04.02 | Unknown | I'm going to go. |
| 03:51:04.04 | Ray Withy | Thank you. environmental impact report review. and feel free for you or your neighbors, whoever else, to show up and say, hey, these are the concerns I think aren't being addressed or aren't being mitigated in this document. And that's really your chance to have a first crack at saying, hey, you've got to take my situation into account. Thank you. |
| 03:51:22.77 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:51:25.17 | Ray Withy | All right, thank you. |
| 03:51:25.47 | Unknown | And then they have to respond to that. |
| 03:51:25.86 | Michael Rex | Yeah. Thank you, Jeremy. |
| 03:51:31.83 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:51:31.87 | Michael Rex | I'd like to respond to David's comments. We have specifically asked, and it was confirmed, that this environmental study will include views, assessment, public and private. And we are assured it would be. Also, two things I'd like to point out. This process includes a scoping session, which is a public hearing, so to speak, where the public can weigh in on what's being studied. And there's a comment period, a 30-day comment period, where the study, the consultant must respond to every question raised by the public. So there's plenty of opportunity to address neighbor concerns. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 03:52:17.48 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. All right. So let's, we have a motion to move this ahead. |
| 03:52:26.42 | Thomas Theodores | See you. |
| 03:52:26.66 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 03:52:26.68 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 03:52:27.81 | Thomas Theodores | I move that we authorize the city manager to execute a professional services agreement with the planning center. DCE for the preparation of an environmental review document for the Valhalla Residential Condominium Project. |
| 03:52:42.00 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. Second. Okay. All in favor? Aye. |
| 03:52:46.27 | Thomas Theodores | I... |
| 03:52:46.84 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:52:46.86 | Thomas Theodores | Thank you. |
| 03:52:46.88 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:52:49.34 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. OK. Moving right along. That's it. And we go to. |
| 03:52:56.02 | Ray Withy | Thanks for staying, folks. |
| 03:52:57.61 | Mayor (Chair) | You know, |
| 03:53:01.96 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 03:53:01.98 | Ray Withy | All right. |
| 03:53:02.83 | Mayor (Chair) | you City Manager, report. Only 11. Only running. And not one hour behind. |
| 03:53:14.33 | Adam Politzer | I have three brief items. Thank you. for you. You all should have received an email from Council Member Berman from the City of Mill Valley. and I will forward it again tomorrow. At the next MCC MC meeting, August 26th, Jared Huffman is the featured speaker and Andy is looking to get questions, one question from each city to give to Jared ahead of time so he can prepare for it on things or issues or items that we think are important for him. |
| 03:53:48.42 | Unknown | have. |
| 03:53:56.17 | Adam Politzer | to address while representing us as our congressman. So if you would like to forward those to me, and to Debbie. Then we'll work with the mayor and vice mayor to narrow that down to one because we're limited to one. Obviously at the meeting itself, |
| 03:54:14.90 | Unknown | What is the future? That's the one question I want to ask. |
| 03:54:18.76 | Adam Politzer | Back to the future. At the meeting itself, if there's additional time, then he'll be taking questions from the field. But they thought that it was important to just try to give him some questions ahead of time so he can come prepared, rather than fielding them off the cuff. |
| 03:54:19.61 | Unknown | At the meeting itself if there are |
| 03:54:24.23 | Unknown | at Mill Valley Community Center. |
| 03:54:33.92 | Adam Politzer | So you can respond back to Andy directly. We recommend that you respond to Debbie and I, and then we will work with the mayor and the vice mayor and then forward. |
| 03:54:34.12 | Unknown | Okay. |
| 03:54:43.25 | Adam Politzer | A question off to Councilmember in Mill Valley. And what is the date? By the way, I did not get that email. 26. |
| 03:54:48.38 | Thomas Theodores | And what is the date? By the way, I did not get that email in the 26th. |
| 03:54:53.95 | Adam Politzer | Okay. |
