| Time | Speaker | Text |
|---|---|---|
| 00:00:00.03 | Director Phipps | is 7 30. I'll turn it over to the director for next steps. Thank you very much, Vice Chair Junius, and good evening to you, as well as Chair Saad, Planning Commissioner, staff, and members of the public. This evening's meeting is being held at City of Sausalito Council Chambers at 420 Litho Street, as well as the Palmer House Hilton at East Monroe Street in Chicago, Illinois, and is open to members of the public. Members of the public may also access this meeting and provide public comment through Zoom. Before I move to call roll, I note that Chair Saad is attending this meeting virtually. Chair Saad, could you please confirm for the record that you're attending this meeting in accordance with the traditional Brown Act requirements for remote meeting attendance? |
| 00:00:44.06 | Nastassya Saad | Yes. Thank you, Director Phipps. I am. |
| 00:00:47.03 | Director Phipps | Very good. Appreciate that. And with that, I will move to call roll. Commissioner Luxenberg. Here. Commissioner Merlon. Here. Commissioner Moore. Here. |
| 00:00:57.09 | Fred Moore | Bye. |
| 00:00:58.15 | Director Phipps | Vice Chair Genius. Chersande. All right. All our attendants, we have quorum and back to you, vice chair. |
| 00:01:06.99 | Andrew Junius | Thank you, director. Next item on the agenda is approval of the agenda itself. Do I have a motion? |
| 00:01:13.23 | David Marlatt | Some of you. |
| 00:01:17.13 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. Can we call Roll on that? |
| 00:01:18.53 | Director Phipps | Thank you. |
| 00:01:18.97 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 00:01:19.02 | Director Phipps | Thank you. Commissioner Luxenberg? Yes. Commissioner Merlot? Yes. Commissioner Moore? Yes. |
| 00:01:20.31 | Fred Moore | you |
| 00:01:20.34 | Jeffery Luxenberg | I'm going to go. |
| 00:01:20.53 | Fred Moore | Thank you. Thank you. you |
| 00:01:23.97 | Director Phipps | Vice Chair Genius. Yes. Chair Hassan. Yes. Motion passes. |
| 00:01:29.32 | Andrew Junius | Next item is public comments on items not on this evening's agenda. I'll turn it back over to you, Brandon. |
| 00:01:34.82 | Director Phipps | Thank you, Vice Chair. This is the time for the Commission to hear from citizens regarding matters not on the agenda. Except in very limited situations, state law precludes the Commission from taking action on or engaging in discussions concerning items of business that are not on the agenda. However, the Commission may refer matters not on the agenda to staff or direct the subject to be agendized at a future meeting. Video or audio public comment participation is limited to three minutes per speaker. If you'd like to make a comment, please submit a speaker card to me and or my colleagues. To my right, Maria Hernandez, present this evening. If you'd like to make a comment in the Zoom application, please raise your hand and you will be called upon when it is your time to speak. To raise your hand from a phone, press star nine and we will notify you when your time has elapsed. Thank you very much. With that, |
| 00:01:45.38 | Unknown | in, |
| 00:02:24.21 | Director Phipps | Looking. to the chamber. I don't believe we've received any formal speaker cards for this item. I'm going to move to the Zoom application now, Vice Chair. And I see somebody approaching. |
| 00:02:41.59 | Director Phipps | This is public comment on items not on the agenda. Now, just let me clarify. If you'd like to speak, please provide your speaker card to Maria Hernandez to my right. |
| 00:02:55.75 | Director Phipps | Yes, thank you very much. I'm looking to the Zoom application vice chair. for raised hands. I bet McDougal. You will have three minutes. |
| 00:03:10.41 | Ms. McDougall | Hi, good evening. Thank you for taking my call. First, I apologize for not being there in person. Thank you. I'm under the weather, but I would like to speak with regard to the working waterfront located within the marine ship. I ask you to think about this because We will soon be taking up the issue of what to do about the marine ship. And one of the things that so many folks seems to have lost track of is the fact that if we have a sailboat here in Sausalito, as I have had for decades, I gave it up once my husband passed, but the boat itself still lives in Sausalito. And there is no way we could have ever maintained a 32-foot sailboat for decades had it not been for the services right here in Sausalito. I don't think anybody realizes that we have over 2,000 pleasure boats lifts. We also have other. faculties along our shoreline for work and other activities. The truth of the matter is if we lose the working waterfront and there is no reason to keep a boat here, All of those 2000 plus boats will leave. I don't think people that don't. play on the water have any idea how hugely expensive it is to take one's boat to another place outside of our immediate location for any kind of servicing. It's hugely expensive and time-consuming. We're talking. Big money. bigger than you normally might think it would take just to keep the boat at all. So it's very inconvenient. If you want to see Sausalito die, then just kill the working waterfront altogether. It'll work just fine. That's a really great way to kill the working waterfront. Without the working waterfront, our sailboats... Our motorboats, our working vessels will need to go someplace else to find their services. Once that happens, little by little, These marinas will empty because it's too expensive to keep your boat in one location. and travel to another. simply to get it repaired. or serviced. and keep it in the kind of condition that's necessary. in order to even sail the San Francisco Bay in the first place. So I ask all of you to consider that as we go forward. And if you're not a boater yet, then get out on the water any way you can just to know what it feels like. It really does enrich one's life experience to get out on the water when you live so close by. Thank you for your time today. I'm happy to yield back the balance of time to you. |
| 00:05:49.11 | Director Phipps | Thank you, Ms. McDougall, for your comments. Looking to the Zoom application for additional raised hands. Seeing none, Vice Chair, I'll give it back to you. |
| 00:06:01.22 | Andrew Junius | Great so we're in a close public comment on item three moving on to item for approval of planning commission minutes for a Sausalito planning commission minutes from the meeting of 4 to 25 do I have any comments questions or a motion |
| 00:06:19.26 | Jeffery Luxenberg | I'll move to approve. Second. |
| 00:06:19.72 | Nastassya Saad | of the |
| 00:06:23.36 | Director Phipps | Roll call, please. Commissioner Luxenberg. Yes. Commissioner Merlot. Yes. Commissioner Moore. Yes. Vice Chair Junius. Yes. Chair Son. Yes. Motion passes. |
| 00:06:26.13 | Jeffery Luxenberg | I don't know. Yes. |
| 00:06:31.48 | Unknown | Yeah. Yeah. |
| 00:06:33.29 | Andrew Junius | Moving on to item 4B, the minutes of June 11th, 2025. Do I have any questions, comments, or emotions? |
| 00:06:42.90 | David Marlatt | I'll make a motion to approve the minutes of June 2nd, 2025. June 11th. June 11th, sorry, 2025. |
| 00:06:46.75 | Andrew Junius | June 11. |
| 00:06:51.60 | Andrew Junius | I'll second. Thank you. Roll call. |
| 00:06:54.36 | Director Phipps | Commissioner Luxenberg. |
| 00:06:56.10 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Yes. |
| 00:06:56.71 | Director Phipps | Commissioner Merlot. Yes. Commissioner Moore. Yes. Vice Chair Genius. |
| 00:06:59.17 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Yes. |
| 00:07:01.03 | Director Phipps | Yes. Yes. Motion passes. |
| 00:07:07.14 | Andrew Junius | Excellent. Moving on to item number five, communications. First off, we'll start with staff. Any announcements or communications from staff? |
| 00:07:14.85 | Director Phipps | No communication items this evening, Vice Chair. |
| 00:07:18.43 | Andrew Junius | commissioners do we have any declarations we all we want to make this evening with respect to the next item |
| 00:07:23.57 | Jeffery Luxenberg | No expert a communication Thank you. |
| 00:07:26.17 | David Marlatt | No communications. Thank you. No communications. |
| 00:07:28.72 | Fred Moore | Thank you. |
| 00:07:30.83 | Andrew Junius | I'm going to wait until we actually call item six, and then I'll make an announcement, as I think the chair will as well. |
| 00:07:36.47 | Nastassya Saad | Agree, thank you, vice chair. Thank you. |
| 00:07:38.51 | Andrew Junius | I don't know. |
| 00:07:38.69 | Nastassya Saad | But... |
| 00:07:38.73 | Andrew Junius | Bye. a couple of weeks. |
| 00:07:40.74 | Nastassya Saad | Sorry, and do we need a public comment on the minutes? |
| 00:07:47.64 | Andrew Junius | I'm gonna, we're gonna go back. I think that's right. |
| 00:07:49.85 | Director Phipps | Yeah. Thank you. I'm sorry. I think that that would be appropriate. |
| 00:07:54.32 | Andrew Junius | reopen item four. |
| 00:07:55.20 | Nastassya Saad | have my wits still. Thank you. |
| 00:07:57.14 | Director Phipps | Thank you, Kira. |
| 00:07:57.76 | Andrew Junius | for public comment on the meeting minutes. |
| 00:08:01.31 | Director Phipps | We have no received speaker cards for this specific item. I am looking to the Zoom application for raised hands. Seeing none, Chair, Vice Chair, back to you. Thank you. |
| 00:08:11.92 | Andrew Junius | We'll close that item again, move on to item 6A, the public hearing for 1755 Bridgeway. Director Phipps, can you take it from here? |
| 00:08:22.35 | Director Phipps | Absolutely. I'm going to pass the mic to our principal planner, Kristen Taiki, and I will just read out the item here. This is a 19 unit project located at 1755 Bridgeway. It is design review with heightened review findings. There is an associated encroachment agreement, tree removal permit, and vesting and tentative map. Kristen Teichy, principal planner, floor is yours. |
| 00:08:53.23 | Andrew Junius | Actually, before we do, and I think the chair and I need to make the following statement. I do own real property located at 4 Laurel Lane in Sausalito. This is my personal residence. The property is more than 500 feet, but less than a thousand feet away from the property at issue in this project. Having considered the issues in this project, there does not appear to be any potential that the, that it would alter the development or income potential or market value of my property. nor the highest and best use. Additionally, the project will not alter any traffic levels and sensitivity of use parking view, Privacy noise levels or air quality at my property accordingly. I have determined I do not have any conflict of interest and can participate in this hearing and Chair Saad? |
| 00:09:34.67 | Nastassya Saad | Now I echo his statement without reading the entirety, but just say that I own property at 409 bonita and I also within 500 excuse me. I'm between 500 and 1000 feet. But I'd like to echo the statement for the record. |
| 00:09:50.74 | Andrew Junius | Thank you, Chair. And now we can move on. |
| 00:09:52.65 | Kristen | Thank you. Good to see everyone tonight. Thank you. Can we go to the next slide? So the site location that we are discussing tonight is two lots that total 25,262 square feet. The current site addresses are 1745 through 1757 Bridgeway and 160 and 170 Filbert Avenue. Next slide. So the applicants proposed demolition of the four existing residential structures on the site and the two detached accessory structures, the merger of the lots in a 19 unit condominium subdivision, and the construction of a 19 unit condominium complex. Um, Total units proposed includes a density bonus. Next slide. So the permits required, as our planning director so aptly said, was design review, heightened design review, encroachment license agreement for the improvements in the right-of-way fronting Filbert and Bridgeway. tree removal permit and a vesting tentative map. So this is a conceptual elevation looking at the site from bridgeway of what they believe it will appear to, will look like when it's constructed. Next slide. And this is from Filbert Avenue at Street Elevation and then above Street Elevation. You can see the building sort of nestled in the bowl there of the site. The site is concave a bit, so it does sort of rise on one side and go downhill on another and sort of dip in the middle. Next slide. So the applicable R3 zoning and land use element of the general plan permit a density of 29 units per acre. This particular site, being about a half acre, permits a base density of 16 units. R3 standards say it's one unit per 1,500 square feet of land area. The applicable, the applicant is proposed to dedicate 25% of the 16 units to affordable housing, which is four units. And based on that, California density bonus law allows them a density bonus of up to three units for a total of 19 units. As explained in the report, the project generally meets objective zoning standards In accordance with government code, the applicant has requested two concessions from these standards. One is floor area ratio limit, and the other is height limit. The application subject to the Housing Accountability Act, which limits the city's ability to deny, reduce the density of, or make infeasible housing development projects that, are consistent with objective local development standards and contribute to the city's housing needs. The city's determination of consistency with objective development standards must allow for any additional density or concessions, incentives, or waivers granted pursuant to density bonus law. So this site is listed on our inventory site, Appendix D1, inventory and opportunity sites in our current adopted housing element. The proposed 19-unit density and its affordable component were listed in the appendix. The proposed units will assist the city in meeting its overall RHNA allocation and provide four moderate-income units out of the 114 moderate-income units the city has to provide according to our housing element. Buildings were all constructed between 1894 and 1917 on this particular site, the four residential buildings. So we required a resource determination information packet that included two evaluations by historic architects. The application was heard before the planning, the Heritage Preservation Commission, which I believe was the committee at that time in 2019. Um, At on 10 24 19 that her the Heritage Preservation Committee Recommended the buildings were not eligible for inclusion in the local inventory or significant in a manner that required their preservation. |
| 00:14:01.62 | Kristen | Buildings present a contemporary, in terms of the project details, the buildings present a contemporary flat roof design, flat roof design and the equipment The flat roof and the equipment are shielded from view by a two foot parapet wall. There are four-foot screen walls that would further shield taller, larger air condensing units in the elevator penthouse. Not truly a penthouse. It's an elevator mechanical area that's being shielded. Exterior finishes are a mix of shingles, horizontal siding, and smooth plaster, and it's all finished in an earth tone palette. Next slide. |
| 00:14:23.29 | Unknown | you |
| 00:14:38.41 | Kristen | And these are the front elevations of building one and two. On the left is building two, looking at it from Bridgeway. On the right is building one, as if you were standing in the courtyard between the two buildings. Next slide. So in the bridgeway frontage, there are multiple encroachments. This particular front property line is 39 feet from the improved roadway. In between that roadway and the front property line, the applicant has proposed Thank you. both residential and public improvements that include the new curb and ADA compliant public sidewalk and entry walkway 24 foot curb cut and driveway. Handicap access ramp to the building. Two drainage retention basins plus a half of a third. There are four drainage retention basins total. I did receive some public comment, not quite understanding that I meant there was four. Trash pickup staging area is also proposed between the sidewalk and the street. A landscaping consisting of grass bridles, shrubs, and small trees and an ADH. compliant accessible on-street parking space fronting the project near the handicap access ramp. Those are all Bridgeway frontage improvements. Next slide. On Filbert Avenue, the setback is 19 feet to the front property line. And between the street and the front property line, the applicant proposes a new curb and ADA-compliant public sidewalk. The sidewalk will extend down past 1763 Bridgeway, tie into the existing sidewalk that leads down to Easterby Street. Two stairways required for site ingress and egress and for emergencies are shown as well as landscaping. Next slide. And this slide sort of, you can see in green, the areas green and purple, the areas that would be occupied with improvements and landscaping. Next slide. the Go back to the civil plan I included mostly because they just so you can see all the water is being collected. There are four retention basins one behind building two between that in Filbert Avenue and three out in the front. And the yellow squiggle up there that I tried to highlight is the telephone pole that may, or I should say the electricity pole that may be required by PG&E. I just wanted you to know for sure where it was. I had had some questions about that. The utilities from the pole, if it has to be installed, would be undergrounded at that point. to the transformer box, which is about central on the front, in the middle of the front of the property, down on the edge of the road near the trash pickup area. Next slide. So the project, as detailed in very great detail in the staff report, it does comply with the zoning regulations applicable to this property, including lot coverage, impervious surfaces, setbacks, including increases to side yard setbacks based on building lines. Most of the applicable height limits, including height measured at the front lot line, height measured from the street elevations, And the maximum height of 50 feet measured at any point. It also complies with all on-site parking according to our current code, which exceeds what the state law would require. Next slide. So as permitted under density bonus law, they are requesting two concessions, one for floor area and the other for the average height limit. You can see they're permitted what would be permitted with a.80 FAR versus what's proposed, and that number is based on staff calculation. The applicants was slightly higher. The average height limit is 32 feet, and the proposed building one would be 38 feet 9 inches that's the one down on bridgeway and building two which backs to filbert would be a maximum of 34 feet 11 inches that's on average Next slide. So this was out of the plans, and I put it in to show you how the applicant gave us great detail on all the setbacks and all the increased setbacks in their calculations for increasing the side yard setbacks. Those were all evaluated and checked and determined to be accurate. Next slide. To support the project design, there is a preliminary grading plan in your project plans. It was prepared by the project engineers and stamped. The site will be stripped of all buildings and vegetation. It's graded to stair-step the buildings up the hill. They'll need to platform for the driveway access central courtyard. They will provide partially underground parking on both buildings. All the water on site, including roof drains and hardscaping, is collected and run to the bioretention basins, the four that will be on site. two in the public right away entirely. Geotechnical report was prepared and it determined the site is suitable, subject to some conditions and recommendations that they provide. And the plans were in the report were reviewed by DPW and found to be acceptable. Slide. They have, as we noted, proposed extensive tree removal, 25 trees total on the site and in the right of way. The Larkspur municipal code indicates that any tree four inches or more in diameter is a protected tree. Based solely on the diameter at breast height, there are eight heritage-sized trees and 17 protected trees. |
| 00:19:58.71 | Director Phipps | I just want to make a quick corrective statement. Sausalito Municipal Code specifies any tree measuring four inches in diameter at breast height is a protected tree. I think you said Larkspur. |
| 00:20:08.37 | Kristen | I'm sorry. It's old habits die hard. 22 years there. I still do it. So of those trees, only four were determined to be notable or native trees. The remaining are 14 domestic fruit trees and seven non-native overgrown shrubs and small trees. Next slide. The four notable trees are listed here. Two oaks, a toyan, and a diodor cedar. The diodore cedar is sort of in the middle of the lot, and one of the more notable trees on the site specifically. Trees one and two are in the path of a required sidewalk adjacent to Filbert Avenue. And I spoke directly to the director of public works about the trees and asked if the sidewalk could be jogged around it reasonably to protect those trees, see if they could be retained. He was not supportive of that idea. He said because of the terrain, the sidewalk design would become tricky, but he also was concerned that the trees will eventually undermine the street itself because they're right on the edge of the roadway. So, In return for removal of these trees, the landscape plans do propose 12 replacement trees, which is a ratio of three to one for the notable trees. Next slide. government code they have filed a vesting tentative map and what this does is when the project or the plan is determined to be complete by the city it then vests their right to proceed in conformance with the rules in effect at the time that was done so if a city is is in process of zoning amendments, those zoning amendments wouldn't apply. They'd get to work with the ones they vested in. Um, the condominium plan will be prepared upon approval of the project. And if this is a concern to anyone, it's, there's a quote there from government code that indicates the city. is not allowed to deny approval of a tentative map based on the absence of a condominium plan. So the condominium plan will be reflective of the unit plans, the layout that you see in your floor plans, if you want some idea. Next slide. Under the Housing Accountability Act, I'm sorry I have a lot of information here, but some of this is really important for the public forum. The city must approve a housing development project that complies with all objective rules in the general plans zoning ordinance and subdivision ordinance and design standards. These are objective not subjective rules. If a housing development project is entitled to a density bonus, the density bonus along with any concessions and waivers cannot be held against the project. You can't say it doesn't comply because of them. Because the housing project is subject to the Housing Accountability Act, the Planning Commission cannot deny or condition the project to require a lower density or make specific findings required without making specific findings required under the Housing Accountability Act. And I gave you the government code section here. And I did attach them to your staff report as an attachment so you could see what those were. Next slide. As demonstrated in earlier discussion, the proposed project complies with the applicable general plan designation, the R3 zoning standards, with two concessions. It's anticipated in the adopted housing element. Staff finds the development to be appropriate for the location and the site and its surroundings. And then we have provided you with all the findings of approval and draft resolution for the design review, the heightened design review, the tentative map. the tree removal permit, and the encouragement license agreement. Next slide. So I just kind of ran through some design details. I won't read them all to you that kind of support the design review findings. You can kind of glance at those quickly. Next slide. The same with encroachment license agreement. The findings are based on very specific, you can keep going, very specific findings. And we determined that all of those could be met. Next slide. Tree removal permits as well. We have given you positive findings for all of them and just noting that the robust landscaping plan will replace all the lost on site vegetation and with 12 replacement trees. The one thing I didn't really talk on and touch on was that they did not propose as replacement trees any native trees. And I had suggested in the staff report, if that was a concern at all, because we are losing two oaks, that a good location for those replacement trees, if you want oaks, would be between the property line and the Filbert Avenue right away. There are, I think, three or four... ornamental olive trees proposed there, and you could replace those with oaks or some oaks if you felt that was warranted. So next slide. Again, I gave you some findings for the vesting tentative map here, just some things that I touched on that were related to the findings. Next slide. and the environmental determination accompanying this The whole project is an initial study, mitigated negative declaration, and a mitigated monitoring program. The initial study was done in accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act, the state CEQA guidelines. We determined all potential impacts on the environment can be reduced to a less than significant impact A mitigated negative declaration may be adopted. And the monitoring program was attached as appendix I to the initial study negative declaration I want to just cover all my bases here. The notice of intent was sent out in accordance with government code and state law. Notice was filed with the Marin County clerk. It was posted on the site. A 30 day comment period was allowed. And we continue to take comment after it closed, but there has to be a deadline only so that the environmental consultant could respond to comment. The response to comments was prepared, and it was included as appendage H in the initial study. |
