All right, good evening.

This is the City of Belmont City Council's special meeting agenda.

The dice looks a little bit different this evening.

This is actually a study session that we are having this evening with the City of Belmont Planning Commission and roll call, please.

See, I'll get this right.

That's me.

Councilmember McCune.

Present.

Pang Manganaris, President Jordan.

Here.

But I did it again, I'm sorry.

Laudamarlo?

Yeah.

Mayor Mates here.

All present on council.

Planning Commissioner Twig.

Yeah.

Adam Hoods.

Here.

Majesty.

Here.

And Jadala?

Here.

Thank you.

All present.

Great.

And thank you all for being here tonight, kind of all sitting shoulder to shoulder.

So with one nice tight happy family.

We are going to have item two as a study session.

Again, joint meeting with planning commission and city council.

We're going to receive a housing law update, and we're going to receive this on an informal basis on state housing laws and their implications for the city of Belmont.

And I think we have our assistant city manager with us this evening, Kathy Kleinbaum to kick us off.

All right.

Good evening, everyone.

Thank you so much for making it here at this hour.

So we're going to have a presentation tonight.

Two sort of separate presentations.

The first one will be from the California Public Policy Group, who is a consultant to the city, and they will be providing an overview of the trends in state law and in the state housing market.

And then we will move over to Barb Kaufman from Goldfarb and Litman, who will go into more depth about some laws that have been on the books most recently, as well as some that have been in place for about a year or so that are really changing the way that the city processes our housing development applications.

So with that, I will hand it off to Dan Kerrig from the California Public Policy Group who is joining us tonight by Zoom.

Hopefully shortly.

Good evening, Dan.

There you go.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

I'm waiting for my colleague Dane Hutchins to join.

Oh, there he is.

And I'm gonna be participating, but I know Dane is gonna help uh lead our presentation.

Good to see you, Dane.

Hi, uh good evening.

My apologies for being a few minutes late.

Um technical issues resolved now.

Uh Dane, the uh uh mayor and uh assistant city manager just introduced the topic, and we are uh keyed up to go and give them an update on uh some of the trends.

And my understanding is you'll be sharing your presentation directly.

So I think Dane, we can't hear you.

Sorry.

That is correct.

My apologies.

You're all good now.

Thanks.

Okay.

Did you all hear where I said I apologize for being late?

I had technical issues.

Yes, we heard that part.

I just saw your mouth moving just 30 seconds ago and didn't hear anything.

All right, fantastic.

Well, good evening, everybody.

Um, thanks for uh thanks for giving us the time this evening.

Dane Hutchings and Dan Carrick, senior advisor for the California Public Policy Group.

Um, you know, don't need to read off our bios, you guys know who we are, um, and uh happy to answer any questions with respect to background.

I've been with uh with the city for now for uh a little over gosh five years.

Um time flies and you're having fun.

And Dan uh was my former boss to lead in California Cities and has served as senior advisor uh for us uh really since the inception of our firm.

So, you know, we wanted to go over uh a few trends in state housing law.

Um I also wanted to take a moment to highlight some factors that are not currently being addressed where we see, you know, that uh you know to provide you more of a sort of a holistic landscape of what's happening and frankly what's not happening yet in uh in Sacramento.

Uh Dan's gonna spend a little bit more time uh uh specifically on SD 79, and then we can touch uh briefly on um uh trends for uh this upcoming session.

So from uh from a trend perspective, you know, look, uh you know, no stranger here.

Really, over the last six or seven years, the legislature has really tightened down considerably in uh uh in in statewide housing law and and local governments really are seen as the soft target.

Um, you know, uh, we don't have perhaps the the political action resources that some of the uh folks and that you know, some of the other contributors in this sort of global uh issue have.

Um and so a lot of our job has really been trying to be collaborative with legislature and try and maybe reduce impacts uh because each uh individual city is unique um so we've seen things uh really uh uh focusing on the Bay Area affordability challenges through increased density traffic in commutes uh GHG reductions and so they're looking at sort of climate transit housing is really uh one issue um uh you know there's frankly one of the big challenges is a lack of uh vacant buildable land uh and so you know they want you to go up um and so uh yeah and most of the most aggressive laws uh have really been uh spearheaded by Bay Area lawmakers uh Bay Area delegation and of course uh the governor who uh reigns from the Bay Area and so just a snapshot of of some of the laws that we're we're talking about so we've taught we've seen you know a flurry of bills uh I mean to put it in perspective we see probably about a hundred and fifteen to a hundred and twenty bills per year introduced uh that are specifically targeted at local government and so it is a more than a full time job just trying to track all of these pieces individual pieces of legislation and try to assess impacts for for the city of Belmont but uh regional housing needs and housing elements density bonus law buy right development uh the housing accountability act uh major uh pushes in uh ADUs um uh SB9 of course is duplexing and forplexing uh now we're seeing and one of the things that we sort of look at as this maybe conflicting policies we've got all these legislation that really hampers or really puts pressure on local governments to increase their planning increase their planning and then you've got bills that say like you know irrespective of all the planning you're doing we want you to build in commercial zones um and uh and then of course affirmatively furthering fair housing I think everyone can agree the you know um that's a laudable goal uh it also happens to be a moving target that uh can really be uh difficult to pin down what that actually means and uh frankly I think that's that's uh uh the intent uh and we've tried to you know get clear understanding in law about what that actually means typically those efforts don't bear fruit you know other issues that aren't being addressed frankly you know we've seen a decline in state housing production since the 80s uh uh you know we've seen a a population that's flattening uh you know because of you know or not really leading to a de demand for increased units there's market dynamics which we'll cover um you've got a lot of uh you know developer uh sentiment here um you know kind of I think a lot of folks were really spooked after the the Great Recession and so now you're seeing units sort of drip drip drip through despite the fact that they're entitled ready to go um uh you know a lot of corporate ownership in single family homes um and a lack of resources.

I mean it's it takes money to to subsidize some of these affordable units and and um we've seen uh a pretty big uh shift uh in policy uh since the elimination of redevelopment take it over to Dan.

Thanks Dean um as Dane kind of touched on I mean a lot of the policy bills that have been going through the legislature the last maybe five or six years uh most of them have been focused on local government, the arena process, the approval process, lots of focus there.

But as you can tell this this slide here is from the governor's May revise from this this this past budget of a couple months ago and and this is kind of where the reality is on housing and the state itself given that this is in the governor's budget and looking at economic trends uh sort of tells a different story which is if you look this is basically over the the governor's uh term as as as governor and looking forward a couple of years you see the forecast is either flat or down uh for actual production and that goes back to some of the things that Dane touched on um affordable units.

I mean, you know, those are hard to build if you don't have the subsidies and and some of that's been dried up over the last decade or so.

So there's a lot of other things maybe below the surface uh that that uh besides local government approvals and planning uh that that that that has bearing on on production that that maybe doesn't get us discussed as much as uh as it should.

Here's one thing uh I I've always you know, I think we all know it, which is basically we all know that you know what while certainly it maybe in the Bay Area, the tech industry, there's certain areas of our economy that that people are doing financially well and and you know and can you know can afford uh you know, maybe the maybe the move up housing and other things.

A lot of the average folks though, average Californians, they haven't been doing that well over the f financially.

And this this charts from the California Housing Partnership, a recent report they put together.

As you can see, um the revenues for the average kind of renter are pretty much flat over the last 20 years or so.

Well, costs are going up, and we know there's cost from inflation and all sorts of things that go into costs.

So there's something deeper in my mind that's going on also with within the uh California economy that is affecting uh why uh units, more units aren't being produced, despite the fact that locals have really removed a lot of whatever the alleged uh obstacles were.

A lot of those have been removed.

And you know, shifting back to one of the big issues that frankly hasn't been given a lot of uh you know daylight here is that over just the past since 2010, we've seen over 700,000 owner-occupied single family homes really taken off the market.

You've got it's a combination of speculative investors, uh private equity firms that either um uh securitize the homes as an asset and don't even rent them out, keeping them vacant, uh, or or uh uh you know, folks like you know, the the uh Airbnbs and those sort of platforms that turn some of these homes into vacation homes.

And so, you know, the the legislature has done very little in trying to uh provide any sort of assistance or addressing this particular issue.

There have been bills that have been floated in the past, but they have been, you know, uh won't even get out of the first policy committee, let alone the first house of the legislature.

Um, you know, but there are major major deficiencies here that just simply aren't being addressed.

Um, you know, the sort of the go-to is well, local governments just need to plan more, and we have we need to streamline more.

Um, and so uh you know, I did want to show uh, you know, what some of the other factors here that yet aren't you know aren't yet being uh talked about in the broader discussion.

And then, you know, look, there's an absolute unequivocal nexus between the elimination of redevelopment and the reduction in affordable housing development.

That that was far and away the single most um uh utilized funding source uh and ongoing funding source that helped bridge that gap to get those to get those uh uh covenants in place and uh those uh those units on the market.

And uh since uh we've seen the reduction of uh uh redevelopment in particular, we've seen a considerable uh decrease in uh uh in affordable housing development.

And then, you know, one of the other factors, of course, too, is is uh the putting more pressure on local government is the uh methodology that has been applied for these really considerable increases uh in these uh BMR units.

And so I mean in the Bay Area for Avag, we've seen a 234% increase uh on average in total for this from the sixth cycle to the fifth cycle.

I mean, we can plan all we want, but frankly, it you know, and Belmont's doing a fantastic job in actually beating those income thresholds, um, uh really a shining star in that area, but frankly, uh it is darn near impossible, especially when you start getting into the low and very low, because the the subsidy that's needed is just so incredibly high because the developer's not going to take a haircut on on you know on the profit of the of the of the unit.

So um uh it it you know, it's really really it's just a lot of the things are simply out of our control um that you know we're doing our level best to try and navigate through.

And then I'm gonna kick it back over to Dan for uh a little bit more of a deeper dive into SP 79, the latest uh TOD bill that was just signed into law.

Thanks, Dane.

Um, well, uh this is SB 79.

I would say is well, there's probably maybe 70 or 80 uh new housing related bills that were signed this year.

This is probably the most, certainly the most significant bill.

Um, and uh it and this is a bill that Senator Weiner uh, who has been working on housing for the entire time he's been in the legislature, uh he's been working on this type of bill or versions of this bill probably the for the entire time he's there, and and I think finally kind of achieved, you know, maybe uh more aggressively what what he's been kind of pushing for with various bills in the past.

So this bill basically says um if if you have a a transit stop and they're defined in different ways, either a tier one or tier two based on the number of of you know rail rail uh trains going through the types of trains, things like that.

My understanding from my reading of the bill and understanding your situation is you do have a tier one uh transit stop, which matches up with this bill that that it basically says for every sort of residential mixed or commercial site within there's two concentric circles, one's within a quarter mile of that transit transit station, and then the next ring is up to a half between a quarter and a half mile.

Um, and uh the the local agencies have to they can't deny uh basically housing developments or mixed use projects that meet certain criteria, and there are certain um uh height limits in this case if you're within a quarter mile, 75 feet, the density, 120 units an acre, uh there's a floor area ratio.

Uh a local agency that has one of these um stations, uh cannot uh basically deny developments that that sort of fall within those parameters.

Now there's uh some density bonus uh implications if if there uh are certain affordability.

There's an affordability requirement.

Uh there are several several tiers, but uh there's also some uh density bonus uh provisions that that connect to connect to that.

Um there's also a provision that says if the development is adjacent, immediately adjacent to the to the transit stop, you can get a little more height, that sort of thing.

There's a lot in this bill, a lot of moving pieces.

The other thing I was gonna say is I I know the next presentation, Barb Kals, someone I've known for a long time.

You've got a really good attorney uh working with you, and uh as you work through this law and these other laws, uh, very valuable resource.

So the way this SB 79 is gonna roll out is first of all, the all the MPOs, metropolitan plan organizations have to come up with their maps as to uh the maps that they believe uh qual match up with SB 79.

Uh the Department of Housing is gonna approve approve those maps, and so so you're gonna have this process of designating these areas sort of in uh in conjunction with the MPOs.

Then also HCD is gonna be out um try to determine how to connect the housing element that you've already just adopted, which I know is as Dan says, you've already had your arena number increased through that process.

How do how does this SB 79 that sort of establishes this sort of overlay of density and height?

How does that mesh up with your uh housing element?

And so HD is gonna be working on that, and I think by um the middle of next year is supposed to come out with something there, maybe beforehand.

So that's gonna be another level of complexity.

Uh, that that uh that that you know, obviously wait to see how this comes out.

Now, I know this kind of this bill, the way it looks initially is kind of this one size fits all where you know every parcel, you know, within a quarter mile, here's what you have to do, here's the caps, and this.

Well, there's some ability for locals to adopt uh ordinances to help sort of uh implement this this law, including the ability to adopt alternative plans.

Now, that's another um uh process that we're gonna have to wait and see exactly how HCD interprets it, but there may be some flexibility for your city to kind of work through this alternative plan process to the extent you have certain sites that you're trying to do something else with and you and you need some flexibility.

Um, and um I know uh Barb and others can can advise you on that as that that as that moves forward.

There was another bill I had, I think here.

Here's another one.

I don't know how much this law is going to be used, but I wanted to make sure you knew about it because it might sort of some developer may knock on your door and mention this, and you're what is this?

507 uh adaptive reuse.

Basically, you're taking a maybe an underutilized commercial building and then converting it to uh to primarily residential.

I think at least 50% has to be be residential.

Um there's a number of of you know uh criteria associated with this, there's certain levels of affordability that that have to be hit.

There's also a uh prevailing wage requirement that applies, but one little wrinkle on this is it says that locals may, so it's your option, uh uh agree to sort of um dedicate some of the um the additional property tax that would come from that converted building uh back to the developer for purposes of helping offset the cost of the affordable housing um uh uh in the project.

So somebody may knock on your door and start and talk about this this bill in the future.

Um there are you know there's affordability, there's prevailing wage, um, and it's your option as to whether or not uh you'd want to give back some some of the property tax to help offset the uh the affordability side.

Well, let's get our VLF back and then we can then we can talk about uh you know our shortfall here, and then we can talk about that.

No, I'm I'm just kidding.

So all right, uh last thing here, um as far as trends looking forward.

So, you know, uh there was a change in leadership in the state senate.

So Senator Monique Lamone out of the Santa Barbara area uh is now the new or will uh I believe after that uh uh the special election next week will be officially sworn in, or or assumes the leadership role of the Senate Pro Tem.