| 03:54:54.60 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:54:55.25 | Adam Politzer | The other two items here are also disinformational. I wanted the council to know that at the last meeting you heard from resident Shelby Van Meter representing a lot of folks in the community that were concerned about the level of maintenance for the open space and particularly the right-of-way in the median and Caledonia Street in particular. Lauren and Bertis, Jonathan Goldman, and Ken Basso have offered an invitation to meet with her. and members of her committee or members of the community share her concerns. So look. one, to identify those places to make sure that we're I'm both focusing on the areas that need improvement. I don't think that anyone in the city would say that everything is perfect. or even near perfect. And so if there's an area specifically that they want to have addressed, we want to make sure that we focus on that. And then focus on teamwork, as I mentioned at the council meeting when those concerns were raised that we have to work as a team and that includes the community and as many of the council members have mentioned, volunteers are important. has done with Blooming Bridgeways has obviously set the stage and the tone on how the community can help us, what the Lions Club recently did, helping us with Harrison Park, the Rotary Club, with their help at MLK and now taking on CASNO and what they've done Gabrielson Park is another example of our service groups, the women's clubs with their efforts, also down with the with Gabrielsen Park, specifically the entrance and the rose garden. but also beautification throughout the year. We've been able to count on those three Um... organizations to help us. So we see this as a real positive group of residents that want to get together to help us maximize our resources. And if necessary, we'll come back in September with a report to the Council on what we're This is operational, you know, they're complaining about THE CITY DOESN'T LOOK GREAT. unless we need additional money or it's a policy issue. We may or may not bring it back to the council. We'll see how the meetings go. and what immediate successes we may be able to have within the next 30 to 45 days and take a look if it's important to come back to the council. Right now we are leaning to come back to the council, but until we meet with them, We really don't know if this is a massive giant issue that has that we're just not seeing or if it's just cosmetic and something that we can fix correctly or quickly. So I just wanted to let you know that we listened, we heard, and we responded, and hopefully we are able to resolve. Thank you. as going forward. The last one, and you would have noticed it tonight, is that the community development department has some folks that... have been taking leave for personal reasons, And then we have a... an employee that has left to take a job with the county of Marin. That's Nicole Houston, who is our building technician. She has moved on and is now working for the county of Marin. So we have some temporary folks in Nicole's seat. helping with Kenneth and helping at the front counter. And then as you saw, Steve, tonight, as the contract planner. Heidi is out and Allison is still on maternity leave and we'll be back in September. So there is some new faces at the counter. We are very I'm confident with the folks that we have that are helping us but, you as council members if you hear complaints that We have people there that aren't doing a good job or aren't responsive. Please make sure that you bring that to my attention. I appreciate Jeremy's effort to make sure that that we are staffed and with capable and competent people during the time of transition and time of people needing to take a break for their own personal reasons. That concludes my report. Happy to answer any questions that you folks may have. |
| 03:59:22.43 | Ray Withy | you |
| 03:59:22.61 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Mr. Mayor, thank you. |
| 03:59:24.52 | Ray Withy | coming on his report. Are you commenting on his report, asking the question? |
| 03:59:29.43 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I have a question about the kind of in line with the beautification thing. |
| 03:59:32.49 | Ray Withy | Let's first do the... Oh, go ahead. All right, go ahead. |
| 03:59:34.97 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:59:37.83 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Uh-huh. Oh, well, I mean, it's kind of and sort of, and I'm not sure if it does. The bully bus. I empathize with the cause, you know, but it's very large, and they also have bikes with big cardboard signs that they lock to, you know, police and things. So I was just wondering if you could comment on that, because I've had some residents ask me, you know, questions about that. |
| 03:59:42.53 | Unknown | It does. It's 11 o'clock. |
