City Council Meeting Page 1 of 43 March 11, 2024
7 City of Lafayette
City Council Minutes
Lafayette Library and Learning Center – Don Tatzin Community Hall March 11, 2024 3491 Mount Diablo Boulevard, Lafayette, California 6:00 p.m.
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Vice Mayor Kwok called the Regular City Council meeting to order at 6:00 p.m.
2. ROLL CALL
Present: City Council: Mayor Dawson (arrived at 7:00 p.m.); Vice Mayor Kwok; Councilmembers Anduri, Candell, and McCormick
Absent: None
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Staff Present: Niroop Srivatsa, City Manager; Tracy Robinson, Administrative Services Director; Greg Wolff, Planning and Building Director; Sonia Urzua, Assistant Planning and Building Director; Diana Elrod, Housing Consultant; Matt Luttropp, Engineering Manager; Patrick Golier; Transportation Program Manager; 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
Councilmember Candell requested to move Item 4; Pledge of Allegiance, to be taken after Item 8; Land Acknowledgement Statement.
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Candell/McCormick) to adopt the agenda, as amended. Roll Call Vote: 4-0-1 (Ayes:
Kwok, Anduri, Candell, and McCormick; Noes: None; Absent: Dawson).
5. PUBLIC COMMENTS – (For Closed Session items only) – None
6. CLOSED SESSION – 6:00 p.m.
A. Conference with Legal Counsel – Anticipated Litigation Initiation of Litigation pursuant to Government Code section 54956.9(d)(4) - (1 case) Open Session – Report out of Closed Session – 7:00 p.m.
Mayor Dawson announced there was no reportable action taken in Closed Session.
7. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE – David Clark led in the Pledge of Allegiance.
8. Mayor Dawson
Land Acknowledgement Statement
We acknowledge that Lafayette is part of the unceded, ancestral homeland of the Bay Miwok people. The Bay Miwok and neighboring Ohlone people have lived in and moved through this place for thousands of years. They stewarded and shaped this land for hundreds of generations. We express our appreciation and gratitude for this profound legacy, which enhances and contributes to our lives to this day. We will strive to honor this land and strengthen our ties with the Indigenous communities that continue to live and work in our East Bay region as our neighbors and community members. We acknowledge and honor them and their ancestors, elders, and next seven generations.
9. PUBLIC COMMENTS (For Items not on the agenda)
LAUREN HERPICH thanked Ms. Iarla for including St. Patrick’s Day in last week’s Weekly Roundup and said she brought some Irish Soda bread for everyone. St. Patrick’s Day was listed, along with International Women’s Day, as part of the list of cultural observations and celebrations being celebrated in March, and asked that Easter be included for next week’s Roundup.
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LIBBY HENRY referred to RHNA numbers and Housing Elements and voiced concerns with honor and integrity of democracy in the State, undemocratic actions by the State, legislative actions which took away voices, votes, and rights as citizens, continual diminishment of individual and homeowner rights, the City’s rights to plan, govern, and voice opinions when discussing housing projects, and chaotic systems prevailing in Sacramento.
ROB LAVOIE ceded his 3 minutes to Libby Henry.
LIBBY HENRY continued to voice concerns about the 159 housing bills being forced through a 10-month period, affordable housing as measures to make housing more affordable in the State, questioned the legislative’s actual purpose, removal of people’s rights, cities’ rights, people’s freedom of choice in how they live, and AB 2053 which allows developers to not provide parking, mandates with no differential for impacts.
10. CITY MANAGER’S UPDATE
City Manager Niroop Srivatsa gave the following bi-weekly update on activities on department activities:
• The Mayor, city manager and the Chief of Police met with Caltrans and CHP last week and had requested the meeting to better understand Caltrans’ policies regarding gatherings on Stateowned bridges, including the El Curtola Bridge. Senator Glazer and Don Tatzin were present, and the meeting was productive. Caltrans will be sending a response to the questions asked and these will be shared with the community.
• The Council may see some equipment soon on the Terraces of Lafayette site at Deer Hill and Pleasant Hill Roads. A grading permit was issued to remove the existing asphalt and establish positive drainage in the area. Mass grading will likely begin late summer of this year. • The Environmental Task Force (ETF) continues its efforts to educate the community about the ban on gas-powered leaf blowers. This ban will go into effect in Lafayette on July 1, 2024. As a reminder, the Council approved this new rule last October and time was given to allow residents, businesses, and landscape companies to prepare for the ban. • The Parks, Trails and Recreation Commission will be releasing the much-awaited Parks and Recreation Guide next week, and registration kicks off on March 25th at midnight. • The Public Art Committee (PAC) is encouraging local poets to apply to read their work at their Pilot Literary Events series. The first event will be held on Tuesday, April 30th. She asked those interested in joining to reach out to the PAC and said the link is on the City’s website. • She provided a Reservoir tower update, stating that in 2023 EBMUD made a presentation to the City on its plans to seismically retrofit the Reservoir tower and the plans call for shortening the tower by 40 feet. The community and Council were concerned about the loss of this iconic tower which is featured on many websites in Lafayette. A group of community residents with broad expertise in seismic structural design, structural engineering, and architecture volunteered their services. For the last few months, the group has been reviewing EBMUD’s plans for the tower.
They have released a report with a finding that the tower could remain in its current height and be cost-effectively retrofitted using just a modest addition of mild steel reinforcement. EBMUD disagrees with that finding and she and the advisory group will be meeting with EBMUD to get their points across and hopefully come up with a solution they can all support.
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Mayor Dawson opened the public comment period, and there were no speakers.
11. PRESENTATIONS
A. Antoinette St. John, Field Representative for Assemblymember Bauer-Kahan Legislative Update
Recommendation: Receive and file.
Antoinette St. John, Field Representative for Assemblymember Bauer-Kahan, gave an overview of their office’s field representatives serving Lamorinda, provided an overview of their San Ramon office, and legislation the Assemblymember has been working on thus far. Assemblymember Bauer-Kahan is the Chair of the Committee on Privacy and Consumer Protection this year and also sits on the Insurance Committee, the Utilities and Energy Committee, the Natural Resources Committee, and Judiciary Committee. As a member, she is able to work on the most pressing issues such as the current insurance crisis, utility rates, and climate issues.
Ms. St. John then spoke of 2023 and the 13 Assemblymember’s bills getting signed by the Governor. Most were in the areas of workplace protection, reproductive health, and environment. To start off the 2024 year, the Assemblymember has introduced 21 bills, some of which include AI bills:
• AB 331, the Automated Decision Tools Act: This is designed to protect individuals from algo rhythmic discrimination by requiring developers and users to assess automated decision tools to make consequential decisions for any biases present in the tools, known as ADTs. • AB 1836, which will protect the face, name, image, and likeness of deceased artists from being replicated without consent from their estates by generative AI. • AB 2885 looks to create a standard definition for AI in State law. • AB 3204 will require all models to register with the State. • As founder and chair of the Select Committee on Reproductive Health, the Assemblymember continues to champion multiple bills to make California a place where women have safe access to vital reproductive health services. Some bills are AB 2085 to create a more streamlined process for clinic developments.
• AB 2099 will update penalties for harassing and doxing abortion patients and providers. In addition, the Assemblymember is using her role as Chair of this committee to hold an exciting series of first in the nation hearings on menopause. These will discuss research and policies to address the symptoms widely experienced by women going through menopause. • AB 2236: Most recently, Assemblymember Bauer-Kahan has announced she is partnering with two State Senators on legislation that will eliminate the option to receive unwoven plastic bags at grocery stores. AB 2236 has received strong support from a broad coalition of environmental groups and has received strong support from the California Grocers’ Association, as well. • AB 2021: The Assemblymember is also focused on protecting young people in California from predatory tobacco sales and has introduced AB 2021 which will raise penalties for on-line tobacco sellers who illegally sell tobacco products under the age of 21. • AB 2011 will remove the sunset date for the small employer family leave mediation program and expand the program to include reproductive loss as a qualifying event. • AB 1860 seeks to ensure that forgiven debt is not considered as income for tax purposes. • AB 2054 is going to instate a 10-year cooling off period before a CPUC Commissioner can be employed by a regulated entity.
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• AB 1999: The Assemblywoman co-authored this bill which re-establishes a $10 cap on the fixed charge on ratepayer bills.
Ms. St. John said their office can assist with any State-level casework and she asked those to visit their website. She announced that on March 21st they are hosting an event on behavioral health care and what that will look like after Proposition 1. On April 18th they are hosting a screening of Jennifer Seibel Newsome’s film, “Misrepresentation” alongside a panel of speakers that will share their career trajectories and how the representation of women in the media and social media has impacted their careers and day-to-day lives.
Councilmember Candell asked if there is an AI bill to protect elected people or City staff. Ms. St. John said no, not in the Assemblymember’s bill package; however, this is something she can check with the Privacy Committee.
Councilmember Candell asked if Prop 1 passed. Ms. St. John said they are not sure yet as to whether it passed or not.
Mayor Dawson opened the public comment period.
SARAH said in light of Women’s History Month, she asked how the Assemblymember defines the term “woman.”
Mayor Dawson and Councilmembers thanked Ms. St. John for providing an update.
12. CONSENT CALENDAR
Mayor Dawson asked if there were any public comments or items Councilmembers or the public wish to remove from the Consent Calendar, and there were none.
A. Minutes
February 26, 2024
Recommendation: Approve.
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Candell/Kwok) to adopt Consent Calendar Item A. Vote: 5-0 (Ayes: Dawson, Kwok, Anduri, Candell, and McCormick; Noes: None).
13. OLD BUSINESS
A. Niroop Srivatsa, City Manager; Tracy Robinson, Administrative Services Director; Suzanne Iarla, Communications Analyst
Benchmark Survey Poll Results
Recommendation: 1. Authorize $60,000 in 11-110—861 to conduct an informational campaign and gather community feedback regarding the City’s current financial situation. 2. Authorize City Manager to sign agreement with IMC Corp to provide public relations consultant services.
Administrative Services Director Tracy Robinson said Dr. Gary Manross will participate via Zoom. He headed up the survey just conducted and will present the poll results.
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Dr. Manross stressed that the study follows the scientific method to the letter which means the City can have confidence in the accuracy of the findings. Whatever decisions the Council makes on these data are valid and sound. The research design sample size is 400. For the entire U.S. of about 333 million people, a typical sample size is about 1,000 to 1,500 so 400 for a city, especially given Lafayette’s size, is extremely good. He said they surveyed registered voters, said the statistical sampling error is plus or minus 4% to 5%, and they gathered the data from January 16th through February 8th.
He presented a PowerPoint presentation and spoke about the importance of the decision-making process when voting which is driven by core values. It is important how opinion leaders feel because this will impact the ultimate decision of how voters vote. The number one characteristic of the profile of opinion leaders, which are information-seekers, is that they are more critical and/or more supportive. At 14.5% with 58 opinion leaders in the sample, their opinion counts.
Dr. Manross then presented a slide about satisfaction with quality of life as a resident of Lafayette which showed 93% are satisfied, 58% are very satisfied, 23% are extremely satisfied, and these are wonderful findings. He observed that there must be a difference of 3% or more between the mainstream and the opinion leaders to be significant and this shows there is no difference. Everyone is happy with the exception of 4%, which is very low.
Dr. Manross then referred to collective core values which are what drive decisions. If they asked the question as an open-ended question, it would mean what is front of mind, which is what people are seeing on television, what the media is promoting, what they are talking about when they go shopping, what is on their mind at the moment, and it is not necessarily indicative of their core values. In ranking them, the Council should look at high concerns. The rank order will change if you just limit it to high concern. The number one concern on the electorate’s minds is the need to maintain streets, roads, and storm drains in Lafayette.
Second is the level of wildfire preparedness, traffic circulation is third, the ability to increase the amount of open space., After that it is the need to maintain a vibrant downtown, amount of potential new development, crime, lack of available housing, and climate change.
Regarding satisfaction scores, overall, these are happy residents with 86% being satisfied, 32% are extremely satisfied, and the opinion leaders are significant at 90% which is a nice finding. The satisfaction with parks, trails, and recreation shows no difference between the mainstream and opinion leaders. 88% are satisfied and 49% are extremely satisfied. This tells him that people love parks, trails, and recreation amenities.
Regarding level of police services, 83% are satisfied, 40% are extremely satisfied, and opinion leaders are much more satisfied because they pay attention to public safety.
Regarding maintenance of public streets, such as potholes getting fixed timely, 77% are satisfied and opinion leaders are on the downside of that. While education is not provided by the City, 76% are satisfied with the quality of education. Over half are extremely satisfied, especially those with school-aged children.
Regarding how satisfied people are with the way they are treated when dealing with City government employees, 63% is still a high number. Over two-thirds of opinion leaders are satisfied with how they are treated, which speaks well to professional staff.
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Regarding community development satisfaction including code enforcement, planning, and zoning, it is 58% which is not bad, but almost one-quarter are dissatisfied. These people likely were not happy with code enforcement or zoning. Given that reality and context, this is always lower than the rest in other cities, but these numbers for Lafayette are very positive.
One of the two most important findings of the study include a question, “Were you aware of the fact that the City of Lafayette will soon be facing an annual deficit of about $2 million?” and 74% are not aware and this is equal to opinion leaders. Voters just do not know, and if the resident learns about this from someone they trust, would it cause concern, and if so, how much? Overall concern is 83% which is pretty important, so people care. 30% would be highly concerned to learn this, and over half are somewhat concerned.
