Presentation of Requested Information Regarding the Draft 6th Cycle Housing Element and Direction to Staff Related to the Sites Inventory

City of Piedmont

COUNCIL AGENDA REPORT
DATE: August 1, 2022
TO: Mayor and Council
FROM: Sara Lillevand, City Administrator
SUBJECT: Presentation of Requested Information Regarding the Draft 6th Cycle Housing Element and Direction to Staff Related to the Sites Inventory

RECOMMENDATION
Receive a report on the Draft 6th Cycle Housing Element, receive public comment, and provide direction to staff related to the sites inventory.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
At the conclusion of its consideration of the Draft 6th Cycle Housing Element at its special and regular meeting on June 20, 2022, the City Council continued its deliberations to a subsequent meeting and requested additional information, as follows:

1. Feasibility of Use of Civic Center Sites: the Council requested draft findings, such as a high-level economic feasibility analysis for a housing plan that includes the Civic Center Sites;

2. Issues concerning the City’s Ability to Regulate Development on City-Owned Sites: the Council requested information on what the City is committed to doing by including the City-owned properties at 120 Vista and 801 Magnolia Avenues in the sites inventory (“Civic Center Sites”);

3. Alternatives to Civic Center Sites: Council requested potential alternative sites for 40 lower-income and 13 moderate-income units should the City-owned properties at 120 Vista Avenue 801 Magnolia Avenue be removed from the housing sites inventory; Propose alternate sites for the 34 lower-income and 5 moderate-income housing units removed from the Highland Avenue grassy strip and the Corey Reich Tennis Center; and

4. Questions Related to Specific Plan: Council requested exploration of time-efficient alternative(s) to a specific plan to determine optimal development on City-owned sites in Moraga Canyon, including Blair Park which could meet Measure A-1 timelines; The item before the Council tonight:
• Provides responses to items 1-4;
• Seeks Council direction on removing the Civic Center sites from the Sites Inventory, and including all City-owned sites located in Moraga Canyon to the Sites Inventory, pending further investigation on feasibility;
• Provides information related to increasing ADU and SB 9 production in the 6th Cycle Housing Element;
• Provides clarifications regarding the City Charter and actions require a vote of the electorate and what do not relative to the housing element; and • Provides clarifications regarding the submission timeline to HCD.

These items will determine what further revisions to the Draft Housing Element are necessary in order for the Council to approve a document to submit to HCD for an initial 90-day review.

The Draft Housing Element itself as well as all agenda materials, presentation, minutes and the meeting recording for June 20, can be found at https://www.piedmontishome.org/event/citycouncil-meeting-1 and the City’s website at https://piedmont.ca.gov

BACKGROUND
Every eight years, every city and county in California must update the Housing Element of its General Plan that is then certified by the California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD). The 6th Housing Element cycle under State of California law covers the time period from 2023 to 2031 in the San Francisco Bay Area region. The Housing Element is a planning document to ensure that local agencies plan for an adequate number of housing units that are accessible to individuals at different income levels.

State law does not require that jurisdictions build or finance new housing, but they must plan for it. It is in the community’s Housing Element that local governments make decisions about where safe, accessible, and diverse housing could be developed to offer a mix of housing opportunities for a variety of household incomes. The Housing Element sets priorities and outlines strategies that can be implemented in the future, by future City regulations. These new City regulations will be developed through subsequent public processes with public hearings and community engagement within the Housing Element planning period of 2023-2031. The Housing Element policies and programs are intended to enable possibilities for the development of housing.

The Housing Element process is also an opportunity for a community conversation about how to address local housing challenges and find solutions
Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA)
Every city in California receives a RHNA number, which is a target number of homes to plan for at various income levels. RHNA starts with the Regional Housing Needs Determination (RHND) provided by HCD, which is the total number of housing units the San Francisco Bay Area region needs over the eight-year period, by income group. The Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) is tasked with developing the methodology to allocate a portion of housing needs to each city, town, and county in the region. For this 6th cycle, the City’s RHNA is 587 housing units. For context, the City’s prior RHNAs set housing targets that were less than 100 housing units over the 8-year planning period. Thus, the RHNA mandated by the State for the 6th Housing Element cycle is unlike any of the RHNAs from prior cycles. The much higher RHNA Agenda Report Page 2
for this 6th cycle requires the City to develop completely new and different housing programs.

Because Piedmont’s size and available land are so constrained, the City’s housing programs must be more innovative than those in many other jurisdictions.

The RHNA assignments by income level for the City of Piedmont are outlined below along with 2021 income levels for a household of four.
2023-2031 RHNA
Allocation
City of Piedmont
Income Level Allocation 2021 Household
Income (4)

VERY LOW INCOME
(<50% of Area Median Income) 163 < $69,000

LOW INCOME
(50-80% of Area Median Income)
94 $69,000 - $110,000

MODERATE INCOME
(80-120% of Area Median Income)
92 $110,000 -$151,000

ABOVE MODERATE INCOME
(>120% of Area Median Income)
238 >$151,000
TOTAL ALLOCATION 587

DISCUSSION
At its June 20, 2022 meeting, Council directed staff to conduct further inquiry and investigation as to the inclusion of City-owned sites in the Sites Inventory of the Draft Housing Element. Staff provides responses to the requests for information in this section. 1) Economic Feasibility of Use of Civic Center Sites for Housing The Council requested staff to propose potential draft findings, such as a high-level economic feasibility analysis, for a housing plan that includes City-owned properties in the civic center.

After the June 20, 2022 Council meeting, the City retained Economic & Planning Systems, Inc. (EPS) to provide an evaluation.

At the time these agenda materials were published, the report was not yet final. Ashleigh Kanat, Principal at EPS, will present the findings at the August 1 meeting and the report will then be made available to the public.

Based on information available at the time these staff materials were published, at a very high level, EPS’s analysis reveals that there is potential to develop affordable housing on city owned civic center property separate from Civic Infrastructure improvements. However, there are complexities involved that would require significant study and parcel reconfigurations to thoughtfully address and accommodate civic facilities and housing in the constrained space. Ms Kanat will present a funding gap analysis for 53 housing units (40 lower income and 13 moderate income) as well as scenarios to illustrate options to improve economic feasibility of Agenda Report Page 3
developing housing on City-owned Civic Center sites.
2) Issues Concerning the City’s Ability to Regulate Development on City-Owned Sites The Council requested information regarding the legal and practical effect of including Cityowned properties in the sites inventory.

General Policy Implications and Requirements to Include City-Owned Sites When a city includes city-owned sites in its Sites Inventory, it is making a policy decision that housing should be accommodated on those sites. Thus, the City should only include City-owned sites where it intends to enable development.

If non-vacant City-owned property is included in the sites inventory, the City will be required to make a finding based on substantial evidence at final adoption of the Housing Element that the existing use will not be an impediment to the development of housing, and actively pursue development partnerships in accordance with the programs and milestones as established in the Housing Element.

Surplus Lands Act Requirements
The City must follow the procedures specified by the Surplus Lands Act (“SLA”) and associated guidelines from HCD when it comes to selling or leasing City-owned sites. The City would need to abide by the SLA when selling or entering into long-term leases (more than five years) for the City-owned parcels listed on the sites inventory.

Recent changes in the SLA ensure that state and local public lands are made available for affordable housing development. Generally, the purpose of the amendments to the SLA is to promote affordable housing development on unused or underutilized public land throughout the state to respond to the existing affordable housing crisis. The amendments to the SLA also clarify and strengthen reporting and enforcement provisions of the SLA to promote increased compliance with the SLA.

The SLA provides that, prior to disposing of surplus land, “a Low- and Moderate-Income Housing Availability Notice” (NOA) must be sent to interested housing sponsors identified by the expressions-of-interest list maintained by HCD and local public entities within whose jurisdiction the surplus land is located. The City of Oakland does not have jurisdiction in Piedmont and would not receive an NOA. The NOA invites those interested to respond to the local agency with a notice of interest. An NOA can include reasonable conditions and restrictions, such as a requirement to develop affordable housing on a site consistent with the Housing Element.

After receipt of a notice of interest, the local agency must then enter into a 90-day period of good faith negotiations with interested parties and could ultimately transfer the property at or below fair market value. An offer can be rejected in the event the parties cannot agree on a sale price or lease terms; the agency has received an offer with a greater number of affordable units or lower Agenda Report Page 4
affordability; or the proposed purchaser is not responsive to reasonable conditions or restrictions in an NOA that have been reviewed by HCD.

If a local agency does not receive any notices of interest in response to an NOA or does not successfully negotiate a transfer in accordance with the provisions of the SLA, the agency can sell the property without further compliance with the SLA except that if any housing is developed on the site, at least 15 percent of the units must be affordable with certain restrictions.

In sum, the City, as the property owner, would be able to develop goals and objectives for the City-owned sites and then develop an NOA and negotiate terms that meet the City’s goals.

Other Jurisdictions Using City-Owned Sites for Housing
The City Council asked about other cities that use City-owned sites for housing development.

Several cities are considering and/or have developed publicly owned land for housing, including civic buildings. HCD guidance is clear that publicly owned non-vacant sites should be considered for inclusion in a housing element sites inventory as the City has control over their redevelopment (as opposed to private land owners) when supported by a program to redevelop the sites for housing (See HCD Housing Element Site Inventory Guidebook Government Code Section 65583.2 May 2020 P. 38) and this is a strategy that is being used in a number of communities.

Examples of cities that have used (or are relying on) city owned land for housing development include:
• South Pasadena: City Corporation yard is included as a site in its draft 6th Cycle Housing Element
• Del Mar (6th Cycle Housing Element): While Del Mar previously redeveloped its Civic Center in 2018, they are currently considering low-income units on public land, specifically the state-owned Del Mar Fairgrounds and two city-owned empty lots at the Civic Center on 10th Street and another on 28th Street. • San Jose, former corporation yard (completed)
• Norwalk, includes City Hall (project design/EIR phase) The approach presented in Piedmont’s Public Review Draft Housing Element is intended to be creative and innovative given Piedmont’s limited availability of land resources. New approaches are necessary as the past approaches to rely on ADU production will not meet the larger RHNA targets given new HCD guidance.

Density Bonus Law
In order to facilitate the construction of affordable housing, State law requires local jurisdictions to adopt policies that offer waivers from building regulations when the developer proposes to include a specified percentage of lower-income housing units. This is referred to as a “density bonus” or “concession.” The waivers often seek some relief from on-site parking requirements, building height limitations, density limitations, setbacks or other requirements, or a combination of requirements. A greater percentage of lower-income units in a development may garner Agenda Report Page 5
greater waivers from regulations. Currently, Piedmont’s City Codes provides the following provision in zones C and D:

The Planning Commission will grant a density bonus for affordable housing in compliance with Government Code section 69515. A multi-family residential project that incorporates affordable units is also eligible for a 20% reduction in planning application fees.

The Draft Housing Element includes multiple programs and policies that encourage the provision of affordable housing as part of market rate multi-family housing projects.

The decision on whether to apply for a Density Bonus and Waivers and Concessions is made by the property owner and developer. With respect to City-owned sites, the City can negotiate and specify what it would like to see develop at those sites, and ensure development at certain specified densities.

City’s Collection of Property Taxes on City-Owned Sites Staff was asked whether the City can collect taxes on City-owned property. While the City is exempt from the payment of taxes, property taxes can be collected on the housing improvements on land owned by the City and leased long term to a housing developer as a taxable possessory interest (PI), subject to certain tax exemptions for affordable housing developers.

Basically, a taxable possessory interest (PI) is created when a private party is granted the exclusive use of real property owned by a non-taxable entity. In very simple terms, for a possessory interest to be taxable it must be independent, durable, and exclusive of the rights held by others. So yes, property taxes can be collected on the housing improvements on land owned by the City and leased long term to a housing developer.

What if the City does not move forward with developing housing units on City-owned sites identified in the Housing Element during the 6th Cycle (2023-31)? If the City does not move forward with the development of housing units identified in the Housing Element sites inventory on City-owned sites, other sites would need to be identified for this housing during the 6th Cycle planning period (2023-31). This identification of an alternative site(s) would be accomplished in the preparation and submittal of mandated Annual Progress Reports to HCD.
3) Identification of Sites Other Than the Civic Center Sites The Council asked staff to identify potential alternative sites for 40 lower-income and 13 moderate-income units should the City-owned properties at 120 Vista Avenue and 801 Magnolia Avenue be removed from the housing sites inventory, and to propose alternate sites for the 34 lower-income and 5 moderate-income housing units removed from the Highland Avenue grassy strip and the Corey Reich Tennis Center.

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If all City-owned sites in the Civic Center were removed from the Sites Inventory, 74 lowincome and 18 moderate-income housing units would need to be located on sites elsewhere in the city. Generally, there are three areas in the City where an increased density to accommodate additional housing units might be accomplished:
• Zone C, Multi-family Residential – located mostly along Linda Avenue with individual properties elsewhere
• Zone D, Mixed-use Commercial and Multi-family Residential – located along Grand Avenue and Highland Avenue
• Moraga Canyon – the City-owned sites included in the Sites Inventory and proposed to be studied through the development of a specific plan.

Per HCD requirements, low-income housing must be sited on parcels that are at least 0.5 acres in area and no more than 10 acres in area. This constraint severely limits our site inventory options for lower-income units.

Potential Alternatives for 74 lower income units:

Grand Avenue: 1221 and 1337 Grand Avenue are the only two parcels that are not City-owned and are at least 0.5 acres. These two parcels are currently included in the Sites Inventory for the allowance of 84 above moderate-income housing units. While more analysis and justification would be required before submission of a draft Housing Element, relocating the 74 low-income housing units from the Civic Center to these two properties may be viable with a density of 80 du/acre resulting in 3-5 story buildings. Moving these Civic Center units to Grand Avenue would also require finding sites for some or all of the 84 above moderate-income housing units they would displace in the Sites Inventory as well as the remaining 18 moderate-income units from the Civic Center.

Moraga Canyon: The draft Housing Element currently sites 100 of 257 lower-income units in the Moraga Canyon specific plan area. Staff does not recommend any additional lower-income units be added to the Sites Inventory in Moraga Canyon.

Zone C, Multi-family Residential: There are no properties in Zone C larger than 0.5 acres, and as such, staff does not recommend including lower income units in Zone C.

Potential Alternatives for 18 Moderate-Income units
Some additional analysis would be required but these moderate-income units could likely be placed in the sites inventory on smaller parcels in Zones D and C on Grand and Linda Avenues and/or incorporated in to an expanded Moraga Canyon specific plan area. 4) Questions Pertaining to the Specific Plan
The Council inquired whether there is there a more time-efficient alternative to a specific plan to determine optimal development on City-owned sites in Moraga Canyon.

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Given the complexity of the Moraga Canyon site, any instrument that the City uses to plan for housing there would likely be time-consuming. As background, the City selected the specific plan approach because the City was provided guidance to do this from HCD staff, including the reviewer assigned for Piedmont and Paul McDougall, Manager of Housing Policy. We discussed the initial concept of using the two City-owned parcels north of Moraga Avenue as a possible housing site. HCD recommended a specific plan as a preferred approach because the site has challenges, including parcelization, topography and a desire to retain critical public functions; and specific plans are required to include an implementation schedule and plan which increases the likelihood of development. Specific plans are developed through a rigorous public engagement process so that the community’s interests are served. The Draft Housing Element has been composed to reflect this approach recommended by HCD staff.

The City could propose and define an alternative plan (i.e Precise Plan, Master Plan, Neighborhood Plan, Area Plan), however, any planning process to appropriately address the complexities of development in Moraga Canyon will take considerable time and effort.

The Council also inquired whether is it feasible to prepare a specific plan for the Moraga Canyon area and complete that in sufficient time to gain the County’s approval of a project using Measure A-1 funds on a site within the specific plan area.

In order to seek approval of Piedmont’s use of Measure A-1 funds, the City will need to identify a project site and have a developer with a proposed project for the site before the end of 2024.

Timelines associated with the Specific Plan could be accelerated to meet the deadlines but would require beginning the planning process in advance of the Housing Element final adoption.

Inclusion of Blair Park in the Moraga Canyon planning area In its proposed revisions put forward at the June 20, 2022 City Council meeting, Staff recommended including Blair Park in the specific plan study area in order to provide more flexibility and a more comprehensive analysis of all the City-owned land in Moraga Canyon.

Including all City-owned acreage allows for increased likelihood of meeting multiple goals: the production of new housing; improved public safety (traffic, fire, etc.); replacement and/or modernization of Public Works facilities; maintained or improved recreation facilities; and a comprehensive landscape plan to retain and improve open space. Including Blair Park in the proposed specific plan area is feasible and recommended by Staff.

Questions Regarding Parkland
Staff was also asked whether laws prevent the City from considering parkland as a possible site for housing development. State laws do not pose a barrier to the City’s consideration of these sites. The Parkland Preservation Act provides that cities and counties may not acquire any real property that is in use as a public park “for the purpose of utilizing such property for any nonpark purpose” without providing compensation, land, or both to replace the parkland acquired. (Government Code section 5401(a).) Because the City does not propose acquiring any parkland for the purpose of using it for a non-park use, the law does not constrain the City’s use of the Agenda Report Page 8
parkland at issue here.

Government Code section 38440, et seq. also does not pose a barrier because the State’s parkland disposition law does not apply to charter cities such as Piedmont. (Wiley v. City of Berkeley (1955) 136 Cal. App. 2d 10, 14.)
However, other factors such as reversionary interests could potentially serve as a constraint and should be reviewed during the planning process. Accordingly, areas used for open space or park usage can be considered for development, and the City may choose to replace areas used as parks and open space in other areas of the City.
5) Increasing ADU and SB 9 production in the 6th Cycle Housing Element Community members have asked whether the City can increase the number of ADUs we project to be developed in the 6th Cycle. Piedmont’s Draft Housing Element follows HCD/ABAG Guidance on ADU projections, which takes into account increased production after 2018 when regulations were updated. The Guidance states that ADU projections are to be provided in their own section, not in the sites inventory. The City could add ADU building permits issued thus far in 2022 (aka “pipeline ADUs”) to project a 2022 total estimate, which would impact the 4-year total and average. Depending on how that changes the average per year, this may or may not increase the number of units projected over 8 years. Based upon final guidance from HCD, the City could also take a less conservative approach and assume more ADUs are affordable to lower income than currently assumed in the Draft Housing Element. This would increase the number of ADUs in the low income and moderate categories, and reduce the above moderate ADUs. While this approach does not change the total number of ADU’s counted toward RHNA, it could shift approximately 35 ADUs to lower income affordability. Staff recommends this less conservative ADU affordability allocation as well as utilizing 2022 ADU permit data to the extent it increases our ADU projection.

Staff was also asked whether the City can be more aggressive with SB9 units. HCD has advised City staff not to count SB9 units in the sites inventory to meet RHNA without high evidentiary support that there are projects pending. Redwood City recently received comments from HCD on its initial submittal of a Draft Housing Element which set a high bar for including SB9 sites.

HCD asked for analysis demonstrating a history of production, experience, trends and market conditions that allow lot splits and interest from property owners and developers. As such, it is staff and consultant professional recommendation to not rely on SB9 unit production to meet the City’s housing targets. HCD does encourage communities to develop programs which help facilitate projects under SB9, and then can count any units that are developed in its Annual Progress Report (APR). The draft Housing Element includes programs and quantified objectives for unit production under SB9 provisions.
6) Questions Regarding the City Charter
Questions have come up regarding Section 9.02 of the City Charter, and whether increasing densities or adding another residential use category within existing zones would require a vote of the electorate.

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The City’s Charter provides that “[t]he Council may classify and reclassify the zones established, but no existing zones shall be reduced or enlarged with respect to size or area, and no zones shall be reclassified without submitting the question to a vote at a general or special election.” (City Charter, Section 9.02.) A vote of the electorate is thus required when changing a zone’s boundary or changing the zone of a property from one zone to another zone, but not to change densities for already allowed uses. Therefore, a vote of the electorate would not be required since, under Section 9.02 of the Charter, and its historical interpretation by the City Attorney, changes to the density within each zone do not require a vote of the electorate. 7) Questions Regarding Timeline for Certification of the City’s Housing Element Since the June 20th meeting, the community has inquired whether the City can slow the Housing Element process down and take more time before sending a Draft Housing Element to HCD for an initial 90-day review. The City must abide by timelines specified by law. Delay in submitting the Draft Housing Element to HCD reduces the amount of time that the City has to discuss the Draft Housing Element with HCD, make revisions for HCD to review, and receive HCD certification by the mandated deadline. Delayed submittal increases the likelihood of missing the deadline and exposing the City to penalties associated with non-compliance. Perhaps just as important, receiving initial comments from HCD after its 90-day review allows the community to engage in the next round of revisions to the Draft with real feedback rather than conjecture about what HCD will or will not accept.

If Piedmont does not obtain state certification for the 6th Housing Element by May 2023, then Piedmont will be out of compliance with State housing law. Because the housing element is a mandatory element of the General Plan, when a jurisdiction’s housing element is found to be out of compliance, its General Plan could be found inadequate, and therefore invalid. Some repercussions include:

1. Local governments with noncompliant housing elements are ineligible to receive various state grant and loans.

2. Local governments with noncompliant housing elements maybe subject to financial penalties, courts can fine jurisdictions up to $100,000 per month, and if they are not paid, multiply that by a factor of six.

3. Jurisdictions are also vulnerable to litigation from housing rights’ organizations, developers, and HCD and the State Attorney General. If a jurisdiction faces a court action stemming from its lack of compliance and either loses or settles the case, it often must pay substantial attorney fees to the plaintiff’s attorneys in addition to the fees paid by its own attorneys. Potential consequences of lawsuits include: mandatory compliance within 120 days, suspension of local control on building matters, court approval of housing developments, court imposed financial penalties, and court mandated receivership.

4. Courts have authority to take control of local government residential and nonresidential permit authority and to bring the jurisdiction’s General Plan and housing element into substantial compliance with State law. The court may suspend the locality’s authority to issue building permits or grant zoning changes, variances, or Agenda Report Page 10
subdivision map approvals – giving local governments a strong incentive to bring its housing element into compliance.

Oakland, Orinda, Alameda, Dublin, Lafayette, Livermore, and San Ramon have already submitted Draft Housing Elements to HCD for initial 90-day review.

CONCLUSION
The Draft 6th Cycle Piedmont Housing Element for 2023 to 2031, represents a significant investment of time and resources of City decision-makers, staff, and the hundreds of community members who have participated in public meetings, community workshops, surveys, comment letters, and online planning tools.

The City is committed to meeting the letter and intent of the Housing Element, that is to enable the development of more housing affordable to various income levels. Given our very real geographic and topographic constraints on land in Piedmont, meeting state criteria, particularly for our lower income allocation, is quite challenging.

Additional analysis and consultation since June 20, 2022 validates the recommended approach to include City-owned land in the Draft Housing Element Sites Inventory while also revealing significant complexity relative to the civic center sites. Feasibility analysis performed on the City-owned sites containing Veterans’ Hall/Police Department, City Hall/Fire Department and the Center for the Arts at 801 Magnolia shows a potential path to development of housing but not without impinging on space that may be required to undertake imperative rehabilitation and/or replacement of the City’s essential services buildings. Given the dire need to overhaul our civic buildings in this area, staff recommends prioritizing the master planning effort for City service infrastructure in advance of commitment to developing housing on these parcels. Staff believes Moraga Canyon is the most likely location to actualize the development of new affordable housing units in Piedmont and recommends initiation of a robust Specific Plan process to support the development of housing as well as enhancement of recreation spaces, open spaces, and Public Works facilities.

