Evening, it's Monday, June 22nd, 7 p.m.

and we'll begin today's planning board meeting and to kick us off, we'll have four members of weekly just in the pledge of allegiance.

And um just before we formally kick things off, I would like to share some rules about meaning conduct and this is official business of the city of Alameda, so um please no disruptions for those both in the room and online.

They're listening in, so uh let's be respectful for everyone for sharing their views.

And if not um there are some consequences according to Penal Code Section 302.

There are warnings and continuity violations will lead to additional action.

So just want to say that.

So we could convene this meeting.

And with that, we'll go ahead and start with roll call.

Good evening.

Board member Hom here.

Board member Ruiz.

Here.

Present.

Board Member Wang.

Board Member Sahaba.

Present.

And President Cisneros.

Here.

Okay, we have a quorum and board member uh Sue is absent today.

Okay.

Noted.

And do we have any non-agenda public comments?

Oh.

Well, actually, there's agenda changes.

Oh, do we have sorry, agenda changes?

Yes.

No.

I don't think so.

Yeah, I think potentially we might want to move uh 5B in front of 5A.

Maybe it's a uh heavier meeting agenda item.

I don't know if uh the board agrees or uh I would agree to that.

Yeah, okay.

And uh we don't have to make a motion for that, right?

We just make that change.

No, you should do it by motion.

Okay.

We have a motion.

Do we have a second?

Yeah, I motion for the change in sequence of uh agenda items 5B first and 5A.

I'll second.

Okay, all those in favor say aye.

Opposed and one absence.

Okay.

All right.

We have the agenda changed, and then moving on to agenda item three.

Any non-agenda public comments?

I don't see any hands raised online and I have no speaker slips.

Okay, great.

And then moving on to the consent calendar.

Um do we have uh any discussion?

If not, then do we have um any public comments for the consent calendar, which are the draft meeting minutes for June 8th?

No public comments on that.

No, okay.

Uh and we do have an absence.

Um, board member Dewey's from that day.

So do we have a motion?

Yeah, I'll move to adopt the consent calendar.

Okay, in a second.

I'll second.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

I abstain.

I want to be abstention.

Great.

Alright, and moving on to regular agenda items.

So um formally 5B, which is um a review of the Harbor Bay Parkway um project for the Oakland routes.

This is a public workshop.

Do we have uh staff presentation?

Good evening, President Cisneros and members of the planning board, Brian McGuire, planner three here to present item five B.

Um, which is a planning board study session item or workshop on the Oakland roots proposal to host professional soccer matches at their existing headquarters and training facility uh next to the Oakland Airport and the Harbor Bay Business Park.

You can see in the image here, um, thought of simulation of what uh game day atmosphere might look like with a full house and amenities primarily in the existing parking lot behind the office building, which is off screen left.

In case you aren't familiar with the site, 1150 and 1220 Harbor Bay Parkway are at the southeastern tip of Bay Farm Island, um basically as close as you can get to the airport without being on port property.

Of course, this was the former home of the American football team, the Oakland Raiders, uh, before they moved to Las Vegas.

1150 on the left is the training facility and the practice fields, and then 1220 on the right is the office building and parking lot.

The routes propose to install modular grandstands, including a press box and seats for up to 7,600 fans, plus some field level seating, and bring in food vendors and merchandise booths and temporary restroom facilities for games.

The routes are proposing to host about 24 professional soccer matches per year with up to 8,000 fans in attendance.

The games will be primarily on Saturdays with some Wednesday evenings.

The game times dovetail nicely with the business park's typical nine to five workday.

In addition to those larger events for the routes, they may they anticipate about 10 additional events with between 500 and 2500 attendees.

The routes have been very clear that they're not proposing for this to serve as any kind of a music or concert venue.

The routes are proposing to rely on the existing supply of surface parking in the business park.

They're in discussions with a number of the property owners in the area and working on shared parking agreements.

Obviously, those can only go so far before the project is approved and in place, but it's a work in progress.

We estimate that there would be a need for about 3200 parking spaces on game days for a sellout crowd.

The roots inventory suggests that there are about 5,200 spaces within a half a mile walk or about which is about 10 minutes walk from the facility.

Which, if the park station USA versus Australia watch party from last Friday's any indication, there's there's some some overlap in those bike users and soccer fans in Alameda.

Just here, since this wasn't in your package, there's a sort of photo simulation of a street level look at what the back of the bleachers would look like from Harbor Bay Parkway at the ground level, the existing training facility there on the right, and then you can see the back of the grandstand and the light light facilities there.

Um the closest use in our zoning code for this would be similar to like an auditorium or maybe a theater type use, but conducted outdoors.

So the outdoors part is why this would be subject to the conditional use permit process that we're here to discuss.

To be clear, we're not asking you to approve the project or make findings tonight, but in order to approve the project at a future meeting, the planning board would be would need to be able to make a number of findings.

In addition to the use permit findings, you would need to make the standard design review findings as well as make a SQL determination.

Our analysis of the project is not complete.

However, staff anticipates relying on the 2021 general plan EIR, which anticipated significant increases in employment in the business park and therefore increases in vehicle miles traveled.

We think the project would be eligible for sequel streamlining pursuant to sequence guidelines, section 15183, projects that are consistent with a general plan where an EIR was certified.

The staff report included a number of draft conditions of approval covering what we think are the areas of most interest to the planning board and the community.

That goes from what how many events at what capacities we would require a detailed traffic control plan approved by the city engineer and public works director, safety and operations plan approved by police and fire for game day operations, number of security staff, sworn police, traffic, you know, emergency personnel, etc.

We've talked a little bit about some of the transportation management solutions.

I think the applicant will cover some more of their strategies.

The project has to comply with the city's noise ordinance, needs to go through FAA review, mostly for the lights, which are tall enough to catch the attention and need to be probably lit appropriately with those blinking red lights, as well as uh review by the airport land use commission before the project can move forward for compatibility with the airport.

We're also mindful of the city's dark skies ordinance and the need to make sure these modern LED fixtures are shielded, protected down, projected downward towards the field, and not causing excess light and glare beyond the project site.

We're also suggesting the project be subject to an annual review since this is uh a unique use for us, and we would want to regularly check in to see how we're doing, what can we do better, and give the planning board an opportunity to weigh in and the public a sort of routine opportunity to to check in on compliance with the use permit conditions.

The staff report suggests some questions for the planning board in order to frame the discussion.

Basically, are we on the right track with the draft conditions of approval to ensure the project is a compatible use?

Um we're waiting on completion of the formal traffic impact analysis, which would include a trip distribution model, which will tell us how many people, you know, at the end of a game are going down what streets, and you know, are they primarily predicted based on the understanding of the origin destination for that roots have experienced in their previous three homes, including Laney College, Cal State East Bay, and the Coliseum, of course, and where their fan base is coming from, and obviously what the site characteristics would dictate.

And that trip distribution model, among other things, will give us sort of an idea of what we need to put in the traffic control plan to address anything we're hoping to minimize or avoid on those game day operations.

Also, this is not an office building or an apartment building with your standard architectural package that the board's used to reviewing.

I mean, these are bleachers sitting in the grass with some temporary facilities.

Um so we're also want to make sure the board is comfortable with what's provided in order to make the design review decision when the time comes, or is there additional information that the board needs?

Um we did receive a few uh pieces of written correspondence, which are posted uh on the project on the staff report webpage, including a couple of letters from the Chamber of Commerce and downtown Alameda Business Association supporting the project as well as a property owner in the business park who call it qualified support, expressed some concern about the week weekday potential impacts for games that happen on weekdays in terms of conflicting with traffic and parking needs in the business park.

Lydia Tan from The Roots is here and has a presentation as well.

If the board would like, we might suggest you hear their presentation before we move on to any questions.

Thanks for your time.

Thank you so much.

Good evening, President Cisneros and members of the board.

I'm Lydia Tan.

I'm the Chief Real Estate Officer for the Oakland Roofs and Seoul.

Thank you very much for this opportunity to speak with you today.

I'm gonna talk a little bit more in detail about certain aspects of oh, this, okay, awesome.

Which one would okay?

Go into a little bit more detail on a few things.

So the first is just a little bit about what am I not doing?

Okay.

Okay, anyway, so so the Oakland's Roots and Soul, we are a professional organization, but very much steeped in mission and purpose, and everything we do has uh essentially a triple bottom line around being an excellent sporting team, doing well for the community and doing well for investors as well.

Our club structure right now, we have a men's professional team, the Oakland Roots, we have a woman's preprofessional team called the Oakland Soul, and then we have a youth development academy called Project 1510.

Uh as uh Brian was mentioned, we uh occupy the former Oakland Raiders facility uh that is our uh corporate headquarters as well as our training facility for all of our teams as well.

Some photos of of the area.

Uh we occupied on a year by year license that was given to us by the uh County of Alameda and City of Oakland uh since 2021.

And so since then, we have been not only using the facility for ourselves, but also for a number of other civic and corporate uses, and just here's a list of the kinds of things that we've been having on site, the the events that we've been uh sponsoring on site since um our um being able to call this our home.

Uh, since let's see, somewhere of 25.

So for about a year now, uh we were able to enter into a long-term lease, and it's been able to actually allow us to think a little bit more strategically about how we use the site.

It actually is the reason we were able to uh attract the Australian national men's team to use a training facility during the World Cup.

I just left at Australia uh event just now where we had 500 Australian fans come and root their team as we're watching them play practice.

Uh just some photos of things that have been happening, both with the community, and then also on June 3rd, we had a community training session where we had about 900 uh uh local community fans come in and were invited to uh observe the Australian national team as they were practicing.

So we learned a lot actually about that particular event in terms of working closely with the city around transportation, logistics, and parking, uh, and we were hoping to be able to take those lessons learned to apply them to next year.

Uh we've also been starting to spend time in the Alameda community, just a few lists of things that we've been involved with and uh working closely with a number of um Alameda based um companies, both in terms of uh having them as partners but also uh working with a number of businesses in terms of actually being vendors and suppliers to the company.

So uh as Brian mentioned, um we are uh proposing to build an interim venue, bring in some stands, uh, and do some pop-up activation uh during our event days.

We've if you've been watching if you've been following the team, you know that we've had um quite the story in terms of trying to find our home, our permanent home for our teams.

Uh as you can see, we've been in four locations over the last six years.

Uh the main three are down at the bottom here.

Um, with the Oakland Coliseum, still so very uncertain, and we're getting more and more feedback that even 2027 is gonna be very difficult.

We've had to really pivot and think about what 2027 looks like.

Eventually, we do expect to be either at the Oakland Coliseum or at Howard Terminal.

We are talking to both the port around Howard Terminal and as well as the future developers of Oak Coliseum as being our permanent home, but for the next three to five years, while those two plans are moving along.

We'd really like to find a place that we can call our home and not have to move every two years.

It's very disruptive for everybody, including our fans.

So as we've been looking at potential new home, these are kind of the vision and goals that we put out.

We'd like to be close to Oakland, Alameda, the Inner East Bay, that's where the bulk of our fans are.

We really do want to provide an amazing intimate experience for our fans.

We'd love to field both the roots and the soul at the same place.

Right now it's financially uneconomic to actually feel the soul at the Coliseum, and we'd love to be able to bring that parity to the two teams.

We'd love some stability for a little bit so we can focus on other things.

And more control over the facility.

Right now we're a renter.

We're a day-by-day event by event renter, and we'd love to be able to actually control our venue so that we can make it available for other community events and and um experiences.

So to date we have been out talking to stakeholders in the community about this idea.

We have had uh interaction already.

We're going to be talking to the Harbor Bay Isle Home Association later later this week.

We've been getting some really great feedback, lots of good interface interaction, lots of very smart questions, as you might have imagined.

Um these are sort of the top four that have come up.

One is certainly transportation and traffic.

Uh, the other one is simply parking.

How are we going to handle parking, sound and noise, and then lighting.

So I thought I'd go a little bit into each one of these.

Um, as Brian mentioned, we're still working on all of these plans.

This is really work in progress.

Uh, but the ideas that we've come up to with to date, one certainly is to reduce auto volume, encourage our current BART users to keep using BART and provide a shuttle to and from the BART station.

Uh, also provide incentives for high occupancy car pools.

So, for example, anyone with four more people in the car, you get free parking, you get to park right near the facility, those sorts of things, um, secure bike ballet as well, um, making sure we avoid the neighborhood streets, um, encourage use of Hagenberger and 98th Avenue for non-locals to make sure they're out of the neighborhoods.

Um, incorporate traffic local traffic only signs in certain places.