Uh she comes from a uh, you know, uh the Santa Barbara area.

Um you know, she has been exposed to wildfires, you know, mud flights following those wildfires, uh, increased development.

Uh I think she uh may have a little bit more of a balance on the issue.

Um, but you know, one of the things the reason why we bring this up is because the pro tem of the Senate has the option to assign new policy committee chairs in the Senate.

So your appropriations chair, housing chair, local government, some of these pathways that housing bills really make their way through uh housing and community development or the seven housing committee and the like.

And so I we'll get more of a bellwether of of really where she's putting these priorities here.

I will say some I think positive signs are uh you have the soon-to-be Senate pro tem who's who's been on record that said, like, you know, isn't maybe necessarily a fan of the you know quote developer giveaways, uh and uh uh you know, I think understands that locals have are just you know we're being whipsawed a bit on trying to figure out how to comply with all these laws uh that you know perhaps you might see a bit of a reprieve.

But uh, you know, frankly, uh uh as I've heard you know before, they can't stop folks from introducing bills.

Uh, and so we see about 120 new housing bills uh introduced every year.

Uh everyone wants to have one at least.

So um uh more to come on that.

Now, with respect to things that we know uh I believe are coming.

Um we I I believe there's going to be another run at um uh you know more of an SB9 expansion.

Senator Wiener tried to run that bill this year, was stalled in in the Senate, um continued erosion to a limit uh to limit cap uh or uh postpone uh development or fees, transportation impact fees or anything, you know, fee authority.

Um HCD is gonna have a major role in implementing SB 79.

Um, and so devil's in the details, and frankly, uh, as we've seen, we can we can know exactly what we're supposed to do, and then a bill comes in uh that gets gotten amended and changes the entire game and expands it all.

Uh, and so uh, you know, I anticipate more bills in that area.

Um, also a possible housing bomb for 26, and then you know, two more things real quick that aren't on the slide.

Number one, uh, you know, uh there was a there was a gut amend attempt this year that would have, depending on uh your city, uh, would have either eliminated your document transfer tax uh or uh uh which is at the county level that every city has, or your real estate transfer tax, which at present can only be adopted by charter cities.

Um they're coming.

Uh that it was a it was a last minute gut amendment bill was stalled, but we anticipate that something like that coming back.

Uh and then uh the California Chamber of Commerce just announced a major uh um uh CEQA ballot uh initiative.

And so Dan and our team are going to be really digging into that.

Uh uh, there may be some good things with streamlining and building the fire stations and things like that, but uh again, if it qualifies, uh that also may change the game on the housing development uh moving forward.

So uh Never O Dole moment in Sacramento.

Uh thank you again for giving me the time.

And again, I do profusely apologize for being a few minutes late.

Uh uh so happy to answer any questions.

Great.

Thank you so much for the presentation.

Um I appreciate your apologizing.

We started late too, so you you really weren't that late.

Uh so this is an informational item.

Um, a lot happening here in the housing world, and um unfortunately uh less and less that we cities are able to do about it.

So if we turn it back to the commission and council, uh, how about any qu yes?

We have one more presentation.

Oh, I'm so sorry.

Okay.

How about let's just take a quick pause since we digested a bunch of information there.

Does anyone have questions at this time for this presentation?

Yes.

Um I just had two.

Um so with SB 79, is it right that there's an adjustment for um cities that are less than 35,000 that we don't have to go out the full half mile distance but a quarter mile distance instead?

There is a provision that mentions cities for 35,000.

What's and I I think with your attorney and this kind of shifts from kind of the policy realm to at some point attorneys uh looking at the language more closely.

But as I read the law, yes, if you're a city under 35,000, you're not necessarily subject to the bill's second second ring.

However, there's another provision that says there's there seems to be like a minimum 30 30 units per acre.

Now, I think the question is how is how's the HCD going to interpret that?

Are they gonna look at every site, every residential mixed and commercial site you have in that second ring and say, aha, 30 units an acre?

If that matches up with your housing element, then maybe it's it's kind of you know it's it's all okay, but but does that sort of affect your your total um uh uh sort of uh anyway?

I I think with your attorney and how HCD interprets that one provision I just talked about.

I I think that that there's sort of um more to more to learn on that second ring part.

Okay, thank you.

And then um I guess this counts as a policy question.

Um that slide about corporate and speculative ownership increasing was really a very interesting slide.

And I'm you saying you were saying that um the legislators aren't really taking motion on that particular source, but if if it is destabilizing communities and reducing affordability, why isn't the legislature doing that?

Because they could incentivize owner occupied sales or highly taxed corporations if they buy and don't live in the home.

So what's the reticence of addressing the source?

Because I know housing is a remedy, but if we don't address the source, then yeah, no, I think that's a that's a really that's a really great question.

And look, I I think um uh politically it's a lot easier to uh maybe pivot back to well, we just need to focus on on local agencies.

I think it's a tougher sell to try and go after uh you know these very well-funded, you know, private equity firms and um, you know, these very, very large uh uh associations that have regional impact, regional offices, regional lobbying efforts.

Um, you know, we have seen uh bills, you know, for example, uh assembly member Alex Lee just um batted by geography, but he's in you know a Santa Clara County area, Alameda County area, um uh introduced a bill that simply would have required disclosure if one uh company or corporation owned more than a thousand units, just to get a sense of what uh about out there, and that bill it died, it didn't move, and it just didn't have the political will to advance.

And you know, for me, I I I I questioned to say, well, if we can jam through 300 pages of sequel law in a budget bill in uh 96 hours uh or you know 200 pages of new housing law through the budget process in in 72 hours.

Why couldn't that also get flipped into the into it?

You know, and so it it it's a it's a question that I I hope that more people start to ask and and hopefully get some political um uh get some political courage from those in Sacramento uh to really take a look at that that issue.

It's astounding 700,000 units in a day in about 15 years off the market.

Uh it it's huge.

Thank you.

All right, thank you.

Any other questions at this time?

All right.

Uh oh, I'm sorry, did you have no okay?

Uh sorry, I can I lean forward.

I thought maybe you had one.

So I guess the next presentation is from Golf Harbin Lipman.

Great, thank you again.

There we go.

Hi, I'm Barbara Couts.

I'm a partner at Goldfarb and Lipman.

Uh we're outside counsel to the city on many of your housing uh developments.

Um, I really appreciated the presentation from uh from your lobbyists because a lot of their analysis of the housing uh crisis actually coincides with mine, that the legislature is not really dealing, you know, uh, as they said, uh local government is a soft target, but many, many thousands of uh units have been approved by local government now, but they're not getting built.

Um, but my role tonight is to tell you about uh, you know, the major laws that affect the city, regardless of whether I think they're good laws or bad ones.

So let's go on here.

Let's see, that's not the right.

There we go.

Um, so what I'm gonna discuss, I've been briefly talk about state housing policy, then talk about the housing accountability act, density bonuses, which are probably the most, I think the most significant issue, not so much because of density bonuses, but because developers can waive almost any development standard.

Um, ministerial approvals, meaning those that are treated like building permits and exemptions from the California Environmental Quality Act, housing and commercial zones where this we understand the city has been uh experiencing more and more uh inquiries, shortened review times, uh what's been happening with litigation, housing litigation, and a little bit on what can cities do.

So, in terms of state housing policy, so the legislature started this flood of bills.

There have been over 500 that have affected land use.

I think those of us in the field can't keep track, but when they started this uh in 2017, they said that their intent was to curb the curb the capability of local governments to deny render the de reduce the density of or render infeasible housing development projects, and they felt that they needed to do more to make that happen.

And so the so that's really where the legislature started was to make it harder to deny or reduce uh dense or reduce the density of housing.

Uh there was emphasis on objective standards, but they've gone way beyond that because now applicants can use density bonus law to ignore almost all city standards, height, floor area, open space, setbacks, anything.

They're unlimited.

Um they've also moved to place state standards in place of local ones, accessory dwelling units, which have been the one big success of state laws.

Uh the number of uh ADUs account for uh somewhere between 9, SB 79, which was discussed, parking, housing and commercial.

Anyway, they've imposed their own standards in place of local ones.

They've greatly sped up timelines.

There's more ministerial approvals, and a lot of increased authority to the Department of Housing and Community Development, and increased penalties to cities if they don't do what HCD says.

So let me start with the Housing Accountability Act.

So you may have heard of something called a preliminary application, which is basically like an abbreviated planning application, requires a limited amount of information, and it freezes development standards as of the date, all the required information was submitted.

Application has to be filed within 180 days, it has to complete the application within 90 days of receiving an incomplete letter, but it can be submitted for any housing project, and essentially it means that once a preliminary application is submitted, the city can't change its can't change its laws and apply new laws to the project.

There are some limited exceptions for mitigation measures under the California Environmental Quality Act, but they're pretty limited.

You probably know about this that there's a five meeting limit for housing projects, including all appeals, continuances, excuse me.

It includes any meeting organized by the city.

But once the application is found to be complete, the city can't have more than five meetings on it.

Is that the project can be denied only if it doesn't comply with objective standards, but if it has received a waiver under density bonus law, it's considered to comply with objective standards.

So it's so most projects do comply.

And then if if it does comply with objective standards, it can only be denied or have the density reduced if it results in a specific adverse impact on public health and safety.

And so that has to be based, and that's defined as, as I have here, a significant, quantifiable, direct, and unavoidable impact based on objective identified written public health or safety standards that can't be mitigated.

So if it could be mitigated by requiring the project to comply, it can't be denied.

Also, the standards have to have been in effect when the preliminary application was filed.

So even if I worked once in a community where residents provided evidence that a project would increase evacuation time, but the city had no standards for evacuation time in case of fire.

So they could not use that evidence to make changes in the project.

And then if the project's considered to be affordable, and now an affordable project only needs to have 13% lower income units, then additional findings need to be made.

Either it can't comply with both the zoning in the general plan, there's a specific adverse impact finding again, doesn't comply with state or federal law, inadequate water or sewer, or zone for agricultural resource preservation with sites around it being used for that.

So again, it's it's the legislature has made it very difficult to deny or reduce the density of an of a house of any housing project.

Um a lot of the uh a lot of the laws refer to objective standards.

It's one that doesn't have involve any judgment by any public official, refers to an external benchmark.

Uh you know, here, you know, they're the typical ones density, height, lot coverage, setbacks, but the kinds of standards that cities used to rely on, like reflecting the look and feel of the community or reflecting community character or has to be compatible with adjacent uses, can't be used to deny a project.

There is a case that says that subjective standards can be used to apply conditions of approval, but that's very limited because the conditions of approval can't result in a project in reducing the density of the project, but could allow some design changes.

But as I said already, the developers can obtain waivers of most of these standards, whether they're objective or not under density bonus law, and a project with waivers is considered to be consistent.

That's what the legislature has written.

So it's it's you know, so in terms of about the only city standard that remains is city standards for density, density can be doubled uh under density bonus law, but there's at least some uh some limitation there, but in terms of height and never all the other standards that the city creates, uh, those can all be waived.

So we talked about so a project has to be eligible for a density bonus to get these waivers.

Um an eligible project can have anywhere, can have as few as 5% affordable housing if it's uh for very low income.

Uh and they and also anywhere from one to seven incentives or concessions.

I think there's some ways to get even more now, an unlimited number of waivers.

Uh concessions and waivers for a density bonus, they can can only be denied if they'd have a specific adverse impact.

The the finding I read earlier, you know, based on an objective standard, an objective health and safety standard.

If the concession or waiver violates state or federal law, so for instance, all the stormwater requirements that the city has are generally based on state and federal regulations.

Someone couldn't require a concession or waiver of those, or if it has an adverse impact on a project listed on the California register.

Concessions can also be denied if they don't result in identifiable and actual cost reductions, but the burden of proof would be on the city to have substantial evidence to demonstrate that whatever concession is being requested doesn't result in any cost reductions.

Cities used to interpret waivers to mean that they only needed to be granted if the project really needed it to physically, you know, construct the project, and if the project could be designed to, you know, be modified and maintain the uh normal setbacks or height or whatever, and still get the density that the waiver didn't need to be granted.

But this case, Bankers Hill 150, uh, states that the waivers have to be approved for a project as designed, unless you can make one of the findings that uh that I just discussed.

It was an odd case.

The issue of density bonus wasn't even briefed by either side, but the court came up with this holding, and one of the authors is now the Chief Justice on the California Supreme Court, so I think it would be very difficult to get that holding overturned.

Those are all eligible for a density bonus.

But smaller projects can also elect to provide affordable housing and also be eligible for a density bonus.

So let me talk about ministerial approvals and new CEQA exemptions and more limits on city actions.

So if the project requires a discretionary approval, it doesn't use one of the new ministerial approvals.

CEQA may apply.

Mitigation measures can then be imposed.

But the legislature is creating more and more exemptions and more and more ministerial approvals that are exempt from CEQA.

Ministerial approvals are only reviewed according to fixed standards like building permits, and the state has created more and more categories.

ADUs, of course, are all approved ministerially.

Housing in commercial zones, very major projects can be approved on housing projects can be approved on commercial sites and all and are subject to very strict timelines and also to ministerial review.

Other ones, there's affordable housing on faith faith-based sites, there's other uh there's other laws that allow school districts to have ministerial uh approval.

One of my one of my colleagues tried to compare all these different ministerial approvals and came up with a spreadsheet about like that that nobody could read and there's just there's just oodles of them.

If a if a developer, you know, I think the it's very hard for cities to keep up.

Generally, a developer will come in and say that they want to use some particular provision, and then people get really into it, but they these can be very major projects.

So the legislature in July, as part of the budget bill, created a broad new infill exemption.

People generally call it the AB 130 infill exemption.

So any housing project in the city is exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act.

If the sites not more than 20 acres, if it was previously developed with an urban use, 75% surrounded by urban uses or near-urban uses, very generous definition of this.

It has to be consistent with the journal plan and zoning, but remember that if it has a lot of density bonus waivers, it's consistent.

Has to have at least 15 units an acre.

There are certain environmental standards it needs to meet, in particular, no habitat for protected species, and it can't demolish a listed in historic resource, but many projects can qualify for that.

And if those projects have 20% lower income housing, they're also exempt.

Um this is a little bit different, but the city wanted also wanted me to mention that there's a freeze on residential building codes.

The city can't make changes in its local standards, aside from adopting the current code, the current new codes, until June 1st of 2031, unless the Building Standards Commission deems them necessary as emergency standards to protect health and safety.