| 00:26:12.04 | Kristen | So staff recommendations. We recommend that you hold this public hearing tonight. Look at the initial study, the mitigated negative deck and mitigated. monitoring program, hear from the applicants and all interested persons, close the public hearing, discuss the project and the environmental documents. Our recommendation is move to approve with the draft resolution adopting the initial study MND and MMP. and move forward approving application DREA TRP VTM 2018-00413 for 1755 Bridgeway, subject to findings and conditions provided in the resolution. |
| 00:26:51.73 | Andrew Junius | Great, thank you, Kristen. We're going to go to questions from the commissioners. So hang in there, Kristen. Commissioner Luxenberg, do you have any questions for the staff? |
| 00:26:59.90 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Actually, I have a question for Attorney Rudin, if he could come up. |
| 00:27:06.80 | Sergio Rudin | Yes, Commissioner. |
| 00:27:07.79 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Yes. So in reviewing the documents, I understand there will be a 30-year deed restriction to assure affordability for the four units. The first buyer must meet the income limits in the documents in the state statutes, and if sold, there is an equity sharing agreement. That's what was put in the conditions. Assuming the unit is not sold to a non-profit housing corporation, which has different requirements, does the first owner have to sell to an affordable buyer, or does they sell to anybody, then the profits, the share goes to the city, and they put the unit elsewhere. Trying to figure out if these units are affordable after the sale from the first buyer. |
| 00:27:59.85 | Sergio Rudin | So in looking at this, three of the four affordable units are required in order to meet the city's inclusionary housing requirements. That is in 1040-140, which provides that for resale of affordable units, they are subject to restrictions on resale, which are administered by the Housing Authority of the County of Marin. Um, and those resale prices are limited under the Municipal Code. to the least of basically the purchase price press plus a CPI increase. Um, increase based in household median income as established by the housing authority or fair market value. So that's for three of the units. For the third unit, which is just a volunteer unit for the developer to meet the density bonus law requirements, I believe that that would just be subject to the requirements in density bonus law that would be subject to an equity sharing agreement. So that could be resold. at fair market value. |
| 00:29:05.36 | Jeffery Luxenberg | And so for three of the units, they would go to an affordable buyer managed through the Marin Housing Authority? |
| 00:29:12.26 | Sergio Rudin | Yes. |
| 00:29:12.58 | Jeffery Luxenberg | But in the fourth unit, they could sell it to a market rate, but there would be an equity piece. Where does that equity piece go? To the Marin Housing Authority or to the city of Sausalito? |
| 00:29:26.51 | Sergio Rudin | I believe that would go to the city of Sausalito and we would establish that in the affordable housing agreement |
| 00:29:33.22 | Jeffery Luxenberg | And the city would try to do affordable housing elsewhere, not here necessarily. |
| 00:29:39.55 | Sergio Rudin | I'm sorry, what was your question? |
| 00:29:40.75 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Those funds would be used to have the city provide affordable housing somewhere in the city, but not necessarily on this site? |
| 00:29:49.54 | Sergio Rudin | That's correct. |
| 00:29:50.03 | Jeffery Luxenberg | All right. Okay, thank you. No other questions? Nice year. Thank you. Commissioner Marlow. |
| 00:29:56.69 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:29:56.71 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Thank you. |
| 00:29:57.62 | David Marlatt | Yes, thank you. And thank you, Kristen, for the presentation. There's a lot of material to work through. I have a few, I guess, questions or comments. Some of it just sort of housekeeping. If I understand right on the draft resolution, both draft resolutions, they reference the Planning Commission conducted a hearing, one says on May 28th, the other says on May 14th. |
| 00:30:22.04 | Kristen | We had a change in date. I missed that one. |
| 00:30:24.78 | David Marlatt | Okay, I'm sure this will come up in discussion, but I just wanted to point that out. |
| 00:30:28.03 | Unknown | that. |
| 00:30:28.12 | Alex Colouros | Thank you. |
| 00:30:29.32 | Kristen | We'll correct it to May 25th. |
| 00:30:31.44 | David Marlatt | Excuse me. |
| 00:30:32.81 | Unknown | and Thank you. |
| 00:30:33.43 | David Marlatt | Thank you. |
| 00:30:33.50 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:30:33.52 | Kristen | Yeah. |
| 00:30:33.53 | David Marlatt | Thank you. |
| 00:30:33.79 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:30:34.65 | David Marlatt | June 22. |
| 00:30:34.80 | Kristen | Sorry, June 25th. |
| 00:30:35.95 | David Marlatt | Thank you. Otherwise we'll do this again. |
| 00:30:37.43 | Kristen | We changed the date twice. |
| 00:30:38.88 | David Marlatt | Thank you. |
| 00:30:39.04 | Kristen | Bye. |
| 00:30:39.95 | David Marlatt | Another question. This concerns on the negative declaration, and here maybe you have to educate me a little bit about the scope of a normal NegDec. The project proposes 5,200 cubic yards of excavation of soil removal, which for a city of our size is a big number. And with normal kind of rule of thumb, soil expands as you put in the truck. That's probably 700 or more trucks of soil. My question is, would it be, would in usual cases, mitigated negative declaration study address that, address the impact possibly on public streets and rights of way and passive travel? I was surprised to see some very detailed things in the negative declarations, but not anything addressing such a major, for our city, such a major impact. Is that, or? |
| 00:31:35.50 | Sergio Rudin | So the city separately has a construction impact fee to address impacts, public facilities and roads related to construction activity. So, I will Look for One, that is something that the city has already contemplated in terms of its regulatory framework in terms of the. MND impacts, you know, to you know, public facilities like that are not necessarily impacts to the environment. Um, |
| 00:32:08.39 | Director Phipps | And if I may, Attorney Rudin, just to flesh out the construction impact fee piece a little bit on our master fee schedule, that's calculated by.85% of the project valuation plus a $5 cubic yard surcharge. |
| 00:32:08.64 | Unknown | that is, |
| 00:32:28.47 | David Marlatt | OK. And like I said, it may be something that I just need to better understand what this document is supposed to cover and not cover. But it just seemed like a major impact of the project. Also on the MND and A, this is a little bit down at the detail level. Part of the code that I do know something about, Cal Green, and I would just make a comment that it references, it doesn't reference the right code. There's a reference in there to Cal Green and electric vehicle charging that's incorrect by the current code. So it might be something, I don't know, that it's major, but maybe needs to be addressed. |
| 00:33:00.99 | Kristen | Yeah. |
| 00:33:09.78 | Kristen | I do have the consultant available to speak if you'd like to ask them specific questions about the work that they prepared for us. |
| 00:33:16.80 | David Marlatt | Well, specifically, in the document, it says that Calgary shall apply to the code that is current, quote unquote, at the time of construction. In January, our codes are going to change. So I think it's very unfair to an applicant to be subject to the code at the time of construction. I don't think that's the intent. And like I said, this is a little bit down in the weeds. And if we, and I'm surprised as to see just a detail of Calgary sort of cherry picked into one document, maybe something |
| 00:33:46.72 | Sergio Rudin | I can actually address that. The issue of which building code applies to a particular project is prescribed by state law. And that basically as long as a building permit application is filed for a project before December 31st. The new building codes will go into effect January 1st. They are allowed to proceed with construction under the terms of the prior building codes. |
| 00:34:10.11 | David Marlatt | Oh, yes, sure. No, I completely agree. I'm just commenting on the wording of the MNDA because it says at time of construction, which would not be consistent with practice. Another question I would have, and this could be for the applicant, what code are we using for this project? Because the documents say 2019 code, I'm trying to get, I can address that with the applicant, normally new projects under the 2022 code. |
| 00:34:36.26 | Kristen | Well, keep in mind this application was originally filed in 2018. So we will apply the codes that are in effect when they file their building permits. |
| 00:34:46.41 | David Marlatt | OK, and that might be something I ask the applicant what their intention is as well, whether to convert to the |
| 00:34:51.11 | Kristen | Well, they'll have to apply the code that we require and check for. |
| 00:34:58.00 | David Marlatt | OK, so this will be under the 2019 code. which is what we decode in effect in |
| 00:35:03.87 | Kristen | Which is the code in effect? |
| 00:35:06.40 | Sergio Rudin | The current code in effect is the 2022 code. So that would be the code that applies if they filed a building permit today. Which code applies is not up to the city. |
| 00:35:17.22 | David Marlatt | Yeah, but they have an entitlement application that they filed in 2018 originally, and I guess something happened in the |
| 00:35:23.58 | Kristen | That's for a discretionary permit. They have not filed building permits. |
| 00:35:26.97 | David Marlatt | Okay, so then this will be 2022 code. |
| 00:35:29.30 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, so the vesting tentative map freezes the city's zoning standards and subdivision standards primarily. |
| 00:35:36.96 | David Marlatt | Okay. Then another just like I said, maybe this is a little bit housekeeping, but if you look at the slide with the setbacks, and I think this just maybe some small errors that should be corrected. It's on A2.06. |
| 00:36:10.36 | David Marlatt | I actually have another question about that too. But there was one of the |
| 00:36:16.05 | Kristen | Pretty early. |
| 00:36:25.38 | David Marlatt | Yeah, here we go. And I think here's my just, I don't think this has any concrete material effect on the architecture, but maybe it's something just to keep a clean document. The document references a 15-foot front yard setback, and I believe it should be zero. Otherwise, it appears that it's encroaching in the front yard setback, which is not the case. But it's marked 15-foot front yard setback. |
| 00:36:48.01 | Kristen | the ground story goes to the front property line. I said that repeatedly in the staff report, but the second story steps back 15 feet. |
| 00:36:55.31 | David Marlatt | Right, but R3 zoning has the front yard setback and R3 is zero. So there is no 15-foot front yard setback. |
| 00:37:04.16 | Kristen | It depends on whether they can meet the height requirements because within the first 15 feet, |
| 00:37:05.45 | David Marlatt | Thank you. Thank you. whether I can use it. |
| 00:37:10.72 | Kristen | Measured from street elevation, they can't exceed a certain height, so sometimes you have to step back the building 15 feet to meet that height limit requirement. So it's not cut and dry like that. Sorry, I'm not talking into the mic, but... But I think that's a minor thing, and it certainly doesn't. |
| 00:37:27.59 | David Marlatt | Yeah. I agree. I'm just trying to keep the document clean. And then along Filbert, I think it's just a typo because they say 15-foot side yard setback. I believe they mean to say rear yard setback on Filbert. And then where the easterly line jogs, |
| 00:37:47.47 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:37:47.84 | David Marlatt | there's a side yard setback and then vertically side yard setback and side yard setback. And that's a question, I guess, kind of for staff, because that would be inconsistent with the project we looked at late last year on 11B Marion, where we said that when a side yard jogs, that becomes the rear yard setback. |
| 00:37:52.64 | Unknown | Mm-hmm. |
| 00:38:06.39 | David Marlatt | I don't think it has a material effect, but it doesn't have a material effect. But I think it's good to have a document that's consistent |
| 00:38:06.51 | Unknown | say, I don't know. you're right. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:38:15.11 | Kristen | I would consider that a side yard, but, um, and obviously the prior staff did as well, cause they didn't. |
| 00:38:17.92 | David Marlatt | And love you. |
| 00:38:21.56 | Kristen | Change that. When this was originally being reviewed, it was well along by the time I took over the project. So at that point, I wasn't looking to reinterpret |
| 00:38:32.12 | David Marlatt | It was a question, really. If the department has a policy that that should be a rear yard, then I think the document should be corrected. I think I can yield back. Those are probably 11 more things in discussion. But those are my only questions for now. Thank you. |
| 00:38:33.85 | Kristen | Thank you. |
| 00:38:43.77 | Andrew Junius | What was that? |
| 00:38:45.39 | Unknown | My only question. |
| 00:38:47.24 | Andrew Junius | Great. Thank you, Commissioner Marlott. Commissioner Moore. |
| 00:38:52.54 | Fred Moore | Thank you again for your presentation. A couple of questions here. Is my understanding that you confirm the building height for building two? is lower than the first floor elevations of the homes across Philbert. |
| 00:39:07.80 | Kristen | Right. What I gave you were numbers based on topography. I worked off a Marin map in the survey and the civil plans that are provided in this particular set of plans. And the finished elevation of the roof is 88 feet, four inches, give or take. And the top of the parapet wall or the top of the parapet around the penthouse for the elevator shaft is 91 feet. And if you look across the street at the front property line, the elevation was 90 feet at the lots across the street. And then the homes were back. several feet or 20 feet, depending on which lot you're looking at. And then the finished floors are raised up, so they're all above those elevation markers. |
| 00:39:51.35 | Fred Moore | He also provides some information about the potential maximum height of 24 feet if a building was back on field work from the street level. So based on those elevations in the plane, it looks like It ranges from the first floor of the buildings behind anywhere from 10 to 18 feet above the highest point. Of building is that fairly accurate. |
| 00:40:15.13 | Kristen | I'm sorry, can you repeat that? I didn't follow you. |
| 00:40:17.59 | Fred Moore | You had a bunch of elevations for the range of elevations, the average height for building two along Filbert. Right. |
| 00:40:24.66 | Kristen | Right, based on the elevation of the street. |
| 00:40:27.26 | Fred Moore | Correct. and you also indicated that a maximum height could be 24 feet above Filbert. So if you had 20, so the proposed project is anywhere from 10 to 18 feet below what the maximum height could be along Filbert. That's an accurate determination of the height limitation. |
| 00:40:33.98 | Unknown | Yes. |
| 00:40:45.12 | Kristen | I came up with a little bit lower on the appeal side, but yes, generally that's correct. |
| 00:40:49.76 | Fred Moore | That's great. And we talked about various parking along Filbert and the addition of the sidewalk along Filbert and the extension to the existing sidewalk and around the fire hydrant. Did you be able to confirm that no legal on street parking will be displaced by the addition of the sidewalk? |
| 00:41:12.91 | Kristen | Based on the civil plants and the location of the trees shown on the civil plants versus where they are on the street and the location of the fire hydrant and the shape of that... where it dips whiter, it appears that the sidewalk will be on the on the toward the property side of the existing edge of the roadway. It's not going into the roadway and narrowing the roadway. So what onsite parking is legally available there will remain. There is some no parking signs on part of this frontage. People appear to park there anyway, but there are no parking signs along part of it. |
| 00:41:51.82 | Fred Moore | on the, |
| 00:41:53.34 | Kristen | On the filbert frontage. Yeah. |
| 00:41:54.96 | Fred Moore | On the tentative track map, it talks about sewer and drainage easements for 148 Filbert. So I'm assuming those are existing easements that are now going to be relocated through the construction of this project. |
| 00:42:06.83 | Kristen | I believe that is the intent that the study surveyor addressed in some of her comments. |
| 00:42:14.42 | Fred Moore | Um, Also included in the vesting tentative track map, there's no 12 that talks about the timing of the project and it says it's gonna start back in 2021. Obviously, I'm assuming that that note's going to be changed, and I guess is staff going to direct them to reconsider whether or not they need to include a timing provision in the tentative track map? I haven't seen that before, so it may be worthwhile if staff thinks that should be removed to remove any confusion if things get delayed, and then would be invalidate possibly the vesting tentative map. |
| 00:42:48.69 | Kristen | Well, we could ask Sergio what he thinks of that question. I mean, the approval date is well beyond that. So I think, logically, someone would look at that and think, There was a timing delay. And that isn't applicable, but if we need to amend it, Sergio, or change that tentative map to take out any timing dates, do you think that's necessary? |
| 00:43:11.24 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, I don't know the answer to that off the top of my head. I'm going to keep looking at that as we're proceeding. |
| 00:43:17.63 | Fred Moore | And I kind of want to follow up on Commissioner Lexenberg's comment about the affordable agreements. And is there a possibility that all four of the units actually are limited to affordable sales prices and affordable households for some time period, whether it be 25 or 30 years, rather than allowing one or more of the units to be sold with an equity sharing agreement? |
| 00:43:42.62 | Kristen | So that's a good question. And Sergio, do you think we could condition the fourth unit to remain affordable for a period of time? |
| 00:43:52.55 | Sergio Rudin | So looking at our existing density bonus ordinance, which is a little out of date in comparison to current density bonus law, there are provisions in there. with respect to requiring a deed restriction for a 30 year period to retain the affordable status of the housing unit. I understand as part of the density bonus report, the applicant has indicated that they were proposing to do that anyway. So absent any sort of change by the applicant, I don't see a problem with the city requiring that. |
| 00:44:36.73 | Fred Moore | Another question maybe with some Sergio's on the phone with respect to the affordable Is there an opportunity to include a condition that the affordable units need to be offered for sale initially to city employees and or residents of Sausalito prior to extending a sales advertising program to people outside the city or outside city employees for some specified time periods, for example, a 30-day, 60-day, 90-day time period? |
| 00:45:09.73 | Sergio Rudin | So to my knowledge, I think the answer to that is no. The only... in which I've seen that kind of like restriction is city owned employee housing where cities typically will make employee housing available to employees first and then to the citizens and then to the general public. I'm not aware of anything in our code that would require the applicant to, um, you know, prioritize rental to, um, city employees if that's not what they wanted to do. |
| 00:45:48.16 | Fred Moore | Another question, this may be not for staff, maybe it's for the applicant, but kind of follow-up on Commissioner Marlott's comment. With the greenhouse mitigation measure, it talks about an electrical circuit. Normally you see that if you have a garage attached to a residential unit and that circuit's there. Here we have a subterranean garage or a detached garage area. So I'm curious how the mitigation measure is going to be met. if that circuit's going to be put in the subterranean garage and next to the assigned parking spaces or what other design option are they going to go for? I don't know if the staff has talked with them or Maybe the applicant needs a response. |
| 00:46:29.52 | Kristen | We have not talked to them about that particular item yet. When we get to the building permit stage, we certainly will with the building official involved in, Try to figure out the best course of action to meet that condition. |
| 00:46:40.52 | Fred Moore | Thank you. Final question for staff. I know we have an encroachment permit. It's very standard. Because this encroachment deals with the location of a transformer for the building, it seems like the time period is associated with potential termination of the encroachment permit, which I assume will never happen by the applicant or the city. But if it should happen, I think those time periods need to be extended. And maybe that's something that can be done when the final encroachment agreement is put together. But I think it should be noted for staff that they might want to look at those time periods and talk to the applicant about really whether or not a 30-day time period makes sense versus 180 days. |
| 00:47:16.87 | Kristen | Thank you. |
| 00:47:16.97 | Kristen | for getting the encroachment license agreement |