NEXT STEPS AND DIRECTION
Staff recommends continuing to move forward toward the preparation of a resolution describing a number of revisions to the Draft Housing Element and authorizing Staff to submit the Draft 6th Cycle Housing Element to the California Department of Housing and Community Development for review. In order to progress toward a draft for submission, staff seeks the following direction from Council:

1. Expand the Moraga Canyon Specific Plan area to include all City-owned property along Moraga Avenue including Blair Park and initiate the planning process before the end of 2022

2. Conduct analysis required to relocate Civic Center City-owned sites contained in the Sites Inventory as follows:

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a. 74 lower-income units to 1221 and 1337 Grand Avenue
b. 18 moderate income units to parcels in zones C and D

3. Conduct analysis required to relocate above-moderate income units from 1221 and 1337 Grand Avenue as needed to keep density at or below 80 du/acre

4. Within HCD guidance, maximize total and lower income ADU count

ATTACHMENTS
A Public Comment, received June 14, 2022 to July 25, 2022 B Public Comment, received after July 25, 2022
C Online Draft 6th Cycle Piedmont Housing Element, published April 8, 2022 https://www.piedmont.ca.gov/government/city_news___notifications/council _consideration_of_draft_housing_element_
D Online June 20, 2022 Draft Housing Element Staff Report – Including Attachments https://piedmont.ca.gov/common/pages/DisplayFile.aspx?itemId=18643579 E Online June 20, 2022 City Council Meeting Minutes
https://piedmont.ca.gov/common/pages/DisplayFile.aspx?itemId=18769765 Agenda Report Page 12
Attachment A Agenda Report Page 13
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Honorable Mayor and Members of the City Council
I am pleased to submit these comments and suggestions for your consideration as you review the City’s Draft Housing Element. While a lot of work has been done, some significant changes are needed to comply with State laws and to remove major risks to civic facilities and financial burdens on the City this could impose.

Piedmont’s Draft Housing Element Needs Fixing
Significant changes to the sites inventory in the Draft Housing Element are needed to ensure compliance with State laws and community objectives. In particular, the element fails to include a single realistic site that would be available for construction of lower-income housing over the next several years. Additionally, the City’s proposal to locate majority of its housing, including all affordable housing, on currently non-surplus public sites (as defined under State law) actively used for civic and recreational uses (e.g., police station, Veterans Hall, tennis courts) is highly unusual, and perhaps unique among hundreds of California cities. This would encumber the City with obligations post-adoption it may struggle to meet, resulting in highly messy implementation, significant financial burdens, and potential loss of civic facilities and parks, even if this strategy passes muster with the State.

I will first start with some easy opportunities that should be captured, followed by a discussion of the some of the items raised above.

1. Count Allowable Sites Currently Not Included in the Inventory The Housing Element currently fails to reflect housing and sites allowed to be counted under State laws, which should be included in the sites inventory, and would put some dent in remaining housing needs:
• Housing for which certificate of occupancy will be issued July 1, 2022 to Jan. 31, 2023. These are not included in the current draft of the Housing Element, as it seems from the June 6th community workshop, that the City’s consultant was unaware of this provision. This stems from the difference in the Housing Element Planning Period (which starts January 2023) and the regional data Projection Period (which starts July 1, 2022). The State HCD reference to this has been provided to staff and hopefully this will be corrected in the next draft of the Housing Element. https://www.hcd.ca.gov/community-development/housing-element/docs/6th-webhe-duedate.pdf. At the current pace of development, this would likely be 12 to 15 units, but City staff should have precise building permitting data. • SB-9 Units. It’s a bit puzzling why these have been left out of consideration for housing sites. City staff mentioned that housing built under SB-9 would be reflected in the City’s Housing Element annual progress reports as achievements following adoption, but including this now would help the City meet a portion of its housing needs. Several Southern California jurisdictions have used SB-9 without running into Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #1 Agenda Report Page 36 Comments on April 2022 Draft Housing Element
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issues with the State Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD), and Bay Area cities such as Mill Valley, Larkspur, and Ross are using these as well.

SB-9 has both a lot split and a non lot-split component. However, rules (e.g., direct street access from a new lot to street) need to be spelled out by cities, and Piedmont has not done so yet.

2. Provide Meaningful Lower Income Housing Opportunities The draft Housing Element fails to make available any realistic sites for affordable housing, as required under State law. All lower income sites are located on City-owned land, none of which is surplus. I am not aware of any other city in California that is doing this, especially for the entirety of its lower-income housing program. The Civic Center sites are unrealistic (see below) and the Housing Element would require preparation of a Specific Plan for the Moraga Canyon sites, adoption of which is a discretionary City Council action, and thus with no certainty that this will happen, and even if it does, it would certainly push out site availability by several years. Thus, the City’s commitment to lower-income housing is questionable.

3. Remove Civic Center Sites as these are Unrealistic for Housing and Have Potential to Generate Massive Problems for City Post Housing Element Adoption
The Housing Element has sites in the Civic Center area that are actively used for civic and recreational uses (e.g., police station, Veterans Hall, tennis courts), and Highland Green.

There are no details in the Housing Element of housing will result on these sites. There are some real practical problems – e.g., the costs to rehab and seismically retrofit Veterans Hall and the Police Building alone was estimated by the City at $15 million to $20 million two years ago, and the City decided not to place these together with the pool reconstruction on the bond ballot measure at the same time. So currently there is no funding for these. If housing is built together with these facilities, these facilities will need to be replaced, not just rehabbed, at significantly higher costs, which may be several multiples of the rehab cost. The City does not have money to rehab these facilities, let alone build new ones. Housing on top of these structures would also be much more expensive to build and be unlikely for even market-rate housing, let alone for affordable housing.

Additionally, there are legal uncertainties. The City Charter does not permit reclassification of existing zones, and going from allowing one single-family unit per site in the Civic Center area to higher density housing at 60 or 80 units per acre is reclassification of Public zone to Public/Residential for all practical purposes, regardless of whether the zone title is changed.

The City also cannot commit any monies to affordable housing under the California constitution, without a vote of the people (as example, Oakland has a ballot measure in place for November asking the voters to authorize this).

It should be noted that following the demise of redevelopment which provided monies for affordable housing to cities, State law was changed to allow cities to use a minimum “default density” as a proxy for affordable housing. In the Bay Area/Piedmont, this is 30 units per acre. So while housing elements may have sites at higher shown as having potential for Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #1 Agenda Report Page 37 Comments on April 2022 Draft Housing Element
- 3 -
income-restricted housing, in practice, it is rare for these sites get developed with affordable housing, as these require subsidies and assembling of financing packages, that are often difficult to cobble together. The higher densities do facilitate development of market rate workforce or senior housing, so this serves a useful purpose.

Because the City is the owner of the sites where the lower-income sites are shown, it would be incumbent upon the City to demonstrate how lower income (that is, income-restricted) would result in more detail in the Housing Element. The City needs to lay out this roadmap in the element to satisfy the State. Later, say when the City is ready to move along with rehabbing Veterans Hall, it would need to wait for a housing partner. The City may need to issue RFPs to attract developers, convince the State that no developers were found if that is the case, and have to find other sites to zone under new State laws passed in 2018, which means starting over.

This approach is so fraught with potential problems, that I don’t readily know of any city in California that is doing this as part of their Housing Element inventories, not even cities with a lot more dedicated staff and resources or huge commitments to housing. While this may seem like an easy way out to find sites and get the Housing Element certified, the real problems will emerge and consume the City for the several years after the Housing Element is adopted and certified, and present problems that the City may find hard to extricate itself from.

The City should remove these sites from further consideration in the Housing Element.

4. Remove Highland Green From Consideration
The City should also remove Highland Green from consideration. This site has a total of five paltry units capacity as per the Housing Element (which is a lot less than the SB-9 units the City believes it doesn’t need to count), is used for July 4th parade staging, and is barely 25 feet deep, and unsuited for housing. Piedmont also is shorts on parks and recreation space, and the EIR on the Housing Element will likely show a significant and unavoidable park impact with the addition of new housing, requiring the City to undertake all feasible measures to mitigate these impacts under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA).

5. Remove Requirement of Specific Plan for Moraga Canyon Development A requirement of a Specific Plan as a prelude to any development in this area will delay development. This is also unnecessary, as utilities are available at the site and the City can apportion areas here easily for housing development to enable development to proceed.

The City is already required under State law to prepare objective housing design standards, which could be tailored for the area.

Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #1 Agenda Report Page 38 Comments on April 2022 Draft Housing Element
- 4 -

6. Designate One of the Two Grand Avenue Sites for Lower-Income Housing The Housing Element designates Ace Hardware and Sylvan office building for moderate and higher income housing. These sites are within the acreage (0.5 acres to 10.0 acres) that HCD recommends for lower income housing, and should be designated for these instead of Civic Center sites. Development at these sites will likely take place by razing the existing buildings, and housing can be easily incorporated as part of redevelopment.

7. Consider Higher Densities along Grand Avenue and Highland Avenue to Make Up Shortfall Resulting from Removal of Civic Center Sites The proposed densities of 80 units per acre along Grand and Highland avenues are low, and can be increased to 120 or 140 units per acre, within five stories. For context, much of new development along Broadway in Oakland in Broadway Valdez area are at about three times this density. The new six-story residential building with a 35,000 s.f. Target store and other commercial uses Broadway/26th is at 240 units per acre, in a seven-story configuration (six stories residential above commercial). Half this much density, especially along Grand Avenue, is not unreasonable. This a great area, walkable, with access to stores, school, and amenities.

Attached are calculations showing how the City would have adequate sites by substituting Civic Center sites with modestly higher densities along Grand and Highland avenues.

8. Additional Items for Consideration
Promoting Missing Middle Housing. The Housing Element does not consider strategies to foster a greater variety of housing types (for examples triplexes, fourplexes) in some or all single-family areas. This may run afoul of City Charter, but is a strategy worth considering, and is much less of change from the City Charter than what is being considered for the Public zone in the draft element. The City can maintain the existing development regulations (pertaining to setbacks, heights, floor area ratios) to ensure that these blend in into existing neighborhoods.

Consideration of Walkability and Access to Amenities. The draft Housing Element has a lot of housing units (132) squeezed into a relatively small area for the Corp Yard site. This area does not have the same access to stores, services, and transit as the Grand Avenue area, yet the highest densities (80 units per acre max.) are the same in the two areas. This number should be reduced, and more housing accommodated along Grand and Highland avenues.

The City may also find that less development here is needed once SB-9 sites are counted.

Sincerely,
Rajeev Bhatia
Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #1 Agenda Report Page 39 Attachment A Agenda Report Page 40
Attachment A Agenda Report Page 41
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/3/?ik=d523606921&view=pt&search=all&permthid=thread-f%3A1736107216187376559&simpl=msg-f%3A1736107216187376559 1/3 Fwd: Housing Element: Piedmont Civic Center Sites
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Kevin Jackson <[email protected]> Sun, Jun 19, 2022 at 4:20 PM To: "Kathryn Slama - Lisa Wise Consulting ([email protected])" <[email protected]>, "David Bergman ([email protected])" <[email protected]>, Stefano Richichi <[email protected]>, Henry Pontarelli <[email protected]>, Dave Javid <[email protected]>, Paul Kronser <[email protected]>, Rachael Sharkland <[email protected]> Cc: "Michelle Marchetta Kenyon - Burke, Williams & Sorensen, LLP ([email protected])" <[email protected]>, "Deepa Sharma - Burke, Williams & Sorensen, LLP ([email protected])" <[email protected]>, Sara Lillevand <[email protected]>
I’m forwarding the latest email from Mr. Bhatia.

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From: Rajeev Bhatia >
Sent: Sunday, June 19, 2022 4:12:40 PM
To: City Council <[email protected]>
Cc: Kevin Jackson <[email protected]>; Pierce Macdonald <[email protected]> Subject: Housing Element: Piedmont Civic Center Sites
You don't often get email from . Learn why this is important [EXTERNAL] This email originated from an external source. Please use judgment and caution when opening attachments, clicking links, or responding.

Dear Councilmembers,
I want our Housing Element to be set up for success, rather than failure, and include actual sites where the City can fulfill its housing needs, rather than sink time and energy into sites where housing is unlikely. While including housing as part of the Civic Center is a noble sentiment, it is impractical in the timeframe of this Housing Element planning period, as I will discuss below. Please be aware of the following State laws and other requirements, which among others require the City Council to make certain findings at adoption time that the City would not be able to make for the Civic Center sites:

State Law Requirements to be mindful of for Including Civic Center sites Demonstrate realistic development capacity at designated sites. Where there are existing uses, “..Existing Uses — The housing element must demonstrate non-vacant and/or underutilized sites in the inventory that can be realistically developed with residential uses or more-intensive residential uses at densities appropriate ….and evaluate the extent these uses would constitute an impediment to new residential development.” See https:// www.hcd.ca.gov/community-development/building-blocks/site-inventory-analysis/analysis-of-sites-and-zoning. shtml. The City needs to show the community the analysis used to arrive at feasible housing capacity at existing civic uses and tennis courts. E.g., there is no housing feasible where the tennis courts are. The examples cited so far are of tennis courts on top of parking structures such as at UC Berkeley, which is very different than tennis courts on top of housing, that too affordable housing. The Housing Element is not a policy direction to explore ideas … it is focused on delivering sites for development, the feasibility of which has already been established.

8.1.22 Staff Report Attachment #2
Attachment A Agenda Report Page 42
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/3/?ik=d523606921&view=pt&search=all&permthid=thread-f%3A1736107216187376559&simpl=msg-f%3A1736107216187376559 2/3 the resolution adopting the housing element. https://www.hcd.ca.gov/community-development/buildingblocks/site-inventory-analysis/analysis-of-sites-and-zoning.shtml. Thus at the time of Housing Element adoption, the City Council will have to make findings that the tennis and basketball courts at Vista and public safety uses at the Civic Center will be discontinued during the planning period (2023-2031). I do not believe it is possible to make this finding given that there are no plans to relocate these uses to other places. If the City Council does not believe this finding can be made, it is better to drop these sites now rather than finding that we are short on sites at adoption time.

Required Rezoning for Shortfall. The City would need to commit in its Housing Element to a process and timeline to make sites it owns available for residential uses. The draft Housing Element currently lacks this, and HCD would most likely want to see this detail included. Under the Housing Accountability Act, should housing not be feasible at a site and there is a shortfall mid-cycle, the City will have to proactively undertake a rezoning program to find sites elsewhere to make up for this shortfall. This means doing a Housing Element Update and EIR all over again mid-cycle in three or four years, and tying the City’s hand in being able to proceed with rehabbing the public safety buildings until alternative housing sites are in place. Thus, In designating the Civic Center sites I believe we are just kicking the can down two or three years, rather than solving any housing problems. We should be focused on finding and delivering those alternative housing sites to meet our housing needs and obligations now, rather than five years later.

City Charter
City Charter Amendment. Reclassification of zones under the Piedmont Charter requires a vote of the people.

If the City Council wants to reclassify the Public zone (which allows a de minimus one house at every parcel in the city) to permit high density residential and thus make this zone Public/Residential, this should be submitted to the voters and placed on the upcoming November ballot. Lack of legal certainty will not inspire confidence on part of any developers the City may wish to attract. ———
Physical Feasibility at Civic Center
Not finding any drawings or information in the Housing Element on methodology to determine housing capacity at Civic Center sites, I sat down over the weekend and tried to understand this for myself. Attached are two drawings, with sites in the Housing Element labeled A through D, with Housing Element information noted.

A. Vista Tennis and Basketball Courts. Assumption in HE: Housing at 60 units per acre, 34 realistic housing units. The courts presently fill up the entire site. It is physically not possible to vertically integrate housing and whole bunch of tennis courts and bleachers on top of a residential building without extraordinary expense, and I am not aware of any examples in the Bay Area where this has been done. Tennis courts can go on top of parking structures as they have been at Cal for over three decades and industrial and office buildings, but not residential, as the building floorplate is entirely different. Is the proposal to remove tennis courts? The facilities were just renovated a year ago for something like $2 million. This idea does not seem even physically, let alone financially, feasible.

B. Center for the Arts. Where is the space for the five units? Will this be razed and replaced? Again, wasn’t this rehabbed a few years ago, and didn’t the City recently sign a 10-year lease on this? Is this even available during the Housing Element period?
C. City Hall/Police/Veterans Building. The site area for this in the Housing Element includes City Hall, and the area is counted at 60 units per acre to calculate resultant housing. Neither tearing down City Hall, nor putting housing on top of it is a credible suggestion. The eastern half of the site is about 0.5 acres, and that is where the police and veterans building are located. It would be quite a structure that includes a new police station, rec. building, and 40 housing units (which, because of the small acreage, would actually be at 120 units per acre max) all at the same small site. It would require razing the existing facilities and starting from scratch, and be surely several multiples more expensive than the cost to rehab these, plus the higher cost for housing building and having the civic facilities support the resultant structural weight and complexity of housing above. Theoretically it could work if the housing can be on its own pad as staff mentioned for other examples they shared at the Planning Commission meeting, but looking at our site I don’t see any area where housing can just be squeezed in without messing with the existing buildings. Rehabbing the existing Veterans Hall and Public Safety buildings will also be a lot more environmentally sustainable and emit fewer greenhouse gases than razing these buildings and building something new, when the same housing can built more sustainably and be delivered to the community at lower cost by adding say one more story to the Mulberry/BofA site across the street, where housing is already planned, and provide an additional density incentive for the property owner to develop that site.

8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #2
Attachment A Agenda Report Page 43
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/3/?ik=d523606921&view=pt&search=all&permthid=thread-f%3A1736107216187376559&simpl=msg-f%3A1736107216187376559 3/3 D.

Highland Green. The width of this parcel during most of the stretch is 30 feet. With required front setback of 20 feet in Zone A, and rear setback of 5 feet, the remaining buildable width of housing would only be 5 feet. So, these sites are also physically not feasible. The loss of five units assumed here would not be that significant.

Count every housing unit (including ADUs) expected to be completed between July 1, 2022 and January 1, 2023.

These units, under State law, can be counted toward both the 5th Cycle (in which we are) and 6th Cycle (starting in 2023), because of data projection period overlap. There should be about 15 units that result, including e.g. the Mayor’s ADU.

Count SB 9 Units. The City does not have a trend of these because the City has not allowed these in the past. With properly development rules and methodology, the City should attempt to have these counted now to bring the remaining need down, rather than just as Housing Element success story later. There are many cities that have successfully counted these units, consistent with HCD guidelines.

Consider densities that are much higher than currently contemplated at Grand and Highland avenues, while developing standards so that these are well designed, with ground level retail and cafes, and housing above.

Densities of 180 units per acre with ground floor retail and four stories of residential above (60 feet building height), with structured parking may be appropriate for Grand Avenue, and 120 per acre for Highland Avenue. If necessary, the City should add a real architect with experience in doing projects like these in the Bay Area to the out-of-town planning team.

Add missing middle housing (fourplexes, sixplexes, etc.) and smaller-scale multifamily development in some or many existing neighborhoods. Some of the City’s rules relating to allowable densities, lot sizes etc. may need to be modified. There may, again, be some City Charter issues involved, but these would be of lower magnitude than high density residential issues in Public zones.

Continue counting all the remaining single family and religious sites with the good work staff has done, although it remains to be seen if HCD will buy off on allowing so many of these to be counted.

Anything else needed should be added after the above has been done, and this remaining need would be modest.

Thank you for volunteering your time and energy to serve the community! Rajeev Bhatia
Piedmont, CA 94611
Civic Center Parcels.pdf
5651K
Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #2 Agenda Report Page 44 Attachment A Agenda Report Page 45
Attachment A Agenda Report Page 46
6/22/22, 4:54 PM Plan to Place Mail - FW: Housing Element: Is the City Council Operating With Wrong Information? https://mail.google.com/mail/u/3/?ik=d523606921&view=pt&search=all&permthid=thread-f%3A1736175035179537218&simpl=msg-f%3A1736175035179537218 2/3 As you know, I have provided two comment emails to the City Council over the past few days on the Housing Element.

Over the weekend, two City Council members reached out to me independently on their own initiative to better understand my perspectives, and were both very sincere. They both told me, separately, that they have been told by staff and consultants that the housing on tennis court idea will be tested out, and if the City is not able to negotiate it out with a developer, that’s it — the City will just back out, and nothing else will happen or will jeopardize City control of the courts.

I hope that they were not told the above, as I do not believe this is legally-correct information, in light of extensive changes to State laws made over the past three years to hold cities’ feet to fire and follow through on housing commitments. It’s an entirely different world, and the State has shut down games that cities were playing in showing housing sites they did not intend following through with. The State will likely allow the tennis courts to be counted for the housing sites inventory, but following Housing Element adoption, simply shut out the City from encumbering the housing with anything that will make it less feasible. I am not an attorney, and this topic is out of my area of competence. However, I believe that our Council needs to have correct information before being asked to make what I believe are monumental decisions that will set the course for the future of public and civic space in Piedmont, and I am hoping the City Attorney can weigh in at the Council meeting today and correct any false information the Council may have been provided or premise that may have been created.

I believe that under the California Surplus Land Act, the City cannot just start negotiating with a developer to sell or give away rights (the Act uses the words sale or lease) to public land without first going to through a process. This process includes first declaring the land surplus. The words in the State statute are unused or underutilized, so the tennis courts and Veterans Hall, police/fire station will fall under the underutilized category. Once it gets on the surplus list, other public agencies get a shot at the site before a housing developer will.

But before the site even makes it to the surplus list, it needs to be offered for park and rec use to other public agencies.

The State places the highest priority—higher than housing—of use of public land for park and recreation purpose. I find it ironic that while the State thinks the highest priority use for public lands is recreation, the City is proceeding in the opposite direction. California Government Code Section 54220 (b) states "The Legislature reaffirms its belief that there is an identifiable deficiency in the amount of land available for recreational purposes and that surplus land, prior to disposition, should be made available for park and recreation purposes or for open-space purposes.” and Section 54227 “ .. first priority shall be given to an entity that agrees to use the site for park or recreational purposes if the land being offered is already being used and will continue to be used for park or recreational purposes”.

Thus, if Piedmont thinks that a better use for the tennis courts is housing—and this is a finding the Council is required to make at adoption time under the Housing Accountability Act as part of inclusion of this site as part of the sites inventory— in the eyes of the State, a higher priority would be given to say, OUSD/Oakland Tech High School that is located very close to Piedmont and lacks adequate tennis courts and wants to maintain that use of the site. OUSD would be silly to not avail of an opportunity to lease the courts for $1 per year. My son goes to PHS and plays tennis every day at the tennis courts — would he be able to play there if that happens? Why would the City just give away this land? If it’s not OUSD, PG&E or EBMUD or another agency may have an interest, and that interest will trump any housing developer.

Let’s assume that somehow no other agency wants this site, and the City starts negotiating with a developer. Under amendments to the Surplus Land Act that became operational last year, now the State Department of Housing and Community Development will be involved, and the City wold be required to negotiate in good faith on its promise to develop housing at the site, with the State actively looking over our shoulder. Beginning January 1, 2021, local agencies are required to send, and HCD is required to review, negotiation summaries for each surplus land transaction in the state. HCD is also required to notify local agencies of violations and may notify the Attorney General and assess fines, as necessary.

Further, the Housing Accountability Act (HAA) passed a few years ago, Government Code section 65589.5, establishes limitations to a local government’s ability to deny, reduce the density of, or make infeasible housing development projects.

Developers are allowed up to four “concessions” to make housing feasible, these concessions include excluding any other use that may make housing infeasible. Furthermore, in a pair of published rulings within the last six months (see https://www.hklaw.com/en/insights/publications/2022/06/california-courts-of-appeal-strengthen-density-bonus-law) courts have held that developers rather than cities get to decide what those concessions are, and cities are not able to challenge those or offer alternatives that may also make housing feasible. These concessions have in practice included Attachment A Agenda Report Page 47
6/22/22, 4:54 PM Plan to Place Mail - FW: Housing Element: Is the City Council Operating With Wrong Information? https://mail.google.com/mail/u/3/?ik=d523606921&view=pt&search=all&permthid=thread-f%3A1736175035179537218&simpl=msg-f%3A1736175035179537218 3/3 changes in development standards, height changes, exemption from parking, and exclusion from requiring to provide retail at ground level. Exclusion of tennis courts, especially rooftop ones, would definitely improve financial feasibility and would be consistent with State law. So, this could mean that we could end up not having any courts.