If they relate to home hardening and if they're proposed by the fire district, you can incentivize all electric and then changes related to administrative practices.

So pretty much limited to fire hardening and incentivizing all electric development, all electric homes.

The city's mentioned that it's receiving inquiries from developers interested in developing housing in 100% commercial zones.

And these two bills, AB 2011, SB6, and SB 79, all may allow it.

There's a ministerial approval under AB 2011, and it may be ministerial under SB 79, depending on, you know, depending on if the developer chooses to use a streamlined process called SB 35.

So it applies to most any site where to most sites, where commercial and parking uses can occupy more than a third of the site.

But it's specific if you have a specific plan that was adopted before January 1st of 2024, it's not allowed unless the specific plan already allows multifamily development, and it's they're also not allowed if the site or adjoining site has a third uh industrial uses.

The requirements are very complex.

The length the statute is very long.

And SB 79 appears to apply only within a quarter mile of the Caltrain station.

I was interested in what your lobbyists were saying about 30 units an acre.

I'm not quite sure.

Maybe I haven't read the bill in quite enough detail.

I was at a conference yesterday, though, where pretty people pretty much said that if you had a population of less than 35,000, you're only subject to the quarter mile standards.

Yeah, it specifies the allowed building heights and densities, you know, 30 to 80 units an acre height, but you can get density bonus from these.

One interesting feature of SB 79 though is that the 75-foot height limit can't be waived except by a hundred percent affordable project.

There's various affordability requirements.

There's prevailing wages required, certainly for AB 2011 SB 79 only if the building's over 85 feet tall.

And then the legislature has really shortened review times.

So for ministerial projects, this was a change made in July, along with the new CEQA exemption.

The city has to make a decision 60 days from the receipt of a complete application.

So if it receives an application, it has 30 days to decide if the application is complete, but if the application is complete, the city has only 30 days to decide to approve or deny the project.

These ministerial projects have provisions that appear to allow for public hearing, but with these super fast timelines, it's unlikely that there'd really be time for the optional public review.

Now there's an exception for the AB 2011, that's the housing and commercial zones, and where you have a little bit more time to determine whether they're consistent, and you have more time to determine whether to approve them.

The new AB 130 infill exemption has extremely short timelines to make a decision on a project.

So there's a tribal notification process in there.

The tribes have 60 days to respond.

Up to 60 days if the tribe asks for an extension.

But if the project is eligible for AB 130, then the city has to either approve or deny the project, either within 30 days after the tribal notification is complete, or within 30 days after the deadline to tell the applicant whether they're consistent with the general plan or zoning.

So while one public hearing can be pretty easily scheduled in a 30-day period, but it really only allows for one hearing, despite the five hearing limit, you know, it's unlikely you get more than one hearing.

Be very difficult to set two hearings if the project needs to go to both the planning commission and city council.

Just a very very short timeline.

Yeah, and this is basically, you know, the public notice has to be sent 10 days before the hearing.

Basically, to schedule the hearing, the staff has to be preparing the hearing notices and staff reports before the tribal consultation or the review of the project is complete.

And last uh almost lastly, so HCD has a housing accountability unit.

I used to say it at 25 people, but at the conference yesterday it's 47 people.

They have 47 people who are reviewing whether cities are complying with state law and sending, so they keep getting broader and broader authority with every uh with every year.

What they will do is send letters of technical advice, basically telling you the city what it should do.

If you don't do what it says, they can issue notices of violation and then refer to the attorney general.

The AG also has a strike force.

At one point it had 12 attorneys.

I don't know how many it has now.

Um, and they can sometimes they act independently of HCD to go after cities.

HCD has authority to decertify or basically disapprove the city's housing element if it isn't implemented as promised.

And if that happens, it would subject Belmont to the builder's remedy.

So any site in the city, because the city is uh every site in the city is either considered to be high or highest opportunity.

The tax credit uh commission does a map of high opportunity areas, and Belmont is considered high or highest opportunity.

Because of that, any site in the city, any single family site, could be built with a base density of at least 80 units an acre, which could be doubled with a density bonus.

The project could qualify for the new infill exemption, the way it's the laws are written now, and the statute says it has to be approved as proposed by the applicant.

So nobody wants to be subject to the builder's remedy.

There's a lot of third-party litigators out there, that have sued dozens of cities.

They often join in or separately sue cities in litigation relating to denials.

Developers' attorneys are becoming more and more aggressive, demanding and challenging, I think, in my experience.

But the cities are generally losing in court.

And if there's a if a city loses under the housing accountability act, it's also almost impossible for the city to appeal, because the city is required to post a bond, and the LA courts have set bonds between 7 million and 35 million dollars, and even the city of LA wasn't willing to risk a $7 million bond.

So the cities risk significant attorneys' fees exposure.

If cities lose, they pay the other side, high defense costs, and a new bill that will go into effect January 1st has a fine of $10,000 a unit if the city takes action contrary to a letter received from HCD or the Attorney General.

Barbara, I just wanted to make one comment there.

There's also, well, the legislature has shown the cities the stick on the fines and attorney's fees issue.

They've have offered us a carrot in the form of reducing our attorney's fees exposure when we uh approve a housing development project and then it then gets uh appealed by an opponent uh and the the legislature has reduced the uh has adjusted the standard by which attorney's fees are awarded in a way that's much more favorable to a city acting in good faith.

Yeah.

Um what can cities do?

You know, the only the only standards that can really be um uh imposed are objectives health and safety standards, so things like sidewalk and bikeway standards, you know, street design, adequate sewer and water capacity, all those uh should make sure that the city has that.

The city, if the city wants to has historic sites and buildings and wants to preserve, it needs to designate those in advance, or else the project will be eligible for AB 130.

Um you can adopt standards requiring studies of environmental issues apart from CEQA, but also contact your legislators because it is really um we've seen city after city getting accused by the public of not listening to the public, but it you're really the city councils are almost forced to approve these projects, and that's due to the legislation, not due to you know necessarily what councils want to do.

Um CQ review can help you know it in the city can enforce health and safety standards, enforce state and federal law, and protect uh historic sites if possible, and that's the end, and I'd be happy to answer any questions.

All right, thank you so much.

A lot of information, very much.

No, no, I mean you're you know the the folks on this dais are um acutely aware, I think, of the repercussions, but the planning commission and the council have these housing laws um and that how they've impacted us in terms of the work that we're doing with the projects, and so but I think this is really important to have this and to have it recorded, and thank you for um submitting your presentations because I think it's really important for the public to be aware of the things that we're facing and the the erosion and uh of loss of control.

Um we have a media agenda that starts at seven, but I want to allow for any questions at this time on the um Gold Farb presentation.

Sure, go ahead.

I just have one question, which is why.

Thank you.

Uh one question, which is why is it only Caltrain?

Why not BART or any other form of uh transit?

Oh, it does apply to BART, okay.

Yeah, and it applies to all the, like light rail in San Francisco.

So I saw somewhere where San Francisco said they have hundreds of places where this applies.

But in but in Belmont it only applies at Cal Caltrain.

Okay, all right, thank you.

Yeah.

Yes.

Did you have a question also?

Yeah, a couple of clarifications.

So at the very beginning you mentioned um freezing development standards at the time of preliminary application.

I think that's so cities can't rush through changes.

But how does that interact then with state law?

So somebody, you know, submits an application, then the state, you know, allows more.

So I assume it doesn't go in the city's favor in that case.

Well, actually, uh, state law isn't frozen.

Only local laws are frozen.

So the legislature just for a builder's remedy project just changed, just said that the site couldn't be uh this previous in July a site, a builder's remedy site could be as large as five acres and still qualify for for the exemption.

Now it can only be four acres, but that applied when the bill went into effect.

So state law can can be applied.

Okay.

Um and I don't know how relevant this is, but what's the difference between a concession and a waiver?

Oh concessions are supposed to be uh are supposed to reduce development costs to allow the developer to uh create the affordable housing.

Waivers are just I don't want to comply with a development standard.

Okay.

But they're supposed to be a cost factor with concessions.

Okay.

And then um for the new review timelines, which are quite extreme.

Um I've seen some I don't know, opinion type analysis online suggesting that perhaps the public 10 day notice rules are essentially waived.

Some interpretation that basically because the projects are no longer um uh you know under any kind of discretion, they're completely objective, therefore they're not a uh an action that requires a public day notice.

But it seems like you would you would disagree with that.

Well, if they're ministerial, there's no public notice required.

Right, because you mentioned the 30 days you can't meet that if you have 10 days of notice.

But if you waive the 10 days of notice, then you could schedule a hearing of that.

No, I don't think that I don't believe that the public notice is waived in that case.

Okay.

Yeah, that was sort of a opinion analysis that I saw online.

I was curious.

And then finally you kept talking a lot about housing in commercial zones.

Just to clarify, so that would be a zone that currently today is 100% commercial, no housing allowed, and then these new laws would apply, or would that also apply for things something that's zoned mixed use today that already allows residential, and then you'd have all these extra exemptions?

It applies in any in any zone where a third of the development can be commercial, retail, or parking, I believe.

So it applies in both of those it can't apply in both of those.

The only exception is that if you have a specific plan that doesn't allow residential in some area, then it's not eligible for SP 2011.

Okay, so something zoned like 100% light industrial or commercial wouldn't apply.

Okay.

Well light industrial, no.

It has to be zoned for commercial retail or parking.

Okay.

Thanks.

Yes.

Quick question.

Um you mentioned that one of the few ways that a project might be halted is if we didn't have adequate sewer or water.

Is that true?

Well, a project can uh the standard is that the project doesn't comply with a s a specific health or safety standard, so there would need to be a specific health or safety standard related to sewer or water, and it can't be mitigated.

But if so, if for instance the problem could be mitigated by requiring a larger sewer pipe, say, then the project couldn't be denied, but you could uh apply the the condition.

So as a city, could we decide that we don't want to process more than a certain volume of sewer and limit development in that way?

Um, or water.

Well, I mean, I think your sewer plant processes a certain amount of of you know sewage.

Yeah, but we decide how many people staff it and how we use it.

It's ours.

Uh I don't think you could I don't I believe you would need a uh if we had capacity at the plant, I don't think we could set up uh essentially sewer flow, which is a it should really be a proxy for setting a building permit limitation or building intensity limitation, which the state law does not allow.

Okay.

But that's some good out of the box thing.

All right.

Uh before I turn to my council, any other any other questions from Planning Commission.

Okay.

Thank you.

Vice Mayor, you you said you had some questions.

Oh no.

This one.

Okay.

Um yes, so I have two questions.

Um one, I know subjective standards are not a thing anymore, right?

They just don't apply.

Um, objective standards, subjective standards are are nothing.

But if we have a, let's say we have a ministerial approval.

If a developer has something that goes against an already established objective standard, their options then would be to either use one of their many waivers or go to planning commission and get an exemption from us, or like how let's say they go against the objective standard and they're out of waivers.

So you get an unlimited number of waivers, so you're never out of waivers.

Oh.

And the only clarification there is the project has to have some affordable housing in it to make it eligible for the density bonus law.

Once it's eligible for the density bonus law, it has unlimited waivers typically.

Yeah.

Unlimited waivers.

Yeah, okay.

And I'm gonna pull this out because it comes up so much for all of us.

A specific adverse impact or a significant quantifiable direct unavoidable impact is not traffic.

That does not count.

Cars on the road does not count as something that we could say is a specific adverse impact.

I didn't think that was a hard question.

Okay.

Um I think generally, uh I would say generally not, but you know, there are certain traffic sta standards, right, that might be a significant adverse impact.

For instance, a sidewalk next to a busy road.

Okay, that yeah, I mean there's lots of studies showing that sidewalks reduce pedestrian injury.

Um, you know, site distance, some other things, but mere congestion is generally not viewed as a specific adverse impact.

Okay.

Councilmember Jordan.

Yes, um, thank you for your presentations.

Just one, I want to go back to the preliminary applications questions that one of our colleagues had.

So the development standards are frozen for the city, but state law can change, and if it then becomes easier, they can still then the they can change they can make changes because state law has changed and made things easier for them.

Is that correct?

I belie yes, generally.

Okay.

Thank you.

Any other questions from council or anyone else?

Okay.

Uh thank you so much for your presentation.

Um, are there any uh comments that folks would like to make?

Uh I know we're kind of bumping up on time, but want to make sure folks have uh enough time.

I I did want to actually mention um among other things, including thank you for the um acknowledgement that Belmont for a long time has been doing the right thing before these state mandates and for the better part of 10 years have have actually been building housing, uh including a lot of affordable housing, and so um these are especially painful pinch points to hear because uh we were being treated like everyone else, including those who haven't done the right thing, and I think again, everyone on this day has uh planning commissioner or council member and uh r understands how how painful that is not to be able to uh implement the vision we had have for our city, which included housing and um and affordable housing.

Um and then I did want to mention um Barb because you mentioned uh HCD, um, you know, our assembly member Diane Pappen, she did put forth um AB 650, which was going to streamline uh given the fact that, you know, she was a council member herself and um took a lot of time hearing kind of the issues that we have uh with HCD and she did try to pass a bill that would make it a little bit easier for cities to comply and maybe not spend as much money as we do um meeting HCD's uh requirements and unfortunately that the governor vetoed it.

So um anyway, all of all of that is just to say to, you know, we do need to keep watching and peek keeping uh vigilant.

Uh any anything else from anyone else in the last couple of minutes?

Mayor, uh I just I'm sorry.

I had that actually that that bill in my original uh slide deck, but I know that we were running low on time.

Uh just one note there.

Yes, um, that the assembly woman really did do a really, really good job in trying to get that bill through.

Uh I had in this primary testimony on that bill throughout the process and work with her office closely and hoping to get to get that to the governor.

Um, what I find just really challenging, other aspect that wasn't really shined on is that, you know, we've seen over 200 bills passed.

Really, all of these costs saying, well, these are minor absorbable costs for HCD.

But the one of the aspects of that particular bill, all it would have required was to uh require HCD to point to the area of law that we're violating or that's in question during our housing element to give us actual guidance.

Um HCD came back and said that was going to cost 15 million dollars, and you on ongoing cost for HCD.

I mean, the numbers were just absolutely absurd.

It gave the governor all the cover in the world to veto it, and it really is just a shame because I think it's a it was a really good policy, giving us more time and actual clear direction to promote collaboration.

Um, and so that one that one hurt a little bit when that one was vetoed.