| 00:47:19.93 | Fred Moore | Terminating. The encroachment agreement has a term in it where either party can terminate it. Obviously, give the city the flexibility to use that right away if they need to. But if the city decided it needed that right away, wanted to terminate the encroachment, potentially because of where the location of the transformer is, |
| 00:47:24.01 | Kristen | Mm-hmm. |
| 00:47:37.14 | Fred Moore | The association could in no way remove or relocate the transform in 30 days. Right. So I think they need more time. |
| 00:47:40.36 | Kristen | transfer. |
| 00:47:44.98 | Kristen | Um, Sergio, is the 30 days just a notice and then we negotiate or do we need to amend the time frame? |
| 00:47:54.52 | Sergio Rudin | So the timeframe for removal of existing improvements is something that is again, typically, Um, It's not baked into the code, so it is something that is subject to modify a modification at the city's discretion. And so when the council improves the encroachment agreement, that is a change that can't be made. And this is a recommendation that certainly the planning commission can recommend as part of its action tonight. |
| 00:48:25.30 | Andrew Junius | Commissioner Moore, thank you. Chair Saad, what questions do you have for staff? |
| 00:48:32.22 | Nastassya Saad | Thank you, Vice Chair. Thank you for all the questions from the Commission, and thank you for the presentation. I had Just a point of clarification for the trees. Um, Kristen that If we have any conflict on the tree removal permit specifically, does that make the project infeasible as far as I read from the report that is all necessary for the development. Can you confirm that? |
| 00:49:05.41 | Kristen | Well, certainly if the trees aren't removed, the project isn't feasible in the way it's designed right now because the trees would be in the way of many of the improvements and there's too much excavation for them to survive. But I also understand that these kinds of permits, when the Housing Accountability Act law is part of this and it's a density bonus law, that we need to be proactive in supporting some of these accessory permits that are needed to achieve the density in the project. |
| 00:49:41.30 | Nastassya Saad | Okay, thank you. And then does staff have any, opinion or they want to weigh in on the I believe it's a class two bike lane. that runs along that part of Bridgeway. And given that It is shared essentially with vehicles going usually 25 to 35 miles an hour plus Plus the construction, is there a safety concern with the way that the current Class 2 bike lane is set up? |
| 00:50:15.66 | Kristen | Well, Public Works has not given me any comments to that regard, but I can assure you that when it comes to the construction management approval and the encroachment license agreements that they have to acquire from DPW, They will be responsible for coming up with a plan for public safety. And any of those types of things will have to be addressed and they'll probably have to create a safe corridor for bikes and people to get through all this. Said is under construction. |
| 00:50:44.60 | Nastassya Saad | Thank you for confirming. And lastly, I believe it was noted in the report or in one of these documents that the existing Cars that are parked in that frontage area. I mean, they've been there for since I was a kid. I swear I've never seen them move. It, I think, was deemed that they might not be known, that their owners might not be known. Can you just comment on what happens with that if everything moves forward and they're going to start construction? Is that something that works out with Sosselito PD? Do they get towed? I mean, how does that how do we clear a path for moving forward with so many unattended vehicles that are potentially no owner. |
| 00:51:32.95 | Kristen | I was unaware that there's potentially no owner to some of these vehicles. I really can't answer that. I think that the property owner is largely responsible for taking the legal steps to be able to tow the cars away. |
| 00:51:45.40 | Director Phipps | Yeah, I'll confirm, Chair, that illegal parking and illegally locating vehicles on private property without owner consent is generally something that PD would handle. So I think that you're going in the right direction. We also have a code enforcement arm that may be able to assist in ensuring that these vehicle owners are reunited with their vehicles off of this private property. We'd be happy to look into that further. |
| 00:52:16.20 | Nastassya Saad | Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Kristen. Thank you, Vice Chair. Those are my questions. |
| 00:52:23.49 | Andrew Junius | Great, thank you, Chair. I only had, I think, just one question, more of a clarification. With respect to the density bonus, the... The density bonus clause is relatively flexible and the amount of the bonus depends on the amount of affordability offered up by the sponsor, right? |
| 00:52:39.18 | Kristen | Correct. |
| 00:52:39.50 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:52:39.62 | Andrew Junius | And in this case, they've offered an affordability component to the project that gets them three units. Thank you. |
| 00:52:44.74 | Kristen | Correct. |
| 00:52:44.99 | Andrew Junius | but they could have certainly offered more affordability and gotten a bigger project. Right. |
| 00:52:47.74 | Kristen | Right. Had they offered low income, they would have gotten a higher density bonus. |
| 00:52:51.43 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 00:52:52.21 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Thank you. |
| 00:52:52.85 | Kristen | Thank you. |
| 00:52:53.04 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Thank you. Can I ask a follow-up? Vice Chair, can I ask a follow-up? Go right ahead. Based on Commissioner Moore's question about height, what is the height from Bridgeway, not the average height as defined in the zoning, but if you're standing on the sidewalk and looking at the building, because you have this bowl effect, do you know what the differential in the elevation is? So if you're standing on the sidewalk and you're looking at the building, how tall does it appear to be? It might technically be higher, |
| 00:52:53.83 | David Marlatt | Yeah. |
| 00:52:53.97 | Unknown | Right. |
| 00:52:55.87 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 00:52:55.89 | Unknown | Yeah. Go right ahead. |
| 00:53:24.70 | Kristen | I honestly can't answer that just standing here. I'd have to look at the elevation drawing, because all the elevations are identified on the top of the parapet for the height, as well as at the grade. So we'd have to look at that for me to tell you exactly. But there is a height limit from the street elevation for uphill lots, I believe it's 40 feet within the first 15 feet. because there's an average of 32 and then there's height limit of 40 feet within the first 15 feet And then there's an overall 50-foot height limit at any point. There's multiple height limits that could be applied to the site because it's both uphill and downhill. |
| 00:54:00.98 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Do you know if the architect is going to be here this evening? |
| 00:54:03.84 | Kristen | The architect is here, you can ask. |
| 00:54:05.50 | Jeffery Luxenberg | And I will hopefully he can look at that before he comes up and might have the answer to that question. |
| 00:54:10.91 | Kristen | I would think it's at least 40 feet. |
| 00:54:14.19 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Okay, so well, if we can get an exact number from the architect when they do their presentation, that'd be great. Thank you. No more questions. Commissioner Marlott had a follow-up. |
| 00:54:17.14 | Kristen | Thank you. |
| 00:54:23.13 | David Marlatt | Yeah, thank you very much. One quick question, has the Southern Marin Fire Department reviewed the project |
| 00:54:31.33 | Kristen | Yes. |
| 00:54:32.08 | David Marlatt | And have they issued any kind of report or letter or? They gave us |
| 00:54:34.86 | Kristen | They gave us comments, but they are a separate district, so we do not attach their comments as an attachment to the staff report or enforce the conditions. We refer them to the party. |
| 00:54:46.17 | David Marlatt | But there's nothing in the comments that might alter the form of the building, which may make it relevant to the building. |
| 00:54:51.23 | Kristen | Not that I saw. |
| 00:54:52.34 | David Marlatt | OK. Secondly, can you just clarify, in your presentation, you said the FAR is 1.04, but the staff report and the architect's documents say 1.11. Right. |
| 00:55:03.31 | Kristen | Right. When we calculated the floor area on, I think it was Bluebeam at the time, our calculations were a little bit lower, but we exempt a lot of areas based on the definition of floor area. And my assumption, because It doesn't change the size of the building. We have to exempt these areas based on on the, Definition. My assumption is that they just didn't understand fully how much they could exempt. |
| 00:55:29.94 | David Marlatt | So there's a building, is the area then of 28 to 44 still accurate? I just want to understand, so the building area is 28,244 in the staff report and in the... |
| 00:55:38.97 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:55:38.99 | Kristen | THE AREA. |
| 00:55:39.56 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:55:45.21 | Kristen | Right, that's what the plans say, and I used that number, but I did give you a little caveat down with the, and all the different bullet points below the data table, I gave you a little explanation that staff's numbers were less. Okay. |
| 00:56:00.60 | David Marlatt | OK. |
| 00:56:01.03 | Kristen | Okay. |
| 00:56:02.34 | David Marlatt | Okay, so it is 1.04 that we're discussing tonight. Right. |
| 00:56:04.25 | Kristen | THE END OF THE END OF THE Right, but I didn't want to confuse things too much by putting my number up there and have you see on the plans it's there. |
| 00:56:10.22 | David Marlatt | Right. No, just thank you for that clarification so we know what we're addressing. I see. Point number four. You're right. |
| 00:56:12.36 | Kristen | So. |
| 00:56:17.48 | David Marlatt | Thank you. |
| 00:56:18.42 | Unknown | Sure. |
| 00:56:18.64 | David Marlatt | Thank you. |
| 00:56:18.93 | Unknown | Commissioner more had a follow-up |
| 00:56:20.35 | Fred Moore | Sorry, I could follow up. With respect to the height limitations, when the architect comes up, I think attachment 14, page 22 has some heights for the front and the back on the bridgeway and Filbert. So maybe we can confirm that those are consistent. Because I know the, The plan back in 2019 showed higher heights on filbert. So that's one of my questions will be how to justify how they went lower. But two follow-up questions. I know the city went to great effort to have the negative declaration, mitigation measures, et cetera. Would it have been a reasonable legal argument to have this entire project exempt under CEQA for the infill exemption that exists? And maybe Sergio can answer that. Not to sort of that the city could have done it, but it would have been a reasonable argument the city could have made to say, hey, we're just going to have this project exempt because the statute allows that. |
| 00:57:12.17 | Kristen | Well, certainly, reading the straight language of the CEQA exemption, it appears it could apply. |
| 00:57:20.30 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, I will agree that it's not atypical for projects like this to be CEQA exempt. However, given the fact that the city has already conducted an initial study, I think, and identified you know, Impacts that could be considered significant but are subject to mitigation, I don't know that the city can now backtrack and say, well, a CEQA exemption is appropriate now that our initial study has been prepared and analysis has been done. |
| 00:57:46.70 | Fred Moore | Oh, I'm not suggesting that. I'm just trying to make sure everybody's aware that this project could have avoided a lot of, potentially avoided some of that effort. And the last question followed, right now the plans talk about an ADA van parking space. And I know there's been some common concern about how delivery trucks are gonna be able to drop off deliveries. Can that ADA parking space along the public street be a dual use for temporary deliveries as well as ADA without violating any ADA laws? |
| 00:58:20.06 | Sergio Rudin | So I don't know the full history of this ADA parking space, but I suspect that there was a specific request for accommodation made by the city by somebody with disabilities who needed a parking spot to ensure you know, access to their to their property at that general location. And if the city painted a space blue as a reasonable accommodation, we would want to ensure that we're you know, still making available public parking to that person with disabilities and, you know, protecting any... rights and fulfilling any obligations the city may have under the ADA. prior to removal of that parking space. With regards to dual use, once the space is striped blue, I do believe that any parking there without the placard is prohibited by state law. So I don't know that we could necessarily do a dual use That being said, I'm sure people park in handicapped spots all the time and as long as they do so quickly and leave, chances are it's not going to be an issue that's enforced. |
| 00:59:34.43 | Andrew Junius | Thank you, Commissioner Moore. I'll have a follow-up question. You know, height is definitely an issue this evening, a big issue. I'm just curious if the staff can speak a little bit about the methodology in this case. And I appreciate the fact that this is like the first time this has ever happened, probably in Sausalito for this kind of project. having to deal with the Housing Accountability Act and having to deal with the state density bonus law and having to grant the concessions and or waivers with respect to the things that make the project go to get the bonus. The height limit is one of the things that can be exceeded here under the bonus. So is there, was there, was there, any internal questioning about the relevance of the actual height limits that apply. I mean, quantifying a height limit that the applicant has a right to exceed seems a bit odd, but does that make sense? |
| 01:00:28.80 | Kristen | I honestly can't tell you what the initial reviews and all the plan checks comments were in the beginning phases, because this project was around for several years before I was hired and took over the project. And at that point, it was basically complete and we needed to move forward. So I was working with a set of plans that were already in process. But certainly you can see from the old iterations of the plans that in talking to staff, they did lower the height. |
| 01:00:51.17 | Amy Chan | But certainly. |
| 01:00:58.90 | Kristen | at certain points because the 2019 plans, as Commissioner Moore indicated, had a higher height off of Filbert than the plans that we're looking at tonight. So there was some discussion, I think, to try and make it. make it fit a bit better into the site. |
| 01:01:15.89 | Andrew Junius | All right, excellent, appreciate that. All right, I think we're gonna move on. It's time for the applicant to step to the podium, and you'll have 15 minutes to... |
| 01:01:17.09 | Kristen | Mm-hmm. |
| 01:01:25.01 | Andrew Junius | uh, Tell us about your project. Welcome. |
| 01:01:28.37 | Amy Chan | Thank you. Good evening. I'm not sure. Madam Chair. Mr. Vice Chair and member of the Commission, And staff. Thank you. your time to consider this project. My name is Amy Chan and I'm the project Manager. This project gets you read all the documents have been in the works for over 10 years. The property owners bought the property. because They light the city of Sausalito's relaxed space, the artistic community, the waterfront view, and close to San Francisco where they work. They are not professional developers. In fact, after the project is built, they plan to occupy three to four. units for themselves. With us tonight in the audience are the popular nurse, and the site manager, Mark Klein. We also have the architect. I'm sorry, landscape architect from Jets. landscape. Rebecca Vandy on the Zoom. can be answered any questions commissioners may have. Our architect, Alex. Colouros. of the BTE Architecture We'll talk more about the vision, the design features, and how the project fit into Sosalito's vision, planning vision. um, We are all happy to answer any questions you may have. So for now, I'm going to turn it over to have our I get to make the presentation. Thank you. |
| 01:03:30.14 | Alex Colouros | Good evening. Thank you. Thank you. I have quite a lot I would present. I don't know that I have enough time to do everything though. So I'm going to try to rush through it. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 01:03:41.81 | Andrew Junius | to. |
| 01:03:41.95 | Alex Colouros | Thank you. |
| 01:03:41.97 | Andrew Junius | FOR THE FAMILY. |
| 01:03:42.03 | Alex Colouros | it. Um. Thank you. Thank you. I can't really read there, so I'm going to look at my papers here. Thank you. I want to address your first question about height. Obviously you have a marker and number in the files, but based on a 10 foot of floor, a parapet hyper OSHA in the garage, you're about 45 feet You want to take. So in order to help Socialito meet its housing goals, the site has been designated as an ideal location for higher density housing by the Socialito Housing Task Force. So therefore, the project... will help Sosalito get back on track with housing needs. The project will, we hope, embellish the getaway to Sausalito. and hopefully also be a catalyst to help uplift the neighborhood. and incentivize restoration and renovation of this area. Um, Thank you all for being here today, those who approve and disapprove of this the same way. And Next page, please. So most of you all know the site. Here's a few photos of the site. It's plagued with derelict buildings, illegal parking we talked about and maintaining public right away. And there's vermin as well. Most of the views right now are obstructed with trees and bushes. Um... And like we said, the project has been in the making for 10 years. It was started by the previous architect, Miles Berger. and taken over by BD architecture because of its intricacies. We try to maintain also the original design ideas. next page So the surrounding our site, here's a few photos, are nondescript multifamily buildings. And on the left side, and on the top and a few around single family homes. Some of the features you can see are roof overhangs, projecting decks, you have wood shingle, you have siding, step back in an articulation in the single family homes and exterior corridors. And some of these are most of these features have been replicated in our building. as well. on the next page. Oh. the images I'm missing. OK. Well, there's a bunch of images here. There's a material board and the materials you can see for some reason. Okay. The building character is contemporary using a historic and contextual palette. which you can't see. It takes from the elements of social and the neighborhood while proposing a timeless building that we hope will be seen as a catalyst for the future of the neighborhood. and along Bridgeway. Alongside massive landscape setbacks, we have extremely big setbacks. The building is split in three levels over residential levels over parking podium. Um, This makes the billing look scaled down and less imposing. Changes in materials, heights, step backs, setbacks, help to avoid the monotony of the monolithic type of building. And also over the parking garage, Sleptorin parking garage, we have patios. This will help activate the project frontage with occupant activity. Um, You can't see in the image, but I was pointing out to all the elements on the main elevation, referring to shingle overhangs. step backs and, you know, elements what we've seen from the surrounding properties. next page. |
| 01:07:59.22 | Alex Colouros | Um, So lush landscape and lush and controlled landscape. entertains the pedestrians I. The Cyclist. of course, the drivers, and hides the partially subterranean parking garage and the accessible ramp. and all the while we are providing some buffer and filter between um, the street and the residence of the building. between the two buildings you will find common areas with patios and seating. areas for entertainment. Also, in order to avoid a sterile parking look, we're using pavers and patterns in green areas and sunshades to make the parking in between the two buildings more Frilling. Next page. |
| 01:08:51.06 | Alex Colouros | Um, Lord. |
| 01:08:56.89 | Alex Colouros | in the come up. |
| 01:09:02.45 | Alex Colouros | Okay. |
| 01:09:04.18 | Director Phipps | Well, we're going to try it from another source, sir. Give us a moment. I'm going to try to share it from my computer. |
| 01:09:10.35 | Andrew Junius | I'm going to turn the timer off here. Let's take a two-minute break or a minute break here to give staff a chance to work on the presentation. |
| 01:09:17.83 | Alex Colouros | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 01:09:18.28 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 01:09:18.30 | Alex Colouros | Thank you. |
| 01:09:18.34 | Andrew Junius | HANG ON. |
| 01:09:18.64 | Alex Colouros | Thank you. Is there a couple of questions you had for me in the meanwhile? |
| 01:09:22.40 | Director Phipps | Bye. Let's go back to this slide, the material board. I think that this is much more helpful than the previous version that was shown to the public. And I think that you'll appreciate the opportunity to clarify. Okay, please continue. |
| 01:09:38.28 | Alex Colouros | Yeah. Can you see? Okay, all right, I can't really read it from here. Let me do this at the same time. So we're providing, you know, from the language from the neighborhood, |
| 01:09:50.31 | Director Phipps | And I'm sorry, sir, just want to confirm from Vice Chair that we will not be counting down the timer until we return to the slide that the gentleman stopped on. |
| 01:10:01.50 | Andrew Junius | that's right well why don't you go once you proceed and when we get to where your slideshow screwed up we'll um we'll talk again i appreciate it |
| 01:10:07.00 | Alex Colouros | Appreciate it. Thank you. So you can see here, We've been using Shingle Look. um, based on, um, the neighborhood, also the historical church we have here. That was the original, uh, idea coming from this church. Um, we also have siding, um, that's used for particular corners to emphasize certain corners. Overhangs and decks are used to create articulation and shadows. So it doesn't look like a flat, bland wall. DEX also has some recesses, so it looks like Thank you. Each unit, you can see actually there's one, two, three, four, five units along here. It looks like more like it's almost like a townhome rather than the one monolithic building. Um, use of corner windows to dematerialize the corners Oh. And again, I want to point out that we haven't done a four-story building looking like a four-story building. We have a base that sticks out that's partially hidden here with patios, but it looks like a three-story building instead. So hopefully it doesn't look like 45 feet. |
| 01:11:29.56 | Alex Colouros | on the next Yeah, so we looked at the next page. Okay, okay, next page. That's where we left off. okay here |
| 01:11:41.79 | Andrew Junius | All right, let's go ahead and start the timer again. |