Governor Newsom and the State Attorney General in November 2021 assembled a “Housing Strike Force” of State lawyers, “.. tasked with enforcing California housing laws that cities across the state have been evading or ignoring”. This is their full-time job. The Strike Force has been proactively looking around everywhere and has threatened to sue cities to enforce housing laws and elements (the Town of Woodside is an example from a few months ago, where the Attorney General threatened to sue and forced it to back off).

Many cities and planners in California are still operating under the old premise of the last housing element cycle, where playing shell games of showing sites where housing was not really intended was rampant, and cities got away with it. The world has changed in the last three years, and the State has, rightly I believe, shut down this game. I tell every one of my nearly dozen active City clients for whom I am preparing long-range plans—and there are several in the Bay Area as well —to not count any housing on any site that they do not want to see this developed, that they should be prepared to lose every other use mixed with housing at those sites, and be prepared to offer numerous concessions, especially for affordable housing. This is the most honest and transparent approach. Don’t play shell games, or you could end up with the short end of the stick. None of our clients are showing any site they don’t really believe will be built with housing in their housing elements. This is very serious stuff. No city that I know is showing sites to just test the waters. No city that I know has tennis courts, City Hall, or police station as housing sites in their housing elements.

The City Attorney does not provide opinions to the public. However, I believe it is their job to make sure that the Council is not acting with false information. I urge you to have the City Attorney brief the Council tonight on risks entailed with showing housing on public lands, or a later time if more information needs to be gathered, or in a closed session for legal risk assessment if that is more appropriate.

I urge everyone to shoot straight and not play shell games with housing sites, that neither advance the State’s and the Piedmont community objectives of supporting actual housing development, and may come back to bite us. It is totally feasible for Piedmont to accommodate all of its housing needs on non-public land, so starting with civic sites first is the totally wrong approach. This what one would do if they hated Piedmont and the kids who play at these courts, and do not want to have safe police and fire stations. If staff or consultants believe that housing will not actually develop at the tennis court site, say that in public. And then, for the sake of honesty and truthfulness to the City citizens and the State of California, remove that and other civic sites from the inventory. Develop housing where it is easy to develop at lower costs so that teachers and other members of community can afford to live in the city, rather than saddle housing with costs that in the end would only result in luxury housing — these will NOT be places where tennis courts are on the top or the police station below.

Sincerely,
Rajeev Bhatia
50 La Salle Avenue
Piedmont, CA 94611
Attachment A Agenda Report Page 48
Alternative Housing Sites Program
(no public lands used)
Units
Housing Occupied July 1, 2022 to Jan, 31, 2023 incl.

ADUs 15
Assumed. Staff has actual permitting
data to calculate precisely
SB-9 Units 40 Assumed. Analysis would need to be conducted ADUs (as per Housing Element; Table ES-1) 140
Single Family and Places of Worship (as per Table B9 in Housing Element) 140 Sub-Total 335
Mixed-Use Sites (Grand and Highland) Acres
Proposed
Density Units Max
Units
Realistic
1201-1221 Grand Avenue (note that 1201 was
counted in the previous cycle but has mysteriously
dropped from the current element. State law allows
this be counted if the new allowable density is at
least 20% greater. Existing density is 20 units per
acre, and since increase is greater than 20%, can be

0.75 180 135 108 160 units per acre can be achive at
Ace/Sylvan with ground floor retail + 4
floors, as the sites are really well
shaped to result in efficient housing.

Maybe ground + 5 stories to hit 180
units per acre
1337 Grand Avenue 0.63 180 113 91
Highland Sites 0.76 140 106 85
These can be achieved with ground
floor retail + 4 stories
Sub-Total 284
TOTAL 619
40 Total w/small multiplexes 659
Total sites in current draft 658
RHNA 587
Buffer 72
Potential additional small
triplexes, quadruplexes, etc.
through creative zoning
Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #3 Agenda Report Page 49 Item # 3 – Consideration of Direction to Staff to Provide the Draft 6th Cycle Housing Element of the General Plan to the California Department of Housing and Community Development for its 90- Day Review
Correspondence received before Monday, June 20, 2022 at 11:30 a.m.

Dear Mayor and Council:

The following letter was sent to the Planning Commission for its May 12 meeting. It remains timely and relevant, but there is a concluding paragraph updating more recent actions.

May 5, 2022
Dear Planning Commissioners,
I am Michael Henn, a longtime resident of Piedmont and a mostly retired city planner who has been through the Housing Element (HE) process several times as staff with different jurisdictions. I was also on the Piedmont Planning Commission which worked on the current HE.

I have also served on the Alameda County Grand Jury three times. I think most planners and managers recognize that each city goes through this HE exercise primarily because we are required to do so by the state. Nevertheless, a good faith effort is needed to avoid legal action and being targeted by militant housing advocates like Yimby Law and Public Advocates. I would think that there is more likelihood of Piedmont being criticized by HCD and housing advocates for including infeasible sites in the inventory than for accepting the legislature's intent and welcoming more ADUs and SB9 duplexes and potentially a few lot splits for developed lots. As proposed in the Draft HE, little benefit would result from ADUs and none from SB9 potential duplexes and lot splits. This failure to benefit from pro-housing legislation creates more pressure to place sites into the inventory which are increasingly improbable. For example, Corpus Christi School's playground is a highly suspect site for high density apartments. Where are the kids going to play? Cannibalizing a city’s already inadequate parks and open space was not intended by the legislature. The Quimby Act sets minimum park acreage standards per 1000 residents.

Piedmont’s park acreage is already deficient under the law. Losing developed parkland acreage to the HE would worsen the deficiency. Including such sites is also not going to be politically acceptable. Thus, proposing high density multifamily housing for sites like Coaches Playfields and Blair Park invites valid criticism. What is the city going to do for a corporation yard if the one and only one we have is actually included in the HE list, and lost? I would suspect that jurisdictions which are more protective of the qualities of their communities will handle their RHNAs differently. They will assign larger numbers toward both ADUs and SB9 housing. Given the extensive litigation statewide against RHNA assignments (34 cities in SoCal), and the State Auditor’s criticism of the HCD’s RHNA methodology, I would expect that HCD will be conservative in rejecting such attempts, if at all. Logically, HCD should be receptive to allowing a substantial unit yield from both sources. The State passed the “byright” ADU law without requiring any parking, and the by-right duplex/lot-split law with the expectation that these strong new laws would have a significant impact in producing needed infill housing. To now disparage their significance makes no sense and actually endangers the Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 50 city to unnecessary litigation because of the lack of a realistic expectation that many of the selected sites could ever achieve the necessary units.

For inexplicable reasons, the city staff and their HE consultants have not made use of the fact that HCD has issued an opinion document on how to treat potential SB9 units in a HE. The SB 9 Fact Sheet on the Implementation of Senate Bill 9, dated March 2022, provides for a means to allow valid new housing units from SB9 into a HE. As stated in the HCD document: “To utilize projections based on SB 9 toward a jurisdiction’s regional housing need allocation, the housing element must: 1) include a site-specific inventory of sites where SB 9 projections are being applied, 2) include a non-vacant sites analysis demonstrating the likelihood of redevelopment and that the existing use will not constitute an impediment for additional residential use, 3) identify any governmental constraints to the use of SB 9 in the creation of units (including land use controls, fees, and other exactions, as well as locally adopted ordinances that impact the cost and supply of residential development), and 4) include programs and policies that establish zoning and development standards early in the planning period and implement incentives to encourage and facilitate development. The element should support this analysis with local information such as local developer or owner interest to utilize zoning and incentives established through SB 9. Learn more on HCD’s Housing Elements webpage.” I would expect that staff and the outside consultants should be able to provide a defensible SB9 analysis which could provide, for example, a couple hundred units over 8 years. Also, the HE is being too conservative for potential ADU production. The “by-right” ADU law passed in 2019 and it takes a certain time for such a change to filter through a community and be broadly implemented. To take only the average of past ADU production, when regulations were more restrictive, makes little sense.

Although not directly related to Piedmont’s Draft HE, it should be pointed out, in general, that HCD’s RHNA assignments are severely problematic. Throughout much of the last decade California was adding 200,000 or more people per year to its population although slowing toward the end of the decade. The draft RHNA numbers, which assumed continued and even higher growth rates were circulated to planners by 2019. These older numbers remained almost unchanged in the final adopted statewide metro-by-metro RHNAs. However, there was actually a significant halting of state population growth followed by a significant and unprecedented population decline after January 2020. Nevertheless, the HCD administration refused to update their obsolete assumptions. Numerous articles, such as the following, have publicized this decline, but that reality has done nothing to cause an update by the state or local RHNAs.

Exodus: Bay Area, California population dropped in 2021 as people left (mercurynews.com) https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2022/04/10/walters-californias-shrinking-population-has-bigconsequences/ Besides not being demographically sound, the state’s collective metro RHNAs add up to some

2.2 million units for the state by 2031. At the typical 2.9+/- people per dwelling unit, the state is assuming that there is a need for housing for 6+ million more people by 2031, or 750,000 per year. That number is higher than any year in California history. Planners I’ve talked to at MTC/ABAG defend their overshoot by saying the bigger numbers are needed to reduce Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 51 overcrowding and reduce the number of people who are cost-burdened by the high cost of housing. While a laudable goal, it is rather speculative as to how much excess housing is needed to bring down the cost of housing to where it becomes affordable. And why would builders build such an amount if the present profit margins were to go away? Another aside that is not directly aimed at the current Draft HE, in my view a proper RHNA process should be a bottom-up not top-down process. State and regional planners allocated RHNA housing units to over 500 jurisdictions without knowing what is existing on the ground.

Instead, the process should start with an accurate and detailed inventory of each jurisdictions vacant and underutilized sites, and the actual density of developed residential areas (Most of Piedmont has relatively small lots compared to the suburbs so Piedmont is already about four times denser than, say Orinda or Lafayette). Only once this factual background information is known, units can logically be assigned. Piedmont is largely built out, but that fact was not known or appreciated in Sacramento.

To conclude, I believe Piedmont should slow down the review process and ask for an extension.

Then we should eliminate the sites that most would consider infeasible, particularly if the owners knew their sites were on the list. The HE does not provide evidence that the owners have been contacted and are in agreement. Responses should be obtained from at least Corpus Christi Church, Kehilla Synagogue, Zion Lutheran Church and Ace Hardware that these sites are available for affordable housing, or not. If the answer is No, then these sites need to be struck from the list. Then, the HCD SB9 review process should occur to identify larger private lots feasible for SB9 lot splits, and assume that a proportion of the single family homes could very well be converted to duplexes or Tenants-In-Common two family residences (TICs). Much of the apparent single family housing in San Francisco is actually, two-family TICs. I hope that these comments are appropriately addressed. I fear that the staff and consultants have already set out on the path they wish to take. Doing so could unnecessarily produce HCD rejection and even litigation, and do little for actually producing the housing that the Housing Element process is meant to achieve.

Addendum: Since this letter was sent to the Planning Commission in May, East Bay for All has sent the city a detailed analysis of various flaws and problems with the current draft HE. The housing organizations working together as East Bay For All includes known legal groups who specialize in litigation against cities that do not provide a good faith effort in their Housing Elements. Consequently, it can be assumed that the current draft HE will be given heightened scrutiny by HCD in its review. Therefore, the failure to provide the SB9 analysis and the inclusion of so many improbable sites in the city’s inventory will decrease the chances of approval.

Sincerely,
Michael Henn, AICP
Dear Council Members:

Long, hard, excellent work by staff and the Planning Commission, along with expert contributions from the community, have resulted in a revised Housing Element that you can and Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 52 should support. This document represents a high-quality effort to identify appropriate goals for more affordable housing in Piedmont and deserves wholehearted endorsement and a Yes vote. The changes to our zoning code to foster appropriate growth are long overdue. It is a culture change for some in the community, but Piedmont's beauty and serenity will remain, to be shared with those who could not otherwise afford to share those benefits.

I strongly urge you to vote to approve the revisions to our Housing Element.

Linda Roodhouse Loper
To the City Council of Piedmont,
I am pleased that the City of Piedmont has embraced a plan to create more housing. I participated in one of the Piedmont Housing Element Focus Group interviews in July 2021 and was excited to discuss possible ways to expand affordable, equitable housing opportunities in Piedmont.

If Piedmont is to create 587 new housing units, I believe the city needs to create housing throughout the community, in all zones, rather than in just one or two areas, primarily in lower Piedmont or on the borders of the city. Moreover, the city should consider allowing duplexes, triplexes, and small multifamily buildings in single-family zones. Around the corner from our house (on Olive Ave. across from the Rose Garden) is a duplex that fits in well with the neighborhood. If a duplex can happily exist in the lower Piedmont neighborhood where lots sizes are small and homes are close together, allowing more multifamily buildings on the larger lots in middle and upper Piedmont should be doable and would allow for more options for more housing.

I appreciate the difficulties of finding space in an already built-up community for more housing.

But if Piedmont spreads the new housing throughout the community in various forms of living arrangements, not only ADUs, but also duplexes, triplexes, and two homes on a large lot, I believe the goal can be achieved.

Alison Kuehner
Hello City Council:

I won’t have time this weekend (Father’s Day festivities) to review the staff report but wanted to offer up these observations and suggestions about the Housing Element (HE) for your consideration Monday. I attended the HE workshops, participated in the online surveys and have read the HE.

1. SB 9: staff has stated at several meetings that the Department of Housing and Development (HCD) is not accepting unit projections based on this SB 9. HCD guidance says otherwise and several cities are submitting such projections. Please clarify why staff has not done so and direct them to conduct this analysis for inclusion in the final HE. Not considering the potential for SB 9 to produce units in the next cycle is bad planning.

2. Multi-family zone: the HE makes no projections for units from this zone over the next 8 years. This is short-sighted in that this area is a logical zone for new units and the HE increases Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 53 zone density for that reason. Staff simply needs to cite other such developments in the Temescal, Pleasant Valley Rd etc. to show that this development is highly likely. These developments are not in Piedmont but are very local and I would think HCD would understand that similar developments are likely to occur in Piedmont. Also clarify whether the small housing policy prohibits the destruction of the small houses on Linda to the Oakland Avenue bridge. Conversion of these lots to multi-family buildings could vastly increase the number of units.

3. ADUs: the incentives workshop mentioned increasing ADU height from 16 to 18-20 feet.

The workshop also presented the idea of garage conversions by presented to specific building height. The HE now has specific height for garage conversions (24 ft) but does not mention what the new height for ADU will be. Please clarify this point; I asked staff but received no response. I think the ADU projections (20/year) is an underestimate; ADU development rate these past three years was likely influenced by COVID restrictions.

4. Extremely low/very low-income units: the HE provide no details on where these units will occur in Piedmont, which according to HCD should be over 120 units. I asked about this at the last workshop and the consultant could not answer. Instead he referred to the Alameda County family of four income ($100,000) as a target for Piedmont’s low income housing. The HE policy to prioritize housing for PUSD and City of Piedmont employees dovetails with this target – these employees will meet this income level but very low and extremely low Alameda County residents won’t. Where will the housing be for families of these income levels?

5. Better outreach: the process leading up to the HE utilized several different communication/engagement methods. Now that the draft of out, those methods should be used again. Particularly, staff should conduct an online survey of the HE and particularly focus on policies not included in the workshop or prior surveys: ADU tax on large remodels, purchase of supportive housing by the City of Piedmont, revocation of charter elements for example.

6. General Plan: staff conceded it has not completed an analysis of how the HE integrates with the General Plan. Inquire about this and what elements of the Plan staff thinks will be impacted.

Garrett Keating
Dear Council Members,
As a long-time tennis player in Piedmont and current President of the Piedmont Ladies Tennis Club, I strongly object to any consideration of the conversion of the Corey Reich Tennis Center site into affordable housing. The revamped Corey Reich Tennis Center was completed by the Piedmont Recreational Facilities Organization in late 2019 at a cost of over $450,000 with private contributions from more than 200 individuals. No City money was spent on this project.

It is one of Piedmont’s treasures.

Sacrificing these four recently enhanced courts, which are heavily used year round by the high school tennis teams as well as by local and nearby players, would be a huge loss. Where could an alternate tennis facility of the same size and caliber be built in Piedmont? Who would pay for it? How fast could it be built to accommodate the many adults and children who use these courts daily? And how will all the new residents of Piedmont even get access to the increasingly crowded tennis courts that are currently available?
Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 54 I urge you to immediately remove any reference to these tennis courts in the City’s plan for a potentially high density housing development in the Civic Center area. It would be a crime.

Beth Hurwich
Tonight's agenda lists this hearing as new business -- but that's not quite accurate. This hearing (scheduled, disappointingly, at 5:30 on our federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the US) is a continuation of a meeting of roughly a century ago. At that meeting the Council gave into the worst instincts of constituents and directed staff to use city resources to drive an African American family from Piedmont and thereby making clear that minorities were not welcomed in the community.

The long arc of history has since bent toward justice, and State law requires you to identify sites for about 215 units of low-income housing. But history has also repeated itself because constituents have urged you to isolate all or nearly all the units in Blair Park, physically separated from Piedmont proper.

Sixty years of research into the costs and benefits of low-income housing tells us three things.

First, low-income housing remains, unfortunately, stigmatized -- it's typically not welcomed in established neighborhoods. That's why the State has had to require communities like Piedmont to accommodate such housing and that’s why some of your constituents urge you to concentrate the units in Blair Park, physically apart from Piedmont proper. Second, the benefits of low-income housing are greatest when the housing is least stigmatized by the host population. Third, stigma is reduced when low-income housing is dispersed throughout the community.

The hard truth is that research tells us that concentrating low-income housing in Blair Park will, by virtue of sheer physical and social isolation, create the most stigmatized circumstance imaginable in Piedmont. Make no mistake – putting all, or nearly all, mandated low-income units in Blair Park would be the most stigmatizing choice you can make.

If you approve language in the draft Housing Element that leaves open the option of cynically isolating Piedmont’s low-income housing in Blair Park, tonight's meeting will be, like that a century ago, continued until justice calls upon some future city council to explain why lowincome families live segregated, by city policy, from other Piedmonters. Be assured that the then City Council will think of you the same way you think of the Council that, a century ago, used the resources of the city to make clear that African American families were not welcomed in Piedmont.

Ralph Catalano
: I have lived in Piedmont for 14 years and know the town fairly well. There are a number of houses that simply sit empty (held for investment purposes, multi-year/slow builds/remodels and other reasons). I know of at least 3 on or adjacent to the block of Grand/Cambridge/Howard. I know of another on Manor. I know there are several more in the city. Without a use tax or other means to encourage actual occupation, these housing elements are wasting space and forcing the Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 55 city to consider tearing down the center of town to put up an apartment complex. I encourage you to do a count of the unoccupied units to see how much they could help to meeting the goals.

Scott J Weber
Dear City Council Members:

I strongly object to the consideration of selling Piedmont's Corey Reich tennis courts to a developer for use in providing new Piedmont housing units.

These courts are heavily used all year - both by recreational players and high school teams. They were just updated several years ago (funded by private donations), and replicating them somewhere else in Piedmont would undoubtedly be prohibitively expensive (not to mention the parking issues that would need to be addressed).

Please make sure that the Corey Reich tennis courts are not listed as a potential housing site in the Housing proposal that the City Council is planning to submit for State review.

Yours sincerely,
Anne Adams
Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 56 Date: June 15, 2022
To: City Council
From: Piedmont Racial Equity Campaign Housing Committee Cc: Planning Commission, Housing Advisory Committee, Piedmont Planning Staff and City Manager
Re: Addendum to Feedback on the Draft Housing Element
Dear City Council Members:

We are writing to follow up on our letter of May 5, 2022, providing feedback on Piedmont’s Draft Housing Element (attached for your reference). We want to reiterate our thanks to the City staff and Lisa Wise Consulting for their excellent work on this important document.

As we stated in our May 5, 2022, letter, PREC believes the City must take an “all of the above” approach to housing. We must build more housing, for everyone, everywhere. Besides being a way for the City to fulfill its legal and moral obligation to help address the regional housing crisis, planning for more housing — and especially more affordable housing — can help Piedmont become a more diverse, equitable, culturally rich, and inclusive community.

Since the release of the draft Housing Element in May, we were pleased to see that several of the changes we suggested have been incorporated by staff and the Planning Commission. At the June 7 Town Hall and June 13 Planning Commission meeting, City planners announced that staff will add Blair Park to the Moraga Canyon specific plan study area. We strongly support this idea. The affordable housing professionals in our group generally view Blair Park as the most feasible site for affordable housing development in the next eight years. We were also pleased to see the City add a new Program 1.Q to explore going beyond the state's density bonus program for affordable housing. We believe allowing higher density for buildings that include low-income-restricted units can be an important tool to incentivize affordable housing production, especially in Zone D.

While we believe the draft Housing Element is generally in good shape, we believe a few further changes would make it even stronger. We urge the City Council to adopt the following key changes:
1 Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 57

1. Add a policy to undertake a master plan for the City Center that considers how best to incorporate affordable housing in the area. As the City considers how to retrofit aging facilities such as the Veterans Hall/Police building, it should carry out a planning study to understand how sites like 801 Magnolia, the Veterans Hall, City Hall, and the tennis courts can be creatively rebuilt or recombined to provide for these functions to continue to be met while carving out space for affordable housing. The master plan could also incorporate a redesign of Highland Avenue and Highland Way to improve safety and make better use of the unnecessarily wide swath of asphalt in the center of town. This master plan should also include consideration of some or all of the adjacent commercial sites. With its wide streets, larger buildings, substantial transit service, and proximity to schools, city employment opportunities, and recreation resources, the Civic Center offers an ideal location for denser and more affordable housing.

2. Strengthen policies to enable the creation of “missing middle” housing (duplexes, triplexes, fourplexes, and small multifamily buildings on large lots) in Zones A and E. Single-family zones comprise over 90% of Piedmont’s residential land, yet the draft Housing Element leaves these zones virtually untouched, apart from policies to encourage ADU production, allow housing on religious institution lots, and implement Senate Bill 9 (SB 9). SB 9 implementation, however, is delayed until 2026-27. We encourage the City to implement SB 9 much sooner than that. The law has been in effect since the beginning of this year, and there is already guidance on how to implement it, as well as many different models from across the state.1 Moreover, we encourage the City to explore ways to go beyond what SB 9 authorizes. For instance, under SB 9, the owner of a 6,000 sf house on a half an acre lot could get a lot split, develop two units in the new lot, and subdivide the existing home into two units - for a total of four units.

However, depending on the circumstances, it may be preferable to subdivide the existing home into four units. The City should commit to tailoring SB 9 to the specific nature and potential of Piedmont’s housing stock, and to crafting other policies to enable the creation of small multifamily dwellings on large lots, as many other cities in California are doing.2 Strategies that have been adopted or are being considered in other cities include adopting maximum and/or minimum unit sizes (to encourage a variety of housing types and units that are “affordable by design”), imposing affordability requirements, and creating exceptions to allow for extra units, beyond those authorized under the base zoning (for example, up to six units in corner or large lots).3 3 See Almendin and Garcia, Id., table comparing SB 9 implementation across ten different California cities. The City of San Francisco is considering adoption of an ordinance that would allow four units per lot, and up to six units on corner lots, pursuant to an exception from otherwise applicable density limits. 2 This does not need to entail rezoning to eliminate single-family zones; the City should keep single-family zoning to ensure SB 9 applies, and in addition, adopt other policies that would go beyond that law. 1 See California Department of Housing and Community Development, SB 9 Fact Sheet. On the Implementation of Senate Bill 9 (Chapter 162, Statutes of 2021), available at https://hcd.ca.gov/docs/planning-and-community-development/sb9factsheet.pdf; see also Muhammad Alameldin and David Garcia, Terner Center for Housing Innovation, State Law, Local Implementation:

How Cities are Implementing SB 9. available at
https://ternercenter.berkeley.edu/research-and-policy/state-law-local-interpretation-senate-bill-9/ 2 Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 58

3. Following HCD recommendations, we believe the City should target a buffer of 20% over its Regional Housing Needs Allocation, especially for its low-income allocation. The original draft Housing Element included a 12% buffer overall, but only 3 surplus low-income units, or 1% of the 257 RHNA low income goal. Since the plan relies upon Oakland for housing market trends, it is worth noting that while Oakland has easily exceeded its above moderate or market unit housing goal in the current cycle, it is falling well short of its low income and moderate income goals.4 Oakland’s 21% planned low income buffer is much higher than Piedmont’s 1% for low income units in the next housing cycle.