Uh, but we certainly plan on working with her again that's to try and maybe take another fight of the apple on that.

But we appreciate your efforts on that.

Yeah, and we definitely want to pile on when when available.

Um in fact, the uh fifteen, I read it as eleven, but maybe in the end they said it would cost fifteen million.

But when you add up how many cities, how much we pay to go back and forth on those types of things, that adds up too and that's all our our taxpayer money that means we can't do services.

Um so anyway, we can I guess get off our soapbox, but thank you.

Thank you all so much.

Thanks for um the presentations uh and to City for setting this up to City Staff, and then you know, please feel free uh to reach out to to us or um, you know, s uh planning commission uh uh community development directors, anything that um anything that comes up after this and you have questions, please reach out and feel free.

Thank you so much.

And uh I think we'll take let's just take a five minute recess, come back at seven oh five.

We'll start our a regular agenda at seven oh five.

Thanks so much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um, we're not gonna have a lot of people who are not going to be a little bit more than a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit more than that.

Okay, good evening.

This is the City of Belmont, uh City Council meeting.

We are in the City Council chambers at one Twin Pines Lane here in Belmont, California.

Um, we have a few ways that the public can attend our meeting.

Uh, we are broadcast live on Comcast Cable Channel 27.

Uh also streamed live via the city's website at triple W.Belmont.gov.

And we also have a zoom option with directions uh on our published agenda.

And if you'd like to make comments, you can do so in public.

Uh here the comment cards over in the corner, and um just please lay your comment cards in the basket over on the clerk's desk.

If you are joining us virtually, you can raise your hand feature to speak uh when the item is announced.

And um uh all public comments are subject to a three minute time limit unless otherwise determined by the chair.

You can also submit a written public comment at C Clerk at Belmont.gov before the council discusses the item.

Um, it will not be your comments received up to three hours uh before the meeting will be distributed to the council, and otherwise um they're not uh read aloud but are included in the public record.

Uh just a couple of housekeeping uh items to remind everyone that the mayor has the authority to rule any speaker out of order, including speakers during the public comment period.

If the subject raised is not within the subject matter jurisdiction of the city council during a public hearing or a general business item, if the speaker is not presenting testimony or evidence relative relevant to the matter, or if the speaker becomes disruptive to the proceedings and conduct of the meeting.

Personal attacks, cursing, and outbursts from the audience in support or opposition to a speaker, are not tolerated to foster an environment where everyone feels welcome to speak.

So uh no report from our city attorney, and he's given me the thumbs up.

Nonverbal communication.

So we're moving on to an item five.

Uh special presentations.

5A, unfortunately, we're gonna have to reschedule that.

Sounds like um, not able to do that tonight, but item five B is an update from Chris Lou, our library manager.

Good evening.

I'm sorry, Josie.

How can I see my presentation notes on this?

I have presentation notes on us.

Okay.

Yeah, no, um, it's weird.

Is there any other turn on the computer?

How about if I show you?

Yeah, that's fine.

Okay.

I think I have it right.

So I exit out of that.

Yeah, but that's pretty much other studios.

I think if there's a videos that don't work.

I apologize for the delay.

I'm so sorry.

No apologies.

This is great.

This is good for suspense.

I promise to not disappoint once we get started.

I'm not sure.

Those are not going to go up unseen though.

I can hear Josie.

All right.

Thank you so much.

We're going to switch back to the screen and go ahead and get started.

Thank you all for having me this evening.

Thank you, Mayor Mates, City Council members, and city staff.

Um, my name is Chris Liu.

I am the community library manager for the Belmont Library.

And I want to thank you all out for allowing me to speak tonight.

And I'm pleased to share the library's annual report for fiscal year 2024 2025.

First established as a county free library in 1912.

The library joint powers authority was formed in 1999.

Our service area is three hundred and fifty-one square miles made up of eleven member cities and the unincorporated areas of the county.

Each of our 13 libraries is part of a larger system offering countless opportunities for connection and exploration.

This year, we rolled out our new five-year strategic plan.

Our new plan grounds us in our shared goals to listen, connect, discover, and engage.

As we put our new vision, mission, and goals into action, we know our continued success depends on the insights, contributions, and voices of the communities that we serve.

As a part of our strategic plan, we introduced a new vision and mission to guide our work.

Our updated mission.

Together, we build meaningful connections and inspire lifelong curiosity.

I'd like to share how that's coming to life at our libraries.

The program and collections at San Mateo County Libraries are well used.

This year we saw one point seven million library visitors, two point four million items circulated, and over 11,600 programs and events.

Beyond numbers, each data point represents the connections, learning, and growth that happens across our communities.

We strive to deliver services and offer opportunities where our diverse communities feel seen, heard, and valued.

Each of our staff brings unique backgrounds and experiences to the library.

The diversity strengthens how we serve through responsive programs, meaningful outreach, and culturally rich collections.

Our culture of discovery and exploration is reflected in our 249,967 active cardholders.

We saw 2.8 million website visits, 41,984 laptop checkouts, 4 million in library Wi-Fi sessions, and a huge increase here from previous years, 23,343 hotspot checkouts, thanks to additional hotspots added to our collection.

We were proud to welcome 14,274 new cardholders this year.

At the local level, we saw just shy of 1.14 million digital downloads this year.

This was our first year surpassing 1 million e-resource checkouts, and this year marks a 23% increase over last year's numbers, which in turn was a nearly 30% increase over the year before.

Our program attendance at our Belmont Library reached over 16,000.

And in addition to our popular on-site programs, we make a point to get out within the community.

You've likely seen us at the Twin Pine Senior and Community Center at local schools supporting the My Summer Adventure Kickoff, or school's back-to-school activities, as well as the Belmont Farmers Market all through the summer.

Also at the local level, Belmont Library had nearly 182,000 library visitors and circulated 297,226 items last fiscal year.

While the closure, of course, affected library attendance, disclosure would be the Belmont Library Refresh Project.

These upgrades were a worthwhile investment in partnership with the city and friends.

The community has made clear the appreciation for the improvement library.

We create moments for every stage and phase of life to foster growth and curiosity, and I'm excited to share some of the greatest accomplishments from last year.

Our 55 plus programs continue to grow, connecting older adults with opportunities to stay active, learn new skills, and build friendships.

We create welcoming spaces and provide meaningful experiences where we help older adults find connection, routine, and a sense of belonging.

Here's a short video highlighting one of our recent 55 plus field trips, which have been highly popular.

It traerons, just as an aside, Belmont's trip was to the Marine Mammal Center in Sal Salito, California.

So came from here, went to there, and then came back.

It was a really fun opportunity for residents to check that place out.

We're helping families spark a love of reading from day one.

Through Dolly Parton's Imagination Library, children ages 0 to 5 receive free books in the mail each month.

Since launch, thousands of San Mateo County kids have enrolled in this program.

We're thankful to our partners at the Dollywood Foundation, the Foundation for San Mateo County Libraries, and our Friends Groups, which make these offerings possible.

Together with our partners, we bring the library into the community in fun and unexpected ways.

At Library Night with San Francisco Giants, thousands of fans explored our maker mobile, browsed ebooks, and took home baseball-themed books.

And at the San Mateo County Fair, we created a vibrant reading garden where visitors of all ages enjoyed books and activities.

Wherever we go, we remind people the library is within reach.

In this short video, we'll see highlights from the Giants Library Night.

Our staff are at the heart of everything we do.

This year, our library champions leaned into growth and new ideas, turning creativity into even better services for our communities.

We celebrate our teams from longtime staff who know our communities deeply to new team members who bring fresh perspectives, and we're thankful for the support of volunteers and friend groups who continuously help us reach even more people across our county.

Our libraries are, of course, community destinations, and we provide welcoming spaces to gather, learn, and connect.

Through continued upgrades and new spaces, we're always working to make them more comfortable, innovative, and inspiring for everyone in collaboration with you.

Here's a short video showcasing the reopening of the Belmont Library after it received some recent upgrades to support the community.

We are so happy to see you all today, eager to join us in exploring the refreshed library, which is, as everyone knows, really the gem of our community.

This year marked a transformative chapter for the Belmont Library as it temporarily closed for several months to undergo an exciting refresh project.

The renovation brought vibrant new paint, fresh carpeting, updated furnishings, and cutting edge technology upgrades throughout the space.

Perhaps most notably, it saw the completion of the Belmont Library Makerspace, a dynamic hub designed to inspire creativity and hands-on exploration for years to come.

To celebrate the opening, the library hosted a joyful community event that honored Belmont's rich diversity and showcased the new makerspace and tech enhancements.

Over 2,000 patrons returned to the library, greeted by a day full of engaging activities, welcoming spaces, and shelves brimming with books to be discovered.

The Belmont Library celebrated its own wins and progress last year in the form of programming.

We're proud to highlight our Maturing Gracefully program.

This is a meaningful partnership between the library, Dignity Health Sequoia Hospital, and the Friends of the Belmont Library, where each month we welcome an expert to the library to share guidance and answer questions on topics related to aging, wellness, and navigating life's later chapters with confidence and care.

During the months of the Belmont Library's temporary closure for its refresh project, the City of Belmont's Park Recreation and Culture Department graciously hosted this ongoing program at the Twin Pines Senior and Community Center.

Thanks to their support, this valuable series centered on education, community building, and providing light refreshments, continuing uninterrupted and ensured our patrons stayed connected and informed.

This year, the Belmont Library pilot proudly piloted a Mandarin language citizenship class.

This is an initiative designed to make the path to U.S.

citizenship more accessible to our Mandarin speaking community.

The class allowed prospective citizens to engage with the citizenship test material in their native language, fostering deeper understanding and confidence.

One of our dedicated library assistants led the charge by translating the entire curriculum into Chinese and working closely with patrons over an eight-week period.

Through the personalized support, three patrons were able to familiarize themselves with the content and prepare meaningfully for their citizenship exams.

One participant followed up with the staff instructor instructor and let us know that they passed their tests and secured their citizenship.

So this pilot reflects our ongoing commitment to inclusive programming and meeting our community where they are linguistically, culturally, and educationally.

So thank you to city staff, to council for your collaboration with us and for championing the library, in particular, manager William Mates and City Manager Ashton Oskey for your work on the library JPA Governing Board and Operations Committee, Friends of the Belmont Library for their ongoing support, advocacy, tireless celebration of library offerings, library staff for their committed and passionate work, and I'm happy to answer any questions.

Great.

Thank you so much for the presentation.

After our study session on housing laws, this is definitely a very welcome, different kind of presentation.

Very proud of all that the library does.

Do we have any questions for Chris at this time or any comments?

Yes.

Okay, uh, go ahead.

Vice Mayor.

Chris, this is just a deep appreciation for you for all that you do for the city, for how present you are, for how involved you are, and for creating such a valuable asset to everyone in Belmont.

So I just want to say thank you for you.

Thank you.

Councilmember Jordan, yes, thank you for your presentation.

Um, for our public tonight, if someone would like to enroll in one of these classes or programs, how would they do that?

Yeah, so we offer different citizenship classes both in person and online.

Um so the best way you can do it would either be to head to smcl.org and check our events page and look for it for it that way.

We also um, you know, are happy to engage.

So heading into your local library and speaking with staff there to talk about the different offerings because we have different classes at different locations as well as online to try and meet the needs of the public.

Great.

So smcl.org.

Sncl.org.

And then events page for different opportunities for people to participate.

Absolutely.

And when you're in the in the libraries themselves, you can ask for our event calendars, ask for our adult learning calendars.

We want nothing less than to leave you with more resources than you know what to do with.

Great.

Thank you.

And I just want to make one comment.

Uh, thank you so much for everything you do.

I echo what the vice mayor has said.

And I will say I was at the library.

I think it was maybe a random Tuesday morning to go pick up a book.

And I got there right in time because when I left a few minutes later, the parking lot was full, and it was about 10 10 in the morning, and it made me so happy to see that there were the library was in use, there were people coming in and coming out, and I had to actually ask for help because I couldn't find my book that I was looking for, and uh the staff was so helpful and uh really gracious when I said I I don't I didn't know where to find it.

So, but thank you, and uh thank you to all the staff and all the work that you do.

The library is beautiful, so we really appreciate all the efforts that you make in getting out beyond the community beyond the library and into the community and just extending it.

So thank you so much.

Thank you, Casey Member Jordan.

Thank you so much for the presentation.

As you mentioned, um, I am the chair of the JPA, and it's been so we get presentations like this often, and it's really wonderful to say it's what it's my favorite uh board to sit on because um it is so impactful in so many ways, and as we've seen tonight, it's not just about checking out books and the incredible work that the library does, as you said, to meet the community where they are.

Um, if folks haven't looked at our library website lately, I encourage you.

There's so many programs, and the partnership I think with our city, specifically Parks and Rec and the cultural things we've done, whether it's lunar new year or Diwali last weekend, so well attended, and it's uh it's great, and I know it's a heavy lift uh uh with everything else that you do, but it's very worth it.

We've heard from our city uh community how important it is.

So thank you very much for for all that you do and um and for for bringing this to the full council and letting us know.

All right.

Any other comments?

All right.

Thanks so much, Chris.

Appreciate it.

All right.

So now we will be moving on to public comments on items not on the agenda.

This portion of the meeting is reserved for persons wishing to address the body on any city matter not on the agenda.

The period for public comment at this point in the agenda is limited to 15 minutes with a maximum of three minutes per speaker.

Um, and I'll just remind everyone about the um the decorum uh of public comments that I mentioned at the beginning of the meeting.

Um Madam Clerk, are there any public comments on items not on the agenda?

Item six.

Um I'm sorry, we're having a little bit of a technical difficulty, I think.

Oh, okay.

Um there might be some people that are having issue getting into our webinar, but um I am seeing attendees.

Um but in the meantime, we do have um a speaker in the room for this item, and that'll be uh Juliano.

Uh uh Madam Clerk, maybe we just uh if are they having trouble if they're having trouble getting into Zoom, should we just um reiterate the phone number maybe to call in instead of joining by web if that's that easier?

I want to make sure all the folks who want to speak are able to speak.

I do have call in.

Um the two individuals that are on are it looks like they're using a telephone.

So I don't know if there's something wrong with the actual webinar portion of it.

Okay.

All right, so if you are having trouble um with the webinar or Zoom, please feel free to call in, and there are instructions on the uh published agenda on how to call in.

Um right, I'm sorry.

Let's go ahead with our first uh in chambers uh public commenter.