Opinion leaders are significantly higher than the mainstream, so these two findings are critical. Voters are just not aware of what the City is facing fiscally and want to become aware from someone they trust. The question would be, “Would you encourage City officials to find new sources of revenue, or would they advise to cut back on services presently being provided to residents?” Over half say to find new resources, 30% say to cut back, and 19% are unsure. There are not many options in Lafayette for increasing income so the two options that were considered most seriously were property tax and sales tax. In order to address the $2 million shortcoming, it would be about $200 a year per parcel . The second option would be to increase the sales tax by 1%.
The neighboring communities have done this successfully; however, the City has tried twice and both times it failed. Part of the reason it failed was going back to three-quarters of voters are not aware the City has this problem facing them so the question is, if the City puts an Initiative on the ballot in the November election cycle, would it pass or fail? If the City put the 1% sales tax increase on, it would fail again. He shared that he has created a “go/no go” model..
The model for the “go/no go” decision is where they take 100% of the ”definitely” and half of the “probably” which gets them to the “likely yes.” The bad news here is if you take potential support of 100% of the “probables” that are your potential “yes,” in this case, it is still under a simple majority.
The thing the Council must understand now is that it has been shown in Lafayette that its voters want control of how money is spent. If there is a general election, that yield from a successful bond initiative or financial decision of any kind will sit in the General Fund. A special election requires 2/3 voter support, and it is often easier to get the 2/3 than a simple majority. If the money goes into the General Fund, at the end of the day, the City Council makes the decision of how to spend it, and there are no guarantees.
So, it is not that people will not vote in support of a funding measure, the issue is that people might not vote on it because they want to know how that money is going to be spent.
In this case, the problem is spread out over many dimensions. It is impossible for the Council to say they will spend “x” dollars here and “y” dollars there. To earmark money on a sales tax measure is very difficult.
So, the City is only going to need 50%. The bad news is, they will have the problem of constituents wanting to guarantee what you cannot give them -- how the money will be spent. It is the “trust me” issue and they do not necessarily want to trust.
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Regarding whether voters would support a three-quarter percent increase, the answer is “no.” With the “go/no go” model, 41% is better than the results for 1% , but is still not enough. The good news here is potential support is 52% so there is hope, assuming that the Council makes residents aware of the need and do it in a way it is trustworthy. Regarding a one-half percent increase, the City is still below the majority support, but the potential goes up to 56% and a definite “no” at 35%, which is a real challenge.
The bottom line is that the Council is not legally required but morally required to advise constituents what they want to do, why they want to do it, the cost to them for doing it, and the consequences of doing it, meaning the benefits and consequence of not doing it. In this case, the City would be forced to cut back on services provided by the City. What the City cannot do is advocate a “yes” or a “no” vote, but they have a responsibility to inform, and the City can see what happens if they are not informed. So, it is incumbent upon the City to inform, not using the word “educate.” Regarding the impacts of public outreach, the City should know in advance the arguments. They should strive to get the most important arguments or justifications for the need. All must be real, and the first and most compelling is that the City will not be able to keep up with road maintenance. If it turns out the City does not have the money to keep up with road maintenance, this is scary. Almost 65% would be more inclined to vote “yes.” 71% of opinion leaders are more aware of the condition of local streets and roads, and this would make them more inclined to vote for a spending measure.
The second most compelling one is that the City will not be able to invest in wildfire mitigation. This is critical and while small, 58% is still a compelling argument. The next one is, with sales tax, everyone pays their fair share. 60% would support, opinion leaders are 71% more inclined to support, and 3% said it is not believable. Based on history, the City has said they have to cut back and have not cut back which makes City staff and the City Council proud of where they managed to not cut back. So, if the City does not have the money and needs to cut back, it had better be true.
The next argument they tested is that the City will not be able to invest in more parks, trails, and open space, and recreation programs for children and seniors. This is important to constituents, and this would cause 59% of the mainstream to likely support it. Also, the following arguments polled well: this measure will help protect property values with quality City services, parks, open space, and safe neighborhoods.
And 100% of the sales tax must remain in Lafayette to benefit its residents. This is always an important one, and he is not sure why it was not higher up in the ranking order. Probably the reason for that is because it is expected.
There is a citizen’s oversight committee that is proposed to be appointed to monitor all expenditures. This is always done and there is an annual audit by an outside organization to add credibility. It is still over half because 51% of the mainstream say it is important, and this can easily be 54%. The point is, it is important, and the City will want to make this clear. It also shows that residents expect it and value it.
The language of, “The City will not be able to build traffic calming improvements” should have probably not been used because traffic calming is not a common or household term, so some people might scratch their head on that. But the City still got 50% and 52% with opinion leaders, so there is no difference.
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Regarding “The City will not be able to invest in needed improvements for orderly growth downtown” the City’s downtown is unique. It is compressed, with many restaurants, traffic pressure, and so orderly growth downtown really is a factor but not is something constituents think the City can do a lot about. It does not have a huge effect and he did not think it should be used in any outreach campaign.
The next argument polled is that sales tax will not be entirely funded by Lafayette residents. Non-residents purchasing goods and services in Lafayette will also pay the tax. This is a replication of an earlier argument. The reason this argument is in here is when looking at language and how you want to talk about something you know is going to be important the question is how to articulate it to constituents. If the Council moves forward, he will recommend going a different route in terms of language, but it should still be pointed out.
“Without these monies the City will be forced to cut back on level of services provided” is the same thing.
He thinks the City should be careful about how it talks. If the City talks about this in a manner that is not believable, it gets back to “I heard it before, and I’ve never seen it happen” which means it is not believable. The City must inform constituents in a compelling fashion that rings their bell for their core values, for why they live in Lafayette, and for what their expectations of the City are.
Regarding whether a sunset clause is needed or whether the tax should it be permanent, voters want it renewed. This is not unusual in most communities. Sometimes they can be permanent, but usually it does not happen. One of the big reasons is that most people may be willing to make a decision for themselves and their children, but not their grandchildren. So, this should be brought back to the electorate in some number of years.
When Dr. Manross started in his profession, sunset clauses were typically 30 years. All funding measures being approved were routinely at 30 years. Then it went from 30 years to 20 years, then 20 to 10, 10 to 7, and now it is going back up and across the State, it is 10 years. In this poll, 20 years does not fly, and for 10 years, the City only has 38% and it is equal with opinion leaders. That said, under normal conditions he would go to 5 years. He has clients like Rio Vista where this is what they use. They go every 5 years, and it has passed every single time by 2/3 vote. If the City goes forward, he would recommend 10 years and would not go down to 5 years because it is expensive to put something on the ballot.
The next question is what is the preferred source of information regarding the City, and the City’s website has the most traction. And, while the City does not have a daily newspaper, it does have weekly and monthly newsletters which are read. He congratulated the City on its Lafayette Vistas newsletter which says staff is doing a great job.
Regarding direct mail, phone, email, and attending City meetings, there are happy campers that trust the City elected and professional staff alike. Why would they want to come out to a meeting when they can stay home with their family and do something they prefer to do? The only time people come to a meeting is when they are upset, which makes sense. What does not make sense is social media and they identified all of them. He is surprised this is not higher up and he is betting it will be, so he cannot explain it.
At this point, Dr. Manross said he would like to make two recommendations coming out of this study.
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Although the go/no go model predicts that a ballot measure won’t pass, In this case, he recommends the City put an initiative on the November 2024 ballot because first, the City must inform the constituents that there is a problem and the consequences of that problem is that the City will be forced to cut back services. If the City waits two years and does not do much, this is a mistake. The City will get criticized as voters will say why didn’t you put it on November? The City should position itself to say, we gave you an opportunity to resolve the problem and you voted “no” so the City must cut back services and did. If the City does not create that believability and credibility, the City will be in deep trouble two years from now, even if it ran a campaign of information for that two-year period, it will be a mistake.
Therefore, he recommended going in November 2024 and second, that the City in the process conduct an outreach effort without advocating a “yes” vote, but explaining the need and squaring that up with the collective core values of constituents which has been identified.
He hopes the Council listens to his advice which is based on empirical evidence, and he stressed it is highly valid when looking at the demographics. When people look at demographics for voter surveys, they often come back and say, “this is not our town” and “you got it wrong.” The survey looked at and studied the electorate which is different than the community at large. Most Lafayette residents vote, but in other cities there are whole subsets of populations that do not vote. This is why they look at “most likely to vote,” “most likely to succeed,” and they break that out. He did not do this. They could do that though because when pulling the sample, they do test to see how many have voted in the last 10 consecutive elections versus 6 or less. At this point, the findings were so clear it led to two simple recommendations, and he could answer any questions of the Council.
Councilmember McCormick said he also agrees that the sample size of 400 is very significant. In stepping back, he was involved in a legislative briefing today regarding the State of California. They know the current situation the State is in, and there is the potential for three or more State bond measures to be on the ballot in November asking for a lot of money. He asked if Dr. Manross’s opinion changed given the context they will see in November with lots of requests for money and could imagine voters saying “no, no, no” without thinking of the merits.
Dr. Manross said he gets asked that question every single time. The answer is “no” and here is why. It will not impact high propensity voters. They will vote no matter what, but this affects their personal lifestyle, personal pocketbook, and it is real. Residents will vote on this, and they will vote the way they said they will vote. If it is a State, regional or county initiative, or federal initiative it will not affect the local election for Lafayette residents who love Lafayette.
Councilmember McCormick referred to the likely versus registered voters and said Dr. Manross’s contention is that constituents are likely voters versus registered voters. Dr. Manross said he did not say that, and apologized. The issue here is they go and look at high propensity voters, moderate propensity voters, and low propensity voters. In a survey like this, there will be very few low propensity voters because low propensity voters will not vote. There were no significant differences between high propensity and moderate propensity and very little with even low propensity voters. It is consistent across the board. So, to say “likely voters” was not useful, and it would use space and time that was not justified.
Councilmember Candell referred to page 37 and question 13, “Now that you’ve heard several arguments in support….” She noted it was not broken down into the 1%, 3/4% and the 1/2% options. She asked if Dr.
Manross thinks it is therefore valid across all those levels.
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Dr. Manross said the question was phrased as follows: “Assuming the amount of increase does not exceed your threshold of willingness to pay, would you vote “yes” or “no”. He also emphasized again that if this passes, wonderful. If it fails, the City must pull the trigger and cut back services.
Mayor Dawson opened the public comment period.
LIBBY HENRY said before she would vote for ever paying more to live in Lafayette than she already does she would ask what is the cause of this $2 million deficit the City did not have before. It reminds her of the State with its surplus and then it is completely gone, with no accountability as to what happened with that money. Police services are less than adequate in the services they provide, and she thinks their services could be cut.
DAVID CLARK stated he thinks what he heard is that the best way for the City to proceed assuming they put a measure on the November ballot and that they explain the importance of the big issue and the connection with their core values, they would probably go with a 1/2% rate and they will look at the General Election majority vote as opposed to the 2/3 specific vote.
LAUREN HERPICH asked how Dr. Manross actually knows the likeliness of voting. This was not a question asked, and she was not sure where he got his sample pool from. Also, in the report it states there were 400 individuals who completed the survey. She asked if this is the number who were called or who actually went through the process. This would determine statistical significance. She was one of the people who got the call and at first, she thought it was a crank call. The first question asked was about her feelings about the direction of the United States, and she thought about why the City would be asking that. She knows by talking to others who got the call that they hung up on the survey and some even twice, and some of those people she would consider to be opinion leaders or influencers.
She referred to the recommendation which is to recommend hiring IMC Corporation and asked who they are. She asked if there is already a contract with IMC being considered and also saw there is a specific spend of $60,000 being asked. So, she asked if this is the RFP cost, or the cost IMC has said their services would cost. She would also want to know whether the money is being spent wisely. She would caution because she knows there have been a lot of small expenditures like this which include the Communications Plan, Experience Lafayette, the gift card program, the $40,000 to communicate a gas leaf blower ban which all might be contributing to the suspicion the money is not being used wisely, and it might be why you see the 30-30-30 percent split when asked how effective is the message that services may need to be cut without these funds. Lastly, she is not surprised to see that 75% of people did not know there would be a sales tax deficit as she is pretty up to speed with the City Council, and the first time she heard this was happening was because of the phone call she got, so the agenda tonight even does not communicate this.
ROBERT LAVOIE said he has a similar question and wondered what the results of the first question were, and if people on one side or the other were tending towards pro or con on supporting of the proposed tax increase, it would be interesting to see. Also, whoever is putting together the survey and follow-up marketing, he asked if the plans for that would be shared with the community or something that is decided by City staff.
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As a general comment, he got cut off on his survey halfway through and then they disconnected and did not call him back, so he was not sure he was one of the 400 or those not finishing the survey. When they were talking about things that might get cut, if this did not pass, some of the ideas seemed weak, such as the wildfire preparedness. He asked how large this item is on the City’s budget as it is certainly not 10%.
Roads are important but he knows there are many other things related to the Clean Water Act where costs are rising quite a bit. He asked how much traffic circulation is for the entire budget and knows a big chunk of the budget are salaries. Lastly, he said things like open space and number of downtown parks and recreation facilities will be outside the budget as well, so those might be from development fees from the 30% in housing increases the City is proposing, but probably not from the City’s regular budget.
Mayor Dawson asked staff to comment on the $2 million as a reserve shortfall.