So, as you're leaving Harbor Bay Parkway, encourage folks to go out Ron Cowan Parkway and not turn left onto Harbor Bay.

Those sorts of ideas we've been talking with our traffic consultants about, and then in terms of just managing the safe streets and managing traffic flow, um, making sure that as a ticket holder, you know exactly where you're going in terms of your parking assignment, uh, making sure we have traffic control officers on the street to make sure the cars are going where they're supposed to go, and pedestrians have a safe way to cross streets, and then geofencing, especially for ride share, so that the Ubers and the Lyfts know where to drop off and pick up, and they're not just doing it willy-nilly in the streets.

And then we've also been talking preliminarily with the city about potentially traffic signal management to allow flows to go a little bit more smoothly outside of the regular business park hours really quickly on parking.

As uh Brian mentioned, we think we're going to need about 31, 3200 spaces.

We're targeting about 2100 to be in the park itself, and the rest would be either out on the Hagenberger or up near the Coliseum BART station.

So that shuttle I mentioned would not only be shuttling BART riders but also parkers that are parking along the route as well.

Just a little just very quickly.

Um, as Brian said, we we don't have we've been talking uh fairly intensely with a number of folks, but this is just uh an illustration of how we might actually station traffic control officers to make sure the intersections are protected, pedestrians know when to walk, and folks aren't necessarily jaywalking when they're not supposed to.

Other concerns, the lighting, um as Brian mentioned, we will be using LED directional lighting.

We're working with a lighting manufacturer that does a lot of sporting events, and you can just a couple of examples of the kinds of things they do to make sure that the light is intended to go where it's going where it's intended to go.

And then sound and noise, we have been working with ideas with our acoustic consultant.

The things that we've come up with to date are, as you can see, the pink oriented most of the fans to be away, facing away from the neighborhoods, so that if they we hope we hope they yell that we hope they cheer our team on, but they're doing that towards the airport and the airplanes that are flying overhead rather than towards the neighborhood.

Amplified sound would be on the north end facing, and then directed towards the airport again.

Uh, and then uh just turning down the volume.

We've been talking a little bit about how many DBs would be accept acceptable to not impact the neighborhoods.

So we're still talking through these things, we're still testing, but these are the ideas that have come up so far.

Um, and that's really it.

We just we're really excited about this idea.

We like the idea of having an intimate um venue uh to celebrate uh the community, the team, and um we're really look forward to hearing some feedback from you, questions that we haven't answered yet, things we should be thinking about, really appreciate the time.

Thank you.

Thank you so much for their presentation.

Um with that, um, I'll bring it back to the board for any clarifying questions, and then we'll open up for public comments, either for staff or the applicant.

Uh Vice President Arisa.

Thank you.

Thank you for the presentation.

Um I'm wondering, so I think you mentioned Brian that there's gonna be a traffic study that is in progress.

But we don't have the finalized version yet.

Correct, we don't have the finalized version yet.

We're expecting to get the first uh the uh the draft of the uh trip distribution model, which basically is like you know, you can imagine like a heat map that says like you know, 60% of the car is gonna go this way, 30% are gonna go that way, 10% are gonna go this way later this week, um, which will feed into the final overall traffic impact analysis and plan in terms of how to manage that.

Do we know at what time the games will occur?

Yeah, I think the the assumption is probably Saturday afternoons or evenings, and then um sometimes on uh Wednesday evening would be the most common other time.

Does that sound right?

Okay, thank you.

Great, thank you.

Uh, board member Louise.

Thank you for the presentation.

Just a few questions.

Oh, by the way, full disclosure.

I had uh um have a conversation with um the applicant of today.

Um, so I know some of these I've already shared with with the the applicant, and just reiterated again.

Um during when we receive the traffic, the final traffic study.

Will we describe the frequency and capacity?

Would it prescribe the um frequency and capacity of the shuttle service?

Yeah, I think we would we would want to understand that as staff, absolutely.

Yeah, and because I'll be interesting to see where uh the pickup and drop off locations are because I I don't recall seeing that on the plans.

Had that been maybe I've missed it, the shuttle pickup and drop off location.

Yeah, we we uh we haven't determined them yet.

What I would say is um a couple things on the shuttles.

One is as you might imagine, vans coming in and leaving, it's pretty condensed, even though you know we might be having have our gates open um, you know, an hour before an hour an hour laugh after.

So we want to make sure we have enough shuttles to actually move folks as quickly as possible so that it's a good experience and they keep using the shuttle.

Um the second is that we are working with the operators of the Harbor Bake um shuttle system.

They know that route, they know exactly how to get there and back.

Um, and so we're working them with right now, given their experience to help us design a shuttle system and plan that um we think we'll be successful.

Okay, and then um, same thing with a bike valet.

I'm not seeing that on the plan yet.

You're that location is still right now.

We're proposing the bike ballet is in the, we have a we have a front parking lot right right off of Harbor Bay Park.

Would you mind showing pulling on the plan?

So I probably missed it on the site plan.

Forgive me.

So it it is literally right in the front so it'll be and then we are working with bikey spay to be our bike ballet.

Okay.

All right great.

And then just a comment on sheet um there's a um SP-02 no number five is me missing the keynote and I know you email me back it says that that is actually gate location.

I just want to make sure that's reflected in the record because the drawings didn't show what that keynote was.

One last question in terms of um noise and light would you be are you planning on having any fireworks.

I think that's that's a big no I think our uh fire department would would say no even if we um feign to ask okay it's just a question.

Okay.

Thank you.

We weren't we weren't planning it just as you can see um uh for member um Ruiz you can see the bike valet way at the top oh I see right at the corner got it loop bro thank you Harbor Bay yeah yes I did miss it thank you great thank you any other um uh board member Wang and then member Sahiva uh thank you uh question for staff we just had a use permit that triggered uh a desire to go back and rework the city's noise ordinance wondering if you could advise us on how you're thinking about decibel level control in this use permit relative to the work stream to revise the noise ordinance.

Well maybe I'll I'll start on this how we're thinking about it here and then in terms of maybe Steve or our city attorney's uh staff car can speak to the larger process but I think you know as part of our review a big part of that analysis that we're working on right now and the applicant's consultant is working on is what is how are they designing the the their sound system how are they modeling the sound so that the project as proposed is consistent with our noise ordinance obviously this is you know something that's been before the board a lot in the last year um uh and so in obviously a little different location next to the airport a little different context not uh you know it's probably eleven twelve hundred feet to the nearest residential properties um to maybe some other projects you've you've discussed recently but in terms of how it fits with the broader process I'll defer to two others.

Yeah I would just say um we are looking at the noise ordinance and and various um exceptions that might be written in currently the the primary exception is events in a public park um and so uh during certain hours and so this is an example of another category that might be added as um I'd say like a like a school um sports field you know uh is is largely exempt um from local uh regulation I think um an approved use permit sports field might also either be exempt or have certain hours or other limitations under our amended ordinance that we're considering.

Okay but from uh sequencing perspective it sounds like the amended noise ordinance may follow the desired approval timeline of this use permit.

It could and so that's why we're doing the sequel analysis is to come up with the best um plan modeling and mitigation.

Okay.

Yeah so I think I think what you might find with the you know a potentially a final proposal if if the we come back hopefully um in a couple of months um for the board's consideration would be a very detailed plan that is you know potentially more restrictive than the applicant in a perfect world would would um prefer um but in order to fit within you know be able to make those findings and ensure that it's compliant it would it would be built to a to sort of fit within the current framework um and then if some other process you know gave more flexibility to that in the future that would be a separate sort of independent process that would be separate from whatever decision was before the board in the in the near term okay thank you.

Board member Zahiba yeah thank thanks again for the presentation um I had a question just regarding vehicle access and shuttle route um I know years back when we had sports teams at the Coliseum uh I live on Harbor Bay the AC Transit used to run a bus over to um Oakland airport and then the the direct shuttle from the I guess the air train that takes you from there to the Coliseum.

The vehicle access shuttle route um has there been consideration taken for folks to get to Oakland airport and then a shuttle from there to the to the stadium because that would be an easy way for folks to reduce the route as far as the shuttle system goes yeah I I see what you're getting at in terms of I think it's it's interesting thing to explore I think off the top of my head a couple things I think every time you add a seat to a trip the less desirable that trip gets even if you know the the the trip is as efficient from a time you know you're assuming good connections you're also introducing a not insignificant fare right the that's a I don't know another eight or nine bucks uh eight bucks maybe give or take for that uh that driverless monorail um to the airport so I think those would be some big considerations for the viability and the desirability of that product that's definitely something we could okay we could explore um yeah that sounds good and then uh I guess eventually when the plan comes back with the shuttle stops the Uber and Lyft drop off areas will be clearly identified as well um on the yes okay yes we we've had some experience they've obviously with the uh Australian men's national team here for the world cup um with some events this summer in terms of starting to to stress test you know what is what is that operation look like and and how do we how do we manage those things so it's been useful.

So okay thank you.

Any other questions?

No questions just comments.

Okay great um I had a clarifying question just because I started getting confused with um the parking spaces availability and need um so is it um a need for 3200 spaces um or um yeah I think I'm just uh wondering what the actual calculation is.

I think the applicant's preliminary number in their presentation was a little over 3100 maybe uh 3100 and 16 or 18 um I did the simple math that said basically based on their experience with other other facilities um Cal State East Bay being the most comparable um to this site in terms of you know transit access you know um etc uh conservatively we're assuming about two and a half people per vehicle coming to the site do the math 8000 divided by two and a half get got me to 3200 we're gonna we're gonna get some of those people to use transit we're gonna get some of those people to to bike to the site especially Alamedans um hopefully will take advantage of that opportunity but then you throw in staff security et cetera probably comes out somewhere somewhere in the wash but I think the final um traffic impact analysis and transportation plan will include um clarify those detailed numbers yeah got it okay yeah I guess um like it's sort of a comment but uh question too because if if there is um the opportunity to have up to 5200 parking spaces, which I think um that was, or I don't know, the numbers are all over the place, either 4,000 or fifty two hundred you know.

Why not have those parking spaces available um uh it sounds like maybe some of them will be available at the other um sites where there will be shuttles, but just in case, like maybe to be conservative.

I do wonder just like how we might want to consider that.

So, anyways, whatever the need is.

I just I think the point of my question is like being able to take advantage of those share parking.

Absolutely, and just maybe to add a little um context to the those numbers.

I think depending on how you slice it, is it are there 4,000 within a reasonable distance, is it 5200 within a 10-minute walk, etc.

Um, that's a census of the parking spaces.

It's an inventory in the business park.

It's not a list of property owners who have said, yes, you can use this for these events.

Um, so somewhere in the middle, those things are going to come together.

Um, hopefully, you know, there will be an expectation uh that the applicant provides sort of the critical mass needed, but they may not get all the way there, so they need to supplement other sports stadiums or venues, it's not uncommon for different property owners to put their like as opposed to here, roots.

Do your thing, you know, uh, give us our cut, they might just decide, hey, we'll run our own parking lot on event days, right?

You go to uh a giant scheme, you see lots of lots of things like that.

So there's a mix of the team providing sort of the bulk of the space, and you could imagine other property owners either saying, hey Roots, cone off our parking lot.

We don't want anything to do with this, or we're gonna do our own thing, or hey, great, go ahead, let's get the agreement worked out in time for for your season.

Yeah, okay.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Uh great.

I think those are all the board's questions, and with that, uh, we could go to public comment.

We'll begin with uh in-person public comment.

Um, but if you're online and you'd like to speak, please raise your hand in the meantime.

Our first speaker is Marie Kane.

Good evening, President Cisnero and members of the City of Alameda Planning Board.

I and many of my neighbors on Bay Farm Island are extremely concerned and opposed to the possibility of the Oakland routes and Seoul Sports Clubs hosting professional soccer matches with up to 8,000 attendees at 1150 and 1220 Harbor Bay Parkway, which is so close to thousands of our residents.

We kind of feel like Bay Farm and Harbor Bay are like the stepchildren of Alameda, and I'm just wondering how this is going to benefit the city on the whole.

The proposed facility hosting up to 8,000 attendees and the increased traffic will detrimentally detrimentally affect our air quality, our traffic situation, and most importantly, our ability to evacuate in the event of an unplanned emergency, earthquake, fire, or other natural disaster.

We have only two exit routes from Bay Farm Island.

If something happens, then the cars there will totally block the whole that whole exit, and we'll only have one exit route from Bay Farm Island.

Please consider that lives could be lost due to your decisions.

This is not an appropriate place for this big of a venue with this many people coming in.

