1 From: Joseph Batchelder
Sent: Tuesday, October 28, 2025 9:23 PM
To: Planning Commission
Subject: Re: Planning Commission Regular Meeting 10/28
Good evening,
I was the gentleman who called in this evening with a question for the presenter from station Park Green.
I w
as a little perturbed that I was not given a chance to clarify my comments after they were misinterpreted by both the representative and the council. I understand that there is only so much time for public comment but given that I was the only member of the public present I felt it would have been appropriate if I could have reiterated my question so that it could be better understood.
My question was in no way attempting to speak to my perceived lack of value from the inability of station Park Green to fill their retail spaces but in reality, to the perceived lack of value that the current apartment tenants will receive from their proposed change of use.
I understand the focus of the meeting was primarily about the retail space and whether or not Essex could make adjustments to potentially get tenants in the door. And I understand as a planning counsel your primary goal is to keep a large corporation that does lots of business in the area happy, I'm sure that the $50,000 donation they were making to local park renovations in no way factored into your decision.
The city of San Mateo wants local businesses to thrive and tax revenue to come in and, they definitely didn't want Essex to move their HQ from the building by the Kaiser and whole foods somewhere out of San Mateo entirely.
So the comitte making the concession for them to save probably tens of thousands of dollars a month by moving their employees into a building they already own, made sense. In addition to the hardships presented by both COVID and the current political climate I'm sure it made it difficult for existing businesses or new businesses to expand, especially into retail spaces that were not necessarily ready to occupy as it seemed from some of your comments.
My concerns come from the fact that the representative stated, what I believe to be facetiously, that the additional staff presence in the complex will present no additional complications or parking challenges.
I w
anted to stay for the record that as it stands the complex already has difficulty with tenants being able to find parking in this area and surrounding streets. It's unclear if the area inside of the complex is technically public street? But large portions of it are regularly occupied by employees who work at local businesses outside of the complex, but park here and walk to their offices instead of parking elsewhere.
I did email Chris the year previous with my concerns with the complexes lack of ability to enforce their community guidelines including loose dogs and excessive noise, parking and the like, but as you would expect I was given mostly empty corporate platitudes.
I did shoot him another email after we concluded reiterating and clarifying my question to see if there would be any benefit to the actual tenants who live here, instead of just a nebulous "local community"
2 that may or may not potentially get a couple extra restaurants in an area with lots of traffic and limited parking.
I did appreciate that one of the comitte members called out the fact that this move would be a potential windfall for essex saving on rent, and while I'm happy they are maybe making some rent concessions to potential future tenants, making the "community center" easier to access, and writing a check to the city, I feel as though none of those do anything to address the fact that the rent in this complex is absurdly high, considering the fact that they do such a poor job living up to the promises they laid out when I and other tenants agreed to rent here.
I'm sure if you talk to any of the tenants that actually live here they would much prefer a 5% rent reduction, as opposed to three additional overpriced fast casual dining opportunities in the area, and 100 Essex employees fighting for parking near by.
Appreciate your time.