Ms. Robinson said there are a number of factors that come into play here. The Council actually talked about this in detail in the last issue of Vistas. The City did explain some of this in detail and would encourage people to visit the City’s website, and when Dr. Manross said a majority of people did not know, it was right when Vistas was dropping, so hopefully people are more informed at this point.
Going back to the question, a large portion of about $1 million is the increased cost just to maintain its roads over what the City had originally anticipated due to many factors. A large factor is inflation. There are also mandates for green infrastructure when the City is repaving roads. They also now must spend money on storm drains and putting in green infrastructure. Those are mandates the City did not have to do before. There are also a number of unfunded State mandates; stormwater pollution and the City is receiving more and more requirements to comply with, but the amount of money they are allowed to charge has stayed the same. Every year, the requirements are more, the revenues stay the same, and requirements also get more expensive due to inflation.
Similarly, the downtown core area is more expensive to maintain, and the City has no ability to raise revenues for that. Overall, there are increased demands and things put in place for residents the City did not do before such as safety measures, traffic calming, and more requests for these types of expenses. In terms of staff, the City had an increase in staffing the Council approved. Those were necessary, because as a consultant determined, the City was being asked to do more than the current staff could reasonably accommodate and recommended increase staffing. She said some of those positions remain vacant because they did not feel comfortable hiring them if they did not have the funding. They are necessary as there are an increasing number of tasks that must be done as requested by residents and the State that staff are struggling to keep up with. She thinks this is a great question and something they want to inform the public about. This is why they are asking for funds so they can get the message out to people so they can understand where this came from.
Mayor Dawson said she knows Ms. Herpich mentioned other expenditures, such as the gift card program and ExperienceLafayette.org which were downtown support programs. This money was through the ARPA program to increase more revenues coming in from sales tax.
She said the next question was from David Clark looking for confirmation as what Dr. Manross’ recommendation is which is to proceed with a sales tax measure at 1/2% with a General Election which would allow for a 50% vote. Mayor Dawson confirmed that this was his recommendation, and this will be discussed by the Council.
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The next question was, how do you know the likelihood of voting based upon the percentage of people who voted.
Dr. Manross said they pull the sample off the most current version of the registered voters provided by the County and in the data indicates how many times that particular individual voted over the last 10 consecutive elections. They use 8 out of 10 which is considered high propensity and highly likely.
Moderate propensity is between 7 and 6 and anything below 5 is low propensity. All 400 responses are from completed interviews and it is not that they call 400 people and half answered. They go until they get 400 completed surveys.
Mayor Dawson said another question was the poll recipient’s answer about how do you feel about the direction of the United States, and why this question was asked. Dr. Manross prefaced this and said they do not create charts and put into the report itself the responses to 100% of the questions. What they do is once they figure out what they have and what they are going to recommend, they will report and create graphs and charts for those that explain why they are recommending what they are recommending. The answer to that question was very positive. For the United States, 26% said they are going in the right direction and 55% said the wrong direction, but in Lafayette, 66% said the City is going in the right direction and only 17% said they are going in the wrong direction. This is good information. They do not need that in terms of developing a public outreach effort which is why that slide is not created and is not there, but they do need it in terms of understanding it. It tells them the local Lafayette voter on the whole says they have good local government, good City Council, good professional staff, and everything they do is in the interest of the residents. It was not necessary to expand the report by adding more charts and more text.
In this particular study, the findings are very clear. He apologized in the recommendation and should have said specifically they are recommending 1/2%.
Mayor Dawson asked staff about the selection of the IMC Corporation and that process. Ms. Robinson said IMC Corporation is an arm of SRI Consulting, and she asked Dr. Manross to explain what IMC is.
Dr. Manross said the IMC is a sister company to SRI and he is CEO of both. For many years they only did research which is weird because his background and expertise is integrated marketing and communications, but nonetheless, for this purpose they did SRI and in the private sector they did the outreach. The reason he created IMC is when a PR firm is retained to do the public outreach, nine times out of ten they do not necessarily understand the findings from the benchmark survey. It is urgent to structure the discussion and outreach around the findings. For example, you capitalize on the core values and do not ignore them. It must be driven by the findings of the benchmark survey. More times than not they end up doing a period of time when they do outreach and then a tracking poll to justify and see if the expected outcomes were real, and if so, why, and have they answered the elector’s questions, and tonight were good questions and concerns. The community is going to be concerned about those things and they need to speak to them.
But, before making the go/no go decision, the Council has until August 8th to make it, so they recommend a tracking poll in June. This gets to the point of has support shifted and has it gone above the threshold of a simple majority and if not, why? If so, why? He created a firm for that, brought in the expertsto make sure they executed it properly and that they will follow the findings in the benchmark survey. If you put an RFP out there and go based on whatever they base it on, he guarantees they will throw this survey away and the City’s likelihood of success is diminished. So, if they do not follow the findings from the benchmark survey, the City is wasting its money.
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Mayor Dawson said the only outstanding question is whether this would be done with no transparency, and she would say no. This is never their intention. If they were to discuss this and recommend the Council goes with the recommendations from staff, the whole thing is about getting more community feedback.
Ms. Robinson said she thinks also one of Ms. Herpich’s questions was if they did an RFP. The City did not do a full-blown RFP but they did speak to neighboring communities who recently put measures on the ballot, who have done public outreach, and the cost is actually is very much in line and actually a bit lower than what their neighboring peers have done, and she believes Dr. Manross made a persuasive argument that going with a firm that understands the questions, the polling, and how that works will very much streamline the process and give the City a lot of bang for the buck.
She added that to address Mr. Lavoie’s concern is the whole idea is absolutely to gain community input, so the things they have planned is both to go out to the community, make people understand what the issue is, and be able to listen to the community, and the feedback. So, a lot of their planning and tasks in the next few months will be focused on exactly that. Some of the money they have asked for in the budget are for some specific tools they will also be able to use that will allow people to actually get in, manipulate the budget, and see what their input and ideas are, where they think the City can cut. Maybe they should do a combination of cuts and increases, and it is a balancing act. She thinks it is similar to what was used during the General Plan Update where more people were asked to put the housing, in particular, and be able to actually balance the things that need to be done. They absolutely want community input and that is the entire reason the City wants to do this.
Councilmember Anduri said he may have misunderstood, but one of the speakers said they had allocated $40,000 to communicate the leaf blower ban, but the actual number is $10,000. Mayor Dawson agreed and said this is another informational campaign that isimportant,so the City does not have to have people coming to their Code Enforcement Appeals Board.
Mayor Dawson thanked Dr. Manross and said the recommendation from staff is to authorize this budget to conduct the informational campaign and sign an agreement with IMC Corporation. She asked for comments from the Council.
Councilmember Candell said she supports the suggestion and agrees with the 1/2% and the 10-year limit which makes sense, but she does not completely agree with the direction of the feedback. She thinks they need to include a big part about why the deficit is there. This is very important for residents, and wildfire is very important. It is actually not part of the City’s budget, so this would be difficult. In addition, she thinks they should get a schedule from IMC of what the City is getting back so they understand the timeline of what is coming.
Councilmember McCormick referred to the interactive tool because he is very sensitive to spending money wisely especially since they are going out to ask for more money. In looking at the three components they have here, he respects Dr. Mangross’ experience. He thinks the collateral material with social media and graphic designs are all great. He referred to the $12,000 for a tool to help wiggle the budget around, he would like to understand more about this because this seems a little steep.
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Ms. Robinson said actually there are three different tools that they get bundled. Rather than the City just providing information, if they give people a budget there are parameters they put into the tool like they did with the General Plan. People internalize their information better because they have a discovery experience of their own. They can look at the entire budget, make the cuts, and they can see how that affects other parts of the budget. It is very easy for people to look at one thing and not look at the budget as a whole.
So, if they have a tool that really allows them to do different scenarios so they can see the impacts of what cuts may be, they will have a very good discovery experience. They will internalize it and believe it more if they are able to do it rather than the staff or Council coming to them with pre-determined solutions about what should be cut or what could be cut. So, it gives people more control. Staff found that when they used the balancing act in the General Plan. Again, they were not working with dollars. They were working with housing units, and she thinks it was really telling that they found out that many people had a hard time completing the task because it is a hard task. There are many things to think about. It is a full picture rather than just saying you should just cut police or this or that, but they need to look at the budget as a whole. She thinks people really found that useful.
Another part of that tool is allowing people to prioritize so she thinks what they heard from community members when they proposed the survey was that other community members said, what about me? I didn’t get called. I want to have say. I want to have input. So, this gives them a robust tool for people to prioritize their values and get their voice out there. The last tool, which was thrown in for free, but they found it could be very interesting because it allows a receipt which can show people what they are actually contributing to Lafayette in terms of their tax dollars and what they are spending. It can be very illuminating. You may pay $10,000 in property taxes. The City gets $600. She sees this a lot on social media where people say they are paying all this money and what are we getting for it? She thinks this is a very important message for the City and this tool is interactive in terms of people can put in their actual income and what their house is worth so that they can see what they are already contributing. It is getting that information out there because a lot of people really do not know that. So, it is the combination of these tools that could be very valuable for people to have their own discovery experience instead of staff just pushing information at them. They are able to absorb that information themselves.
Councilmember McCormick asked if this was a recommendation from Dr. Manross or the City’s own idea.
Ms. Robinson said no, this was not a recommendation from Dr. Manross. Staff looked at it because they believe there was success using this tool with the Housing Element.
Councilmember McCormick said personally he thinks those are two different animals. He thinks there is the balancing for the Housing Element and where those were going was like a waterbed where you had to push and pull. He thinks this is a great job and the City needs interactive tools to see vistas of where their budget is and what they are doing. They are not asking people to trade off, but he is just cognizant of the dollars and the bang for their buck. The others seem very well done, but he is not really conceptualizing what they are getting for their money, so he appreciates the explanation.
Vice Mayor Kwok said when people work with the tool he asked if there will be a function where they can submit or save if they have to do their own $18 million budget for the City and they have to decide where the money is going to go. Or he asked if it will be a tool where the user gets to see their findings, but the City will not get that.
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Ms. Robinson said Suzanne Iarla is more familiar with the tool and she is saying yes. The tool is very flexible, and staff can set it up anyway they want to. They will have some expert help from someone who has done this before so they can tell them what they have learned from their experience and how best to set it up. She thinks it is also important to put their own parameters in there. For example, they will not let someone say they do not want any police, which is a zero, so they must put guardrails in because they know this is actually not realistic. So, the tool is flexible, and staff does see what they give the City in terms of what their input is.
Ms. Iarla reiterated that the outcome of the exercise is when someone would submit their version of the budget that showed if they wanted to make cuts to balance the budget, if they thought pursuing a revenue measure was important or some combination, so staff would see all of those answers.
Councilmember Anduri said he had questions about the tool and discussed these earlier with Ms.
Robinson. He is prepared to leave this up to the Fiscal Sustainability Subcommittee. He would move that the Council authorize up to $60,000 to conduct an informational campaign and gather community feedback regarding the City’s current financial situation through engaging IMC Corporation and, if the Fiscal Sustainability Subcommittee concludes that it would be useful, then spending up to $12,000 within the $60,000 for these tools and authorize the City Manager to sign the agreement with IMC Corporation.
Councilmember McCormick asked what information the Fiscal Sustainability Subcommittee would receive to understand whether the $12,000 is being used. Councilmember Anduri said the Committee is the Mayor and Vice Mayor. The remaining Councilmembers are not going to get into enough detail on this to make a decision, and he would leave it to them to get the details and make the decision.
Councilmember McCormick said if it is a tool, he would think they would get some sort of specification first, evaluate it, and really understand it. He is amenable to this, and he supportssaying $12,000 towards Items 1 and 3 might be money better well spent versus Item 2 if they are looking at the consultant and collateral materials. But he agrees if they can get a specification and the Committee looks at it and agrees it is great, he thinks it is a good approach.
Mayor Dawson said she thinks the balance they would consider is how it will help the City effectively inform the public as to where they are at, so they will definitely take into consideration the cost versus the benefit. She asked for other comments.
Councilmember Candell said she would support Councilmember Anduri’s suggestion.
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Anduri/Candell) to 1) Authorize up to $60,000 in 11-110—861 to conduct an informational community outreach campaign and allow the Fiscal Sustainability Subcommittee to determine how to best gather community feedback regarding the City’s current financial situation; 2) Authorized the City Manager to sign agreement with IMC Corporation to provide public relations consultant services. Vote: 5-0 (Ayes: Dawson, Kwok, Anduri, Candell, and McCormick; Noes: None).
BREAK
Mayor Dawson called for a break at 9:05 p.m. and, thereafter, reconvened the regular meeting at 9:15 p.m.
City Council Meeting Page 17 of 43 March 11, 2024
B. Greg Wolff, Planning and Building Director; Sonia Urzua, Assistant Planning and Building Director; Diana Elrod, Housing Consultant
California Department of Housing and Community Development Review of Lafayette’s 6th Cycle Housing Element
Recommendation: Receive update and direct staff.
Planning and Building Director Greg Wolff said staff is before the Council again after two weeks to check in as staff works to address the comments received from HCD on February 12th. They discussed items with HCD when they held a productive meeting and staff will meet with them again tomorrow for 30 minutes. Diana Elrod will provide the bulk of the presentation and will discuss items to receive clarity with the Council on the letter the City received on February 12th.
Diana Elrod, Housing Consultant, offered an apology for some mistaken comments she made specifically to acknowledge Councilmember Candell as well as other Councilmembers and members of the community regarding the inventory for Danville at the last meeting. Frankly, her role in Danville’s Housing Element was significantly less than Lafayette’s and she was not aware of the many changes to the inventory because most of her focus was on both AFFH and the needs analysis.