The location is also very close to Waters Edge Lodge, a senior facility, and close to a multitude of residential areas that house many seniors and children.

Naps, sleep, pets, and the quiet enjoyment of our homes will be affected.

Please visit the roots current games at the Coliseum and note the current noise factors and the ongoing noise factors after the games are over.

The noise can now be heard at our homes even from the current Coliseum location.

This Bay Farm, Harbor Bay location is absolutely not appropriate for this kind of thing.

Detrimental effects would absolutely outweigh any beneficial effects.

Allowing these events to occur in so such close proximity to our residential areas would be a travesty to us all.

Please do not let this project move forward.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Stephanie Brochier or Brochier.

Excuse me.

Marie actually covered pretty much everything that I wanted to cover, but one of my concerns is it's stated that you're going to encourage people to take Hagenburger 98.

How do you stop people from taking Island Drive and Harbor Bay Parkway?

That's our access point, especially Island Drive for the residential portion of Harbor Bay.

And as it is, I mean, we're we get jammed during regular commute times, during school times, and if you have people, you know, if people can find an alternate route to one that's backed up because of people trying to get to the facility via 98th and Hagenburger, that they're going to try to find another route.

So encouraging somebody to not use local traffic ways to our residential homes.

How are you going to implement that so that it's a fact and not just an encouragement?

The other thing is that currently with the routes, I had the I had to go online recently during one of their games because I kept hearing thunk, thump, thump, thump, and my windows were rattling, and I had to actually drug my dog because of the noise and the fireworks that were going on.

Now they've said that it's a possibility that we won't be able to have it, but I think it's a given that we shouldn't have any fireworks out there, period, because of the proximity of the homes and the noise that it creates.

And again, the decibels of noise are the big concern to me.

In Harbor Bay, we're already hearing from San Francisco when they have their festivals on the wharf and Treasure Island, and you're hearing all the noise from that, and our windows are again shaking over where we are.

And it goes on till one o'clock in the morning for those kind of things, but I'm hearing it already from the roots at the at the arena, or not the arena, but at the field in Oakland.

And it's just going to be closer, and that is a big concern.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comments.

Our next speaker is Melissa Debore.

Good evening.

Good evening, members of the board.

President Cisneros, how are you this evening?

My name is Melissa DeBoard.

My husband and I have been residents of Bay Farm Island for the past 18 years.

We are here this evening to voice our support for allowing Oakland Roots and Seoul to host matches at a training facility located in the Harbor Bay Business Park.

We understand that traffic is a major concern, but we see this as a sign of success, not a threat.

The influx of traffic on game day represents visitors coming to Alameda, spending money at our restaurants, filling up our hotel rooms, and placing Harbor Bay on the map.

To us, this isn't any different from a weekday where there is an influx of employees working in the business park.

We see these employees purchasing from our local Starbucks, grocery shopping at our local safeway, having lunch at La Penka, Laval's Pizza, and Chinavilla restaurants.

During the week, employees are using Ron Cowan Parkway as a main thoroughfare to and from the business park.

Which would be the same for game days.

I do not see any cars coming through our communities during the weekday from employees being at the business park.

Another concern that has been raised is noise, of course.

As a Bay Farm resident, we hear noise coming from the Oakland Coliseum during raider games in the past, as well as San Francisco during a major music event, and most of all the Oakland Airport.

We commend the Oakland Roots and Soul organization for being very cognizant of this concern and working with acoustic engineers to design a system that would direct sound away from our communities.

In closing, my husband and I feel that hosting game days at the Oakland Roots and Soul facility would be beneficial to our island community.

It's soccer in our backyard.

It's a family-friendly event.

Please allow this project to move forward.

Thank you for your time and enjoy your evening.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Judy Stanton.

Hi, I am also a Bay Farm resident of very careless children who wander into the streets despite me cautioning them.

So I care a lot about traffic.

And I am fully in support of this.

I think it's a great idea.

I think it would bring life and energy to an area that I think is so completely underused and underutilized.

There's so much space there.

It is unlike places on Park Street, which border on houses.

This is out next to the airport.

If any of you live on Bay Farm, you'll understand the noise from the planes and the airport.

I am not worried about the noise from this overtaking that.

I also think it's just a great thing to bring to our community as a parent of tweens.

There's very little for them to do on the island wholesome activities that bring people out.

Mostly they want to go hang out at South Shore, and we all know what happened at South Shore a couple weeks ago.

So I love the idea of bringing wholesome family activities to our neighborhood for kids and families to get excited to go to.

It's true as Bay Farm, we do sort of get treated as the stepchild of Alameda, and I think this is a great way to change that and integrate and make this area more vibrant.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comments.

Alright, seeing no more in-person speakers.

Um I'm gonna start unmuting our online speakers, beginning with Madeline Sadiq.

You should now be able to speak.

Good evening, President Cisnero and members of the planning board.

My name is Madeline Sadek, and I serve as the president and the CEO of Alameda Chamber and Economic Alliance.

I'm speaking tonight in support of Oakland Roots and Souls proposal to use the Harbor Bay facility as an interim match venue.

The chamber views Oakland Roots and Souls as much more than a professional sports organization.

Since locating in Alameda, they have become an active community partner, working with the local businesses, supporting youth programs, and participating in community events and investing in relationships throughout the city.

From a business perspective, this proposal presents an opportunity to bring new visitors and economic activity to Alameda.

Match days can really benefit local restaurants, retailers, hotels, and service businesses, which showcases Alameda to audiences throughout the Bay Area and beyond.

The chamber encourages the planning board to evaluate this proposal and to consider the long-term value Oakland Roots and Souls brings to Alameda as an employer, community partner, and economic driver.

Thank you for your time, your service, and your consideration for this project.

Thank you.

And proceeding to our next online speaker, Kenneth Chen, you should be able to speak now.

Hi, hi everyone.

Good evening.

I represent the school in the church that is in the business part, Kosankushin School and Bay Area Chinese Bible Church.

And we do have mixed feelings about this because on one end, of course, it is having a professional soccer team near the school.

We do have a soccer team, so we will I like to, you know, eventually uh connect with some of my roots and see if they're uh opportunity to collaborate.

But at the same time, we also have a church that comes in on Sunday, and I believe I heard only games on Saturday and Wednesday.

So I just I'm not sure if that is uh for for sure because that would be a great relief for the church because otherwise, of course, it's concerned.

If there are games on Sunday, that would severely impact how we worship it.

I do believe there is another church that's much closer to the roots, uh, the acts two, and they are going to be probably the last.

So that's all my time.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um, and Mr.

Umre, how many more um speakers are there?

Uh okay, so maybe one.

I just wanted to watch that could be a longer.

No more.

There we go.

Okay, Rayla Graber, if you'd like to speak, you are now unmuted.

Yeah, hi.

Um I live on Bay Farm, and I have a number of concerns.

I don't know if I can um list them all.

Um, but the traffic is very concerning.

As one speaker said, yes, you're going to encourage shuttle riding, but what is going to be encouraging to them?

Are you going to give them cheaper cheaper parking at the Coliseum than if they uh come directly to the site?

Will they pay higher parking?

That might be an incentive.

Um, otherwise I can see people coming through Fernside, exiting High Street and coming through Fernside is a very direct route if they're coming from that part of the main line, mainland, you know, Berkeley, Oakland, etc.

Uh, I don't see people going all the way to 98, and then going down round Cowan Highway.

Um, I'm concerned about um, are you going to be serving liquor?

Is liquor going to be served?

Um, that wasn't brought up, so I'm just bringing that up.

Uh, police.

You know, uh soccer is known as a very spirited game with a lot of spirited fans.

So uh, are we going to need additional police?

We're already low on Alameda police.

We're already short-funded.

So, have we thought about that?

And actually, what is going to be the benefit to Alameda?

I mean, this roots is already putting on little events in the community or whatever they're doing that supposedly is very positive.

That's great.

Uh, but when I hear all this, all the all the jumps and hoops that the city of Alameda is gonna have to go through to put this thing, make it come into existence.

How much is it costing the city and what are we going to be getting out of it?

I mean, it's it's all nice about oh, you know, the community, this and how nice, and uh just think about the the other uh effects that this business will have, and monetarily.

Are we gonna come out even or are we gonna come out in the hole?

And why should we?

This is a business, and they need to operate as a business.

And that may not be appropriate for our community.

There are other places for them to go, and we don't even know that it's going to be limited to five years.

They may want an extension, maybe never find another stadium.

They haven't said they've got a stadium that it's a sure deal.

So for goodness, so much.

Thank you so much for your public comment.

Appreciate it very much.

There are no further public comments.

Okay.

And with that, we'll go ahead and close the public comment portion of the evening and we'll bring it back to the board for deliberations.

Again, this is a study session, so no formal action will take place.

But this is an opportunity to give guidance and feedback.

Board member Hong.

Yeah, thank you.

I appreciate first of all staff and applicant bringing this to us at an early stage.

I realize this is at a preliminary stage, so even though I have a lot of questions, I realize that the answers are probably premature to ask these questions now.

I don't have any preconceived notions or opinions about this use, but I do have a lot of questions.

And I'm hoping that when the use permit application comes before us, these issues would be addressed.

So let me kind of list the items in my mind that I would like greater clarity and information on.

Some of these items already been brought up.

As far as environmental issues, the number one issues, obviously, traffic that's been foisted today.

So getting to understand, you see the traffic analysis and understanding what the traffic program is from the applicant would be really beneficial as far as you know, like the shuttle program, how many shuttles, how you encourage shuttles, how do you discourage traffic?

Are you gonna charge for parking?

Um just kind of understanding the parking management program, not the traffic management and parking management program would be important to me to understand.

Uh, one of the questions, I don't know how large of a fan base the routes and the sew have, but if but if there's expected to be fans coming across the bay, I'm wondering whether the um Harbor Bay Ferry might be an option if there's enough, you know, um, ticket hope buyers that want to view the view these games from across the bay that could help with the traffic.

Um I do want to understand how you're gonna discourage traffic from going through the residential streets.

Um Matlin Drive is a drive that could be impacted with a lot of residential homes on either side.

So be interested and see how that street could be prevented from having the adverse impacts of the traffic.

So that's kind of one area that I think additional information uh will be needed.

I think it seems to everyone agrees to that.

Another farmo issues brought up is but the noise.

So, be interested in understanding how what type of controls or program will be proposed to mitigate the noise from these evening games.

You know, the evening noise even travels farther, so uh it'll be interesting to understand what kind of controls or programs will be in place regarding noise.

Uh a third item, a lighting plan.

You know, I think you mentioned I'm assuming you'll be submitting a new lighting plan, so you're proposing some modifications, so interested in seeing that to ensure the dark sky uh requirements are in place.

I don't know the JSON area that much.

I don't know whether it's wild wetlands right next to where the Oakland fields are, but if there are um kind of understanding how uh impacts on adjacent wetlands if there are to wildlife, how that would be mitigated also.

So that's lighting.

Uh so you mentioned the shuttle already.

Um, I'll be interested to know the community benefits that this um this lease can offer.

You mentioned there'll be unlimited uses for groups up to 500.

So I assume that might be related to some community events you're willing to provide to the city.

So it'd be good to understand what you're proposing there, and whether you know there's costs for, whether it's cost-free, just kind of what community benefits the fields can offer to the community.

So interested in knowing that as well as more details about the actual schedule, you know, talking about 24 events with up to 8,000 and another 10 for 2500.

So interested a little bit now about more about the schedule.

Uh let's see, what's another item?

Oh, um, trash.

Um, it'd be good to understand how you will maximize recycling and minimizing the use of trash using uh non-disposable containers, wrappers, etc.

I'd be interested in seeing a proposal on how you will minimize uh trash generation from these events.

Um, community outreach, you mentioned uh Harbor Bay I.

You're gonna reach out to them.

Well, a lot of the rest, especially along Matlin Drive, they're in a Bay Farm community.

They're not part of uh Harbor Bay Isle Association, so it seems since they're probably the most closely impacted by this proposal.

I like to see a concerted effort to reach out to those neighborhoods to get their input.

I do appreciate this transparent event um transparency right now, and I'm sure you're gonna be doing that, but want to just make sure that those neighborhoods are involved in the public dialogue.

And let's see, final comment is the annual report.

I'd like to understand what criteria is going to be used uh that needs to be reported out that will come back to the planning board for review.

So outlining what those requirements and reporting standards are would be good to see.

So those are some of the items that um that came to my mind as far as uh things I would want to make sure that when a use permit comes before the board that we have a clear understanding of how these issues would be handled.