Filiano, gee.

Oh, I don't think it's um, is there a little button on the microphone?

Uh like on the good now.

Let's see if I remember to put it down and it's done.

Um, been a little while since I've been here.

Thank you all for everything you guys do.

You're all amazing.

Uh here today to let you know that a couple weeks ago, another cyclist was hit riding in Belmont.

Um it's dangerous.

Want to chat with folks.

Every time I come up, um staff, not every time sometimes when I come up, uh staff tries to minimize my comments.

I don't know how this happened.

I don't know why this happened, but it happened.

Um, and you all set policy.

I hope you all can find it with you to somehow prioritize safe cycling.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any other public comments on items not on the agenda?

Well, this is item C.

No more on this item.

All right.

Then we will move to item seven, which is council member announcements.

Um let's start with Councilmember Jordan.

Any council member announcements from you?

Councilmember.

Okay, please go ahead.

Um I'm spreading the word, hoping that the community can come together and support local food banks amid this government shutdown.

It's gonna have drastic local everywhere implications, but here especially um CalFresh, other support services are being suspended, some as long as the entire month of November.

Um the county's earmarking $900,000 to help is gonna be a rough time for a lot of people.

So if you're interested in volunteering your time or supporting local food programs, visit smcgov.org slash HSA for more information on the core agency providers.

Um those in need of food or assistance are encouraged to visit shfb.org for free food.

Great, thank you.

And uh before I move on, just checking, okay.

Okay, I was gonna say if we could remove that.

Vice Mayor.

Yes.

So Councilmember Lautomaro and I attended the public safety committee meeting last week, and we learned a few things that I wanted to reiterate and to share with the community.

It is a reminder that all bicycles and e-bikes, class one, class two, class three, are not allowed on sidewalks.

They must follow all rules of the road.

So stopping at stop signs at stoplights.

They cannot ride through crosswalks.

You have to get off your bicep your bike or your e-bike and push them.

And those under 18 must wear a helmet at all times.

And if you're over 18 and on a class two bike, you must wear a helmet.

And for class three, you must be a minimum, you um have a minimum age of 16 and then also wear a helmet.

So please stay off sidewalks with your bicyclists.

It's dangerous for you, and it's dangerous for those of us who are walking on the sidewalks.

Okay, thank you.

Councilmember McEwen.

I would just like to thank the Vice Mayor for that comment because I've been seeing a lot more dangerous bicycle riding with the electric bikes.

They go faster, and people ride them like motorcycles, but they're not licensed as motorcycles, and the helmets are bicycle helmets, not motorcycle helmets.

So that is an excellent comment.

On a another traffic thing for the folks in Belmont Heights, uh, they might like to know that the beloved Hallmark Barricade was rammed by a vehicle from the San Carlos side last week and destroyed one of the planters that's a major uh portion of that barricade.

Uh traffic cannot pass through there.

There's still curbs and stuff there, but I'm meeting with Public Works Director Guan tomorrow to take a look at the uh barricade, and there have been plans in the works to redo the gate anyway to create a large a wider gate for the fire department.

So if anybody you know drives and sees that the hallmark barricade is in a state of disrepair and partial demolition demolition, we're we're on it, we're working on it.

That's it.

Great.

Thank you for that.

Councilmember Latamerla.

Oh, I'm good.

Oh, I'm sorry, we did, we did.

You gave a good important one.

Uh, and then I just have a few.

I wanted to give a shout out again to the Diwali um uh really well attended event that uh was at the senior center um this last Saturday.

The boo bash is tomorrow at Twin Pines Park on October 29th, which is tomorrow from 5 30 to 7 30.

It's free, open all ages and includes our trunk retreat where families can drill through decorated vehicles and collect sand candy in a safe, fun, and festive setting.

Um there's also a haunted building and park and some loud um uh live music, so not loud, just live music.

So um please come.

Uh I remember last year we had a lot of um folks who had little ones who can't go out at night, maybe because they're a little too young.

So this is a great event, but it's for open for all ages.

Um also wanted to quickly mention the deadline for our updated happy hydrants program and utility box art opportunity has been extended.

Um so now you have until this Friday to submit your applications and help us celebrate Belmont Centennial with these great community art opportunities.

I always get people asking if they can decorate their fire hydrant the way um we were once were able back several years ago.

Now we're able to do that.

So um please don't repaint your hydrant without permission, but go ahead and submit uh your art opportunity to us by the 31st.

And then uh just two more things.

If you're interested in being part of Team Belmont, we're hiring for a handful of positions.

So take a look at our job openings on the Cal Ops or Belmont website for more information.

Veterans Day is coming up, and so please join us November 11th at 10 a.m.

at the Veterans Memorial in Twin Pines Park for our annual Veterans Day ceremony.

Um we have a guest speaker, a captain in the Air Force who served during the Vietnam conflict.

Um, if you haven't already attended our uh memorials uh on Veterans Day are always very meaningful, so uh please join us.

It starts at 10 a.m.

And then save the date for our Belmont Civics Academy Day on November 22nd from 9 to 3 at the City Hall here in Belmont.

You'll discover how decisions are made, meet city leaders and staff from every department and gain a deeper understanding of how Belmont serves the community every day.

I highly encourage folks to attend.

This is a real eye-opener about how things happen here in the city.

Alright, and with that, this is also all of this information you can find on our city website.

Moving on to consent business, item seven.

These business items are considered to be routine in nature and will be enacted by one motion with no separate discussion unless a member or staff requests specific items to be removed for separate action.

Looks like we have four items here on the consent business calendar.

Any staff or uh council member who would like to remove an item or have any questions or comments on any of the items?

Do we have any public comment on item seven, which is our consent business?

Uh yes, I have uh oh, I'm sorry, it's item eight.

It's eight, yeah.

Juliana Carlini.

Hey all.

So I'm often here writing email and here in council asking you for more complete infrastructure, in particular, like you know, Ralston and Alameda and uh other places.

It's not really going to be safe until we have arterials covered.

I complain about the uh fact that we nibble around the edges, but I'll take that.

I'll take every inch of safe cycling that we can get.

And I want to thank the uh parking and traffic safety committee, you all public works, for um few dozen yards maybe of additional uh bike lane that's being added to Old County at the juncture with San Mateo, where uh they have uh uh provided uh protected bike lanes uh earlier.

It's fantastic.

Um trying to get into San Mateo before entailed weaving around cars and into traffic, which was somewhat sketchy.

I've been riding a long time, I get by.

Um, but it terrified folks, so a little bit, but thank you.

Thank you.

Do we have any other um commenters or uh on the consent calendar?

That is the final speaker for this.

All right.

Uh then we can entertain a motion.

Move approval.

Second.

Roll call, please.

Councilmember Jordan.

Yes.

Laudamarlo?

Aye.

McCune.

Aye.

Vice Mayor Pang Maganares.

Aye.

Mayor Maids.

Aye.

Motion passes 5-0.

Thank you.

All right.

Great.

Then uh we can move.

Uh move on to uh item nine.

Um I'm sorry, my error.

I did have one more slip for the consent calendar.

All right, please.

Thanks for pointing out that to us.

Sorry about that.

My first time commenting at Council.

No, that's fine.

Uh thanks for giving me an opportunity.

I'll keep it brief.

I just wanted to express gratitude about item 80, and uh to Councilwoman uh Latamerlo and the PTSC uh commission, like Giuliano described.

I filed the PTSC report.

I think a couple others did as well.

I myself patronize Belmont businesses coming from San Mateo fairly often by bicycle or Sam Trans, which is what I'll be riding home tonight.

And it means a ton.

I know you guys are considering uh zoning considerations for Easter 101 and my I myself worked in Redwood Shores for a number of years, tried to bicycle along Sterling View from coming from San Mateo.

So even those few dozen yards of protected bike lane are super meaningful, and you'd be surprised at just how dramatically small infrastructure projects like this have dramatic effects on people's perceptions of what transportation options are available to them.

On my way over here, I jogged.

I didn't, I didn't drive or bike or take the the um the bus over, but I did jog along this segment of Old County Road, and the lighting was not super great, but I could see how this will be a big improvement.

I did see a bicyclist uh riding in the shared area on Old County from Belmont northbound, and then I also saw a vehicle driver taking a right turn at the stop sign off Sterling View north onto Old County and totally rolled that stuff.

So there's work to do, but this type of hard infrastructure, while seemingly super small and on the consent calendar, has profound impacts.

I just wanted to say thank you.

I know the process can sometimes be expensive, but I'm amazed to see the results.

Thanks.

Thank you very much.

All right.

Any other comments for that item?

No, that would be our last one.

And the motion did pass 5-0 with a um motion from Pang Meganaris and a second from McCune.

All right, thank you.

Um then we will move on to item nine, which is our public hearings.

Tonight, 9a is the appeal of planning commission approval of application number 2023 0032 for by right processing of design review, grading plan, tree removal permit, affordable housing plan, transportation demand management plan, and state density bonus for 500 580 Masonic Way.

We have with us tonight our community development deputy director, Laura Russell.

There you go.

Thank you.

Oh yeah.

You're right clicking.

There we go.

Okay, thank you.

Good evening.

Mayor and members of the council.

I'm Laura Russell, Deputy Community Development Director, and tonight we are talking about the appeal of 500 to 580 Masonic.

So we don't do very many appeals, so I just wanted to go over the meeting structure so everyone knows what to expect.

So I'm giving now the staff presentation, and then we will have council questions for staff.

Then we'll go to the applicant presentation.

They've been told in advance that they are limited to 10 minutes, and then council questions for the applicant.

Then the appellant presentation.

They've also been notified.

They have 10 minutes for their presentation.

Council questions for the appellant, and then the public comment section of the public hearing.

And then the appellant can come back for up to three minutes to give any closing remarks or rebuttal to anything that's come up so far.

And then the applicant closes out that portion, and then we go back over to the city council for your consideration of the item.

So you are likely very familiar with the project site.

It is the entire block bounded by Masonic Way, Granada Street, Wessex Way, and Hiller Street.

And as you know, there's currently commercial uses that you can kind of see here in the aerial, kind of in the center of the project site.

The project summary is this is a proposal for construction of a residential apartment building with 140 dwelling units, including 25 affordable units at five stories and 60 feet in height, approximately 147,000 square feet.

It includes parking for 138 vehicles and 142 bicycles.

The unit mix is 39 studios, 68 one-bedrooms, and 33 two-bedrooms.

So a good mix across the different unit types.

And wanted to point out that this presentation that I'm giving is really going to focus on the appeal, but complete information about the project is included in attachment B to the staff report, which was the planning commission staff report.

So that includes all of the project details.

So we know that you've just received a presentation about housing laws, but we wanted to just briefly touch on the ones that are really applicable to this particular project.

And so as you likely know, this project is subject to the Housing Crisis Act, Senate Bill 330, signed into law in 2019.

The California State Density Bonus Law provides tools for developers to encourage affordable housing.

There's certain key categories that we want to be aware of when we're talking about this project related to density bonus law, and that's the density itself, the number of housing units that are allowed with the project.

It's a bonus above what would normally be allowed.

There's waivers to development standards, and then there's this separate category from waivers that are incentives and concessions.

And my staff report uses the term incentives for that throughout.

We just want to point out that incentives are different than waivers that may come into the conversation later.

This project is subject to by-right processing.

That is a specific definition under state law as related to housing elements.

And this project meets the eligibility for a by right processing because it is identified in our certified current housing element as subject to this type of processing if it meets the criteria, and the criteria is to have 20% of the units affordable to lower income households.

And the law is nuanced, but in generally speaking, the reason that this project is subject to by right processing is because it's carried over from the past housing element and then meets some other specified requirements of the law.

So for this type of project, there's no discretionary permits allowed.

They all have to be by right based on objective standards.

And specifically under state law CEQA, the California Environmental Quality Act does not apply.

So we don't even look at it to see what type of exemption is applies here.

It's just completely exempt according to the law statutory exemption.

And just briefly touching on under state density bonus law, what is a base project?

And just to explain, we use this concept of a base project because Belmont does not have a density limit in the Belmont Village specific plan area.

So a lot of cities would have a limit, 50 units per acre, 75 units per acre.

We don't have that type of limit.

Our limits are set by floor area and height and other development standards.

So for projects that don't have a density limit, state law says we go through this kind of mathematical exercise to figure out how many units can fit within those development standards and the size of those units, and then also the amenities that kind of go along with that project.

So the way I think of it is it establishes the base building envelope.

Imagine a three-dimensional box that a certain number of units can fit in, and then they get a bonus on top of that according to state law, and then that box gets bigger to be able to fit those bonus units.

So as we're talking about this, just wanted to refresh you on that concept of base density.

So as we have been thinking about this appeal and thinking about the questions that we have received from the community, we really wanted to walk you through this idea of what's been going on in the legal context and what's been going on with this project for the last few years to help people understand how we got to where we are today.

So I've got a couple of slides on that to kind of bring everybody up to speed.

So as you know, the Belmont Village Specific Plan was adopted in 2017.

At that time, the laws were really different.

And there's an underlying assumption in the BVSP that cities have discretionary review authority.

So there's a lot of discretionary components that were built into the BVSP the way it was originally imagined.

State density bonus law was in effect, but it was in a very different form.

So state density bonus law goes back a long way, and it stayed like kind of the same for a while, you know, a long time, and then recent changes have gone into effect that's changed it a lot in the last few years.

And it's worth pointing out too the BVSP and the implementing zoning were created at the same time together.

So that doesn't always happen, but what that helps us to understand is that the zoning was implementing the BVSP.

They were created together and adopted together.

So that's something to keep in mind as we talk through this.

And then, as I mentioned, and as you know, in 2019, SB 330 was signed into law, and that really begins the series of state laws that look limit local authority for housing projects, and that has been continuing to today, as you've been discussing.

So that kind of sets us up for August of 2023 when this application for this project at 500 580 Masonic was filed.

There was a previous version of this project that had its own process that it needed to go through, was withdrawn.

So we're using that date as when this version of the project was first applied for.

And then we have to take a little detour and remind you of what was happening with the housing element.

Okay, so in December of 2023, the city received a letter from HCD with comments on the draft housing element.

And that letter included a number of things that ended up impacting how we're viewing this project.

And so the state law required certain zoning amendments to be completed by January 31st of 2024, and those specific code amendments needed to be approved by HCD in order to get certified housing element status.