Ms. Elrod gave a PowerPoint presentation and reminded the Council staff last met with the Council on February 26th and on the 27th they met with HCD to receive clarity. The recommendation for the Council tonight is to receive the presentation, direct staff and continue the matter to March 25th.
She highlighted in red and in italics of the program the areas needing clarity or further analysis. The program request from HCD said incentives for lot consolidation should be significant and include density incentives not limited to State density bonus law. One of the first questions to HCD was what does that actually mean. HCD said the City has to do more to incentivize lot consolidation and specifically brought up adding something called a density bonus program for projects that consolidate lots resulting either in a minimum lot size or unit count. HCD said to consider a graduated density program such as 5% or 10% based on the resultant lot size or number of units. The program features could include streamlining lot consolidated process and other actions to perhaps act administratively.
The recommendation they provided in the staff report was a lot of information about how other jurisdictions are doing it. This is exactly what HCD wants to see, and staff’s recommendation is to add a new program called 8.1.B; Enhance the Feasibility of Affordable Housing development by incentivizing consolidation of two or more smaller adjacent parcels through tiered density increases that allow a greater density when small parcels are consolidated into a single building site. This is precisely how the other jurisdictions did it; less than half an acre they get the base density. If they are able to consolidate lots to create something between one-half acre and up to one acre they get a 5% increase over the base density and then for one acre or more they get a 10% increase over base density. This does not include State density bonus requirements, i.e., they would not have to provide for this particular density increase any affordable units in that development unless they wanted to go further and get a State density bonus for that site.
The second question staff discussed with HCD had to do with the local processing and permit procedures.
They have heard repeatedly about objective design standards. HCD’s letter directs the City to clarify that if a project complies with objective design standards, then it will be deemed to meet approval findings.
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When staff asked about that, HCD said they wanted the City to revise the implementation program or programs because there a couple that have to do with this, and to clearly state that local codes will be revised to reflect that complying with objective standards will be deemed to meet approval findings. HCD also asked the City to review findings elsewhere in other ordinances and so forth to make sure that subjective findings are not relied upon in order for a project to be approved which would provide certainty to applicants.
She pointed to an underlined section which staff would add and specifically from the word “complying with objective design standards” will be deemed to meet approval findings, etc. The part before this about development standards will be established on rezoned sites to facilitate maximum allowable densities and the City will permit multi-family uses by right are things that are required to rezone parcels that are included that would be the new or re-used sites in the inventory.
They then discussed the conversion of existing single-family housing. The City staff asked what does it mean to say, “should also allow the conversion of single-family space for new single-family uses.” The second clause is “consider increasing the allowable distance from downtown.” Right now, staff said the allowable distance from downtown for this program would be one-quarter mile from the boundaries of the downtown.
What HCD said is “should also allow the conversion of single-family space for new single family uses.” means if an existing single-family structure is razed to build a new structure within the prior envelope, allow conversion of that new structure to multiple units as. HCD again asked for the City to expand the quarter mile radius where the current program applies and again, staff raised the issue of very high fire hazard severity zones, particularly north of Hwy 24. HCD acknowledged that State and local concerns around wildfire and supported expanding the program radius to one-half mile and excluding very high fire hazard zones, which is essentially all south of Hwy 24. This program would not include anything above Hwy 24.
Staff would revise the language to allow the conversion of existing or new single-family dwellings into two to four units within one-half mile of the downtown, excluding very high fire hazard severity zones.
The next one is long and wordy. HCD wants to know on all of the non-vacant sites, and this has been one on each of the letters. They want more detail to explain why the City thinks these sites can be reused for housing within the 8 year-cycle, including environmental constraints and other known constraints that could impact housing development on identified sites in the planning period, etc.
Basically, staff have included opportunity sites inventory analysis called tear sheets which they had in the original Housing Element, but they revised them to get consistent with what HCD is asking for, containing information on each site and the criteria for their inclusion in the opportunity sites list. HCD thought they were good, and they have new versions they have been looking at, but they should be augmented with additional information to address any other known impediments to development. Hopefully, this is something the City will get clarity on tomorrow when they meet with HCD.
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With this one, staff is asking the Council to direct staff to continue enhancing the information and analysis for each site, addressing HCD’s and public comments. She then presented the next slide, stating the italicized is the most important section. The Element should include a significant and robust suite of actions not limited to the RHNA to promote housing mobility and increasing housing choices and affordability throughout the City, but especially in lower density neighborhoods. This has been in the letters and is not anything new.
HCD specific comments about this particular section include, “The program should include geographic targeting, i.e., is it throughout the City, outside of downtown, a metric or numeric objective, and an implementation date earlier in the planning period than what the City had.” The next slide shows how the City proposes to revise this information. City staff have added a goal to create 20 new units of housing within the 8-year period and specifically HCD is asking for the geographic targets to be low density, high opportunity, high income neighborhoods throughout the City outside very high fire hazard severity zones.
What this does is making an affirmative statement that the City will help create and facilitate since the City does not develop housing itself. The City will help facilitate 20 new units of housing within the 8-year period.
One thing mentioned that was brought up in a comment that they now include a total of 155 units in the so-called mobility section of AFFH. A member of the public had asked where that number came from.
HCD gave the City direction before when staff met with them when they first took some of these ideas to talk to them about some of these mobility actions. They said specifically they thought for a City of Lafayette’s size that 150 units of housing that would be accommodated or created through these various programs is the right target. So, the total number of actions that address this particular comment about the mobility concerns, the robust suite of mobility actions, those total 155 units within the 8 years.
The second comment in this area is that HCD said the program to increase maximum densities in low density zones, which are specifically D.1 zones would propose increasing the density from 17 du/acre to 20 du/acre. HCD said this program should commit to establish or modify development standards as appropriate to facilitate maximum densities. So, staff revised the language to read, “Establish or modify development standards as appropriate to facilitate maximum densities.” Regarding some of the staff questions that were not directly related to the letter included a RHNA allocation. There are requirements in State law to provide substantial evidence in the record that existing uses “will discontinue within the 8 years if more than 50% of the lower income units are located on nonvacant sites.” Staff asked: if the City revises the inventory to fall below the 50% threshold on non-vacant sites, does that change HCD’s review or trigger other requirements. The response was that it would conduct the same level of review based on the analysis of each site provided in the inventory irrespective of whether more or less than 50% of lower income units are now on non-vacant sites. However, the statutory provision for substantial evidence would not apply if less than 50% of lower-income units are on non-vacant sites.
HCD went onto say the statute provides flexibility to the City to distribute the units across the sites which they knew, and the statute allows the local jurisdiction to determine the income. Concerns about no net loss and complying with AFFH requirements were discussed with HCD if the City decided to change the allocations of units by income on the sites.
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Staff is they are currently analyzing whether increasing the lower income allocations on vacant lots in the opportunity sites could result in less than 50% of lower income allocation on non-vacant sites and therefore would not be required to meet the findings in law; however, many jurisdictions are making the findings because they have insufficient vacant land to meet the 50% threshold on vacant sites, such as Danville. Staff still does not know if that will become an issue and how potentially to address it. Staff will present this analysis and options at an upcoming City Council meeting.
The second question staff raised was that the City understands that past permitting of ADUs has to be used to project ADU production for RHNA, but for mobility, can the City commit to programs to incentivize ADU production and thus project a higher number of ADUs for mobility or AFFH purposes. The City already has one mobility action to allow an additional JADU if it is restricted to lower income.
HCD advised the City that it can distinguish between allowing ADUs to meet RHNA obligations and AFFH.
The City can only rely on past performance, but the City can add programs to incentivize ADU production and project higher numbers than past production to address AFFH. It could revise that program, for example, to allow an additional ADU on site if the owner agrees to rent it out at any income level like workforce housing.
It was not clear that the City must create an additional program to incentivize ADU production for mobility purposes because there are a number of incentive programs already in the implementation plan that address incentivizing ADUs, for example, pre-approved plans and reducing fees, etc. But HCD’s comments on this segment of the AFFH discussion primarily focused on geographic targets and metrics which the City has addressed with revisions to the programs before the Council. Staff recommends waiting for further evaluation from HCD as to whether recent draft revisions are adequate. Staff would need to ask how the programs would differ, like how do you cleave two programs to address ADUs; one for RHNA and one for the other. There would be theoretic overlap and how would that work. Also, staff will want to ask HCD about SB 9 and whether SB 9 could be considered a program to address mobility concerns. But they are not sure of the answer to that question yet.
So, staff will bring back additional information, analyses, and recommendations as they become available.
This includesinformation about whether the City is capable of achieving greater than 50% of lower income units on vacant sites, the requirements necessary to keep the City-owned 949 Moraga Road in the inventory, and other comments in HCD’s letter.
Regarding the next timeline and tasks, staff needs to make the edits as directed by the Council. Staff will meet with HCD tomorrow for further clarification and then they want to bring the discussion items back to the Council on March 25th. Their request is to receive the presentation and continue the matter to March 25th and direct staff to make the required changes to the Housing Element to comply with HCD direction and prepare analyses and recommendations on further areas for Council consideration.
Councilmember Anduri referred to staff recommendation 3; the conversion of single-family space for new single-family uses, it goes onto say that if there was a structure that was torn down that they are referring to building within the prior envelope. He asked if staff would be open to amended language to make this clear.
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Vice Mayor Kwok asked if this is the prior building envelope or does it refer to some other envelope like the parcel envelope. Ms. Elrod said it was the prior building envelope, and the reason staff discussed it is because the purpose of this particular program is to allow for conversion within an envelope so the actual view from the street would not change. It is not like there are three or four houses on a lot. It is still the same overall size.
Councilmember McCormick said at a high level they talked whether they felt they were converging toward the end or if HCD had items they had not even looked at like looking at the opportunity sites. He asked if it feels like the City is converging toward a solution or working through a punch list of things HCD wants the City to do.
Mr. Wolff said it is clear that they are making progress and these items need to be addressed regardless, so what they have discussed the last time and are bringing tonight are more punch list items. There was no indication of a wholesale or big items that are outstanding at their last meeting, but he thinks that until the City gets a certification letter, the inventory and what HCD deems necessary around that remains outstanding. That would be his primary concern.
Councilmember McCormick asked if staff is going to discuss new items with HCD tomorrow and/or show what has been done so far and get their assessment. Mr. Wolff said they would love to get these items checked off and then broach new topics, particularly around necessity of additional analysis for the inventory.
Vice Mayor Kwok referred to Item 3 and building within the prior envelope. The goal is for ten incremental units within one-half mile radius of the downtown if 5 homes were redeveloped so two were in each, and then the City would have hit their goal. He asked if this is the goal, and Ms. Elrod confirmed. It could be any number of ways, but the goals are relatively modest because that is a lot to try to consider within an 8-year period, and HCD recognizes that.
Vice Mayor Kwok said they received some feedback from those who have some concern about extending the one-quarter mile to one-half mile and the amount of change that would happen in their communities, but it seems like the goal being set at ten and maybe even two or three homes, it is not hundreds of houses that are affected. Ms. Elrod said no, they do not have the expectation that this is somehow going to develop into a blossoming of units.
Vice Mayor Kwok referred to Item 1 and slides showing lot consolidation strategies and the 5% to 10% being recommended. There were some examples in the staff report about how other cities have done that or done more. He does not understand that too well as to how it motivates lot consolidation and how does the City know whether five or ten or a larger number will actually make it happen. He asked if that is a proven method of getting lot consolidation.
Ms. Elrod said she cannot speak to that. She can only speak to this is what HCD said the City should do.
Vice Mayor Kwok asked how it works. He asked if owner A and owner B are incentivized for a lot consolidation because a developer comes in and that developer can then offer them more money to incentivize them to sell.
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Ms. Elrod said yes, theoretically, but this would be the case anyway because of the high land values in Lafayette. Whether or not it will materially change anything, this is the big unknown. She thinks one of the areas staff will discuss with them again is about the lot consolidation idea and the City’s track record.
Mr. Wolff said staff provided a list of recent projects in the Housing Element and it showed that five of the seven consolidated lots and proposed projects and the City approved them. His question to HCD was even demonstrating that, and HCD’s conclusion is that more should be done, and they provided examples, and these were included in the report. He thinks how the program would work is it would give the developer additional density which means additional revenue, which they then could put into the land cost. Developers have said time and again that the primary cost drivers are land costs, cost of material, labor, certainty, and interest rates. Those are big drivers. Consolidating lots take time and money to do, so he thinks the State is targeting that as areas where jurisdictions need to do more. Based on examples, staff provided, and direction provided by HCD, staff is bringing this to the Council.
Councilmember Anduri asked if staff has had a chance to develop a map which shows where that half mile would be. He assumes it is all south of the downtown.
Mr. Wolff said yes, he was able to get this from staff after 5PM, and he displayed it. The yellow is the boundaries of the downtown or the DSP, the green is the quarter mile, and the blue buffer is the half-mile buffer. The Council is also seeing red, which is the very high fire severity zone, so those areas would be excluded, and it would be within the blue and not in red. It extends significantly beyond the quarter mile and essentially doubles it.
Councilmember Candell said if the Council does this program, she asked if these will need to be upzoned.
This takes one house and makes it into two or three houses. She asked how this is done without upzoning.
Mr. Wolff said staff does not have that level of detail as of yet. It may take revising zoning to allow that.
