City Council Meeting Page 1 of 43 August 28, 2023
7 City of Lafayette
City Council Minutes
Lafayette Library and Learning Center – Don Tatzin Community Hall August 28, 2023 3491 Mount Diablo Boulevard, Lafayette, California 6:00 p.m.
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City Council Meeting Page 2 of 43 August 28, 2023
Mayor Anduri called the Regular City Council meeting to order at 6:00 p.m.
2. ROLL CALL
Present: City Council: Mayor Anduri; Vice Mayor Dawson; Councilmembers Candell, Gerringer, and Kwok
Absent: None.
Staff Present: Niroop Srivatsa, City Manager; Greg Wolff, Planning and Building Director; Sonia Urzua, Assistant Planning and Building Director; Renata Robles, Senior Planner; Arly Cassidy, Senior Planner; Nichole Zittel, Assistant Planner; Suzanne Iarla, Communications Analyst; Mala Subramanian, City Attorney; Joanne Robbins, City Clerk
3. Disclosure and/or Take Action on Remote Participation due to Just Cause or Emergency Circumstances Pursuant to AB 2449 (Gov. Code section 54953(f).)
4. ADOPTION OF AGENDA
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Candell/Gerringer) to adopt the agenda. Vote: 5-0 (Ayes: Anduri, Dawson, Candell, Gerringer, and Kwok; Noes: None).
5. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE – Jeff Gilman led in the Pledge of Allegiance.
Communications Analyst Suzanne Iarla provided an update regarding maintenance of the HVAC system in the building, said they ran into some technical glitches and presentations and those participating in Zoom will only be visible on the screen behind the City Council, and they have had issues with the microphones.
6. PUBLIC COMMENTS – (For items not on the agenda) – None.
7. PRESENTATIONS
A. Chris Bachman, Assistant Fire Chief, Contra Costa Fire Protection District Update on Fire Prevention Measures and the Impact of New County Fire Ordinance on Lafayette Residents
Recommendation: Receive and file.
Assistant Fire Chief Chris Bachman, CCFPD, gave a PowerPoint presentation regarding the Con Fire regulations update. What has changed since last year is their new County fire ordinance which is done every 3 years. In order to make amendments to the 2022 code, they had to create Fire Code Ordinance 22-034. This ordinance provides local amendments to the 2022 Fire Code.
One of the biggest change from the previous Fire Code Ordinance 2019-37 was removal of Section 321.
This was the exterior fire hazard control section which covers their weed abatement process and exterior hazard control and fuel break requirements. What that did not include was anything about defensible space inspections. They were hearing from contractors was not every Fire District across the County was consistent. Therefore, they came up with the same or similar language throughout all Fire Districts. For the most part, the requirements are the same which were implemented.
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They removed Section 321 because they did not feel exterior hazard control belonged in a Building Code standard but in a stand-alone ordinance that deals with exterior hazard and defensible space. They added more clarifying language and clarified standards to be compliant with weed abatement and this is why the exterior hazard defensible space is longer than Section 321.
Regarding questions he was asked ahead of time, Section 4; Sale or Transfer of Property, this is not a local requirement, but they included this, and it refers to AB 38 inspections which are only required in the very high fire severity zone currently. They did not call this out, but this is the only place they are requiring it.
The reason they did not call out very high fire severity zone is because the State may not require AB 38 inspections to not only be in the very high but also in the high fire severity zones. This is why they did not include it because the ordinance would still be a valid ordinance and they would not have to modify it. It was more about cleaning up the language and making sure they had a consistent Countywide Fire Code Ordinance across jurisdictions.
Regarding program updates, Assistant Chief Bachman said they now have the Contra Costa County Wildfire Mitigation Program. This is a countywide program and CCFPD is overseeing this program which is funded through Measure X with $2 million annually for mitigation work. The reason they like to keep encouraging this and asking residents to use the QR code is because this is a community-driven approach.
It includes City staff, Firewise communities, Fire Safe Councils, and neighborhoods coming up with proposals to submit to grade. The way it works is that City staff or neighborhood would apply for one of the programs and indicate they would like the CCFPD to consider this. It goes to the local fire department which grades that program 1-10. As they move around the County with Crew 12 which is the mitigation contractor, they are hitting all 10’s first, then 9’s and 8’s, etc. There is a question on the application that asks whether the individual spoke with anyone in their local fire department, and if so, who. This way, they can reach out to get input from and ensure they assign the proper grade to it.
The programs consists of community chipping days, evacuation route fire truck cleanup, Firewise strategic plan projects, the Home Hardening Outreach Program is about ready to go live, Low Income Exterior Hazard Control which is another new program which is capped at $1,500 worth of work, and removal of dead trees, shaded fuel breaks, and vegetation fuels management reduction programs are all currently in place and have had a good success rate.
They currently have 66 projects in the queue that have applied but they have not gotten to yet. There are another 39 projects completed. He is encouraging all fire districts and residents to ensure they are aware of these programs and are getting information about it.
Councilmember Candell thanked Assistant Chief Bachman for his presentation and the Fire District’s approach and work. She asked if the City can do anything about enforcement to enable more work to be done.
Assistant Chief Bachman said they will be going out doing defensible space inspections. One question he has heard in the past from residents is identification and removal of dead trees. He believes 50 dead trees have already been cut down this year and some residents will ask if they need a permit. Some cities require permits, and some do not, so he asked to ensure City staff is aware of this program, and they will need to work on this process with City staff.
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Councilmember Candell asked if people understand what is being asked of them and suggested a version with fewer words and pictures, so it is simple to understand what is okay and what is not okay.
Assistant Chief Bachman stated they have a defensible space tri-fold handbook that shows the different scenarios of the different zones and requirements. They also have a flyer on fuel breaks, and he can email that to Councilmembers and City staff so it can be put on the City’s website. They are also open to suggestions and said they have 2 full-time staff members who work in education and create the flyers to make it as easy as possible for residents to understand.
Councilmember Kwok said with the Maui wildfires in the news, he thinks it is timely to look at what they can do in the community to prepare and educate themselves on how to reduce risk in their own homes.
He referred to the ordinance attached to the agenda which he believes the Board of Supervisors passed around April 3rd and became effective May 3rd. He asked if this was the second section Mr. Bachman presented.
Assistant Chief Bachman said the first line item was the Fire Code update, which went into effect on January 1, 2023, and the exterior hazard defensible space ordinance was adopted in April and went into effect the beginning of May. They used to be under one ordinance, but they broke them out because every 3 years they would need to go back and update the ordinance. Sometimes cities would not get this ratified until April, and while the Fire Code is still in place, potentially they could go several months without having that enforcement mechanism.
Councilmember Kwok referred to the second ordinance which he found to be proactive and said it looks like it applies to everyone and not just those selling their homes. Assistant Chief Bachman said this is correct for weed abatement standards which is CCFPD-wide. With the defensible space requirements, because Section 1 where it says “authority” they reference the state statutes that call out the difference of when defensible space is required and when it is recommended. Currently, it is only required in the very high fire severity zones. New mapping is coming out and areas will expand. There is also discussion of 7-A requirements where, when people are in very high fire hazard severity zones, they must build to 7- A standards. This could expand to the high fire severity zones, and there is discussion that the defensible space could expand, as well. So, they are following the Cal Fire model of where it is required and where recommended, but here is a standard to do it and do it safely.
He confirmed the ordinance applies to both city and unincorporated areas and in either scenario weed abatement is across all CCFPD jurisdictions. The defensible space requirement is across all jurisdictions but only in the very high fire severity zone as a requirement. It is recommended everywhere.
Councilmember Kwok thinks the City could work with the 2 staff members to address the requirements, participate in the educational programs, and could coordinate with CCFPD to get the word out.
Mayor Anduri referred to Section 4 which is whether the house transfer requirement applies in the very high fire severity zones he asked how this is working out with homeowners and realtors. Assistant Chief Bachman said they believe it is working out and are seeing a good number of requests. The big concern was whether it would slow the sale of the home, and they are not seeing that. The turnaround time is between 7 and 14 days for inspections to be done. There may be situations where it is not compliant at the sale, but the new owner understands what the new requirements are and any deficiencies they are willing to accept.
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Mayor Anduri said Assistant Chief Bachman mentioned the shaded fuel breaks and asked where they exist now and those that have been approved and will be in the process, such as the Rossmoor.
Assistant Chief Bachman said the Rossmoor is the large one and they are working through the biological surveys and all of the required paperwork they need to submit to the state, notices they must send out, and evaluation of the area to ensure it will not have any negative environmental impact by its installation.
They specifically picked the majority of the 14-mile fuel break to follow mostly fire trails because it is a lot easier to build it off of 100 foot wide from the trail rather than cut through the woods. In some areas they need to locate a chipper to chip in place. Other areas they will haul the materials out, and some areas they will stack for pile burning. They will have to evaluate that depending on locations as they move around almost 200 acres that will be impacted by this. Some areas will be addressed with goat grazing and some with cattle grazing, and some with just hand work and mechanical work. They must identify all of these areas and be specific to the state, so it is transparent. They expect to break ground sometime in November. They have identified they have a couple of months of paperwork and studies to complete, and he received an updated timeline with material to pass onto cities impacted by this.
Mayor Anduri opened the public comment period.
DAVID KLUG voiced concern about the accumulation of branches and debris near the Lafayette BART Station. He was not sure how many people at the south entrance use it, but he has used it for 46 years and many things required are not being maintained properly including many lights at the station. There was no cleanup after the winter storms and the whole area is ripe for a major fire. He has contacted BART but got nowhere with them, contacted the fire abatement number twice and no calls were returned, contacted the Fire Marshal’s office and no calls were returned, so he questioned if anyone cared whether there is a large fire. He thinks many homeless people stay there because he sees small alcohol bottles and he would like to have this addressed.
Councilmember Candell asked about the jurisdiction process for the BART lots.
Assistant Chief Bachman said since it is within their fire protection district, it is technically BART’s land, and they need to comply with requirements. They get the same requests where there are railroad lines or Caltrans. They do not immediately send them a notice for abatement to say they need to abate it, or the district will abate it for them, but they have contacts at all of these types of facilities and have been very successful in getting items abated. If Mr. Klug contacted their office, he apologized and recommended sending an email to [email protected] which goes to a specific person that checks every morning, and the email is forwarded to the appropriate division. He said he will obtain Mr. Klug’s contact information and ensure there is follow-up.
Mayor Anduri and Councilmembers thanked Assistant Chief Bachman for his presentation.
B. Sarah Yoell, Local Government Affairs, PGE
Steps PG&E is Taking to Prevent Wildfires, Including Enhanced Powerline Safety Settings (EPSS) and Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS)
Recommendation: Receive and file.
C. Aaron Johnson, Regional Vice President, PG&E and Sarah Yoell, Local Government Affairs, PGE Update on Recent Power Outages
Recommendation: Receive and file.
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Sarah Yoell, Local Government Affairs Manager, acknowledged the disruption recent outages have caused and reliability in Lafayette has been unacceptable and said PG&E fell short on their responsibility to the City. As they work to strengthen the system and improve reliability, the Council’s feedback is critical. They had a Town Hall last week with attendees from Lafayette and Moraga. They have and will continue to take steps to improve reliability in the community. She introduced Aaron Johnson, Vice President for the Bay Area Region. She said she will provide the Community Wildfire Safety presentation and what they are doing to prevent wildfires, and then Mr. Johnson will address what they have done to address liability issues in Lafayette.
Ms. Yoell then gave a PowerPoint presentation regarding reducing wildfire risk in Lafayette and their enhanced power line safety setting, public power safety shut-offs and their vegetation management work, recent outages and efforts to improve reliability, and highlights of customer resources and support.
Aaron Johnson, PG&E’s Regional Vice President, said he has accountability and responsibility in 5 operating divisions in the inner Bay Area. He echoed apologies for service levels and what Lafayette residents have experienced in the last month and one half. He also thinks their communication as outages occurred was sorely lacking in terms of being proactive to help customers understand what was going on.
He emphasized the enhanced power line safety settings, which is a quick turnoff for power lines. They found it has been far more successful to date in reducing ignitions on the PG&E system across 48 counties than the amount of money spent on tree removal and aggressive tree trimming.
PG&E will continue to do routine tree trimming similar to what they have done for years, will back off tree removal which is expensive and has 7% reductions in ignitions as compared to the 68% reduction in ignitions in the system. They see a lot of promise in this program and the challenge is that it can lead to more outages. He spoke of their responsibilities in outages, better steps to conduct proactive notification, and said they do not have the answer with the problem on this circuit. They believe there is a defect in the system which is not showing itself and it is masking where the problem is on the circuit. They have done a series of visual inspections which he described, and they suspect the problem is in the underground circuits. There have been 7 outages on that circuit starting in early July.
PG&E has also taken steps to remove customers on those circuits and switch them on an alternative circuit. They have transferred about 1,300 customers with 800 left and unfortunately this means the problem is less likely to show itself, but it is a trade-off. He also said they have installed 14 fault indicators on the circuit which will give a better sense of where the defect is, they fine-tuned the safety settings from those faster than 1/10th of a second to 1/10th of a second, have done some tree trimming and patrols around the overhead line, and added a sectionalizing device on Moraga Road to keep outages shorter and narrow where the outage is.
In conclusion, Mr. Johnson encouraged the signing up for alerts and emails which is important for customers, said they are working aggressively with Ford and GM on bi-directional charging for electric vehicles to turn the car battery into a battery that will provide 2-3 days of power for a home in it, and the key will be that the charging device will also works as a circuit breaker on the grid.
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Vice Mayor Dawson thanked PG&E officials for coming to Lafayette, and said it sounds like 800 customers will still have unannounced outages happening. She asked how PG&E will narrow down the outages for those 800 customers. She said this is also occurring in other communities, and she asked if PG&E has found parallels to what is happening in those communities and possibly narrow down what is occurring in Lafayette.