4. Strengthen and broaden Program 3E Affordable Housing Fund. We support the creation of an Affordable Housing Fund, and we agree with the Planning Commission that the language of Program 3E should be expanded to allow such a Fund to support a broader range of uses. However, the revised language only slightly meets that objective.

The language describing the Fund remains focused on owner-occupied properties and the creation of ADUs or “other small housing units.” We believe that Program 3E should be amended to be less specific, and instead state the broad intention of being used to support the creation of housing units that will be both affordable to, and made available to, low-income households for a minimum of 15 years. Alternatively, if the language specific to ADUs is being provided to comply with California Health and Safety Code (HSC), Section 65583(c)(7), which requires that cities “[d]evelop a plan that incentivizes and promotes the creation of accessory dwelling units that can be offered at affordable rent,” we encourage the City to add language to allow the Fund to be used for additional critical purposes. Specifically, it should be clear that the Fund could be used to provide gap financing for deed-restricted multifamily affordable rental housing on terms similar to other local “soft loan” funding for affordable housing (3% interest, 55 years, no required annual payments). As we have noted previously, local gap financing is a powerful tool to support the creation of affordable rental housing, as it can be leveraged to secure substantial state and federal subsidies.

Since the staff report for the City Council’s June 20, 2022, meeting has not yet been released, we understand that some of these points may be addressed in that document. However, we wanted to send written feedback to the Council in advance, so that you have ample time to consider these points as you review the matter.
4 Oakland’s draft HE for the sixth cycle shows above moderate production at 175% of its fifth cycle goal but very-low-income production only at 42%.
https://oakland.konveio.com/draft-2023-2031-general-plan-housing-element-appendices-a-through-f. 3 Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 59 We appreciate your consideration of these points, and would be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Members of the PREC Housing Committee
Irene Cheng
Elise Marie Collins
Carol Galante
Ellen Greenberg
Sarah Karlinsky
Deborah Leland
Jill Lindenbaum
Hugh Louch
Andy Madeira
Andrea Ruiz-Esquide
Alice Talcott
Randy Wu
4 Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 60 Dear Councilmembers,
I want our Housing Element to be set up for success, rather than failure, and include actual sites where the City can fulfill its housing needs, rather than sink time and energy into sites where housing is unlikely. While including housing as part of the Civic Center is a noble sentiment, it is impractical in the timeframe of this Housing Element planning period, as I will discuss below.

Please be aware of the following State laws and other requirements, which among others require the City Council to make certain findings at adoption time that the City would not be able to make for the Civic Center sites:

State Law Requirements to be mindful of for Including Civic Center sites Demonstrate realistic development capacity at designated sites. Where there are existing uses, “..Existing Uses — The housing element must demonstrate non-vacant and/or underutilized sites in the inventory that can be realistically developed with residential uses or more-intensive residential uses at densities appropriate ….and evaluate the extent these uses would constitute an impediment to new residential development.” See https://www.hcd.ca.gov/communitydevelopment/building-blocks/site-inventory-analysis/analysis-of-sites-and-zoning.shtml. The City needs to show the community the analysis used to arrive at feasible housing capacity at existing civic uses and tennis courts. E.g., there is no housing feasible where the tennis courts are. The examples cited so far are of tennis courts on top of parking structures such as at UC Berkeley, which is very different than tennis courts on top of housing, that too affordable housing. The Housing Element is not a policy direction to explore ideas … it is focused on delivering sites for development, the feasibility of which has already been established.

Required City Council Findings at Adoption Time That Existing Uses Will be Discontinued. If a housing element relies on nonvacant sites to accommodate 50 percent or more of its RHNA for lower income households, the nonvacant site’s existing use is presumed to impede additional residential development, unless the housing element describes findings based on substantial evidence that the use will likely be discontinued during the planning period. In addition to a description in the element, findings should also be included as part of the resolution adopting the housing element. https://www.hcd.ca.gov/communitydevelopment/building-blocks/site-inventory-analysis/analysis-of-sites-and-zoning.shtml. Thus at the time of Housing Element adoption, the City Council will have to make findings that the tennis and basketball courts at Vista and public safety uses at the Civic Center will be discontinued during the planning period (2023-2031). I do not believe it is possible to make this finding given that there are no plans to relocate these uses to other places. If the City Council does not believe this finding can be made, it is better to drop these sites now rather than finding that we are short on sites at adoption time.

Under the Housing Accountability Act, should housing not be feasible at a site and there is a shortfall mid-cycle, the City will have to proactively undertake a rezoning program to find sites elsewhere to make up for this shortfall. This means doing a Housing Element Update and EIR all Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 61 over again mid-cycle in three or four years, and tying the City’s hand in being able to proceed with rehabbing the public safety buildings until alternative housing sites are in place. Thus, In designating the Civic Center sites I believe we are just kicking the can down two or three years, rather than solving any housing problems. We should be focused on finding and delivering those alternative housing sites to meet our housing needs and obligations now, rather than five years later.

City Charter
City Charter Amendment. Reclassification of zones under the Piedmont Charter requires a vote of the people. If the City Council wants to reclassify the Public zone (which allows a de minimus one house at every parcel in the city) to permit high density residential and thus make this zone Public/Residential, this should be submitted to the voters and placed on the upcoming November ballot. Lack of legal certainty will not inspire confidence on part of any developers the City may wish to attract.
———
Physical Feasibility at Civic Center
Not finding any drawings or information in the Housing Element on methodology to determine housing capacity at Civic Center sites, I sat down over the weekend and tried to understand this for myself. Attached are two drawings, with sites in the Housing Element labeled A through D, with Housing Element information noted.

B. Center for the Arts. Where is the space for the five units? Will this be razed and replaced? Again, wasn’t this rehabbed a few years ago, and didn’t the City recently sign a 10-year lease on this? Is this even available during the Housing Element period? C. City Hall/Police/Veterans Building. The site area for this in the Housing Element includes City Hall, and the area is counted at 60 units per acre to calculate resultant housing. Neither tearing down City Hall, nor putting housing on top of it is a credible suggestion. The eastern half of the site is about 0.5 acres, and that is where the police and veterans building are located. It would be quite a structure that includes a new police station, rec. building, and 40 housing units (which, because of the small acreage, would actually be at 120 units per acre max) all at the same small site. It would require razing the existing facilities and starting from scratch, and be surely several multiples more expensive than the cost to rehab these, plus the higher cost for Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 62 housing building and having the civic facilities support the resultant structural weight and complexity of housing above. Theoretically it could work if the housing can be on its own pad as staff mentioned for other examples they shared at the Planning Commission meeting, but looking at our site I don’t see any area where housing can just be squeezed in without messing with the existing buildings. Rehabbing the existing Veterans Hall and Public Safety buildings will also be a lot more environmentally sustainable and emit fewer greenhouse gases than razing these buildings and building something new, when the same housing can built more sustainably and be delivered to the community at lower cost by adding say one more story to the Mulberry/BofA site across the street, where housing is already planned, and provide an additional density incentive for the property owner to develop that site.

D. Highland Green. The width of this parcel during most of the stretch is 30 feet. With required front setback of 20 feet in Zone A, and rear setback of 5 feet, the remaining buildable width of housing would only be 5 feet. So, these sites are also physically not feasible. The loss of five units assumed here would not be that significant.

All of these sites are impractical given the dense fully built out conditions of civic facilities and the fact that we don’t any have vacant land there, and a distraction from the real work the City needs to do to deliver feasible sites.
————
Practical Approach to Meeting RHNA
I believe the most practical approach for the City to meet its RHNA is as follows, in order of importance:
• Count every housing unit (including ADUs) expected to be completed between July 1, 2022 and January 1, 2023. These units, under State law, can be counted toward both the 5th Cycle (in which we are) and 6th Cycle (starting in 2023), because of data projection period overlap. There should be about 15 units that result, including e.g. the Mayor’s ADU.
• Count SB 9 Units. The City does not have a trend of these because the City has not allowed these in the past. With properly development rules and methodology, the City should attempt to have these counted now to bring the remaining need down, rather than just as Housing Element success story later. There are many cities that have successfully counted these units, consistent with HCD guidelines.
• Consider densities that are much higher than currently contemplated at Grand and Highland avenues, while developing standards so that these are well designed, with ground level retail and cafes, and housing above. Densities of 180 units per acre with ground floor retail and four stories of residential above (60 feet building height), with structured parking may be appropriate for Grand Avenue, and 120 per acre for Highland Avenue. If necessary, the City should add a real architect with experience in doing projects like these in the Bay Area to the out-of-town planning team. • Add missing middle housing (fourplexes, sixplexes, etc.) and smaller-scale multifamily development in some or many existing neighborhoods. Some of the City’s rules relating to allowable densities, lot sizes etc. may need to be modified. There may, again, be some Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 63 City Charter issues involved, but these would be of lower magnitude than high density residential issues in Public zones.
• Continue counting all the remaining single family and religious sites with the good work staff has done, although it remains to be seen if HCD will buy off on allowing so many of these to be counted.
• Anything else needed should be added after the above has been done, and this remaining need would be modest.

Thank you for volunteering your time and energy to serve the community! Rajeev Bhatia
Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 64 Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 65 Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 66 Pierce Macdonald, Senior Planner
City of Piedmont
Piedmont Housing Puzzle Report – May 5, 2022 Goals On March 24, 2022, the City of Piedmont launched the Piedmont Housing Puzzle, a web‐based interactive tool hosted on BalancingAct software. Active from March 24, 2022, to May 1, 2022, the tool was intended to present land resources and constraints analysis prepared for the Draft 6th Cycle Piedmont Housing Element to members of the public in an engaging format. The license to use Balancing Act, as well as software technical support, were awarded to the City of Piedmont as the result of a competitive grant.

At the Housing Element Community Workshop on March 24, 2022, City staff and consultants introduced the Housing Puzzle tool to the community. As presented to the public, the goals of the Piedmont Housing Puzzle were:
 Create a setting that puts residents in the shoes of decision‐makers to show how they would solve tough public policy challenges
 Frame trade‐offs so that background data, community values, and community preferences can be included in decision‐making
 Allow public engagement that is not limited by staffing resources, so that thousands of people can provide informed input using smartphone, computer, or tablet.

One of the Housing Element Community Workshop presenters on March 24, 2022, was Chris Adams, President of Balancing Act. During the presentation, he highlighted the kinds of data the Piedmont Puzzle was not intended to provide, as follows:
 The Piedmont Housing Puzzle was not intended to be the sole or final means by which sites for the Housing Element sites inventory will be evaluated
 The Piedmont Housing Puzzle, by itself, is not a scientifically valid research tool The Piedmont Housing Puzzle was not intended to capture other factors that go into site selection, such as environmental constraints or affordability and equity requirements.

Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 67 Pierce Macdonald, Senior Planner
City of Piedmont
Publicity and Promotion of the Piedmont Housing Puzzle The Piedmont Housing Puzzle was published to the homepage of the Housing Element website at Piedmontishome.org and to the homepage of the City of Piedmont city website. The Piedmontishome.org website was, in turn, publicized with 30 banners on streetlights along Grand, Highland, and Moraga Avenues starting the week leading up to the launch on March 24, 2022, and continuing beyond the close of the web‐based tool on May 1, 2022. Physical posters were located at community bulletin boards, including City Hall, the Piedmont Police Station, Mulberry’s Market, Wells Fargo bank, the Piedmont Service Station on Highland Avenue, the Shell gas station on Grand Avenue, a location near Kehilla Community Synagogue, and Piedmont Community Church. The City publicized the Piedmont Housing Puzzle in notices and posters for the March 24, 2022 Housing Element Community Workshop, as well as the Planning & Building eNewsletter mailing to over 4,000 email addresses. Emails were sent to all City staff and sent to PUSD to share with School district employees. Local news outlets, including the Piedmont Post, The Exedra online newspaper, and the Piedmont Civic Association website published stories about the Piedmont Housing Puzzle and the Housing Element Community Workshop on March 24, 2022. Approach Piedmont’s next Housing Element must identify the sufficient land to meet the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) of 587 new housing units by 2031. The Piedmont Housing Puzzle tool included a map of Piedmont with 14 sites, chosen using the following methodology: sites suggested by the community in March‐April 2021 through the web‐based interactive Pinnable Map tool, hosted on Social Pinpoint software; public comments gathered at stakeholder interviews, public meetings, and community events, hosted in person and virtually over the last 12 months; and sites and constraints analysis, completed by City staff and Housing Element consultants. Users of the Puzzle could allocate the 587 units to any of the identified sites, up to reasonable maximums capped in the software to urge users to develop a “balanced” housing plan with sites for new housing throughout the community. These 14 sites were identified on the Housing Puzzle map:

1. Zones A & E, Single‐Family Residential Zone 8. Zone D ‐ Gas Station, Mulberry’s, Bank of America, Wells Fargo

2. Piedmont Community Church 9. Grassy Strip and Median on Highland Avenue at Sheridan Avenue3. Zone C – Linda Avenue at Oakland Avenue 10. Public Works Corporation Yard4. Zone D – Grand Avenue 11. Blair Park5. Corpus Christ Church and School 12. Civic Center: City Hall, Veterans Hall, Corey Reich Tennis Center, etc.

6. Linda Dog Park 13. Plymouth Community Church

7. Kehilla Community Synagogue 14. Zion Lutheran Church & Renaissance School Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 68 Attachment A Agenda Report Page 69
Pierce Macdonald, Senior Planner
City of Piedmont
Results The Piedmont Housing Puzzle tool generated 173 housing plan submittals and 116 public comments. Although the majority of sessions (84%) did not result in a balanced housing plan filed through the Piedmont Housing Puzzle, the software could track where all user activity was occurring as people considered the pros and cons of the various locations. As shown below in the table titled “Table 1, Piedmont Housing Puzzle Opens By Site,” the most activity or “opens” occurred in the following categories: Zones A & E; Zone D on Grand Avenue; and Blair Park. All the sites listed on the Housing Puzzle map received some level of interest from members of the Piedmont community. Table 1, Piedmont Housing Puzzle Opens By Site Conclusion In conclusion, the Piedmont Housing Puzzle helped introduce the Draft Housing Element sites inventory and successfully piqued the interest of a significant percentage of Piedmont community members. It provided a venue for community members to both learn about sites considerations and share their perspectives on potential housing sites. The web‐based tool resulted in 116 additional public comments, which are listed in the appendix and included in the public comments compiled for the consideration of the Planning Commission and City Council. This qualitative data is important to fully understand the community’s concerns and preferences for growth. Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 70 Pierce Macdonald, Senior Planner
City of Piedmont
Appendix Part I, Approximate User Residence Location Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 71 Pierce Macdonald, Senior Planner
City of Piedmont
Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 72 Comment Item Change Date
1 Lots of great options and the #2 place to place units (Zone D is best location). C ‐ Properties in Zone C, Multi‐family Zone 96.15 5/2/2022 18:16 2 This is absolutely the #1 place to put units. I'd add retail at the ground floor. Great access to public transportation and easy walk to commercial.

D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 210.53 5/2/2022 18:16 3 Great area to add units. Ideally the Blair Park (L) gets turned into a park with soccer fields (desperately needed). K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard 166.67 5/2/2022 18:164 I think it's important to develop this area into a park with soccer fields. Piedmont desperately needs more soccer fields! Given that I needed a few more units, I added some to this location...hoping that still allows for space for soccer.

L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue

24.24 5/2/2022 18:16
5 Deprioritize for housing ‐ maintain quiet nature of city center B ‐ Piedmont Community Church Property, 400 Highland Avenue 0 5/2/2022 16:09
6 Close access to school, transportation, retail shops and restaurants C ‐ Properties in Zone C, Multi‐family Zone 96.15 5/2/2022 16:09 7 Access to transportation and retail shops, grocery and restaurants D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 210.53 5/2/2022 16:09
8 Close access to Park Ave transportation and retail shops and restaurants F ‐ Corpus Christi School Property 31.25 5/2/2022 16:099 Close access to school, public transport and shops G ‐ Linda Dog Park, 333 Linda Avenue 23.81 5/2/2022 16:09 10 Deprioritize for housing ‐ surrounded by single family homes I ‐ Grassy Strip and Median along Highland Avenue at Sheridan Avenue 0 5/2/2022 16:09
11 Offering new commercial options would be interesting but not housing. Prioritize needs of surrounding single family homes (quiet, parking)
J ‐ Zone D ‐ Gas Station, Mulberry's, Bank of America, Wells Fargo 0 5/2/2022 16:09
12 Housing could make sense here (along Moraga thoroughfare) as along as Coaches Field is not disturbed. Piedmont already has too few rec fields / spaces
K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard
166.67 5/2/2022 16:09
13 Would love to turn this into soccer fields which we are desperately in need of L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue 0 5/2/2022 16:09 14 Like the idea of supporting emergency and rec uses but not additional housing M ‐ City Hall, Veterans Hall, Corey Reich Tennis Courts, etc. 0 5/2/2022 16:09 15 Close access to Park Ave and Montclair for public transport and shops Z ‐ Zion Lutheran Property 40 5/2/2022 16:0916 Super congested already‐‐‐bad city planning B ‐ Piedmont Community Church Property, 400 Highland Avenue 0 5/1/2022 20:52
17 Close to public transit and retail best for dense living. D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 210.53 4/30/2022 3:24
18 it would be great if in development the density could be varied so there were different housing types ‐ townhomes, apartments, etc.

C ‐ Properties in Zone C, Multi‐family Zone

86.54 4/29/2022 22:53
19 Mixed ‐use zoning to allow business uses to remain with housing above. Since housing almost always is more profitable to develop, require mixed‐use with business/not‐for‐profit tenancy, not just vacant space. Consider affordability as well. Does Piedmont work to house its teachers and first responders, etc.? D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 210.53 4/29/2022 22:53
20 has Piedmont considered housing for teachers and first responders who work in Piedmont? any consideration of affordability? locations like this one could be a good opportunity for lovely townhouses I ‐ Grassy Strip and Median along Highland Avenue at Sheridan Avenue 4.94 4/29/2022 22:53 21 keep businesses ‐ mixed‐use zoning J ‐ Zone D ‐ Gas Station, Mulberry's, Bank of America, Wells Fargo

20.41 4/29/2022 22:53
22 this could be a great place for Piedmont to add some new multi‐family housing with greater density than is typical in the city ‐ and to consider affordability
K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard
166.67 4/29/2022 22:53
23 could be a very interesting venture ‐ lots of unique opportunities with the Church and school and the location on Park with access to bus, etc.

Z ‐ Zion Lutheran Property
40 4/29/2022 22:53
24 Like the newer condeos below the dog park, this could be high end bt smaller unit syle condos and townhouses. Good transportation and walkablility score. Good for the senior set and city employee preference houseing, teachers, fire dept, rec center, city admin, etc G ‐ Linda Dog Park, 333 Linda Avenue

31.75 4/29/2022 18:01
Part II, Piedmont Housing Puzzle Comments Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 73 25 The corporation yard seems a good area to put the multi unit type development. There is a main road already in place, public transportation route, and in walking distance for someone who is fit to school and to area's of interest. IT will also not negatively affect the main part of the community with added traffic becasue of normal commute.

K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard
166.67 4/29/2022 18:01
26 How will public transportation be delivered to this area? What would be the main routes drivers would take to this community?Why is this area not already open to the Piedmont comunity and public as a park? L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue
181.82 4/29/2022 18:01
27 Adding some housing here would change the nature of the Piedmont City Center. Perhaps the city buildings in place could be reidentified for community need.

M ‐ City Hall, Veterans Hall, Corey Reich Tennis Courts, etc.

25.86 4/29/2022 18:01
28 My comments are in the specific areas. RHNA Allocation 0 4/29/2022 18:0129 Actually, why is the maximum 183, each house could turn their garage into an ADU according to CA state law AE ‐ Private single‐family properties throughout Zones A and E 182 4/29/2022 17:52
30 Redeveloping a park into housing is quite a drastic step compared to allowing more ADUs in the AE zone or redeveloping a larger area of the corporation yard into usable space
G ‐ Linda Dog Park, 333 Linda Avenue
0 4/29/2022 17:52
31 Do we need giant banks downtown? An ATM seems sufficient J ‐ Zone D ‐ Gas Station, Mulberry's, Bank of America, Wells Fargo

96.94 4/29/2022 17:52
32 Honestly, do we need the public works facilities to be inside city limits? What about acquiring or leasing land in Oakland and developing the corporation yard into high‐density housing? Has the advantage of easy access to CA‐13 and frankly the nearby neighbors may prefer a well designed housing complex to an ugly corporation yard (I could be wrong) K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard
166.67 4/29/2022 17:52
33 This park is really underutilized and could be a good spot for townhomes, with easy access to CA‐13 L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue 48.48 4/29/2022 17:52 34 Please convert this useless Bank of America into some kind of restaurant or cafe please! J ‐ Zone D ‐ Gas Station, Mulberry's, Bank of America, Wells Fargo 0 4/28/2022 20:36
35 We need to focus on the Estates Zone. These are large lots, and mansions could be remodeled as condos and new multi‐unit housing built on excess land. An outreach effort needs to be made to homeowners in this zone. It is not inconceivable that many will see the justice and benefit of their property being sold to a developer who can convert it into multifamily housing. This is especially possible in cases where the homeowners' heirs live elsewhere and understand the inequities brought about by intergenerational wealth transfer and the unprecendented levels of wealth concentration we are experience in this country.

AE ‐ Private single‐family properties throughout Zones A and E 182 4/28/2022 18:05
36 This should be recreation space, if you're talking about the space between the Oakland Ave bridge and Linda Beach field C ‐ Properties in Zone C, Multi‐family Zone 0 4/28/2022 18:05
37 What happened to the idea of the owner of the Shell station to convert that to multi‐unit housing? D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 78.95 4/28/2022 18:05
38 Not sure if there's any room here, but Kehilla would be disposed to the social justice angle H ‐ Kehilla Synagogue Property, 1300 Grand Ave 6.91 4/28/2022 18:0539 No. This needs to be maintained and improved as open space ‐‐ for both the human and animal populations of the area.

Piedmont has less open park space than surrounding areas, and I believe we're below the national standard.

L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue
0 4/28/2022 18:05
40 If the tennis courts in the center of town are being proposed, why not the City of Oakland owned Davie Tennis Stadium (within Piedmont city limits)? Eminent domain that place and let Oaklanders ironically complain about Piedmont building affordable housing instead of letting them keep a tennis stadium. Oakland has plenty of other property to build a tennis stadium.

M ‐ City Hall, Veterans Hall, Corey Reich Tennis Courts, etc.

34.48 4/28/2022 17:44
41 This is very confusing. I'm just adding these here to account for housing created by ADUs and letting people split parcels to build additional homes. There could be more.