This is one mechanism. He knows that for Danville, instead of doing proximity to their downtown or transit did corner lots. So, lots at corners of intersections were able to go to four or eight units, and so staff can look at their implementation mechanism and see if that is simply written into the new zoning. Based on circumstance, the likelihood is that the City will need to revise the zoning to some degree internal to what district it is.
Councilmember Candell asked if this is for an AFFH program. With all the other ideas the City has for the ADUs and separating those out and trying to get those into other zones, she asked if they can counteract part of this by getting that 155 units satisfied by ADUs. This is even much broader. An ADU and a JADU are allowed for any house right now and the City is offering them another JADU if they deed restrict it.
So, she asked if there is a way they can justify that and get this back to the quarter mile.
Ms. Elrod said again, the goal is a very modest goal of 10 units which would be throughout all of the blue area. It is a goal, and HCD has said at least three or four times that the City really needs to consider half mile and not quarter mile, and staff kept saying that they do not understand; that the City has all this area above. They asked again this last time and said to just exclude very high fire zones. So, it is a question of going back and asking them again, but she does not know what the response will be, but staff can certainly ask them.
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Councilmember Candell said this relates to the legal question raised by Robert Brundage. He basically laid out the case that “As I read the statute HCD relies on, HCD is not a legal authority to require these changes.” It is specifically these sorts of things because it is not really adding to the City’s RHNA numbers, not adding lower income, and this is separate. He thinks that HCD does not have the jurisdiction to force the City to do these things. This was a compelling letter a good attorney sent the City, and she hopes they can address that. Maybe this is part of the argument with this because the City is doing a lot of growth in these same places, but all-around Lafayette, and isn’t that better with mobility, and they are not adding any affordable units because this is not what this is about. They are not requiring them to be deedrestricted or anything, but she would love to get these things worked out.
She referred to objective design standards, and asked if those were intended to be for multi-family or single family as well. Her question is when staff said it achieves the approval, she asked if HCD is implying that if the City gets a project that meets objective design standards, the City does not hold any meetings, or she asked what they are implying.
Mr. Wolff said this was a specific question staff asked at the meeting, and HCD’s response was there is no prohibition on design review, but the approval needs to be solely based on objective standards for projects under the law. So, it can be single-family projects that are producing multiple units or multifamily. But a single-family residence still has the ability to take it to a hearing, evaluate the project against objective standards, discuss subjective things like color or other things. But it needs to be clear and provide certainty to the builder that if they are doing multiple units and they meet these objective standards, that will be deemed to be approvable.
Mayor Dawson said if there is a duplex built, she asked if there would be objective standards if multifamily units go into place or the objective standards for the single-family envelope. She asked if the City needs to come up with a different set of objectives for that particular use where there is a conversion.
Mr. Wolff said he thinks they can explore that further, but his initial thought is, irrespective whether it is one single-family or there are two units in that same volume that the same objective standards would apply, so closer to form-based code in that regard.
Councilmember Candell said therefore the City can still get its five meetings for projects if they want them, but it is mostly the larger projects where they choose to do that. Mr. Wolff said this is what they heard from HCD.
Councilmember Candell said improving on those tear sheets, she asked if the City will have to include the letters about the FBO’s because a couple of the FBO’s came in. She asked what happens if they have this over-reaching thing with the FBO’s and you have a lot of letters saying they are not interested. She asked how do they handle that at this point.
Ms. Elrod said one of the requests from HCD which they have included was that they would provide outreach and education; that they do liaison work with the churches to make it a viable program. They have reached out to at least all of them, and specifically one that sent in the letter saying they do not want to be included and the City asked for some dialogue. They have not heard back, and the City will reach out again this week. She thinks from HCD’s perspective right now is that if they are working towards an effective outreach program that they can continue to include them until such time as they cannot. They are still in a phase where it is not certain one way or the other.
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Councilmember McCormick referred to the tear sheets and HCD asked for more considerations with these. He asked if the current update is that the City is looking at it and staff will receive more clarification and come back.
Ms. Elrod said they have drafts, and it is basically the same information and just packaged in a different way than the Housing Element previously had in it. They are in draft form because they also have a couple of sites that have fallen out of the pipeline projects, and they have some new opportunity sites coming on. So, they have included language to say that these parcels effectively work together as one site. More detail about owner interest, any prior interest in development even if they are not a pipeline project, etc., so the City has added a lot of information, have said no other known environmental factors on every single one. They wanted a level of detail of everything, and every single one got very repetitive. So, hopefully tomorrow HCD will give them the thumbs up on what it should look like or here is what else you need to do, and staff will show them a sample.
Councilmember McCormick said he was looking at Danville’s last night and Lafayette’s seems very quantitative, and Danville has a lot of quantitative and qualitative. Some of it is repetitive but it is demonstrating the analysis happened.
Councilmember Candell asked why doesn’t DeSilva count in terms of being outside the core and mobility details. She knows it is in the RHNA but for the AFFH.
Ms. Elrod said in a way it does, but what they are specifically asking for with mobility is small, gentle increases in density in the highest resource areas, high opportunity areas. It is above and beyond RHNA.
They want actions not just to address RHNA which DeSilva’s function is—primarily to address RHNA. So, potentially any site where they have allocated “x” number of lower income units, any of those could be considered a mobility action. But, for the purpose of this particular requirement it has to be beyond the RHNA allocation. It says a best suite of actions beyond RHNA.
Councilmember Candell said she drove by Madison Park, and it looks like the parking lot is still there, so it is not all dirt. She asked how does the City work with that.
Ms. Elrod said it is not being used for anything, so she thinks staff might be able to make an argument that it is not a parking lot. It is a dead site that does not have anything on it. They are going to include it as a vacant site.
Mayor Dawson said if staff was to put together increasing the half mile radius and also small lot consolidation and then the Council would potentially have to look at rezoning, this definitely could have potential to change the neighborhoods with multi-family home dwellings right next to each other where it was formerly single-family homes right outside of that. Obviously, it is a big impact for those neighborhoods. Regarding the half mile that HCD is recommending, she would second what the flexibility is to still seek those 10 units in that quarter mile because it is quite a big variance in terms of what they went through with the public before.
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She referred to small lot consolidation incentives and asked how that would work. Basically, a developer would get an increase in density and only if they chose to they could use that to increase density to apply for the density bonus. She asked if it is additive and then an additional 15% if they were putting in affordable housing requirements which is basically a 25% increase.
Mr. Wolff said this is correct; they would be two separate programs and they would be additive. So, if they consolidated the lots they would get 5% or 10% based on their outcome and then separate from that and in addition, based on State density bonus law, any bonus that would be achieved through inclusion of below market rate units which would also apply. They would be utilizing both and affecting an increase of density from each.
Mayor Dawson said to confirm, even with objective design standards with State density bonus, they could override those and ask for waivers and concessions. Mr. Wolff confirmed and said pursuant to State density bonus law they can be entitled to concessions and waivers.
Councilmember Candell asked and confirmed the City is not changing the base density. If it is a 30du/acre, they get 10% more, but that does not change the base density up to 33 du/acre.
Mayor Dawson opened the public comment period.
DAVID CLARK said he has had a hard time following the RHNA versus the AFFH overlay. Tonight’s discussion has helped, but for example, in the beginning they took the D-1’s off the RHNA list because the areas are too small, and the City was not going to consider it. Now, it has come back by AFFH, and they are going to upzone it, so they got to the same place regardless of how they got there, and he is sure there are other districts that are probably the same.
With respect to the 155 units on the list shaded in green; the AFFH. He gets a total of 135 and he does not know if the 155 is a target number the City is shooting for and have not got there or if this needs to be tweaked somehow. He thinks part of the problem may be an AFFH action 2.7. The description is that the goal is to identify five different projects of 20 units or more where the diversity of type of unit can occur.
If that is trying to say we are going to add 20 units by virtue of this program step, it is not clear because five developments of 20 units or more tells him the City is going to look at five big projects, but it does not create 20 units. So, if the goal is to create 20 units it could be reworded to make that clearer. The item above, 2.6 with the old goal of creating ten units is still listed there and this should be deleted because of the new goal of 20 units.
STELLA WOTHERSPOON said she has a recommendation for AFFH Action 2.5 which is to create a buffer using a network method which is basically not crows fly. The network buffer uses the road network to approximate what a human would do if they are traversing from one point to another. When you get to a half or a quarter mile or whatever the threshold is on a road network, you stop. Then the buffer ends up looking jagged, but it is more accurate for what humans do. It will also have logical end points so the end points along a block will make more sense than what you see with the lumpy cloud-shaped buffer.
This is her recommendation and asked staff to share with her the DSP polygon she could crunch that and run that buffer.
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Mr. Clark mentioned he did have some clarity about the AFFH versus RHNA, but she did not. She would like to understand why the unit goal for Action 2.4; Rezone FBO’s has changed from 80 to 200 which was submitted in December, and now it is at 75, and how that goal relates to the site inventory which lists 276 units. Those are disparate numbers and she asked if the City could list 276 in the site inventory and then only 75 in the AFFH action which uses the exact same sites as in the inventory. Regarding interest from the FBOs, she recalled there were two letters from different churches indicating they were not interested in being upzoned; St. Perpetua and St. Anselms. The St. Anselms letter she saw in the public comment posted on the PlanLafayette.org website as it came in. She went back and noticed it was not included in the submission to HCD at least in the document she pulled down. So, she wonders if this got through to them. Lastly, there was discussion about AFFH programs to be small and gentle increases and targeted to missing middle. On the FBO’s 35 dwelling units per acre with an 88% minimum density requirement is not a small and gentle increase. This is a current downtown density that would qualify for 100% density bonus with mandated affordability levels.
LIBBY HENRY said she is very much in agreement with other community members or residents and not outside interference with many suggestions they have made. In the second paragraph of HCD’s letter, they use the term “substantially comply” with State laws. She asked to consider that the entire structure of HCD’s RHNA requirements, including the number of housing units required was proven to be faulty three years ago. The State auditor found several problems and faults with HCD’s methodology in calculating RHNA allocations, including the double counting of numbers and the over-inflated final housing goals. However, HCD in three years’ time has failed to adjust, correct, or re-calculate any city’s RHNA’s goals even though they know that they are out of compliance by a considerable margin. She knows Mr. Wolff disagrees with her on this, but the first rejection the City received is when they challenged those RHNA numbers and were flat out denied the challenge with no substantial reason given.
To her, this is the first show of bad faith by HCD and this needs to be pointed out to HCD but emphasized and replied to this latest meeting.
The reason the City of Lafayette has been in substantial compliance with unsubstantiated and incorrect RHNA allocations from the very start, at each time HCD seems to find some small points of contention to give them justification for not certifying their already substantially compliant Housing Element. In legal terms, this might be considered fruit from the poison tree since HCD is not operating in compliance in the first place and the City of Lafayette has, in good faith, laboriously and at great time and expense written, rewritten, calculated, and re-calculated all requirements of its unjustified and unsubstantiated RHNA in the Housing Element. Now, for the third time, HCD is nitpicking again; another show of bad faith. If these items they mention were not in compliance she asked why weren’t they mentioned the first two times.
There seems to be malicious intent and extreme bad faith on the part of HCD and that needs to be considered in the response.
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GRACE DIXON referred to the envelope of the existing structure and asked if it includes the footprint or stories, or both. For instance, her home is 1,436 square feet not including the garage. So, she asked if this means 1,436, 1,436 plus garage, or 1,436 plus second floor. Her second question is the City is going for “x” quantity of units, but “x” quantity of units for how many years, and the City cannot pull back on that.
It is going to be going forward. She wants to have a clear picture of what this impact is. She would like to know could this be quantified in something that the common person on the street could understand. For instance, staff could use her address or anybody’s address, but she asked if the person on the street understand the impact of this decision and she asked to make it understandable to them. People do not understand the implications unless the City makes it very clear to them. She would also agree with Ms.
Wotherspoon’s comments.
ROB LAVOIE said he would like Ms. Elrod to remind them what the error was last month on Danville. It looks like they did 73% of low-income housing on non-vacant spots and 47% on vacant. Now, HCD has admitted the City can put them anywhere they want so it seems they could get to the 50% there very easily and have a good comparison for it. He asked which cities did the .5-acre density bonus and asked if they have similar narrow streets like Lafayette.
In looking at the new map Mr. Wolff produced he noticed it includes Boyer Circle which is a topic of one of the future agenda items the Council will be discussing which has a problem on their street because it is narrow and when parking a car on the street, there is no room for two cars to travel on it. Also, there are no sidewalks, so it means people are walking down the road with their dogs and kids. So, he asked if the City really wants to add 400% more density in neighborhoods like this that are already discussing whether they have to ban on-street parking. They cannot ban on-street parking if you cannot restrict parking in the new high-density house being built for units instead of one. So, he thinks this is absurd and the City needs to tell HCD that they are not going to do this because it is just not feasible in town. He thinks HCD pulled the 155 number out of the air, but he also thinks that the ADUs is the correct solution, and the City has over 115 ADUs just based on their low ball two or three-year history the City is using.
He also asked why the City needs to add more programs for ADUs when they already had 47 and 65 applications for ADUs in the last year. He asked Ms. Srivatsa to update the ADU production for last year because the numbers in the plan are from August. If the City wants to do the bubble map, he thinks the City should require 100% low income. This will keep it from going out of control. Otherwise, it is a crazy idea, and they need to push back.
