To: Honorable Mayor and City Council Date: August 3, 2026 From: Andrea Sanders, City Clerk
Subject: Desk Item 8.1 – Public Comment
This desk item 8.1 includes public comment related to a public hearing to consider of an interim ordinance implementing AB 450 as modified by AB 1061.
MEMORANDUM City of Campbell
City Clerk’s Office
From: Gary Wiesehahn
To: Clerks Office
Subject: FOR PUBLIC COMMENT Item 8.1
Date: Monday, August 3, 2026 11:59:25 AM
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________________________________
To Whom It May Concern,
I support the amendment to apply the same, simple setback rules already used for houses to smaller structures such as detached garages, garden structures, etc.
Thanks very much.
Sincerely,
Gary Wiesehahn
From: SAM RIAD
To: Clerks Office
Subject: FOR PUBLIC COMMENT -- Item 8.1 -- Support for Updated Objective Design Standards Date: Sunday, August 2, 2026 6:46:43 PM
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Dear Mayor and Members of the City Council,
I am writing to you as a Campbell resident to express my support for Agenda Item 8.1.
Adopting updated, clear, and uniform objective design standards brings needed clarity for property owners while aligning our local code with state law under SB 450 and AB 1061. Clear, predictable rules serve residents better than case-by-case discretion, and they still fully preserve the character of our neighborhoods.
I encourage the Council to vote yes on adopting the interim ordinance.
Thank you very much.
Samir Riad
From: David Galvin
To: Clerks Office
Cc: Sergio Lopez
Subject: FOR PUBLIC COMMENT - August 3, 2026 Agenda Item 8.1: Interim Ordinance Implementing SB 450 (2024) as Modified by AB 1061 (2025), Section 14 (Accessory Structures) Date: Thursday, July 30, 2026 10:41:07 PM
Attachments: Petition in support of accessory structure.pdf Attachment in support of item 8.1 Section 14 accessory structures.pdf Some people who received this message don't often get email from [email protected]. Learn why this is important
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To the Honorable Mayor and Members of the City Council, We are residents of Sheffield Avenue, and we are writing to submit public comment on Item
8.1, the continued public hearing to consider adoption of an interim ordinance superseding Interim Ordinance No. 2321, implementing Senate Bill 450 (2024) as modified by Assembly Bill 1061 (2025). We write specifically in support of Section 14 (Accessory Structures) of the proposed ordinance.
Attached please find a case statement describing our own experience with the current code's inconsistency between primary and accessory structure setback standards, along with a petition signed by 21 neighbors expressing their support.
We have reviewed the proposed ordinance language, Section 14 (Accessory Structures), and it appears to directly address our situation: accessory structures would be required to meet the same setback standards as primary structures, and would no longer be restricted by position on the lot.
We respectfully ask that the Council adopt Section 14 as proposed, and confirm that this language remains unchanged in the final adopted ordinance.
Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely,
David and Gina Galvin
THE CASE FOR THE ACCESSORY STRUCTURE STANDARDS
AMENDMENT
A Sheffield Avenue Story -- Submitted in Support of Item 8.1, Section 14 (Accessory Structures), August 3, 2026 What the Amendment Actually Says
The proposed accessory structure standards amendment includes the following provisions relevant to our situation:
• Streamline accessory structure standards by removing separate design and placement requirements and clarifying that detached garages, sheds, and similar structures are subject to the same setback rules as primary residential buildings, resolving inconsistencies created by implementation of State laws. • Establish a process for homeowners with single-family homes built under older Planned Development permits to make additions or exterior changes when the work complies with current objective residential standards.
A Neighborhood Built for a Different Era
Our home, like most on Sheffield Avenue and Sheffield Court, was built in 1963, during a specific and well-documented period of Santa Clara Valley history. Campbell incorporated as a city in 1952, largely to manage the rapid conversion of orchard land into residential tracts as the postwar housing boom accelerated. Homes from this era were financed through GI Bill and FHA-backed mortgages and built for a workforce commuting to aerospace, defense, and early technology jobs. The design priority was simple: the garage and driveway dominate the front of the home, and no covered porch or street-facing social space was included, because the design never anticipated residents spending time outside greeting neighbors.
That priority has reversed. Families on our block are no longer a transient commuting population; many of us have lived here for decades, and more of us work from home or are retired than at any point in this neighborhood's history. The car-centric design that once matched how people lived here now works against how we actually live today. Our homes were built for a different era's use, and the way we use our properties has changed even though the rules governing small accessory structures have not.
A Tradition the City Already Says It Values
Since March 2020, many of us on Sheffield Avenue and
Sheffield Court have kept up a weekly tradition we call "Happy Hello": an informal Thursday gathering, alternating between driveways, with folding chairs, food, and
conversation. What started small has grown to include
neighbors from Phantom Avenue and Cronwell Drive as well, with attendance regularly running fifteen to thirty people.
Happy Hello, Sheffield Avenue: a recurring weekly
tradition since 2020.
Campbell's own General Plan recognizes exactly this kind of neighborhood connection as a civic goal, not an incidental nicety: the Land Use and Transportation Element calls for neighborhoods to have "a central focal point that serves as a place for gathering and interaction" (General Plan, Land Use & Transportation Element, p. LUT-25). Happy Hello is our block's own answer to that goal, built entirely informally, in driveways, because our homes were never designed to provide a proper place for it. A small, open garden structure set back from the street is not an unusual or self-interested request; it is exactly the kind of small-scale neighborhood infrastructure the City's own planning documents already say they want to see more of.