Mr. Johnson said his strong desire would not be to dig up streets in Lafayette in search of a mystery outage on that line. They will continue inspections and look for any visible sign of the defect. In terms of hardening and undergrounding, they are looking to publish the plan for the 10,000 miles of undergrounding. They have 2 years of short-term planning available on their website, their goal is to get published by the end of the year what their 10-year roadmap is for where they would be doing undergrounding. The priority will be in the most wildfire-prone areas.
Going forward, he would expect to see the Sierra Foothills will be areas they will be starting and concentrating on the work. In this area, they are concerned with egress which is challenging for data scientists to quantify. They have worked to introduce this into the risk models they use which largely have been developed from a company called Technosilva that supports Cal Fire and the U.S. Forest Service.
Vice Mayor Dawson said it sounds like the triage for the 800 customers will be done after other areas are assessed and she would like to hear that PG&E is prioritizing them. It also sounds like the 800 customers have had 7 outages in the past month, and she asked if customers would be compensated similar to what occurred in Moraga, given the significant impacts.
Mr. Johnson said for Lafayette his objective is to find the cause of the outage on the circuit and repair it, so it is functioning. They cannot rebuild every circuit where they have had multiple EPSS outages. Even getting the people to do that would be difficult to achieve. If they cannot find the reason, they will have to rebuild portions of it, but he is still optimistic they will find the challenge on the circuit, and it will operate as intended. There may be storm outages, the occasional EPSS outage of short duration, but 7 outages should not occur in a 30-day period. They have continued to patrol the circuit, have the fault indicators in place, so he is optimistic that if there was another outage, they would have a better sense of where to start looking for that. In the meantime, their engineers are running additional tests and they are doing additional patrols. His local superintendent in the Diablo Division and the distribution engineer who sets the settings and does the planning work both volunteered to be at the open house, which is unusual.
Regarding refunds, they have a standard program they put in place when outages are driven by their equipment. The program begins at 24-hours and bills for outages longer than 24 hours. But they do not do refunds on outages less than 24 hours, and he confirmed it is not cumulative.
Vice Mayor Dawson said this would be something to consider, and she asked and confirmed Mr. Johnson would be the person to contact for this. She thanked PG&E representatives for their presentation.
Councilmember Candell thanked PG&E representatives for the open house. She asked how close of an area PG&E knows an outage occurred. Mr. Johnson said there is about an 8-mile section of lines, some of which are overhead and some underground. Somewhere in that area is where the outage is located. They have junction boxes and have looked in every one of them and it is highly unusual for a trained professional not to find some visible clue that should allow them to test a piece of the line.
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Councilmember Candell said the things she heard from that night is it is not the fact that the power outage happened but how long it takes PG&E to recover from these. She asked why they could not just retry it or asked if there was a better way to recover from these. This could avoid a lot of inconvenience.
Mr. Johnson said the early version of this program was called a reclosure shut-off program because they have that technology on the circuit. Most outages are momentary, lights flicker for a second, and what has happened is something happened where a tree branch may have hit the line, a squirrel or bird touched the line, and this causes a momentary outage and then it is gone. The equipment will test back in seconds, see if the line is good, power will come back on, and they do not do anything. There are a number of wildfires that have started from utility equipment where there was a branch on the line and the equipment tests back in. It shoots a bolt of energy back into that. If that line is broken it could lead to sparks which can then lead to wildfire. It is exactly the technology that will turn the power back on more quickly in these instances that they are hesitant to use in fire conditions. In wet storm conditions these are turned off, and if one outage happened in December after a good rain, this is what the system would do, and they would not do the full patrol they do on the lines. Nine times out of ten the equipment comes back on, and they do not need to send someone out, or a crew or helicopter to physically patrol the lines.
In this instance and because of fire risk, they will put physical eyes on that section of line before turning it back on. They have helicopters on stand-by every day to do those patrols as quickly as possible.
Vice Mayor Dawson asked why PG&E decided to do the EPSS as opposed to insulting wires. Obviously, there is a high instance of the wires being compromised along with the equipment failing. It seems like they could have cut the percentages in both of those areas by just doing hardening. She knows it is expensive, but when looking at reliability issues, she asked if this is a possibility for the places they cannot figure out.
Mr. Johnson said it is something they are looking at. For them, the issue is how to cover 25,000 miles of distribution lines that are vulnerable to a potential cause of ignition as quickly as possible. He would make the analogy of paving 25,000 roads to repave, which is a bit of an effort and will take a while. They think almost 80% to 90% of the risk in their lines is in about 10,000 of those lines in high fire threat areas which are the riskiest and is closest to people and property. So, this is the thinking behind the 10,000 miles of undergrounding, and this is the program that protects communities until they can get the massive infrastructure lift completed, which will take time.
They also do overhead tree wire which they have used in a number of places, and they will continue to do that in certain communities. At this point, this would be an option from his perspective if they cannot find the challenge here. His distribution engineer believes the problem is likely in the underground tap lines that come off of the main line, but they are not 100% sure about this. But this is where their focus is at the moment.
Mayor Anduri said he appreciates PG&E representatives coming to the meeting and taking responsibility for the 2 areas identified as shortfalls. He asked to confirm that PG&E is taking specific steps to improve their proactive response and to improve responses to calls and emails that come from Lafayette residents when they experience this sort of outage. This is the significant complaint that he heard; that they reached out, could not get a hold of anyone, and no one responded.
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Mr. Johnson said on any given outage, their call center will potentially have information but not sufficient information for a constituent. There are a series of steps they have in place that should have been followed here where they are doing proactive communication. They did all those steps, but it was far too compressed and far too late. Things like posting on NextDoor and using social media, direct email to customers with specific information about what is going on and not just a generic message, and then a community meeting. All of these steps should have happened sooner, and they would rather spend their energy solving the problem, but if they can communicate better up front then a community might not be needed. In this day and age, if you can proactively communicate to people about the state of things they would appreciate it much more.
Mayor Anduri asked and confirmed that there are proactive steps being taken now by PG&E. Mr. Johnson added that they are looking at all circuits in the Bay Area and if there are additional outages on this particular circuit, they will be communicating directly through those email lists with this group of customers because they have experienced far too much already.
Mayor Anduri opened the public comment period.
PHILIP LEE thanked Councilmembers and PG&E for attending the meeting. He rarely comes to these meetings, but this is too important to pass up. Some of the information has been addressed, but he and his family have lived in Lafayette for over 30 years, live in a cul-de-sac off Moraga Road, recently experienced 8 unannounced power outages over a 4-week period lasting anywhere from 1 to 6 hours. It is because one of the PG&E servicemen doing a scheduled maintenance at Campo Linda College forgot to notify people he was going to turn off the power. One of the outages burned one of their computers and PG&E did not forewarn them of any of these outages. They learned later on there were 2,100 households affected by this, and they learned the sudden outages were the result of PG&E adopting a new fire mitigation strategy. Instead of doing vegetation management, they would crank up the sensitivity of the EPSS automatic shut-off mechanism. So, this means every time a squirrel or branch hits the power line or the slightest disturbance they will lose power. He has been in Havana, Cuba where they have more reliable power than the here.
The portion of Moraga Road in question is a 1 ½ mile stretch from St. Mary’s Road to the border with Moraga. They have above-ground wooden poles and lines that weave through trees crossing the roadway multiple times. They have experienced people hitting poles and branches/animals affecting the lines for a long time, and he suggested simply burying the lines below ground. This is only 1 ½ miles and the expense of such a project is negligible compared to the $25 billion PG&E’s CEO have already allocated to undergrounding power lines. PG&E was originally awarded its monopoly power as a power supplier for the sole purpose of providing reliable power to the community, so he asked how could it be that the only solution now to protecting the community against fire risk is to not provide power. PG&E has been collecting utility charges from houses in their grid for over 75 years now, so it is time for them to invest some of that money back in neighborhoods’ ancient electrical infrastructure by burying the lines.
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ANTOINETTE SIGUENZA, Local Government and Community Liaison for CPUC, said the CPUC regulates services and utilities and ensures Californians have access to safe, reliable, and affordable utility services and infrastructure. The CPUC regulates energy, transportation, telecommunications, and water. In her role as a community liaison for the CPUC, she can provide information on how to resolve issues with utilities, how the CPUC wants and needs your voice to help ensure that the CPUC’s decisions reflect all Californian’s concerns and perspectives, how to stay informed on CPUC proceedings and events, and how the CPUC works with and for communities. She wanted to share that if someone has a problem with their utility bill or service, the Consumer Affairs Branch (CAB) can help. There are three ways to contact the CPUC; call the complaint hotline 1-800-649-7570, www.cpuc.ca.gov/complaints, or write CPUC Consumer Affairs Complaints Branch at 505 Van Ness Avenue, San Francisco 94102.
The CPUC oversees and monitors enhanced power safety shut-offs during the oversite of the investor in utilities. There is a joint CPUC/Office of Energy Infrastructure safety workshop on these fast trip and unplanned outages on March 17th. There is a two-day public briefing pre-season utility public shut-offs.
There will also be a post season reporting out. The CPUC is monitoring the data.
City Clerk Robbins announced a brief internet outage.
Mayor Anduri thanked Ms. Siguenza for being here and with the program. He said a good booklet is available which Ms. Siguenza has made available in the materials for the meeting tonight on the City’s website.
LIBBY HENRY thanked Ms. Siguenza for her contributions and hopes the public will be able to access CPUC program information. She lives on a private lane off of Happy Valley Road and about 2 years ago PG&E conducted an assessment and let her know they were coming. They have hired subcontractors for tree services 4 times in the last 12 months and not one single time have they been informed they were coming.
It is a single lane road, a very steep hill with hairpin turns, she has a 91-year-old neighbor who would need emergency access fairly quickly, and the subcontractors have blocked the road for days with no notification.
Often, the subcontractors pretend to not speak English. On 4 times there was a different tree service each time and she finally got someone from PG&E to talk with her. The last time, most egregious was the fact that they said they are not cutting down trees anyone, but they cut down 4 trees, one of which was a very well-established oak tree that was supposed to be protected. It is all private property, and the tree was not even close to touching power lines so there seems to be a huge disconnect between the tree service and PG&E. There are many private lanes in Lafayette, and she questioned why her street was getting so much attention. She asked to be notified in the future if and when any work is proposed to happen.
BOB MCCLAIN said he thinks PG&E can do a better job setting the expectations. In the wintertime when storms come, people know they will lose power and the City Council does not hold meetings. If people know they will lose their power for 2 hours the City Council and others could be home watching baseball at home instead. In talking about the EPSS is a bit of a red herring. It is great to know about it, but it is unknown as to how long the shut off will be, and this is driving people being upset. He is doing a remodel in Moraga right now and he has had painters and trim guys sitting around for 4-6 hours. He cannot send them away and has spent about $3,000 out of pocket to pay people to do nothing so it has a direct impact financially.
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He also questioned what would be different in winter conditions and non-EPSS. They would still have long outages, there could still be a branch that hits a line, and so it is the same issue and he asked what the difference is between standard conditions and EPSS other than the line does not restart or cycle through.
CAROL REIF, said they have experienced all of the outages for various amounts of time. What she has heard tonight does not give her any confidence that her home will not experience continued outages.
They are still within the 800 people who are losing power. Her family visited from Baltimore with 3 kids, had a lot of food in the refrigerator and freezer, was worried about it going back, and she was sure others had medical issues impacted by this. She does not have confidence in PG&E that their approach is going to solve the problem. She is an architect, built a house 30 years ago, said this residential area has experienced constant power outages, and much of it has to do with vulnerability of the poles along Moraga Road.
KAREN HAWKINS thanked PG&E for acknowledging that communication has been less than optimal.
PG&E displayed a pie chart that showed outages and it was broken down by 1/3 was due to winter storms, 1/3 was from equipment, and 1/3 was from EPSS. She would like to see that 1/3 EPSS further broken down. In all marketing materials, if a tree hits a wire, PG&E will turn off the power. The 4 outages in 2022 for EPSS were equipment-related. She knows this because she spent 1 ½ hours on the phone she will never get back going through her account with PG&E, and they know the 7 outages are not from the same branch hitting the wire. They are equipment issues. She would therefore like to see the EPSS numbers broken out and asked PG&E to be more transparent. People are reasonable. She understands there are technology issues and asked to actually get back to people and indicate what the outage was caused from.
She asked that text alerts be sent that includes more information on what the outage is due to.
MICHELE GREER said PG&E’s net income for the 12 months ending June 30, 2023, was $1.944 billion, an 816% increase year over year. She is not trying to start a riot at City Hall right now, but she is assuming with the heat in the room, it is somewhat appropriate for the visitors.
CHERYL MACDONALD thanked Mr. Johnson for coming. One Councilmembers made a comment about compensation for the hours with power loss. She did not think it had to a flat 24-hour period to be compensated. She is in the downtown area and was affected by many of the 7 or 8 outages, and if they occur over and over again, residents should also be compensated. She also agreed PG&E’s communications needs to be greatly improved. She called PG&E to see what was happening and got a recorded message saying there is an outage in her area but there was no one she could talk to. They ended up having to talk with neighbors. She hopes PG&E will communicate with all affected.
Mayor Anduri asked if PG&E members wished to respond to any comments.
Mr. Johnson said a number of people indicated various hardships and financial burdens that had come from those outages. PG&E does have a claims process and he would encourage customers to pursue that process which are reviewed on an individual basis. They will follow-up specifically with the customer not receiving notifications about tree-trimming around her property because this is not the way it is supposed to happen. In terms of transparency around the outages, all 7 outages are of unknown cause from EPSS circuits. They do an after-the-fact review and if they do not find the cause they will follow on later to understand if there was something missed. The majority of outages from EPSS are a combination of their vegetation, equipment related, or animals.