| 01:11:46.33 | Alex Colouros | So in a nutshell, basically you can see here how this building is laid out. You have the subterranean parking garage right here. under the base. And over that, you have a three-story residential building, wood building. And the second one in the back, which is also on top of the subterranean parking garage that you can see, individual garages. You have three types of parking in this project. off-street parking in a common garage. You have individual garages under this building on Filbert and you have three, uh... parking that's outside Um... Yep. So we have 35 cars. I hear there's a lot of concern about too many cars added to Sosa Lito. I don't know what I share with concern. To me, 35 cars doesn't seem like a lot compared to the amount of tourists and visitors you get every day. We've added two cars on the public right of way of bridgeway. One of them was accessible. It was a requirement. I don't know where the requirement is coming from, but it was a requirement from the city of Sausalito. we have exceeded the minimum requirement for Bikes. by three times, because we believe that given the proximity to the city center and ferry and bus stop, public transport, we want to promote cyclists and pedestrians. Also, everybody knows Sosalito is very slopey. So all these homes are meeting all accessibility requirements for California BIN code. And that's something that's really missing on all the surrounding properties, which are apartments. next page. |
| 01:13:44.66 | Unknown | . |
| 01:13:50.78 | Alex Colouros | Okay, so we touched base about views from the properties above Filbert. You can see on this image, this is one of the properties looking out of the bay. We are way above our roof. So while this is proposed under the Housing Accountability Act, the project has taken into consideration most views from most neighboring properties. Many properties are viewed straight across to the bay, as you can see here, and many of the properties in the back are way above us. So we might have obstructed a certain angle or two, but The hope is that most properties still have views to the base. And it is true that the building on Filbert was reducing height originally. We had received comments about... this building being too high and too wide. without, you know, not providing views on the sides to the base, so which changed the building height We reduce the building height, which of course in turn forced us to excavate more because we lowered the building. but we also made it less narrower to provide views from the sidewalk straight up to the bay. Another thing that we changed, because we heard from the residents in the back, we used to have a bridge going from the sidewalk straight to our building. That was our secondary lobby, or to the Filbert building. And there was concern about, you know, too many cars parking on Filbert and access to our project from Filbert. So we removed the whole bridge and the lobby. And this building is now only accessible from Bridgeway. That was a concern from the residents. Um, Indeed, this building here could be up to 24 feet from the sidewalk, but I think right now it's at 14 feet, which is about the height of a single-family home. and that's what we want this to look like when you're on Filbert. Um, Let's see, three minutes. Let's go to the next page. OK. Determining building height has proven very difficult on this site, as planning can attest. However, we have done our best to make it work for the project and for the neighbors by minimizing the height. While there are some areas that go over the 42 feet, limit our project is well below the max of 50 feet overall it's worth noting that it is mostly elevator penthouses that go over the the limit that we require exemptions for density bonus if you look at the built filbert building this building here is below 30 feet, 32 feet on average. The elevator penthouses that sticks out. This one is the exception where it's like, instead of the eight feet with the penthouse, it's I think four feet above the maximum limit. Um... So the site, the project was designed to minimize excavation while keeping building height below maximum requirements. on Filbert. the concern about having issues with excavation too close to Filbert, but we are like really far away. The minimum would be 35 feet up to 65 feet. So the first excavation for our buildings really far away from Filbert in order to minimize disruption along Filbert for grading. Um, Construction is approximately 24 to 30 months. That's based on a 100 to 200 unit project, based on our experience. This is 19 units. A smaller project wouldn't take much less time. It's not really a question of size, it's more a question of staff. demolition of all structures containing lead and asbestos will be dealt with for OSHA and abatement. Even if it was a smaller, less dense project, you would still have to get through the same demolition and OSHA requirements. |
| 01:18:11.16 | Director Phipps | you I'm just going to stop you, sir, and give you a friendly reminder. You have 56 seconds remaining on your timer. |
| 01:18:16.48 | Alex Colouros | on your... All right. |
| 01:18:25.93 | Alex Colouros | Let's go to the next page, I will skip a couple of things. All right, so to conclude, I just want to say, thank you for listening and considering this project. I think it's going to help a lot. So Salito getting his housing back and embellish the whole area. which is right now a bit of an eyesore, just to say the least. I think it would be a great project to consider. I looked at a lot of the letters that we received from the public. a lot of support, a lot of opposition. I just hope we can come to a consensus and an agreement that This is a plus for Solido. Thank you. |
| 01:19:02.66 | Andrew Junius | And thank you. Don't go anywhere. I'm sure we've got some questions for you. Commissioner Luxenberg, do you want to start off? Questions? |
| 01:19:07.71 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Sure, thank you. First, I want to commend you and the owners for providing the appropriate mix of affordable housing with the 1-1 bedroom and the 2-2 bedrooms and the 1-3 bedrooms spread throughout. So I think that's excellent. I also want to commend you on the design because I think it does reflect Sausalito, the colors. I mean, it's obviously bigger than some of the buildings but it's reflects the colors and that the church used as a guide I want to let's go back to the height I want to confirm what I think I heard you say if you're standing now don't talk about zoning if you're just standing on the sidewalk on Bridgeway you're saying though if you're looking at the building it's 45 feet and if you're standing on the sidewalk and Filbert it's 14 feet About, approximate, based on my memory. No, I know, but in ballpark figures. I do have some questions on parking. It's great that you're putting two on-street spaces back on Bridgeway. If I understand it correctly, on Filbert, you're putting in a sidewalk but no parking. There's no on street parking where you're where at that point of Philbert Did you look at the possibility of pulling because there's 19 feet there of pulling it back? And putting in a couple on the street spaces or was the slope too Significant at that to make that work putting the sidewalk towards the property in other words, move the sidewalk closer to the property and then put in some on-street spaces. But I mean, there's a slope there, obviously. |
| 01:20:49.48 | Alex Colouros | Yeah, that's, I don't want to talk for the owner, but moving the sidewalk completely over, basically over the air requires quite a lot of retaining wall, which is very costly. Thank you. |
| 01:21:06.46 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Okay, so I guess I'm concerned about guest parking. And I looked at the plan, and you have a series of tandem parking spaces, so obviously they have to go to specific units. And then there's, I believe, 13 tandem spaces and nine single spaces, if I counted them correctly. And so if you took the, there's two, there's three spaces in the courtyard. One thing I wondered if you considered is making two of the three spaces, one's handicapped, but the other two spaces as guest parking that everyone could possibly use so that if somebody comes in and a guest, that given the restricted amount of parking on Filbert and only the two spaces on Bridgeway, that those spaces, not changing the design at all, but could those be made guest spaces, I guess, is question. Um, |
| 01:22:03.60 | Alex Colouros | me get back I think we can answer this a couple ways first of all first of all correct me if I'm wrong Kristen we are providing almost double the minimum right that's required by social ito more we're not |
| 01:22:27.46 | Kristen | We're meeting. You're meeting the minimum standard required by the code. Thank you. |
| 01:22:33.38 | Alex Colouros | Okay. |
| 01:22:33.57 | Kristen | I believe, though, that the government code has a lesser requirement. |
| 01:22:37.72 | Alex Colouros | Yeah, the density bonus law requires us less parking. even though we could potentially have done less parking, even ask for a waiver potentially too, |
| 01:22:48.06 | Kristen | And the code does not require guest parking on site. |
| 01:22:50.81 | Alex Colouros | Right. We decided that providing the most parking for our residents on site would help Thank you. Eliminate the need for street parking. If you keep this in mind, then our guests, yeah, they could use street parking. Now, if we put more guest parking in our project, then our residents might end up parking in the street. Now... It's really up to the owner to decide if they want to allocate two or three cars to residents. I think that's just... conversation. I'm not opposed to that. Um, it's also a marketing, a marketing, um, issue because you know you It's difficult to sell condos if you don't have parking sometimes. I'm not sure how to answer that question. |
| 01:23:40.24 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Thank you. I'm not sure how to answer the question. I guess I'm suggesting that all the units, all the three bedrooms would have two spaces. All the one bedrooms would have one space. And then the two of the two bedrooms, instead of having two spaces, would have one space. You're still meeting the code requirement, but you could make those. I was just suggesting you could make those guest parking. One of those is an affordable one. Maybe you've got 24 bicycle spaces. Do you absolutely need two spaces for every single two-bedroom? I'm just saying there is a way in the non-covered spaces to provide some guest parking without changing anything in the design, changing anything. I'm just throwing the idea out there that might help, when people are coming to visit the development, then they, you know, at least there's a couple places that they might be able to park. Anyway, it's just an idea. Those are all the questions I have at this point. Sorry. |
| 01:24:38.31 | Alex Colouros | The idea is certainly worth discussing. I'm just trying to figure out, are we balancing one way or another? Where there's a push and pull, I guess, on parking. Yeah. I mean, it's too bad. |
| 01:24:47.79 | Andrew Junius | You'll certainly have some time to think about that while the public comment is going on, so appreciate that. Question for the applicant from Commissioner Marlott. |
| 01:24:55.30 | David Marlatt | Yes, thank you very much, and thank you for the presentation. you was a little closer. So this project has been around for a while. And you're the original designer, I take it? Thank you. |
| 01:25:06.59 | Alex Colouros | Miles Burger, I think, started in 2011. |
| 01:25:06.78 | David Marlatt | The Muzberger. |
| 01:25:12.28 | Alex Colouros | maybe three years before us. And we took over because he retired and just like, I suppose, project was getting too complex and we took over in 2019. And yeah, we pretty much redesigned the whole thing. |
| 01:25:19.92 | David Marlatt | Oh. I think it was Okay, because I was assuming that because the 2018 project had a very similar sort of shingle tessellated facility. |
| 01:25:32.65 | Alex Colouros | We try to keep the original language from the previous architect, but we tweaked a lot of things, quite a lot. |
| 01:25:38.38 | David Marlatt | Okay, thank you. And then, so a few things are just sort of housekeeping that I feel I need to point out. One is on age zero and then the subsequent pages Thank you. Voselito is misspelled. Sorry. So that might be something you want to look at. Another thing, too, is just coming back to this question about code cycles. And I know that building code is not planning code and so forth. But your drawings say that it's 2019 code. The negative declaration implied that it's current code, which was kind of vague. City attorney has clarified that this will be the 2022 code. have you looked at the project in light of any possible changes that will be triggered when you change the code cycle? For example, on 2.06 roof plan, you have an allocation for future PV panels, but those PV panels must be installed under the 22 code and with batteries and so forth. And I don't know if you've looked at that in terms of whether the changes required in what we're considering tonight to meet anything else in the 2022 code. |
| 01:26:47.39 | Alex Colouros | And understand where you're coming from and everything we talked about is correct. When we first submitted, we were, that's been like, I don't know, more than two years, three years. Um, we've been going back and forth with planning a lot, and not much had really changed on the building. So yeah, our plans stayed previous code. But it is true that we will have to adhere to the current code at time of permit, not of construction. And the current, the code gets more and more stringent. when it comes to green requirements when it comes to electrical vehicles, a bunch of things, it gets more and more expensive as it is right now. the drawings and the permit will not be in the city before the end of the year. It would have to adhere to 2025 codes. |
| 01:27:41.56 | David Marlatt | So you think you'll file the building permit application in 2025, next year under the 2025? |
| 01:27:46.41 | Alex Colouros | If all goes well, It takes six months. |
| 01:27:49.76 | David Marlatt | . And have you looked at the project in terms of possible changes? Because the last thing we want is for you to come back here. So any possible? No, we have not looked at it. |
| 01:27:59.48 | Alex Colouros | No, we have not looked at it. Sorry, we have not looked. |
| 01:28:03.04 | David Marlatt | Thank you. requirements. Okay. |
| 01:28:04.52 | Alex Colouros | implications of code requirements. |
| 01:28:09.10 | David Marlatt | The project will be all electric, however. |
| 01:28:11.73 | Alex Colouros | Yeah, there's no more, yeah, guys, it's been banned, yeah. |
| 01:28:13.99 | David Marlatt | OK, because there's some reference to a boiler room. The civil engineers' drawings show gas meters. And I don't know if that's something that needs to be purged from the drawings or if that's |
| 01:28:23.59 | Alex Colouros | No, I don't think it's a requirement. I think when you go with the construction drawings for building permit, at that point, everything's vetted. It doesn't matter what the planning set, the shows. We have to meet all codes at the time. Old code say electrical, that's what's going to happen. |
| 01:28:41.09 | David Marlatt | So thanks. Like I said, I know a lot of that is housekeeping. But if something was triggering in the code, that might fundamentally change your exiting configuration, which changes the unit count in an extreme example, for example. We don't want to do anything here that would trigger a trip back here. |
| 01:28:59.13 | Alex Colouros | Thank you. |
| 01:28:59.15 | David Marlatt | I don't expect |
| 01:28:59.90 | Alex Colouros | the |
| 01:28:59.97 | David Marlatt | Thank you. |
| 01:29:00.02 | Alex Colouros | And you don't. |
| 01:29:00.11 | David Marlatt | You don't. to the |
| 01:29:00.58 | Alex Colouros | back here either. I don't expect the code requirements to change the building. or the apartments, the condos. or the exiting, because that hasn't really changed. Mostly it's insulation, green requirements, TEL24 and stuff like that. |
| 01:29:19.09 | David Marlatt | Yeah, and seismic infrastructure. In your project statement, and thank you for the project statement, I think it's showing the intent and what you're trying to achieve. Can we talk about, I guess you said, we have designed contemporary architecture in an historic palette. And obviously you've chosen some shingles inspired by Bernard Mabek, but also mixed in board form concrete, stucco, some hardy siding. And this is leading up to a question, I promise. You've sort of applied the shingles almost in a painterly style, just across very tessellated massing. Did you look at other options of using material change or differentiation to further enhance the sort of tessellated facade that looks like almost townhouses? Were there other alternatives that you looked at in terms of materials and might be willing to consider? application of materials, I should say. |
| 01:30:25.01 | Alex Colouros | No, we have not. We figured that this was the appropriate palette here. |
| 01:30:28.30 | David Marlatt | Yeah. Thank you. |
| 01:30:31.35 | Charles Melton | Thank you. |
| 01:30:32.30 | David Marlatt | Um, The board formed concrete in one corner on the base, and this will come up, I guess, in discussion, mixed with stucco, but I'd like to hear from you how that was. considered, how you consider that or what the intention was? |
| 01:30:49.51 | Alex Colouros | Thank you. |
| 01:30:49.59 | Joy Lamar | THE END OF |
| 01:30:49.68 | Alex Colouros | Well, you know, I think The idea was to propose a contemporary building with a forward-looking building. feel if I can say so we did not want to mimic some kind of historical building that looked like Disneyland but And to board from concrete, you know, it's significantly enough, different enough, and more than enough from the rest of the building. provide that more forward-looking look and be different enough from the rest of the building so that it looks like it's two different structures and look less like a four-story building. I believe bought from concrete looks with all these lines, replicating siding, looks interesting more than just playing Port Concrete or sometimes even Blaster. |
| 01:31:53.85 | David Marlatt | Well, that may come up when it comes back up to the dais for discussion. Just one last question or maybe a couple related questions. There are some really significant cuts. Sorry, there are some very significant cuts and retaining walls, particularly along the eastern edge. I can calculate the way of an exit staircase along the eastern edge. At the base of that stair, it looks like it's a 21 or 22-foot tall concrete wall. and then it's basically four foot four foot something inches wide passage for, I guess, egress. And then there's the building facade. And then along the, what do you call it, where the easterly edge jogs, that's something like a 15 foot wall. So there's some pretty significant walls. And then along Filbert, there's an eight foot wall, some nine foot walls. And I didn't see how these walls are treated aesthetically. |
| 01:32:48.85 | Alex Colouros | Yeah, probably it was omitted. |
| 01:32:51.30 | David Marlatt | Thank you. |
| 01:32:51.50 | Alex Colouros | I would like him to be treated the same way. |
| 01:32:51.85 | David Marlatt | Actually, they're big. |
| 01:32:57.47 | David Marlatt | which would be, because you've got both Stucco and- Board form. Board form? |
| 01:33:00.76 | Alex Colouros | board form or concrete. Thank you. |
| 01:33:02.74 | David Marlatt | OK? |
| 01:33:02.94 | Alex Colouros | No, I would like to keep this stock for the building itself. You know, you bought from concrete is pretty expensive. |
| 01:33:06.85 | David Marlatt | you know. as opposed to just regular formed concrete. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. |
| 01:33:15.06 | Alex Colouros | That's really for the Thank you. |
| 01:33:16.91 | David Marlatt | I mostly wanted clarification of what the materials were and how you considered these very significant |
| 01:33:17.30 | Alex Colouros | of the order okay |
| 01:33:23.63 | David Marlatt | walls and the impact on light into some of those units. |
| 01:33:28.62 | Alex Colouros | The walls are below our units. And when we are on the side, I mean, we don't really have windows. The main light for the units is coming from front and back, not really the sides. |
| 01:33:39.15 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:33:39.17 | David Marlatt | Thank you. Okay. |
| 01:33:42.78 | Unknown | Mr. Marlach, can you make sure you speak into the microphone? Yeah, I'm sorry. Clearly, so that Mr. Sarkin. |
| 01:33:44.57 | David Marlatt | Yeah, I'm sorry. so that the question is not getting here. Sorry. I think those are all my questions and I'm sure that some of this will come up later. Just in time. Just in time, yeah. |
| 01:33:50.34 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:33:50.38 | Andrew Junius | Just in time. Commissioner Moore, any questions for the applicant? |
| 01:33:55.82 | Fred Moore | couple kind of going on your situation of the monolithic building the contemporary design and Commissioner Marlott's questioning about alternative designs. had you considered or did you run any design scenarios where you created the different sections of the setback of buildings different colors so that it would not look like one massive building it actually would look more like multiple buildings in the project, either on the front building with different sections and or the front and the back can be then the one. around design. |
| 01:34:31.70 | Alex Colouros | No, that was never the design intent for this project now. If you ask me if I would be interested to do that, I've done something similar in Petaluma. because I was forced by the planning department. And it ended up looking like Disneyland. And I never really liked it. |
| 01:34:50.99 | Fred Moore | Clearly, there's a balance between a Disneyland look and maybe lighter colors, different shades that make the building look like a less large, imposing structure from the bridgeway. |
| 01:34:55.48 | Alex Colouros | Yeah. |
| 01:35:02.58 | Alex Colouros | Playing with color, I think, is not very complicated, if you so desire. |
| 01:35:11.19 | Fred Moore | and you have the one entry gate leading to building two. Is there a reason for that, that you need that there? |
| 01:35:22.43 | Alex Colouros | It's just like the parking garage. We have a gate to the parking garage. It's just to provide a little more privacy from the rest of the street. It's not a requirement. Just like the parking garage, I think it feels better. I mean, also, this gate's going to be on power... |
| 01:35:46.05 | Alex Colouros | What's the word? Sorry. |
| 01:35:48.11 | Fred Moore | It's okay. I just didn't see any in design. I didn't see any clarification of what would happen if someone drove up to that gate inadvertently and then realized they couldn't get in or they were trying to visit somebody. They didn't answer. I didn't see a call box there or the ability for someone to turn around versus backing down the driveway to get out if they inadvertently went the wrong directions. Have you analyzed that at all? |
| 01:36:12.36 | Alex Colouros | Well, like I said, initially, all the parking was for the residents. So there was no reason for a... visitor to go through the gate. Now if we change the parking to accommodate residents, sorry, visitors and maybe the situation changes where you have a call box or maybe the gate goes away. I'm not sure. That wouldn't really affect the building. |
| 01:36:34.74 | Fred Moore | With respect to the two access stairways on Filbert, it looks like you have some entry gates there. Are those coded key fob gates only for the residents or can a member of the public |
| 01:36:45.77 | Alex Colouros | I don't think they're coded. They're just gates to provide some privacy. The stairs were really required by the fire department. They're not to be locked. I don't think it would really matter. They're not that high. Anybody could jump over it. |
| 01:37:03.88 | Fred Moore | Right. So if I walk down a field, which I often do, I could actually open that gate and walk down the stairs into the project. |
| 01:37:13.04 | Alex Colouros | I suppose you could. I mean, you would walk on a private property, but you |
| 01:37:17.60 | Fred Moore | Okay. What is the material that you're proposing for the two stairways on each side of the project? Is it wood? Is it concrete? Or something different? |
| 01:37:27.71 | Alex Colouros | the egress stairs for the fire department. |
| 01:37:30.17 | Fred Moore | Correct. All the stairs. Yes. |
| 01:37:31.69 | Alex Colouros | In general, they would be poured concrete. |