So otherwise, I appreciate the opportunity for us to provide early input.

Thank you.

Yes, uh board member Dewey.

Oh, did you raise your hand first?

How about you?

Okay, board members of keyboard.

Okay, thank you.

Uh I appreciate uh well, thank you for the presentation again, and um thanks for all the public comment.

That was uh very insightful.

Um also uh I think board member Hom covered a lot of the operations side of it, which which I agree with all his um discussion points.

They're gonna be critical to get a global understanding of really how the operations of this facility is going to work.

Uh I'll focus a bit more just on the design um aspects and um some things that I think could uh through through this uh use could could really be beneficial.

Um I've been a resident for Harbor Bay over a dozen years or so.

Um excited to see something like this potentially arrive.

Uh first off, I'd just say that you know the island community that we're on um does do a lot and prides itself on sustainability, and I'd like to hear more about uh potential sustainable um uh implementations that may take place through this use.

Uh just throwing out ideas of um on game day.

I see that the rendering shows a series of um uses that are in the parking lot that I think if there were some uh permanent solar panels installed or something, then that would become the roof covering for let's say a stage or some of the other tents that have been put up sort of temporarily.

Um, but that could also have multiple factors of obviously providing power for some of these uses, but also for um your your facilities.

Uh I'd also um just consider lighting specific to the parking lot because um I understand the lighting for the for the field, but I I think that based on the um use of this parking lot or the you know the use of it as being a um pre-function space into the the field uh I think lighting's gonna have to play a critical role and the impact of that um should be studied uh I'd also just put push uh the group to s explore um potential design strategies for the parking lot in the sense of how striping occurs and such if it just feels like you're occupying a parking lot um that's sort of the bare minimum of course there's gonna be um uh elements staged on the parking lot that will help transform it but um I think wayfinding's gonna be really important um how people get from the lot to the field and maybe that's a design opportunity really to stripe the parking lot in a different way that doesn't feel like uh an afterthought when when game day occurs uh I think um with minimal uh expense on on just how it's painted and such it could it could really provide um that arrival um opportunity that that feels a bit more special before you enter into the into the field uh overall I I think I'd just like to reiterate that um the arrival experience you know after you get off whether it's your parking or coming by shuttle or bike or Uber or Lyft um I think if there's uh there needs to be clarity to that and I and I think the clarity will um make sure that we understand as as as a board just the the way that not only how you get to this facility but that it's it's being um that there's there's clarity on how you maneuver through it.

Uh so I think with that um those are those are my comments and uh yeah really appreciate what um uh the concept of of bringing this type of venue to Talameda.

So thank you.

Uh board member Deweys.

Thank you.

Um first of all I want to thank the applicant and also the residents for voicing out their concerns and this is how this process should work.

Um but before I go on to my comments, um one of the speakers alluded that the city's making concessions on this project and I do what this is a question for the planning members.

I from what I can see in the staff report I don't believe the city's making any concessions in terms of economics.

But just would like to clarify that on the record.

That's correct the applicants covering all costs of obviously the application process as well as you know the expectation would be any game day operations um you know we have users that need police support for for their routine events and they will have to pay for that right those costs exactly okay that's my understanding as well but I want to make sure that is set on the record so we don't have other false facts floating out there.

Okay thank you for that um I agree with um board member home's comments I'm not gonna belabor that and then we iterate I would like to just want to see say that um when the conditional use permit uh application comes back and when we receive the final traffic um studies and traffic control plans I would like to see how you plan to mitigate um Bay farm bridge traffic um that should be included in in that study and um definitely in the final um conditions of approval when we if we get to that stage um we will want to make sure fire work is specifically excluded in the use permit um so those are just my concerns in you know in addition to what board member Hom had already it reiterated.

Um it's it's in the past few years I've seen a lot of businesses left to Bay farm island um a lot of businesses close in the shopping center.

And it would be good to see some economic engine to keep the busy streets um more eyes on the streets is good for the community rather than the vacant lot and the vacant um site.

And I think if we can move the project forward that provides positive impact to our neighborhoods, I can be in support of this.

But you know, at the moment I'm suspending my judgment until we have further studies to make sure that all the neighbors' concerns are addressed.

Thank you.

Any other comments?

Yeah.

Thank you.

If I understand correctly, there needs to be a CEQA report.

So that will definitely help clarify all these questions about you know noise impact.

And then the traffic study will help also answer some of the questions of really what is the impact of potentially 8,000 people coming into the site to see the games.

And at the same time, um I think that we don't have enough information to make any decisions.

I think this was this is a preliminary workshop, so we are just kind of listening to everyone and considering what the impacts could be.

I am definitely more concerned about games on during the week.

I think that just thinking about it without even having any studies in front of me, it seems like the impact of that kind of event on a Wednesday night just would be a lot more, you know, potentially a lot more um just not, you know, not make the neighborhood not like a nice environment during the week.

But I think a Saturday night it's more probably more appropriate for for that kind of event.

Um in any case, until we don't have more details on the schedule and the sequa determination and the report from the traffic study.

We we won't really know exactly.

But I do agree that it would be good to know like the point of arrival or the point of entrance, just as far as the design also, to understand how all these people are going to be coming out at the same time from the from the field to the parking lot or from the field to the street, because that is a lot of people, and it I don't really see that kind of open space yet.

It seems very all very kind of close together just from looking at it inside in the site plan.

So it'd be good to know to understand that too.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh, board member Wayne.

Thanks.

Um, generally agree with the very uh thoughtful and forward-looking comments from from other board members.

Um I just have one comment.

Um, I I think that um traffic control is good.

Uh having a robust transportation plan, including shuttles is good.

I do think, you know, we got a comment about encouraging use of certain streets and discouraging uses of other streets.

Um I I do think there's something there, right?

Um we can provide recommended routes for people uh online.

We can communicate to them uh to to ticket buyers what streets we want them to drive on.

Uh, but I do think generally speaking, globally, we are a little bit at risk of underestimating um the type of user who misses all of those cues and just follows what Google Maps tells them to do, right?

And when Google Maps, when the algorithm picks up that there's a lot of congestion over here, it's gonna say go over there.

And so I do I would like to encourage staff to think more proactively about that.

About how do we solve for that?

I think staff knows very well that if you sign uh streets uh a particular way that you can actually uh shape what the algorithm does.

Um so I'm not saying that we're there.

I think we're here just to have a discussion today.

Uh but uh when we understand I think the the potential impacts a little bit better, I think we should be prepared to think um more proactively about how we shape the way that traffic flows down our streets.

Um yeah, that's that's all I've got.

Great.

Um excellent.

Um, and I um uh as usual, um, appreciate very much my fellow board members for uh basically summarizing all my uh scattered thoughts so cohesively um and agree with board member Hom series of questions.

Um I did um uh want to disclose that I also reached out to the applicant and had very similar um train of thought as board member Wang, where you know I just used Chat GBT and of like how can we um direct the traffic to avoid these residential streets like fernside and um you know, High Street Bridge, Harbor Bay Parkway, um and apparently there's like apps that uh patrons can use um when they prepurchase tickets and um as part of the transcendent traffic management plan.

They could coordinate with Google Maps and Waze, so those are some of the things that I love to see um just some research on that when it comes back because um I agree with a lot of the um concerns and sentiment already brought up.

Um and you know, just uh um, you know, uh circling back to what board member Deweys brought up in terms of this not necessarily a cost, but an additive to our community in Harbor Bay, which um hasn't had a lot of economic um activity or attention.

I think this could be a really great um opportunity for um this part of Alameda that's been the step cousin or whatever that we want to refer it to, and um I think it's it's an exciting potential addition um given some of these questions and concerns that we just want to have a better understanding of so um tentatively um excited to see what comes back and look forward to uh drilling in further.

So um is that helpful for uh the staff and applicant in terms of direction?

Yeah, that's that's fantastic.

A lot of good um discussion and ideas for for what to bring back with more detail, good feedback from community.

Um I've got some ideas there too.

Um I think you know, I think we've talked about the use.

Um we've got some comments on how to improve the sort of um the site circulation and design and the arrival and and how does the how does this the site function in terms of, you know, so if we're feeling good that that's a pretty good list of of what we think, um I think we've got our marching orders.

Thank you very much.

Okay, great.

Yeah, and uh thank you again to members of the public for um participating both uh in person and online.

So thank you everyone.

Uh with that, we'll go ahead and close this agenda item and move on to um the zoning zoning ordinance update for accessory dwelling units.

Thank you, Esteem Planning Board.

President Cicernos, thank you very much for your time.

The item before you this evening is, as you mentioned, a resolution to recommend approval to the City Council of various amendments, text amendments to the existing accessory dwelling unit ordinance.

The presentation I'm going to go through includes a lot of information that you may recall from discussion last month.

And we got some really great great feedback from the board on sort of the policy direction we wanted to take for some of these amendments.

But I am going to go through some of this information again just to jog our memories and provide a little context, and then we can very quickly go through what the amendment looks like based on your feedback from last month.

So once again, our ADUs and JADUs, accessory dwelling units and junior accessory dwelling units, are a means by which residential property owners are able to increase the density of units on their lots.

They're generally considered more affordable, easier to build, and they have streamlined permitting pathways in state law that make them easier to build.

And so to that end, we have a number of state laws that have changed in the past few years impacting ADUs.

Most importantly, I'll remind you is AB 1033, at least for our conversation here tonight, because it allows local jurisdictions to opt into the ability to convert ADUs to condominiums.

But then there's some other state laws there as well that we needed to put up there to just acknowledge that we've made some updates to the ordinance to comply with those.

And while the board's direction was not to take action on all of these, I wanted to make sure that they were all up there just to remind you some of the things that we had discussed.

And I'll go through these on sort of a case-by-case basis as we proceed.

So the first is our ADU condominium conversion, whether or not to allow it outright.

Generally speaking, the board seemed to see this in a favorable light.

And so staff drafted uh sort of a second subsection to the ADU ordinance that will provide a process and standards associated with the conversion of ADUs to condominiums.

That process is primarily derived from sort of our existing processes for condo conversion as well as just obviously complying with state law.

Happy to dig into that a little bit further, but in the interest of keeping us moving along.

The next item that we discussed was the front yard setback.

Currently, there is no explicit front yard setback applied to non-statewide exemption ADUs in the ADU ordinance, although there are, of course, front yard setbacks applied to most residential properties in the city.

The direction from the board was to uh apply a more explicit front yard setback in the ADU ordinance, but to ensure that that front yard setback would be commensurate with the expectations for sort of the uh residential properties on that same site.

And so we did draft provisions that uh reference to section of the code that provide exemptions for substandard lots, for example.

So that's uh in the city of Alameda lots that are under a hundred feet in depth in the existing ordinance have allowances for reduced front yard setbacks, and so too would those apply to ADUs as currently written.

Otherwise, the typical front yard setback of 20 feet would be expected to apply.

Um moving along, the number and type allowed.

You may recall staff had suggested to you that there were parts of our ordinance currently that uh sort of are more permissive than the requirements under state law.

Um this was always intentional.

Um, however, the question we wanted to pose to the board was whether we wanted to continue to have unlimited caps, specifically on the conversion of existing multifamily housing areas into new ADUs.

We've keeped kept that uncapped at your direction.

And the only other sort of changes to that section that were made were to comply with state law.

So, for example, increasing the number of detached new ADUs on multifamily properties to comply with the new equivalent to number of multifamily units on the site or you know up to eight.

So we did keep our uncapped provision there for the conversion of existing multifamily portions of the home.

And the intent is to have that remain to exceed the permissiveness of state law.

Just keeping moving here.

This is a conversation we had around legal nonconforming additions.

So it's not uncommon for ADUs to be created out of existing accessory structures that are converted.

And oftentimes existing accessory structures in the city of Alameda have legal nonconformities.

That is to say, they may be not respecting setbacks or other provisions of the code because they were constructed prior to the effective date of those provisions of the code.

In these cases, there are situations in which that converted structure may have portions of it that are new.

And so the direction of the board was to ensure that those newer portions, the expansion of those existing structures to be converted, would comply with the setback provisions applied to ADUs in general, ensuring that any of the existing legal nonconformities would not be expanded to the extent that they would create negative impacts on surrounding properties.

And finally getting into some of the sort of less substantial questions.

This is, of course, removal of existing parking and existing policy that the city has.

A little bit more interesting here.

Starting off with the housing element, I think we noted during our study session that the housing element does commit to us that we will continue to waive impact fees for ADUs, in part because the intent is to incentivize these types of construction, but also because state law requires that we waive impact fees for most ADUs.