City Council Meeting Page 12 of 43 August 28, 2023
Vice Mayor Dawson thanked Mr. Johnson for addressing the claims information. Restaurants and other businesses have lost money, as well as contractors, and there are medical impacts. She reminded everyone that Ms. Siguenza with the CPUC is a good resource to lodge complaints, knows the Council is expecting to return with other Council questions, and hopefully this challenge will be resolved.
Mayor Dawson thanked PG&E representatives and Ms. Siguenza with the CPUC.
8. CONSENT CALENDAR
Mayor Anduri asked if there were removal of items, and Vice Mayor Dawson requested removal of Item A. He asked and confirmed there were no public comments or requests for removal of items. Mayor Anduri thanked everyone who worked on the Local Roads Safety Plan and was happy to see it adopted.
B. Resolution 2023-48 Adopting the Local Road Safety Plan Recommendation: Adopt Resolution 2023-48.
C. 2022 Rain Garden Project Number 014-9722 - Final Acceptance of the Construction Contract Recommendation: Accept the construction contract with GradeTech Inc. as complete and authorize staff to file a Notice of Completion for the 2022 Rain Garden Project Number 014-9722.
D. Professional Services Agreement with Scientific Art Studio for Phase 1 Design Consulting Services for Leigh Creekside Park and Gazebo Park the Two Park Collaborative Concept Recommendation: Authorize the City Manager to execute a professional services agreement with Scientific Art Studio for Phase 1 design consulting services for Leigh Creekside Park and Gazebo Park the Two Park Collaborative Concept.
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Gerringer/Dawson) to adopt Consent Calendar Items B, C, and D. Vote: 5-0 (Ayes:
Anduri, Dawson, Candell, Gerringer, and Kwok; Noes: None).
9. OLD BUSINESS – None.
10. STAFF REPORTS – None.
11. PUBLIC HEARING
A. Arly Cassidy, Senior Planner
GP02-23 Safety Element Update: City-initiated update of the General Plan Safety Element to analyze and improve the City’s preparedness for and resilience to local hazards related to drought, wildfire, hazardous materials, flooding, inundation, landslides, and climate change.
CEQA Determination: Pursuant to the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), the City, as lead agency, prepared an Addendum to the Housing Element Environmental Impact Report (EIR), analyzing impacts from the Safety Element.
Recommendation: Adopt Resolution 2023-44, adopting the Addendum to the Housing Element EIR and 2023 Safety Element Update.
City Council Meeting Page 13 of 43 August 28, 2023
Senior Planner Arly Cassidy said tonight’s hearing will serve as the second review of the Draft Safety Element for the City Council. She provided a background of its review by the Planning Commission and City Council, small edits made, and said staff is bringing an updated draft for consideration with a resolution recommending approval. The staff report also includes an Addendum of the Housing Element EIR which finds the proposed Safety Element is consistent with the Housing Element and finds its potential environmental impacts are within the scope of those addressed in the Housing Element EIR.
Staff asked the Council to focus attention on the 2 questions in the staff report; 1) Were all comments provided by the City Councilmembers correctly captured in the draft; and 2) Are there any final changes or edits needed to the draft Safety Element and, if so, can these edits be implemented by staff without further review by the Council. She introduced consultant Eli Krispi from PlaceWorks.
Eli Krispi, PlaceWorks consultant, gave a brief presentation on edits made to the Safety Element and stated staff’s recommendation to adopt Resolution 2023-44, adopting the Addendum to the Housing Element EIR and 2023 Safety Element Update.
Mayor Anduri opened the public comment period, and there were no speakers.
Mayor Anduri proposed revisions on Program 4.1.9 on page VI-54 stating he had submitted language to Mr. Krispi, Con Fire who came back with suggestions, and he is happy with what came back except he would like to add after “….through the use of technology, including satellites.” Mayor Anduri said another edit relates to a revision that went to Con Fire and he is happy with how they revised it. However, when they sent it back, they said they were happy with the language crossed out, “including through the use of aerial firefighting equipment” and asked to keep that in.
Mayor Anduri said there was a description of how other agencies had been cooperating and the Council indicated they wanted something in there that would develop a program to make sure they are communicating with other agencies. The language was inserted in 4.4.6 on Page 56. He thinks the language was intended to be in 4.4.8 which is “Coordinate with EBRPD, Caltrans, PG&E, EBMUD to undertake vegetation management programs.” This is where they want to say to consult with these external agencies on the best way to create a collaborative relationship.
Councilmembers agreed to these proposed changes.
Councilmember Kwok said he wanted to observe that this update from the 2002 Safety Element was an incredible amount of work. As he read through hundreds of pages, there is significant effort in every paragraph and appreciates the amount of thinking that has gone into this element. As a wider observation, in the 20 years since the last safety element, he thinks risks have escalated significantly and the climate crisis has changed in what residents’ face from living here. If he were to predict the next two decades with continuation of this trend, there will need to be a lot of preparatory work. This is a framework, he hoped for its implementation which will lead to hopefully guiding everyone, and he thanked staff and the consultant.
Councilmember Candell echoed Councilmember Kwok’s comments. She referred to Figure S-8 on page 27 which is the Cal Fire Historic Wildfire Burn Areas. It has all of the major fires, but it only goes to 2010.
It seemed the fire on the hill should be included and asked why it was not.
City Council Meeting Page 14 of 43 August 28, 2023
Mr. Krispie replied that Cal Fire data only includes fires of 50 or 100 acres or larger. So, if smaller than that threshold, it would not have shown up.
Vice Mayor Dawson echoed comments and thinks the fire is a very real risk because it was a PG&E electrical fire from infrastructure. She thinks it would be important to capture that history. It is mentioned in the policies and programs, but she thinks in the historical data it would be important to capture it.
Mayor Anduri asked Mr. Krispie if there is a way this can be incorporated. Mr. Krispie said they can look at options to include it, whether through a map or acknowledge it in the text similar to how they did with the Contra Costa Sheer Zone.
Councilmember Gerringer echoed comments and thanked staff, Mr. Krispie, GPAC, and the community for their input. It shows that it is inclusive and that a lot of input and comments were heard and added.
Mayor Anduri agrees completely and suggested a motion.
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Kwok/Gerringer) to adopt Resolution 2023-44, adopting the Addendum to the Housing Element EIR and 2023 Safety Element Update, as amended. Vote: 5-0 (Ayes: Anduri, Candell, Dawson, Gerringer, and Kwok; Noes: None).
BREAK
Mayor Anduri called for a 5-minute break, and thereafter, reconvened the regular meeting at 8:09 p.m.
B. Greg Wolff, Planning & Building Director; Renata Robles, Senior Planner; Diana Elrod, Housing Consultant
GP01-23 Housing Element & EIR – The City of Lafayette 6th Cycle Housing Element and the Environmental Impact Report (EIR) analyzing impacts of growth stemming from the housing plan and housing opportunity sites identified to accommodate the mandated Regional Housing Needs Allocation of 2,114 assigned to Lafayette, plus a buffer, which total approximately 3,000 new housing units between 2023-2031. The Housing Element is also required by State law to contain programs to Affirmatively Further Fair Housing. The draft Housing Element Update can be found at www.planlafayette.org; the draft and final EIR can be found at www.lovelafayette.org/CEQA.
Recommendation: Conduct the public hearing, provide direction to staff on the revisions to the opportunity sites inventory and other Housing Element revisions made to date. Continue the matter to September 11, 2023.
Mayor Anduri stated the Council is considering the Housing Element update, and it is important to keep in mind they will focus on 2 aspects of the update; the first is meeting the City’s RHNA obligation and second, their AFFH obligation. New programs to meet AFFH obligations will not help them with RHNA numbers, so he asked not to conflate the two. The only place where there is an overlap is with a potential change to zoning for churches. For example, if they allow up to 4 units in an existing building, that will not help the City with its RHNA numbers but will help them with AFFH obligations.
City Council Meeting Page 15 of 43 August 28, 2023
Director of Planning and Building Greg Wolff introduced the item and stated staff received a late letter this afternoon from one of the property owners from Desco Plaza which is one property identified in the staff report as potentially coming out. The letter expressed interest in building housing on one of the Desco sites. Staff have not had an opportunity to review that, make any revisions to the presentation, but this can be brought back to the Council at a future meeting. Public comments received up until 12 noon today were uploaded to the website and distributed to the Council.
Mayor Anduri said he assumes staff will discuss RHNA and AFFH. When opening public comments and questions from the Council they will cover both. But he is intending to first discuss AFFH and then discuss RHNA.
Senior Planner Renata Robles gave a PowerPoint presentation and said before the Council are revisions to the adopted Housing Element based on comments from HCD in their March 29th letter. She will provide a summary of the meeting with their new HCD reviewer in July and background on technical assistance received from Veronica Tam Associates. They will also review the current status of the AFFH programs and review potential modifications to the Opportunity Sites Inventory as outlined in the staff report.
Staff is looking for direction from the Council as to whether to include church parcels in the Housing Opportunity Sites Inventory, whether to include the DeSilva South site in the inventory and proceeding with additional CEQA review in response to the AFFH programs and/or changes to the Opportunity Sites Inventory and seek feedback on any other changes the Council wishes to make.
She then reviewed the Housing Element revisions as outlined in the staff report. Veronica Tam Associates has provided assistance through ABAG, and she has worked with jurisdictions throughout California to receive certification. Ms. Robles stated at this time there is no specific deadline to submit revisions to HCD and staff is working expeditiously. All edits are summarized in the staff report which includes page citations, and all changes are made in track changes, as well. There are sections untouched that will need to be changed based upon Council’s direction.
Ms. Robles then presented and described AFFH Programs, said after the July meeting the Short Term Rental program was proposed for removal and it is not shown in the listing or the appendix, she then described public comments relating to church sites, their locations throughout the community, the Council asked for the program to be further developed using 30 du/acre, said staff reached out to several religious institutions and a letter of interest was received from Our Savior of Lutheran Church on Carol Lane with their intention to pursue housing development on their property in conjunction with retaining their existing uses. Staff met with the school district but there was no momentum to date.
Regarding conversion of single-family residences to be split into 2 to 4 units within ¼ mile of the downtown boundaries, there was a request for a map with roadways and parcels identified. One item included in the draft program was consideration for evacuation-constrained or properties within high fire zones north of the freeway, and this would be reviewed for criteria in the implementation of the program.
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Ms. Robles lastly described a program proposed to require a range of unit sizes on a project-by-project basis since that can impact affordability. It involves less than going outside of the downtown area and more with working the mix within a project. The Council directed staff to meet with other communities relating to implementation and staff met with 2 other communities that resulted in a mix of units occurring. The City Attorney raised at the July 10th meeting there is a potential for an SB 330 conflict as this could be perceived as a reduction in how many units can be produced. A technical assistance session was scheduled with the HCD Accountability Unit who then encouraged staff to pursue an incentive route as it could further constrain development, and staff drafted the program included in Appendix G.
Diana Elrod, housing consultant, provided a brief historical background of the Opportunity Sites Inventory, best practices to have a 15% buffer for very low and low income units to avoid future rezoning, the modification for pipeline projects and ADUs which is a reorganization of where it shows up in the inventory, a change from the 90% along Mt. Diablo and 95% everywhere else to 88% in the yield of what is realistic development, site eligibility criteria which creates objectives against which to evaluate each site, and revision of the inventory to show the modified opportunity sites at 88% yield. These changes result in some losses of units to the inventory such that additional actions must be taken.
Some alternatives to meet RHNA would to include DeSilva South with no change in densities downtown, DeSilva South and a broader increased densities downtown to meet the RHNA allocation, include DeSilva South and increase densities further to meet the RHNA allocation, and an alternative not flushed out yet about using religious and institutional lands to meet AFFH. There is a possibility they could use these lands if they track SB 4 language to meet part of the RHNA allocation which is the decision the Council must make.
In terms of pipeline projects and ADUs both have been separated from the opportunity sites because they do not need to buffer the ADUs or pipeline projects.
In terms of site eligibility criteria, this figures into why some sites may have fallen off the list. HCD has repeatedly required objective documentation to justify the sites the City has included. From the letter, the description of existing usage is generic and must include sufficient detail to facilitate an analysis of the potential for additional development on under-utilized sites. They want to see indicators such as age of structure, vacancy, improvement to land value ratio, etc. What this has meant is in consultation with Veronica Tam, who has been very involved with Southern California Housing Elements and getting them certified (she also helped Los Altos Hills and San Ramon get certified), staff has reverse engineered the site’s criteria.
Based on conversations with HCD staff, they are happy with this analysis. They specifically want to see proffer sites are undeveloped or have vacant buildings on them or there are parcels that have current developer/owner interest in redevelopment for housing, as a first cut, then no other site criteria have to be applied. If neither one or two apply to a particular site they must have at least 3 of the following attributes: 1 sites containing a limited improvement such as parking lots, storage, existing FAR less than
0.6, existing uses that are similar to uses that have been recycled, age of structure, 30 years or more for most but 20 years for retail and commercial units, things that are single story buildings, and improvement to land value ratio of 1.0 or less. Some sites may be slightly more than that but generally this is what HCD is looking for.
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Ms. Elrod said when staff originally reviewed this, they had to remove Desco Plaza because it did not meet enough criteria, specifically because of very high improvement to land value ratios which tells us that there has been a lot of rehabilitation on these projects. For Site 3.1; the AT&T site, they reduced that site from 1.28 acres to .6 acres because they can only consider the land in front of the switching station and not the switching station itself. Oak Hill West Site 3-2B was removed because there were 4 owners for 5 parcels and around 19 existing housing units there. So, the relocation obligation would be high, and they could not justify figuring out a way to split the sites in half and to have 2 and 2 owners. They would still never recover the number of units in any other way. The Masonic Lodge was removed because they received a letter demonstrating they had no intention of redevelopment at any time.