LAUREN HERPICH said she honestly does not even know what to say anymore. Like most residents, especially those who have been paying attention for the last four years who are tired. They have been taking the time to help the Council, help GPAC, be part of GPAC, and to come up with solutions. She thinks they keep saying the same thing and the fact that HCD keeps coming back and saying “no, no, no.” It is true that they are not working in good faith. The City has met their original requirements and they have denied them and keep changing the goal post. Earlier tonight during the sales tax survey presentation, about 90% of respondents say they are satisfied with their life in Lafayette, and she is sure everyone has minor complaints, but Lafayette is one of the most desirable communities throughout the State and in the nation.
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The City was recently featured on a list of the most expensive cities in the country. On that list was also Westfield, New Jersey, a town she grew up aspiring to live in. It is a town just like Lafayette. She grew up in a town like the one the State is proposing Lafayette to turn into. It is mostly two-family stacked homes, very dense, no one had a lawn in their front yard, and not many people had a backyard. It was kind of a concrete jungle. It was a great place to grow up. They had tons of community parks, but she always aspired and worked really hard to live in a place like Lafayette. This was always the dream. Her husband is the same way. They have worked very hard to live in a place like Lafayette which is walkable to schools and resources, and she does not want the community to consist of doctors, lawyers, and tech executives. They need a society full of professionals across the income spectrum. It feeds their schools, police, firefighting crews, restaurants, and stores, but they also need to make HCD know that they do not have the infrastructure for everything they are trying to force on them. They do not have sidewalks. They do not have sidewalks, especially in the Moraga Boulevard trails area that barely allow for driveways. She asked where two to four more families on each parcel park, so she thinks it is time to push back and she asked the Council to stand up for its town.
JAMIE said she just wanted to chime in and say she thinks it is great what Robert Lavoie said about Boyer Circle and she is so grateful for residents like Lauren, Libby, and Stella and others for paying attention to all the mayhem happening in the City right now regarding their culture and how it is about to be destroyed.
Mayor Dawson referred to questions raised by public speakers. The first was 155 units for the AFFH goal.
Mr. Clark said he came up with 135 versus 155.
Ms. Elrod said this was a mistake and she will have to go back and look at it. She knows when they discussed it with HCD, the number was 155. It is possible one of the goals did not get corrected and she will go back and confirm it, but 155 is the number.
Mayor Dawson said Ms. Wotherspoon had some questions. The unit goal for the FBO’s has moved around and it is 75.
Ms. Elrod said she thinks it is important to remember there are two different things at work here; the RHNA, the sites inventory which is capacity. The other number they have for FBO’s is what they think might happen which are called quantified objectives which are separate things. So, within the 200 and however many FBO potential capacity, they think “x” number is actually going to happen with the 8-year cycle. It may be more or less than that, but that is the goal. The State recognizes that goals or quantified objectives like this will not equal RHNA because of the financing and all sorts of other things.
Mayor Dawson said there was a question about a letter from St. Anselms not being passed onto HCD. Ms.
Elrod said she was not sure what happened or if that is the case. Staff will definitely look at this.
Councilmember McCormick said Ms. Wotherspoon also mentioned the way staff was mapping out the half mile radius. Mayor Dawson said yes, as opposed to how the crow flies versus the road network.
Mr. Wolff said staff understands her suggestion and would be happy to share the polygon. They may have the capacity to do that network analysis in-house and if not, Ms. Wotherspoon said she was able to do it.
One way or the other, staff will have the analysis done and show it to the Council.
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Mayor Dawson said the next one was the envelope in terms of single-family home conversions; a footprint versus FAR and if that would change.
Mr. Wolff said Ms. Dixon was questioning what the definition is of “envelope.” It is not just footprint. It is the outer boundaries of the volume of the structure. This is how historically that word is used, and staff will confirm HCD has the same understanding.
Mayor Dawson asked if they could better understand the quantity of units or impact if they were to look at expanding the radius to the one-half mile. She asked how that actually impact and implications for a person on the street in their neighborhood.
Councilmember Candell said yes, to provide an example of that. She also thinks that if they upzone this entire area, they are saying there will be 10 units. She asked what is the range and thinks this would benefit residents’ understanding.
Mr. Wolff said he thinks the ultimate potential would be the number of lots times 4 that are single-family.
He thinks the reality of that is far, far, far less. Most individuals are not going to tear down their existing house only to put up a two-plex or four-plex. So, therein lies the increment of opportunity. If an existing house is at the end of its useful lifespan and it goes on the market, this is an opportunity to rebuild and put in the same envelope of two or potentially four units. This is hard to project, and staff could try to analyze tenure of homes, but what is not captured is when it was originally built and what the year is now, but maintenance, rehabilitation, etc. So, it could be a very complicated analysis to arrive at some rough estimates.
Councilmember Candell said if our goal here is 10, but there is a 155 target, it seems so out of whack. She thinks they can achieve that with their ADUs easily and she just does not see how they can justify making the City do this work.
Councilmember Anduri said the big thing for him is you can put two to four units in that envelope, but he asked where vehicles will go. He asked if HCD said anything about what can be said about needing to provide off-site parking before that can be done. He asked if the City can require there be off-street parking before someone can build or subdivide their house.
Mr. Wolff said provided that the parcel is beyond a half mile from BART, staff can do that. The State has passed a law that local jurisdictions can no longer impose parking requirements on projects within a half mile from BART in the case of Lafayette. So, if it is beyond a half mile, the City could make that a development standard.
Mayor Dawson said the next question was about allocation for Danville. Mr. Wolff said staff can bring this data back on March 25th when they will talk about site inventory and income distribution, etc.
Mayor Dawson said another question was, what city did the .5-acre density bonus capture. Ms. Elrod said there were three identified in the staff report.
Mayor Dawson said there was the mention of Boyer Circle regarding parking, and she thanked Mr. Wolff for the reminder about the half mile around BART.
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Mr. Wolff said with respect to Boyer Circle, this is within the quarter mile radius as the program was submitted to HCD. Similarly, it would then be within the half-mile radius.
Mayor Dawson said she believes there were no other questions she captured from public comments.
Vice Mayor Kwok said he would raise one question that came in through the many letters the City received about whether the City can tell HCD they do not want to comply. He thinks they know the law requires the City to hit their RHNA numbers and the question is how they are going to do that. The City has presented a couple of times how they plan to do that and each time they have gotten the answer back it is not acceptable yet, so they have tried again. He thinks it is the question of how they are doing it.
To ask the broader question, he asked if there is a mechanism that cities could push back or say they do not want to do the “how” or in order to comply and get an approved Housing Element he asked if they just must keep working through this process to get to something HCD approves. There is a lot of frustration in the community. This has been a long process and they have gone back and forth. He thinks the way they presented how they are going to achieve the numbers is not acceptable, so they have to keep going back to the drawing board. He asked if there is way to explain why they continue to be on this path.
Mr. Wolff said he will touch on Ms. Henry’s comments in that he and she disagree with respect to the number of rejections or findings. The rationale between the disagreement is the RHNA allocation was administered by ABAG. ABAG denying the City’s appeal was not an action by HCD. This is why staff does not believe that counts. With respect to pushing back on HCD, the legislature and the Governor signed into housing law, and it is the City’s practice to date and moving forward to comply with housing law. HCD is charged with evaluating Housing Elements throughout every jurisdiction in the State to determine whether or not that jurisdiction and the Housing Element substantially complies with that Housing Element law. In dialogue and in working with HCD, staff can make assertions and be forceful, but ultimately that power lies with HCD and, in many meetings prior to tonight, they have articulated the implications of not having a compliant Housing Element which are many and can be severe.
Staff will continue to advocate for the Council and the direction from the Council and community. He thinks they have demonstrated an understanding of the breadth of the community’s comments and the codes and goals that have been articulated over many years. This is new territory for everyone in the State; the expansion of the housing laws and implications on local jurisdictions, and they appreciate that.
Councilmember McCormich said staff is meeting tomorrow with HCD, and he asked where is the City in a process. He asked if staff expects they will meet, obtain feedback, and then schedule another meeting.
He asked where they are in their overall scope of work in this current cycle.
Mr. Wolff said he would say it is early stages. They will absolutely be requesting another meeting and continue to chip away at this. He remains optimistic, but he believes they should hope for the best and plan for the worst. It could be drawn out, but he hopes it is not.
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Mayor Dawson said staff has made a recommendation on multiple items. Tomorrow when meeting, staff is going back with other questions that exist on the list, and then these will be reviewed. In the meantime, staff is looking for direction on the work process here and adding in recommendations to the revised Housing Element. Mr. Wolff confirmed and asked for direction on the scope of what staff presented in the staff report and in tonight’s presentation, this would be great, and staff can report that back to HCD.
They have clarifying questions regarding the subject topics, and then as time allows, they would dive into new topics with HCD tomorrow or schedule another meeting.
Mayor Dawson suggested going one by one and decide if more clarification is needed or to go with them. 1) To add the new Program 8.1.B; Lot Consolidation. This is providing increases to the base density depending on consolidated parcel size.
Councilmember Anduri voiced support. Councilmember Candell voiced support, but that they provide increases to the base density, and she asked to make that clearer to say they are not changing the base density but allowing a yield which she would support. Vice Mayor Kwok said it is the 5% to 10% reference on page 3. Councilmember McCormick said he likes the fact there are concrete examples from other cities that have done it with approved Housing Elements. Vice Mayor Kwok agreed. Mayor Dawson said she would support this as well with the clarification on the yield.
2) Revising to state objective design standards will be deemed to meet approval findings.
Councilmembers Candell said when they say we have to maximize density, she asked if this means they have to go back and modify all of their objective standards. Mr. Wolff said the City must demonstrate that maximum density the City establishes is achievable with the development standards for those districts. The concern that HCD has is to zone for a certain density but then have such restrictive objective standards that you could never realize that maximum density.
Councilmember Candell said knowing the City’s objective standards, she thinks they are fine. Mr.
Wolff said staff agrees, but HCD wants to have that assurance in writing with their phraseology.
Mayor Dawson voiced support, and Vice Mayor Kwok asked and confirmed that the underlined text on page 4 will be added, and Councilmember McCormick also confirmed it is also added on
9.1.A, as well in the matrix.
3) To revise the AFFH program 2.5 where they look at one quarter to one half mile from the Downtown. Councilmember McCormick mentioned the matrix does not incorporate the change put in the staff report, and he asked if they should add “or new” to the matrix. Councilmember Anduri said in terms of how it is done, he would not add the words “or new” there because grammatically it does not follow. He thinks it needs to be revised so it makes clear that if you are building a new structure, it has to be within the prior envelope. Ms. Elrod said staff can make that change.
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Vice Mayor Kwok said this is a new bit of language in Section 3; the word “building envelope” because that was not in the original language, but it was in the discussion, and the Council has discussed what it means today. He definitely feels that if they put those words in, it needs to be within the existing building envelope, then it will restrict the number of units that would actually do this because most of the older homes you think about demolishing and putting something new there are probably smaller homes. Many people who are demolishing homes will likely want to add some square footage to them. This would be a common reason one would demolish and build something bigger. But, in this case, the City would say you demolish it, and you would divide it in half and make it two into one, which seems to be a very limiting subset. To get 10, maybe the City would get 10 but probably will not get 100 that way because they might as well do SB 9 and not be limited on their building envelope. So, he thinks everybody within one half mile today already has SB 9 and they do not need this. So, he does not see this item changing much at all, except if that is what HCD is interested in seeing and they could achieve 10, it seems to be not that onerous on the City.
Councilmember McCormick said this is how he interpreted it if you look at SB 9 with ADUs and JADUs, they are talking about more than 4 anyway. So, they are already under that, so they are already complying with HCD lingo.
Mayor Dawson said she thinks they want to confirm that is a correct understanding and that there are no unintended consequences that they are walking into by saying yes, to expand this radius.
Already there is an understanding issue they need to inform residents in terms of what that means. To confirm, the half mile still aligns with the policy that they cannot have parking minimums within the half mile portion. Mr. Wolff confirmed to both of those.
Councilmember Candell added that they really should solve that legal question of Robert Brundage to find if HCD has the jurisdiction to impose these and identify the valid statutory authority for its position and prove they can require Housing Elements to include actions to increase housing density or affordability. Apparently, by statute, HCD does not have that. So, this is a fundamental question—can HCD force the City to do this outside of RHNA for AFFH and ask HCD to provide this answer.
Mayor Dawson said Councilmember Candell had asked about zoning and if the City would need to rezone any of the additional areas. Councilmember Candell said they do not for SB 9 or for ADUs, so many they do not, which would be better and just have a program. Mayor Dawson asked to confirm this.
Vice Mayor Kwok asked in terms of Councilmember Anduri wanting to strike the word “or new” but keep the word “existing.” Councilmember Anduri suggested saying “allow conversion of single-family dwellings into two to four units by either modifying the existing structure or building a new structure within the prior envelope.” All Councilmembers concurred with this wording. 4) Direct staff to continue enhancing the information analysis for each site of the tear sheets, which all Councilmembers agreed to.
5) Revise Action 2.1 to include milestones and objectives. Mayor Dawson said she noticed some changes were made that they include working with other jurisdictions.
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6) Revise Action 2.6 which is to increase zoning density from 17 to 20 in the low-density multi-family homes. All Councilmembers voiced support.