AE ‐ Private single‐family properties throughout Zones A and E 182 4/28/2022 1:05
42 This just seems dumb to include this. We're not tearing down our community church in the center of town for housing. Why do you even have non‐starters on here?
B ‐ Piedmont Community Church Property, 400 Highland Avenue 0 4/28/2022 1:05
43 Again! Why are we even suggesting getting rid of a thriving church and school? This is dumb. F ‐ Corpus Christi School Property 0 4/28/2022 1:0544 No! It's offensive to even be suggesting this. H ‐ Kehilla Synagogue Property, 1300 Grand Ave 0 4/28/2022 1:05 Part II, Piedmont Housing Puzzle Comments Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 74 45 Ditto. Stop with the anti‐religious suggestions. It's really offensive. N ‐ Plymouth Church Properties on Olive Avenue 0.45 4/28/2022 1:05 46 If a church decides it can no longer function, it will sell its property and then we can have these discussions. Until then, it's offensive to suggest getting rid of them.

Z ‐ Zion Lutheran Property
0 4/28/2022 1:05
47 This has always seemed like the most realistic place to build new housing, especially multi‐unit housing L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue 193.94 4/28/2022 0:4248 Important that the HE include more than the needed number of housing units as it is unlikely that all of the locations will develop and not providing excess capacity for development will mean the City has not successfully authorized the amount of development needed to meet our RHNA numbers. Please don't treat this like a check the box exercise ‐ Piedmont must do its part.

AE ‐ Private single‐family properties throughout Zones A and E 182 4/26/2022 22:31
49 Lots splits in Zone E should should be encouraged. ADUs that are rented may be counted but not those used for other purposes.

AE ‐ Private single‐family properties throughout Zones A and E 63 4/26/2022 16:52
50 Displacement of current tenants should be avoided C ‐ Properties in Zone C, Multi‐family Zone 19.23 4/26/2022 16:52 51 Public land should be used only for affordable housing. Market rate units or above moderate should be built on privately owned land.

K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard
121.21 4/26/2022 16:52
52 Given the history at Blair Park some open space for an enclosed dog run and heritage trees should be preserved. L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue 60.61 4/26/2022 16:5253 It is important to allow increased density in Piedmont's historically single family neighborhoods. This could be through ADUs, duplexes, triplexes etc.

AE ‐ Private single‐family properties throughout Zones A and E 147 4/26/2022 14:17
54 These are well located sites with transportation where we should zone for increased housing density. But because they have existing economically viable uses, they are unlikely to be actually redeveloped quickly. We should not count on these to meet a signifiant portion of our RHNA obligation.

D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 105.26 4/26/2022 14:17
55 This is a great site and our best opportunity to build a feasible affordable housing development soon. this is one of the few sites in Piedmont that can build a community that is large enough to be financially feasible and meet our ELI/VLI goals K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard

75.76 4/26/2022 14:17
56 this site is one of two sites large enough to build an affordable project capable of meeting our ELI/VLI goals‐ it must be considered. The site could be developed in a way to retain and improve park land. Without these larger sites it is simply impossible to actually meet the goal of building our ELI/VLI RHNA requirement L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue

72.73 4/26/2022 14:17
57 These are great sites, close to schools and services. These are likely to take a long time to redevelop, however‐‐ but let's start planning!
M ‐ City Hall, Veterans Hall, Corey Reich Tennis Courts, etc.

68.97 4/26/2022 14:17
58 I did not even realize the church had a parking lot. This seems like a great option for housing with parking underground. B ‐ Piedmont Community Church Property, 400 Highland Avenue

29.85 4/26/2022 4:02
59 I support housing along Grand Avenue and adjacent lots, including this intersection. C ‐ Properties in Zone C, Multi‐family Zone 96.15 4/26/2022 4:0260 Grand Avenue is one of the most logical places for multiunit housing. The Ace Hardware parking lots are a total pain ‐ I have even been in a car accident in the hardware parking lot. This space could be easily redesigned to include the current hardware and garden stores, parking and housing above that. It is accessible to transit and in a very walkable location too.

D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 210.53 4/26/2022 4:02
61 This is probably the least attractive dog parks in Piedmont. This site could be nicely reconfigured to provide housing and some park area for dog walkers at the same time. The one unknown is how this would affect traffic by Beach School.

G ‐ Linda Dog Park, 333 Linda Avenue
103.17 4/26/2022 4:02
62 Perhaps the parking lot could be repurposed to include housing with parking underground. H ‐ Kehilla Synagogue Property, 1300 Grand Ave 6.91 4/26/2022 4:02 63 This section of the street could be reconfigured to incorporate housing. I ‐ Grassy Strip and Median along Highland Avenue at Sheridan Avenue 30.86 4/26/2022 4:02
64 This is an area prime for an update. The BofA is currently unused. Gas stations will soon be obsolete as we transition to electric vehicles to address climate change before it's too late. This area combined with the police station and veterans building could be redesigned together to include the banks and Mulberry's in a visually appealing way that also features substantial affordable housing.

J ‐ Zone D ‐ Gas Station, Mulberry's, Bank of America, Wells Fargo

96.94 4/26/2022 4:02
65 The city's owned site are the easiest and biggest opportunity for adding housing because the land would not cost money. The city should seriously consider the corporation yard as well as the skatepark.

K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard
166.67 4/26/2022 4:02
Part II, Piedmont Housing Puzzle Comments Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 75 66 Blair Park, the city's largest owned property, is the most logical place for affordable housing. This is highly underutilized open space. I regularly drive by and see one person or nobody using this space. Affordable housing could be designed for this space in a way that includes open space that gets far more use than what is there now and even has more appealing greenery. It can be done in a way that would not hurt neighbors who live above the park and it could be done in a way that minimizes traffic impacts on Moraga, for instnace by widening part of the road by this property.

L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue
193.94 4/26/2022 4:02
67 It makes total sense to consider the tennis courts especially for housing. The housing could be designed in a way that retains the tennis courts, perhaps on the roof. It also makes sense to look at the veterans hall and city hall as part of the plan. Finally, while we are considering tennis courts, why not look at the ones by Hampton Field and off HIghland behind the dog park too.

M ‐ City Hall, Veterans Hall, Corey Reich Tennis Courts, etc. 112.07 4/26/2022 4:02
68 we should be promoting ADUs while being realistic about affordability and production numbers. Owners of large lots should be able to subdivide their properties to create additional legal lots, and duplexes/triplexes/fourplexes should be allowed on the larger and the smaller lots.

AE ‐ Private single‐family properties throughout Zones A and E 42 4/26/2022 3:33
69 If the Church wants to add housing I'm supportive. I am adding units here because of the way the "puzzle" is structured, which requires 587 units. I object to this ‐ people should be able to contribute whatever input they have, even if it is partial.

B ‐ Piedmont Community Church Property, 400 Highland Avenue

29.85 4/26/2022 3:33
70 Yes I support multifamily on Linda. C ‐ Properties in Zone C, Multi‐family Zone 96.15 4/26/2022 3:33 71 Redevelopment of the Sylvan learning center building seems very feasible in light of what appear to be relatively low value tenants and a relatively low value building. I support a 5‐6 story apartment building on that block and I'd support a variance enabling 100% residential, in light of how little demand there is for retail space. Ace hardware, I suspect, isn't changing.

D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 118.42 4/26/2022 3:33
72 I don't think this is a feasible housing site. G ‐ Linda Dog Park, 333 Linda Avenue 0 4/26/2022 3:3373 why maximum of 8? This is a great housing site. H ‐ Kehilla Synagogue Property, 1300 Grand Ave 6.5 4/26/2022 3:3374 I support multifamily housing on Blair park with up to 5/6 stories ‐ whatever is needed to create a project feasible and with some level of affordability. I think Blair Park has much better potential than the sites across Moraga.

L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue
181.82 4/26/2022 3:33
75 Yes!! Veterans building and tennis courts especially should be considered as sites. Veteran's building is probably near the end of its useful life, and community hall/police/fire could be below residential in a 4/5/6 story building. Tennis courts could be on the roof of a multifamily building.

M ‐ City Hall, Veterans Hall, Corey Reich Tennis Courts, etc.

60.34 4/26/2022 3:33
76 Slope of site appears to make it unsuitable for housing, but I'd be happy to see housing there if feasible. N ‐ Plymouth Church Properties on Olive Avenue 7.17 4/26/2022 3:33 77 only more than 3 units with low income. Up to 8 units if design of building is consistent in style with neighborhood like 1001 Warfield avenue.

AE ‐ Private single‐family properties throughout Zones A and E 7 4/26/2022 2:52
78 6 stories max B ‐ Piedmont Community Church Property, 400 Highland Avenue

13.43 4/26/2022 2:52
79 up to 10 stories high D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 184.21 4/26/2022 2:52
80 make same zone as D H ‐ Kehilla Synagogue Property, 1300 Grand Ave 6.91 4/26/2022 2:52 81 up to 6 stories M ‐ City Hall, Veterans Hall, Corey Reich Tennis Courts, etc. 25.86 4/26/2022 2:52 82 It would be great to see a variety of housing types that would allow a broader range of people with different needs welcomed to Piedmont.

AE ‐ Private single‐family properties throughout Zones A and E 70 4/24/2022 15:19
83 Please consider this site even including the skatepark, which wasn't well designed and is not accessible to kids that would use it anyways. Seems like a great place for housing!
K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard
151.52 4/24/2022 15:19
84 I'd love to see housing here…seems like an under utilized resource and has great proximity to nearby amenities. L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue 193.94 4/24/2022 15:1985 We should allow duplexes, triplexes, and small apartment buildings in Zones A and E, especially on larger lots. We need to think beyond single‐family homes and ADUs.

AE ‐ Private single‐family properties throughout Zones A and E 182 4/23/2022 15:47
86 I'd love to see apartments over retail and buildings up to 6‐7 stories on Grand Ave. D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 78.95 4/23/2022 15:47
Part II, Piedmont Housing Puzzle Comments Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 76 87 Strongly support exploring the Corp Yard for affordable housing. We should add the skate park site too for consideration. K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard 166.67 4/23/2022 15:47
88 Blair Park is a great opportunity site. We should definitely explore. Could put housing and some park / recreational space there, such as a playground.

L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue
193.94 4/23/2022 15:47
89 We should do a master plan for the Civic Center that integrates some of these facilities and puts affordable housing over community and city facilities. Strongly support putting affordable housing in the Civic Center so it is well integrated and close to transportation.

M ‐ City Hall, Veterans Hall, Corey Reich Tennis Courts, etc. 112.07 4/23/2022 15:47
90 It makes sense to have housing where there are services and community resources. M ‐ City Hall, Veterans Hall, Corey Reich Tennis Courts, etc. 0 4/22/2022 21:20 91 This area would help benefit lower income families due to ease of access to local businesses and transportation. C ‐ Properties in Zone C, Multi‐family Zone

96.15 4/22/2022 21:09
92 Blair park should be maximized. It is only used by a few residents. Perfect area for development. L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue 193.94 4/22/2022 18:42 93 This is a wonderful central location and I would advocate upzoning this area to incentivize housing in this area, especially low and moderate income housing
B ‐ Piedmont Community Church Property, 400 Highland Avenue

29.85 4/21/2022 18:11
94 97 units in this small area with small lots seems unlikely, given the high cost of construction and the fact that properties in this zone are already developed
C ‐ Properties in Zone C, Multi‐family Zone

38.46 4/21/2022 18:11
95 I think significant upzoning will be needed to make redevelopment of private businesses in this area financially feasible, but it would be great to have higher density housing in this area D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 78.95 4/21/2022 18:11 96 This seems unlikely to me given the existing use of the church and school property F ‐ Corpus Christi School Property 0 4/21/2022 18:11 97 probably too small to be feasible H ‐ Kehilla Synagogue Property, 1300 Grand Ave 0 4/21/2022 18:1198 Central locations seem like the best place for new housing, given proximity to schools, city jobs, and transit I ‐ Grassy Strip and Median along Highland Avenue at Sheridan Avenue 24.28 4/21/2022 18:11
99 Central locations seem like the best place for new housing, given proximity to schools, city jobs, and transit. 60 du/acre seems like a reasonable maximum
J ‐ Zone D ‐ Gas Station, Mulberry's, Bank of America, Wells Fargo

61.22 4/21/2022 18:11
100 This site is less connected to city services (schools, jobs, transit) but could still accommodate some housing, with efforts to improve traffic safety and integrate the neighborhood
K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard

60.61 4/21/2022 18:11
101 This site is less connected to city services (schools, jobs, transit) but could still accommodate some housing, with efforts to improve traffic safety and integrate the neighborhood
L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue

60.61 4/21/2022 18:11
102 The city center is the best place for new housing given proximity to schools, jobs, transit and recreation resources M ‐ City Hall, Veterans Hall, Corey Reich Tennis Courts, etc. 112.07 4/21/2022 18:11
103 I'm not in favor of converting any city land/parks into housing. G ‐ Linda Dog Park, 333 Linda Avenue 0 4/18/2022 3:42104 I'm not in favor of converting any city land/parks into housing. I ‐ Grassy Strip and Median along Highland Avenue at Sheridan Avenue 0 4/18/2022 3:42
105 I'm not in favor of converting any city land/parks into housing. K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard 0 4/18/2022 3:42106 I'm not in favor of converting any city land/parks into housing. L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue 0 4/18/2022 3:42107 I'm not in favor of converting any city land/parks into housing. M ‐ City Hall, Veterans Hall, Corey Reich Tennis Courts, etc. 0 4/18/2022 3:42108 This is too many units, but because it's on the city's borderline it would be less disruptive. F ‐ Corpus Christi School Property 31.25 4/14/2022 22:05 109 This is a very condensed area, and therefore I believe there should be 0 units placed here. I ‐ Grassy Strip and Median along Highland Avenue at Sheridan Avenue 0 4/14/2022 22:05
110 This seems to be the least obtrusive place for new housing of all the locations offered. K ‐ Redevelop City Corporation Yard 166.67 4/14/2022 22:05111 This seems like too many units for one location, but too many of the other locations shouldn't have any new units. L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue 193.94 4/14/2022 22:05
112 These zones should be upzoned to allow 2‐6 units per property by right. AE ‐ Private single‐family properties throughout Zones A and E 182 4/12/2022 1:50
113 I don't believe it's likely that the maximum buildout would actually be possible as many landowners may not be interested. D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 118.42 4/12/2022 1:50
Part II, Piedmont Housing Puzzle Comments Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 77 114 I live near here and this area desperately needs revitalization and increased density! Ground floor retail with space for hardware store, coffee shops, karate place, sandwich shop etc etc would be ideal. Hard to picture how many stories these buildings would have to be to accommodate this housing though, so I'm not sure what is reasonable number of units here.

D ‐ Zone D ‐ Ace Hardware, Sylvan Learning Center, Homes and Small Businesses 105.26 4/7/2022 3:46
115 I don't have a dog but it seems this space is heavily utilized ‐ would need to preserve some dog‐park area. G ‐ Linda Dog Park, 333 Linda Avenue 0 4/7/2022 3:46 116 This area so needs to be reimagined! Less space for cars, and more for people. See Mill Valley for inspiration of a charming downtown with a plaza (both downtown Mill Valley, and the recent redevelopment of the Mill Valley Lumbar Yard). It would be ideal to have ground level retail and apartments above. Mulberry's, an ATM, and a few other shops/cafes around a small plaza with tables/outside eating area, with housing above. Remove the banks and lawyer/real estate offices. Make Highland Way a small pedestrian‐only walkway, or remove all together? It's hard as a lay person to know how different number of housing units would feel here, but I think apartments above more (non‐chain) businesses would be a wonderful transformation.

J ‐ Zone D ‐ Gas Station, Mulberry's, Bank of America, Wells Fargo

25.51 4/7/2022 3:46
117 Empty lot behind 216 Howard. C ‐ Properties in Zone C, Multi‐family Zone 38.46 4/6/2022 6:19118 Why is this the only park listed? There are many other parks in Piedmont. Why are we listing parks at all? L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue 0 3/25/2022 1:30 119 Testing F ‐ Corpus Christi School Property 4.69 3/25/2022 1:22 120 This is a park. It is not zoned for residential. Do not take away our parks! L ‐ Blair Park, 930 Moraga Avenue 0 3/25/2022 1:22 Part II, Piedmont Housing Puzzle Comments Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 78 Pierce Macdonald, Senior Planner
City of Piedmont
Part II, Website Traffic Referrers
Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #4 Agenda Report Page 79 Item # 3 – Consideration of Direction to Staff to Provide the Draft 6th Cycle Housing Element of the General Plan to the California Department of Housing and Community Development for its 90- Day Review
Correspondence received before Monday, June 20, 2022 at 4:00 p.m.

HiPiedmont resident here putting in my two cents on the housing draft. The Vista tennis courts are the worst choice for housing! They are central, they are heavily used by the schools as well as the general public. If we’re converting tennis courts, it makes far more sense to convert the Park and Hampton courts.

Also, I was disgusted when the PGE lot was converted into 1.85 million dollar townhomes. Piedmont doesn’t need high income housing, it needs low income housing! I’m afraid that partnering with developers is just going to be another boon doggle, with no increase of low income housing.

Thanks,
Sharon Robinson
Dear Members of City Council,
When perusing the Housing Element Draft, I was very concerned and upset to see that a number of sites in City Center were identified for high-density housing, for example the tennis courts, Veterans Hall, and 801 Magnolia. I know that it's not 100% that these sites would actually be built on, but there is 0% chance right now, and I for one am not willing to take the risk. I am very concerned that by making high-density housing a possibility at these locations, we are only one rich motivated developer or individual away from a terrible situation which would result in much division, possible lawsuits, and worst-case, a huge detriment to our community and to our safety if high-density housing were actually developed there.

Here are just a few of the downsides if a space like the tennis courts ever became high-density housing:

1. Loss of high school tennis team team courts

2. Loss of courts used by kids clinics all summer and during the school year and by 3 different sets of ladies tennis groups, not to mention countless other recreational players

3. Increase in response time for police and fire as they would have to navigate construction and then later navigate increased traffic from the residents of the high density housing

4. Less safety for kids walking to school and parents driving kids to school b/c residents of that housing would be leaving for work around the same time as kids come to school

5. Loss of precious community space shared and enjoyed by all residents of Piedmont and particularly by our kids
Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #5 Agenda Report Page 80 I beg you to remove City Center from the list of sites and consider other sites within Piedmont to meet the Housing Element, for example Grand Ave, Moraga Ave, or simply incentivizing that

23.48% of Piedmont homes build an ADU, resulting in the required 587 additional units.

As someone who plans to live in Piedmont for the rest of my life and leave my home to my children, I am incredibly vested in the future of the City Center and the safety and happiness of all residents. Please leave City Center as is. We can't take any chances with the precious heart of our town.

Thank you,
Alissa Welch
Dear Council Members,
I was surprised to read on PAGE 30 of the Piedmont Post dated June 15th that there was a public hearing scheduled for 5:30 on June 20th on a final plan that was posted June 8th with no direct contact with ALL the residents of Piedmont. We deserve to know what proposals are being put together directly - we all get our mail everyday - and we deserve to have a vote on what we want our City to look and feel like. Many of us have picked Piedmont to live because of the non-crowding, the safety of our homes and the ability to be able to have our children walk to school without fear that something will happen to them.

I was very disappointed to see how you are planning to use every inch of space in Piedmont, where it's allowing a home site that is zone single family to be changed to allowing a 4 unit complex to be built or a new build having to include an ADU, let alone re-zoning various areas that are City owned to be possibly turned over to developers to put up what they want and demolishing the current beautiful buildings in our small and charming downtown to put up multiple story buildings which will only increase the traffic and safety of our children who go to the schools that are in the heart of downtown..

What will all of these ideas do to our property values. It is my belief that the residents of Piedmont live here for a reason and you are endangering our property values and way of life WITHOUT DIRECTLY contacting ALL the citizens of Piedmont and having them VOTE on these changes you are putting together. I support the need for affordable housing, but these needs hopefully can be accomplished without sacrificing beneficial recreation space, historic facilities, and much needed educational and city resources.

This issue of multiple changes to how we live is NOT something that the City should TEXT, BLOG or email about. This is an issue you must be sure you include everyone to have their say.

Very truly yours,
A Second Generation Piedmont Owner (Deborah Newton)
Dear City Council,
Attachment A 8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #5 Agenda Report Page 81 I was gratified this morning to read several articles in the PCA about tonight's Housing Element meeting. The common thread is that there remain many questions about the proposal. These include to name a few 1) Lack of use of SB9 units in the projection 2) Choice of unrealistic sites for development 3) Reclassification of zones under the Piedmont Charter without a vote of the people, 4)The requirement that some new construction require the addition of an ADU and 5) the location of a transitional home for six homeless people.

Fortunately residents finally appear to be paying attention to the changes contained in the Housing Element. Some changes are clear, some not so clear, but many will radically change Piedmont forever. I urge the Council to extend the comment period and take advantage of the community engagement that is occurring now. Much of the prior discussion has been dominated by the same people, from the same organization, saying the same things. They do not speak for me, or I suspect for many Piedmont voters. It is time to hear what the community thinks.

Good luck tonight.

Best,
John L. Lenahan
If you zone it, they will come…
Developers I mean. And possibly not in a good way.

The primary debate in the community does not seem to be about providing state mandated housing, but rather whether piedmont should create a CITY CENTER, or maintain its TOWN CENTER, which truly is the jewel of town.

Please find other locations in piedmont for housing and protect Piedmont’s town center and schools by maintaining the current zoning for that area and not add any congestion or ruin it’s charm.

Thank you
Jodie Marko
Dear Piedmont City Council and Staff,
I have significant concerns over the Housing Element plan under consideration by the Council this evening. PLEASE SLOW DOWN AND DO NOT APPROVE ANYTHING TONIGHT.

Many Piedmont residents are just learning details of the plan being proposed. We need more time to learn, consider alternatives, and contribute to a plan that can be supported as broadly as possible.

Specifically, I do not want to see new development jeopardize the safety of our children or the availability of common space in the center of town treasured by students and residents.

Attachment A Agenda Report Page 82
For historical precedent, please consider the process around the new high school. There was a small group of passionate people who wanted a new theater. Theater is good, right?!? Well, you know what you can't do with a brand new theater? Tear it down to build a STEM building.

Thankfully, enough of us spoke out and voted down the new theater project, demanding a PLAN first, a plan inclusive of the entire community, whether they were paying attention from the start or not.

After the first theater plan was rejected, there was a much more inclusive, methodical process to offer the community easily consumable information on a steady basis. There were powerpoint decks and surveys and meetings to take feedback every step of the way as we considered all possible iterations and eventually honed in on a specific plan. The buildings that stand today are the result of a super inclusive process and there's a new theater about to open.

We need to do the same around the housing element. I'm sure a lot of great work was done, just like in the early days of the new theater and high school. Now, it is time to educate the residents, offer alternatives to stimulate discussion (not just one plan), and move forward with a plan that best meets the needs and desires of our entire community.

Unlike with the high school, we have an entire city within which to move pieces around to accomplish the goals. Let's not rush into a plan that destroys space that people have cherished for generations.

Thank you,
John Welch
Dear Piedmont City Council and Staff,
I have significant concerns over the Housing Element plan under consideration by the Council this evening. PLEASE SLOW DOWN AND DO NOT APPROVE ANYTHING TONIGHT.

Many Piedmont residents are just learning details of the plan being proposed. We need more time to learn, consider alternatives, and contribute to a plan that is as inclusive as possible.

My greatest concerns are that new developments do not jeopardize the safety of our children or the availability of common space in the center of town treasured by students and residents.

For historical precedent, please consider the process around the new high school. There was a small group of passionate people who wanted a new theater. Theater is good, right?!? Well, you know what you can't do with a brand new theater? Tear it down to build a STEM building.

Thankfully, enough of us spoke out and voted down the new theater project, demanding a PLAN first, a plan inclusive of the entire community, whether they were paying attention from the start or not.

After the first theater plan was rejected, there was a much more inclusive, methodical process to offer the community easily consumable information on a steady basis. As a critic of the first plan, I was invited to join a new Facilities Steering Committee to oversee the work. There were Attachment A Agenda Report Page 83
powerpoint decks and surveys and meetings offered to the public to take feedback every step of the way as we considered all possible iterations and eventually honed in on a specific plan. The buildings that stand today are the result of a very inclusive process and there's a new theater about to open.