The other modifications that do not affect unit count or income distribution was Blackwood Lane. They split it into 2 sites because there were too many owners. This is 2 owners for each of the 2 sites. The Methodist Church at 949 Moraga Road was split into 2 sites because of the very significant grade change.
With the opportunity sites modified which includes removal of all of Desco, at 88% capacity, reduce the area of the AT&T site, remove the Oak Hill West site and the Masonic Lodge, they went into negative territory. They have an overall buffer for low and very low income of -12% so they will not be able to overcome this with HCD. It is the same with moderate income units, although the City might be able to make that up in other ways, but this scenario does not do it for them.
Regarding options, they include the DeSilva South site but with no change to the density downtown that gives them a negative very low-income buffer and 4% overall for lower income. The next option is putting in DeSilva South, which increases the downtown beyond what the City Council already approved. They are still at a negative in the very low-income buffer, but the overall lower income buffer goes to 7%.
DeSilva South and a broader increased densities downtown gives them a 3% VLI buffer and 13% overall for lower income, and if they exclude DeSilva South and add even higher densities to meet RHNA in the downtown this has an identical result which is 3% very low buffer and 13% overall. The last is religious and institutional lands. They did not originally discuss this as something to meet RHNA but offered this as an opportunity to find out about it. A preliminary review is that it would meet RHNA, but the buffer will not be a lot, but it could be helpful depending on how it was structured.
Ms. Robles suggested skipping through the subsequent slides that provide more detail on each of these options which are identified in the staff report.
Mayor Anduri agreed. He said when getting to the RHNA discussion, he will recommend the comment on the ADU and development yield, the opportunity site changes, and that they defer discussion on the alternatives until they can get more definition on whether they can include Desco or not because that changes everything, and then come back and discuss that.
Ms. Robles said as a result of the potential changes from the AFFH programs which expand beyond the geographic boundaries of the study areas included in the Housing Element EIR, additional environmental review will be required as well as if, in the future, changes to the Opportunity Sites Inventory occur and changes in densities occur, they may also need to review the EIR additionally. Staff anticipates the review even for the AFFH programs may take a couple of months, and it is their hope that if the Council feels comfortable they could provide direction to staff to begin environmental review at least on the AFFH programs if they are in a sufficient state to do so, given the lead times on the work and timelines to keep the movement towards certification going.
City Council Meeting Page 18 of 43 August 28, 2023
To reiterate the request, there were some requests regarding the inventory for church parcels and DeSilva South, but they still maintain the request for direction to begin additional CEQA review, particularly on the AFFH programs as well as any other revisions the Council wishes to make to the current draft of the Housing Element.
Regarding next steps, staff will incorporate any changes brought forward into the inventory or Housing Element. If directed, they would also engage the environmental consultant to start the environmental review and will return to the Council in September likely with some opportunity sites alternatives.
Mayor Anduri asked for questions of the Council on AFFH first and then RHNA.
Councilmember Kwok referred to the church zoning and asked how many churches might be affected by this suggestion. Ms. Elrod said she believes there are approximately 8 or 9 churches.
Councilmember Kwok acknowledged the correspondence and meetings with some of the church sites. He said if the church for some reason got sold before they built anything and they decided to close and the Council upzoned it he asked if the buyer of that property be eligible for the upzoning to build there or he asked if the zoning is tied to religious institutions and that development must be managed by religious institutions.
Ms. Elrod said staff has not gotten to that level of detail. Their intention is to make it only for religious institutions. SB 4 specifically will allow a church to develop their property for affordable housing. The requirements of that are that it must be a church that has been in existence at some beginning date, and that it can only be used as long as the church is there. She was not sure what would happen if the church 10 years into the future decides it does not want to be a church any longer, but this is the way the bill is being structured.
Ms. Robles said she thinks an easy comparison can be made to the City’s senior housing overlay where, if a project is meeting certain criteria, in this case it could be a religious institution sponsoring the development. Whether they are the actual applicants, she thinks this can definitely be designed into the program as a requirement before they can proceed.
Councilmember Kwok said SB 4 is requiring low-income housing to be put on church and educational institution sites, and he asked if there is any requirement other than 30 du/acre zoning such as low income.
Ms. Elrod said they have not developed a program yet and the intention is to focus on lower income however defined which would include opportunities for people who either work there, are parishioners or other people as part of their mission to provide housing for people who do not otherwise have the means to have housing. So, they can engineer the program in order to be more consistent with reaching a lower income population.
Councilmember Kwok said it sounds like some things are under development here and staff is asking Council to give a green light to study this more and return with more details.
Mayor Anduri clarified with staff that the City will not submit to HCD a flushed-out program. Staff is going to have in Appendix G (Implemented Plan) their intent to develop a program and overlay, so all details will be dealt with later.
City Council Meeting Page 19 of 43 August 28, 2023
Councilmember Candell said this was a big surprise to many people in the community and is a complete re-write of the Housing Element. She asked if most of these suggestions come from Veronica Tam for the opportunity sites in terms of criteria A through D. Ms. Robles said they met with their new reviewer, Senior Program Manager at HCD on July 12th. During that meeting they broached site criteria, discussed the AFFH program to get initial feedback, and in that same meeting they floated these criteria understanding this is something they sought from other communities that have gotten certified. There was not a rubber stamp of approval, but he has reviewed the criteria and are similar to those used elsewhere.
Councilmember Candell asked if these criteria came mostly from Veronica Tam and Associates. Ms. Robles said no, they are pulled from other jurisdictions. Ms. Tam gave feedback on them as well, but it has become a kind of standard set of criteria based on what HCD is seeking as far as information regarding development feasibility of sites.
Councilmember Candell said for the public’s knowledge, because this was such a big change, much more clarity is needed on who was telling who to do what is important in order to understand where these suggestions came from, as well as conversations with other groups. She said she wants the process to be transparent for people to understand the scope of the process. The City has received many legal arguments against upzoning churches and asked if the City Attorney could weigh in on that.
City Attorney Mala Subramanian said she suspects the individual who wrote the letter is also here to speak if Councilmember Candell wants her to address it now or when the Mayor opens public comment.
Mayor Anduri suggested addressing it now.
Ms. Subramanian said in terms of the religious institutions, it is one program the City is considering. It is not a financial donation the City is giving. Often times the “no aid” clause deals with actual money given to a financial institution and this is not that. It is a potential upzone or rezoning. The City has also considered multiple upzones in the downtown so there are secular institutions also receiving increased density. Given all of this, she does not think it would be unconstitutional for the City to consider. As the Council has also heard the State is also considering SB 4, which will have similar impacts and there are other communities throughout the State who have also considered upzoning religious institutions. It would also apply not just to churches, but all religious institutions within the City.
Mayor Anduri asked if they are only using “churches” because those are the only religious institutions affected in Lafayette. Ms. Robles stated no, there is Temple Isaiah, and she clarified this is separate from the ¼ mile from the downtown program.
Councilmember Candell said there was significant documentation that they have not gotten buy-in from the churches, but just one. She asked if they have had more buy-in than that. Ms. Robles said they have reached out to all but one of the churches that they have listed and 8 have been identified as potential sites. Only 2 meetings have happened thus far, and staff will continue outreach.
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Councilmember Candell referred to the ¼ miles from downtown extending north into the very high fire zone and recalled that this was not the map shown at the last meeting, stating it was only from Mt. Diablo.
Ms. Robles said the map included in the presentation and shown tonight is updated from the last one to further refine the boundaries, but the buffer has always been extending from the downtown district boundaries, outward from the edge of downtown.
Councilmember Candell asked what the parking implications are on this. Ms. Robles said this will definitely be a consideration as they flush out the design. Right now, they are developing their implementation plan so these are high level conceptual programs, and they will go through the gritty process of nailing down those details in the implementation in the years to come. That said there is already a State provision in AB 2097 which prevents the City from implementing any parking requirements within ½ mile from BART. So, a substantial area included as part of this program is already exempt from parking requirements, but they would be considering this and can look to the ADU ordinance and laws for comparable requirements. They will try and get creative and consider those impacts.
Councilmember Candell asked and confirmed the City would not have to redo the EIR but process an Addendum to the EIR.
Vice Mayor Dawson said Temple Isaiah was mentioned. She asked and confirmed it is included and staff is using “church” as a catch-all term for religious institutions.
Vice Mayor Dawson said if SB 4 is actually approved she asked when that would go into effect. Ms. Elrod deferred to the City Attorney and asked if it would go into effect in July or January of 2024.
Ms. Subramanian said staff is double-checking this and will respond later.
Councilmember Candell turned to the RHNA side and asked out of the 2 through 5 how big a site the site referred to in the Desco letter. Mr. Wolff said it is the property owner of the parking lot that comes off of the Boulevard adjacent to Diamond K and the City Offices as well.
Councilmember Candell asked if the Desco is just that property. Mr. Wolff confirmed Desco has 4 properties and 4 buildings, and the letter was received from the eastern-most property owner.
Councilmember Candell referred to Table B1 on page 3 that calculates the City’s buffer. The way she thought the buffer was calculated is that you take the VLI buffer plus the LI buffer, add them together and divide them by 2. Ms. Elrod clarified it is divided by what the RHNA allocation is. If they are required to have 500 VLI and LI units, they meet that by getting 600 units, so the buffer is 100 units divided by 500.
Councilmember Candell said the percentages in this table show the buffer as 6% so that is already percentage buffer. Ms. Elrod stated the numbers immediately above it are the actual numbers.
Councilmember Candell said there are 500 for VLI, 599 and so they have 39 more than that which is a 6% above. Ms. Elrod confirmed and said it is 6% and she commented that the RHNA number is wrong, and she said staff will go back and double check what those numbers are.
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Councilmember Candell referred to the yield and said they took the ones that do not have a density bonus and added them all up together as if they were equal and divided them by 6. Ms. Elrod confirmed.
Councilmember Candell said this was done even though 2 of them are 6 units and a couple of them are ADUs. This makes zero sense mathematically, it makes zero sense they are including sites less than onehalf acre because they cannot even count them, and she asked why staff is not proposing 2 other methods using math that makes more sense.
Ms. Elrod said they cannot. The requirement is all projects that have not used the density bonus and an average of those projects. It is in the guidebook and in discussions with HCD you have to take an average the same way they do the ADUs. The question brought up about why they are including sites that are less than one-half acre is a different issue in terms of opportunity sites. Opportunity sites less than one-half acre cannot be counted for lower income. They are only talking about what was built density so they have to include everything and cannot pick and choose which things they want to leave in or out. That came across very clearly in a letter, and she agreed to send the Council the letter with this reference.
Councilmember Candell said either way you calculate this, even using those projects it is way over 100% still. She would like to see the letter and she thanked staff for talking about the ADUs and getting updated information. There are letters from Bruzzone are great where they are using 2.2 acres, but she asked if they are allowed to re-think that as well.
Ms. Elrod said HCD clearly told them is they could only use parking areas of a shopping development and thus far Bruzzone has offered McCaulou’s and the parking behind it. Also, the Chamber has expressed a great deal of concern about moving parking from that location.
Councilmember Candell noted the Chamber has nothing to do with HCD and does not change the Council trying to include it. Ms. Elrod said it does because HCD will want to know a concrete timeline for redevelopment of parking areas which will be significantly easier to do for the McCaulou’s site and parking behind it because it is not direct to Safeway and Whole Foods.
Councilmember Candell asked if they could talk with Mr. Bruzzone about that, and Ms. Elrod said she assumes the City has talked with Mr. Bruzzone. Ms. Robles said Mr. Wolff met with David Bruzzone.
Mr. Wolff said he did not think the letters went into great detail on what is contemplated or what is not but rather expressed a general interest in capitalizing on the opportunity to build housing on the site. His recollection of their conversation is that would need to be in due consideration of the existing businesses that are there and still affording the opportunity for them to operate and for customers to park throughout construction of the housing and being sensitive to that. It was not a conversation around wholesale redevelopment of the site, closure of what is there, demolition, and reconstruction. However, he is happy to follow-up with Mr. Bruzzone.
Ms. Subramanian returned to the question asked and said staff confirmed with Casey Elliott that if SB 4 went into effect it would go into effect January 1, 2024.
Mayor Anduri asked and confirmed each Councilmember has read all submissions that have been made.
He said if the public would like to speak to the Council, he would encourage speakers not to read their letters. If there is something else to add, they are welcome to do so, but he emphasized that Councilmembers have read all letters. He then opened the public comment period.
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TOM MAYHEW said he is an attorney representing the Housing Action Coalition. They are working to make sure cities around the Bay Area are meeting their fair share of the regional need for housing. The Housing Element Sites Inventory is about making sure there is a plan to make it legal to build enough housing to meet Lafayette’s share of the regional need and thus far, the Council has not done that, and this is what HCD is telling the City. There is a significant shortfall specifically for the lower income RHNA categories.
For lower income categories, it is mainly about whether you make it legal to build apartment buildings or not. Most of the Bay Area cannot afford to live in a stand-alone single-family home, and Lafayette has historically used zoning laws to say that most of the land in the City cannot have anything built other than a single-family house. Lafayette is not the only city that has done this. It is a regional problem and statewide problem, and this is why there are so many new State laws that address this.