This is not just our own sense of things. Eighteen neighbors signed a petition at a recent Happy Hello gathering expressing their support, people who know the block, know the tradition, and want to see it continue to have a real place to happen.
A Rule That No Longer Fits Either Era
This is where the accessory structure standards amendment matters directly. Current code treats a small garden structure, such as the gazebo we were preparing to request through a separate variance application, more restrictively than it treats the primary residence itself, for reasons that have nothing to do with distance from the street:
The kind of structure current code treats more restrictively than the house itself.
The City's own setback standard for primary residential structures is twenty feet (CMC 21.08.050, Table 2-4). The same code section that governs accessory structures, CMC
21.36.020, already permits them to sit as close as ten feet to the rear of a home, or five feet to its side, confirming that modest separation distances are considered entirely adequate for structures of this kind. Yet a small, open, unenclosed structure sited in the front yard, however far back from the street, is currently barred outright, not because of its distance from anything, but purely because of its position relative to the house. That is an inconsistency, not a safeguard.
Aerial view of our property; the yellow circle marks where the gazebo would be sited, well behind the garage line.
California state law reinforces this same principle, and Campbell has already accepted it once. The City's own Accessory Dwelling Unit ordinance (CMC Chapter 21.23) states as its baseline rule that accessory dwelling units satisfy the same setback requirements as a primary dwelling, then layers a narrower, state-mandated exception on top: under Government Code Section 65852.2, a qualifying detached ADU, a full, independently habitable residence with its own kitchen and bathroom, needs only four feet of separation from the rear and side property lines. That is a more lenient rear and side standard than Campbell's own code already applies to a mere garden accessory structure under CMC 21.36.020.
The City has already accepted the principle that accessory structures do not need excessive separation to be safe and appropriate; it has simply never extended that same objective, distance-based logic to smaller, unoccupied structures like ours.
This distinction is not just a matter of degree; it is close to arbitrary. Had the exact same structure been built attached to the house, as a covered patio addition rather than a freestanding gazebo, it would be evaluated under the primary structure's own setback rules, the same twenty-foot standard already discussed, and would not need a variance at all. The only reason a variance is required here is that the structure is detached rather than attached, a difference in construction method, not in appearance, distance from the street, or any of the substantive concerns a setback rule is meant to address. In practice, the only way to avoid a variance under current code would have been to redesign our home's facade and roofline to physically attach a covered structure to the house, essentially adding a porch. That kind of construction is costly and disruptive, tearing into an existing roofline and structure, and it defeats the very purpose an amendment like this should serve: encouraging small, modest, low-cost neighborhood-connection features, not forcing homeowners into major remodels just to sidestep a technicality.
This amendment does not change any primary-structure setback, alter the streetscape, or add density anywhere in Campbell. It applies only to small, secondary structures, garden gazebos, sheds, and similar features, that are already required to sit close to the home itself.
So long as an appropriate setback is maintained and curb appeal is not sacrificed, it should not matter whether a structure's purpose is utilitarian or purely decorative. The real issue here is not use or appearance at all: a rule that regulates position alone makes an entire portion of otherwise usable yard inaccessible, no matter how well anything placed there might be designed. Campbell's own code already permits small, well-designed decorative arbors in the front yard by right, without any variance, confirming that a modest, attractive structure has never itself been the concern. In our own case, the existing facade is dominated by the garage door, and a small, open-lattice structure set well back from the street would serve as a visual complement to that expanse, not add to it.
Under the current framework, resolving that inconsistency for one property requires a formal variance:
an estimated $6,000 in cost, a four-to-six month approval cycle, and, even if granted, additional requirements such as scaled drawings and a case-specific justification for why one block differs from another. None of that expense or delay protects any genuine safety, privacy, or planning interest. It exists only because the accessory structure standard was never updated to match the same objective, distance-based logic already applied to the home itself.
What We're Asking For
We support the accessory structure standards amendment because it fixes this inconsistency for every resident who runs into it, not just for us. Applying the same objective setback standard to accessory structures as to primary structures is a small, common-sense change, and for a neighborhood that has built something genuinely valuable out of a design the rules never anticipated, it would remove an unnecessary obstacle to something Campbell's own planning goals already recognize as worth encouraging.
We respectfully ask the Council to adopt this amendment on August 3.
From: Tracy Hsu
To: Terry Hines; Sergio Lopez; Dan Furtado; Elliot Scozzola; Anne Bybee; Clerks Office Cc: Daniel Fama; Rob Eastwood
Subject: concerns on objective zoning standards
Date: Thursday, July 30, 2026 5:43:13 PM
Attachments: C00.pdf
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Dear Council Members:
On October 30, 2024, we submitted a proposed parcel map for 1121 Hazelwood Avenue under Application No. ENG-APP14506. At the time of submission, the proposal met the City’s requirements for an SB 9 lot split.
However, the City’s objective zoning standards changed effective January 1, 2025.
Under the revised standards, our proposed parcel map cannot be approved because the rear property line is not straight. The new standards effectively limit SB 9 lot splits to rectangular properties.
The property at 1121 Hazelwood Avenue is irregularly shaped because it is adjacent to a creek and one of its rear corners is absent. Due to these existing site conditions, the property is now ineligible for an SB 9 lot split. The proposed parcel map is attached for your reference.
I respectfully urge the City Council to consider revising the objective zoning standards at its upcoming meeting on August 3 to allow irregularly shaped lots to qualify for subdivision, provided that the proposed parcel map otherwise complies with all applicable SB 9 requirements.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
Sincerely,
Tracy Hsu