Specifically, the only impact fees that we could apply would apply proportionally to those portions of an ADU over 750 square feet, as they would to a single family residential dwelling.

When we began talking to the permit center staff about what that might actually look like, it quickly became clear that in order to sort of figure out what that sum would be, we need to do a sort of case by case analysis because you can only count the impact fees towards those portions of the ADU that are over 750 square feet.

Not only are many ADU applications that we receive under 750 square feet, but in addition to that, the uh the sort of accounting required to figure out what that impact fee looks like for a given ADU would have required substantial amount of staff time.

We quickly realized that the adopted uh master fee schedule for 2026 to 2027 actually included a new row specific to ADUs in our development impact fees that set the new rate for development impact fees on both ADUs and J ADUs to zero.

So as a result, we can come before you and tell you that the projected revenues from any impact fees without any changes to our current master fee schedule would be zero.

So I felt that that kind of covered the issue.

Didn't feel like we need to investigate that much further.

And then finally, the board gave very clear direction to limit the deed restrictions applied to JADUs to only those required under state law.

This would omit a current provision we have which requires owner occupancy for JADUs in their deed restriction.

It's worth noting that under state law that would have had to have been amended if we did want to keep it to be limited to those JADUs that share sanitation facilities.

That being said, we did omit that requirement for the deed restrictions in the interest of providing a very streamlined pathway for those JADUs to submit that recorded deed restriction as part of their application.

And then finally, we did have a number of sort of what I'll call cleanup edits.

Generally speaking, these include replacing design requirements with design considerations as required by state law.

And as pointed out by one of the public comments received by the Housing Defense Fund, clarifying that state mandated ADUs are not subject to the city's tree preservation ordinance.

Again, just in compliance with state law.

We also updated references to government code sections.

And then, you know, very simple cleanups.

And thank you specifically to board member Wang for some pointing out some typos that we needed to correct in there.

The intent because we received those comments without the sufficient time to update the exhibit.

Our intent is to bring a revised version of the ordinance before city council that will uh address all of those sort of typos or punctuation errors that you had noted in your comments.

And then the only other thing I wanted to address was we'd also received a comment regarding from the board regarding tenant protections and uh what types of tenant protections would be offered to uh ADU condo conversion uh the residents that are you know currently living in those ADUs, assuming these are existing ADUs and not proposed.

And we just thought we'd share that there are fairly robust tenant protections under state law that include things like uh 60 to 100 in day noticing timeline for existing residents, uh first rate to refusal, uh, and then of course we also have fairly robust local rent control provisions that we suspect will help with that as well.

Um, but certainly if the board were to uh direct us to include additional tenant protections, we could, you know, happily incorporate any of those that uh the board sees fit.

Um, as previously noted, but just want to make sure this is clear because they were received a little bit late.

I didn't know if all the board members got an opportunity to see those.

We did receive uh two public comments in favor of the amendments, one from the Caseda Coalition and the other from the housing defense fund.

Um, both pointed out that the uh process of allowing ADUs to convert to condominiums increases the range of housing types available for prospective homeowners.

Um they offered their support, although I will note that the housing defense fund public comment also offered some suggestions to us on how best to comply with state law.

Um and with that, I will uh put it back to the board for any questions you may have or clarifying comments staff can provide.

Excellent.

Thank you so much for that recap and some updates.

Um I'll bring back to the board for any clarifying questions.

Yes, board member Ha.

Yeah, thank you for the presentation.

Um I have a couple of questions, but the main one I'll throw it out for for now is regarding um condo conversions.

Um I appreciate that you wrote up that whole section.

And I'm I'm thinking there's a requirement as I understand it for CC and Rs.

Makes sense, and a homeowner association.

And I guess that's what I'm questioning whether you really need a homeowner association for these type of conversions when there might not be any common areas.

So what I'm thinking of is like there's, for instance, in the city, there's a whole host of examples of like flag lots where someone owns a single family home in the back in the front, and you share maybe a common driveway.

There's there's situations like that in my subdivision.

I'm not uh there's no common area, so I'm not aware they need to like file a create a homeowner association, which then requires and a reporting to California state board and all of that.

Does the state law only allow a condo HOA situation, or can it also be something a little bit more simplified?

If there's no common areas, so uh and I'll preface this by saying I'll likely defer to our city attorney's office on anything uh beyond what very surface level response I can provide.

Um my understanding is that the requirement that this is very much uh ADU condo conversion is specifically permitted, but uh subdivision of a primary unit in an ADU is not.

And what you're describing sounds to me more like a uh an actual parcel map or a subdivision of the physical land itself.

Um, short of that, because that is not permitted under state law, only a condominium conversion is, which would entail only the structures sort of being conveyed separately, and as a result, you'll always have the sort of property that the structures are on as a shared resource that needs to be managed through the HOA.

Um, specifically to your question is to whether or not state law requires it.

I I would assume so, but I would defer to city attorney's office.

Yes, yes, you're your that's the way we would analyze it is that the structure is owned, but that the underlying real property is owned by um through a condominium uh property right, and the state law that authorizes this type of conversion um does require um compliance with the Davis Sterling condominium laws, and that does require a homeowners association.

Okay.

That's yeah, that seems unfortunate.

I could just add I would say that there's a whole section in your draft ordinance um that's essentially drawn from state law.

The whole section about uh section F is all about state law, and this this is a requirement if you opt into uh AB 1033 uh ADU condos, you have to include this in your ordinance, which is about a condo plan, a subdivision map, um, the HOA, uh C CNRs, and so on and so forth.

So we either have to do that or we can't adopt this ordinance.

Okay, so unless the state law changes down the road, this is we're limited to a whole the condo solution, which was could be pretty onerous for just two homeowners.

Okay, thank you.

Um you can also do an SB9 um parcel map, essentially, if the lot is large enough for that.

So that's another alternative.

Yeah, no, thank you.

Uh great.

Um any other clarifying questions looking on this side?

Yeah, and I'm going to board member Dewey.

Yeah.

Thank you for the update.

Um a few questions.

Um, I appreciate you we incorporating the state mandated uh regulations and the non-state compliance or mandated regulations.

But one thing that's not clear is can the applicant do both?

What is the final number?

That's if I do some that's state mandating and someone not, does that mean not all of my ADU numbers are balloons?

Thank you for your question.

Uh the short answer is if you do not comply with all of the provisions of the state exemption ADU, that is the 66323 units, then you are not a 66323 unit.

You must comply with all of the provisions of that government code in order to be considered that type of statewide exemption ADU.

But what I'm saying is they can potentially do both, right?

Can the applicant do both?

Uh no.

So in order, you could you could either you are or you are not a 66323 unit, a statewide exemption ADU.

Um, you could have multiple ADUs on a lot, in which case you may have one statewide exemption ADU and one non-statewide exemption ADU.

Right, that's what I'm saying, but they can you can aggregate both.

You can have several that are state compliant and several that are not state compliant.

That is correct.

And that's allowed under current, and that's the intent.

The ADUs are considered on an ad hoc basis.

Each individual ADU is considered independently for everything but the number and type allowed on the lot.

So and that isn't influenced by the statewide exemption, the overall number.

Okay.

And then um, thank you for clarifying that.

Um so the answer is yes.

Um question on section E3, sub-paragraph A.

Let's give you a page.

Give me a second, let me find a page.

That is on page two of the um red line.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Um, this is E.3.

E.3.

That's paragraph.

Four.

Max under maximum height.

That's okay.

So, um, so paragraph A states attached AD ADUs to conform with the maximum height standards for primary residential structure permitted by the subject property zoning district.

What happens if the priming structure has been grandfather clause and it exceeds the current zoning height?

The so this is a uh function of state law, this language is pulled directly from state law for attached ADU height maximums.

Well, no, no, no, this is E.

This is under E, so it's a for non-state mandated ADUs.

Right.

There are requirements outside of those requirements for state mandate ADUs that apply to non-state mandate ADUs and limited jurisdictions authority to regulate them.

So we are limited in our authority to regulate non-state mandated ADUs that are attached in so far as their height is concerned.

Right, but what I'm saying, you did you understand my question?

Uh the answer I think to your question is if there were a legal non-conforming height, then they would need to comply with the height in the underlying zoning district.

That is my understanding now.

If you have a legal non-conforming building and you're just converting a portion of it, I don't believe we can require you under ADU state law to revise the height of that building to be lower and therefore comply with the zoning district, as long as you're not concerned.

But based on but based on it, so I I think but that's not what it says here.

I understand what you're saying, but what you're saying is not what's written.

I think we have there are two categories, if if I may, there are two categories of ADUs.

Um one is the state mandated ADU, and we and state law designates how we regulate those.

Um the second category, we have a lot of flexibility.

Um if you wanted to be more liberal by um allowing a um ADU to um not conform with the um the required height in in that particular zone, then you could do that.

Right now it's it's written so that it should comply with the height in the zone, but that is a policy call for you.

Right.

That's that's my question because right now and I'm questioning that that right now is this written if I have an existing eight primary structure, that's say it's 20 feet when the in height, and the zoning code only allows 18.

So it's already existing non-conformant from conforming structure, right?

Right.

Right, right.

So that's say if I add on to it, add to an it's not internal conversion, but it's added to it.

Do am I required to be based on it is written 18 will be the cap.

Even though the main structure is 20, can I go with 19?

That is my question.

But based on it currently, it's written, no, the answer is no.

Can I clarify a little bit?

Um just because it sounds like we're talking about the ADU height maximums, this would apply to the height maximums with the underlying zoning districts.

So generally like 30 to 45-ish feet for residential districts.

Um so this isn't referring to like your 16 through 20 foot ADU height maximum.

This is referring to the underlying zoning districts.

Okay.

So that this is just the primary structure only, not for it is exactly the situation you were describing, but let's say, for example, the district had a 35 foot height maximum and your existing structure had a 40-foot height.

You're correct.

That's currently written, a new attached ADU constructed off the rear would need to comply with that 35 foot height maximum.

But because of the provisions of this code, it can exceed the typical ADU height maximum of say eighteen feet.

Okay.

So that's what the intent of that provision is.

Okay.

All right.

Understood.

Thank you.

Um then question another question.

Sorry, I have a lot of that's great.

Um page number five, uh, in the red line.

Um under paragraph F about junior ADUs and list about the following standards.

That means all of them or some of them.

It says junior ADUs shall be permitted ministerially if complying with the following standards.

My question is, is the intent that you need to comply with all of them or some of them?

All of them.

Okay, that's clarify that.

I'm just I would just clarify, except that some of them say may.

So that's that's the question.

Yeah.

It's not clear.

Right.

So it's it I think it's clear.

You you either shall or you may.

I think okay.

There's a lot of mays.

Yeah.

Okay.

So that means it's not all of it.

All of the shells.

The language can be a little more clear.

So again, we can get into the suggestions.

This is just questions.

Uh I'm trying to understand intent.

Uh page number six.

Um, paragraph number eight, sub-paragraph A, lowercase A.

Um, why what's the thought process behind prohibiting short-term rental of junior ADU?

Is required by state law.

Got it.

Thank you.

Um, and then back to this, the whole list of you know, F, that whole junior ADU list of compliance.

Um, when talk about mis ministerial approval, why is this now part of um lowercase I-1 when we talk about approval process?

I believe because there are development standards contained in this section, and we were trying to distinguish the portions of this ordinance by the type of ADU proposed, that is to say, state mandated, non-state mandated, attached, and detached, and then finally JADUs.

And so that was sort of the the formatting intent.

Um, whereas I, the application review process is exclusively to do with the sort of sort of uh just the process, right?

Not necessarily any development standards or expectations for how the unit operates.

Okay, so but you also talk about ministerial.

I don't know if I buy that argument in the moment, but we can discuss that later.

Um that's all my questions for now.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Um any other clarifying questions from board members?

Yes, board member Hahn.

Yeah.

Related to what uh board member Ruiz says.

I'm trying to find that section.

Apologize, I can't find it, but there's a section that that talks about if an existing structure does not meet the required side yard or ray yard setback.

I think Maile you want to say the structures right on the property line or say the wording, and I apologize, I can't find it.

I hadn't had it this more this afternoon.

It says that you can um re you can rebuild that structure uh as long as you stay within the dimensions of the existing structure.

Does that mean both setback and height?

Like for instance, you have an existing um ADU, I'm not in accessory structure that's maybe 200 square feet.

You can rebuild that structure, say it's gonna be larger, say you're gonna propose a 600 square foot ADU.

Does that new structure except with the footprint is, does that need to be the new footprint portion of the structure?