The Coalition has sent another detailed letter today and the main point he asked Councilmembers to take away is to focus on the yield issue and whether 88% is valid or not. There is a real question particularly with Town Center III. He thinks the data is showing it is about 60%; that people develop about 20 du/acre when they are not using density bonus on those projects that had a 35 du/acre maximum. If the Council does the math the right way, they will find they have an even bigger RHNA shortfall than the one the Council is trying to address tonight. When the Council finds out it has a bigger shortfall they will need every tool in the toolbox. Tonight, the Council is being asked about DeSilva South, faith-based institutions, and increased densities downtown. Realistically, the Council does not have a lot of choice about that because to comply with State law, they will have to say yes to all of them. Therefore, he asked to give direction to staff tonight, support their recommendation of options to get out of this issue, and go with an “all of the above” approach. He knows there are residents that are not happy with apartments in neighborhoods, but they need an “all of the above” approach here.
DARA DADACHANJI said he has lived in Lafayette since 1988 and when he was 12 they moved a short distance to a house on Happy Valley Road where he currently lives with his father, and it is a few doors down from a site where a billionaire has recently purchased 4 adjacent houses with the intention of converting them into a single estate. While living at both of these houses, he and his brother were the only non-white kids on the street. The City is required to ensure its selection of opportunity sites in the Housing Element affirmatively further fair housing. The choice to concentrate almost all multi-family development sites along Mt. Diablo Boulevard very clearly does not do so. This has also been noted by HCD in their review letter. Furthermore, the City’s SB 9 plans include many double standards which make duplexes harder to build than single family homes. This further demonstrates bad faith in their efforts to reduce segregation in Lafayette. The City must identify sites on Happy Valley, Upper Happy Valley, Pleasant Hill Road, Moraga Road, Silverwood, and other neighborhoods and must amend its SB 9 plans to remove double standards for duplexes.
Meanwhile, the opportunity sites they do have assume incorrectly that the BART lots will be developed under the current RHNA cycle, that new housing will be comprised of 16% low income and 28% very low income with no subsidies despite actual numbers for the previous cycle being 2% and 2% respectively.
Many more false allegations are detailed in the letter from Inclusive Lafayette. The State has provided a clean and EIR exempt template to upzone downtown areas in SB 10. This Council should move to adopt it.
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Lastly, he pointed out that they spent the first half of this meeting discussing the frequent power outages as a result of aging infrastructure which there is no money to fix. This is not surprising, as Lafayette was incorporated just over 50 years ago in 1968, shortly after the Fair Housing Act was passed. This is around the age most suburbs begin to experience financial problems from deteriorating infrastructure and the improved tax base from infill housing will go a long way towards funding improvements necessary to provide a service quality commensurate with urban living standards.
Mayor Anduri asked what the speaker said about the BART lots. Mr. Dadachanji said the BART lots are included in the opportunity sites, and Mayor Anduri clarified they are not included.
ROBERT BRUNDAGE, Sweet Drive, said he lives across the street from a church. He thinks the City should not single out religious institutions’ properties to upzone, and secondly he thinks the City is being misinformed by HCD about the scope of the City’s obligation under AFFH. He appreciates the City Attorney and Council took the time to read his letters. He appreciates the City Attorney’s analysis. He differs slightly noting that the City Attorney said the “No Aid” cause was not a bar for 2 reasons. Number 1 is that it generally applies only to providing money or property. With all due respect, he did not think that is correct.
The fetal tissue case mentioned in his letter explains which is from the California Court of Appeal. It explains that the “no aid” cause reaches governmental exercises of power. The phrase it uses is “power and prestige” and the fact of that case did not involve Los Angeles County providing either money or the County’s property to the religious institution. It involved the County allowing religious institution to bury fetal tissue with religious rights, and the Court of Appeal held that was a “No Aid” caused violation. It does not apply only to providing the government agency’s property and money.
The second thing was that it is not just churches. Other things might also be upzoned. The trouble with that is that the law under the “No Aid” cause is that the government benefit must be “equally available to religious and non-religious institutions.” This is the phrase from the California Court opinion and also from a Ninth Circuit opinion. He lives across from the church. He has the same zoning as that church, but under this plan he would not be able to build multi-family housing and the church would. It would not be equally available. Therefore, he strongly urged that the City take another look at that, and he would be happy to submit a supplemental letter if helpful. Regarding the HCD issue, he pointed out that both the AFFH statute and the Government Code provision that HCD relies on both specifically talk about protected characteristics. The AFFH statute uses the phrase, “based on protected characteristics” and the Government Code provision requires affirmatively furthering; to remedy segregation based on protected characteristics. HCD’s letter does not mention a protected characteristic. Instead, it edits out the phrase, “protected characteristic.” The rest is in his letter.
LIBBY HENRY said the Council understood her letter and she also included a copy of the letter from the City of Hayward. This is her main point here. This is hard for her because she is listening to people who have no vested interest in their community tell them that they must do certain things. It is making her very upset. Single family homes are a housing choice and their neighborhoods in Lafayette were planned that way and to suggest the City should upzone and destroy their single-family home neighborhoods, destroy their commercial downtown is certainly not based on the facts.
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After the City of Lafayette appealed their RHNA numbers in 2021, an audit of HCD came out in the Spring of 2022 which showed their RHNA numbers were falsely calculated. They were double-counted and overinflated, yet HCD did not recalculate any RHNA numbers. The California Department of Finance came out with a report a few weeks ago about the decline in population in California and that the predictions they said were wrong—that they are leveling out until the year 2060. Over 871,000 have left the State of California since 5 years ago and the main reason they are leaving is because it is too crowded. The highdensity idea is not truly supported. Governor Newsom’s goal of 3.5 million was never substantiated with any evidence and the Biden administration put out a report last year with a goal of 1.5 million for the entire country, so she did not know how this coincides with 3.5 million just in California. It does not make sense, does not follow facts, and after 4 times being rejected by HCD it is about time for this city to stand up and say it has acted in good faith. Every time the HCD comes back with something else, and it will never stop. She encouraged the Council to take her letter seriously and draft a letter to HCD.
JEREMY LEVINE, Inclusive Lafayette, said he was born and raised in Lafayette, grew up hiking its hills, attending their schools, and he knows how much the community has to offer to the people who grew up here. He loves the things that define their community-great hills, great schools, open space and community spirit, and their commitment to inclusive valleys. For these reasons are the reasons why he is excited to allow more homes and more new neighbors. Allowing more housing in the community, especially in areas near the downtown and the Mt. Diablo corridor, will help people experience everything that makes Lafayette great. Their community is not defined by 3-story buildings or extra parking spaces.
They are defined by their commitment to community, to sustainability, to inclusion. Allowing more housing near the downtown, near public transit, and in neighborhoods is the most important thing the city can do to reflect their shared values.
Updating this Housing Element has been a very long process. Inclusive Lafayette has been involved from the beginning, and they have seen the City attempt many strategies proposed by many residents to try and create an acceptable Housing Element that complies with State law. Their goal is for the City to create a great plan for new homes that unambiguously complies with State law. The proposals before the Council tonight to enable more homes are an important step that the City can take to achieve these goals.
Inclusive Lafayette has shared additional recommendations in their public comment that they hope the City will consider between now and the September 11th meeting and hopes the Council will listen to staff and appreciate their hard work for the City to complete this complex process. He thanked the Council and staff for representing their community and guiding them through the Housing Element update together, and he looks forward to the Council’s deliberations.
ALISON HILL, Hawthorne Drive, said she has lived in Lafayette for 53 years, has volunteered on City commissions, first became involved when there was a development issue in her neighborhood, and they rallied to attend meetings. She was very impressed by the PC and Council with their impartiality and listening to all sides. She has continued to be impressed by both City staff and unpaid Council volunteers.
She thanked everyone for all the work and her beliefs are that housing is needed, they can do that without spoiling the town, and they can make it work. It should not be an all-or-nothing and thinks they can find viable compromise to house more people and yet maintain much of the charm and character of the city.
She thinks they can spread the development out widely, but she personally does not see the difference between a duplex and 4-plex in her neighborhood and one giant house.
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MAX HENINGER said he is a board member of Inclusive Lafayette and a Lafayette homeowner. He echoed Mr. Mayhew’s comments and looking down the road of what they might end with HCD in a few months and asked to think about the tools the City will have in its toolkit to meet the requirements. He asked to consider missing middle housing, specifically there is a great opportunity with SB 10 where you can allow for up to 10 units on a single parcel and those changes are not subject to CEQA. One of the concerns is additional CEQA analysis and do an Addendum. He thinks this might be an additional way of unlocking more density without having to do more CEQA analysis and allow the city to get into compliance sooner.
Beyond that, they think missing middle housing has a lot to offer the community. It does not appear at a significantly different scale than the housing already here, and they have a proof of concept in his neighborhood. Sunset Village by the Lafayette Reservoir is a great neighborhood and at times it is hard to tell what is a single-family home and what is a duplex. So, this type of housing would not feel as much of a change to folks.
Another nice thing about that type of housing is it tends to be less expensive to build. In terms of affordability, it may come out to 200% of AMI so he will not pretend it is very affordable to low-income households, but he would argue and question what that the 200% AMI compared to a single-family home, and thought it might be 500% AMI, and he questioned where that family would move to such as the outskirts of Sacramento or Phoenix. He thinks the City is doing a lot for affordability and the climate crisis to be building that type of housing in Lafayette. He has also heard about affordability and SB 9 types of projects. One thing the Council could look at is what the City of Portland is doing where they are allowing more missing middle housing, but they have a mini-density bonus program for up to 6 units. Those additional units above a 4-plex would be rent restricted.
STELLA WOTHERSPOON said she is speaking as a private citizen, thanked the Council and staff for the work they are doing to adapt to change. The Council’s policy is satisfying RHNA in downtown and it is pragmatic, equitable, and also satisfies the goal of affirmatively furthering fair housing. Most importantly, this policy ensures affordable living and not simply affordable housing by providing new low-income residents superior access to transit, jobs, goods and services, and by not levying the burden of costly auto ownership. Some have said that downtown proximate direction for the RHNA runs counter to the pursuit of AFFH, that locating high density housing in downtown exposes low-income residents to worse air quality; that this will create residential segregation, and these claims cannot be substantiated by the data in the AFFH assessment report.
So, by metrics of environmental quality, segregation, educational outcomes, access to jobs and transit, the data in the assessment supports the downtown proximate housing distribution. If downtown schools were worse than the rest of the City, jobs were less plentiful in the downtown, access to transit and environmental quality was worse, and substantial segregation existed within the City, one might make the argument that a downtown proximate strategy is inequitable. However, Lafayette Elementary in the downtown is superior, access to transit and jobs are highest, air is cleanest, and the fields each index which ABAG recommends shows Lafayette is one of the least segregated jurisdictions in the Bay Area.
There are fewer residents who are racial minorities, but providing affordable housing anywhere in the City will increase diversity.
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Given the economic benefits of downtown residency to low-income households and no compelling data that supports locating low-income housing in remote locations, it is clear the City of Lafayette should focus on increasing density near clean air, good schools, transit, and jobs where existing infrastructure is robust and where residents will not be burdened by high auto transportation costs. The intent of AFFH policy is to guide cities away from concentrating on new, low-income housing in already disadvantaged neighborhoods. However, Lafayette is an entirely high resource community, so locating housing downtown will not concentrate existing disadvantaged locations. So, while many low-income residents live in downtown, many are elders on fixed incomes who live in senior housing complexes. Downtown residents enjoy the same access to schools, resources, and there is nothing bad about living in the downtown. So, she asked for all these facts to be applied to the question of church upzoning. If remote locations of churches outside downtown are not favorable, if any church is to be researched as opportunity sites, these should be the ones proximate to downtown and perhaps within that Action 2.5 boundary map.
BILL BUCHER reiterated that the previous speaker makes some good points about the viability of increasing density downtown. He would like the Council to consider that. Also, the other point about whether HCD is overstepping their mandate with affordable housing, and he thinks the Council should push back on that and make sure the City is getting clear direction. Also, he asked to find some of these number variations and ensure the counts are right. He also said the map developed about the ½ mile from BART or ¼ mile from the downtown, he thinks more work could be put into that. There are some good points made by Inclusive Lafayette relative to duplex and some other opportunities in those sites that do not have to be tall high rises. There are many public comments about people particularly north of Hwy 24 in the high fire zone, and he thinks this should be taken into consideration, as well as the issue with the churches. As great as it sounds, those are deep in residential neighborhoods, and he questioned if the City is giving one benefit over to another one.
DOUG GUERRIN said he fully supports the City increasing its downtown density as much as possible. He and his family were able to move to Lafayette last year. The only reason they were able to afford his wife’s hometown was because alternative options to single-family housing were built near the downtown in the 1970’s. They live with their 3-year-old, 8-month-old, and their dog in a townhome community on Marlene Drive. Her parents have been residents for 30 years first on Vaughn Road and now on Dewing. He and his wife are government employees making a good living and even for them, Lafayette and most of the East Bay seemed out of their price range. He cannot imagine what it is like for teachers, firefighters, police officers, nurses, people trying to start small businesses. Diversity of housing options like townhomes, condos, and apartment buildings will allow for a diversity of households of small families and retirees looking to downsize, young professionals, and this is demonstrated by his in-laws. They decided to sell their single-family home and bought a downtown condo. They will now be able to age in place, focus less on driving, they can walk, take BART, and are still able to drive as well.
They also opened their house and sold it to a family. So, more dense housing throughout downtown will allow for more walkable, bikeable, transit-oriented community. Although he lives 1 ½ miles from BART, there is no current way to get to BART other than by car. Biking feels fairly unsafe. His wife works 2 times a week in San Francisco. His office is in downtown Oakland, and one of the reasons their townhome was affordable was because they are trying to be a single car household, but without safe bike lanes, walkable community, and a functional bus system they may not be able to sustain a single car household. Building more dense housing will increase young families being able to live in this community, and he encouraged the Council to approve the biggest goals they can achieve.