We need to do the same around the housing element. I'm sure a lot of great work was done, just like in the early days of the new theater and high school. Now, it is time to educate residents, offer alternatives to stimulate discussion (not just one plan), and move forward with a plan that best meets the needs and desires of our entire community.

Thank you,
John Welch
Hello Piedmont City Council MembersI am writing to ask that you not vote to Submit Draft Housing Element to State tonight.

As an average Piedmont citizen (not part of any action group or coalition) I have considered myself reasonably aware of the development of the Housing Element. I understood ABAG’s RHNA assessment for Piedmont, I participated in the online housing feedback questionnaires, I checked in on Piedmontishome.org with some regularity. I am in support of increased housing, addressing an array income level needs, equity and inclusivity. I think of myself as a “YIMBY”.

However, I am concerned because I have never heard as much discussion about the Housing Element as I have at the two kid birthday parties I attended this weekend, in fact I never heard anyone bring it up before. What I heard: "I had no idea that the siting had been decided for the draft plan, I had no idea they are planning the bulk of the housing downtown, I had no idea they are changing the downtown zoning to accommodate 6 story structures, I thought they were planning to use Blair Park, I thought that the Housing Element does not amend the zoning map”. And the follow up questions- how will this impact our community? Where are the environmental impact reports, who is the transit specialist tasked with this, have they done traffic studies, what is normally required for zoning amendments?, etc.

Since the city council has been immersed in working on this, it may seem to you that the amount of community involvement and feedback has been adequate to this point. I am writing to you to impress upon you that the scope of this issue has not even begun to penetrate the consciousness of the community. In the interest of full transparency, there should be more time and more hearings devoted to this issue, specifically to hearing from the community about the impact of the distribution of the siting for the housing in the draft plan. It may throw off the calendar for the state process, but it is more than worth taking more of the time before May 31, 2023 to carefully consider this plan and its specific impacts before submitting it.

As California communities adjust to keep up with statewide housing demands, I have seen different cities deal with the same scenario Piedmont is dealing with right now, and it can play Attachment A Agenda Report Page 84
out in many different ways. In cities where the community gets the impression that the Council votes too quickly to pass a plan without adequate debate and input on the housing siting, what should be a process turns into a hugely divisive issue. Lawsuits abound, which are terrible wastes of resources. I am hoping that the Piedmont council does not follow this trend, that it takes an open, transparent, and community minded approach to this process. If right now in the process is the first you are hearing any opposition to the draft Housing Element plan, the timing should not preclude you from listening. Slow down and hear everyone out, be open to alternatives. Make your position in support of the plan factual and easy to digest, as most people do not have the time to read and understand the full draft Housing Element. I personally feel that more discussion, exploration of alternative sites and impact studies are needed before the building sites are locked into a plan submission.

Debate and disagreement will occur on issues as impactful as this one. Piedmont has not had major changes to its planning, zoning or structures in most citizens' memories. People need time to understand and absorb what you are proposing. Do not make the mistake of thinking you can avoid dissent by pushing this through tonight. Embrace the voices of your community and give this topic the time it needs so that the majority of Piedmont’s citizens feel that even if they do not get their desired outcome, at least they had the time to understand what will be happening to their community before it is voted on.

Help create a community of YIMBYs by slowing the process to truly involve them.

In short, please delay vote to submit Draft Housing Element to the State.

Thank you for reading this.

Liz Selna
Kevin, thanks for your prompt reply. I see you are working on a Saturday.

I admit I am confused by your response re the use of SB9 projections in the HE. I assume you are relying on professional advice, but your response seems contrary to the plain words of the HCD Fact Sheet, which says that a jurisdiction can "utilize projections based on SB9 toward a jurisdiction's regional housing needs assessment" then it lays out the 4 steps to follow.

In your 2nd paragraph you say SB9 "has been interpreted" to mean something rather different from the words quoted above. By whom was it so interpreted? Can you provide a copy of this interpretation?
Then you go on to say that the city would have to rely on "applications in process or imminent".

That's inconsistent with a projection meant to cover an 8 year planning period.

You then say: "HCD is requiring evidence of actual performance and production of units." This again is contrary to the Fact Sheet, and to the inherent meaning of the word, "projections".

Projections are forward looking, not retroactive.

Your observation that SB9 would produce only "a handful of units at best" needs evidence.

Houses turn over rapidly. Some buyers may want to maximize their return. Selling one house for say $2 million or half of a TIC for almost as much each is a reasonable possibility. Just a Attachment A Agenda Report Page 85
speculative example, but if a half of 1% of the SFRs in Piedmont became a two-unit building per year, for 8 years, it would produce over 150 new units.

You're correct that new SB9 units are unlikely to be affordable, but the more credible larger sites can be designated for affordability.

You say that no city has received certification relying on SB9 projections. Since the law only became effective in January, and the HCD implementation guide only came out in March, it would almost be impossible for any jurisdiction to have received HE certification containing SB9 projections.

Please provide copies of any communications from HCD confirming your statement that a HE with SB9 projections is unlikely to receive certification. Maybe that could be true if a jurisdiction relied exclusively on SB9, but not if such projections, consistent with HCD's own Fact Sheet, were a part of the mix.

As I said in my comment letter, I believe a jurisdiction is more likely to receive HCD approval by implementing SB9, than by including sites in the inventory which are extremely improbable.

I see housing advocacy groups are already closely following Piedmont's process. Providing the highest degree of credibility would seem prudent.

Thanks for your time.

Mike Henn
Attachment A Agenda Report Page 86
Councilmembers,
One of you asked me about my statement that the housing program can be accommodated on non-public sites. I said yes, it can be, it requires accepting some tradeoffs, principally perhaps two more stories on three sites — the two on Grand and one on Highland. This could be accomplished on Grand with ground floor retail plus four residential floors, maybe five, depending on unit mix, and on Highland at ground floor retail plus 4 floors residential. This would be working within the framework of sites identified by staff, but excluding all public land, and building in some assumptions about SB-9 units (40 units) and small lot triplexes, fourplexes (40 units). There would be a healthy 72 units buffer, so if these two numbers landed somewhat less, there is still some room. The attached show what that program would look like, and has exactly the same number of units as in the current Housing Element draft.

I believe the overall change is modest, and is mainly only on three total sites already identified by staff for higher density development. This would avoid development on not just Civic Center sites, but on Corp Yard and Blair Park in their entirety as well. All sites would be available for development the moment the Housing Element is adopted, rather than being locked for another several years while specific plans or master plans are prepared or fictional sites on which housing will never result. This would also place the vast majority of residents in walkable Civic Center and Grand Avenue areas, with great access to stores, transit, parks, and other amenities.

With good attention to design and development standards, these developments would positively enhance our urban fabric and result in vibrant streets with more cafes and dining places. No messing with tennis courts or police/fire building rehab. We can spend all that time and energy instead getting the design right. I have previously mentioned the slightly taller buildings on three sites to staff, but was told that this was not “politically acceptable”, but perhaps something has been lost in translation.

BTW: I read through the entirety of the community outreach summary on pages 14 through 18 of the Draft Housing Element, including community workshops. I see NO mention of Civic Center sites anywhere in the feedback summary on those five pages, although Grand and Highland are mentioned several times. So as a community member it is a shock to me see these as front and center in the Housing Element. If the Council proceeds with the recommendations as presented, you would be proceeding with no community direction to move forward on those sites, without benefit of physical, economic, or legal analysis, and for whatever that is worth, without my recommendation — while I have no elected position in the community, I have done general plans for more California cities than anyone else, so at least that is one professional urban planner perspective!
Please see attached Excel and PDF files.

Sincereley,
Rajeev Bhatia
Attachment A Agenda Report Page 87
Alternative Housing Sites Program
(no public lands used)
Units
Housing Occupied July 1, 2022 to Jan, 31, 2023 incl.

0.75 180 135 108 160 units per acre can be achive at
Ace/Sylvan with ground floor retail + 4
floors, as the sites are really well
shaped to result in efficient housing.

We are writing to you with urgency because we are deeply concerned about the current feasibility of using Piedmont’s allocation of Measure A-1 Bond Funding to create affordable multifamily rental housing in Piedmont. Despite the Planning Commission’s and the City Council’s recommendations to use Piedmont’s allocation in this manner, and despite the recent two year extension of the commitment deadline granted by the County Board of Supervisors, we believe that the successful development of Measure A-1 financed affordable housing in Piedmont is in serious jeopardy.

As you know, we are a group of affordable housing advocates, policy experts, and professionals who live in Piedmont. Several of us were among the affordable housing professionals who met with the Ad Hoc Subcommittee in April and May of 2021. Staff reports and recommendations prepared by the City and by the County Board of Supervisors related to Piedmont’s Measure A-1 funding have referred to the input provided by our group of professionals, and we urge you to take our input seriously once again.

We understand that using Measure A-1 funding and the Housing Element are two distinct efforts. We also recognize the importance of having a State-certified Housing Element by the May 2023 deadline, and that both City staff and its planning and governing bodies have been highly focused on that effort. The rationale for pausing work on Measure A-1 was the need to not “get out ahead” of the Housing Element public process, and so we had set out a timeline to coordinate with the Housing Element update process. However, rather than these two efforts working in parallel, Piedmont’s Measure A-1 planning process seems to have stalled completely, while the Housing Element includes significant barriers to it proceeding in a timely manner. To remedy this, we urge you to take the following actions:

1. Make changes to the draft Housing Element to facilitate, rather than impede, the timely selection and development of a site for a Measure A-1 financed affordable housing development.

2. Reconvene the Measure A-1 Ad Hoc Subcommittee immediately, to coordinate with staff and keep the City Council engaged in adhering to a timely Measure A-1 planning process.

Changes to the Draft Housing Element
We are encouraged that, in response to public comment on the Draft Housing Element, the City Council has directed staff and the City’s consulting team to look into alternatives to a Specific Plan for Moraga Canyon. We would like to strongly reiterate the importance of eliminating the 1 Attachment A8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #6Agenda Report Page 89 Specific Plan approach. In order to meet the new extended Measure A-1 commitment deadline of December 2024, and to allow sufficient time for a development RFP process for the selected site, the City will need a site selection process that can be completed by the end of 2023. We do not believe this is possible with a Specific Plan process because the Specific Plan is on a slower timeline than the timeline needed to commit A1 funds under the new County deadline.

We are also encouraged that Blair Park seems to be among the public sites being considered for affordable housing development, but we remain confused as to its exact status, as it does not seem to have been added to the site inventory. If it is not included in the site inventory, will the General Plan be amended to allow for housing development on that site? Would there be other impediments to selecting a Measure A-1 affordable housing site that is not on the site inventory?
Measure A-1 Planning Process and Timeline
Last summer, we presented a timeline for a Measure A-1 development planning process that showed how that process could work in coordination with the Housing Element process, rather than sequentially. It envisioned that site feasibility analyses would have been completed by now, enabling public engagement on affordable housing site options to go hand in hand with public engagement on the draft Housing Element. However, while it is our understanding that staff did follow the direction of the City Council to engage a consultant to evaluate development feasibility for various public sites, no such analysis has been presented to the public to date.

What is the status of this site feasibility analysis? We respectfully request a copy of the contract between the City and Janet Smith-Heimer and/or Urban Math 1 . If it would facilitate our receiving a copy of this contract, we can make a formal Public Records request.

Regardless of the current status of site feasibility analyses, it is imperative that the City not wait until the Housing Element is certified to begin work on site selection for Measure A-1. The City must dual-track the process of selecting a site for A-1 funding, and must start that process now.

We have updated the A-1 timeline we prepared last year to show how the City can meet the revised deadline for committing A-1 funds. As you will see in the attached, the City must re-initiate the process now and continue to hit milestones in order to meet both the deadlines to commit funds and start construction.

We are happy to meet with City staff and/or the A-1 Ad Hoc Subcommittee to provide additional technical advice and support your efforts to take advantage of the A-1 funds as an important step toward meeting our City’s housing and diversity goals. 1 While we are unsure who exactly the contract is with, we understand that Janet Smith-Heimer and principal(s) of Urban Math are doing some site feasibility work under such a contract with the City.
2 Attachment A8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #6Agenda Report Page 90 Yours truly,
Deborah Leland
Andy Madeira
Claire Parisa
Alice Talcott
The opinions expressed here are those of the individual signers and do not represent the viewpoints of their affiliated organizations.

Cc: Planning Commissioners, Sara Lillevand, Kevin Jackson, Pierce MacDonald-Powell 3 Attachment A8.1.22 Staff Report_Public Comments_ATTACHMENT #6Agenda Report Page 91 Attachment A Agenda Report Page 92
Public Comment Received July 26, 2022, to 12:00 noon July 28, 2022 (Also includes public comment accidently omitted from Attachment A) Dear Piedmont City Council, Mayor, and To Whom It may Concern, Including State of California Entities,
I never voted in any Piedmont election to change zoning laws, population growth, and the long‐ established character of the city. I never voted in any California election for any law change to allow California to change cities’ zoning laws unilaterally, suddenly, without a vote, and for political reasons.

And I implore Piedmont’s City Council members to not, without the urging and votes of more than half of, or two‐thirds of, Piedmont’s citizens, take it upon themselves or any other commission members to suddenly change Piedmont’s zoning laws, character, history, schools, population density, pollution, traffic, parking problems, and crucial electrical grid, sewage, and water needs.

It seems obvious to me that it is illegal, unconstitutional, and against long‐established laws for any government entity in the USA, for example the state of California, to force a city or any other government entity to change a city’s zoning laws and, indeed, long‐established character and population natural‐limit.

Therefore I think that Piedmont should fight this illegal take‐over of our zoning laws by the State of California. Certainly there are more than enough lawyers in Piedmont to fight this. Certainly there are at least dozens of towns in California that are against this unconstitutional power grab, and would join in a massive legal fight.

I could certainly imagine at least a judicial restraining order against construction of multi‐family units in cities long created as single‐family‐dwelling locales.

Realize that the state, and or a power‐grabbing few locals, seek to take over Piedmont city parkland, open space, environmentally sensitive areas, land owned by churches, play areas for children… If the state of California, or a few locals,  force Piedmont to change its character and Piedmont does not fight it, the effects we will see are:
 increased stress on our fire‐fighting and police departments;  stress on our  electrical grid and sewers;
 overcrowded schools, probably a sudden 15%‐‐20% increase in pupils;  overcrowded parks, fields, and playgrounds for our youngsters;  traffic congestion, parking problems, smog and other pollution;  population crowding and the urbanization that Piedmont has always offered an alternative to;
 possibly increased crime,  especially threatening to our many aged residents who feel safe here and give us a delightful multi‐generation community.

I have seen the figure of 537 housing units being shoe‐horned into little Piedmont. I’m guesstimating that might represent a sudden increase of 15%‐‐20% population, including student population. No town can absorb that.

Attachment B Agenda Report Page 93
I’m guessing that a huge majority of Piedmont residents do NOT want this to happen. I’m guessing that fewer than a dozen City Council members, Mayor, and planning commissioners are trying to implement this against the wishes of 5,000—10,000 Piedmont residents. Are they afraid to tally and see what the Piedmont public might (not) want?
I have ignored financial concerns above. Rights are rights, laws are laws, morality is morality.

But if Piedmont’s population is increased 15%, I’m guesstimating that the value of our Piedmont homes will correspondingly go down by 15%. I’m guesstimating that is an average drop in home value of $300,000‐‐$450,000. That would create an enormous opportunity for Class Action lawyers to bring an enormous Class Action lawsuit against Piedmont and its City Council members.

Personally, my home value is my entire life’s equity, which I have to live on the rest of my life. I have no pension, virtually no income, and my small art business has LOST money the last several years. Thus if a small faction changes Piedmont’s laws and regulations and character and home values, I will be forced to initiate or join a Class Action lawsuit in order to live out my life (I’m 73 and needing to retire) on my only equity: my Piedmont home.

Thank you for reading this and considering it and forwarding it to others for their consideration.

Sincerely, Dave DeRoche
Dear Councilmembers,
Please see the attached correspondence from the League of Women Voters of Piedmont regarding our support for more housing in Piedmont.

Best regards,
Lorrel Plimier, President, League of Women Voters of Piedmont Dear Esteemed Members of the Piedmont City Council and Members of the Trusted Piedmont Staff:

As a third generation “Piedmonter" and a 37 year resident of XXX Bonita Avenue near Vista Avenue, I am strongly requesting that the Piedmont City Council deny any changes in zoning to the area in and around City Hall including the Cory Reich Tennis Courts, City Hall, The Fire Department, Veterans Hall, 801 Magnolia Avenue, and the surrounding residential neighborhood including 342 Bonita Avenue, and remove this area for proposed housing development from Piedmont’s Draft Housing Element. There are presently a few established small commercial areas in Piedmont already much better suited for dense housing development than in a residential neighborhood. Please keep the present “small town” character of the area in and around City Hall.

I have read the State Draft Housing Element, ABAG’s Draft Housing Element, and Piedmont’s Draft Housing Element, and I do not read these proposed plans the same way that some others do? Piedmont is very unique in that it is totally built out and land locked at 1.7 square miles, not a commercial city but Attachment B Agenda Report Page 94
rather a residential community with an extremely small commercial area. This is different than most other cities in California. The residential character must be maintained. As I read, one of the important points in the State and ABAG’s plan is that the cities should build housing to support jobs in the community? Piedmont does not have very many jobs? Piedmont is not a commercial city, but a residential community with an extremely small commercial area, and in the State and ABAG plans I read that the residential character must be maintained as well? This area in and around City Hall cannot handle any more increased density. The density of the area recently increased significantly with the two new school buildings. Now the aquatic center is coming which will increase the building density in the area significantly more to the point that the back of the new aquatic center buildings will be touching the back of the tennis courts where the busy basketball courts presently are, etc. This area cannot handle any more commercial building including a high rise apartment building or dense housing.

When we moved to our home in April, 1985, the neighborhood was definitely a fairly quiet and peaceful Piedmont residential neighborhood with a school across the street. Living across the street from a school was pleasant and enjoyable. The location of our home in Piedmont is superb for raising a family.

At that time, most of the activity at Havens was on Oakland Avenue, between Highland and Bonita Avenues, and the hours of the activity at the school was less than today. Parking was not too much of a problem at that time except for a few hours during the day. There was no restricted parking in the area in and around City Hall, nor were there any painted parking places on the streets in the area. School children of driving age mostly did not drive vehicles to school. The Piedmont Adult Evening School was small and only held classes on weekday evenings, and mostly Piedmont residents attended the classes.

Most nights when I got home from work between 7:30PM and 8:00PM, I could park my car in front of my home. It was as previously stated, definitely a residential neighborhood. And unlike today, the wonderful view of Oakland and San Francisco could be enjoyed by all from not only the homes but from street level, the tennis courts, and more.

Living in our home for 37 years, I have seen many changes to the residential character of the neighborhood. I have been required to learn state and local laws, learn about the geothermal issues affecting the terrain, soil composition, the underground springs and potential land movement when the springs are irritated or redirected, and the scientific engineering of the area in and around City Hall and more. I been involved in so many issues surrounding development in my neighborhood. First, approximately 35 years ago, there was a push to convert Havens Playground from asphalt to grass without subsurface drainage due to the extensive cost of such drainage, called “Grassy Fields”. Without subsurface drainage at Havens which is approximately 15 feet above Bonita Avenue, our neighborhood group proved with the help of different Piedmont resident engineers along with great help from engineers with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, that from water hitting the grass and ground the land movement of Bonita Avenue and to the homes along Bonita and down the hill would have been significant and a liability risk that The City could not take. As a result of the neighborhood uniting, the Havens development was removed from the plan. Harris & Associates, the City contracted engineering firm, recommended that The City remove Havens from the plan. However, from Grassy fields the community got among other locations the sports field, Hampton Field which was previously a forest, at Hampton and LaSalle Avenues. Then a few years later, without working congruously with The City nor the neighbors, the small Piedmont Adult Evening School independently became an all Bay Area continuing education and adult school with over 10,000 students per year attending the school. This Attachment B Agenda Report Page 95
school held classes all day, in the evenings up until midnight and later on some nights, seven days a week and twelve months per year. The noise in the area in and around City Hall was substantial at all hours of the day and night. Both The City and the neighborhood worked together to try to reduce the size of the school and the impact on The City quality of life as a whole. Fortunately, the State funding for such a school stopped and the school is now much smaller. Then, as a result of the parking problems this large Piedmont Adult Evening School created to many neighborhoods beyond the area in and around City Hall, there was a push to build a several story parking garage where the Cory Reich Tennis Courts are. This time a few of the affected neighborhoods and many citizens from all over Piedmont united against removing the tennis courts and building the garage. I contacted Riley Bechtel of Bechtel Corporation about the costs to build a such a garage at that location, and he told me that at that time conservatively it would cost approximately $50,000 per parking place, not counting the costs that Piedmont would be responsible for relating any damage to the homes in and around the area, and downslope as well from that area due to land movement. The parking garage idea was cancelled as the proposed cost at $50,000 per parking space and the liability issues associated was not realistic. Then there was the proposed eminent domain of 342 Bonita Avenue to build a parking lot for the city. That proposal was stopped as 342 Bonita was nominated and accepted on a Historical Registry. After the parking garage and the eminent domain proposals, over the years more development was proposed in the neighborhood, including building a library, a post office, a coffee shop and small mall with shops, and even at one time, moving the tennis courts to near the present Guilford Tennis courts and dividing the Cory Reich tennis court land into buildable lots and selling them for single family homes, and more.

Thus, due to some of the activity that I wrote about, we have learned that this area in and around City Hall has significant springs running underground. Most of the homes in this area have some sort of a subsurface drainage system in place and at 331 Bonita Avenue there are lots of springs surrounding the home underground so we have three sump pumps installed under the home which keep the basement dry. We have another sump pump in the driveway at the bottom by our garage entrance. I believe that in The City files there are many studies regarding the soil stability and springs all around the area in and around City Hall, not only completed by Harris & Associates but also by Piedmont resident engineers and engineers from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

In closing again, with my thoughts as stated above, I am strongly requesting that the Piedmont City Council deny any changes in zoning to the area in and around City Hall including the Cory Reich Tennis Courts, City Hall, The Fire Department, Veterans Hall, 801 Magnolia Avenue, and the surrounding residential neighborhood including 342 Bonita Avenue, and remove this area for proposed housing development from Piedmont’s Draft Housing Element. I am again stating that Piedmont is unique, and therefore The City seriously take another look at the Draft Housing Plans again to see what I read regarding the numbers and reasons for the required housing units.

With my vest best regards,
Michael A. Gardner 高德迈
Piedmont City Council,
Attachment B Agenda Report Page 96
At your June 20 meeting, you apparently made two preliminary decisions regarding sites for the 215 or so low-income housing units state law requires Piedmont to accommodate. You removed the Vista Avenue tennis courts from the list of potential sites and added Blair Park. Both choices appear at odds with recommendations made, after months of study, by the city’s professional staff as well as its paid consultants and the citizen advisory committee you appointed.

You argued that designating the tennis courts, recently upgraded with help from citizen gifts, for low-income housing would discourage philanthropic giving to the city. The argument for including Blair Park was that Piedmont must use or lose its share of County funding for lowincome housing and that the Park provides opportunity for relatively fast development.

A moment’s reflection, however, calls both these arguments into question. Residents have given gifts to both the city and to the Piedmont Beautification Foundation to upgrade Blair Park. Friends of Moraga Canyon, for example, funded a landscaping plan, commissioned by the city, for the Park. Despite the plan, the city chose to leave the Park “as is.” Why? City staff argued, among other points, that improving the Park would attract users and that traffic engineers had not found a way to safely separate visitors to the Park, particularly children, from high-speed traffic on Moraga Avenue.