| 04:00:02.27 | Unknown | recently. |
| 04:00:12.48 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:00:12.50 | Adam Politzer | specifically. |
| 04:00:12.53 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Specifically, also the bikes with the cardboard signs locked to poles. |
| 04:00:17.58 | Adam Politzer | Yeah, I'm not prepared to comment on it. I think I get more information on that and see if they're violating any specific |
| 04:00:21.71 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 04:00:21.96 | Unknown | Thanks. |
| 04:00:24.70 | Adam Politzer | Thank you. |
| 04:00:24.75 | Unknown | Okay. |
| 04:00:25.05 | Adam Politzer | City law or state law. Okay, thanks. |
| 04:00:27.11 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:00:27.13 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay, thanks. To my knowledge, the ones where you saw were on that. bike racks or the The bus that's parked there has been putting money in the meter and You know, he has gotten tickets for over-expired meetings, so... |
| 04:00:44.09 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Mr. Mayor, your microphone isn't on. |
| 04:00:46.72 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 04:00:46.87 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 04:00:47.48 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | But I was just going to say, I know that in Hurricane Gulch there was a bike parked just yesterday locked to a sign pole where cars come down Alexander right in front of the condos and with a lot of cardboard signs. |
| 04:00:47.98 | Mayor (Chair) | but I was just going to say. |
| 04:01:10.41 | Ray Withy | Can I ask you a question about beautification, what you're actually talking about? Can you make sure you try to get everybody in the same room, like Diane, as well as Shelby, to go out on this site visit so you don't get that telephone game working against you? I know that may be impossible, but if you can, that would be great. So you get those interested parties up front. |
| 04:01:20.18 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:01:20.20 | Mike Langford | is |
| 04:01:20.43 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:01:33.87 | Adam Politzer | Yeah, they... Kind of sad news, but I'm sure that we can twist your arm, is that Diane technically has resigned as the chairperson and even on the committee and has Pass the torch on to Tom. She still loves the email. |
| 04:01:45.19 | Ray Withy | He still loves the email. |
| 04:01:47.77 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:01:48.65 | Adam Politzer | Thank you. I don't know what Tom's... Will I... Tom Wilhite is now the new chair of Blooming Bridgeways. |
| 04:01:53.68 | Unknown | chair of the Blooming Bridgeway. |
| 04:01:55.72 | Adam Politzer | I think. We've kind of put it out to Shelby to bring whomever, and encourage her to forward the email that had some attachments on what are occurring. schedules are for both maintenance of parks, both on the, again, annual, monthly, quarterly, weekly, daily level. And, you know, we'll invite anyone that would like to come to this meeting. So it may be something that we post in the in the currents. and invite all. and see who comes, but we want to make sure that Shelby and the interest that have been working through her She has tried to organize this. and the courteous. professional manner and we want to respect that. We'll start with her and then continue moving forward. |
| 04:02:48.32 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. |
| 04:02:48.93 | Adam Politzer | Thank you. |
| 04:02:48.98 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. Thank you. Future agenda items? |
| 04:02:52.45 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | I have another question, and it's possibly something that, Adam, you could investigate a little bit more with regards to, as you know, I've had several residents tell me that the French school is now using MLK as a transit stop for shuttling their students to San Francisco. And so, and it's not just a rumor now. I know from what I've seen, it looks like it's actually happening. So I was wondering if we could follow up on that and kind of explore that a little bit more. |
| 04:03:36.28 | Adam Politzer | Yeah, it was explored. I thought that my response to your email was telling you that it was just a rumor was the case, I did call the Chief Administrative Officer for the Licea. They absolutely said that is not going on and they have no plans for having that as a carpool site or a as a transfer site from Marin County students to the city or vice versa, but the chief operating administrator for the school has said that that is absolutely not in their plans or currently in their operations. |