So that need to be set back four feet, or can it be continued a line of the existing um ADU?

So that's one question.

Second question is what if if that structure is only say ten feet tall?

Can they build up to 18 now?

So there are a couple of different nuances here.

I want to just make sure I'm kind of addressing them correctly.

So all of your questions have to do with existing accessory structures that are either being demolished or converted.

Yeah.

Perfect.

That do not meet the current setback.

That have legal nonconformities, exactly.

So um the section that you're looking at just to kind of clarify for everybody, is under 4A.

And so this is on page three near the bottom.

Oh, okay.

Okay.

Yeah, I think just so we're all on the same page.

Uh it reads that no setback shall be required for an existing accessory structure or a new structure constructed in the same location into the same dimensions.

And then it goes on to say for the purpose of this subsection's dimensions shall mean the exterior width, length, and height of the accessory structure up to 18 feet.

Um so that is intended to convey that the existing structure, if for example, there was a 10 foot high structure and it proposed to increase the height, it would not be able to take advantage of the reduced setbacks under this section.

So uh it would either need to comply with the four foot setback or it would need to comply with the setback uh allowances under a different section.

Okay.

So in other words, if they wanted to build a larger or just a larger ADU, they they would they could either stick to what the existing structure allows, or they would need to comply with the other standards.

I'm not totally that is correct.

The only exception I would offer to that is statewide exemption ADUs.

If, for example, right.

So for non-statewide exemption ADUs state, then yes, then yes, you would you would need to comply with that now.

It's worth noting that we also had that provision we talked about that is um something we discussed last meeting, which was the uh whether or not we should permit an existing legal nonconforming conversion to expand along that existing non-conformity.

Right.

We did not incorporate that kind of a provision into the ordinance.

So any expansion would need to conform, they would need to exact the four feet.

Okay, okay.

Thanks for clarifying that.

Because I remember we had that discussion last time, and I couldn't understand whether where the ordinance landed on those issues, great.

Um any other questions, I mean none.

Um I did have um a follow-up, and I um appreciate you um bringing up the uh tenant protections um that we have currently um in our city as well as with state um policy.

Um my question comes from like the RAN comment that came in.

And I, and I believe board member Hahn mentioned last time, uh suggesting the first rate refusal um potential option.

Uh and I couldn't quite follow what you were saying.

Um is it that we already have that in place in the city?

Because I don't think there's like a statewide like policy for that or uh as we understand it, there are policies in place that would require first rate of refusal for the existing tenant, yes.

Okay, per the city of Alameda's.

I can get back to you about where exactly that provision lives.

Okay.

Yeah.

But my understanding is that yes, they are currently required to offer first rate of refusal to the existing tenant.

Okay.

Okay.

Um that is helpful for me.

Okay.

That was my only question.

Thank you so much.

I appreciate that.

And I guess if no other questions from the board, we could open up for a public comment.

So far, I've got one speaker in person.

If anyone online would like to speak, please raise your hand.

Uh Hank Hernandez.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good evening, members of the board.

My name is Hank Hernandez.

I'm a longtime Alameda resident and president of Alameda Tiny Homes, your local ADU builder.

I'm in full support of clarifying our ADU ordinances and very excited about implementing AB 1033.

But I want to flag uh three issues before you adopt it.

The first is design review, item I2.

The second is parking, item G1.

And then last is roof pitches E3B.

On the first subsection I2 on design review, as written, a new detached ADU designed with an integrated rooftop patio could be pulled into discretionary design review because the ordinance treats the deck as separate from the ADU itself.

ADUs that qualify under our section 66323 are exempt from design review by state law because we're trying to encourage new housing.

Subjecting an integrated patio to discretionary review effectively imposes a discretionary condition on an ADU, which is exactly what our state law is meant to prevent.

I argue that a modest patio gives ADU residents access to real outdoor space and meaningfully improves their quality of life.

Second, subsection G1 on parking, it requires that remaining driveways be at least 18 feet long or they must be abandoned.

That's longer than necessary, and removing driveways and curb cuts eliminates the most practical place for residents to do EV charging.

I'd ask the board to shorten the standard to the 15 foot compact length, which uh would uh allow people to continue to use EV chargers there, or uh better yet, strike this whole subsection and handle it as part of a comprehensive review of our parking standards under 30-7.

Third uh is subsection E3B on roof pitch, which allows the extra two feet of height up to 20 only if the ADU matches the primary home.

But the ordinance doesn't say uh how closely it has to match, how that's measured, or what happens when the primary home has more than one pitch, which is common.

In practice, this pushes builders to lower interior plate heights just to hit a specific pitch instead of focusing on what matters, which is a livable unit.

I'd ask the board to drop the pitch matching requirements so we can design two-story homes without artificially lowering ceiling heights.

Thanks for your time.

Thank you.

Thank you so much for those comments.

Next speaker.

Next speaker is Mark Gonyer.

Thank you.

Yes, my name is Mark Gonyer.

I appreciate the time, President Ciceneros and the rest of the board members.

So I'm here to speak in favor of the ADU condo conversion ordinance that's being considered this evening.

So you know, every day we read in the newspaper and hear it all over the media about uh housing and affordability, the ability for families to, you know, even just to start a family and to have home ownership today, and I think the ability to um giving giving uh community members the ability to create housing, housing that gives them the option to be able to sell it, is good for the community, good for you know everyone here uh to add uh affordable housing.

So, particularly in the uh discussion around starter homes, because typically ADUs are smaller in size, they're more modest in size, and so they can potentially be much more affordable for those that are looking to you know get out of the uh ongoing renting and um just you know paying rent every month and actually start to build equity in terms of a home.

So um my situation is a little bit unique probably.

Uh my business partner and I we acquired a six unit uh apartment building, it was run down, it had been vacant for nearly 10 years as we understand.

It's in a beautiful neighborhood on San Antonio Avenue, and so we spent two and a half years renovating this building, and it's got a uh a broad mix of units from studio to one bedrooms to a two bedroom to a couple three bedrooms and even a four bedroom home.

And what we've determined is that we think the highest and best use of this property is to actually condoize it and sell those off as starter homes for people because we uh foresee the pricing would be very uh modest and achievable for home ownership.

Um the challenge is that uh we took the six-unit building and one of we created an additional home, so now it's a seven-unit building, and uh that was created via ADU law, but now we can't do the strategy of you know, um the property as individual units because one is an ADU.

And I know that that's what you're considering.

I've spent, you know, several months talking to Tristan about this, and so we're very excited about the opportunity for you to consider this.

Um we think that it is really a path to the city, you know, helping do its part to create more affordable homes.

Thank you very much.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

Great timing.

Um any other public comments?

No other speakers.

Okay, great.

Um, before I bring it back to the board for uh discussion and feedback, um I was wondering if staff um had any reactions to some of the public comments.

Um it sounds like uh we have some experts in the room and they had some uh pointed suggestions.

Um I'd be curious just to hear some reactions, or if you need time to digest, that's fine too.

But I don't think it's uh staff's opinion that anything that came up in the public comments is um you know something that we have strong opinions on.

I think at the end of the day, it's the board's direction that we're we're going on.

Um I might, you know, I think they're I don't think it's difficult to imagine the counterargument to any of these questions.

Um, and so I mean, if you have specific questions about why staff might have previously adopted a particular position or how we came to that conclusion.

I'm certainly happy to answer any of those questions.

Um yeah, otherwise I I think the comments were fairly self-explanatory, so I won't I won't try to go too deep into detail with those.

Okay, great.

I would I would just add, I think on the parking question, um there's a separate section that is not discretionary on the part of planning, um, which is the you know, public works code says that abandoned driveways shall be um removed and the curb re-established, you know, to to provide public parking on a public street.

Um and so if the an if a driveway isn't usable leading to a legal parking space, then it it is supposed to be removed, and we and we see this occasionally on commercial streets as well as on residential streets, um, and that's at the discretion of the public works director.

That's helpful.

Great, thank you.

Um with that, I'll bring it to the board.

Okay, all right.

Uh board member Dewey.

Oh, I didn't raise my hand.

Well, I seem to be very opinionated tonight.

So um okay, well, thank you very much.

And I know I have a lot of questions and I really appreciate your patience in walking me through those.

Um, a couple things.

Um again, these are suggestions.

There are a lot when when we are writing ordinance, I always look for clarities and in terms of verbiage as well.

I know there's a a lot of references about subsection E, subsection um D.

It would be good to say subsection of this ordinance or subsection of what, you know, I'm trying to figure out which subsection.

Um, so that's just a general um recommendation on page five of the red line version.

Um recommended design consideration.

I think that's page five.

Yeah, five over twelve in the red line version.

Um under A, it says the design of a tattoo accessory dwelling unit should match the same material, da da da da da, etc.

Um, I would say match or compliment, because you are wearing a checker pattern shirt.

But I'm sure that you don't have a checker pattern pants, because that would be a lot.

Um that would be matchy matchy, and I think compliment that's where we're going here.

So I would like to see that word added.

Um that would apply to the roof form as well.

I wouldn't, you know, I I hear the the speaker's recommendation about rule of pitch, I don't know if we should really match that rather than allow more flexibility of complementary slopes or you know, design is it look more complementary rather than match.

Um in terms of the roof deck attached to ADU, I think maybe under a certain size, it should be part of the ADU rather than the certain design.

So I'm I'm curious, open to hear what other board members' comments if we limit to a size, if it's smaller than this, is attached to the ADU.

It's part of the ADU, don't mandate a separate design review.

That's my current position, and I'm curious to hear what other board members' uh thoughts on that.

Um in terms of parking, um, thank you, Director Buckley, about the um your your comments, your refresher on the public work, rather than mandating here, I would rather refer it back to the public works section so to avoid conflicts, and if we rather so that we're not overriding them, and vice versa.

If public works is governing, you know, a b quote unquote what is considered abandoned driveway, and go from there rather than creating our own mandate that can potentially be in conflict with with that.

Um so that's my thoughts on that.

In terms of the um the section on um condo conversion, and thank you for I believe this is the first time we look at the condo conversion section, right?

Okay.

So are you ready?

Um I appreciate the thought process um again in terms of uh ordinance.

I don't know if you want to use language that if you are considered as a if you're you if your you know we want to avoid using pronouns in ordinance, I would suggest remove any reference to if you're considering if you're a condominium, if you know, all those pronouns change to if the applicant or if the application, the applicability, make it third party, so it sounds like an ordinance rather than you're talking to neighbor.

And again, that's from the state law, but I think we can probably do that kind of change and it'll be okay.

Okay, thank you.

So this is verbatim from the state?

It's verbatim.

That's scary.

Okay, that's worse than okay.

Then the second thing, this um I know there's a lot of that's the CC.

It's it's a notice to consumers, and so it's meant to be targeted to the reader as a consumer.

So do we need to include the notice to consumers in our ordinance?

Yes.

Because this is a mandate to the developer that you shall do these things and it shall say this.

Okay.

Um, because I feel like a lot of this, I guess is from consumer protection.

But for example, in terms of when I'm reading about all the lender requirements, that has nothing to do with zoning code.

That is we have no purview in mortgage requirements, etc.

I am very confused on why this is in our zoning code.

Is there any way we can just refer back to state mandate and call it a day?

When I'm reading this, all these notes about paying off your current lender, securing their lender approval.

I feel like that is a overreach of the purview of this board.

We have no governance in that, right?

We're not a consumer's protection agency.

Why do we have this in our zoning code?

I think because state law references it, and so because we're drawing on that, it's then we just refer back to the state law.

We we can look into it, but I yeah.

My anyway, go ahead.

Yeah, I'm sorry.

What we typically like to do is we like to, you know, give the applicant just one document and and have all of the regulations codified in the same document so that the applicant doesn't have to go and look at the state law and what happens if what happens when the state law changes.

Yeah, we probably should make a um a reference for that in this in this ordinance.

Um but it it I also will say that in you're right, this is a zoning law, many cities codify their um subdivision ordinances in a different section, which which we do as well.

And so you you tend to see this type of language more in in a subdivision ordinance rather than in a zoning code ordinance.

Um so that's why this may not feel this traditional as you might.

But my concern is whenever we copy state law v verbatim into our rather than doing a reference, once they update it, there will be a potential for conflict.

So I rather refer to it and then copy and paste.

I will note that we do have an administrative section at the very end of the ordinance that does authorize the planning director to, you know, basically ensure that the procedures remain consistent with state law.