| 01:37:33.53 | Fred Moore | Or concrete? |
| 01:37:33.55 | Alex Colouros | concrete? Yeah, no. Thank you. |
| 01:37:34.61 | Fred Moore | Thank you. |
| 01:37:34.64 | Alex Colouros | Thank you. |
| 01:37:35.35 | Fred Moore | Just a side question. Do you have any idea how many stairs there are from Bridgeway all the way up to Filbert, one of the residents? I mean, how many steps? Yeah, steps. |
| 01:37:42.39 | Alex Colouros | me in how many steps? I have no idea. |
| 01:37:47.37 | Fred Moore | You indicated you had some paving options. Is it stamp concrete? Is it pavers that you're trying to articulate? |
| 01:37:54.91 | Alex Colouros | for the parking lot. |
| 01:37:56.45 | Fred Moore | for the I guess the upper area between buildings one and two and I think some of the areas in the front along Bridgeway. |
| 01:38:05.52 | Alex Colouros | Um... |
| 01:38:11.52 | Alex Colouros | We have done both successfully. I don't think it was really determined at this time. It could depend on cost. I mean, pavers wouldn't look much nicer, but maybe require more maintenance. Stamped concrete, colored concrete works well too. |
| 01:38:28.49 | Fred Moore | you have common trash bins obviously in the parking and then you have the trash collection area along bridgeway. It's kind of hard for me to determine the dimensions of the trash bins you're proposing in the garage area and the storage area on Bridgeway. Is that trash storage area on Bridgeway large enough to handle all of the common trash bins from the garage? |
| 01:38:53.16 | Alex Colouros | So in the parking garage, you have six bins, right? Not all six go out. Three go out and three replace the bins that are outside so that if somebody uses them while they're being picked up, Thank you. There's no empty hole, right? and I believe that the space provided on Bridgeway would be large enough for three of the bins, not more. |
| 01:39:19.40 | Fred Moore | So the proposal to remove the bins from the garage to Bridgeway, is that some sort of skip loader, or how do you propose to get those bins point A to point B and back? |
| 01:39:30.76 | Alex Colouros | Yeah, I mean, you use the hand, how do you call this thing? It's like, you know, you could of course call this, you know, these hand pulleys or, yeah, mechanical help to move these bins. You can't do it manually. |
| 01:39:50.37 | Fred Moore | You indicated the time period to do the construction. Have you estimated the time period to do the demo and the grading before you actually start construction? |
| 01:40:00.26 | Alex Colouros | Yeah, that was in my presentation. I skipped over it. Matter of because of time. And I estimated 24 to 30 months, which is a long estimate. That's based on our experience between 100 and 300 unit developments, which happened between 24 and 30 months. I mean, typically the excavation part and... Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. foundation could take six months, I would say. |
| 01:40:31.41 | Fred Moore | Sorry, just a couple more questions, I apologize. So there's dust control measures in the mitigation measures. And I know some of the neighbors have been concerned about dust from the grating, the excavation, et cetera. Assuming you've read those mitigation measures about the timing and the watering, are you comfortable able to put that in your construction plans? |
| 01:40:51.68 | Alex Colouros | This is all requirements the general contractor has to follow regardless. And they always do. But we have to. |
| 01:41:06.32 | Fred Moore | that. Thank you. |
| 01:41:07.44 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Thank you. |
| 01:41:07.69 | Andrew Junius | Thank you, Commissioner Moore. Before we move on, we're going to give Commissioner Saad an opportunity to ask questions of the applicant, and we'll come back to you. Don't worry. |
| 01:41:08.67 | Jeffery Luxenberg | I'm not sure. |
| 01:41:14.32 | Jeffery Luxenberg | I just wanted to follow on a real quick question, but I'll define it. |
| 01:41:17.98 | Andrew Junius | I want you to hold on. Go ahead, Commissioner, or Chair Sajid. |
| 01:41:18.02 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Yeah. |
| 01:41:20.97 | Nastassya Saad | Thank you, Vice Chair. Excellent line of questioning. Commissioner Marlott and Commissioner more. I appreciate it. You took many of my questions. I want to follow on with the gate as well, that Commissioner Moore. mentioned Do you know How long? it's timed for to open. Some intent of the question is more about a queuing issue if more than one car pulls in there to the point of commission or more if there's a mistake. Do you know how long that's set to how many seconds it set before it would open. |
| 01:41:59.07 | Alex Colouros | I do not have cut sheets to give you something I could just, give you a number of that. I think it's appropriate, but I don't think that's appropriate to see. See you. It could take |
| 01:42:09.84 | Nastassya Saad | no need to make something up. Does the intent for the question if it's something that you could think about I think Commissioner more's. Point is a good 1 with that gate. Maybe if it's not necessary, that's something we can discuss later up with the dias. But I think I understood that you said it's more of a nice to have if I summarize it. Thank you. And then Just from the, um, From the PG&E service requirements, have you had a discussion with them? I see it's mentioned in the staff report. Was that, did you and your team Thank you. for the applicant team have a direct discussion with PG&E on the utility pool that will need to be included. |
| 01:42:55.49 | Alex Colouros | I think we had our civil engineer, |
| 01:42:57.94 | Director Phipps | Thank you. |
| 01:42:58.04 | Nastassya Saad | THE END OF |
| 01:42:58.10 | Director Phipps | Thank you. |
| 01:42:58.12 | Nastassya Saad | Thank you. |
| 01:42:58.14 | Director Phipps | Thank you. |
| 01:42:59.03 | Alex Colouros | Our civil engineer had conversations with PG&E multiple times, however they are. not here. to answer the question. |
| 01:43:07.16 | Nastassya Saad | Okay. The intent really is I see that |
| 01:43:07.89 | Alex Colouros | The intent. |
| 01:43:09.83 | Nastassya Saad | It's going to be on the North East potentially, but I think you probably know in your experience PG and he really has the right to place the pole wherever you know they see fit. It's going to be 39. Feet above grade. Would any of that interfere with your design plan? I mean, I think this is all designed with those front facing windows for view and light and air. Any concerns on the PG&E pool, utility pool that would be required? I think that's a good question. |
| 01:43:40.63 | Alex Colouros | that's a good thing. |
| 01:43:40.70 | Nastassya Saad | Thank you. |
| 01:43:40.93 | Alex Colouros | I am, I'm not really concerned, I'll tell you why. I think the intent of PG&E is anytime now to do a renovation or a new project, they want to underground. And the idea for them would be to underground along our entire project. and that was why they located the pole at the edge of our project, at the property line. because there would be no point to put the pole in the middle of a project if they want it underground and the entire sidewalk. |
| 01:44:06.77 | Nastassya Saad | That's my concern. I do know that... The sites not within the approved undergrounding district, maybe it's more of a question for. Kristen perhaps, um, Is there an option for undergrounding or because it's not within the council approved undergrounding district, is that a non-starter for PG&E? I ask you to comment. |
| 01:44:35.59 | Nastassya Saad | or director Phipps. I'm not sure how the underground, District works. If you're not in it, is it not an option? For example, if PG&E offers it to them, that would be a nice option to take. I'm just not sure. And I see Sergio are illegal. Do you want to weigh in? |
| 01:44:55.67 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, no, typically with regards to undergrounding districts, the way they're paid for is either by the property owner or by the ratepayers. With regards to. Payment by PG&E, that is still payment by the ratepayers. There's something called the Rule 20A program where PG&E collects from every ratepayer and then basically conducts, you know, undergrounding projects using its own money. All those rule 28 funds are spoken for. So PG&E will not be generously volunteering to conduct a you know, new undergrounding program. So |
| 01:45:29.91 | Nastassya Saad | Okay, that's very clear. Thank you, Attorney Rudin. Vice Chair, those are all the questions I have. Thank you. |
| 01:45:37.20 | Andrew Junius | Commissioner Luxenberg, did you have another follow-up? |
| 01:45:38.79 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Yeah, I just had two quick follow-ons to this idea of pedestrian income. Let's assume you don't have guest parking for a second. You have a gate. Somebody has a fob or something to get through the gate. But if somebody's a guest and they're walking up, can they just walk? Do you have locked gates? Because you say there's no call box. So is this fully open, that if somebody coming either from Filbert or Bridgeway to visit somebody, they don't need to come to a call box and push a button? |
| 01:46:13.48 | Alex Colouros | No, no. If you're a pedestrian and you visit the project, you go to the main lobby of the bridgeway building. You have a call box there. They let you through. You have to take the elevator to the second level, to the back parking, and you walk across to the lobby of the second building. So you walk through the lobbies and you go up to the elevator. You will never have to take the driveway. |
| 01:46:34.78 | Jeffery Luxenberg | You don't have to take the driveway, but there will be a call box. And then my second question is, I was confused about the garbage that Commissioner Moore raised. So on trash day, do the residents have to bring trash out to the street, or does a truck come in, and will the truck have access through the gate? |
| 01:46:54.77 | Alex Colouros | generally, generally. Residents never do that. It's |
| 01:47:00.60 | Joy Lamar | Thank you. |
| 01:47:02.62 | Alex Colouros | No, no, we're talking about the trash bins. Usually there's a service for that. I'm not sure that's the trash department that does that. Or the HOA has a building management that takes care of taking out the trash, but not the residents. |
| 01:47:19.02 | Jeffery Luxenberg | yourselves. Okay, but they're going to come through the gate and get to the garage to pick up the trash? |
| 01:47:20.39 | Unknown | Thank you. Because... |
| 01:47:20.65 | Alex Colouros | Thank you. |
| 01:47:26.99 | Alex Colouros | there's no gate to go through the, you have to go through the, um, the main garage entrance. |
| 01:47:35.12 | Jeffery Luxenberg | which you said there was a gate for the- |
| 01:47:37.89 | Alex Colouros | The door, yes. |
| 01:47:39.43 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Yeah, and so you need an electronic sub fob to get through, so the trash people will have that access? Either the trash or the building management. Or the building management. Okay, thank you. Back to you, voice chair. |
| 01:47:54.77 | Andrew Junius | Great. Thank you, everybody. So, thank you, applicant. You have a whopping 13 seconds left of your presentation. Did you want to answer any of the questions or follow? I'm happy to allow you to make a statement with respect to any of the questions asked. |
| 01:48:08.82 | Amy Chan | Mr. Chair, if I may, I just want a couple answers to some of the questions were raised by commissioners. The first one is gas parking. I think it's a good idea to take a look at how we can provide parking. |
| 01:48:16.57 | Andrew Junius | Please. |
| 01:48:25.53 | Amy Chan | I think there's some flexibility in there, but if you would like, we would take a hot look at those. Um, in terms of using different color to differentiate so that it doesn't look as massive I think it's a great idea to use different shade and those are kind of details that we can building in when we do the construction join. Um, There was question on the second building, the concrete wall. that wasn't specifically specified. The intent is to have it look the same. So we can be able to use different color schemes to make it more interesting, we'll do that. Um, In terms of PG&E, we did have some conversation with them. They would prefer to have it underground the whole block. And clearly when you do that, each property owner would need to consent to do that if they're going to pay the share cost. Certainly we would be happy to pay our own. share costs for our own property. but certainly not the others. So until they have a decision to underground the whole and I think it's great to do that. but it's not our decision to make. Thank you. Great. |
| 01:49:57.97 | Andrew Junius | Thank you very much. So we're going to hold 13 seconds for you. I'm not sure how you can use that later, but we'll might figure it out. Thank you again for your presentation. We're going to now move on to open the public comment portion of the hearing. I do appreciate everybody's patience for getting us to this point. I think we're going to stick to the three minutes per speaker. But, you know, given the late hour, it really would be great if you don't need all the time you don't use it. And please be cognizant of the comments made before you. You're very well. But given the late hour, it really would be great if you don't need all the time you don't use it. And please be cognizant of the comments made before you. Very well, I think a lot of people have a lot of the same issues. So I very much appreciate that. I also want to just state for the record that all of the written comments that the staff has received, I'm not sure when the cutoff date was, but has been posted to the agenda has been available for review to the commissioners. And so we thank again the public for being so interested in the project and for providing all the public comment that we've received to date. So, Director, why don't you take it away from here. |
| 01:50:55.60 | Director Phipps | Very good, thank you, Vice Chair. And just related to those important and key 13 seconds, the applicant will be able to use those 13 seconds as rebuttal to the public comments, if they so desire. So you will have another bite at the apple, 13 seconds worth. And with that, I will jump into public comment. First speaker is Joel Carr. Joel, welcome. You'll have three minutes to speak. Thank you for being here. |
| 01:51:22.26 | Joel Carr | surprised to be first. Hello, my name is Joel Carr. I am an architect and a homeowner about three or so blocks away from the property that's in discussion. I'm not here to comment on any of the technical issues that have been discussed. I'm here to talk about the human factor. The fact that this hearing is taking place exemplifies the reason why housing is so scarce and costly in our community and the wider Bay Area, even the country in general. This is Econ 101, folks. Reduced supply and scarcity makes prices go up. The more you say no, the worse it gets. Prices rise dramatically. How do you personally feel if your kids come back from college and can't afford a place to live near their parents? The eyesore that has been there for a decade needs to be replaced, and the site is the absolutely perfect kind of place to meet our 724-unit requirement. Please don't allow the ever-present NIMBY forces to slow down or, even worse, kill this project. This is such a no-brainer, it's almost comical. Sausalito is not a museum, it cannot be frozen in amber, and those who object to positive, thoughtful changes are woefully wrong. The houses directly above this project have windows that actually do not even face the new building fronting on Filbert and are significantly higher than the tallest part of the story poles in place. I think that was mentioned earlier. If any of you or the objecting parties have not seen it, there is no human who sees it in person that could argue that this project is even a little objectionable from a view standpoint. The location is ideal. Using CEQA as an argument in this case is absolutely egregious. even though in theory this ought to have been considered for categorical exemption, based on the discussion here. This evening, it's reasonable that it should be categorized with a mitigated neck deck, but there was even the mention of the possibility that ought to have been considered as categorically exempt. There are also a lot of people who say we should just cut one floor off the top. to make it less objectionable. The thing about developers that most of the public doesn't understand is that they have to make the numbers work and that they get their dollars for these projects from your 401ks and other investments. Because the investor funds that build these things come from. all of the large insurance companies, banks, loans, various other financial instruments that support developers. Okay. |
| 01:54:24.60 | Director Phipps | Thank you. that. |
| 01:54:25.35 | Joel Carr | Thank you. |
| 01:54:25.42 | Director Phipps | Thank you. |
| 01:54:25.56 | Joel Carr | So |
| 01:54:25.73 | Director Phipps | Joel thank you for your time you can't turn this project next speaker is Paul Donnelly Paul welcome You will have three minutes. Thanks for being here. |
| 01:54:38.25 | Paul Donnelly | I've lived in and worked in Sausalito for 35 years and care deeply about the integrity, safety, and livability of our community. While I understand the need for housing and mindful development, I am concerned about applying a density bonus to this project without fully addressing its impact to critical infrastructure, and calculating the benefits that this project could bring to the city of Sausalito. Specifically, this project is located on a notoriously dangerous stretch of bridgeway, which has become known to some as Suicide Alley. It's the southbound downhill curving section of bridgeway, which is plagued with confusion over merging lanes. I heard somebody mention a class two bike lane. Is there a bike lane there? I don't see any lines or anything. Maybe it's there. I don't know if the bicyclists see it. And then, Parallel parking, doors opening. There's confusion over the merging lanes, changing speeds as you get down to the pedestrian crossing at Napa Street. And there's very hazardous conditions for drivers and cyclists, whether or not they know their way around or are familiar with the area. I think everybody here has probably gone down Bridgeway by this section. Introducing significantly increased vehicular volume onto this in the project site, I think is about 100 foot of Bridgeway, potentially tripling the current access levels, demands a comprehensive traffic And parking analysis and access to the site relies on to U-turns at Easterby and Napa streets, intersections that should be closely reviewed by traffic, professional traffic engineers, for feasibility and safety. And even the trees and power lines along that section seem to be leaning and falling over into the tree and bridgeway in despair. I have... Thank you. Fair share in public accountability questions. In light of these concerns, I respectfully request clear answers to the following questions. One, has the city of Sausalito updated its master plan with regards to traffic engineering along the section of Bridgeway? Number two, what is the formula or methodology used to calculate the development's impacts and fees for critical infrastructure developments, especially those relating to roadways where the public can have access to that information? Three, will the developer receive a density bonus without being required to contribute proportionally to infrastructure? |
| 01:57:39.30 | Andrew Junius | Thank you, sir. |
| 01:57:41.41 | Director Phipps | Thank you very much for your comments. Much appreciated. On to the next speaker. That is Joe Lamare. |
| 01:57:41.43 | Andrew Junius | Thank you very much. |
| 01:57:51.92 | Director Phipps | And apologies if I got any of the pronunciations wrong. Thank you for being here. You'll have three minutes. |
| 01:57:56.48 | Joy Lamar | Hi, my name's Joy Lamar, and I happen to be living in the unit that is in the elbow of the proposed property. So I am in one of those apartment buildings. I'm in the ground level basement, if you will, apartment. And to my north is going to be the Filbert Building, and in front of me to my east is going to be the Bridgeway Property Building. I like to say I'm in the elbow. I'm thinking sitting here looking up at a 40-foot building. I'm in the armpit. And I'm just one, I get that. But I'd like you to know, I also work on the other side of Bridgeway. And in the four or five years that I've been in this property and driving down the hill past the 7-Eleven down onto the Marinship area. I have seen three people get hit. Two times the driver spread off and the person got up and hobbled across the street. One was by a bicycle, two by car. And it just seemed normal. And that's very concerning. If you're talking about adding even more traffic... um, Yeah, I mean, it's horrible. I also want to, since I'm an individual here, and speaking on a very personal level, I want you to know that I have been an affordable housing purchaser in the past. And, What I liked about my property is it was just like everybody else's in the town. And there was enough room. And I'm thinking about this in that it seems to be a bit Shameless to offer to people who maybe could not afford otherwise property that is so dense. Yes, it might fall within... the code and within your plans, but the density of it Well... isn't like the rest of Sausalito. And I think that should be considered too. I'm probably one of those people would shave off the top of the buildings that you're talking about. But in some way or another, to be able to make this less dense, more truly affordable on an aesthetic level, on a more natural place that Sausalito is, I think is a consideration I'd like you to take up. Thank you. |
| 02:00:21.76 | Director Phipps | Thank you for your comments. Appreciate you being here and joining us tonight. Next speaker is A.T. Lin. A.T., welcome. You'll have three minutes. |
| 02:00:33.69 | A.T. Lin | Hello, my name is A.T. Lynn. I live at 1731 Bridgeway. two properties to the south. And I am delighted to see some effort being made to replace that a lot of abandoned collapsing buildings. I'm also going to speak to traffic. I have some concerns. First, southbound. Because of the developed island in the middle of Bridgeway, any resident wanting to enter the property from the northbound side of Bridgeway must pass the site and make a U-turn at Easterby. I often make that U-turn in a mid-sized vehicle, which requires the full two south... down lanes passing a projecting sidewalk curb at an intersection southwest corner by less than a foot clearance. In addition, U-turns are also interrupted by vehicles turning right onto Bridgeway from Easterby and by bicyclists who frequently jump the red light and continue southbound through the intersection. No large SUV or delivery truck can make that turn without pausing to back up and make a three-point turn. The time that would take will be in all the time available on the left turn light, causing any other cars in the left turn lane to wait through another light cycle. In addition, all turns are affected. The left turn lane on Bridgeway appears to be long enough to hold four cars. In addition to cars turning there to make that U-turn, the left-turn lane is used by the dozens of homes directly upslope from the intersection, as well as the 7-Eleven Market just to the west. I have frequently seen at least three cars at a time waiting to make that left turn. With this proposed increase in traffic, I imagine left turning cars could back up into the inside northbound lane on Bridgeway, causing further backups for through traffic. Turning into the property from the right lane may be temporarily blocked by pedestrians, many of whom in this neighborhood walk slowly with baby carriages. Thus, the turning car would need to halt in a lane of cars often traveling at 35 miles an hour. Those following cars might swerve into the adjacent left lane with no notice to the cars already driving there. Northbound concerns are similar about the U-turns, again, at Napa Street. In my career as construction manager for highways in California and other western states, these traffic impacts were absorbed by the development if it was going to affect the safety and efficiency of the traffic as it already exists. I would just want to know if the costs to any improvements to the roads and the island are planning to be absorbed by the project itself. Thank you. |