And so some of the key things that were related to this site are we were told by HCD we had to add a program in our housing element, committing to facilitating pipeline projects, which this project was considered a pipeline project, and that we also must do a complete analysis of what HCD and the law call governmental constraints.

In real life, what this is is basically what are the local zoning regulations and requirements that may constrain housing production.

So what ended up happening is we got in the series of meetings with HCD, our staff and their staff to talk through how to address all of these comments that became important information for us.

So we're doing those meetings in December and January of 2024, working to try to meet that deadline of doing code amendments by the end of the month in January.

And HCD expressed to us their views that ground floor commercial is a constraint to housing production.

So we had conversations with them about this, but they their view is that's kind of an across the board view and their starting point that we needed to remove constraints to housing, and they view a commercial ground floor commercial as a constraint.

So we're working on these different code amendments and we are reviewing them with HCD as we are going through that process, knowing they ultimately have to approve it.

Then in January of 2024, the City Council adopted those amendments to the zoning ordinance to comply with state law and those HCD requirements.

And so what we changed there related to this project is Table 31-1 of the zoning ordinance.

We amended it to add note number two at the bottom of the table, and that says that for buy right projects, multiple unit dwellings are permitted on the ground floor.

So before we did that, a conditional use permit, a CUP, was required for residential on the ground floor for buy right.

It would have been for buy-right projects too if we didn't have any, but it would have applied there.

So this amendment removed that CUP requirement for buy-right projects.

So that was kind of the main action.

You used to need a CUP, this note at the bottom takes that CUP away.

And the way that it was intended was it was always written based on that HCD feedback and intended to allow for 100% residential projects with no ground floor commercial because that really was the expectation of HCD.

So in that kind of spring and summer of 2024 timeline, the applicant revises the project.

There's back and forth between staff and the applicant team.

This is common for development projects.

They may consider different approaches, they may review different things with us.

We're reviewing it for consistency with our objective standards through all of that time.

And some of the key changes were they added three low-income units for a total of 20% lower income, and that's what qualified the project for by-right processing.

So they're basically then using that footnote and applying it to the project.

And then the applicant and staff teams were discussing how does that table 31-1 note number two apply, so that we've got back and forth, we're talking that through, applying it to the project, and then the applicant previously had a request for an incentive for ground floor residential use, but they took away that part of their application.

So they had planned to apply for an incentive to remove the ground floor active use requirements, but then staff told them we've amended the code, you now are allowed to have residential on the ground floor.

So in response to that, they remove that request.

Okay.

And then because we have to formalize things, in September of 2024, staff sends an email to the applicant that's sort of confirming that interpretation and the discussion that's been going on, saying that table 31-1 includes the whole property and does not restrict the location of housing units along any street frontage.

So the applicant has been working under that assumption since 2024.

And then in December of 2024, the application is deemed complete.

So with some of that background and timeline, I'm just gonna walk you through how we're thinking about the analysis and some of the key aspects of the appeal.

So some key questions that have come up are related to the active use frontage overlay, AUFO, that's a concept that comes out of the Belmont Village Specific Plan, and the ground floor active use requirements that are also in the code.

So what are those and how are those applied?

That's been a key question.

There's been questions about whether the community development director made appropriate determinations related to the development standards, is it within the authority, common practice related to setbacks, build two lines, and some of the other standards?

And then how does state law interact with these local decisions?

So those are the key kind of questions that I'd like to walk you through.

So there's always a caveat, right?

And so this is some things I thought useful to know as we kind of get into that discussion.

So the zoning ordinance that implements the BVSP allows for a hundred percent residential project.

So this has always been a component of the BVSP and the zoning ordinance.

But remember when we created all these things, there was a lot of discretion, right?

So no one anticipated how these things would interact together in a context that only allows objective standard review.

But there always has been a provision that you could have dwellings on, you could have units on the ground floor in the AUFO if you got a conditional use permit.

And we have granted such a conditional use permit in the past, so there is some past practice for that.

And the language does not specify that there must be an active use with that residential use.

Okay, so there's always been a pathway to have residential on the ground floor, and then also important to note that the zoning ordinance talks about potential inconsistencies between the specific plan and the zoning ordinance, and it says that the specific plan would govern, and then it goes on to say that the community development director is authorized to determine the extent of any such inconsistency and issue a decision to resolve the matter.

So that concept has been an underlying theme of what we've been talking about with how the standards have been approved, and then the zoning ordinance includes an exception process for certain standards related to streetscape and transparency, but those require a discretionary action by the planning commission.

So that's not possible for this project.

And then also reminder the housing accountability act says that once cities make an interpretation of their standards and their first like in their compliance review, that gets locked in.

So the cities can't change their mind about how they're interpreting compliance under the Housing Accountability Act.

So kind of the first set of questions is around this community development director determinations, and so as I mentioned, the community development director has the authority to issue decisions on potential inconsistencies.

This is a typical practice across cities.

Community development directors routinely make zoning interpretations in Belmont and in other cities, and then we have a zoning ordinance section that talks about when in our design review that talks about applicable objective standards.

And so the way that this has been interpreted here in Belmont in the years since 2017 is that the community development director has had a role in determining the applicability of certain standards.

So if there are some that do not apply to that type of project, for example, those have been removed from the consideration.

So I wanted to give you that background on some of the past practice of the city.

And then again, because of the Housing Accountability Act, the community development director really has to issue any such decision within 30 days of the application being deemed complete.

And so that's that idea of having a compliance review that once it's completed, you have to stick to it.

So then moving to the active use frontage overlay and the question of whether it was applied correctly on Masonic Way.

Staff's view of this is that yes, it was applied appropriately.

The language in the BVSP itself allows flexibility for a range of uses.

And I will point out that members of the public and the planning commission, the appellant raised really excellent questions as we went through this.

And the council may be aware that we did have different staff team members working on this project at different times, and it really gave us the opportunity to go back into the records, think about how interpretations and determinations were made, and really make sure that we had affirmed our position.

And so what we're telling you today is sort of the collection of all of our best thinking as we've been working on this.

So we really um reaffirmed in our minds that the BVSP has a lot of flexibility.

We included the full paragraph in the staff report, and I the appellant has talked about this a lot as well.

And there's different ways to interpret, you know, some of these different provisions, and again, that's why we rely back on the community development director's authority to do that when things appear like they may be internally inconsistent.

So there's no formal requirement, no stated requirement that lobbies take up only a certain percentage of the use.

And we interpret there being adequate flexibility to allow for other similar uses in that language, such as the proposed gym.

We've also been thinking about how the BVSP references table 31-1 and the languages for further specification.

So we really think of Table 31-1 as implementing the BVSP and implementing the AUFO.

So we don't necessarily see the conflict that some others have seen between these two things because the BVSP points to the zoning ordinance in order to implement it.

And then as a reminder, no discretionary entitlements are allowed for by right projects.

So we couldn't have applied any other type of exception process, and the director has the authority to make those interpretations.

Laura, if I could just interrupt you for just a brief moment, I want to emphasize one point that was just made there, and it has to do with the interplay between the Belmont Village Specific Plan and zoning ordinance and the fact that they were adopted together.

The zoning was written in parallel with the plan.

And the plan specifically uses the zoning to get into the further details of how the plan is implemented.

And then the original zoning that was drafted with the plan, residential uses on the ground floor were allowable with the CUP.

So as Laura mentioned, a project as originally conceived the BBSP would allow for or a fully 100% residential project, notwithstanding the AFUO and frontage requirements that were being encouraged, but it anticipated that that might there might be certain circumstances in which it would be appropriate to have a fully residential project.

And then the amendment that was made to the zoning ordinance in January of 2024 that Laura referred to, the amendment was simply to remove the conditional use permit requirement for residential on the ground floor for a buy right project.

So a buy right project by by the fact that that amendment could then be a hundred percent residential project.

Okay, so the next topic is um whether the active use requirements are applied correctly on the other street frontages, so the other three sides.

And staff's position is yes, they are appropriately applied.

And as the city attorney just mentioned, the BVSP has always allowed GLAM for residential uses with approval of a conditional use permit, and that note was to remove that CUP process.

And as we also talked about, these changes were to implement state law and to implement the direction that we got from HCD.

So the applicant had an option, which they exercised to design the building with residential units on Hiller, Granada, and Wessex sides of the building using that logic and approach.

And because the ground floor use is residential, it doesn't then make sense to have the transparency standards which require the big glass door fronts because it's allowed to be residential.

You wouldn't have to have the transparency standards into people's residential units.

So those were found to not apply.

So specifically related to the setbacks and build two lines, hopefully this diagram will help.

It's a little bit tricky to explain.

We usually think about setbacks as a minimum.

And in the case of the BVSP, the setbacks are a maximum because we want the buildings to be located close to the street.

We don't want them to be set back too far.

So the setbacks are saying you have to locate your building within a close proximity to the property line.

So zero to five feet, for example.

And then the build two lines are supposed to go with that, but to be candid, staff finds those two requirements, the setback and the build two lines to be confusing and potentially contradictory.

So this is another area where we had to look at how do we make an interpretation of that.

And so the Masonic side of the building complies with the build two line.

The build two line is more permissive in the AUFO.

It does not comply with the setback, but we interpret that as being allowed by the ordinance because it does comply with the build two line.

On the Granada side of the building, the left side of this diagram, it complies with the build two line and the setback.

And then on the Hiller and Wessex sides of the building, it does not comply with the build two or setback lines due to conflicts with the other standards and the shape of the lot.

Okay, so the way that I think this is perhaps the easiest to understand, the red line, right, kind of representing the outer limits and kind of showing you the shape of the property.

And you can see the outline of the building here.

Okay, so the building gets bigger, takes up that whole area, and would be that really unusual shape.

As you can imagine, they don't build buildings in that shape.

It would be extremely expensive, not cost effective, not efficient, not typically done.

Do you know what I mean?

Only the most unusual building might have that type of shape.

Certainly not a multifamily housing building.

So if you push those buildings all the way out to the outer edges, you would exceed the lot coverage requirement.

Okay, so the lot coverage is the bird's eye view looking down of the building.

The only way to rectify that would to put some sort of hole in the building or would have to be somehow in the middle because you would have the build two lines and the setbacks that push the building all the way out to the outside, and that's not considered a practical approach when the center of this building is the parking, right?

So structurally, you can't put a hole in the middle of the building when you're building a building around the parking structure part of it.

So when we when staff considered all of those things together, the interpretation made by the community development director is that the lot coverage requirement should be the one that governs, because that's the one that's sort of like more restrictive and important.

We wouldn't want the project to be built out to its full extent, and then also it would not be feasible for the applicant to do that.

So that's the rationale behind why those standards were chosen to not apply to this project because the lot coverage and the feasibility arguments um govern that one.

So for the reasons that we outlined in the staff report and in this presentation, staff does recommend approving the project as designed by the applicant and approved by the planning commission.

But as a reminder, however, if the city had determined that the project did not comply with the AUFO and zoning ordinance standards, the applicant would have had the legal right to apply for provisions under the density bonus law.

So they have the right to up to three incentives, and reminder incentives are to remove standards that would result in identifiable cost reductions.

So incentives, also called concessions, are linked to cost.

And then they also have unlimited waivers for standards that would physically prevent the project from being built with the permitted density and also with the proposed incentives.

So the order matters here, right?

You can apply for an incentive, and then you apply for waivers to build according to the density and the incentive.

And you're you're familiar at this point, but um the burden of proof is on the city if it wishes to deny incentives or waivers, that's the reverse of the logic that normally applies to development projects, and there are no required findings for approval for incentives.

Basically, you can only make um deny them if you make the findings to deny them, which as you know are very difficult to make.

So Laura, could I just make one further point on that slide about can incentives and concessions?

So HCD has said that incentives or concessions can be used to um uh request a uh a variance or a waiver of uh ground a ground floor use like a commercial requirement.

So um the there was a I think there was a technical argument being made by the appellant that a waiver couldn't be used to waive a use, but an incentive can be used to remove a requirement for a use.

Um and as Laura points out, had this been the case, the been interpreted differently, the applicant would have had an opportunity to have requested those concessions or those waivers.

The other point is that was made, I think that needs to be reemphasized is that once a compliance determination is made, or uh um if the if the city does not identify a non-compliance in that 30-day period of time, the project is deemed to comply with the city's standards.

So we're unable to go back and undo that compliance determination under the state under the housing accountability act.

Thank you.

So, really, in conclusion, based on all of this analysis, staff recommends that the city council adopt the resolution that's included in your packet as attachment number A.

This these are the listed entitlements that are part of the project.

That attachment also has two exhibits.

One is consistency with the general plan and the specific plan, and then the second exhibit is the conditions of approval.

And so that's the um action that's requested of the council.

If you have questions on the project itself, we would be happy to answer those.

And I've got some kind of backup slides and diagrams if you're interested in getting into that.

Our senior planner Rob Gill may assist me as well if we get into those types of questions.

Um, and then as you know, the applicant and appellant have their presentations.

So that concludes our presentation.

Happy to take any questions.

Thank you very much.

I really appreciate the um presentation and kind of retelling the story and just uh setting setting everything at the baseline so we all have an understanding.

Um, we do have the presentations coming up, but just want to make sure if uh council has any questions for staff at this time on what's been presented thus far.

Now it's a good time to ask.

Yes, Council Member McKean.

Yeah, just real quickly.

Um, reading through the draft resolution that's in the packet.

Uh there's some findings included in there.

If if if that resolution passes, does that have the effect of denying the appeal, or do we need to do something else in regard to the appeal procedurally?

No, what's in front of you?

When a project's appealed, it's can it's before you de novo.

So you get to you're not reviewing necessarily what the planning commission did.

You're acting on the project as if the planning commission had an act on acted on.

So you're making the decision independently.

So you make a decision on the project, and that's all that's required.

You don't specifically also have to say an appeal is denied.

Okay.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

I have one question.

On the incentives, you said that they were entitled to apply for three, but they haven't applied for any, correct?

So once we make a decision tonight, can they change their mind on those incentives or are we are the incentives just done?

Once the project is approved, the entitlements are approved, that locks in the density bonus action.

And so you would have to go back to the decision-making body in order to change those incentives.

So they have not been applied for at this time.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

Council Member Letter Merlin.

Um, I I think for me, some of this um hinges on the difference between resolving inconsistencies and then dealing with objective standards.

So I think you covered it, but I I want to just double check that in kind of removing some of the objective standards because other ones had priorities.

That is well within the purview of the community development director that that did not have to go to planning commission for that to happen.