So, you know, assuming that whatever changes are made to state law are relatively minor and we can make findings of consistency, it does seem like we could build that expectation into the the ordinance itself without necessarily needing to sort of atomize the standards into different places so that an applicant has to go look at state law and our code.

That could be one possible solution.

Okay.

Um but you hear my concern.

I don't have a solution for this, but you hear my concern.

Okay.

And um again, this is the first time I'm seeing this, and I'm and I appreciate we I think we're going through the right direction.

But those are my concerns, and also getting back to the earlier comment about um ministerial review for JADUs and how it was pulled away from all the other review processes you see.

Um I have been, you know, as a practitioner, I've been read the code.

Oh, under approval process, I'll see all the approval processes and then they're later realize, darn, I missed a section because it was somewhere else.

So it would be good to maybe we refer that, you know, for JADU administrative process to see this other section if we you want to pull it out separately.

But I think when we're talking about ministerial process for both, it should be added in there.

So I think the process for JADUs is the same for ADUs though, with the exception of the D restriction.

With the exception of what?

The D restriction.

Right.

Right.

So I anyway, I just feel like the ordering is not, it doesn't flow properly.

Okay.

Thank you.

Those are my comments, thank you.

Uh board member Han.

Yeah, I'm I appreciate the comment that uh board member Ruiz brought up.

One possible solution, I'll throw this out, is that you have the ordinance reference to state ordinance, but you can always state the requirements and the conditions of approval, or you can have a closer to the mic.

Or you can have an information sheet that has all that information provided to the applicant.

So that could be one way, in my opinion, that you don't have to reference the exact language in the ordinance, you could have it in the conditions of approval or part of the subdivision agreement, whatever it is, or it is kind of this informational handout to anyone that that is interested in in a condo conversion.

You know, I mean, that's kind of I think that could satisfy the requirements and comply with state law.

Anyway, I throw that out there something to consider.

Um just following up on some of the comments that board member Ruiz made, and I agree with with her, you know, the patio issue.

I wonder if I was looking at the ordinance, it doesn't really define you know what size patio, so you might consider if it's some size under a certain square footage, and maybe is at least X number of feet away from the property line, that that might allow for a more streamlined approval rather than a full design review.

So that's just an option there.

Um the roof pitch, I I agree with the applicant and makes a good point that when you refer to the roof pitch of an existing house, it could be all kinds of roof pitches.

So maybe uh what I've sometimes see and this for like for primary structures that you allow a little bit higher um height if the roof pitch of the structure is you know over a certain pitch or is so that it's not directly referencing the roof pitch of the existing house because that could get confusing too.

So I see the the rationale for an allowance if you have a steeply pitched roof, so you know sometimes they do you know averaging of heights, which gets complicated to deal with.

But I I agree with um, you know, trying to define that a little bit more clearly.

And then with parking, you know, I I'm fully supportive of limiting the driveway and the curb cut, but if there's a need to reconcile what what public works uh requirements are so that there's not an internal inconsistency, that makes sense.

And then one of my other comments is this is getting into the the weeds of impact fees, only because I've just had to deal with this in another city.

Um, first question Does the city charge water and sewer capacity fees for ADUs?

Uh no, to my understanding we do not, but we can double check on that.

You might might you might check that, and if the city does charge it, you might want to specifically mention the ordinance that those whether the city wants to waive those fees or not, because they're not considered impact fees under state law.

A city can actually charge uh water capacity and sewer fees if um even for uh ADUs under 750 square feet, you can't charge for converting an existing space, but you can't charge.

So there's a difference that I found out uh, you know, in uh administrating ordinance.

The other thing issue with uh under AB 937, I believe that if there are fees charged for ADU, such as the larger ones, they're they're deferred until occupancy stage.

So I don't know whether that needs to be clarified in the ordinance, or maybe it's just part of the fiat fee adoption and not part of the ordinance.

I just want to mention that.

Um I think yeah, those are prime pretty much my comments.

Thank you.

Any other comments, board member Wang and then board member Sagiba?

Um, just a clarification on on the point about decks and design review.

So the way that I read the language as it's currently written is that if an ADU were to include a deck, that this ordinance isn't intended to pull the ADU into a discretionary review process, but somehow the ADU proceeds ministerially, but the deck is now under design review, right?

But I think what the comp the comment that we're entertaining here is that practically speaking, is it really realistic for those for two things that are combined physically to proceed on separate paths like that?

I think you know, I think there's one view that basically says you're either ministerial or not, right?

If you're part ministerial and there's another part that's kind of subject to a planning board hearing, then you know, if you're an owner and you were relying on a ministerial review, you know, the the choice that's in front of you is perhaps well uh maybe I need to just abandon this deck if I want to build my project on the timeline that I thought I would build it on.

Um so I I guess I'm if you don't disagree with that characterization.

I do I do think the the comments from from um board member Ruiz and and Hom, I agree with it.

I think that we should do our best to uh include a ministerial pathway for decks uh or balconies or patios of a certain size.

Um did you uh did you did you have a thought?

Just a clarifying comment.

Um and first I do want to point out that um board member Haum mentioned maybe relying on an existing threshold for uh decks.

There is one in the provision of the ordinance that talks about how we calculate um floor area and decks under a certain threshold.

I want to say it's 50 square feet are considered differently.

Um so that might be uh a place where we can kind of say, well, there's an existing threshold for small decks.

We could look at that.

Um the other thing I wanted to point out, just in your your earlier comments, you said, you know, decks, patios, and so on.

It's it's not all decks, it's not even patios in general, it's second story decks specifically understood.

Um and uh the consideration primarily that is kind of undertaken when we go through those design review is to do with privacy shading and view blockage.

Um the current requirement doesn't so much consider the ADU as a partial discretionary review, so much as it says if you would like this accoutrement to the ADU, because it is not necessary to create the ADU, the roof deck is neither necessary nor sufficient for the ADU, right?

That you could either keep your door, move back your balcony, right, so that your your railing is just against the door, creating like a little Juliet balcony, and then you can still have your flat roof there, but because the railing is by the door, you can simply remove you know change the location of the railing to make it a roof deck or not a roof deck.

That's how we've sort of navigated those from ministerial perspective.

Um, you know, the fact that the deck is not an integral part to the ADU, it's more of an option added to it was sort of the reasoning behind why it was considered discretionary rather than the ministerial portion.

Is that I just hope that was a little bit more clear than.

Yeah, I I think that yes, um, I think that's helpful.

Um I do still support the the notion of a a threshold to have a full ministerial pathway.

I think it would be a good idea generally.

Um I do have a second comment that's a little more global.

Um just just zooming back out, I think to uh to the to the condo conversion concept.

Um, you know, I we we got a public comment on this.

I I want to echo and agree uh and and reprise some of the comments that I've made in in prior hearings, and including in the hearing where we had uh more of a uh a workshop on this topic.

So yes, we are in the midst of a a long-running housing affordability crisis, um, and I don't think there's really much debate about this that has to do with uh a chronic and long-standing housing supply deficit.

Um so here I think when we're talking about the ability to uh to condo an ADU and sell it off.

I I would say here that I don't expect that would meaningfully um change our housing supply picture.

Um you know, I think there have been arguments to to that that have been made that say, well, maybe it'll encourage uh you know some some owners to to create ADUs and sell them.

And I think that would be positive.

I think that would be a positive addition to our supply, probably on the margins, probably not gonna help us um address housing affordability or housing supply in a meaningful way in a structural way.

Uh so in short, is it gonna move the needle really on housing supply?

I don't think so.

Um, is it gonna move the needle in reducing and reducing our rental housing supply?

Uh I don't really see that happening either.

Um I think what we're talking about here is uh making it a little bit easier for people who are uh contemplating uh various decisions related to their property, creating an ADU, thinking about their future income streams, thinking about one-time uh uh income coming in.

Uh I think it just uh to reprise some of those comments, it creates a little bit of flexibility, and that's a good thing.

Um so uh I just wanted to put that back out there uh because uh we did discuss this already.

Uh didn't want to take that for granted here.

Uh I think it was worth reprising.

Thank you.

Uh board membership?

Sure.

Um thanks again for all the public comments.

Uh I think most of my fellow board members have addressed a lot of the uh issues that um needed to be uh sort of discussed.

I I do want to just say for um just respond to one of the um public uh commenters the uh the yeah the curb cut issue is pretty straightforward.

I will say that I know there was this discussion of a compact space versus a regular space.

Um we just can't control the length of a vehicle that'll be part fair, and I think that's that's uh that's kind of a hard hard thing to regulate.

So I think it makes sense what the what the ask is here for you know making sure that we hit the minimum standards for parking stalls to to allow for that curb cut to still exist, um being being the eighteen feet um of length.

Uh I will also say on the um uh specific to the also the point that we've I think spoken about a bit on the um on the decks uh and whether they're ministerial or not, um it sounds like from what you described, there's clear square footages and dimensions and sizes where it can be ministerial.

It's a sort or or it's under a separate section of the ordinance that regulates how square foot area is calculated for such decks.

Um it does not currently have to do with administrative or discretionary approval, it doesn't currently have to do with ADUs at all.

But it is a separate section of the code that does reference small decks and establishes a square foot threshold for what that means.

Does it establish the canopies or roofs specific to that small deck?

Not to my knowledge.

So that's where a little bit of the I can see the challenge of even just a ground floor deck, let's say.

Um if you're trying to create uh a little bit of a canopy over that, and that structure is attached to your ADU, then is there a challenge there?

Unless the finished floor height is above the first story, it would not trigger design review.

Okay.

So it would only be in the case of a roof deck or a rooftop patio of some kind that that would trigger that design review.

Um so it really doesn't the height isn't is is relevant up to a point, but once you're past that second story, it doesn't matter whether your roof deck is on the roof of your second story or your first story or somewhere in between, right?

It's just a ground floor, ground floor deck with the canopy.

Would not trigger design.

Okay, I just wanted to make sure.

So um so it seems like there's clarity there, and um it would if if it's connected to the ADU design, then it's it seems like that should be fine.

For canopies, but can I do it?

Under the first story, under the first door, yeah.

Okay, got it.

All right, thank you.

Thank you.

Uh board member to weave.

So on the no, I have a question.

So if if the it's a let's say if we have an attached ADU that happened to be on the second floor, that way added.

If we can for part of the second floor storage to an ADU and an add on to it is on the second floor, and then I add a deck to it on the second floor.

So that would be that would trigger design review.

Uh as the ordinance is currently written, a second story deck, even attached to a primary dwelling would trigger design review.

Um presumably if we adopted some sort of threshold here, it may depend on the size of that deck, but as it's currently written, yes, a second story deck, even if attached would would trigger design review.

To the primary structure.

But if it's to the ADU, then it does as well.

Regardless of whether the proposed second story deck is uh attached to the ADU or attached the primary structure, the virus design requests.

Yeah, I mean, I would just say we do these all day long.

The these are the bread and butter design reviews.

Um we're even doing one right now for the housing authority that is repairing some parts of a building and they're adding a landing and uh some stairs goes through design review.

But design review through the zoning administrator.

Yeah, it's it's it's not ministerial, but it's it's a staff level.

We we issue a notice.

Staff level design review, not planning board.

Correct.

Correct.

That's helpful.

Yeah, it is never the case that these are.

It never comes to you.

You you don't see these.

No, it's it's a you know, a fairly very straightforward process, but it gives notice to the neighbors because there could be a privacy impact, and the ordinance provides that the purpose of the design review is for privacy, light, um, and views.

And so the idea is if we need to, we can ask the applicant to set it back, or put up a railing, or um, you know, reorient it to the backyard instead of to their yard.

And so that's the kind of feedback that we get, and that's what we do in design review.

And by having the review, it um keys the designer to the fact that these are the things we care about, and so before they come to us, they think about these things and then they design it appropriately, and then we don't have to really do much.

But if we didn't have the review, who knows what they would come up with, and we'd have no recourse.

So that's why we do it.

Thank you for the clarification.

So does that would that delay the ADU approval?

You just bifurcate the two.

We can bifurcate it.

As Tristan said, we can deal with the deck railing and the deck access and paving um separately, or it could be part of the building permit, uh, it could be uh revision to the building permit, uh, things like that.

Okay.

Thank you.

Welcome.

Um, any other comments or feedback?

Um, well, maybe would it be helpful for you all to repeat back some of the uh suggestions that you heard so far?

Okay.

It would be helpful to go over some of these, and also if I could just clarify a comment you'd made, um, board member Sahiba.

I I think I just wanted to clarify the first comment you were making and and just understand what exactly you were going for there.

Can you just kind of repeat to me back how exactly you wanted to?

Specific to the off-street parking.