The city did, however, allow the family and friends of Barbara Peters, who dedicated four decades of service to the city and its residents, to place a bench in her memory in the Park she worked so hard to protect. This is the bench to which a councilperson referred when characterizing Blair Park disparagingly as “just a bench.” Is there a more effective way to discourage philanthropic giving to the city than to have councilpersons publicly disparage gifts? The argument that Blair Park presents a more timely or attractive opportunity for developers than the tennis courts also appears less than compelling. Time will certainly be lost when residents and environmental groups appeal the use of parkland to meet housing requirements.

The State does not encourage cities to use parks to meet housing mandates and no other city has done so. Piedmont, moreover, already has one of the lowest ratios in the Bay Area of parkland to residents.

Most of Blair Park that is not steep hillside is a former landfill. No one knows what the landfill contains other than San Francisco Bay mud, likely to harbor mercury and other heavy metals, from the construction of transbay BART tunnels. This circumstance will lead to time consuming testing as well as expensive and contentious mitigation. Without testing and mitigation, the city may have to indemnify developers and future managers of the apartments against claims of building defects and toxic exposure.

Building 150 or 200 apartments in Blair Park will certainly require expensive and timeconsuming realignment and extension of sewer, water, and power lines, not to mention the reconfiguration of Moraga Avenue to ensure traffic and pedestrian safety. And how long will it take to negotiate responsibility for the liability that comes with managing traffic on Moraga Avenue and its interchange with the 13 Freeway during construction? And, of course, any prospective developer will have to assess the cost of uncertainty likely to arise because some Piedmont residents assume, with good reason, that their City Charter requires a vote of the citizens to convert parkland to residential use. You may claim that loopholes allow you to avoid such a vote, but residents may see it differently and seek timeconsuming redress.

Attachment B Agenda Report Page 97
The tennis court site, on the other hand, is flat, within walking distance of elementary, middle, and high schools as well as of banks, churches, the arts center, and the local market. Piedmont Park and the new aquatics center are as close. Water, power, and sewer infrastructure is on site. No landfill or landslide risks require mitigation. And the recent completion of nearby large school facilities shows that the traffic disruptions of construction in the area can be acceptably managed.

Given the above, why would the City Council ignore the recommendations of its professional staff, paid consultants, and citizen committee and swap Blair Park for the tennis courts? Why would the Council concentrate low-income families as far from Piedmont schools, services, and social as well as civic life as physically possible? Is convenient access to a tennis court more important to us than the isolation of 200 low-income families? Our predecessors brazenly used city resources to drive minority families from Piedmont. They countenanced race-based restrictive covenants. And they allowed a private club to operate a city-owned swim facility when the Civil Rights Act of 1964 required integration of publicly operated accommodations. Given this history, how will you, or a future City Council, dissuade an objective observer from judging the choice to isolate and stigmatize 200 low-income families as anything other than a continuation of exclusionary policy? I believe most Piedmonters want the city to comply with housing mandates in a way that conveys the best of our values rather than the worst of our instincts. I urge you to honor those values as well as Council policy of distributing affordable housing throughout the city. Do the right thing for generations of Piedmonters – adopt the inclusionary recommendations of your staff, consultants, and citizens’ committee.

Ralph Catalano
Dear Councilmembers,
I was dismayed to hear from my neighbor today that the city is seriously considering a plan for new housing in Piedmont which involves tearing down city hall and other historic buildings and replacing them with six story apartment buildings. Not only would this be an eyesore next to the classic park and Exedra, a central location creates many logistical issues related to parking and traffic. It is also completely inconsistent with the architectural character that the City of Piedmont so carefully maintains through Design Review of exterior home modifications. I am familiar with Design Review as I recently completed this process so that I may replace windows with new ones of the same size in the same location.

I urge you to consider other locations off of Moraga Ave. such as the land near Coaches Playing Field and that of Bear Park which are vacant grasslands that do not impact the entire character of downtown Piedmont and which are located on a wider road with easy freeway access.

Thank you,
Karna Sacchi
Attachment B Agenda Report Page 98
Hello,
After reading recently that the City Council had directed that the draft Housing Element update be revised to include Blair Park as an affordable housing site, I'm interested in how the City proposes to develop park land for housing while complying with the State Public Park Preservation Act (California Public Resource Code Section 5400 – 5409). The State Public Park Preservation Act is the primary instrument for protecting and preserving parkland in California. Under the Act, cities and counties may not acquire any real property that is in use as a public park for any non‐park use unless compensation or land, or both, are provided to replace the parkland acquired.

What is the CIty's strategy for replacing the lost parkland? Thank you,
Tim Rood
Hi. I am writing to ask for reconsideration of alternatives better suited for rezoning and development to support to affordable housing mandated by the state. There are other locations such as grand or park avenue instead of the central town center for this purpose as the other locations are better to assess grocery stores and public transport and creat less traffic jam in central Piedmont. It will create less safety concerns. Please reconsider the safety, beauty of Piedmont.

Krammie Chan
Dear City Council Members,
As a 20+ year Piedmont resident, this is my first time addressing the Council about a matter of concern. I realize that Council has established a process for community input on the Housing Element Project, and that I have not previously offered comments. However, that inaction was largely due to my trust in the Council to analyze and balance complex factors requiring reliance on qualified experts including, among other things, socio‐economic justice considerations, state and county legal requirements for the housing element, urban planning and land use priorities and realities, and Piedmont's quality of life for all residents (future and present). I thank the Council for its efforts to deal with this complicated topic, but I would be remiss if I did not weigh in.

Having read the latest draft housing element and certain interested citizen perspectives, I am concerned that the draft element does not present a forward‐looking, realistic plan. In particular, I strongly encourage you to consider and address all of Rajeev Bhatia's sensible, concrete and unemotional recommendations (June 16, 2022 Piedmont Civic Association opinion), which range from proper counting of housing units to viable civic planning. While I am focusing here on Mr. Bhatia's input, my remarks apply equally to concrete and specific observations offered by others.

Most concerning to me is Mr. Bhatia's observation that the draft housing element is unrealistic given the reliance on City‐owned non‐surplus land. These concerns appear particularly acute with respect to the element's reliance on Civic Center area sites for lower income housing. While I believe the Council has a Attachment B Agenda Report Page 99
sincere commitment to lower income housing, I question whether the Council has adequately explored the consequences of making commitments for the Civic Center sites in this regard. To put it bluntly: by proposing to commit the City non‐surplus sites in the Civic Center area to lower income housing, do you have a clear understanding of the costs and practicalities of repurposing non‐surplus City facilities and the legal uncertainties of this path as well as the demands on infrastructure, traffic patterns, and safety for pedestrians? Saddling Piedmont with unknowns in the longer term will burden everyone, including and perhaps especially, the lower income community that we should fully integrate into our community.

Again, I urge you to consider Mr. Bhatia's input (beyond removal of Highland Green from the element, which appears to be the intent), reassess your timeline and engage additional qualified experts, including an expert who can advise the Council on an optimized balance of achieving housing element compliance and avoiding committing the City to an imprudent course that will not serve anyone's objectives in the longer term. To the extent that compliance deadlines are motivating the Council to truncate the process and move to a commitment, please work with an advisor to assess available strategies: this is not the moment to say that you are out of time without fully exploring alternatives.

Thank you for considering my perspective.

Phyllis Solomon‐Colby
Attachment B Agenda Report Page 100
League of Women Voters of Piedmont [email protected]

July 22, 2022
Piedmont City Council
City of Piedmont
120 Vista Avenue
Piedmont, CA 94611
Re: Support for More Housing in Piedmont
Dear Councilmembers:

I write to you on behalf of the League of Women Voters of Piedmont. We fully support equal opportunity in housing and believe that Piedmont should provide its fair share.

We understand that a number of residents within Piedmont have expressed concern over traffic safety and loss of open space that may arise as a result of denser housing in our community. While we can understand these concerns, we believe they represent a classic “not in my backyard” stance that has no place in a community that is striving to provide its fair share of housing.

We believe that the current Housing Element Update should include all types of housing available to us in our small community: duplexes, triplexes, small apartments, medium-sized multifamily buildings, and more accessory dwelling units rented at affordable rates. Embracing creative and robust solutions instead of fighting against change is a necessary first step in doing our part to alleviate California’s housing crisis. More housing in Piedmont means more people working in Piedmont will be able to afford to live here, seniors looking to downsize will be able to do so without relocating to a different community, and young families with small children will be able to afford to purchase a home in Piedmont.

We urge the City Council to ensure that all types of housing in all suitable sites are included in the current Housing Element Update.

Sincerely,

Lorrel Plimier
President, League of Women Voters of Piedmont

Attachment B Agenda Report Page 101
Item # 5 – Presentation of Requested Information Regarding the Draft 6th Cycle Housing Element and Direction to Staff Related to the Sites Inventory Correspondence received before Monday, August 1, 2022 at 3:00 p.m.

Dear Councilmembers,
I generally support the Next Steps outlined in the staff report, with the following two changes that I think have significant community support. Numbers are keyed to the staff report, with a new #5 item added:

3. Conduct analysis required to relocate above-moderate income units from 1221 and 1337 Grand Avenue as needed and explore innovative design solutions with higher densities along Grand Avenue while keeping building heights to four to five stories. to keep density at or below 80 du/acre. Given the great parcel configurations of the two key Grand Avenue sites (flat, just the right depth) it is possible to get densities of 120 units/acre with fourto five-story buildings. This will yield about 45 additional units in the most walkable and amenity-rich portion of town that can be taken off the Moraga Canyon area to lower the development pressure there. PREC and the various petitions on Change. org have asked for the same densities/similar changes.
5 Explore feasibility of allowing three- and four-plexes while retaining the look and feel of single-family homes in selected neighborhoods with walking access to stores, transit, and other amenities. Allowing small-plexes in existing neighborhoods is another item that has overwhelming support in the community. This allows us to gain additional units without developing large-scale new apartment complexes and greenfield development. It is my understanding that the City Attorney has advised staff that doing so would require City Charter change. However, given the City Attorney interpretation outlined in the staff report that allowing multifamily development in Public zones is not reclassification and does not require a change in the Charter, why would the same argument then not extend to other areas where residential uses are allowed? Staff should be directed to explore possibilities that would yield a modest-number, say 30 to 40 additional units over the planning period. This would be based on the assumption that 12 homes would convert from single-family to three or four plexes over the next eight years while largely retaining their outer shell.

Finally, staff and consultants need to count as part of a revised Housing Element all ADUs expected to be completed between July 1, 2022 and January 31, 2023 toward meeting the Sixth Cycle need. These units, under State law, can be counted toward both the 5th Cycle (in which we are) and 6th Cycle (starting in January 2023), because of data-projection period overlap. The City of Oakland Draft Housing Element (that is already with the state) does the same. There should be about 15 units that result. This is simply a technicality and does not require aggressive assumptions about pace of ADUs, but it does lower the housing need for the Sixth Cycle.

The above changes are modest in terms of their physical impact, yet would yield 80 to 100 additional housing units, making a significant dent in the housing need, and also result in housing in more walkable/desirable settings.

Thanks very much for your consideration,
Rajeev Bhatia
Hello Councilmembers!
I am writing to voice my support for more housing in Piedmont, including affordable housing, throughout all parts of our city. As we all know, there is a shortage of housing in California, particularly affordable housing. It is our responsibility and our city's responsibility to do our part to combat this crisis.

I know some fellow residents have voiced their concern about increased traffic, high-density housing, and the location of this housing, fearing change to this city that we all love and we all call home. But change need not necessarily be a bad thing. I believe we as a community can come up with creative solutions to each of these concerns while fulfilling our city's legal duty to build more housing.

By increasing housing capacity throughout the city, particularly in the three main corridors (Moraga Canyon, Grand Avenue, and our city center), no one neighborhood would be overwhelmed and unfairly impacted by this change. Lower density housing could be sprinkled in different locations to better integrate the housing into each area. Those locations also place new housing within walking distance to schools, jobs, and public transport, limiting the use of cars and its negative impacts on parking, traffic, and the release of greenhouse gases.

Thank you for your time!
JinAh Lee
Dear City Council Members,
I am a Piedmont resident, writing today about Item 5 on your 8/1/2022 Council Meeting agenda, urging you to submit a draft housing element to HCD that (1) retains sites in the housing element throughout the City, including in the civic Center; and (2) commit the City through a policy or program to conduct a master plan of the city-owned and commercial sites in the Civic Center that retains all the existing uses, while seeking to expand affordable housing and improving street safety.

You and staff have done an admirable job in this Housing Element process - the process has been transparent and open, with many opportunities for individuals in the community to participate.

Staff and the consultants have worked hard to follow the requirements and spirit of state housing laws, seeking to affirmatively further fair housing in locations throughout the City, not just on the fringes.

As you consider your decisions about the housing element, I hope that you will not act based on people’s fears, but will think of the ways in which your decisions about the housing element can help make Piedmont a more inclusive place while helping to chip away at the now existential threat from climate change. There are three fears I hear from community members, none of which is unsurmountable.

First, there is a general fear of density, of changing ’the way things are’. I know you as a group and members of the community do not Piedmont to be a community that pulls up the ladder of opportunity. It is also important to understand that the density being contemplated is modest - generally three and four story buildings that will fit seamlessly into the City's fabric, especially if we are willing to find sites for housing at locations throughout the City. Every neighborhood that is removed from the housing element only serves to concentrate future housing in fewer places, making both less likely overall and more impactful to our community.

Second, there are fears raised about traffic safety or congestion in the civic center. As a transportation professional, I can tell you that these fears are simply misplaced. Adding residents in the civic center is one of the smartest things we can do as a community - it is well served by transit and people can walk to schools, parks and local businesses, It also could create an opportunity to add more local serving retail or commercial uses that could allow local residents to more community amenities. One of the most critical things we need to do is to develop a plan for the civic center area, including all city-owned and commercial sites, to help identify how to add new housing, as well as modernizing many of our aging civic buildings. These things are compatible. It is also an excellent opportunity implement some of the ideas that are in the City’s Safer Streets Plan as part of a master plan for the civic center area.

Finally, there seems to be a fear about bureaucrats in Sacramento playing a game of gotcha with the City based on what is a for review draft of the housing element. Remember that this is NOT the housing element the City is adopting, but a draft that the City is seeking feedback from the State. Recently, the State Department of Justice threatened to sue a community on the Peninsula that was trying to get out of its housing responsibilities by declaring the entire town to be mountain lion habitat. The State is not looking to go after cities that are working hard to find places for housing but may need to build housing on a different, nearby site than the one that ends up in the housing element. Those are solvable problems.

I know that this housing element is new territory for the City and I appreciate the need to carefully weigh all of the considerations and be thoughtful. I hope that you will seek to produce a housing element that demonstrates our interest in being an inclusive community, welcoming our teachers, custodians, health care workers, and others who might seek to make Piedmont home.

And a housing element that is climate positive, finding places in the center of our town for housing, where it easiest for people to walk, bike and take transit.

To reiterate, please send the State a draft housing element that:

1. Includes sites for housing throughout the community, including in the civic center.

2. Includes a policy or program to master plan the city-owned and commercial areas of the civc center area, to start as soon as possible, with the aim of finding a place or places for housing, while also modernizing our aging civic buildings. As a professional planner, I would be honored by an opportunity to volunteer my time on such an effort.

Sincerely,
Hugh Louch
Dear Members of the City Council,
I am currently traveling abroad and will not be able to attend the August 1, 2022, City Council meeting at which the Housing Element will be discussed. I am writing as a supporter of the City’s efforts to meet the state’s Housing Element goals and to create affordable housing in Piedmont. I wish to provide feedback on the staff report which was just released on Thursday.

I was very disappointed to see the staff recommendation to conduct analysis to remove all of the City-owned sites in the Civic Center from the site inventory, and shift those lower-income units to 1221 and 1337 Grand Avenue. This is a bad idea for the following reasons:
• If it adopts this strategy, the City is signaling that it plans to relegate the vast majority of its affordable housing to the edges of town and bar it from the center, rather than distributing affordable housing incrementally and equitably throughout the community. • 1221 and 1337 Grand Avenue are currently non-vacant sites that are occupied by thriving businesses, including the much beloved Ace Hardware. HCD requires supporting evidence to demonstrate that non-vacant sites are likely to be redeveloped for affordable housing in the next eight years. Will the City be able to present this evidence? • The City Center is an ideal location to add a modest amount of new housing, due to its proximity to schools and transit. Opponents to Civic Center sites have raised the specter of 300 new units. However 50-60 units of housing could easily be incorporated simply by rebuilding the current single-story buildings to three stories (i.e. the height of many single-family houses in Piedmont). The answer need not be 300 or zero; we should focus our discussion on realistic and modest scenarios rather than engage in fearmongering over maximum scenarios.
• On my reading, while putting a City-owned site on the site inventory does require a “policy decision that housing should be accommodated on those sites,” the City retains full control to determine the terms of any development on its property. As the staff report states: “The City, as the property owner, would be able to develop goals and objectives for the City-owned sites and then develop an NOA and negotiate terms that meet the City’s goals.” If no developer emerges who is able to meet the City’s terms, the City has no obligation. If the City subsequently redevelops an identified site without housing, its only obligation vis-a-vis HCD is to identify an alternate site for those housing units (the same task it is facing now by removing all the city-owned sites from the inventory). • Removing the City-owned sites appears to create a gap of 80-100 moderate-income units that must be met elsewhere. The staff report gives no indication of how that gap will be met. Taking the City Center sites off the table likely pushes that increased density to other neighborhoods. Again, it would be more equitable to distribute new housing density throughout the city rather than isolating it to two locations.

Instead of removing all the city-owned Civic Center sites from the inventory, I hope that the City will do the following:

1. 2.

3. Keep at least one or two City-owned Civic Center sites on the inventory,

4. whichever the Council deems the most suitable for potential redevelopment as housing.

The

5. staff report states that a consultant will present scenarios for incorporating 53 units of housing on these sites on Monday evening. Since that analysis is not ready, I cannot speak to the viability of these scenarios, but my own hunch is that 801 Magnolia

6. and the tennis courts are the most feasible. (To be clear, I am not saying that the tennis courts should be eliminated, only that we should be flexible and open to the possibility of creating a reconfigured Corey Reich tennis facility elsewhere, or incorporating

7. new tennis courts into a housing plan.)

8. 2.

3. 4. Add a policy to the Housing Element to create a master plan for the Civic Center

5. that considers how to incorporate a modest amount of new housing into both City- and privately-owned sites and that includes street improvements that enhance safety for pedestrians, bikers, and wheelchair and stroller users. By adding this policy to the Housing

6. Element, the City would be expressing its commitment to incorporating incremental amounts of affordable housing not only at the edges of town but in the center.

7. Lastly, it is disappointing that so much of the discussion about the Housing Element at the June City Council meeting focused on one or two Civic Center sites–especially the tennis courts–and that there was so little attention devoted to the other parts of the document, including strategies for encouraging more ADUs, duplexes and small multifamily buildings in Zones A and E, creating an affordable housing fund, etc. I hope that future discussions can shift away from a myopic focus on reasons and places to say “no” to new housing, and return to the core task of the Housing Element: finding realistic ways to say “yes” and to figure out concretely how to create more housing in a way that benefits all.

Thank you as always for the care, thought, and hard work that City staff and leaders are putting into the effort to create new housing opportunities in Piedmont. The challenge is real, but the potential rewards–in terms of creating a more inclusive, thriving, and sustainable community, and doing our part to meeting the state’s dire housing crisis–are well worth the effort. Thank you.

Yours truly,
Irene Cheng
To Whom It May Concern:

I am very concerned about the proposed housing plan as part of SB9 for the city of Piedmont. This would drastically change the character of this community that so many are so proud of being a part. The community is anchored by the current city center and these changes would eliminate the heart of this community. My family, as residents of Piedmont, are opposed to the draft housing development proposal.

Please consider this analysis:
"“The Draft Housing Element states that the city plans to “Amend the Zoning Ordinance to encourage large lot splits under SB 9 by early 2027”. Piedmont’s primary method of building new Moderate and Above-Moderate Income housing may well be lot splits and duplexes on existing lots, which makes this an unreasonable time frame. The City should go further than SB9 requires and allow for building housing in Zones A and E, such as fourplexes, six-plexes, Cottage Courts, Townhouses, and similar building styles. We believe that allowing the construction of fourplexes and six-plexes will increase the likelihood of development on each site and lower the price per square foot of the new homes, which will make them available to a wider range of people. Adding more units per lot will increase the amount of tax revenue and impact fees the city collects, which will make it easier to construct subsidized affordable housing on other sites in the inventory.”
sincerely,
Heidi and Luke Schloegel
Mayor King and Council Members Cavenaugh, Andersen, McCarthy and Long, I support affordable housing in Piedmont and urge you to approve a plan that will enable multifamily affordable housing. The draft Housing Element plan before you is just the first of many steps in a ten year planning and implementation process.

After the draft HE is submitted for review by the State, you will receive not only feedback from Housing and Community Development (HCD), but also the draft programmatic Environmental Impact Report (EIR) which should be released this fall. Changes to the plan will be made by HCD, and you very likely will make changes based on the draft EIR's traffic safety study and proposed mitigation measures.

You should keep all options "on the table". This means that both public and private land should be in the site inventory. All five zones should be considered for affordable housing. Given the limited undeveloped land in Piedmont, underused parkland must be included.

The staff and its consultants have done a lot of very good work on the draft plan. The critical (and at times heated) comments from the community mean that the Planning Department has listened to all and balanced the competing interests in play. If everyone is unhappy with some part of the draft plan and your decision, this means that you are taking the right approach.

Randy Wu
Dear Sirs and Madams,
First, and importantly, I have not received the postcard providing notice of tomorrow’s meeting that was purportedly mailed on July 20. My sister, who is also a Piedmont resident, has not received this notice as well. As a consequence the city has not met its obligation under the Public Meetings Act regarding this very consequential meeting.

I have been a resident of Piedmont a good part of my life. My family moved here in 1953. I attended Piedmont schools and left after I graduated from Piedmont High in 1969 to pursue my education and life. However, my parents remained, and I witnessed the demolition of the high school, which was architecturally beautifully with spacious and light-filled classrooms, which was razed because of what turned out to be an unfounded concern that the structure was not earthquake sound. I saw the loss of Hamby’s, Foudy’s, and the Sweet Shoppe when the site was “improved” and is now occupied by Wells Fargo and offices. I saw Safeway, which had a butcher, exit to be replaced by a bank and Convenient, now fortunately Mulberry’s. I returned in 1994. The latest plan to address the legislature’s housing mandate, to raze the Veteran’s Hall, relocate the police and fire department and additionally build on the tennis courts and the grassy strip on Highland, is even more poorly conceived and in fact is distressing. The proposed changes to our city's core, would be a travesty and would forever change the character of Piedmont. While understanding the need to respond to the legislature's mandate, the community would be ill-served by these proposals.

I read the observation that moving the fire department to the outskirts of the city would be a detriment to public safety and agree. Has anyone considered the impact of rush hour gridlock on Moraga Avenue would have on the ability of emergency responders to get into the heart of the city when one of our citizens has an urgent need? I have also read objections to the proposal to build on Blair Park and the complaint that the residents of this housing would be “isolated.” They would not be any more isolated than the residents of Maxwelton Road, Abbott Way, Echo Lane, and Nellie Avenue, and traffic safety concerns would be alleviated by a traffic signal. Rezoning on Grand Avenue to accommodate multi-family housing is logical. The infrastructure already exists, and it would be situated on the only existing street in the city that could accommodate the additional traffic, particularly if restored to four lanes.