7) For Number 6, to direct staff to continue analyzing which staff will do. Councilmember Candell said she knows staff had the Danville numbers which is great, but Chris Hsu had in his letter that had tons of cities, and he has guidance in general what other percentages cities were using and it was very helpful. She asked staff to look at this as well. 8) Regarding staff meeting and following up with meetings, Mayor Dawson said she appreciates staff has another meeting lined up and a plan on a two-week cycle.
Mayor Dawson and Councilmembers thanked staff for the work and also thanked residents for their public comments.
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Anduri/Candell) to receive update, give direction to staff, and continue to March 25, 2024. Vote: 5-0 (Ayes: Dawson, Kwok, Anduri, Candell, and McCormick; Noes: None).
EXTEND MEETING
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Anduri/Candell) to extend the meeting until 12 midnight. Vote: 5-0 (Ayes: Dawson, Kwok, Anduri, Candell, and McCormick; Noes: None).
C. Matt Luttropp, Engineering Services Manager
Pleasant Hill Road Surface Seal and Roundabout Reconfiguration Recommendation: Direct staff to complete design plans and bid for construction to include new rectangular rapid flashing beacon signs on the west legs of Olympic Boulevard at the roundabout and consolidate signage using new roundabout specific signs.
This item was continued without consideration to March 25th.
14. STAFF REPORTS
A. Patrick Golier, Transportation Program Manager
Resolution 2024-09 Establishing On-Street Parking Restrictions on Boyer Circle Recommendation: Adopt Resolution 2024-09 to establish full-time parking restrictions along Boyer Circle.
Transportation Program Manager Patrick Golier gave a PowerPoint presentation, stating he is before the Council to seek approval through a resolution that would result in full-time parking restrictions along Boyer Circle, and provided the background information that supports the resolution as outlined in the staff report.
He introduced Matt Luttropp as well as Fire Marshal Chris Bachman from the CCC Fire Protection District to answer any questions regarding fire access and emergency access.
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The item includes the policy and resulting program that articulates the need to establish and enforce noparking zones on narrow roads to allow access by emergency vehicles and to facilitate evacuation. He described items designed to restrict parking and said staff has been meeting with residents to discuss options to create additional parking spaces adjacent to their homes so vehicles can be parked outside of the paved area. Besides parking pads, some other solutions might be to work with neighbors to use their excess driveway space for short-term parking, creating of hammerheads or wider areas within their driveway areas and ensuring their garages can be fully utilized for parking. He then acknowledged challenges for some homeowners, which he described and said unfortunately, Boyer Circle is impossible for parking on-street for many reasons, including the extreme narrow width of the roadway, the non-linear layout of the street, and the neighborhood’s fire risk, and should be restricted.
No parking areas would be delineated through the installation of white edge lines and the installation of No Parking signs at the entrance to Boyer Circle. No parking would be permitted within the white edge lines.
Councilmember Anduri referred to the white lines and asked if the intent would be there would be 20 feet within the white lines. Mr. Golier said 20 feet is not possible along most of the roadway. It would help to indicate to homeowners the extent of a parking pad or gravel area alongside the road. They would have to have the car completely outside the white lines.
Councilmember Anduri asked that in some cases, the white lines might be 18 feet apart. He asked if it is possible that there will be places where there is no room to develop a parking pad and staff is putting the white line along the edge of the pavement and the pavement is only 17 feet, and then someone develops a pad from the white line over, then there is not 20 feet of space. He does not understand why the minimum area between the white lines would not be 20 feet.
Mr. Luttropp explained the idea is they would paint the white lines 20 feet wide if they can, but areas where the road is 16 feet wide, the white line will be 16 feet. Then, if people are able to build an 8-foot-wide parking space outside of those white lines, they could park there. They would not make the road 20 feet wide just because they built a parking area next to it. The existing road would still be compliant because it is an existing road that is 16-feet wide, but people are not obstructing it any further than it previously was.
Councilmember Anduri asked what is the requirement for 20 feet, and Mr. Luttropp said this comes from the Fire Code. They are requiring it but there are portions of the road that are non-conforming. So, those existing portions non-conforming now could stay non-conforming. They would not have to be brought to the 20-foot roadway width.
Councilmember Anduri said if the decisions were grandfathered, yes, but he asked if there is a uniform 30- foot public easement along the entire length of Boyer Circle. Mr. Luttropp said the entire length of Boyer Circle has a 30-foot right-of-way. However, the road is not built within the center of that 30-foot right-ofway.
Councilmember Anduri asked then the City is open to entering into encroachment agreements with residents who would want to build pads off the pavement but within the 30 feet. Mr. Luttropp said yes, definitely, and there are some residents that based upon how the road was built, they would not even need an encroachment agreement because the road is shoved all the way onto their side of the street, but for those that need them, the City would approve the encroachment.
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Councilmember Anduri asked if there is room to build the 30 feet to build a pad and the pad can go over so as to expand the roadway to 20 feet he asked why wouldn’t staff do that and condition the encroachment permit on providing for 20 feet if that is what the City is saying is essential.
Mr. Luttropp said he thinks he understands what Councilmember Anduri is saying. If you have a 16-footwide road and you want to build a parking space next to it, what Councilmember Anduri is saying is, they should make the parking space big enough that it creates ultimately 28 feet. That could be done. The concern is that it would not really get you anything because if you just have one parking space that is extra wide but on either side, it is still narrow.. This does not really accomplish anything because the road is restricted on either end of that car, so you’ve made a 20-foot parking space with a 16-foot road on either side of it, a nice big 20-foot piece of road for just 20 feet in car length. This seems to be overly restrictive on the creation of parking pads.
Councilmember Anduri said therefore, staff is saying they are comfortable with grandfathering the narrower sections of the road.
Fire Marshal Chris Bachman said as mentioned in the report, the 20 feet is coming from the 2022 California Fire Code adopted statewide. Their ordinance provides one exception to that, which allows it to go to a minimum of 16 feet wide if the access is only accessing a one- or two-family dwelling home. This was intended really for flag lots. If you have a flag lot, it is an access and more than just one home. It is potentially two that they would still allow a 16-foot realistic driveway, but it is still an access road to get to multiple residents.
He went through the matrix because when they reconsidered their ordinances in the County to adopt the current 2022 Fire Code, all fire departments throughout the County got together and had a lot of input from residents, from builders, and from City Building Officials asking if they would create a uniform ordinance which would result in the same requirements across the board among all jurisdictions. They got to about 98% there. One of the points that they could not uniformly agree on was on roadway width because some jurisdictions are even more restrictive than the State code. The County did not and stayed standard with the State code.
Con Fire kept the California Fire Code as worded with the 16 feet for one and two-family dwellings, and this is one or two houses and not a row of one or two-family dwellings. It is serving up to two homes. El Cerrito kept it as is, Moraga-Orinda modified it to the required apparatus access as 28 feet wide over 20 feet. So, in neighboring communities, their requirement is 28 feet and not 20 feet. The exception they gave was 18 feet serving up to no more than 3 homes. So, they added one more home, 18 feet, but for all other access roads, the requirement was 28. Richmond Fire identified that if someone is in the very high fire hazard severity zone the minimum width is 26 feet. Other than that, they allow it to be 20 feet.
Rodeo-Hercules kept the same requirements as Con Fire, with the State allowing an exception of 16 feet.
San Ramon Fire kept it the same as the state requirements and that covers all of the fire districts. CrockettCarquinez has the same ordinance as Cal Fire. So, as the Council will see, a lot of them kept the same requirements, some more restrictive than what the 20-foot State requirement they adopted is. He added that in Program S-4.1.4 of Lafayette’s Safety Element, to establish and enforce no parking zones and narrow roads to allow for access by emergency vehicles, the critical point here is, “and facilitate evacuation.” It is not just about fire personnel having access to get in, but to facilitate evacuation.
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Fire Marshal Bachman said to address access, he saw comments from the last meeting from residents, and staff acknowledged that different delivery drivers, garbage trucks, utility trucks identified that you do not really need 20 feet wide to access, but the reason that requirement is there is based on the access of fire apparatus and the average access of the cab is 96 inches, or 8 feet wide. If you add mirrors, they are 9 feet wide. The minimum then as you are meeting a car or passing when fire apparatus is coming in or going out or if a vehicle is parked intentionally, they would stage their apparatus and park on the road because if they have to do a quick evacuation, they will make sure they are aimed out, unhook a hose, leave it in place, and they drive out of the subdivision. So, they are parked in the road in one of those lanes. They still need to have room if vehicles are evacuating to leave, along with additional resources coming in so they can get by that staged apparatus and still drive past it. This is the reason for the 20 feet.
So, he would agree with comments from either delivery drivers or large buses, apparatus, etc. They can drive down that road in areas where there is a parked car and still get by it if it is not quite 20 feet. The reason the 20-foot standard is there is to also deal with the access of the turning radius of the fire truck.
Some of the sections along Boyer Circle have turns. The inside turning radius is what they are concerned about, which is 14’7”. This is what is needed when they make a turn from the inside wheel of the rear axle to the outside wheel of the front axle as they are swinging to make a turn. This is another reason how they came up with the 16 feet requirement, knowing their apparatus is 9’ wide. If they make any type of turn, they need that minimum of 14’7” to make that turn, so they allow themselves a bare minimum of 16 feet.
With that clarification, Fire Marshal Bachman added that CCC Fire supports the recommendation from staff. They understand this is a difficult issue. It will cause issues with certain homeowners about where they are going to park. They like the idea of them adding parking pads where possible, but also they feel it is not feasible to go with the recommendation of doing parking permits or temporary parking which is not a feasible option due to enforcement or in the event of an emergency. If they do it only on Red Flag Days, as some have suggested, he thinks there are other events that occur in residential subdivisions that fire personnel need access to that go beyond just wildfire and Red Flag Days. These access requirements are also intended for medical emergencies along with any type of structure fire that could potentially occur. In conclusion, they support the staff recommendation with the resolution provided.
Councilmember McCormick asked how mechanically this will work. If this was adopted there would be posted no parking signs much like there are on Dewing going up to that, but for the parking pads themselves some residents have constructed off-street parking. He asked how is that delineated and there are no parking signs everywhere, people can park there, and he asked if this is just considered public parking because it is right off the main road. He asked how the City will communicate the subtleties of this particular environment here.
Mr. Golier said the white edge lines are meant to communicate people are not able to park within that area. In the majority of the street those edge lines are going to be along the entire paved segment of the roadway. The TransCirc Commission recommended they only post signs on the entrance to Boyer Circle to avoid sign clutter and not install signs around the entire circle. So, they will be communicating with signs as well.
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Vice Mayor Kwok said some members of the community talked about doing a one-way direction as a potential way of having parking in the second space. But after hearing Fire Marshal Bachman’s discussion about getting an apparatus there and cars parked there, they still may not have access. So, he asked if a one-way circle ruled out and asked if that came before the TransCirc Commission, or he asked if it came before staff for an opinion on the viability of that as an option.
Mr. Golier said it is not viable given the fact that the road is so narrow. Today, the majority of the street does not allow for two vehicles to pass side by side in most locations. Two lanes or one lane of moving vehicles if a car is parked in the street will not provide the clear width needed by fire personnel.
Vice Mayor Kwok asked if there has been any history of needing to go into the circle or troubles getting in over the past few years.
Fire Marshal Bachman said it has not been brought to his attention that firefighters have not been able to get through the circle. There is usually enough access that you can get through. The issue is if there was any type of incident that requires multiple resources to come in, they will not be able to stage or park an apparatus and still get more resources past it. Allowing vehicles to park there today would restrict them to where they could stage their units. The engineers driving the apparatus always know that when they park that apparatus, they are looking for two things; one is that they are pointed in the right direction to get out and that they are also leaving enough room as more resources need to come in that they can get by them. The ideal place to park to protect structures in today’s circumstances if there are cars there, they are not going to park next to the car but move up to the nearest spot they can get over to park which will require additional hose being put on the ground, longer time to get set up to do that, and you do not get a fire truck at every single house. They will park a truck and it will protect 4 or 5 homes, so it is just where is that access where firefighters can stage that apparatus and still make sure it is allowing for other resources or a battalion chief or supervisor to get by to assess the situation to make sure they have the resources they need on site.
Mayor Dawson opened the public comment period.
LEN MASON thanked and expressed his appreciation for Mr. Golier to make himself available to hear residents’ concerns. While he can appreciate the emergency response and safety concerns that on-street parking is causing on Boyer Circle, his family feels this decision was really rushed and has not taken into full consideration of all impacts it will cause and the consequences. As seen from this presentation, they are taking a sledgehammer approach to try to solve a problem where maybe they could take more of a scalpel. He thinks the one-way direction consideration is important to consider with targeted parking in areas it can more accommodate and still provide that 16 feet of egress to get by. Regardless if there are parking restrictions or not, they know they will have a problem because the road is not even to code. If there is an emergency, people will have trouble getting out of there and people will have trouble getting in.
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He also thinks taking the time to maybe find more nuances will cause extreme burdens. They do not have anywhere to establish additional parking. He thinks this is a very emotional issue as seen from public comments on the record. People are targeting two particular residents that do park a lot in the street for their own reasons. It is perfectly legal, but people are just upset, and he thinks this is more a personal issue than a safety concern for many residents. He asked the Council to consider what other options there are and what are the full implications of this decision if it goes forward for access for services other than just safety.