| 04:04:09.66 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Okay, so I'll show you this letter that I was shown and see what you think because I don't know what to think. Thank you. |
| 04:04:20.93 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:04:20.95 | Ray Withy | Yeah, I feel like you're... |
| 04:04:21.20 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | And this is a letter from the school that would, okay. |
| 04:04:24.42 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:04:24.51 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Thank you. |
| 04:04:24.61 | Ray Withy | Thank you. As far as future agenda items, This, you know, I got, people brought this up to me at the Harris, the Sears Park opening, and I think it came up today, and I don't, hopefully we've had this in the budget somewhere, some flexibility to improve our signage at the dog park, I mean at the various playgrounds, to have dawn to dusk, no smoking, which we adopted earlier with our no-smoking regulations, and no dogs in the playground area. So I know that the residents around Sears Park asked that to be put in place. Actually, we need a better way to get in and out of that park because it's a little difficult. I watch people struggle with it in terms of it has a little nut at the end of a fish line, which isn't probably, you know, up to snuff as far as how you would open it. But that would be, I think it would be helpful as far as just alleviating, in all the small parks, you know, put up some new signage, dawn, dusk, no smoking, and no dogs inside the playground areas. So I don't know if that's a future agenda item or just a, if that has to come back to council or not, that's up to the staff if we don't have the money in the budget for that. |
| 04:05:46.91 | Mayor (Chair) | All right, thank you. |
| 04:05:52.83 | Mayor (Chair) | Any public comment on future agenda items? No? Okay. Next, council member committee reports. We have any? Uh... |
| 04:06:03.72 | Ray Withy | No, I don't think so. |
| 04:06:05.01 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. Any? All right. Then we move an appointment of up to three members to the Planning Commission with one term expiring in May 2014 and two expiring in May 2016. I'd like to... |
| 04:06:20.73 | Ray Withy | Hold on. You've got... Does the staff want to make a presentation before you launch into the |
| 04:06:28.20 | Alan Mayer | Thank you. |
| 04:06:28.22 | Unknown | No. |
| 04:06:28.52 | Alan Mayer | Thank you. |
| 04:06:29.20 | Ray Withy | Can you clarify just who's out of term and who's in term and all that? |
| 04:06:40.45 | Unknown | Okay, you accepted the resignation of Stan Baer tonight. |
| 04:06:45.08 | Unknown | Right? |
| 04:06:45.48 | Unknown | you So that leaves a one-year term for an unexpired term. You have Joan Cox, who has served one full term. She filled an unexpired term. her term is currently ending, her term ended this year. And then you have Richard Graff who's served one term and his term has |
| 04:07:00.99 | Monty Georgeson | So heard. |
| 04:07:01.66 | Unknown | Let's go. |
| 04:07:13.98 | Unknown | expired this year. |
| 04:07:16.40 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. Okay. At this time here, I'd like to propose some names. I'd like to have Joan Cox take Stan Baer's finish time, and then I'd like to propose, and that would be to, what do we got here? 2014. And then the 2016 terms, I would like to put Susan Cleveland Knowles and Vicki Nichols. Thank you. |
| 04:07:49.13 | Unknown | Amen. |
| 04:07:49.49 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. him. This time here, are there any other names? |
| 04:07:55.11 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Yes, I would nominate Richard Graff. And I guess, do I just say the ones? |
| 04:08:05.18 | Ray Withy | You just told me that. |
| 04:08:05.89 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Additional? |
| 04:08:06.41 | Ray Withy | Bye. If you already, the other ones are already nominated. |
| 04:08:08.59 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | So I would say I would nominate Richard Graff to the 2016. He has a very good aesthetic eye and excellent track record and very good reviews from residents. |
| 04:08:26.06 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. Any other names? Okay. |
| 04:08:32.33 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Well, you said a Joan Cox taking in Stan Baer's |
| 04:08:35.45 | Mayor (Chair) | Stan Baer's. Yeah, that's there. It's already there. |
| 04:08:36.43 | Unknown | That's it. |
| 04:08:37.40 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | is Thank you. Thank you. and then Susan Cleveland Knowles. |