Yes, that's how we understand the way that the code is written, that it that ability to resolve those is consistencies rests with the director.

Okay.

That was my way.

All right, great.

No other questions.

Then uh we can go ahead and um have the applicant presentation.

Um just trying to be mindful of time.

Oh, great.

I was gonna ask about the 10 minutes.

Perfect.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

All right, good evening.

Uh good evening, Mayor Maids, uh, council members.

I will be mindful of time.

Uh, I'm Don Peterson.

I represent Prometheus Real Estate Group, and I'm joined here this evening by Jonathan Stone of Prometheus as well as other members of our project team.

Uh Prometheus is an active real estate owner, investor, and developer.

Our primary focus as a company is housing.

And we've been a long-time housing provider and owner-operator of rental housing.

Prometheus is a family-owned company, a private company.

We've been around for over 50 years, and we're long-term holders of our properties and those projects that we develop.

We're locally based with our headquarters nearby in downtown San Mateo.

Regarding this evening's appeal of our project approval at 500 five eighty Masonic Way, uh, staff covered quite a bit in its staff report and staff's presentation provided a good overview of the technical analysis and legal context supporting our position that the planning commission approval should be upheld.

We agree with staff's analysis and its recommendation for city council to adopt the resolution to affirm and approve the requested by ride entitlements.

We have submitted our own letter summarizing our position, which substantively mirrors the analysis put forth by staff.

And our land use council is here tonight and available to address any questions in this regard.

I just wanted to take a moment to emphasize that while there'll be some talk here tonight about what the project isn't, I would like to reinforce what this project is.

And what this project is is a proposal focused on housing, specifically 140 apartment units, including 25 affordable units, which supports guiding language in the city's general plan, housing element, and the Belmont Village Specific Plan.

Our project proposal addresses among the housing elements's chief goals, which is to produce new housing at all levels.

The housing element further provides for the establishment of by ride housing designation for prior housing sites, and this site falls into that category, a prior housing site, which requires buy right designation.

At this point, I'd like to turn the presentation over to Alan Jones with Jones Architects.

He's just going to provide a brief overview of the project, highlight certain aspects and how the project both supports and contributes to the goals and aims of the Belmont Village Specific Plan.

Alan.

Hi, Alan Jones, Jones Architecture.

We've been working with the design team on this project since 2019.

It's been a long process, but I think that the project's been carefully designed.

We believe it contributes to the city's vision as outlined in the Belmont plan.

The project supports a diversity of housing opportunities in the village.

It adds much needed housing near transit.

It contributes to a vibrant downtown, supports economic activity and investment.

It's been thoroughly designed and enhances the pedestrian realm.

The project also provides a dynamic link between the adjacent residential neighborhoods and the village center.

Can you go to the next slide?

I'll walk you quickly around the plan.

The project provides a cohesive urban form that is compatible with the surrounding uses, as outlined in the general plan goal 2.3.

We went through many rounds of work with the city and staff, which was a goal of the housing plan element, call H1.5, which was designed to facilitate housing.

The ground story units face Hiller and Wessex.

The setbacks on Hiller that have been talked about with the shape of the building provide a lush garden on the corner.

The building entry and the lobby are located on Masonic Way.

The majority of the building services are located on Granada.

And then parking, as mentioned, is located in the heart of the building, fully buffered by the residential units and the lobby.

To get a little bit into the design, the building promotes infill development with quality materials and good design.

The base of the building is distinct and different from the upper stories.

That base is consistent and addresses the scale of the residential development around it.

There's landscape buffering and street furniture, which can contribute to the public realm.

And the sidewalk and streetscapes will be much improved.

A view from the garden side of the building.

The base of the building is warm.

You can see the residential units opening up to the garden.

The facades are well modulated.

The upper stories are articulated with gable forms that provide a varied roof line.

There's alternating rhythm of balconies, bays, and projections that provide relief and texture for the building.

Overall, it's a nuanced composition of carefully designed vertical and horizontal modulation.

There are photos here that show what the garden may look like with plantings, as well as the image on the right, which shows townhouse units that open up to the sidewalk.

There's stoops that open up to the sidewalk, there's relief niches that provide depth, and a nice alternation that provides scale, texture, and warmth.

It's all finely detailed and we believe well designed, and we think it'll be really nice character along the street.

Overall, the project supports the goals of the Belmont plan, and we'll bring 140 units of housing to Belmont.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Almost four more minutes.

Is that that concludes it?

Alright, thank you so much.

Questions for the applicant on that presentation?

Anything that we've seen so far, you have a quick question.

I just have a maybe you can just elaborate a little bit on the publicly accessible open space.

I think you have one too.

Good evening.

I'm Jonathan Stone with Prometheus.

The public space or the open space that you see on the eastern edge of the project will be a uh privately managed but publicly accessible space.

So the public will be able to walk around it.

There will be community garden uh plots inside it that are will be managed and used by the users of the building, but the walking space around it will be open to the public.

So we'll provide a park like setting.

Okay, thank you.

Is there a lot of Merlo?

Sure.

Um I've seen the iterations of the plans over the years.

The plans have been public.

Um I know you've had a number of conversations, and the city held a number of meetings with the public over many years, over which the commercial units on the ground floor were really promised as a highlight feature to the community, and I think you could see through the whole process how much it meant to the neighborhood to have commercial there.

So I'm curious as to why the sudden shift, because it does feel pretty bait and switchy.

So why did you guys change into that?

Some of the earlier plans um may have had a number of identified spaces along the Sonic frontage.

So there's always one that said cafe.

That's the space that had been a retail space.

The other names or titles that had been used had been part of the residential programming that had always been part and is always part of Prometheus Real Estate Group's residential programming for its residential users.

We use a number of different terms.

I think parlor shows up in one.

These are different ways that we break out the uses for our residents on the ground floor to amenitize our space.

So we even have, I think in some of the older versions of one of the rectangles says co-work space.

That's a design element that came out of design for amenities space for our users during COVID.

So many more people were working from home that we had we just began to provide articulated space for folks to work from home, and that's how it was labeled.

So that caused any confusion.

That space was always part of areas to be for residents that were working from home, wanted to get out of their apartments, go somewhere else that was not off site, if you will, but be able to work still from home.

Any other questions?

Okay.

All right.

Thank you.

Uh looks like uh the we have the appellant presentation.

Thank you.

And I understand uh some of my fellow residents are on the Zoom waiting to get in.

Uh are they able to see by the zoom or should they switch to the live stream?

Um, I don't know who they might be, but I have a number of callers.

On the Zoom, they can see.

All right, thank you.

I'll start now.

Uh can I ask you just to direct the microphone?

Yes, thank you.

Perfect.

And can I check uh my uh land use attorney is on the Zoom as well.

Uh Marta?

Great, thank you.

All right.

Uh I'll try to run through this fast so we have time, and you can ask my attorney all the complex technical questions.

Um just to begin, uh, thank you all for being here and taking time on this thing.

Thank you for Prometheus meeting with me very graciously.

Uh I want to summarize, I think is uh the heart of this thing is we want active use.

That's without question.

And then I think the other half of it is the letter of the law.

And the letter of the law today does not allow this project to go forward as is.

Uh next slide.

Next slide.

Uh here is in the BVSP, which overrides all zoning code.

Zoning code cannot override the BS BVSP, it's the other way around.

Uh, here's the vision of Masonic Way.

Next slide.

Uh this is what we've had today.

Uh, you know, they're not, it's not the best, uh, this is not my favorite mall in the world, but it's what we have, and it's walkable.

And look at these five-star reviews over the years.

Sushi lover, chiropractor, nail, dentist.

These are all things the community walks to within a few blocks.

It's lovely.

It's mixed use.

Next slide.

Uh, this petition has now been signed by over a hundred uh local residents uh since this weekend uh stating they really value the vibrant mixed use that we saw in the Belmont Village Pacific plan.

Next slide.

Uh the commissioners also uh in August uh were my interpretation sad that they had to approve this thing that went against the BVSP because they were told California law allows it.

I and my attorney will hopefully make the case that California law does not require today, not telling you what's in the future, but next slide.

And Prometheus, as I researched them and met uh Jonathan and Don, thank you for sharing about Prometheus.

And when I read about Prometheus Online, they're about us says we build neighborhoods, not properties.

They're trying to make a neighborhood is a living, breathing thing.

They want to integrate with the community, so I'm actually optimistic that we can reach accommodation because we're not so far apart.

They're not trying to build some giant evil brick of concrete.

We want to build neighborhoods.

Next slide.

Interestingly, as uh Councilmember Lyme Merley you asked about the earlier slides, actually, still in today's presentation from Prometheus is that the cover of the project shows cafe tables outside because the original design had that cafe before it was removed.

Next slide.

I'm gonna go into the main thing the neighbors care about, which is the plan does not meet the active use requirements in the BBSP.

Next slide.

The three requirements relevant here are accessible to the general public, engaging to pedestrians, and generates walk in pedestrian clientele.

That section then says all spaces within the AUFO must be designed to accommodate active use.

Next slide.

The gym is not even open to the streets, and it's only for residents.

It is by definition not accessible to the general public, it is not engaging to pedestrians, it does not generate walk in.

You cannot physically walk in.

There is no door.

Next slide.

The lobby.

I mean, if I told my kids uh, you know, show me a shoe, you know, put on your shoes, and they tried to put on a little mouse shoe or something.

Come on, this is not a lobby.

When the lobby becomes the dominant feature of an entire 130 foot wide part of the street, not accessible to the general public, it's residents only.

It may have a card scanner at the door, I understand.

The public cannot even enter without being a resident.

It's not engaging.

It's this big empty front that they put so they don't have to do the commercial, which is required by the BVSP.

Next slide.

So what am I proposing?

Um, as I said, residents, I I'm not here to block housing.

Uh, I look forward to Prometheus running a beautiful new place in the neighborhood and and walking past the garden, it'll be lovely.

Um, but let's see, staff is saying, oh sorry, next slide.

Uh so I think today it is clearly the gym, just take the gym.

If you're looking for one specific letter of the law, the gym is not open to the general public, period.

I don't see how anyone can make that case.

Um, the council cannot, we cannot do the incentive and waiver process in this meeting.

So if they want to go through the incentive and waiver process, we can go through that process.

Uh I'm not sure where that leads.

There are different possibilities, but I don't think today this can be approved because today it violates the letter of the law.

Uh why do I think it might not just get one incentive and be done?

I should just go home.

Next slide.

So, in addition to the active use frontage, there are a few other problems, and they may use up all their incentives addressing those problems, and they may have to come back and follow the active use, which the neighbors would love.

So, problem number two, uh, the zoning on the other streets, which are by BBSP, they are village main streets and village avenues.

They need to have active use.

Uh these standards, uh, they do not conflict with residential is allowed, does not mean residential gets to override everything else.

So, this note too we heard about said residential is allowed.

Previously, residential was not allowed, but just because we say residential, it doesn't mean everything else has been waived, or else the note would have said everything else is hereby waived.

And the note does not say that.

So you can have, for example, on Hillary, you could have 50% residential is allowed, and 50% active use is required by code.

Next slide.

A few I'll run through here quickly, and you can quiz my lawyer.

Uh there is a requirement for transparency.

It is not provided uh that there are exceptions without design review by the planning commission, not the city development director.

Next slide.

Build two.

Similarly here, the zoning code does not recognize exceptions for an oddly shaped building.

I've seen lovely beautiful apartments with curved facades.

And the zoning code does not say that exceptions are available except via planning commission.

Next slide.

Basically the same thing for setback.

I'll keep running fast.

Next slide.

Talking about state by right standards.

The base project must comply.

Before they get the density bonus, the base project must comply with all objective standards.

This project has no compliant base project.

The base project has all five of these letter of the law inconsistencies that I just showed in the base project.

Before, so they don't even qualify yet as a as a qualified buy-right project until they have a base project compliant with law.

Next slide, next slide.

Neighbors would love to collaborate.

We can make something wonderful here.

I know we can.

You guys want it?

We want it.

Next slide.

We know what it looks like.

Next, let's see the picture.

That's what it looks like.

We know what it looks like.

This is the BVSP.

The BBSP is not overridden by zoning code the other way around.

Next slide.

We know it's possible because this is the uh diagram I think you're referring to, Councilmember Lanmerlo.

Here are the four sites on Masonic that they designed that fit in this plan.

These do not physically preclude construction of the project.

We know it because they submitted the plans for it.

These could be turned into a restaurant, a cafe, uh a nail salon, and a dentist, just like we've had.

It is possible without derailing the project.

Next slide.

And I know you guys were concerned from Prometheus about uh you don't want empty dead spaces.

You want to put a retail space and have it sit dead.

No one wants that.

Guess what?

We have excessive retail demand.

These things are popping up.

We had the Smash Burger pop up, we have Velocycle, we have the tea shop, we have the uh made made out of dough pastries.

There is demand for retail.

It will rent.

I will go there, I will buy the pastries, I will sit at the cafe.

Last slide, anything worth having is worth fighting for.

Let's fight for the vision of the BVSP.

Let's fight for a great neighborhood where the neighbors love it, and we have housing.

Thank you.

And how much time do I have?

One minute.

I'll leave questions for my or Mark, would you like to add anything?

Uh I have a quick point of order, Madam Mayor.

If we could pause the clock just for one second, I just want to make sure that everyone got the letter that I sent to the city clerk yesterday with a quest that it be distributed.

Yes, we did, thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Um very quickly, I think Dad did an excellent job hitting all the highlights.

Three very quick points.

Number one, mandatory provisions that are phrased in mandatory terms unequivocally in a specific plan, which carries the force of a general plan, must be complied with.

Nothing in SB 330, nothing in the state density bonus law says that that does not apply.

Second, specific plan policy, absolutely in all circumstances, trumps inconsistent provisions of a zoning code.

It does not matter if they were adopted at the same time, if there is any inconsistency, the specific plan prevails, and if once again the policy is clear, unambiguous, and mandatory, it must be complied with.

Finally, buy right approval isn't the same as the builder's remedy.

And that's basically what's happening here is there's characterization that because the project is subject to buy right approval, it does not have to comply with mandatory land use requirements of the specific plan and objective standards in the zoning code.

If they think that they can't comply with those without reducing density, they can apply for waivers, but there is a process.

Look at Title 26.

10 minutes is up.

Sorry, so just use five seconds to just conclude.

Sorry.

As Doug said, you cannot grant a waiver or an incentive tonight, right?