ELLEN MARIENTHAL said she has been a resident of Boyer Circle for 40 years and they have never had much of a problem until the last 5 or 10 years and it is consistently getting worse and worse because they have more large vehicles, more people deciding to park on the street, and she has said whatever she needed to say in her letters to the Council, as well as her providing pictures, and she feels she understands the inconvenience for some neighbors. They are all very willing to help in situations where people need extra parking. She thinks this issue is a safety issue and not a convenience issue. She knows it is very inconvenient for some neighbors but feels very strongly that with whole neighborhoods burning to the ground that they have seen recently, they are in a very high fire danger area, and it is time they do something about it.
MELISSA GATES MCKEE said her house was built in 1919 before all of their parking issues so they are an unusual house. They are on the hill and coming down to their house it is a very steep hill and cars zoom by going up and down the hill. The PT cruiser is their car and just recently they received two harassing letters which they sent to the Lafayette Police, and they photocopied it and put it in the record. They told them if they wanted to, the solution would be for them to take cameras so they would be able to photograph the individuals that put the letters which were very rude on their car. They decided not to do that, and they are here saying they need more consideration before the City changes parking. It is a very emotional situation for them especially because the cars zoom up and down the hill and there are many children, dogs, and people walking around. It is very complicated and said she appreciates the Council’s help.
Councilmember Candell asked if they have a driveway or garage at their house. Ms. McKee said they have a single garage and a very long driveway, but it just feels better to have a car nearby if they were going to leave. Their driveway is very long, and it is challenging getting in and out. Their preference is to have their car on the street to access it.
LOUIS EDELSON, said his area happens to be the very widest part of Boyer Circle. He measures it is 24 feet from curb to curb. It has been a long meeting and he referred to the white lines with curbs on both sides of the street and requested that instead of having two lines which are each one or two feet in from the curb that they start measuring from the actual face of the curb on one side and then 20 feet to make a single line. This will make it easier for them to make a pad someday. Secondly, he asked if Boyer Circle the only narrow street in Lafayette because he thinks the City is setting up a standard of 28 feet and it seems the City should not wait for a TAR but should be proactively look for these streets.
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GLEN CASS, said this is a safety issue and if you have a Safety Element and it is giving recommendations for egress and ingress, he thinks there cannot be parking. Personally, he does not need lines in front of his house. His road is 13’5” and it drops off. There is no curb for someone to park inside that limit so the City can paint them, but he does not need it in front of his house. This has been discussed for years when they had the parking issue on Dewing Street with BART parkers in the neighborhoods. The City asked them about Boyer Circle and whether residents wanted to do something, and they were able to work things out among neighbors and have an amicable condition, but it is no longer working. It was exacerbated by a contractor who did not follow the regulations at all. He staged his equipment out on the street, made it inconvenient for the whole neighborhood and got everyone so frustrated that they reached the boiling point, and this is where they are at now. They do not seem to be able to compromise any longer and he is at the top of the hill. He has the narrowest area and thinks he has the highest fire risk because it will travel up to his house, with no staging alongside.
JIM COMINS, said most of his sentiments have been expressed tonight. This is not a fresh issue. He has lived on the circle for 27 years and over the course of the last 10, parking has become a problem. People park their cars 24/7 on the street thereby taking a two-lane road and making it a one-lane road. Frankly, he thinks it is rude and thinks it is self-serving, and it takes 50% of the road capacity away. He has had to back up his car, had to turn around and go the other way, has had to get out of his car and move barrels on trash day just to drive home just so some people can park on the street. This to him is not neighborly.
The construction Mr. Cass mentioned is getting way out of hand and there seems to be no limits or regulations. There will be 6-8 cars parked on both sides of the street.
He does not know what the speed limit is on the street because it is not posted, but he presumes it is 25 mph, which is way too fast for the street. He suggested posting signs that say 15 mph, particularly around corners by Melissa’s house and the other side just so people outside of the neighborhood such as Uber, Lyft, delivery vehicles, and others can see this is narrow and tight and tone it down. Maybe when the Council comes up with some solutions, he suggested taking a look at this because some people park on the street to create a traffic calming feature, which he appreciates. He hoped to figure out a way to mitigate that and make it go away. He does also believe this is a safety issue and does not believe people should be parking on the street. They should park in their driveways and should not turn a two-lane road into a one-lane road just for their own convenience and put the rest of their safety at risk.
ROB LAVOIE said he does not live on Boyer Circle but does not think this issue is solely limited to Boyer Circle. If they need 20 feet for fire evacuation safety, that would impact many roads and nearly all of them in the HCD approved quarter and a half-mile bubble. He asked if the Fire Chief or the City Engineer could provide him with a map of all streets that are less than 20 feet wide in town, which would be helpful. He thinks the Council should reject HCD’s proposal for both of their options for expanding the density. He asked how many people on Boyer Circle would be able to keep all their cars in their driveway currently and how many would be able to do that if they had a 400% increase in several of the homes on the street.
These are critical issues the Council needs to address.
NANCY BISHOP said she sent a letter today and she is completely in support of restrictions on Boyer Circle.
Her concern is if she is having a remodel or landscape people come and they have to park, will she be able to get a permit for that and will it be easy to do. Or, if she wants to celebrate her 80th birthday, will she have enough parking for guests to park in the street and will that be permitted.
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MARY JO CASS said she did submit a letter which goes into many of the issues discussed tonight, but she fully supports restricting parking on Boyer primarily for safety issues. If the Council has seen some of the photos that have been submitted for this with a fire truck actually on the street and the fire truck takes up about 85% of the width of the street on the corner it was on. There are other photos of 6 or 7 cars parked in a row along the street, but then there is a car on the opposite side as well. This is approaching a blind curve and it also turns the street into a one-way street where cars can barely get through and they have to bump away the trash cans sometimes in order to make it all the way through the street. She thinks it is a serious issue and the neighbors have volunteered to cut down a tree that is growing at a 45% angle across a driveway so that driveway can be used by the owner of the property more efficiently. They have helped to create parking pads and to make their own driveways available when there are parties, construction, etc. and the neighborhood is very willing to do that. So, there are ways to solve this, but times have changed. The neighborhood is more populated, has more density, with many more cars, and given fires that have happened recently, they can no longer sit on their hands and must act quickly.
Mayor Dawson referred to questions and said one had to do with one-way consideration, which was answered as per the Fire Code, it is not feasible because of the room to accommodate the 20 feet.
Another question related to placement of white stripes, and she thinks this is something that can be considered individually.
Mr. Golier said they are happy to work with any resident to help accommodate those parking pads as feasible.
Mayor Dawson said another question was if Boyer Circle was the only street in Lafayette with these conditions, and there are others. What is unique about Boyer Circle and other similar streets is it is in a very high fire zone and there is a nexus for enhanced fire risk the Council would like to address as best they can.
Another question came up about speed and whether the Council would consider that for adjusting or posting speed signs. Mr. Golier said the State does not give the City the flexibility to set whatever speed they want, so the speed limit is 25 mph so they would not be able to install a 15-mph speed limit, but there are other advisory signs that could be installed.
Another question was regarding a parking permit system and Fire Marshal Bachman spoke to this and would not recommend this because emergencies could happen at any time, but she asked for staff’s comments. Mr. Golier said they would agree, and parking prohibitions would be full-time.
Mayor Dawson called for deliberation.
Councilmember Anduri said one speaker mentioned that if there were multiple contractor trucks for a renovation and how the neighborhood would accommodate that. Mr. Golier said this is probably the biggest challenge they have heard from residents and there is no easy response to that because parking prohibitions would mean no parking on the street.
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Mr. Luttropp interjected and said in other parts of town when people have done large construction projects on their homes that have been in hillside areas and had to go through the permitting process, staff has conditioned them to not have their crews park on the street up by their development. They have been conditioned to park their employees’ vehicles elsewhere and shuttle the workers in. So, this has been done in other parts of town. This is difficult and inconvenient, but he thinks most of the cars cluttering the street during construction are the workers. So, it is possible to shuttle workers to and from a site and not have so many cars on the street.
Councilmember Anduri said if the Council were to adopt the resolution would establish no parking and they would say it would become effective, but this does not say anything about the white lines, about encroachment program or some way to find parking, and he asked how staff sees this happening. He asked if staff would come back or work with TransCirc Commission to develop those elements.
Mr. Golier said the recommendation for the edge lines and the signs at the entrance to Boyer Circle came from the TransCirc Commission, so the intent was not to bring this back to Council. Those would be staff’s way of communicating the no parking restrictions versus a series of signs every 50 feet along the street.
Vice Mayor Kwok said if the Council were to adopt this resolution the start date would be immediate for no parking to take effect. It will impact a lot of the neighborhood and asked what is an appropriate notice period, particularly if people want parking pads and construct those.
Mr. Golier said they would have to design the white stripes and get crews out there, which would take a bit of time and then there is a desire to work with residents to help accommodate that and identify options to install parking pads as feasible. It would take at least a few months to be able to make sure it is a collaborative process and design those proposed edge lines.
Mr. Luttropp said he would envision the edge lines being put in as part of this summer’s surface seal program because they could add that to the project. With that, he would assume the striping could be done sometime around August or September. This is when the City would put the signs in and striping.
Vice Mayor Kwok said this would be about 5 months, and Mr. Luttropp confirmed. He said staff mentioned they spoke to some families about how to accommodate them and, in some cases, they would need an easement or permission from the City, and he asked how long that would take. Mr. Luttropp said typically for an encroachment agreement it does not take very long to process them, but the longest time is how they want to build this and provide staff with a sketch or drawing so they know what they are building. It could be more time-consuming if they needed to build retaining walls greater than 3 feet in height because that would require a building permit which would take even more time. For some people it may be as simple as removing vegetation and making a gravel pad which could turn around in a day or two.
Councilmember McCormick asked when the effective date would be. Mr. Luttropp said the effective date would be sometime after the signs and striping goes in, which would be August-ish. If the Council wants to put the signs and stripes in but not enforce it until a slightly later date, similar to the leaf blower ordinance, this could be done.
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Councilmember Candell said this is a rare thing to happen in the City where you have the Fire Marshal telling the Council and residents in clear terms that it is a safety issue. The Council took an oath to heed his advice when taking office, and so this is very unusual. It makes it feel very real that this is the right thing to do. She knows it will be hard and knows some people will be affected, but she does not have a choice and cannot ignore the safety warnings from professionals. She is very much in favor of this, is glad staff is willing to work with residents, and hopes neighbors will help each other out. There is a WhatsApp group on her road, and they text all the time to be nice, so maybe this could be formed to ensure communication.
Mayor Dawson agreed and said public safety is the City’s number one value and responsibility. Not only do they have to comply with the Fire Code, but they have a policy based on this. She expressed empathy where there are inconveniences for families. They have had safety around schools that has impacted parking in front of homes, but safety is their priority.
Vice Mayor Kwok voiced support, as well for safety reasons. However, it is a big change and given the striping timing in August, he suggested having a 6-month period of time from today which would put the date around September 15th. He suggested in the Further Be It Resolved clause that parking restrictions become effective September 15th and the Police Services Department is directed to enforce these new parking regulations” and asked if this works with staff.
City Attorney Subramanian said the City cannot impose this until it is posted, so she suggested keeping the existing language but indicate “no sooner than September 15th” so it is clear that the City has it posted.
Vice Mayor Kwok therefore suggested “Further Be It Resolve that the above parking restrictions become effective once posted and not sooner than September 15th; and the Police Services Department…” and strike “as otherwise designated, but no earlier than September 15th.” Councilmember Anduri asked that in the second “whereas” clause: “Whereas, the City of Lafayette gives the City Council the authority to establish by resolution no stopping zones.” In the Resolve clause, after designate, insert “but no earlier than September 15, 2024.” ACTION: It was M/S/C (Anduri/McCormick) to adopt Resolution 2024-09, as amended, to establish full time parking restrictions along Boyer Circle. Vote: 5-0 (Ayes: Dawson, Kwok, Anduri, Candell, and McCormick; Noes: None).
City Clerk Robbins stated the Council cannot take any new items after 12 midnight, and there are two action items remaining. The Council must open the items or postpone Item 17.A since it is not an action item and take Items 17.B and C quickly.
15. PUBLIC HEARINGS – None.
16. ITEMS REMOVED FROM CONSENT – None.
17. COUNCIL/COMMISSION REPORTS
A. Councilmembers report on activities and consideration of matters a Councilmember wishes to initiate for placement on a future agenda.
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There were no reports.
B. Vice Mayor Kwok and Councilmember McCormick
Resolution 2024-01 Appointing one member to the Youth Commission Recommendation: Adopt Resolution 2024-01.
Mayor Dawson opened the public comment period, and there were no speakers.
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Kwok/Candell) to adopt Resolution 2024-01 appointing Asha Spitzer to the Youth Commission. Vote: 5-0 (Ayes: Dawson, Kwok, Anduri, Candell, and McCormick C. E-mail from Austin Payne resigning from the Creeks Committee Recommendation: Accept resignation from Creeks Committee member Austin Payne with thanks for his 10+ years of volunteer service.
Mayor Dawson opened the public comment period, and there were no speakers.
ACTION: It was M/S/C (Anduri/Dawson) to accept resignation from Creeks Committee member Austin Payne with thanks for his 10+ years of volunteer service. Vote: 5-0 (Ayes: Dawson, Kwok, Anduri, Candell, and McCormick; Noes: None).
18. WRITTEN COMMUNICATIONS – None.
19. ADJOURNMENT – 12:00 a.m. in recognition of National Women's History Month and this year's theme of celebrating women who advocate for equity, diversion, and inclusion.
APPROVED:
__________________________________
Gina M. Dawson, Mayor
ATTEST:
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Joanne Robbins, City Clerk