| 02:03:26.52 | Director Phipps | Thank you for your comments. Appreciate you being here. Next speaker is Diane Johnson. Diane, welcome. Thank you for being here. Three minutes. |
| 02:03:37.71 | Diane Johnson | I'm Diane Johnson. I live at 161 Filbert, directly across from the proposed development. I oppose the density and the increased height of this massive project, 19 condominiums, parking for 35 cars on just over half an acre. Public safety, fire, and emergency access would be compromised by the one 24-foot driveway on Bridgeway, used by its residents to enter and exit the property. It is unclear whether there is ample space allotted for a fire engine to turn around in this complex. The height of the buildings will block primary views for a number of neighbors, as well as taking away all privacy. Also, the proposed HVAC Units and penthouse elevators on both rooftops will be unsightly and potentially noisy. The projected time frame for destruction of all trees, vegetation and structures, major excavation, grading and building is two and a half years, but most likely three years. with construction scheduled six days a week. Possible landslides could occur from the excavation of the sloping soils and resulting erosion. Also, there are underground springs on the property. The roadway and adjacent apartments could be endangered by landslides or liquefaction. The traffic report is totally inadequate, doesn't take the median on Bridgeway into account or the necessity for U-turns to enter or exit that one driveway. The East Drew Bain intersection is already difficult with a keep-clear restriction, a 7-Eleven, delivery trucks, pedestrians, bus stop, and bicyclists. Also, vehicles coming up from Liberty Ship Road from the Bay Model, Sea Trek, Schoonmacher Beach, Lake Garage, and numerous offices. U-turns at Napa Street would also be challenging. This is not considered in the traffic report. Lastly, there is no true affordability. 16 of the 19 proposed condos are at full market value. The three added for the incentives are moderate income based on Sausalito median income well beyond the income of a teacher, carpenter, food service worker, gardener, artist, etc. the existing housing disparities are only exacerbated by this gift to developers. the project is totally out of scale for our neighborhood. If it were scaled down to the size of the footprint of the existing structures and the height lessened, it could be completed much sooner and with less impact on our neighbors. Thank you. |
| 02:06:19.22 | Director Phipps | Thank you very much. Next speaker is Priscilla McKinney. |
| 02:06:27.10 | Director Phipps | Priscilla McKinney going once. |
| 02:06:29.46 | Andrew Junius | She's gone. |
| 02:06:31.72 | Director Phipps | Oh. Oh. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker is Mary Crawley. Mary, welcome. Thank you for being here. You will have three minutes. |
| 02:06:47.16 | Mary Crawley | Thank you so much. I live at 1709 Bridgeway. So down the street, I'm very familiar with this part of Bridgeway. And one thing I'd like to say is having lived in Southern Marin for over 46 years, I'm familiar with all the communities. And going into Mill Valley has become something that everyone avoids because you probably have all experienced it. There's just chock or block traffic. And I think that affects the restaurants, the shops, the residents. And I think Rosalito, given our world, has done a good job of keeping pretty good access. But I am all for more of a parking study, because you're talking about a very complicated piece of Bridgeway. And I won't repeat the good points my neighbors have made, but I'd say they are very accurate. And so I think a good parking study really needs to be done before something with this volume. And it sounds to me from the comments I heard here tonight. that the property itself with the driveway is a big safety issue. I mean, if people are worried about delivery trucks getting in and out, what about ambulances? What about real emergency situations and fire trucks? I mean, I'm sure you'll all want good answers to all of those details. And I agree that there's a volume. I mean, it's a very nice building that they've designed, if you were talking about a building in a dense city. But we're here in Sausalito where there's a lot more uniqueness and I, you know, actually the two buildings that were there years ago when they were in great shape. were charming and it's sort of a shame that they've disintegrated and they should be replaced. But to replace with this sort of volume is not in keeping with the Sausalito that we know and love, but just from the driving safety, safety of bicyclists, of pedestrians, of cars, |
| 02:09:48.55 | Director Phipps | Thank you very much for your comments. Next speaker is Carson Scott. Carson, welcome. You'll have three minutes. |
| 02:10:02.57 | Carson Scott | Thank you. Good evening. Thank you. My name is Carson Scott. I live a little ways around the corner from the site on Easterby Street. And I want to start by saying I'm strongly in support of this project. Like many others that wrote in in letters to the commission, I walk by this lot almost daily. The first time I walked by and I realized that these were just a bunch of abandoned houses sitting there, I honestly couldn't believe my eyes. This is a prime location. It's close to Caledonia Street. It's close to public transit, and it's just sitting there. It's completely unused and it's a massive blow on the neighborhood, my neighborhood. And I just didn't understand. But I think the many comments opposing the project, both written and that we've heard tonight, Um, and, as well, I guess, some of the comments I think that I've heard coming from the Planning Commission, I think help explain why we're in this situation. And I think it's really easy to find reasons not to move forward with a particular project, to nitpick it, to debate about whether gates should be locked or unlocked, to call it a gift to developers, to delay it with things like parking studies. Now, I think thankfully, I've gotten a little bit of a nudge. from the state and we're forced to look at the big picture. And the big picture here is that we desperately, desperately need housing and this site which would otherwise just be a literal blight. is a great opportunity to build some of that housing. So I hope we can improve this project. Thank you for your time. |
| 02:11:47.50 | Director Phipps | Thank you very much for your comments. That does it for speaker cards on my end. I will now look to the Zoom application, and I will be calling hands in the order they were raised. The first hand raised is that of Jai Haisman. Welcome. You'll have three minutes to speak. |
| 02:12:11.35 | Jai Haisman | Hi, thank you for the time. You know, I actually live in 142 Filbert, which is looking outside my door and off of my deck. I will look over the roofs of the proposed development. And I'm aware that the people at 150 Filbert would actually have their views directly impacted by I composed a letter with a bunch of different points of various concerns. And I realized in listening to people that are pro-project that I'm actually shifting my perspective and feeling more supportive of increased density. I pay a lot of rent where I am and wish I could afford to buy in Sausalito, but it's outside of reach and I see how density would support my potential long term objectives of being a property owner. I do have a lot of concern since I do work from home of, uh, having my work impacted as well as quality of life by the protracted, um, construction and noise, um, And I also share some of the concerns about traffic, especially parking on Filbert. It is difficult sometimes to find parking, and that's just with the existing density. If there were additional density, then I'm very concerned that there is adequate guest parking. and I'm not sure if all of the needs of 19 units would be met by the existing parking. So I think additional attention to that, I would appreciate. I'm also aware of the difficulty in navigating that section of bridgeway, especially if there's people queuing up to get through the gate and or, you know, garbage trucks and delivery trucks. I would be very concerned about traffic backing up and the safety of bicycles around that. Um, |
| 02:14:47.76 | Jai Haisman | But I guess I'll leave it there. I'm not sure if there's anything that can be done about my concerns, given I am pro-density professional. But if there is anything that can be done to mitigate the constriction time and noise, I'm very interested in those possibilities. Thank you. |
| 02:15:09.35 | Director Phipps | and you can see it. |
| 02:15:09.41 | Jai Haisman | you. |
| 02:15:09.48 | Director Phipps | Thank you. |
| 02:15:09.68 | Jai Haisman | Thank you. |
| 02:15:10.90 | Director Phipps | Thank you for your comments. Next speaker is Bebeth McDougall. Bebeth, welcome. You'll have three minutes. |
| 02:15:19.30 | Ms. McDougall | Thank you very much. So I'm very pleased to see so many people comment on So I just want to make sure that, um, I'm going to touch on a few things. First of all, I want to acknowledge that this is my first opportunity to address this planning commission with Mr. Moore. on the dais. So welcome, Mr. Moore. I understand you came to Sausalito not long ago from Orange County, where you in fact were already involved with high density infill and development. So certainly that kind of experience will be important here going forward. You made a comment, Mr. Moore, about diversifying the color palette. the external structure that is under discussion. And I just want to remind everyone that I just drove down the 101 over the weekend. and got to see a really good example of what the Metropolitan housing. Commission does with its housing. and I think those are so ugly. It kind of looks like Lego housing, multicolored, And it just looks so unsightly. And I would hope that we never go that far. because I know that there is a huge plan. that our supervisor will be leading She made a huge very thorough presentation. to the, City Council not very long ago announcing high density transit worker housing for Sausalito and Marin City that she will personally oversee on behalf of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and their desire to turn Sausalito which they've already designated apparently, is a Tier 4 regional transit nexus. Tier 4 happens to be the largest in the world. I don't know if anybody's looked it up yet, but I just want to make sure that we're clear. that we don't end up with Lego housing up and down Bridgeway. I do love the property owner's idea of diversifying the color palette slightly. |
| 02:17:10.96 | Unknown | owners. |
| 02:17:14.93 | Ms. McDougall | I think that's very tasteful. And that would be in keeping with the Sausalito tradition and personality. The other thing I'd like to touch on having to do with, certain issues that have been raised this evening. I don't think there's much we can do about quieting Bridgeway, although I really urge each of you to consider how, given the massive amount of density that will begin happening along Bridgeway soon. under Ms. Moulton-Peter's direction, What are we going to do about quieting Bridgeway? Personally, I'd like to see the bike lanes and all the through traffic somehow routed via and modification of US Highway 101. I think all traffic, including bicycle traffic, vehicular traffic of any kind, that is simply passing through because it's a lovely flat ride. needs to think of an alternative means because we, as Sausaledans need to quiet Bridgeway down. We need to think very proactively about not allowing Any rail lines, any trains, any additional buses? It seems like MTC has thought of everything except for the people who live. |
| 02:18:23.59 | Director Phipps | Thank you, Babette, for your comments. Next speaker is Alexander. Alexander, welcome. |
| 02:18:32.10 | Unknown | Hi there. Um, so I also live in, in South Slido, um, also pro density. Um, and I just want to echo some of the thoughts that were shared about, particularly the fact that this is a transit dense area. And I think more, um, density along our transit corridors is, is really important. It's only 19 units. I think that's actually quite small. I wish it was taller. I wish it was bigger. The views are not impaired. This is such an ideal site for a higher density development. I drive or cycle in this part of the road really every day, and I've never seen traffic in this area. Parking, I think, issues are pretty de minimis and easily mitigated. There's a lot of actually street parking if you go south from the site along Bridgeway. It's caught in the vegetated, and there's random spaces always kind of open there. I think like Bridgeway is a little bit dangerous as a cyclist. That's sort of a separate topic, but I would love for Sausalito to get serious about the safety on Bridgeway. But, you know, this is an entry part for many thousands of people coming into Sausalito. Visitors, locals, everybody. And it's just a pure eyesore. It's blight. And I would love to see a beautiful building put there that addresses our housing shortage. I love the palette and I love the design that was shared. I hope you stick to it. That church that you took inspiration from is right up from me. I love it. And I hope we don't continue to live in a crumbling museum and we make it a wonderful place to live in for many more people. So thank you for your comments. Thanks. |
| 02:20:05.08 | Director Phipps | Thank you for your comments, Alexander. Next speaker is Kieran Culligan. Kieran, welcome. You'll have three minutes to speak. |
| 02:20:13.05 | Kieran Culligan | Bye there. Hi there, Kieran Kelligan, Saucyutu resident. Philbert is my main route to Bridgeway, whether I'm walking, biking, or driving. So I'm not as close as some of the people commenting. Definitely know it quite well. I'm also the former chair of the Pedestrian and Bicycle Advisory Committee. And I just want to start out by saying how happy I am to read such fervent public comments regarding the safety of cyclists. It's just not every day in Sausalito that we get to see this level of concern for others. versus self-interest, and it's a welcome site. There's a healthy dose of sarcasm in there, but I'd like it to be true. I can confirm that on my time on PBAC, we and the Department of Public Works looked at two potential safety improvements for this corridor. For a whole host of configurations, the design and layout here encourages speeding, confusion, like we felt it. but it can be improved with good design. The first one was reconfiguring the merge between Easterby. and Napa. Right now, we essentially maintain the two lanes the whole way. You can do it differently. And then the second one is a roundabout at the Napa intersection. So it would facilitate great safer U-turns along with a host of other improvements. Having reviewed the current proposal, I don't see anything in this design that would preclude either of those vital projects from being considered in the future, so I think it's highly compatible with improvements that are being looked at and the city has sought grant funds. I'm really happy to see the addition of the sidewalk on Filbert where there's nothing today. So that's a big improvement for me, for my kids in particular. Props to staff for keeping an eye out for residents on that front. 35 parking spaces is a ton. That's way more than I would have expected. You know, interesting to see the design choice there. Love also seeing the secure indoor bike parking on the ground level. That's definitely gonna help create some of the opportunity for future residents to have a car free or a car light lifestyle. I think that benefits them, but really our entire community. in multiple ways. So we're just really impressed by the amount of thought and detailed work has gone into this project. There's certainly some things to solve for and improvements, but I support it and I'd love to see it happen. Thanks. |
| 02:22:29.45 | Director Phipps | Mr. Culligan, thank you for your comments. On to the next speaker, Max Kemsley. Max, welcome. You will have three minutes. |
| 02:22:43.15 | Director Phipps | Mr. Kemsley, I think you're on mute. |
| 02:22:47.79 | Max Kemsley | Hi there. Thank you for the commission for listening to me. I actually own the property that hasn't been discussed in this meeting just to the right of 1755 when you're standing on Bridgeway. It's 1763 Bridgeway and 170 Filbert, which was mistakenly mentioned earlier by the planner as an address that the developer owns. I don't know why that was said, but I heard that earlier. Yeah. Anyway, I'm pro doing something with this lot, everyone. It's been an eyesore. I've owned this property next door. I share a fence with this property. And I think it's the worst eyesore I've ever seen. I've been waiting and waiting and waiting for something to appear. Unfortunately... When you stand on my property, We have this little yellow cottage on 170 Filbert. and you look at the height, of that back building that is the Filbert property. It is literally looks like it's 50 feet higher, higher than where I'm standing when I'm sitting there. And then down onto 1763 Bridgeway, which is a two unit building that's right there. that is totally impacted by the front of, by the, the lower building as well. And the views of the Bay and of angel Island are affected. So, For me, I think it needs to be scaled down. I think it needs to be scaled down one level. I know that the developer doesn't want to hear that because they want to make they're my and I'm pro That's what I do. I'm a real estate guy. So I'm into it. But I really think that that the impact and the amount of of bodies that are coming into that area is. is going to create a mess. The impact of the construction and of the excavation, I don't even know how to turn a huge truck that's got a bunch of dirt in and around on Easterby, guys, or around on. on down on Napa like how are you going to do u-turns there are you going to close bridgeway I mean I don't even understand how that's going to work with the amount of excavation that needs to be pulled out of there. I'm also concerned about these properties that have been abandoned for 30 years. Are they going to just rip them down? I can't even imagine what's inside of those things. They probably have termite veins going out 50 yards on every side of their property. as well as the rat infestation that's in there. So, I'm again, pro development. I need to see, I'd love to see something come in there. But I'm also concerned about the entryway to my property. It's on the right side of the building there that's, |
| 02:25:50.97 | Director Phipps | Thank you very much, Max, for your comments. And with that, I will move on to the next speaker. That is Charles Melton. Charles, welcome. You will have three minutes. |
| 02:26:03.30 | Charles Melton | Good evening, Commission. Thank you so much for the opportunity to provide comments tonight on this really important issue. I think first and foremost, we've heard a lot of comments tonight and suggestions made regarding additional studies or needs for this particular project. I think an aspect about this is the more studies that come out, the more questions that are raised regarding things like termites, gates, how long they close, the timing of a gate, the color palette, if gates are locked, things like that, we're losing sight of the bigger issue. And all those things take additional time, additional studies that might or might not result actually in changes. I think the project we have before us tonight is very thoughtful and very considerate. From my understanding, the number of units on this lot is not the maximum number that could be built. This actually, this lot could hold a lot more units under current code. And this project has actually been reasonably sized down by the developer. And I think that is in regards to some of the feedback that's been received by the public already has been very well received. I think to ask for further restrictions of this might actually put the whole property in jeopardy. And additionally, as we discuss color palettes and the timing of gates and things like that we're missing the larger issue the larger issue is that our city is under requirement to meet our housing elements and our housing requirement going forward currently we are on track not to meet that we are falling behind this project makes progress to make that happen but what happens when we do not meet our requirements up by the state the builders remedy And ultimately the detriment of that is for the entire community on the site. This means that even a larger building, substantially larger than what is proposed today can be built there. And those sites can be built all throughout the town. So the neighbors who are here talking about traffic and things like that, imagine that being exacerbated to be even worse. Imagine that being the problem throughout town. That is what the future is going to be faced if projects like this are not approved. Furthermore, even more so with builders remedy, what happens is that the powers that are given to our very own planning commission and our city council are stripped away where the decisions that you get to vote on tonight and make you no longer hold that power. That is the biggest concern for me. here. It's not just the fact about housing, it's about the future and what will happen if our city continues to delay and not approve projects like this and actually build and put shovels in the ground to build housing. That is what we're up against. That is where the clock is ticking. And that is ultimately the decision the Planning Commission has to make tonight. I think the project here before you is, yes, it is density. Yes, it's right next to a traffic stop and a bus stop where people don't need cars to actually live there. Yes, it does put more housing in Sausalito, but we're required to do that and we need to make these projects happen. So I encourage you tonight to not get lost in the details about color palettes and things like that, but focus really at what's at risk here, which is our city itself and the power that's given to our planning commission and city to have our own control of our own city. Thank you. And I encourage you to really think thoughtfully about your consideration tonight. |
| 02:29:09.82 | Director Phipps | Thank you for your comments, Charles. Chair, excuse me, Vice Chair, that does it for raised hands in the Zoom application. I have received no additional speaker card, so I will give it back to you. And just as a reminder, we do have 13 seconds. |
| 02:29:24.49 | Andrew Junius | Great. I do offer 13 seconds of response to anything you've heard. I know that's not much time, but if you'd like to say anything additional, we'd ask you to say it now. Thank you. |
| 02:29:35.79 | Amy Chan | Thank you, Mr. Vice Chair. I know The commission is very familiar with condition of approval. and included in there just for the public. that are not familiar with it. There's a requirement of construction management. and a hearingist to the operating hours. So we are very sensitive to that. We're very committed to it. So I just want to make that comments to you. |
| 02:30:06.66 | Andrew Junius | Thank you very much. I appreciate that. All right. We're going to close the public hearing at this time. I mean, close the public comment, and we're going to bring it back up here to the dais. Before we start, I'd like to just let's organize ourselves a little bit. This is probably one of the most complex projects this commission has seen in a number of years. We have two items to vote on. We have the CEQA document to approve, and we have the project to approve um I hope we can start with some maybe some general thoughts and comments and go around about the project in general and then whenever somebody wants to make a motion we should start with the CEQA motion so who'd like to get us going on just general project comments Commissioner Luxenberg. |