| 04:08:41.29 | Mayor (Chair) | and Becky Nichols. |
| 04:08:44.26 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Well, do we have three slots or four? |
| 04:08:46.02 | Mayor (Chair) | Yeah, well, you have three. You have one filling stand beers, and then you have Keegan and Graff. |
| 04:08:48.58 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | sandwich. |
| 04:08:53.60 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | And I guess I'm just going to make this comment as well, is that it would be nice if we could extend this another meeting because I didn't know about Stan Bear's resignation. I didn't know we were soliciting applicants for the Planning Commission until I got this packet on Friday. So I'm just, you know, suggesting that, you know, that we could delay this for a meeting. |
| 04:09:25.25 | Mayor (Chair) | I agree. I think I put out some names. That's up to the others if they want to do that. Stan Baer is stepping down. I mean, that's very simple. Joan is more than capable of filling in that slot. Yes, I agree with Joan. |
| 04:09:39.88 | Unknown | Thank you. Yes, I agree with Joan. of the Yeah. |
| 04:09:42.74 | Mayor (Chair) | you |
| 04:09:42.79 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 04:09:42.94 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:09:43.02 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 04:09:43.04 | Unknown | and respond to it. |
| 04:09:44.03 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. All right, so we have four names. |
| 04:09:44.36 | Ray Withy | I know. |
| 04:09:56.08 | Mayor (Chair) | Everybody in. |
| 04:09:56.98 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:09:58.11 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | So do we do this one at a time? Or do I just... I nominate... |
| 04:10:03.86 | Ray Withy | They're already nominated. |
| 04:10:05.99 | Councilmember Pfeiffer | Okay, Joan Cox for Stan Ver's term, Richard Graff and Susan Cleveland Nelson. |
| 04:10:13.55 | Mayor (Chair) | Okay. All right, let's go over here, right? |
| 04:10:20.57 | Thomas Theodores | Joan Cox, Susan Gleever-Knowles, and Vicki Nichols. |
| 04:10:27.52 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:10:30.44 | Thomas Theodores | Joan Cox for Stan Bares, position to 2014. Susan Kluge from Knowles and Vicki Nichols. |
| 04:10:37.44 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:10:37.82 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:10:39.89 | Unknown | I'm going to move on. |
| 04:10:42.86 | Mayor (Chair) | Yeah, you go ahead. All right. My original proposal was John Clark. I'm assuming you'll vote for the people you nominated. Let's see if I can remember. Susan Cleveland Knowles and Vicki Nichols. |
| 04:10:47.13 | Unknown | I'm assuming you'll be right. |
| 04:10:47.98 | Jonathon Goldman | Bye. |
| 04:10:48.18 | Unknown | I'm not. |
| 04:10:48.41 | Jonathon Goldman | Really? |
| 04:10:48.97 | Unknown | Let's see if I can remember. |
| 04:10:55.70 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 04:10:55.72 | Mayor (Chair) | Thank you. |
| 04:10:55.99 | Unknown | Mmm. |
| 04:10:57.91 | Ray Withy | I would vote of those four. They're all qualified candidates. Joan Cox for Stand Bears. Vicki Nichols, and Joan has enough time left on her eligibility right to fill that out. Great. Vicki Nichols. |
| 04:11:23.40 | Ray Withy | Susan Cleveland Knowles. |
| 04:11:26.89 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:11:28.90 | Ray Withy | You have it? |
| 04:11:29.76 | Unknown | Yes. |
| 04:11:29.93 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:11:29.96 | Ray Withy | Thank you. |
| 04:11:30.03 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:11:30.06 | Ray Withy | Okay. |
| 04:11:30.62 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:11:32.19 | Unknown | And just to |
| 04:11:32.31 | Unknown | I'm not. |
| 04:11:35.19 | Unknown | reiterate that means that John Cox will continue through 2014. Vicki Nichols and Susan Cleveland Knowles will step into terms for that extend through 2016. |
| 04:11:59.80 | Vicki Nichols | Can I just ask that and clarify, and I think this is the case, but just to be sure, um, I'm on the HLB and tomorrow night we've got a huge meeting with planning, meeting with planning commission, joint meeting. |
| 04:12:17.95 | Vicki Nichols | Okay, great, because HLB's been studying to meet with them, so that's great. |
| 04:12:26.52 | Unknown | was intended to start in September. |
| 04:12:30.68 | Ray Withy | It'll start until September. |
| 04:12:58.87 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. Amen. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 04:13:19.97 | Unknown | Yep. |