The proposal to alter the city center, which has the endorsement of individuals who are not city residents, specifically staff and the outside consultants, is insensitive and out of touch with the community. Moving the tennis courts away from the high school would be a detriment to the high school and raise its own safety issues. When I attended Piedmont High, PE included swimming and tennis at facilities across the street from the school. The school had varsity and JV men's and women's tennis teams. When my daughters attended PHS, the school fielded these teams as well. Is that no longer the case? How is moving these facilities away from the school a positive thing?
We are not Woodside, whose residents are seeking to avoid the construction of housing by prioritizing the needs of mountain lions. Our 1.7 square miles of land already developed. The legislature's mandate of 587 new housing units amounts to a 15% increase in households. (https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/piedmontcitycalifornia/INC110220.) The only discussion regarding the impact that a 15% increase in student population will have on the schools is an observation in Appendix 6 of the 6th Cycle Housing Element, published in April 2022, which does not acknowledge the magnitude of this increase and only points to the "limited capacity of the schools" to accommodate the anticipated increase in its population due to the proposed housing plan.

Census data belies the claim that school enrollment has declined due to a reduction in children residing in the community. Fully 26.4% of Piedmont residents are under the age of

18. (Id.) Without a deeper dive into the numbers, this would suggest that there are 165 children per academic year which far exceeds that of the current high school per class enrollment. The decline school population has more to do with quality which I found to be disappointing when my children attended the high school when compared to my experience thirty years earlier during a time when the city was far more economically diverse than it is now, so diverse that the girls were required to wear uniforms to mitigate the effects of economic disparity in the student population.

The plan also acknowledges EBMUD constraints pertaining to water and sewage but proposes no solution. I did not see any discussion regarding the impact of that a 15% in households will have on other city services, such as police and fire, in the report. I’m in favor of providing subsidized housing for school and city service employees, particularly the teachers. But not at the expense of the city center.

Perhaps there is a solution that include a reasonable response to the legislative mandate which would include additional units without a major disruption to the city center. The Census Bureau reports that Oakland lost 5,526 residents in 2021 from the previous year. (https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/oaklandcitycalifornia.) There is also a significant amount of unused and underutilized land in Oakland. Perhaps the needs of everyone would be better served by entering into a cap and trade type arrangement with the City of Oakland where the construction of new units would be subsidized in part by Piedmont taxpayers. This is not a nimby proposal; it is a pragmatic proposal intended to ensure that the character of the city center is maintained, and the people needing affordable housing get what they need.

Best regards,
Anne Cobbledick Gritzer
July 31, 2022
Dear Members of the City Council,
I am writing in support of the City adopting a Housing Element that will lead to the actual creation of affordable housing in Piedmont. The Housing Element provides an opportunity to create a framework to create a more vibrant, inclusive and self-sufficient community with housing choices available to households across the income spectrum, including those who work in our schools, homes and businesses who currently cannot afford to live here. I truly believe we can come together as a community if we can focus the conversation on saying yes to the ways we can incorporate modest amounts of new housing throughout the entire city.

I have the following feedback on the staff report released on Thursday. • I am surprised by the addition of 1221 and 1337 Grand Avenue on the site inventory list for low- income housing. While certainly appropriate places for affordable housing in terms of location, both sites are currently built out and occupied by thriving businesses, including the very busy and neighborhood-enhancing Ace Hardware. Redevelopment of these properties are theoretically possible but would require the cooperation of the current owners and even then are unlikely to be economically feasible due to lack of leverage to negotiate a feasible sales price. In addition, affordable housing funding would trigger requirements under state and federal relocation law to pay for relocation of the existing businesses which would add significant cost. For these reasons I question that they will be able to meet HCD requirements for non-vacant sites that require evidence that they are likely to be redeveloped for affordable housing in the next eight years. • I also encourage the City to keep at least one or two City-owned sites in the Civic Center in the site inventory. This would further the goal of distributing affordable housing equitably throughout the community. The City Center is an ideal location to add a modest amount of new housing, due to its proximity to schools, transit, business and recreational amenities. In fact, putting housing there would allow residents who might otherwise need to drive to schools, the rec center, the pool or tennis courts to instead walk and thus reduce traffic. City-owned sites can also be provided to an affordable developer at a below market cost (likely through a long-term ground lease) and would greatly enhance the feasibility of such a development over those on privately owned sites. I think there are many possible creative solutions to modestly increase the density in the area while also retaining and improving public facilities. • City owned land in Moraga Canyon presents the best opportunity for the feasible development of affordable housing in the near term as it is both city controlled and vacant. I am concerned that the timeline laid out for Moraga Canyon sites will not be sufficient for the City to retain its current $2M+ Alameda County A-1 Bond allocation to use for the development of affordable housing there. This county money would go directly to an affordable housing developer in the form of a fifty-five year, grant-like loan that would then leverage other funds to pay for the development. Without a local contribution of this type, the potential affordable housing project will be at a disadvantage in competing for state funding. I encourage the City to figure out a faster process that would keep open the possibility that these funds could be committed by the county deadline extension date.

Thank you for the thoughtfulness and hard work that City staff and leaders have put toward this challenging effort. As someone who has worked to develop affordable housing for the last 30 years, I know that the most important factor in success is local government support. I am very appreciative of the work you are doing to ensure that Piedmont can continue to evolve, change and become a more inclusive community.

Yours truly,
Alice Talcott
Dear Council members,
I’m very aware of the huge task you have to conform to state mandates for new housing as well as the needs of the community. Please, as you consider sites, keep in mind the CONGESTION in town center, especially during school sessions, and the desire to retain a small town feel to our little city. I think it is imperative that , we the citizens, have an opportunity to vote on proposals once you’ve made a recommendation. It should be a slow process in order to not destroy what we have created.

Good luck.

Elene Manolis
Dear Council Members,
I am aware of the difficult task you have to create new housing in Piedmont. However, before you make any decisions, I hope we, the citizens, will be able to vote on your proposals.

Thank you for your consideration.

Freddi Robertson
Dear Members of the City Council,

I am writing to you because I wholeheartedly support creating affordable housing in Piedmont. I applaud the City’s efforts to meet the state’s Housing Element goals and to create affordable housing in Piedmont. We have a beautiful, safe town with excellent schools and a variety of enjoyable community events. I believe we can keep these fine community attributes AND open our town to a more diverse population.

I believe it is important to include housing in all three main corridors: Moraga Canyon, Grand Ave, and the City Center. That would allow moderate densities in each location which would not overwhelm any one neighborhood. I want to repeat that some of the affordable housing needs to be integrated into the Civic Center, not relegated to the edges of town.

Tastefully designed duplexes, triplexes, and small apartments can fit in with the present housing stock and should be added incrementally and fairly distributed throughout the town.

And finally, I would like to see Piedmonters be responsible and do our share in relieving the Bay Area’s housing crisis.

Thank you for reading my statement, and I will be attending the City Council meeting tonight, All my best,

Elizabeth Mann King
Hi,
I wanted to add my voice to the support of building housing in Piedmont. I’ll try to be concise:

I do support the building in the center of town and adding more units for walkability to schools, especially supporting affordable housing for teachers. We as a town can make the effort to retain teachers with great salaries and affordable homes.

I do support some moderate building units around Grand Ave and Moraga.

I do especially support looking at the zoning laws for the very large houses in Piedmont, and turning some of those into duplexes or expanding to 3-6plex multi-family homes. Please keep this at the top of the list!
Thank you for your time and patience with this complex matter, Emily Keyishian
I would suggest a change in zoning along Grand Avenue to allow for up to 8 units or more depending on the lot size and possibly commercial/residential. This street makes the most sense to change the zoning.

Thanks,
Ken Evans
To the Members of the City Council,
I am traveling and unable to participate in this evening’s meeting, so I’m glad for the opportunity to comment via email.

I have been participating in the Housing Element process for some time and I appreciate the many opportunities that have been provided for community involvement.

I support changes to the City’s General Plan and Zoning ordinance in order to promote the addition of housing and the goal of an inclusive and welcoming community. Meeting these goals will advance other objectives as well, by providing housing in a place that offers walkability, transit service and proximity to job and educational opportunities.

Specifically, I urge the City to approve a sites inventory that:

1. Recognizes possible opportunities to include housing in the Civic Center area, possibly through upgrading public uses such as the Art Center with multi-use buildings of 3-5 stories that include ground floor public space and upper story housing.

2. Envisions housing additions throughout Piedmont in the form of ADUs and duplexes, triplexes, and fourplexes, with more substantial additions in the three areas of Moraga Road, Grand Avenue and the Civic Center.

3. Makes possible the addition of housing at a range if affordability levels.

Thank you for your consideration.

Ellen Greenberg
I am deeply concerned by the proposed addition of close to 200 units of high density housing in the center of Piedmont in the school zone. While I understand that we are required by the state to submit a plan to add affordable housing, this is not an aesthetic or safe solution.

I am not opposed to the addition of affordable housing to the city and support increasing diversity in Piedmont, but to high density housing in the center. I would be equally opposed to a luxury apartment building in this location.

The center of Piedmont is far from being a bustling commercial zone where a 6 story building will fit in. Not only would this be an eyesore, it would be a serious safety issue as children attending four schools walk through this area. The grossly inadequate parking of one half space per unit which is allowed for high density housing of this type will only exacerbate the issue.

To meet the state’s unreasonable demand to accommodate 587 units without compromising the safety of our schoolchildren and the character of the center requires expanding the number of sites used for the housing in order to decrease the density at the center. We cannot afford to dismiss Grand Avenue, Blair Park or the 9 acres of land by the reservoir. The latter would clearly require negotiation with EBMUD, something I believe the state should facilitate given the scarcity of land available in Piedmont.

Karna Sacchi
I happened to learn about today’s meeting to discuss proposed redevelopment of the city core to bend to the legislature’s mandate that the city increase its housing stock by 587 units, which is a 15% increase according to date obtained from the US Census, and will be considering a proposal to raze the Veterans’ Memorial Hall and Fire Department in order to build housing.

Please be advised that I did not receive notice of this meeting, which I understand was sent via postcard. I live at 424 Scenic Avenue. Neither of next door neighbors received notice. My sister who lives on Craig Avenue did not receive notice. I would suspect that many others in the community received no notice.

This proposal is deeply flawed as is the proposal to put housing on the grassy strip and on the tennis courts. It would forever change the core of our city’s civic center, and in fact destroy it. I have written in more detail to the City Council but am writing to you to put the city on notice that any action taken today will be voidable due to the city’s failure to comply with the state open meetings act.

Best regards,
Anne C. Gritzer
Dear City Council,
Before I begin, I want to thank you for the hard work and extra hours that have been required to create a draft Housing Element. I applaud your continued commitment to getting the Housing Element submitted on time and in compliance with state mandates.

I am writing to express my deep disappointment and concern about the latest Staff Report that recommends that the city center sites be removed from this cycle of the Housing Element.

Our family has been living in Piedmont since the late 1960s and we currently reside at 30 Sierra Avenue. Both of the two homes we have lived in have been within two blocks of the city center.

It was especially beneficial for us to live in the center of town because my brother and I could walk to Havens school. At the time we moved here my mom was working as a district attorney in downtown Oakland and she did not have a driver's license. Because my mom never drove a car, public transportation has always been important to our family. I began taking the bus from the city center in the 1970s when I was 10 years old. I also was hit by a car on Highland Avenue in the early 1970s and lost my two front teeth in the accident so I know that safety has never been fully addressed in this area.

Our family has reaped the rewards of living within a block or two of the PIedmont city center for over 50 years. I walked to school from Kindergarten through high school every day. Before the pandemic, my dad was still taking the bus to work in San Francisco at age 90.

Because I have experienced the privileges and benefits of living in this beautiful city and near its central hub, I feel even more strongly that city-owned sites in the city center (or at least one city center site) should be included in the Housing Element. The explanation in the staff report that the city will lose control of these sites runs counter to what other housing experts have expressed in numerous public comments and meetings.

I am aware that a group surfaced in early July, posting a petition with an alarming tone, “Protect central Piedmont from overdevelopment.” I understand that building housing in our city center is something new for Piedmont and may come as a surprise to some who are not familiar with the careful planning that has been underway. I found the petition unfortunately misleading, especially to those who may not be familiar with the details of the state-mandated Housing Element. I sincerely hope this fear had nothing to do with the recommendation to remove all city center sites from the Housing Element.

The future of our community depends on our interconnection with Alameda county, the Bay Area, and the state of California. Addressing our region’s dire lack of affordable housing for all, including teachers, and young families, is in my opinion of the utmost urgency. The largest building in Piedmont’s city center is our new Piedmont High School STEM building The size of the building symbolizes our community’s shared value of quality education for our Piedmont students. However, we must realize our schools are at risk of being critically under-enrolled in coming decades as enrollment is projected to continue to decline in all of Alameda county and at even higher rates in areas like Piedmont that have much higher median incomes. Cities like Piedmont are simply no longer within reach of most young and middle-aged working families with young children. Piedmont has an opportunity to redesign its city center in a tasteful and forward-thinking manner to allow for gentle density that will support our schools and the shared values of our community.

We have an opportunity to do a beneficial re-design of the city center to reconfigure traffic flow for greater safety, upgrade public transit stops and bolster the area for greater pedestrian safety at the city center while adding a modest number of units in this area. Please do not abandon all sites in the city center.

I am in favor of adding and keeping other sites on the Housing Element to allow for more gentle density in areas all over Piedmont. I find the idea of completely backing off from the city center sites particularly upsetting as a committed citizen who has been pro-actively involved in studying and learning about the Housing Element.

Sincerely,
Elise M. Collins
Item # 5 – Presentation of Requested Information Regarding the Draft 6th Cycle Housing Element and Direction to Staff Related to the Sites Inventory Correspondence received before Monday, August 1, 2022 at 4:30 p.m.

Fifty years of research tells us that day-to-day problems encountered by all communities, regardless of income distribution or history, become more divisive and difficult to solve in cities that create, by policy, low-income, stigmatized enclaves. And although the architectural community may believe otherwise, experience tells us that design alone will not overcome the problem.

The stigma associated with concentrated, low-income enclaves has led to other approaches including “voucher” programs that enable low-income families to participate in the rental market. This approach will not work in the Bay Area because the supply of affordable housing remains so limited that vouchers simply lead to inflated rents.

The “next-best” alternative has been “scattered site housing” or affordable units broadly distributed, in small groupings, in a community. Research finds that this approach creates less stigma and leads to better integration of families into the schools and social life of a community than do larger, concentrated enclaves. I suggest that Piedmont should pursue the scattered site strategy. Indeed, this approach remains the housing policy adopted by the City Council.

I propose a “5 by 40” approach meaning we should find 5 sites where 40 units can be reasonably integrated into the city. I recommend 40 units because research suggests that the relationship between project size and stigma is not linear. After about 40 units the problem accelerates quickly.

I nominate 5 sites: (1) the corporation yard (yes, my "backyard"); (2) the skateboard park near the corporation yard; (3 and 4) 1221 and 1337, and (5) the land occupied by Highland Way. The last 15 units could go on the site city staff has identified on Park Avenue.

The only “new” site here is Highland Way. The city owns the land. Using it for housing would not require replacing an existing city facility. All utilities and infrastructure are on site. Adjacent uses are commercial and institutional with height and mass consistent with multi-unit housing. Keeping 20 yards or so at the western terminus as a street would, moreover, preserve access for the gas station and pedestrian steps to the church.

I look forward to seeing other schemes for a 5 by 40 solution.

Ralph Catalano, Ph.D.

Dear Councilmembers,
I write this email as a supporter of the City’s commitment to meeting the state’s Housing Element goals for the purpose of creating more housing and more affordable housing in Piedmont. Thank you for all the work you have done to date.

I feel that it’s important to recognize that, throughout this process, the very people who might want to live in smaller, affordable and centrally located units, (i.e., teachers, city workers, smaller families and lower income families) are un/under-represented in Piedmont. We don’t have a lot of renters here so we won't hear many of their voices, unified or not. The individuals and/or families who might want to live in smaller, affordable units in Piedmont might not feel comfortable addressing this issue because they are not (yet) residents of Piedmont themselves. It is unlikely that you will ever hear directly from the vast majority of the very people who need affordable housing. There will likely be no petition started by them.

In the spirit of bringing in those voices to this discussion, I will say that I was disheartened to read the staff’s latest recommendation to analyze the removal of the City-owned sites in the Civic Center from the site inventory. If the city were to move forward with this policy, it would indicate its plans to allocate nearly all of its affordable housing capacity to the edges of town. If you, our leaders, take up this recommendation, you would be effectively banning any housing from the center of town rather than distributing affordable housing incrementally and equitably throughout the community. This doesn’t make good politics, policy, or much sense.

While opponents to Civic Center sites have cautioned against the possibility of adding 300 new units, the center of Piedmont is the ideal location to add a modest amount of new housing, for example, 40-60 new units or so (somewhere in between nothing and 300 andon the lower side).

It certainly doesn’t have to be all or nothing.

Rather than removing all the city-owned Civic Center sites from the inventory, I hope that the City would consider:
• Maintaining one or two City-owned Civic Center sites on the inventory, whichever the Council deems the most suitable for potential redevelopment as housing. • Adding a program/policy to the Housing Element to create a master plan for the Civic Center which addresses how to incorporate a modest amount of new housing into both City- and privately-owned sites and that takes into consideration improvements that enhance safety for pedestrians, bikers, and wheelchair and stroller users as well as traffic flow.

Creating smaller housing units centrally located will enable more residents to take advantage of the services and schools; it's environmentally sound, keeps distribution equitably throughout Piedmont and keeps possibilities open since the path to actually building affordable housing is unfolding in real time, and it's too soon to take anything off the table.

Anyone who has lived in Piedmont for a while might recall how hard it was for Mulberry’s Market to get permitted. (It took them years, and they were just trying to give Piedmonters a good cup of coffee!) My point is that some incremental changes in Piedmont can, and in my opinion, will improve the city. Maintaining the option to include some new, affordable housing all over Piedmont -- including the Civic Center -- would improve our city and makes the most sense. Taking it off the table, at this time, doesn't.

More housing in central Piedmont could be quite suitable for teachers and staff at our schools as well as city workers, smaller families and older families. Again, please consider their voices, too. It is time for this city’s leadership to be visionary not reactionary. People are scared of change but strong leadership can navigate these choppy waters to a place that embraces change and is not stuck in an exclusive mentality.

As always, thank you for all of the hard work that City staff and leaders are putting into the effort to create new housing opportunities in Piedmont. There are a lot of challenges but the upside is well worth it, and I would love to see a Piedmont where new and more affordable housing can be found throughout Piedmont.

My best,
Jill Lindenbaum
Dear Piedmont City Council,
Thank you to you and staff for your continued work on the Housing Element. As you continue your deliberations, our family like to implore you to keep in mind that we have both a legal and moral obligation to plan for an additional 587 households in our community. In much of the commentary from our fellow residents, we hear a sincere interest in meeting that obligation.

Hopefully everyone understands the important benefits of including more diverse housing types (from accessory units to multifamily buildings) and homes that will provide a wide range of accommodations from family homes to young adults and seniors. These new homes will increase our student enrollment, provide homes affordable to the workforce of the City and School District thereby reducing turnover and creating economic stability. It will also make us a more diverse and vibrant community.

We also hear that people generally concur that we should plan for homes for “everyone everywhere”. Scattering the new residents of Piedmont in multiple neighborhoods is both sensible and frankly given the availability of sites, the only practical approach. This consensus begins to break down only when we home in on particular sites and neighborhoods. We are happy to see that staff appears to be ensuring “Blair Park” is being added into the inventory.

Yet, we were disappointed that the Corey Reich tennis courts are no longer under consideration.

While disappointed, this is the type of compromise that we can all adjust to.

That said, we are quite concerned that it appears the recommendation is to withdraw the city owned sites from the inventory and to move a significant allocation of low- and moderateincome apartments to Grand Ave. This would be a serious mistake, and one that frankly the state Housing and Community Development Department is unlikely to accept. If the City does not wish to engage in a mixed-use (Public services and housing) on the same site, it could ensure that housing in the civic center is accommodated as part of a master plan that enables one city site to be used for housing and the public uses confined to another. For example, 801 Magnolia, now owned by the City but leased to a non-profit for a nominal amount, was formerly the Christian Science Reading Room. As far as we know, it has never been used for official city business or services. It is surrounded by civic uses, including the new 4 story wing of the high school (the new building is 3 commercial stories which translate into a height closer to 4 residential stories). 801 Magnolia could also be redeveloped to include commercial or civic spaces on the ground floor. There are many opportunities to be creative here.

The number one stated complaint to housing in the civic center is the potential increase in traffic and the already existing safety concerns. Again, all can agree that Highland Ave, and particular Highland/Vista intersection and the Highland Ave curve around Piedmont Park are a serious problem. As part of any re-imagining of the civic center (or even if it remains status quo) these issues need to be addressed. Yet linking these two issues is entirely inappropriate. Piedmont will be adding 587 households somewhere in Piedmont. What is the one geographic area that almost every Piedmonter drives to relatively frequently? City Center! The more households you locate outside city center, the more people will drive there. Adding fewer than 100 homes or apartments here, will alleviate driving to civic center overall. Further, as stated above as part of the re-inventing of civic center there are multiple traffic and parking mitigation plans that can be put in place. People often react negatively to change, but that change can create opportunity. We have lived in Piedmont long enough to remember the uproar over adding a traffic signal at Wildwood and Grand Ave (near the Shell station). It is hard to believe people didn’t want it, but they had fears of cars stacking up and waiting at the light, waiting an extra minute at a light to get to work, etc. Guess what, we can’t imagine trying to cross that intersection without it and most people who live in Piedmont don’t even recall a time when there was no light there.

It is good that people are coming together to deal with the Highland safety issues. The coalition to deal with the safety issues should be listened to on that issue. However, the issue should not derail housing in civic center. The problems they are concerned about can be improved with new housing in the civic center.

Last, but not least, we are in favor of housing on Grand Ave, just not as a substitute for other locations and not as a substitute for Ace Hardware (one of the few viable businesses in our community). Because the land along Grand is privately owned, it will be much harder to finance housing for low and moderate income people in this location because of land costs. Unless the City has very significant evidence that the private owners of these sites and the businesses located thereon, are interested in selling these sites, it is hard to imagine HCD will accept Grand Ave sites in the inventory. If the City has such evidence, they should be included, and this would enable somewhat fewer homes in the Moraga Canyon area and make up for the loss of the tennis courts.

The bottom line is we need all these locations in the inventory to enable flexibility to actually get adequate housing, particularly serving lower income families, to be built.

We have lived in Piedmont for 30 years. We raised two great young men here. Many Piedmonters simply could not afford to move to Piedmont. Home prices and rents have far outstripped middle-income salaries. We can do better. Let’s create more opportunity for everyone throughout Piedmont.

Sincerely,
Carol Galante and Jim Roberts
Matthew Roberts, PHS 2005
Chris Roberts, PHS 2007
Dear City Council,
In June I volunteered to help imagine possible new municipal buildings or a 'civic center' for the City of Piedmont. I have prepared some sketches, and have enjoyed imagining what form such a project could take. Kevin Jackson and Pierce MacDonald have been helpful by providing some basic information. The primary purpose of my drawings is to facilitate discussion. Please look at them as diagrams, not designs. It's an interesting puzzle to solve and would ultimately involve a whole team, but an achitectect's imaginings can be useful at this point. This exercise establishes that there is room on the site to house the desired functions and uses. What goes where, what is adjacent to what, and how space is allocated are all questions that would need to be addressed.

I propose the 'Piedmont Civic Center' be the subject of some student design work. It could be the subject of a design studio at the University of Notre Dame's architecture department or a project of INTBAU, the International Network of Traditional Building Architecture and Urban Design (intbau.org). This is part of The Prince's Foundation, which has projects all over the world. I'm a member of INTBAU's College of Traditional Practitioners.

I have designed many projects in Piedmont, and know and love its architecture. In addition to functional and practical considerations, the 'design problem' is adding a significant new structure to Piedmont's architectural 'ensemble' in a manner that augments and enhances its rich character.

Kirk
p.s. In Europe in May I took pictures of varied spaces that inspire:

Piedmont City CouncilAugust 1, 2022

Piedmont City Council
August 1, 2022