| 02:30:45.69 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Thank you. First of all, this project's been going on since 2018. There was extensive analysis done for the ISMND along with a whole set of mitigations that were developed. And whether or not it needs CEQA or not, it has CEQA. So there is extensive documentation there. And also we require require construction management plan and that condition is in the draft resolution I concur with Commissioner Marlott's comments about let's get the side yards and the rear yards correct for that so I make that note I don't have an issue with some differentiation on the design side. I appreciated the fact that the applicants understands possibly a need for guest parking and they could address that. I appreciate the fact that they have a range of affordable units, one-bedroom, two-bedroom, and three-bedrooms. In looking at the story polls, because of the slope of this project despite the height um uh waiver or whatever it's called that they're requesting does not seem to block any views because the houses on the other side of filbert are higher uh there is some issue with the immediate adjacent bututters but as far as uh you've got the uh marine ship on the other side of bridgeway so if if you were to put housing of this type this is uh i think the place to do it so those are just my general thoughts at this point |
| 02:31:29.40 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:32:29.12 | Andrew Junius | Who wants to go next? Chair Assad, would you have any thoughts or comments to get us going? |
| 02:32:37.42 | Nastassya Saad | Yes. Thank you Vice Chair. Um, I... I understand all the public comment, and I think that I do share some of the same sentiment in terms of change as a lifelong resident. You know, I sympathize and, and. have similar personal feelings here, but as a member of the Housing Element Advisory Committee, um, that totally changes in how I'd view this project, it, you know, we, we, We don't have builders remedy right now. I think there was a comment about that. We have an approved housing element. We've had more than 1 approved housing elements. So. in that regard. that's off the table for the city. And that really is a testament to a lot of the work that Planning Commission, City Council and the HIAC had done over many years. So that puts us in a good position. I was actually on the Historic Preservation Commission I think I was vice chair back in 2019. So I remember this project and we made the findings that it wasn't historical, but you know, of course there's nostalgia about that. That used to be a Portuguese type settlement. So yeah, You know, with that in mind, that's a nice thing from the past, but they are dilapidated and somebody needs to fix them. And we have an owner who's willing to do that. I do think it's thoughtfully designed overall. I think vice chair said it best that. There are entitlements. And there are opportunities for the applicant to go higher. They could have requested different waivers that would have pushed this project in a different direction and concession. So there's a lot going on here and all of those things considered. Um, I think I think it's conscientiously designed based on how it is today. I do have some concerns with. Just a few minor things. I think we can work them out. We tend to work things out here at the commission to get an approval. In terms of the MND, |
| 02:34:51.96 | Unknown | Amen. |
| 02:34:53.31 | Nastassya Saad | Um, I looked through it. It's extensive. And, you know, just for the public's knowledge, those are really done in an attempt to make sure that any issue that does arise can be mitigated, I mean, by definition. And I think there's a lot that has gone into that. that will support what is in front of us. Some of the minor details like the color, I agree with Commissioner Moore, I think there's an opportunity there. to another point of public comment, you know, we still have design review in front of us. It's not something we get all the time anymore with these new state laws. We do have the opportunity for a density bonus project, which has a lot of entitlements, we can make some changes here. So I don't think we should lose our remit to make some additions that we see fit as a commission I struggled with the tree plan a little bit just in terms of the extensive nature of what is going to come out. But I think in order to support the findings for the application, I can make the findings for the tree removal permit. And all that being said, there is going to be a construction management plan that is on the onus of city staff and the applicant. um the the bicycle issue is is an ongoing issue and it would be um a great thing for when the applicant gets to their construction management plan they have to find a way to redirect pedestrian and bike traffic i'd be very curious to see what that is um i personally drive that to access my house so I know it well. So, you know, the personal struggles aside, I think I'm going to move in the direction and I'd actually vote to approve the draft resolution of the mitigated negative deck, just to put that on the table, since we're starting there. Those are my general thoughts at this time, Vice Chair. Thank you. |
| 02:36:52.92 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. Who's next? All right, Commissioner Merlin. |
| 02:36:56.03 | David Marlatt | I can jump in. Yeah. So I have, first of all, I'm also supportive of the project. I understand that the developer, the applicant, could have exercised other options to make this even taller, even bigger. And I think it fits comfortably given the slope of the existing site. I also went out and looked at the story poles and relative to the apartments that surround it. And I think it kind of fits right in. I think that's a good thing. of the existing site. I also went out and looked at the story poles and relative to the apartments that surround it, and I think it kind of fits right in. I don't have any issue with the overall scale. I appreciate also that through the architecture how they have this sort of crenellated facade, so there's not a big bulky facade. So the general way that things are organized and the massing, I think that deserves a lot of... recognition. I regret, or I lament, and I think I might be in the minority here, that the use, the choice and the use of materials doesn't reinforce the massing that I think is so successful. And by that I mean that the shingles to me seem applied as if they were paint. The suggestion has been made maybe using color to differentiate. I wouldn't be so prescriptive. I think the architects are very talented and creative and familiar with the BDE website and they've got beautiful structure. I also regret, and I understand there's other things at play here under state law, but I regret that they didn't choose to take this as an opportunity to do a little bit more with respect to energy efficiency, sustainability, carbon footprint, try to make a statement. This is a big building for Sausalito. This is actually for Sausalito. It's one of the biggest buildings. So I just have an overall feeling. I'll support the project, don't get me wrong, but I just have an overall sense that it could have been a home run and it's a stand-up single. It's a good building. I think more could be done. I wish more was done in particular with respect to making a statement about energy that doesn't necessarily imply cost. But as we've seen in the drawings, they were even prepared for the 2019 code. So just meeting the minimal code requirements for 2025 is already going to imply a significant upcharge from wherever they are right now in their design. So I think those are my high-level thoughts. And when we get there, I might have a question for a city attorney with respect to how that may or may not be able to be transformed into a condition. And then I have some other housekeeping conditions that we can discuss when we get to that point. |
| 02:39:38.64 | Andrew Junius | Mr. Morris. |
| 02:39:41.30 | Fred Moore | I appreciate the comments, both of us, Commissioner Marlon and Commissioner Assad. I mean, we do have a design review approval process. So I'll kind of reiterate some of the comments I made earlier because I'm new on the commission. It would be nice for the commission to get involved earlier in the process with design issues so that we can have input with staff that can have input back to the applicant. That might address certain things like energy consciousness, different variations in materials and color palettes, rather than us trying to redesign on the pulpit here, which I think can be problematic. I think the project is great with respect to affordability. I personally know three families who have had to move out of Sausalito because they can't afford rent, they can't afford a house. So the fact that we're having four affordable units with this project, in addition to other housing, should help people in the city to find places to live comfortably. That's why I brought up the issue of affordability. I think the possibility of losing the affordability after a year with some equity sharing program is problematic. I think those affordable units should stay affordable for a reasonable length of time to, again, ensure young families can come into the community and stay here. I mean I hate to see the three families who had to move out because of that. The fact this project is taking care of a significant eyesore I think everybody agrees it's a terrible piece of bridgeway and having something there will be a big impact to the city positive. I would love for all of the people who are struggling with the infrastructure impacts to rather than reach out here, to reach out to the state. I mean, the state is creating many unreasonable requirements of housing without taking into account a lot of the potential infrastructure projects or infrastructure impacts that the project in higher density have. But unfortunately, we're bound by the state. So reach out to your state legislators and say, hey, think about some different planning tools. I'm planning by background, so I do have a proclivity toward that. This project, though, was moving all the residents, potential residents, off the street. So there's many projects in coming to Sausalito that are putting people on the street for street parking, are asking for reduction so that the people have to find parking somewhere else. This actually is putting everybody on site, which I think is a great benefit. Um, I appreciate all the construction management plan that's going to be in place, which I'm assuming will include a number, so the residents will have a contact person other than the city if there's issues with watering or construction that are causing problems and you have an opportunity to reach out to somebody and have your issue addressed. So I think that will hopefully help mitigate the process of construction. Construction is never super fun, but it is a necessity. I think the improvements on Filbert to have the sidewalk will be great. I've walked on this street many times, and you're hanging out on the street and watching cars go buzzing by. It would be nice to have some additional sidewalk there to make that a safer passageway when I'm taking my grandson down to Filbert. So I think that's a positive. So overall, I am supportive of the project. Like Commissioner Marlott said, maybe there would have been some issues we could tweak here and there with design, but that's not enough to not support the project. Thank you. |
| 02:43:14.05 | Andrew Junius | Great. Thank you all commissioners. Really great comments. I'll try not to duplicate any of them. So before we get to motions and the details here on the actual actions we're going to take this evening, we all need to just take a breath and really acknowledge this project as being extraordinarily important in Sausalito. This is the first major multifamily housing project in decades that Sausalito is seeing. And so it's extremely exciting. And I want to thank the applicant for hanging in there and bringing this to us eventually. I also want to thank the public. Great comments, both for and against. We certainly understand change is difficult, and I'm so, you know, very... sympathetic to you know the comments regarding change. I do, there were a number of comments regarding traffic that I just wanted to point out that in the in the massive negative declaration that included a report on virtually every type of impact, there was a traffic study. The traffic study was done in a manner that is traditional for traffic studies in addition to things that were not even required under current CEQA law. So I just want to point out that The intersection analysis for this, they use a term called level of service. The level of service given the size of this project, which again in traffic standpoint is very small, didn't change. In other words, the 19 units generate, again from a technical standpoint and analyzing it the way the traffic engineers analyze every project in the Bay Area in the state, there's virtually no change in the way those intersections are gonna operate. The AM and PM peak trips are eight and 10, I personally walk down Bridgeway and I'm at that intersection multiple times a week as a pedestrian. The traffic is fast. There's really no backups, and I just don't think there's going to be any issues. So I'm very comfortable that the CEQA process and the traffic study has fully accounted for the very, very minimal number of trips that are going to be added to our street system. You know, a couple of comments about the general safety of Bridgeway, I couldn't agree more. Bridgeway's got issues. This project is not a part of those issues. These 19 units are going to fit right in, and I'm very, very excited to see it move forward. Couldn't agree more about Filbert. The sidewalk is going to change everything. That block of Filbert is extremely unsafe for pedestrians. And the fact that the project occupants can't, residents can't access Filbert directly, they won't have to go all the way around the block and walk up the hill, means I think the neighborhood up there is gonna have a lot less impacts regarding trip traffic and other issues that might come if there wasn't a connection. So now we come to kind of what I think is the more, a little bit of the confusing part. We're being asked to make some design findings under the local codes that I think we can make, and I hope we can make tonight. But we're also in a position where we can't really make recommendations and changes to the project that would in any way reduce the size of the project or begin to make it infeasible. So with that, I think I'd like to just start by, again, let me finish it up by saying I think that the CEQA document is more than adequate. There were literally hundreds and hundreds of pages of analysis of everything from air quality impacts to biological impacts to you name it. It's been analyzed. Again, the traffic I just mentioned, we had archaeological studies, we've got noise studies, we've got historic reports, we've got engineering reports. It's all been done. It's kind of, in my opinion, overdone for a 19-unit project. We we're there so I'm hoping that we can just take an action to approve the next deck first and then we can get on to the more interesting interesting comments do I have a motion to approve the negative declaration as is |
| 02:47:15.31 | Nastassya Saad | I made the motion, not terribly clear, but I will as is. |
| 02:47:17.85 | Sergio Rudin | Thank you. |
| 02:47:17.87 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 02:47:17.97 | Sergio Rudin | Thank you. |
| 02:47:18.09 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 02:47:18.16 | Sergio Rudin | I'm not terribly clear, but I will... |
| 02:47:20.00 | Unknown | As in Zia. |
| 02:47:20.56 | Sergio Rudin | Thank you. |
| 02:47:20.59 | Nastassya Saad | Yes. |
| 02:47:20.72 | Sergio Rudin | All right. And it's the motion to approve the first resolution approving the negative declaration. Correct. Resolution approving the negative without change. |
| 02:47:20.79 | Unknown | because |
| 02:47:25.79 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 02:47:25.80 | Unknown | Correct. |
| 02:47:26.04 | David Marlatt | Thank you. |
| 02:47:26.06 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 02:47:26.09 | David Marlatt | Thank you. |
| 02:47:26.14 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. And I'll see you next time. |
| 02:47:28.60 | David Marlatt | I'd like to offer two friendly conditions. |
| 02:47:32.75 | Andrew Junius | How about the neck deck, not the project? |
| 02:47:34.97 | David Marlatt | Not the motion. |
| 02:47:36.00 | Andrew Junius | okay the motion is to prove the negative declaration only |
| 02:47:37.99 | David Marlatt | I understand. I understand. One is that I'm not even sure if this needs to be part of the motion, but to change the hearing date to June 25th? Absolutely. |
| 02:47:45.99 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 02:47:46.04 | David Marlatt | we're going to do that, no question yet. I didn't think there'd be too much resistance. The other one too is just pure housekeeping and not getting too deep in the weeds, but the mitigation measure related to the Cal Green Energy Code just A has errors and B doesn't need to be there at all. There's no point. We already said this could have been a cat X probably. So my other proposal would be to delete mitigation measure GHG-1 rather than get into the fact that it's referencing codes that are not enforceable yet. It's referencing 19 circuits. I don't want to get into that because we don't need it. |
| 02:48:24.76 | Sergio Rudin | So I would suggest not deleting any of the mitigation measures, mostly because I believe, one, I'd need to look up whether or not that would trigger a need to recirculate the MND. uh, |
| 02:48:38.20 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:48:38.23 | Sergio Rudin | person. Now there's a minor correction that we need to make in measure GH1, and I'm hoping I can find it if somebody can point me to the right page number. |
| 02:48:40.19 | Unknown | There's a |
| 02:48:51.46 | Kieran Culligan | Thank you. |
| 02:48:51.56 | David Marlatt | page. |
| 02:48:56.27 | David Marlatt | Page 3-39. 3-39. |
| 02:49:04.01 | David Marlatt | I'll back off with the whole thing. This is more to protect the applicant from having something imposed on them that they cannot comply with. |
| 02:49:11.73 | Andrew Junius | Well, I think to some extent, let's keep in mind that the CEQA process and all these documents are disclosures. To the extent there's an inaccurate disclosure that doesn't make sense, I don't think there's going to be much harm there. |
| 02:49:20.65 | David Marlatt | Okay. and I'll just stick to the hearing date. |
| 02:49:26.26 | Andrew Junius | I think we're fine to move forward then. So we had a motion by Chair Saad, a second by Commissioner Luxembourg, Sergio. I'll accept. |
| 02:49:33.78 | Nastassya Saad | I'll accept the amendments for the June 25 change. |
| 02:49:38.39 | Andrew Junius | Exactly, obviously correcting the typo there. I think we're fine to move forward. Sergio, you are? We're good. We're not making any other changes. Great. All right. We have a roll call, please. |
| 02:49:48.62 | Director Phipps | Absolutely. Commissioner Luxenberg. Yes. Commissioner Merlot. Yes. Commissioner Moore. Yes. Vice Chair Junius. Yes. |
| 02:49:50.76 | Andrew Junius | Yes. Yes. Yeah. you Thank you. |
| 02:49:55.52 | Director Phipps | Chersan. Motion passes unanimously. |
| 02:50:00.28 | Andrew Junius | All right, now for the more fun part. You know, I'm sure Sergio will be watching and listening closely as to the kind of things we're thinking about asking the developer and applicant to do here. I'm just chairing the meeting at this point. I don't have any interest in making changes. I can make all the design review findings. I do hope that we can get to some resolution on whatever the, you know, the commissioner's desires are so that we can make all the findings. I think that is very important, notwithstanding the fact that we are also subject to a lot of heavy state laws that prevent us from making changes to the project. So let's try to walk that line and, you know, thread that needle. Commissioner Marlott, why don't you give it a go. |
| 02:50:15.19 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:50:15.30 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:50:15.31 | Unknown | THE END OF THE END OF THE |
| 02:50:41.47 | David Marlatt | Mr. Marlott, why don't you give it a go. Okay, yeah, and actually then I have a test case, a question for Sergio. I know that we are supposed to be applying objective standards to this. We can have design review, but in theory those design reviews follow objective standards. So if we were to hypothetically have a condition 14 under the general conditions that said something to the effect, applicants shall work with staff to better articulate building massing through application of finished materials and additional variety of parapet heights. Is that too subjective to pass muster under state law? I'm not suggesting adding cost. So I agree, by the way, but I don't know. |
| 02:51:29.43 | Sergio Rudin | The problem there, primarily, I think, is not that that kind of condition would violate the Housing Accountability Act in this instance, given that this doesn't meet the requirements for being considered a housing development project for very low, low, or moderate income housing. Um, I do think that you can impose conditions of approval making, you know, those kinds of design modifications. The issue is, is, One, I, When the planning commission acts, it needs to take a final action on this project. So, ultimately this project is not going to be coming back to the planning commission for your review of you know design modifications or material changes And typically the way that you would enforce conditions of approval is at the building permit stage and staff would verify compliance with any sort of design or material changes the planning commission wants to impose. So to the extent you want to make that kind of condition of approval, it needs to be with some specificity. And I would suggest it be more specific than what you had just suggested. |
| 02:52:42.40 | David Marlatt | Okay, so in that case, opinion that's problematic because I'm really opposed to designing from the dais. I would love to empower staff and not have it come back to the commission. I'd like our definitive direction to staff is, you know, the architects understand what articulate means and they have questions they can ask, not come back to us. But if you're saying that that's too indefinite, too undefined, and then I won't, I won't bother my colleagues with the motion. |
| 02:53:15.17 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, I mean, my concern is the potential for a dispute or disagreement between staff and the architect as to whether or not that condition has been met. In terms of the way that I normally recommend conditions of approval be drafted, I, normally do recommend they be drafted with a a pretty significant amount of certainty with respect to compliance. |
| 02:53:41.78 | David Marlatt | Okay, so I understand that we're not necessarily in violation of HAA, but of best practices. Yes. Okay, so then it becomes more of a decision for the fellow commissioners. |
| 02:53:47.55 | Unknown | Yes. |
| 02:53:52.95 | David Marlatt | about that. Thank you. |
| 02:53:54.11 | Andrew Junius | I think, sorry. |
| 02:53:55.51 | David Marlatt | Now go ahead. |
| 02:53:55.55 | Andrew Junius | No good. |
| 02:53:57.34 | David Marlatt | I had some other more or less simpler conditions too |
| 02:54:01.49 | Andrew Junius | Commissioner more do you have something to add to this specific issue? |