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DAVID CLARK said he appreciated the staff report and when he read it he was looking for opportunities that may have been missed or otherwise explained and he came up with a couple. Mayor Anduri asked not to conflate the AFFH and RHNA and what he is about to say may look like conflation, but he does not think it is. The draft AFFH action 245 boundary map in Exhibit 10 of the staff report should be treated almost the same as the religious institution argument. He thinks it would pay to try and quantify how many units might be developed from this map given the transition from a single-family residence to 2.4 units. He thinks they may pick up additional units by doing the math on that map.
The other thing is the DeSilva South property in each one of the iterations had a 30 du/acre density. There were 3 separate options, and it was not clear to him why a higher density was not used with respect to the second and third options that were offered. Because it is 9.5 acres, every increase of 10 is another 95 units, so he thinks there may be a reason why that was not done, but it was not clear from the report. All 3 of those are the same number and it seems the additional ones could be higher in each case. He would encourage the Council to move forward with the analysis of the religious institution or church areas. The staff report mentions the City may be able to generate as much as 200 units from that which would come close to replacing part of Desco, so he thinks this is worth pursuing. His personal preference would be to spread the density around. He likes the idea of moving forward with DeSilva South if that becomes available.
MICHELE GREER said she is a Lafayette resident and is the owner of a duplex. She lives on one side and rents out the other and she can bring a unique perspective to the topic discussed. A successful functioning community is more than cramming as much housing in every available square inch of a city limit. A successful functioning community needs schools that are not over-crowded, needs shopping, needs infrastructure, emergency evacuation plans that can work and save lives, and needs traffic control. Right now, as it stands with the current population in Lafayette, they are barely struggling to meet the minimum requirements for those things she just listed. She asked how they will add the Pleasant Hill development, which no one asked the Principal of Spring Hill Elementary if it is possible to take in 400 families at that school. The basics need to be done first and need to be done right before they can even broach the subject of cramming more citizens into Lafayette.
Her second point is to address churches. She knows right now in this world where politics is the new religion, people still use churches as a place of worship, as a place of community, day care, and schooling.
She does not think the City has taken into account how many of the churches here are also used as infant and toddler day cares. There is already a childcare crisis in Lafayette, and she asked what happens when the churches get big offers from developers and the childcare centers go away.
There is also a church on Carol Lane that is home to a special needs school called Spring Stone. It is a nonpublic school that children from all over Contra Costa and Alameda Counties attend in order to get the education the public school system cannot provide. She asked what happens to those children when a developer comes in when the church is offered more money than they can say “no” to. These are things among the unconstitutionality of taking over churches, and this needs to be discussed and considered when the Council votes this evening.
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PAUL BICKMORE said he would like to speak about missing middle, given the fact that what these RHNA allocations are about actual production in the long run. Right now, this is about approval, but in the long run what counts is what is actually produced. Missing middle is a lot easier to get built. It is in places that families tend to be used to living in, and he thinks the Council needs to address missing middle. Zoning in the downtown is great, but it raises questions given the proximity to the freeway with AFFH housing.
Missing middle is something the Council should be looking at. One of the things that makes housing expensive, and the reason they are in the pickle they are in is because they have forced car ownership and driving on everyone and with that is parking. One of the dumbest things you can do is forcing a lot of parking on housing or any kind of development. It is not an issue close to BART anymore, but planning around the car in general and parking in particular is one of the dumbest things the City can do if they need to deal with their problems and get housing built.
Councilmember Candell said missing middle housing does not help the City qualify their Housing Element.
They cannot put it in opportunity sites, and it is not assumed to be affordable. So, she understands Mr.
Bickmore’s comments, but this is not necessarily affordable. It may be if it is their AFFH, but it will not fit their Housing Element.
MEGAN CONNER said she is currently a graduate student at UC Berkeley School of Law. When she was young in the early 2000’s her parents moved to the Lafayette area. They actually cashed in their retirement savings at the time to secure a single-family house so she and her brother could have access to Lafayette’s public schools. She went from Kindergarten through high school in Lafayette, and honestly she does not think she would be where she is today educationally without the resources and opportunities this community provided her. Not everyone can make that type of financial sacrifice her parents made to be able to access their education systems even if they deserve those educational resources, especially today. It is becoming increasingly difficult for people to afford living in Lafayette. While the current Housing Element has good progress made, she agrees with others speaking that they need to expand housing density in Lafayette, even further than the current proposals particularly by creating more affordable housing, through greater rezoning in the entire downtown area.
CHANCE BORECKY, member of East Bay for Everyone, said ultimately the staff report is quite stark about the necessity of rezoning significant portions of the downtown area to meet the RHNA requirement even with the significant possibility of housing development on religious properties, with the inclusion of the DeSilva South site, and there is going to be a shortfall unless real strides are made to pursue smart density in the downtown area.
The idea people are moving out of California because it is crowded is a curious one. He thinks it is a little more responsible to assume it might have something to do with the fact that everything costs more here, housing not least of all. Housing has increased out of proportion to inflation in this State over the past 20 years. Lafayette is no exception. He is a recent UC Berkeley graduate and of all the other local Bay Area students he knew at Berkeley, every single one from Contra Costa County is now living outside of the State. While Lafayette was an excellent place to start a career and family in the 1990’s when housing was accessible to those making reasonable incomes, that is not the case any longer. Median home prices have increased to the point where it is fundamentally inaccessible to the sort of people he feels Lafayette should be welcoming. The Housing Element draft is an excellent start towards addressing that problem and it is something he feels the community should welcome.
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COLIN ELLIOTT said one speaker spoke about infrastructure and the problems they have with infrastructure. He pointed out that infrastructure is sized for the community so literally as you build things, all of it is size for the density built. The problem is you start putting 10 units out in these areas and there is not the infrastructure. They already have problems with what they have. Regarding the yield question, he would echo the needs to look at the yield calculation. He was surprised staff mentioned something about the handbook where you could not use certain sites with density bonus. He has not seen that in the handbook and if it was, staff missed that for the last 2 years, and he does not believe this is so. He thinks it was wrong to include a calculation and not weigh it for the fact that some were density bonus. It seems equally wrong to take those out.
It seems some additional weighting of sites with density bonus versus sites that did not come up with a yield. He thinks it will come up with a high yield anyway and he thinks the City should stick with what it has. In focusing on opportunity sites, one of his favorites is Plaza Center, the Safeway Center. He knows staff approached HCD very early on before they had letters from the owners and probably got the answer they would expect. Frankly, this is what all cities are doing. They are looking at the shopping centers. Many speakers are saying they need more density downtown. They have upzoned that shopping center and are only including 1.3 acres of it. The main parcel is 4.09 acres. They have the Metro, the liquor store, thinks Bruzzone owns one of the banks, and so right now there are 2.2 acres including Millie’s and they should be able to include far more because these sites get developed in phases. It is not an issue with the parking.
They probably would do pads out front, move retailers there, and do it in phases so tenancies are not lost due to lack of parking. He thinks HCD would not have a problem with increasing acreage in that. He would ask to go back and ask staff to look at a better analysis of that because it is a much bigger site.
CHRIS said he wants to address the concept of upzoning churches. It seems to him like a fairly risky proposal. The Council and staff barely know how many there are, where they are, what kind of access they have, and what it means to add 50 units down a narrow street into a residential community. This raises additional risks in the CEQA analysis in how to get people in and out of there during a fire. It is a multitude of sites scattered around the City making that CEQA analysis much more difficult. Then, there is the legal risk that a lawyer spoke to clearly today. Staff is picking out random sites across the City and not in the downtown. They are religious institutions, and he asked how the City is not singling out religious institutions for benefit, meaning additional financial benefits to religious institutions to build housing at a higher density that no one else has. If the City chooses to go this way, he asked what is to keep a person who owns a 2-acre parcel in Happy Valley from requesting the same treatment. If the City comes back and says they are not really a religious institution, it seems like the perfect set up for a lawsuit from his perspective.
There is also the execution risk. If the City upzones these sites and the church indicates it is not doing so well. He asked how to keep the church from selling to a developer who then builds 30 du/acre with market rate housing. The answer from staff is that they will figure it out. As soon as the Council puts this into its housing proposal for HCD, it becomes something they expect. If they go back and look how this execution happens, whether it is even legal to create these restrictions, they are either double confounding their legal risk and possibly putting themselves of opening up all sites to 30 du/acre or having to back pedal on the upzoning offer to churches, putting their entire Housing Element back into question.
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ROBERT LAVOIE said for AFFH, he believes the aspect of the AFFH requiring affirmative action to address a de facto racial segregation is illegal because it violates the State and Federal Constitution. The Constitution does not allow compulsory affirmative action to remedy de facto racial segregation. As for economic integration, it is more of a policy issue, and it is essentially socialism or Marxism. He would argue that dramatically changing zoning, enhancing the character of neighborhoods violates the reasonable expectations of people who have invested in their neighborhoods by buying homes, etc. Also, if someone is trying to find affordable housing he questioned why one would do it in the most expensive areas in the County. Another point is using demographic differences to claim there is unfair housing policy or unfair access to housing is irrational and arbitrary. He questioned what evidence is there to compare Lafayette to Richmond, an urban area that is very dense racially in a different way. What would make more sense is comparing Lafayette to the state of Oregon. These things are all just random. He asked to look at Baldwin Hills in Los Angeles which is completely opposite Lafayette. It has the same population, 53% African American, and he asked if HCD is going to make them become whiter and institute a suite of programs. It just seems irrational.
He wants to go on record to oppose the ¼ mile map of downtown. Anywhere there are 100% single family zoned neighborhoods, if there are single family homes mixed in with the other multi-family he has no problem with that. Once you go into the single-family areas, it changes the character. For example, Herman Drive has hardly enough room for one car to get back and forth when people park on the sides of the road.
Regarding the Housing Element, the buffer calculation needs to remain the same. HCD is being completely irrational. All projects recently have been over 100% except for the one by the nursery school where the developer was generous and did not take the maximum. The ADU permits follow closely the prior year applications and there is a ratio, so he thinks they can project 65 this year, and he recommended looking at the actual results. The opportunity sites, especially Safeway, are developed all the time. He asked to look at the shopping center where Rocco’s is in Walnut Creek. They did the whole redevelopment when it was fully occupied. Lastly, he would say the Hayward option should be left on the table if HCD is holding out and not accepting their plan. They cannot go to 80 units downtown just because they will not change the City’s density.
CHERYL MACDONALD said Councilmember Candell was talking about the complete frustration of the report that came out and asked where this stuff came from. It was overwhelming and a lot to process. At one of the last Council meetings, it seemed they were set to go in the right direction and all of a sudden this report comes out and they have no idea where these changes came from and how they got there, who met with who in order to come up with this stuff, and she voiced support of information becoming a lot more transparent to better understand how they got here.
She voiced support of the downtown core and shopping center which seems like the best place where they can build more, and it would add walkability. She is also curious about DeSilva South because some people have said it is too far away. She questioned why it states it is equal distance to El Charro in the report, and she thinks DeSilva South should be considered and not put it all into the immediate downtown core.
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As for the churches, SB 4 will go into effect and she thinks the City should consider the churches as a way to get affordable housing. She thinks they could have day care and other things if the lots are big enough.
She worries about the ¼ mile issue. She agrees with the previous speaker regarding proposing mixed use where there already is mixed use. She asked how it is determined whether single family housing is 2 units or 4 units. If there is no bus route on Mt. Diablo Boulevard and there is no parking, she asked how people will get to the downtown to buy their groceries. Lastly, she thinks the Council should reconsider the singlefamily houses within the ¼ mile downtown boundary.
LAUREN HERPICH, said she lives in what is being promoted by some as a missing middle neighborhood.
She thanked Councilmember Candell for pointing out to previous speakers that missing middles will not fulfil the City’s obligations. She added that she also wants more bike able and more sustainable neighborhoods, but their streets are already packed. They do not have the infrastructure for it. They bike from St. Pete’s back home every day and she cannot imagine what that would be like with more cars. Even with more housing built in the downtown, many people say no one will have a car if they live downtown, but they still will have vehicles.
She was not planning on saying anything, but she was taken aback by the presentation as well. She thought they were on a good path from the last meeting, but this threw her for a loop. She acknowledged the builder’s remedy that is the elephant in the room hanging over all cities, but they have had 3 years of volunteers who have dedicated time to create a plan that works for the town, their infrastructure and their mission statement. They really took into account the goals of HCD, access to affordable housing, creating more affordable housing, access to resources and amenities, and transportation to BART. This is honestly why she and her husband moved to Moraga Boulevard. They wanted to be able to walk to downtown.
Any plan that would impact more of the residential neighborhoods and which would veer away from what GPAC worked on and recommended for years is frankly a slap in the face for anybody who has participated. She does not know if the public realizes that the majority of the town is all volunteers. She does not know who would volunteer to participate in this if this is what will happen. This was all for nothing if they go against the GPAC’s recommendation. Honestly, it cries foul to this entire process. The goalposts keep moving around and she thinks it is time for the City to push back. She knows the builder’s remedy is hanging over their heads, but she asked that they just keep in mind that thriving communities that Michele Greer had mentioned are not just about density, but quality of life, schools, access to a vibrant downtown, and parks.
BREAK
Mayor Anduri called for a 5-minute break and thereafter reconvened at 10:17 p.m.
Mayor Anduri asked for questions of the Council for staff or the City Attorney.
Vice Mayor Dawson commented about the churches upzoning and SB 4. Interestingly, what that legislation proposes is that 100% of that development would be low income and affordable except for a percentage of people who might live on site from the institution. So, commenters have said the proposal would upzone churches and the property and build moderate or above moderate-income homes, but that is not the intention. There would be deed restrictions for 45 to 50 years depending upon rental or ownership. If the Council were to pre-empt a program like that, they would also focus on very low- and low-income homes at least for those institutions interested in pursuing that.