Uh yes, whether it's it was a little unclear to me whether you wanted to keep the 18th.

Oh, yes, no, I didn't.

I just wanted to make sure I had to.

I just want to address the fact that there was a comment made about compact stalls, and I was just saying that it's hard to regulate the type of vehicle that gets parked there.

I totally agree, just want to make sure I understood correctly the feedback you gave there.

Um, so I mean, there's various comments throughout about sort of um language, for example, the references of you know, subsection, what subsection you're referencing, things like that.

Um, but primarily sort of the more meaty changes have to do with um I did hear some comments about um generally speaking, allowing the roof decks to proceed without any sort of design review under a certain threshold, and I heard some suggestions maybe being the size of that or uh the location on the property, right?

So if it's sufficiently set back or if it's sufficiently small, maybe if it's both, then we would consider allowing that to proceed without design review.

Um likewise it sounds like I think I like I'm just curious now that we know more clarity that zone do the zoning administrator, do we I just wanted to know what you that doesn't apply anymore?

So we only is a zoning administrator review.

No, can I clarify what I think I'm hearing?

Are we saying that design review for roof decks can proceed as currently written with the assumption that the design review will take place at the staff level?

I think so.

I think do we all agree?

Okay, yeah, that's fine.

And of course, um design review at a staff level can be appealed to the planning chart.

It's still notice though, right?

It's still notice.

I wonder if you need to do 300 foot notice.

Yeah, I'm so sorry, one more time.

I'm just kind of wondering whether you have to do a 300-foot notice.

Sometimes with these minor, they just say, you know, I just notice the adjacent neighbors.

Yeah.

For a little small depth through the foot seems kind of.

We can certainly look into the radius that's required for that kind of a design review.

Um sorry, come back to some of the more meaty changes here.

So if we're good with DR on roof decks, um, state law regarding condo conversions, maybe better incorporating a reference to state law um uh and exploring options for reducing sort of the um repetition of that language there.

Um I also heard a suggestion for maybe a handout to supplement that.

Um I heard a conversation around better defining roof pitch and even roof form and what that means.

Basically allowing for greater leniency when we talk about matching the roof pitch, or at least a greater ability to have a complementary roof pitch, maybe not a perfectly matching roof pitch.

Um, same goes for sort of these uh attached design considerations, right?

This idea that it's compatible, but maybe not exactly matching.

Um the uh intent to reference public works parking requirements rather than uh sort of taking those on ourselves in the ADU ordinance, um, maybe deferring to them a little bit as far as their standards are concerned, uh, and then of course reserving that requirement for the 18-foot parking or removal of a curb cover that's not present.

Um other than that, I do have, you know, language updates that are pretty minor, but I think that covers sort of the media updates.

Were there ones that I missed or things that needed a further clarification?

Any other uh seeing no shaking thing?

That's okay.

Yeah, great job.

Okay, so well uh um so we're gonna need a motion for this, right?

Or are you yes?

We are we do have a resolution requesting the board or the staff is recommending that the board adopt a resolution recommending to the city council approval of the ordinance.

Okay, great.

But was there was there consensus on all of these points?

I think so.

Yeah, okay.

So I think, yeah, so I guess yeah.

Just wanted to make sure those uh changes will be incorporated and uh whoever is ready to make the motion um for recommendations to the city council.

I could I just ask one question.

Yeah, you know, some of the comments you mentioned was like considered this or considered that.

Are you clear what you're gonna be revising?

I guess I just want to make sure that we recommend approval of this, you know.

Maybe you might restate what the actual changes are versus what you staff will be considering.

Yeah, so I think the considerations were primarily related to the roof decks, so we can kind of omit a lot of that as far as if we're gonna proceed as currently written with that.

Um as far as the state law around condo conversions.

I think we need to explore options with the city attorney's office to find out sort of how much of that we can omit and how much really ought to be retained in the ordinance.

Um as far as the um better defining the roof pitch, I think the intent is to build sort of leniency into the ordinance, and so the language would likely change to state that there's some level of uh variance, right, that we can accommodate as far as not matching the exact roof pitch, probably taking away the word match, right?

And saying consistent with the you know roof pitch of the primary dwelling, something to that effect.

Um as far as the reference to public works for the parking.

I think we would likely specifically call out that code section, maybe omit some of the existing language in our own, if only you know keeping the stuff that reiterates what's already in the public works ordinance.

Um, I I think we can we'll what we'll do is we'll we'll take this resolution and we'll include these recommendations as part of your motion, and then we'll redraft the ordinance, and we'll make those changes as as we can best interpret it.

But I I think we're pretty clear.

Okay, and then of course, make sure that's yeah, yeah, yeah.

So you're asking us to make a motion to know.

Yeah, and then the council obviously will have its own thoughts, and so they might words it further.

Of course.

So I think it's it's bound to change a little bit here and there.

You had a comment?

Yes, um, thank you, President.

Um, the question for Zab, is there a deadline to send this to the council?

No.

Can we ask her to come back again so we can see the final version?

Yes.

Yeah.

You can.

Yeah, yeah.

If there's no rush, but you mainly because there's a a lot and some substantial changes, especially this is the first time we saw the condo conversion.

Um, yeah.

Uh if it pleases the board, I'm fine with that.

And there isn't necessarily a rush.

Um, if there's a rush, then they's a different.

Yeah.

Do we have it on we have a on the calendar for?

We have not yet posted it to Legistar, nor have we sent out public hearing notices.

Right.

Is slated to go before the the city council with the assumption that the board will move it forward.

But the workflow is in motion.

Okay.

I'll say that.

Can you just continue the public hearing?

So you don't have to renotice it.

I think the director was referring to a um the public hearing for the city council.

Oh, that'd be noticed already.

It hasn't been noticed, but we've reserved a date on their agenda.

Yeah, but it has not been noticed.

So correct.

What what are the what's the drawback of it being in motion but not notice for the city council?

Well it it just means we're gonna have to come back and do this all over again for one thing.

And then it does delay getting to council, and so it just delays the implementation of these changes.

Which I don't think your suggestions are substantial.

I think it's wordsmithing, which we can totally do.

Um, I think you have consensus, we have consensus.

I don't think it's complicated.

Yeah, yeah.

I uh personally don't have a strong feeling, but I I know my fellow board members um you know um yeah, had some pretty hefty feedback, so I could see the case for it coming back.

Um yes, board member home.

Yeah, I don't mind it coming back, but then at this part of me is thinking these changes are as you restated them pretty clear to me, and they're not major, so I don't have a discomfort in not seeing it again, but but I defer to the rest of the board if the board really wants to see it to make sure the wording is as we state it.

Uh I'm fine.

My the only question was regarding how much can we reference regarding the state legislation and I would defer to the city attorney.

I think our comment was try to take as much of it out as possible, at least the noticing word is, but so that's kind of more like a city attorney term, and I'm fine with ever you determine, but you know, quite honestly I'm comfortable acting on it tonight.

There I don't see these changes are that major, but at the same time I don't wanna just you know, f if there's a desire to see them again.

I need to take a vote on how many of us feel comfortable passing the or do we just someone makes a motion?

Can I make a motion and then we see what we can see how the chips fall?

Yeah, yeah, that's the way to have it.

So uh I'll move to approve the draft resolution um to recommending to the city council that it adopts the amendments to the code to amend provisions related to the accessory dueling units with the amendments that we talked about regarding um the was it the parking, you could say as stated by as stated by staff, yeah, because I don't remember them all, but I think there were four, you know, kind of just revisions to the language mainly of the wording of the text.

Um but other than that, um we move I move to up rec to approve the resolution recommending the draft resolution recommending to city council that it dumps the amendments.

I'll go ahead and second it.

Okay, we have a motion and a second.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

No opposed, and no abstention.

Motion carries.

Okay.

Thank you very much.

All right, great.

Yeah, thank you for that.

Um, and many thanks to my fellow board members for the wonderful comments and um, you know, I I and going back to the conversion, um or can it you conveyance policy, it's a big step for City Valameda.

Um, so I appreciate us wanting to be mindful about it being reflective um of uh you know what we want it to be, and I also appreciate board member Wang's comments of you know um being mindful of like the brand comment we received about tenant protections.

Um so I appreciate staff elevating that um and you know we probably won't see huge uh dent um in ADU home ownership and it's a step forward, so um excited to see how this evolves.

So thank you um staff and to members of the public and to everyone uh with that we'll close this agenda item and move on to staff communications uh yes um in your packet there's a list of recent approvals um as we discussed there's uh four design reviews and one certificate of approval um uh related to various um residential additions a second story deck um and uh ADA compliance improvements and things like that so we're handling all of those at the staff level they're still in their appeal period um I also wanted to take the opportunity to recognize board member Saheva um we have a certificate of appreciation for your eight years of service I wasn't here for all those eight years but I um I understand you I understand that you did a lot of uh good work um along with your fellow board members who some of them are who are here and some who uh have rotated um and so um I don't know if there's anything uh anyone else wanted to say but you you've um served out your your term limit and so um you're welcome to stay as long as you can uh until your replacement is found um which will be hard big shoes to fill but um anyway congratulations on your eight years of service thank you yeah no um just um plus one to that I I looked at when you started in 2018 like my goodness like you've been um such a wonderful uh community volunteer and leader um uh you were here when I joined the board and and uh very much look up to you and valued your um professional expertise and perspective and um all your comments that you brought uh really show um your experience and um yeah just very grateful for um your partnership over the past few years so yeah just thank you.

Um yes board member home yeah I just want to say congratulations been wonderful working with you.

I I've uh worked with board members of HEBA for seven out of eight years right so you know I've always admired your thoughtful comments especially your design perspective that I think it's so important it kind of illustrates the need and importance of having an architect on the planning board so having that design expertise I know we still have Teresa but uh but your your your insights on the design and you analyze the project really well so it's almost like I always depended oh well so board members say hiba I'm sure we'll talk about the architectural design and come up with some wonderful comments which you always do so you're gonna be missed on the board but I know you're gonna continue on for a couple more meetings at least so you know no big rush in filling this position just wanna make sure so um we'll see you at future meetings but I just want to say it's been a really honor serving with you kind of uh show elevate the standard of what a board member should be yeah thanks great uh yes board member does ditto um yeah eight years uh as a relative newbie here I think it's been two years for me um I wanted to share my appreciation for you board members AIBA I recently learned from you the story of how you became a board member eight years ago.

So if anybody doesn't know the story, you should buy them a coffee and learn about it it.

It's kind of interesting.

Um I've always appreciated your very thoughtful comments.

Um you don't get heated, you don't get excited, which I think there's something to say for that.

Um I think that's really cool.

Um but thank you for uh for those of us who are newer.

Thank you for showing us how to be a good board member.

Zito.

What are you gonna do without this extra time?

I'm still I still have a day job.

Well, I uh yeah, no, it's it's it's been um my honor and uh pleasure serving on this board uh for the time that I have.

I will say I when I joined I really didn't know what I was getting into.

Um I probably have uh learned more than I've contributed, I believe.

Um, and I think all the board members uh current ones and the ones that have um uh previously been here.

Uh I think just the dynamic and the structure of this board is really unique.

I've um you know practice in in architecture and in a lot of other jurisdictions and um gone in front of various boards, but I always I always felt uh level of um diversity diversity and sophistication with this board that that I think is really strong, and I think it continual continue will be in the future.

So appreciate everyone's um kind words and and um good luck in the future.

Thank you and uh congratulations again.

Um wonderful.

Any other staff communications?

Nothing else.

Okay, um, and no public comments on that.

No more folks coming to celebrate.

Remember the Heba.

All right.

Um, with that, moving on to board communications.

Um yeah, I just wanted to share that I will be stepping down from the board.

Um I've been four years with the board, and after a lot of thought, I even though I really enjoy and I really learn a lot from being here, and I'm glad to serve.

Right now, I just feel I don't have the bandwidth.

So I don't, yeah, I feel that's why I need to step down.

But it's been wonderful to be here.

And of course I'm gonna stay until there's a replacement.

Very good.

No rush.

Okay.

All right.

Well, um, we'll r reserve our departing words um in the future.

So, but yeah, thank you so much for um your service, and yeah, we'll uh enjoy the time we have until your placement comes.

So yeah, thank you.

Um, any other board communications?

If not, then um do we have public comment on that?

Moving on to non-agenda public comments.

Anyone from the public could speak for three minutes on an item that wasn't on tonight's meeting.

Okay.

You will closed non-agenda public comments and it is what time?

9 46, and we are adjourned.

Thank you.

Um, I'm gonna go