| 02:54:05.32 | Fred Moore | Well, I personally appreciated Commissioner Marlott's suggestion. And it seems to be if there were if the. |
| 02:54:14.67 | Fred Moore | boundary was to work with the city staff and agree to the agreement of the planning director that that would essentially if they agree they agree if they don't agree they don't agree we can give them a certain time period to agree if they can't agree with that time period then the existing plans stay so that would at least have the applicant the opportunity to work with planning director for some time period and if the applicant decides after whatever reasonable time period is Thank you. applicant the opportunity to work with planning director for some time period and if the applicant decides after whatever reasonable time period is that they disagree and aren't going to make any changes because they don't agree with city then they can stay the course with what the current plan is that at least allows me to follow up with what the applicant said that they are not necessarily opposed to the idea of doing some material color articulation to lessen the massiveness of the project, which I think goes back to many public comments. that. it may or may not be consistent with what usually you would see in Sausalito. So I'm hoping that with those additions to Commissioner Marlott's suggestions, you think that's, tight enough to not be subject to some challenge or changing the plans. |
| 02:55:38.35 | Sergio Rudin | I think that that sort of concept could work. Um, In terms of suggested language, again, I think Um, You already have conditions of approval specifically approving this design and requiring So this is condition of approval number three, stating the project shall be designed and constructed as shown in the set of plans, you know, with that specific date. |
| 02:55:57.10 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 02:56:06.57 | Sergio Rudin | And then there is language there that says the community development director is authorized to administrative approve minor modifications to the approved plans. So again, that is something that the CDD already has under the code. And I would. probably suspect that unless the commission imposes specific conditions of approval related to materials, colors, et cetera. Those are the sort of minor modifications that the community development director can approve. So you can include in that condition of approval direction to Um, the applicant and architect to submit suggested modifications to be approved as part of that process. |
| 02:56:55.66 | Jeffery Luxenberg | I was going to raise the same thing on number three. So my concern is that three says they have to build it to the plans, and then you can have minor modifications. Some color and other items like that I wouldn't call minor modifications. So I would encourage us to be to Attorney Rudin's suggestion about specificity that we say that the community development director is authorized to administratively approve minor modifications to approve plans, which can include some changes of color, guest parking, and those things. So that normally I would say that those would be outside of minor modifications. But in this case, we don't want to design it from the dais either. And I want to second Commissioner Moore's earlier comment that it would have been nice to have a study session on this so we could address those issues before we're looking at final plans and trying to design from the dais. So for future projects, we can do that. But I think here, because I would not say changing colors is a minor modification, but I think if we can add it to this number three, it might meet Attorney Rudin's specificity requirement and at the same time allow what the applicant has already said that they're willing to do so uh to look at and you know uh and obviously they make huge changes it will come back to us as it always would but anyways those are my thoughts |
| 02:58:10.93 | Unknown | me. |
| 02:58:27.88 | Andrew Junius | Those are my. |
| 02:58:33.70 | Andrew Junius | I'm pretty agnostic to this issue, so I'll let you guys continue to fight it out. I mean, if that's acceptable to the city attorney, I've got no issues at all. We can just get the wording right. |
| 02:58:44.94 | Nastassya Saad | And I'd appreciate that, Commissioner Luxembourg, what you said. I would... be in favor of that. |
| 02:58:52.24 | Andrew Junius | And I think I heard the director typing frantically. So we're basically going to be the amendment we're batting around up here is adding to the last sentence of condition three. that says something to the including, or in addition to, the I forgot. |
| 02:59:11.13 | Director Phipps | Thank you. I'm happy to take a stab. Go for it, yeah. The community development director has authorized to ministerially approve minor modifications to approved plans, including but not limited to changes to color and changes to parking design. Guest parking, right, yeah. |
| 02:59:13.56 | Andrew Junius | the, |
| 02:59:28.12 | David Marlatt | I wouldn't limit it just to color. I mean, color, materials. Thank you. |
| 02:59:31.75 | Director Phipps | including but not limited to. We're down limited to. If you'd like to be more specific about all of these specific things, we can do that too. I think that that would be fine. |
| 02:59:45.26 | David Marlatt | Yeah, I mean, I guess we can come to a consensus around that as long as the intent is that the applicant can continue to work with the director, staff, and the director to further articulate the building massing. you feel like it captures that intent? |
| 03:00:04.52 | Director Phipps | I think if you would like to capture that intent clearly, it should be stated clearly. |
| 03:00:08.60 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, so I think I would suggest that the language be ending that condition with including changes to building articulation, materials and colors to decrease appearance of building bulk and changes to parking and guest parking layout. |
| 03:00:39.89 | Andrew Junius | All right. I'm good. |
| 03:00:40.18 | Unknown | I'd pay with you. |
| 03:00:41.21 | Andrew Junius | Great. I'm looking at the applicant as well. Is that, are you following this? Are we all pretty clear that that's not going to be an issue? Okay, good. |
| 03:00:42.61 | Unknown | I'm... |
| 03:00:51.53 | Fred Moore | anymore. Do we need to put, I mean, going back to your earlier comment, do we need to put a time limit on those discussions so the applicant's not hanging out there for months and months and years and years because they haven't come to an agreement? |
| 03:01:09.00 | Sergio Rudin | Um... Well, as as written, the the the condition wouldn't direct the applicant to submit changes to the approved plans. So if you want her to do that, You know, I would Also add a sentence before that that says that the Applicant shall propose and the Community Development Director shall review changes to the approved plans to increase articulation, |
| 03:01:42.11 | David Marlatt | like. as well as the materials. |
| 03:01:43.27 | Sergio Rudin | as well as the materials and colors to decrease appearance of building bulk. |
| 03:01:51.12 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:01:51.14 | David Marlatt | Right. |
| 03:01:52.74 | Andrew Junius | And staff shall respond within X days, to Commissioner Moore's point, 30 days, 45 to 30 days. We're going to go with 30 days. |
| 03:02:05.26 | Director Phipps | I've noted 30. |
| 03:02:07.25 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Right. |
| 03:02:07.47 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 03:02:07.52 | Jeffery Luxenberg | here. |
| 03:02:07.59 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 03:02:07.61 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Thank you. |
| 03:02:10.25 | Andrew Junius | All right, I think we're getting there. |
| 03:02:11.86 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Commissioner Marlach had one minor change to the description of the language, I thought. So whatever. |
| 03:02:16.53 | Andrew Junius | like. |
| 03:02:18.37 | David Marlatt | Well, I think we've come into the right language. I had said to better articulate building massing, but I think we've covered that. I think we've covered that. |
| 03:02:27.00 | Andrew Junius | And I'd also, I'm sorry, do you have anything else? I'm also going to, I hope, get some support for this. There was the option to sub in a couple of California live oaks at the front of the project as opposed to olive trees or whatever. I think oak trees are what, all over Sausalito, they're beautiful when they get mature. I think I'd love to see a couple of oak trees instead of olive trees where they could be subbed in. I hope that's not an issue. |
| 03:02:28.28 | David Marlatt | Thank you. |
| 03:02:57.30 | Andrew Junius | Anybody like to say that? |
| 03:02:58.13 | Nastassya Saad | Let's share, Junius. May I? counter that only in the issue of height. So we all love the oaks, but I just wonder if because when they are mature, they have a big canopy and they can grow quite large versus the olive tree. if that can potentially prohibit some of the you know, impact the view of the properties that are being created. |
| 03:03:26.31 | Andrew Junius | Fair point. I mean, that's 40 years from now. I mean, they don't grow that fast, and the buildings are already pretty tall. And we're talking about trees in front of the buildings, so I don't know. It was a minor point. |
| 03:03:37.18 | Nastassya Saad | Can you describe to me where they're placed necessarily? Maybe that's my... |
| 03:03:40.62 | Andrew Junius | We can honestly, it's late. We can drop that. I thought that would be an easy one, but we can leave the we can leave the olive trees there. That's fine. Okay. Do we have a motion on the floor to? |
| 03:03:48.03 | David Marlatt | We have a book. Well, speaking of trees, I had one, hopefully this is minor as well. In the applicant's description of the project, they noted that they were going to be planting trees in the right of way. And it says the project owners will maintain these without cost to the city of Sausalito in their intent. I'd like to suggest that in our finding 11, we simply add the last sentence, which relates to trees. Trees planted in the right of way shall be maintained and replaced if necessary by the building owner. I feel like that's just. you know. codifying what they've already offered to do. |
| 03:04:23.08 | Andrew Junius | or which condition? |
| 03:04:23.92 | David Marlatt | that. Finding Allah. Finding or? Finding. Finding, OK. |
| 03:04:29.81 | Kristen | the fire. |
| 03:04:30.20 | Sergio Rudin | THE END OF THE END OF THE |
| 03:04:30.47 | Kristen | Thank you. |
| 03:04:30.91 | David Marlatt | Yeah, I couldn't. Well, we can make it a condition, I guess. |
| 03:04:33.51 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, it would need to be a condition if that's what you are. |
| 03:04:35.84 | David Marlatt | Thank you. Wow. |
| 03:04:37.30 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah. |
| 03:04:38.37 | David Marlatt | Thank you. I'm just concerned that they're going to plant trees in the right of way, and that becomes the city of Sausalito. |
| 03:04:45.49 | Andrew Junius | Yeah, it's the city's street, and it'll be the city's trees. Yeah, I would like that. |
| 03:04:48.86 | David Marlatt | I'm taking out the city's trees that are there now. |
| 03:04:52.22 | Andrew Junius | Are there street trees coming out? I wasn't clear. |
| 03:04:54.74 | David Marlatt | I thought. |
| 03:04:55.66 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:04:55.75 | Kristen | Thank you. There's no. |
| 03:04:56.91 | Andrew Junius | There are no street trees. They're all on the property. |
| 03:04:57.91 | Kristen | No. Sergio, does the city pass the responsibility for the right of the way in front of their property to the property owner? |
| 03:05:05.52 | Sergio Rudin | Um, Thank you. Thank you. So under our municipal code, |
| 03:05:08.30 | Unknown | under. |
| 03:05:09.99 | Sergio Rudin | The maintenance of the sidewalk is a responsibility of the abutting property owner in all instances throughout the city. The exception is the municipal code says that the city shall be responsible for repair of sidewalks damaged by city street trees. In general, trees that are planted as a, you know, and dedicated to the city become City Trees. But, There is an encroachment agreement here. There are facilities that are being constructed to facilitate this project, including an ADA parking spot, as I understand it, and other landscaping improvements. And again, just because they are in the public right of way does not necessarily mean they are the city's obligation to maintain. So I do think actually a condition of approval indicating that trees that are planted in the public right of way shall be maintained by the property owner as a condition of approval is appropriate for this project. |
| 03:06:15.47 | Andrew Junius | I'm still not supportive. Sorry. I'd like this owner to be treated like everybody else with respect to the frontage. I don't see why this would be any different. It's also a condition that God only knows how long it'll take to remember it. And so I'd be very much in favor of just moving forward without that condition. |
| 03:06:33.66 | Jeffery Luxenberg | I actually like that condition. I think that condition, given the huge setbacks and the amount of right-of-way and the amount that the city's giving to do these encroachments, that this is different than just a simple project because there's a lot of landscaping going into this right-of-way, I mean into the encroachment areas, because it's setbacks so much. So I don't see any reason not to put that condition in. I could support that condition. |
| 03:07:03.20 | Nastassya Saad | report that condition as well. |
| 03:07:06.73 | Fred Moore | Well, is it the assumption that all of the improvements within the encroachment, both on Bridgeway and Filbert, are going to be maintained by the Homeowners Association? And that seems to be consistent with the project plans, that that was always the intent. So if we do add the condition, I think it needs to include all the improvements within the encroachment areas, which would include the sidewalk, transformer, landscaping, all of that. |
| 03:07:35.94 | Andrew Junius | But I think, don't we already, didn't the city attorney just tell us that that's already on them? I mean, nobody, this is another one of these rules where you walk all over Sausalito, the sidewalks are a mess, and nobody's fixing them except when the city can get around to fixing them. So nobody's following this rule. I just think to make this property owner have a special burden that isn't burdened on every other property owner with frontage in Sausalito that's not taking care of their sidewalks just seems a bit odd and unfair. But, again, I think it's a minor problem. |
| 03:07:57.34 | Unknown | And... |
| 03:08:05.86 | David Marlatt | Well, I also think they're getting a very unique privilege. I mean, it's a big encroachment with transformers and trash enclosures. There's a lot of privilege going as well. And they are removing all the trees and having them maintain the trees that are in the encroachment I don't feel is unreasonable. |
| 03:08:24.36 | Andrew Junius | But the encroachment isn't really changing, right? I mean, the sidewalk is basically in the same place it was before. So technically and legally, you're right. But if you walk down the sidewalk, you would never think that the property where all those junky cars are sitting is part of the city property. |
| 03:08:39.97 | David Marlatt | as part of the city property and trash enclosures, transformers that serve them privately. They're benefiting privately. |
| 03:08:44.86 | Andrew Junius | Right, and they're setting the building back, and there's a lot of benefits to that. So they're not setting it back. |
| 03:08:47.12 | David Marlatt | So they're not setting it back. They're setting it exactly on the property line. There's zero setback from the front property line. There's a right of way that's 39. |
| 03:08:54.29 | Andrew Junius | I totally get it, but for the city to take advantage of and use that encroachment area would create an extremely odd situation, right? I mean, it's just not usable, and it's never been usable, and it's just not, you know. I'm just trying to point out the reality of it is, yes, there's an encroachment agreement. Yes, they're going to get some benefit of it, and they've had that benefit, and they've been using that property for eternity. and again to treat somebody differently we grant encroachment permits all the time I just don't know why this one's that different and why we why they wouldn't just be treated like every other person that gets an encroachment from it |
| 03:09:10.17 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 03:09:10.21 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 03:09:18.68 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:09:18.69 | David Marlatt | Right. |
| 03:09:18.90 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:09:31.08 | Sergio Rudin | Thank you. And I actually on this subject to |
| 03:09:31.72 | Andrew Junius | And I, |
| 03:09:34.49 | Sergio Rudin | So the encroachment agreement does include conditions that they shall maintain their constructed approachments in a good and safe condition, free from nuisance. So that the encroachment agreement does, and our standard terms for encroachment agreements do shift that. Every encroachment agreement is the same way. |
| 03:09:43.87 | Unknown | And they, |
| 03:09:49.44 | Unknown | Every person. |
| 03:09:50.03 | Andrew Junius | Yeah. agreement say that, right? So we don't have any. |
| 03:09:53.14 | Sergio Rudin | Yes. The only issue is in terms of the description of the encroachments, |
| 03:09:54.18 | Andrew Junius | Yeah. |
| 03:09:58.94 | Sergio Rudin | Thank you. It does not specifically identify the trees and I I would suggest that the issue of tree ownership and maintenance be clarified in the approval of this project, in part because of future concerns over liability with regards to the city as to what happens if that tree falls down. |
| 03:10:19.29 | Andrew Junius | I'm fine with that. Let's move on with that. If we just add the trees to the encroachment permit, I'd be good there. There's no other reason why. Everything else is the same. They're already required to maintain the facilities. |
| 03:10:29.49 | David Marlatt | Yeah, I think part of the encroachment permit. Yeah, I think that's all. |
| 03:10:33.16 | Andrew Junius | Okay. |
| 03:10:34.31 | Jeffery Luxenberg | I would suggest we do the trees and landscaping to the encroachment agreement. |
| 03:10:34.36 | Andrew Junius | I'm not. |
| 03:10:40.32 | David Marlatt | Sure. |
| 03:10:41.43 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Whatever |
| 03:10:41.97 | Andrew Junius | Okay. |
| 03:10:43.98 | David Marlatt | Yeah. OK. |
| 03:10:44.47 | Andrew Junius | Okay. Okay, did anybody make a motion? |
| 03:10:45.87 | David Marlatt | Oh. |
| 03:10:50.09 | Andrew Junius | Do I have a motion to approve the project? |
| 03:10:52.20 | Jeffery Luxenberg | I'll make a motion to approve the project as described in the resolution in the packet with the addition to the language that we've already talked about, the number three, and the language, the additional language to the recommended approach agreement that's going to the City Council. |
| 03:11:11.81 | David Marlatt | And correcting the June 25th hearing date. |
| 03:11:14.32 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. Thank you. Brandon, we clear on all that? Make sense? You got it. |
| 03:11:21.27 | Director Phipps | Yes. Vice Chair, would you like me to read back the specific language, the more robust condition? On number three, sure. Go for it. Just to make sure we're all gidor-y. Okay, very good. The applicant shall propose and CDD director shall review modifications to approved plans to increase articulation and improve upon material and color selections to decrease the appearance of building bulk, as well as changes to parking and guest parking layouts. Staff shall respond to these proposals within 30 days. The CDD director is authorized to ministerially approve such proposed modifications to approve plans, including what I stated at the outset, changes to building articulation, materials and colors, to decrease appearance of building bulk, and changes to parking and guest parking layouts. |
| 03:11:55.08 | Andrew Junius | Bye. |
| 03:12:05.07 | Jeffery Luxenberg | I would add to that and the rest of the language that was there and other minor modifications. I don't think we changed that. If there's something that's not in there that's minor, we haven't taken that away from. |
| 03:12:14.53 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 03:12:14.60 | Director Phipps | Thank you. |
| 03:12:14.62 | Andrew Junius | I don't think we just want to. |
| 03:12:15.04 | Director Phipps | THE END OF THE END OF THE |
| 03:12:15.21 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 03:12:15.22 | Director Phipps | Yeah. |
| 03:12:19.63 | Director Phipps | Great. Are we okay with it? And other minor modifications as deemed appropriate by the community development director? or something. |
| 03:12:26.61 | Jeffery Luxenberg | Well, it already says that. But he read what he was replacing what was there with that, and he took out the minor modification. All right, fine. |
| 03:12:27.05 | Director Phipps | Thank you. |
| 03:12:27.09 | Andrew Junius | Thank you. |
| 03:12:28.24 | Director Phipps | Thank you. |
| 03:12:33.11 | Andrew Junius | All right. Yes, of course. |
| 03:12:36.60 | Sergio Rudin | Thank you. |
| 03:12:39.64 | Director Phipps | Very good. |
| 03:12:40.98 | Sergio Rudin | And I would, I do, unfortunately I noticed one other issue that we do need to correct in the resolution. um, in Section three of the resolution says that the encroachment agreement is approved. But rather, instead, that should be deleted from the list of permits that are approved and you should add a sentence that says the planning commission recommends the approval of the encroachment agreement with a modification to the list of permitted encroachment to expressly include the street trees. |
| 03:13:19.96 | Jeffery Luxenberg | And landscaping. Thank you. |
| 03:13:21.04 | Sergio Rudin | landscaping |
| 03:13:27.01 | Sergio Rudin | And also that the planning commission makes the findings required by 10 56. So 60. |
| 03:13:36.51 | Andrew Junius | 10-56-0-60 is not in section three, right? So we need to add that? Yes. Okay. So. Brandon, you got that? Got it. Okay. That's important. So section three covers everything we need to cover, right? Yes. Yes. |
| 03:13:51.23 | Sergio Rudin | Yes. With those modifications, I do believe that that section three would cover everything that needs to be covered. Thank you. |
| 03:13:59.09 | Andrew Junius | Great. Okay. Grosement agreement, tree removal, vesting tentative map, and design review. Got it. Okay. All right. So with that, we had a motion from Commissioner Luxembourg. Yes. And do you have a second? I will second. All right. Commissioner Marlott seconded. Any further comments? Roll call, please. |
| 03:14:10.73 | David Marlatt | I will second it. |
| 03:14:16.61 | Director Phipps | Commissioner Luxenberg. Yes. Commissioner Merlot. Yes. Commissioner Moore. Yes. Vice Chair Genius. |
| 03:14:17.96 | Andrew Junius | Yes. Yeah. Yeah. |
| 03:14:22.87 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 03:14:22.88 | Director Phipps | Cheers, son. Yes. Motion passes. Thank you. |
| 03:14:27.51 | Andrew Junius | you |
| 03:14:27.69 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:14:28.17 | Director Phipps | Congratulations. |
| 03:14:28.99 | Andrew Junius | Congratulations. Do I have a motion to adjourn? |
| 03:14:32.74 | Director Phipps | So moved. Thank you. |
| 03:14:34.97 | Andrew Junius | We're done. Thank you, everybody. Appreciate it. |
| 03:14:37.19 | Director Phipps | Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Vice Chair, Commissioners, staff, members of the public, applicants. Have an excellent evening. |