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Councilmember Candell said SB 4 has deep affordability requirements. She asked if the City can impose that same thing or do they only have their inclusionary ordinance.
Ms. Subramanian said she would want to look into it and make sure, depending on when they move forward on it and if SB 4 was adopted that they did not have a pre-emption issue. She knows Ms. Elrod mentioned they have not flushed out that program if the Council were to proceed. So, these are things she could look into.
Councilmember Candell asked if an option for them tonight is to say they will watch SB 4 and if it does not pass then they will consider doing their own or just follow SB 4. She asked if this is an option.
Ms. Robles said it is an option, but she wants to emphasize that HCD is looking for the City to take proactive action to affirmatively further fair housing.
Councilmember Candell said she understands this, but if they cannot get the affordability requirements like SB 4 gets and the City does its own, then they are not as effective. She is saying the Catch 22 exists.
Ms. Robles agreed, but said they are not certain there is a conflict there, so staff will bring this back.
Mayor Anduri said Mr. Brundage said in his presentation that he differed from the City Attorney’s analysis and if Ms. Subramanian could respond now or wait, both would be fine.
Ms. Subramanian said she is happy to respond and can do a more detailed response later. Mr. Brundage also offered to give additional analysis on the issue. She thinks the case most on point is a case that deals with a State zoning law related to an historic preservation ordinance. She thinks that was also cited in his letter, the East Bay Asian Local Development Corp. case. It related to the State allowing for exemptions to the historic preservation laws for religious institutions. In that case, the court found that leaving the property in an as-is state for religious institutions was also not considered a benefit to the properties.
She thinks if the City were to proceed which she presumes is the case here, religious institutions could continue to operate as religious institutions in their primary function as a place of worship, potential student education for their religious institutions and day cares. But, the potential upzoning would also allow for that property or part of the property to include affordable housing on it. So, she thinks it allows for the existing use to stay and, depending on what policy or program the Council would consider adopting in the future, there may be affordability restrictions or other deed restrictions that would be considered but it is only if the property owner wanted to utilize that opportunity.
Mayor Anduri said the concern is that the religious institution would be getting the ability to do something that others would not.
Ms. Subramanian agreed, and as she mentioned earlier, while maybe not other single-family homes in the area would have that opportunity, there are other commercial properties located throughout the City that are also being rezoned as part of this program or already have that level of density being considered or even increased density.
Mayor Anduri said David Clark in his remarks asked if they could pick up RHNA numbers by doing the math on the map for the 2 to 4 units within the existing envelope.
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Ms. Robles said her understanding of the commenter’s request was to apply 30 du/acre to the parcels within that ¼ mile buffer of downtown.
Mayor Anduri clarified that David Clark was saying if the City could pick up additional units to be developed because the City allowed 2 to 4 within the existing, he asked if the City could make a projection as to how many that would be and include them in the scattered sites.
Ms. Robles acknowledged that she heard him wrong, and she thinks she conflated comments on DeSilva South. They are not able to count them towards RHNA because the sites would have to be zoned a minimum of 30 du/acre to count for below market rate units on the sites. They also have to be a minimum of ½ acre to be counted towards below market rate units. So, the City would have to effectively upzone those single-family parcels and identify the ones that meet the ½ acre criteria. It would likely be a limited impact, especially if there are considering other environmental constraints like evacuation constrained parcels or high fire zones.
Mayor Anduri clarified that it would only do the City good if they were very low or low income. Ms. Robles confirmed.
Mayor Anduri asked if upzoning the DeSilva South property help with AFFH.
Ms. Elrod said theoretically, yes, because you are increasing density options outside of the downtown area in a similar manner to increasing the density on churches outside the downtown.
Mayor Anduri suggested starting in on the AFFH and he suggested looking at Appendix G-10 and G-11. He referred to page G-10, under New, AFFH Action 2.3; Develop a housing overlay that allows churches and other institutions to provide housing on-site, especially that which is affordable. The Council will consider whether to include this for purposes of AFFH programs and then they can discuss whether they want to move forward which would take more staff work to see if they want to consider them for opportunity sites.
Councilmember Gerringer said if SB 4 passes she asked will the passage and implementation date impact the timing the steps the City plans to take such as preparing research on similar programs in 2025. Orshe asked if they will be required by SB 4 quicker.
Ms. Elrod clarified SB 4 does not require jurisdictions to do anything other than approve by right a proposed development. In terms of the actual zoning question, making this applicable is somewhat a secondary action from that. They put the date there because they have many things to be done in 2023 and 20234 by statute or requirement by the State.
Councilmember Gerringer asked and confirmed staff has prepared a Gantt chart and have not updated that chart with these actions on it.
Mr. Wolff said it would be feasible if the Council directsstaff to craft a program for inclusion in the Housing Element that would follow the current proposal of SB 4. They would do that locally if SB 4 did not pass.
But, if SB 4 passes, then they would be pre-empted and not do that, thus avoiding any conflict between local and State. He thinks they can craft that program and hopefully HCD can see they desire to do that regardless of whether the State is taking action.
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Vice Mayor Dawson said she read that if they are going to do a program, they must have objective standards for that. If the applicant is out of line with those objective standards they need to reply within a very short timeframe. It would be important they have some kind of guidelines and objective standards so they are in place. She likes this and would like specifically to target this program for affordable homes.
Ms. Robles stated SB 4 does that.
Councilmember Candell said she is also comfortable with Mr. Wolff’s approach and adding Vice Mayor Dawson’s comments that the city’s Downtown Objective Standards do not apply and that they consider extending those to SB 4 project.
Mayor Anduri said he is hearing that in the third column from the right, the Council wishes to insert “To allow users to develop low-income housing on site” and he confirmed Mr. Wolff can craft something specifically targeting SB 4 and wording.
Mayor Anduri confirmed there was consensus among Councilmembers for this. He then referred to 2.4, allow a second JADU in return for a short-term income restriction. He believes all Councilmembers were in favor of that and asked for any edits to the text. There were none.
Mayor Anduri referred to 2.5. allow conversion of existing single-family dwellings into 2 single-family in ¼ mile of the downtown boundaries. He said he had a discussion with Mr. Wolff earlier. In the original staff report for this item, it mentioned the Council could exclude high fire hazard zones from the application of
2.5. He would recommend doing so.
Councilmember Candell voiced her support.
Ms. Elrod commented that when discussing potential AFFH actions with Paul McDougall, he specifically said HCD wanted to see some activity towards AFFH north of Hwy 24. Staff suggested to him that it is all largely within a high fire severity zone. He said he thinks ¼ mile is not far enough and it should be ½ mile.
Staff pushed back on that, but there is definitely an expectation from HCD for something that would be viable going forward north of Hwy 24. It was specific under this action as to why the City is not considering more north of Hwy 24. She thinks they would allow a second JADU in the City anywhere, but in terms of this one, she wanted to note he specifically raised this as an issue.
Ms. Robles said while very high fire zones are an easy threshold to use, they can look to alternative objective standards that achieve the same goal. One potential is using SB 99 evacuation constrained parcels. So, while it is less area, it still fulfills the intention, and HCD’s aim of activity north of Hwy 24, and still being responsive to those real concerns of the public. The ask from staff is that the implementation plan is not the details. It is more the concepts. The intention would be that through the implementation of this program we would lay out those details. So, staff intentionally did not include that level at this point, but with the understanding those constraints and standards would be adopted as part of the implementation.
Mayor Anduri asked if staff was referring to eliminating high fire severity zones or eliminating evacuation constrained parcels.
Ms. Robles replied it would be either or both.
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Mayor Anduri asked if that would work; that the City could submit that without referring to that and then one year from now, exclude them.
Ms. Robles said she thinks they can reference those concerns in the program about fire hazards, but the specific standards of what is excluded as part of this program staff can detail when they put more dedicated thought about how the whole implementing ordinance looks.
Mayor Anduri asked if at that point they will not be able to do that because HCD will then do something to the City.
Ms. Robles said the reason they considered SB 99 evacuation constrained parcels rather than the very high fire zones is that it still includes areas north of Hwy 24. When they asked why north of Hwy 24 was so important, the reviewer explained that was where all the single-family homes were. Staff explained there are a lot of areas where there are single family homes and still that area is of particular interest. So, they are trying to balance these needs and they did not want to commit without looking closer at this point and being more thoughtful. But the SB 99 parcels being excluded would still allow some units north of Hwy 24.
Vice Mayor Dawson said she thinks that is fair because the BART Station is within that quarter mile of very high fire severity zones. So, if the State is going to exclude something that does not align with that progression and the City would be looking at it eventually. She is comfortable with what staff is describing—look at those constrains later with the intention to allow the JADUs in this ¼ mile area.
Mayor Anduri said they are on the one where they are dividing the existing 2 to 4 units, and Vice Mayor Dawson said she thinks it is the same intention.
Mayor Anduri asked if everyone feels comfortable about that.
Councilmember Gerringer said “comfortable” is not the right word, but as they can move forward to comply with AFFH. She said in the implementation language, “Prepare a proposal with standards addressing design mitigation requirements in the very high fire severity zone.” She said she will assume the SB 99 evacuation ones are in the “etc.” and she asked if there is a reason not to put it in there.
Ms. Robles said it was a simple oversight and she agreed to expand that language.
Mayor Anduri referred to 2.6; Increase the maximum density and low-density multi-family zones. He has a question in the third column from the right—“Geographic target: All single-family neighborhoods in the X zones.” He asked what is that intended to be.
Ms. Elrod said they did not include this. It is actually not the single-family zones, but it is the duplex areas.
She did not put in what the zone is in the blank. There are 2 existing duplex areas which are “D1” zones.
It would say, “Geographic target: All duplex neighborhoods in the D1 zone.” Mayor Anduri confirmed consensus on this.
Mayor Anduri referred to 2.7; Incentivize developers to provide a range of unit sizes to provide more affordable by design units.” Again, that is something they would consider how to do in more detail in 2026. He confirmed the consensus of the Council for this.
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Mayor Anduri said with respect to AFFH, staff wants the Council to authorize the start of CEQA review. He asked if there was anything else they needed to do.
Councilmember Gerringer stated there is Action 2.8 at the bottom and on the top of the next page.
Ms. Robles said this is the program the State asked them to put in for the new AFFH actions included in this draft to monitor on-going success. They want to have a check-in to see how they are going, what progress is being made, although the City reports to the State on housing production on an annual basis, but this is just one request from them.
Mayor Anduri confirmed there was Council consensus.
Councilmember Candell said if they change their program for the high fire zones or SB 99, she asked if they will have to do another Addendum to the EIR in those areas.
Ms. Robles said they will be doing an Addendum regardless since a lot of these programs are outside of the boundary of the study area from the original EIR. That work will be done regardless.
Mayor Anduri asked if there is any reason not to start now with the Addendum.
Ms. Robles said this is the reason staff brought this to the Council tonight—to start on that work early with regards to those programs, with the understanding other additional work might be needed with the opportunity sites later on. So, there is not any reason she knows of to delay.
Mayor Anduri confirmed staff had direction and suggested moving onto the RHNA side of things.
Councilmember Candell asked if staff reviewed the tables and buffer numbers.
Ms. Elrod said the buffer numbers are correct. They were pulled from the second page and not from the numbers above. The numbers above are incorrect, but they are not included in the calculations. She will show this in the worksheet.
Mayor Anduri said his point is that they are not close on the numbers and Ms. Elrod agreed and said staff must go back in and add Desco to see what that will do and there is the possibility of a second Desco site, but all this became known to staff today.
Councilmember Candell asked to explain Table B1 and how it should have been done instead.
Ms. Robles said in looking at Table I, one of the examples at the very end, at the top of the page are the pipeline projects. These are the ones they moved and calculated the remainder after they accounted for pipeline projects and the ADUs. On the summary page, this workbook is accurately pulling the remaining RHNA whereas the one example from Table B still had the old format before they pulled pipeline projects out. It did affect the buffer in that other workbook, but at least this one was correct.
Councilmember Candell said she still sees the line that says “over/under”. There are 14x units, which is 3% of the buffer and then 37. The way they did it before when she was on GPAC, they would add the very low and low together and then divide them by 2. She asked what had changed.
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Ms. Elrod said the 14 and 80 are 2 numbers. When you add them together as a number, they come out as what is 94 is 13% of the remaining RHNA totals. She explained that 14 units is 3% of 495. So, this is a 3% buffer. The same is true with 80, which is 37% of 218. So, if you add 14 and 80 and you divide it by 495 by 218 you get 13.12%.
Ms. Robles said when staff returns, they will confirm all of the workbooks provided use this new method of using the remaining RHNA after the removal of pipeline projects and ADUs.
Vice Mayor Dawson said the City needs to target a good buffer in each individual affordability level because they will be measured on meeting those numbers eventually.
Councilmember Candell said HCD has the City average the bottom ones, but this is the goal.
Mayor Anduri said if the low is about a 5-unit buffer and very low shows 20 and you cannot get enough very low income, he asked if you can make it up with very low or not.
Ms. Elrod said they must look at each. On line 18 where it states “over/under”, if any one of those columns is a negative number it is not good. They cannot have any category that has a negative number because then the City is not meeting the RHNA allocation.
Mayor Anduri suggested going through each element that goes into the RHNA and give direction. Starting with the first item mentioned is the ADUs. This is 280 or 240 down to 200 and HCD is saying based on the City’s history, it needs to be 200. What he has heard from discussions, Councilmembers would like staff to look again at the actual numbers and return with a recommendation. It would be useful to give more guidance. What he hears staff saying about the discussions with HCD and how they are uniformly carrying this out and that the best the City can do is 200. If this is the case and we cannot make a stronger case, he thinks they just go with 200.
Councilmember Kwok said in the July meeting with the HCD representative, he asked if this topic came up about calculation of the ADUs. Ms. Robles said no, they were focused on the AFFH programs and site criteria, but this is an item explicitly stated in the March 29th letter. They say to adjust the projections to 20 to 25 units per year, so they went with the higher end since the City is adopting programs to further facilitate ADU production and also from their recent permitting trends.
He then asked and confirmed it was based upon permitted as opposed to being built, and this was guidance provided in written format from HCD in their March letter to the City. Members of the public have said 25 is too high, but staff is saying that the guidance received from HCD is that a number between 20 and 25 would be deemed acceptable.
Mayor Anduri said staff is recommending it be 25 and put in 200 rather than the 240 or 280 they had.
Councilmember Candell said Ms. Elrod had said staff was going to look at the 2023 data halfway to see, and Mayor Anduri agreed, and this was the direction from the Council but if they cannot make the case with the 2023 data, he suggested going with the 200 unless someone feels strongly otherwise.
EXTEND MEETING
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ACTION: It was M/S/C (Dawson/Candell) to extend the meeting at 11:00 p.m. to 12 midnight. Vote: 5-0 (Ayes: Anduri, Dawson, Candell, Gerringer, and Kwok; Noes: None).
Mayor Anduri said the next issue is the yield which they had in at 90-95 and staff is saying 88 is what the City will use. He asked for comments.
Vice Mayor Dawson commented that it is extremely frustrating, and Councilmembers concurred.
Vice Mayor Dawson said if this aligns with what they directed, she thinks it should be presented and it should be acceptable.
Councilmember Candell said she would counter that. She thinks Lafayette is unique. They have been building where Orinda has not. They have no history. They are unique in terms of how much they have built with a proven track record, doing density bonus projects, and she challenged that they have to accept such a generic argument for all cities in the Bay Area because they are unlike other cities. She would want to try one more time with their reviewer and indicate they have this history of building. She would try and not use the generic form and she would go for the 90-95%. They simply added up the projects and divided them by 6, which comes up with 88, but there are very large projects they were aggressive on which turned out to be great. If you add in that they did 70 units at double capacity, a project which was 60 units, but it was only 50%, and if added up, they are still over 100%. So, even using HCD’s logic that you can only use ones that do not have density bonus, they are still over 100%. They are just saying you cannot use math that makes sense.
Mayor Anduri asked if this was the weighted average.
Ms. Elrod said no, it is not. It is an average across the board. HCD has directed every jurisdiction to use an average and not weighted.
Councilmember Candell noted they had 6 projects where there were only 6 units at 40% which completely changed the numbers versus the other 3 big projects that produced affordable housing, HCD is not letting them use that data.
Vice Mayor Dawson agrees it is irrational. She sort of split the difference approach where they would take that 90-95%, average it with the 88% and it is nominal, but it is still a difference at 89% or 91%. It picks up some units and it is based upon their comment that they used the density bonus half the time, so it applies that same logic that they are using back to them. So, if they were to adjust that it would be reasonable because it is based on their same rationale.
Councilmember Candell asked staff if they think they could make that argument.
Ms. Elrod said they could try. She thinks they would want to reach out to the reviewer and try to discuss it with him, which is not always easy to get a response, but they can definitely give it a try.
Councilmember Gerringer said the number staff is recommending based on a formula that HCD has been applying to other cities in the area that have approved Housing Elements is 88, and staff was using a different formula and got to 89.
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Vice Mayor Dawson said it is basically an average of the 88% that HCD is recommending as the cookie cutter and averaging on what the City’s conservative first pass at the 90/95%. So, it was to strictly add those together and divide it down the middle. She thinks it was 90 and 91. It is an average of an average and it has a bit of a nod to the City’s local performance and is not precise.
Councilmember Gerringer said because they are coming back with more calculations, but they are also asking staff to spend more time to go back to the reviewer on a percentage, she personally supports going with the 88% staff is recommending, but she is also supportive to conduct more analysis over the percentage of the principle.
Mayor Anduri said unless they have a very strong argument, he would go with the 88% too.
Vice Mayor Dawson said it is cumulative. If they are going to go back and look at numbers for Desco and the difference could be just a little bit of numbers and they do not have to look at upzoning in various places, that could make a difference.
Councilmember Candell stated it will make a difference. This particular number is a huge multiplier.
Mayor Anduri said it reduces very low and low income by 42.
Councilmember Candell said if there is a way to use their track record or anything else they could do to not do the 88 and get it higher, she thinks it will make a big difference.
Vice Mayor Dawson said if they came back and look at numbers, that would be her only argument if it could make a difference.
Councilmember Kwok said if they have the time he suggested trying the argument and see. If 89 or 90 achieves a materially different result, then they are not losing time on it and at least they pleaded their case.
Mayor Anduri said from what he understands of the conversations with the reviewer he would prefer to see what the numbers are at the next meeting after they look at what they will do with the opportunity sites to see if it makes a difference. As he understands the dynamics of these meetings, he is not sure going back on this item is going to be helpful.
Ms. Elrod said she also thinks the Council should have a full set of data in order to decide whether there is a difference between 88% and 95% is really going to be materially useful to the City. She can provide the data back the next time with the higher and lower numbers again. She would rather do that and save their conversations with the reviewer. She was not sure it is a consequential issue, but if it is not, she does not want to go there and fail.
Mayor Anduri said they are now on the opportunity sites. He asked for comments on the way they are handled on page 5.
Councilmember Candell referred to the site eligibility criteria. She said it is Section C.4.d. It states, “Existing uses that are similar to uses that have been recycled based on basic trends.” The last one is D; “Lower density residential uses.” She wanted to be clear that was not lower density anything but lower density multifamily.
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Ms. Robles said these criteria are applicable to sites that are only within the downtown area. That could be single family and it could be multifamily. Those are lower density residential uses.
Mr. Wolff said there are some single-family residences in the downtown commercial and multifamily areas which arguably have more opportunity to be redeveloped.
Councilmember Candell said they are lower density residential uses in multifamily areas.
Mr. Wolff said yes, within the downtown. Councilmember Candell asked to add that clarity.
Mayor Anduri said on Desco Plaza, they have the new information, but he asked if there was new information with respect to another Desco building about the vacancy.
Mr. Wolff said yes, there are 4 parcels, 4 buildings, and the western-most of those is currently vacant and on the market. Staff will factor that into the numbers brought back to the Council.
Mayor Anduri said his understanding is that staff will think about this and then make a recommendation.
From what he has heard, the recommendation is going to include the Desco sites as an opportunity site, but this is something staff will think about between now and the next meeting. Mr. Wolff said this is definitely new information that may change the outcome of the calculations.
Mayor Anduri referred to the AT&T site on Happy Valley Road and asked for comments. There were none.
Regarding Oak Hill West, there were no comments. Regarding the Masonic Lodge, there were no comments, and he confirmed there were no comments on the others.
Councilmember Candell asked and confirmed the Council can discuss more opportunity sites, and Mayor Anduri said separate or part of that would be the RHNA side of the churches, as well.
Councilmember Candell said it seems like there is just a huge opportunity with the whole Bruzzone property that the City is not taking full advantage of, especially considering Mr. Bruzzone’s interest. She suggested staff get a better clarification on that.
Mayor Anduri said his recollection of the shopping center is that the Council had a very detailed discussion and looked at the map in great detail and carved out areas they wanted to add and made a decision about areas they did not want to add. He would say they have had that full discussion.
Councilmember Candell asked then why they were upzoning it to 75 du/acre. She asked why not upzone just a little bit of it. Mayor Anduri said it is 2.2 acres out of 7 acres and he asked if Councilmember Candell’s point is that they have not looked at it closely enough.
Councilmember Candell said considering the second letter that came in, she thinks the City should talk to the Bruzzone’s and see what they are thinking.
Vice Mayor Dawon said it was McCaulou’s and the parking lot behind it which is all they have in.
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Ms. Robles clarified that originally there were a cluster of smaller properties on Oak Hill that were included for development alongside that section of the McCaulou’s area of that shopping center. They were since separated as sites due to the number of owners and parcel counts, so it is a much cleaner situation. The McCaulou’s site is actually only 1.32 acres. It was 2.22 with all of the buildings together, but it is 1.3 just for the McCaulou’s portion and parking.
Mayor Anduri asked if they also took the segment of the center running from McCaulou’s to the east and Ms. Elrod said no.
Councilmember Candell said her concept here is that if Mr. Bruzzone is excited to build, the City has upzoned it to 75 du/acre, he will do whatever he wants. Therefore, the City should talk with him and find out more. She thinks it is a great site and the law is on his side to build whatever he wants there. She just thinks they should really take advantage of that. It is under-utilized right now.
Mayor Anduri said he is comfortable with having another discussion with the Bruzzone’s and looking at that again. He asked about any other sites other than the churches, and there were none. He then asked how they would include the church sites and how different from what the Council has done with respect to AFFH.
Ms. Elrod said they would have to go site by site and make an educated guess about how much of the site is a reasonable amount to develop like an acre of a 5-acre site and look at topographical conditions. They would have to look at other aspects of the development, such as one church site which is bounded by a creek. The assumption is they probably would not be able to do much there because of setbacks. There is one church they discussed leaving out because it is in a very high fire severity zone, but it is only one site, then do the math of figuring out what they could get in terms of potential development yield. They have not done that yet. To her, she feels that the decision about including church sites is that decision is best made after they figure out where they are with the Desco Plaza and others.
Mayor Anduri agreed and said therefore, more detailed analysis is proposed to be done for the church sites, and he voiced support of this. This way, they have information as to what could be included for RHNA numbers if they were to move forward with that.
Councilmember Gerringer agreed. Vice Mayor Dawson said if they look at that, she asked if they could focus it for low income.
Ms. Elrod said this was a question the City Attorney was going to look into. They could distribute them the same way they distributed units by income category in terms of the inventory and not necessarily a program for AFFH. This would give them a ballpark figure how many units at the base they could get.
Depending on whether or not legally they could require them to be consistent with SB 4, that question can be answered by the Attorney.
Councilmember Candell said they have already done the analysis on 2 churches.
Ms. Robles said they have not done a more thorough analysis. They had a conversation with Our Savior, and they are interested in developing, but they are not in the Housing Element. It is the Methodist church and parking lot. That property is in the studied areas and the Carol Lane Lutheran Church is not. Staff would do more of a refined analysis of these different sites. This work can still help the AFFH program if this is limited. The state wants to see quantified objectives, so this can help inform that as well.
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Mayor Anduri said the last thing to discuss is whether they want to give any direction on options to be presented. He would say to leave this to staff because they will see what happens if the Desco numbers are included, whether they have to have the chart that has the much higher upzoning of the downtown.
Councilmembers concurred.
Mr. Wolff suggested the Council continue the matter to September 11th for staff to conduct sufficient analysis.
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Gerringer/Dawson) to provide direction on the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing Assessment and directed staff to begin work on an addendum to the EIR. Roll Call Vote: 5-0 (Ayes:
Candell, Dawson, Gerringer, Kwok and Anduri; Noes: None).
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Gerringer/Dawson) to provide direction on the opportunity sites inventory and other Housing Element revisions made to date and continue the matter to September 11, 2023. Vote: 5- 0 (Ayes: Anduri, Dawson, Candell, Gerringer, and Kwok; Noes: None).
12. ITEMS REMOVED FROM CONSENT
A. Minutes – July 24, 2023
Recommendation: Approve.
Vice Mayor Dawson referred to page 23, paragraph 7, and said there is text that states, “to coordinate with EBMUD and”. She asked to replace that with, “…to parallel our Dam Safety Program for EBMUD in…” ACTION: It was M/S/C (Gerringer/Dawson) to approve the Minutes of July 24, 2023, as amended. Vote:
5-0 (Ayes: Anduri, Dawson, Candell, Gerringer, and Kwok; Noes: None).
13. COUNCIL/COMMISSION REPORTS
A. Councilmembers report on activities and consideration of matters a Councilmember wishes to initiate for placement on a future agenda.
Councilmember Gerringer reported last Friday herself, Councilmember Kwok and Mayor Anduri joined over 40 elected officials to stand in support with the Jewish community against antisemitism. It was at Temple Isaiah and coordinated by the JCRC. The diversity of the group of elected officials and members of the community was very touching and those part of the protected, vulnerable classes who are suffering from hate and hoped for a call to action and next steps.
Vice Mayor Dawson recognized City Clerk Robbins and Dana Anderson for coordinating the Mayors’ Conference which was amazing.
B. City Manager’s Update
Recommendation: Receive and file.
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City Manager Srivatsa reported that 1) the Community Center Playground is scheduled to break ground in early October. Staff received an estimate to replace the HVAC and the roof at the Community Center which came in at $3.7 million, much more than anticipated. So, the PTR is looking at options; and 2) There is a Senior Symposium from 8:30 to 12:30 Saturday, September 30th at Acalanes High School, and the Senior Services Commission will be in attendance.
Mayor Anduri opened the public comment period, and there were no speakers.
C. Councilmember Candell and Vice Mayor Dawson
Resolution 2023-49 Appointing one member to the Design Review Commission Recommendation: Adopt Resolution 2023-49.
Councilmember Candell stated she and Vice Mayor Dawson interviewed Travis Kauzer and Glen Cass and Jon Gray were present. They also received another application for the DRC, so hopefully both spots will be filled soon.
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Candell/Dawson) to adopt Resolution 2023-49 appointing Travis Kauzer to the Design Review Commission. Vote: 5-0 (Ayes: Anduri, Dawson, Candell, Gerringer, and Kwok; Noes: None).
14. WRITTEN COMMUNICATIONS – None.
15. ADJOURNMENT – 11:29 p.m.
APPROVED:
__________________________________
Carl Anduri, Mayor
ATTEST:
_________________________
Joanne Robbins, City Clerk