There is a mandatory process for doing that.

It's set forth in the density bonus law itself and in Title 26 of your zoning code.

Uh and with that, I will rest and entertain any questions.

Thank you so much.

All right, uh, council members, do we have questions for the uh appellate?

I'll look to my right first.

Any questions?

Uh I guess.

My question goes back to uh council member Latamerlo asked about the mixed use and how it's gone away.

I don't, I'm not feeling good about, well, actually, we meant this and this and this, because what was really got me excited about a project that I really don't want to see done at all here in Belmont because of its location was that mixed use piece.

So I'm just trying to understand if that was the most exciting thing to many in the neighborhood, how how did it go away?

No you.

Oh.

Okay.

Uh great.

Okay, let's let's go.

Oh, wait a minute, I see what I did wrong.

There's yeah, so let me just see if there's questions for the appellant right now, and we can go back.

No, no, no, we'll we'll go back to that question.

Uh yes, I'm never a lot of Marlowe.

I just want to understand a little bit more about the transparency aspect.

Could you just talk a little bit about that?

Like the what do you mean the you your problem number three around transparency?

I'm just talking to the sorry, I was he was standing right behind you.

Sorry.

Oh yeah.

Yeah, I think uh I think it's a it's a technical place where this project does not meet the letter of the law, and so they may need an incentive or a waiver to overcome it, and they have not yet applied for an incentive.

And so if they get three incentives, they may exhaust their three incentives.

For example, applying for transparency, setback, build two, there's also the active use requirement on the other three streets, and they may not get to a waiver or an incentive for Masonic, and that would be what the neighbors want.

So that's pointed out as a technical inconsistency.

Uh I defer to my attorney if you're asking how uh, uh, are you are you saying that you don't believe that?

So I understand what you're saying on that piece, and are you saying that you don't think either the community development director or the planning commission addressed that issue yet?

Uh I believe the planning commission did not address anything about the transparency requirement because the staff simply marked it NA.

Mark, can I tag my attorney uh on is the city director allowed to just mark a standard NA?

Well, as uh as was pointed out by the staff.

Uh the initial call uh is vested in the community development director, but that is absolutely uh subject to review by the planning commission, uh, then by the city council here and from there from their court ultimately.

Uh a question whether development standard does or does not apply is a question of law, uh, and it's appropriate for the community development director again to make first determination, but uh again, that is subject to review, and that's exactly why we're here on an appeal.

Um we dispute that uh the marking of this uh development standard with an NA not applicable was appropriate.

Um, as I said earlier, all objective development standards, and this is one of them, must be complied with, and if they can't be complied with, uh they have to follow the uh prescribed process for obtaining waivers and incentives.

May I just add the base project uh needs to comply with everything before it gets any waivers, is my understanding.

I just needed a little more clarity on what you were saying.

Thank you.

All right, questions for the appellant?

Um, sure, right?

So some of the some of the um arguments that you have are are counter to what we heard from you know our staff report.

So uh just talk to me about the you're saying that the active use, and I under I completely understand what you're saying.

You know, I I want the active use vibrant community all of that as well.

Um, you know, we are we are here to look at the appeal, but so active use as defined has many uses, including the lobby.

Do you not uh are you saying that that's not true?

Mark.

So if we could just quote the actual language that we're dealing with from the specific plan from the AUFO, it says, quote, this designation requires that the ground level has uses that are accessible to the general public, are engaging to pedestrians walking by and generate walk-in pedestrian clientele and thus contribute to a high level of pedestrian activity.

Unquote.

It does say elsewhere that ground floor lobbies leading to the upper residential floors are permissible, but I don't believe it says that that when it's 130 feet long constitutes an active use.

A lobby by definition doesn't meet the criteria we just I just read to you.

It's if anything, it's an exception because obviously people need to get into the building through a lobby and get to the upper floors.

Uh calling this lobby that's again 130 feet wide, that's the equivalent of like a 10-story building, um, an active use.

We just respectfully find that an implausible conclusion by the community development director or anybody else that a gym that is closed to the public in a hundred and thirty-foot long lobby, accessible only by residents of the building, satisfies the requirement for active use.

Okay, so I so I I guess there might be a difference in and determination.

The next question I have is around the residential ground floor.

So you're saying the footnote says that we can have residential on the ground floor, but we still need to have other things.

Is that your interpretation?

It's that it doesn't, it can't just take the place.

Is that to me?

Um yeah, the if you read note two, it just says for buy right projects like this, uh residential uses are permissible on the ground floor.

It doesn't say uh nothing else is permissible on the ground floor.

It doesn't say only residential uses can occur on the ground floor.

Um, and so we interpret that as saying you can have residential uses on the other four, or I'm sorry, on the other three frontages, because they're not subject to the AUFO, only Masonic way is subject to the UFO.

So for that frontage, even there, in theory, maybe you could have some studio apartment, but as long as you've it complied with the spirit of this active use requirement, uh, at the very least, uh I I think you can harmonize the requirement of the AUFO and note two in the zoning code.

You can have both.

And I guess the the project plan that was shown, uh I guess a pre-or prior iteration of it that had a cafe and a restaurant, you know, that's exhibit A.

That proves it.

You can do it.

Okay.

Okay, can I just add a sentence?

Uh allowing ground floor floor residential, it did not say, it did not say you can have a hundred percent ground floor residential and that 100% overrules all other requirements.

So I think these things meet together like on Hiller Street where it has 50% active use.

Uh before the footnote, no residential was allowed ground floor as the default, and so but 50% active use was required.

So my interpretation is after the footnote, now ground floor residential is an allowed option, but it doesn't overrule 50% active use is a requirement.

So those two would come together and say you could have 50% residential and 50% active use is how I interpret it.

I see.

Okay.

All right.

Any other questions for the appellant at this time?

Uh okay.

So we do have three minutes for um rebuttal or closing remarks, and I'm wondering if the applicant through the mayor, we want to have public comments first.

Oh, okay.

And then the rebuttal closes.

So let's do this then.

If that's the case, uh then let's have the appellant, I'm sorry, the applicant, answer the vice mayor's question, since um we want to make sure that that gets answered.

You remember the question?

I know it wasn't wild.

You could repeat the question if you want.

Can you restate the question?

Let me start with a statement first.

I'm frustrated by this project.

I'm frustrated by the project because of its location.

I think it would be a lovely, amazing project, but not at the corner of Hiller and Ralston.

I was principal at Nesbitt for nine years.

I lived that traffic day in, day out for nine years.

It is intense.

So when I found out about this project, the thing that made me go, okay, okay.

It's gonna be okay.

First, because it's affordable housing.

You're providing affordable housing, which is a beautiful thing.

Then the second thing was because of the mixed use opportunities that I had envisioned was going to happen based upon what you are now claiming are fake words, misleading words.

You're saying they weren't mixed use.

So I'm just trying to get my brain around how did it go away when it's something that it's that the community really wants and feels is really important, especially when they're going to be giving up so much.

If you've and it's easy for you guys to, I mean, I lived it for nine years, nine years.

It is intense.

Now you're gonna add a building, you're gonna add 140 units to that corner.

It's a lot.

So how do we how do we mitigate this harm, quote unquote, harm to the community by giving them something that they want that we all want, especially you know, through a sorry um with regards to the changes that were made, they were done in order to fully support the success of the residential development.

So the programming on that is on the ground floor and continues to be there before and after the buy right designation adjustment is to further support the success of the housing, and that's what our business is made up of.

And the more we can do to support the success of the residential is um a benefit to the project overall, and um we continue to believe that, which is why we've designed it so it's just disappointing.

Okay, hi.

Um yeah, I I would add because Mr.

Rickett and and by the way, we did have a cordial conversation.

I I do appreciate Mr.

Rickett's passion and and his interest, and hopefully we can work together to build a successful project.

But regarding the removal of um any ground floor commercial space, Mr.

Rickett referenced it.

I mean, we are concerned about it being leased and dark space, and I think that's the last thing anybody wants.

We we do build neighborhoods, we do build mixed-use projects.

We just finished uh a mixed-use project in downtown San Mateo where we're located, and leasing the ground floor commercial um in this environment, and this is in downtown San Mateo, took years.

I mean, so in it's called first generation space when you're building a building and trying to lease up the ground floor.

The last thing any of us want is is dark space, and so there is that certainly the um the economic um feasibility side of this as well.

So it's not first generation, though.

There was already active use there.

I have a question for our attorney.

Is that of course that's the time for questions?

Um so uh I've heard a couple of times that it would not be legal for us to discuss the waiver situation.

What is your understanding of that?

I actually think that that's a misstatement of the law.

I think the appellants attorney and the appellate are actually diverging substantively from the law when they make that statement.

Um to get the point across, I'm gonna read a provision out of that out of the housing accountability act so you can understand where this V in the road, this fork in the road is occurring.

So what the Housing Accountability Act says that if a local agency considers a proposed housing development project to be inconsistent, not in compliance, uh or not in conformity with an applicable applicable plan uh program policy ordinance standard uh requirement or similar provision is specified in the in the accountability act, it shall provide the applicant with written documentation identifying the provision or provisions and an explanation for the reasons it considers uh the housing development to be inconsistent, not in compliance or not in conformity.

And it shall do that within 30 days that the application uh for the housing development project is to be complete.

If the housing development project is contains 150 uh units or fewer.

So this project's a hundred and forty.

So the city had a hundred and had 30 days to tell the applic applicant of any inconsistencies or noncompliance um with their project once the the application was deemed complete.

And that was back in, I'm sorry to interrupt, that was back in December of 2024.

That's my understanding.

I believe so.

So and then, and then so that's I'm reading from so the Housing Accountability Act, if anybody wants to go look, read this themselves is government code uh 65589.5.

I'm reading from subdivision uh J, and specifically uh J2A.

J2B uh reads as follows.

If the agency fails to provide the required documentation uh pursuant to parag subparagraph A, the one I just read, the housing development project shall be deemed consistent, compliant, and in conformity with the applicable plan, program, policy, ordinance, standard requirement, or similar provision.

So once the city makes a determination as to whether the project is in compliance, and that has to be made within 30 days, and that's uh typically made and almost always gonna be made by staff.

The city can't later say, oh, there's something else that you're not in compliance with.

At that point, they're deemed in compliance.

So the statement that the city by the applicant and their and his attorney that the city can't approve the project because it's inconsistent with the plan is actually an incorrect statement of the law as expressed in the housing accountability act.

It's deemed in compliance if noncompliance was not brought to their attention through written uh or written communication within 30 days of the application being deemed complete.

This is a component of the Housing Accountability Act that has been changed by this uh sort of onslaught of housing legislation.

It upends how uh projects are typically reviewed, it upends how agencies interact um uh are able to interact with the project and members of the community when they're reviewing these things because of how fast the process has to go.

But the end result is that if we don't tell them of an inconsistency, it's deemed complete.

The other part of the housing accountability act that's been changed is that uh if an agency denies a project, it's exposing itself to attorney's fees.

And as of the first of the year, we're also it's mandatory attorney's fees, and we're exposed to a penalty of ten thousand dollars per unit, which for this project would be 1.4 million dollars.

Can I ask?

Yes, of course, another city attorney.

I heard them say that this the base project is invalid.

I actually think that they're missing that.

So uh as the deputy director explained, when the density bonus law says that if you if you meet certain affordability criteria, you can then get additional units, bonus units.

Um, the density bonus law was originally written around uh the idea that uh the it was additional units per acre, but how uh cities uh defined allowable uh development intensity has evolved over time, and not all cities, including Belmont, have uh expressed uh the allowable amount of housing on a site by units per acre.

If you don't have a units per acre standard, what the how what the density bonus law says is that you then do an estimate and you and you calculate this estimate of what is the development capacity of the site, and to part of that is that you look at what are the requirements that the the building envelope possible building envelope for the project, and you take into consideration the size of the proposed units, and you come up with a mathematical calculation of what is the building's potential uh units per acre.

That then gets applied to how many additional bonus units they get.

It's not about a design for a project at that level, it's about what is the develop developable potential of the project of the site, uh units per acre of a project, including the uh that would otherwise fit within that building envelope with with units of that size.

And you only go through that exercise if you don't have a density per acre uh standard.

If you have a density per acre standard, you don't have that base project uh calculation.

So the the we believe the base project calculation accurately counted the density per acre equivalency for the project, the potential for the for the site um in that regard.

So I think there's a there's a a difference of understanding of what that requires.

And then one more question.

In my mind, all of the arguments become moot once we say that there's affordable housing being put into this building.

Is that correct?

In many ways that is correct.

I think it's a practical matter the way that the state density bonus law works once you meet that minimum threshold to trigger the state density bonus law they are then entitled to uh request an unlimited number of waivers so that's development standards so if we had said you need to have a certain setback or you have to meet a certain um transparency requirement or uh some other standard they could have simply said uh that's not the project that we've that as we have designed it and we would have had to have granted that waiver under the existing uh case law that was the bankers Hill 150 case that um Barbara Coutz mentioned um the other component is that uh and there was an and I made this comment a moment ago the there's a technical argument that they're making that you can't use a waiver to uh waive a use requirement uh a land use uh requirement um but you can use a concession uh to uh uh um remove a land use uh requirement so an HCD is specifically said you can use a concession to remove a ground floor commercial requirement so had we told them had had the had the staff had a different interpretation of of how the BBSP and the BBZ interact and what the intent of that language was and we had a different interaction with HCD because I think it's important to remember we had a thorough vetting of this of what these uh the plan and the zoning required and we had this uh obligation to uh uh adopt our housing element and move move this project forward in the housing element had we done that all differently and told the applicant that they had to meet all of these standards they could have applied for for the waivers and the concessions and we would have had to have granted them.

Okay.

All right let's uh put a pit in this for now and let's are we asking questions of the appellate and the applicant we can yeah um let's go ahead if you have a question I just I really want to get to public comment as well but this will come back to us for more questions but go ahead I just had a question to the applicant.

I I appreciate um removing the commercial uh requirement because of economic uncertainties did you by chance talk to the existing business owners to vet them to see if there would be any interest in staying uh yes we're in ongoing communication with all the tenants that are out there that are aware of the redevelopment and uh the two that are remaining um have plans to either relocate or or move elsewhere but we're in ongoing communication with them uh they're in communication with our uh brokerage uh community to help them with next steps but that's an ongoing dialogue so we're we're working together.

Thank you that was it okay thank you so much.

Uh so let's go ahead and uh have public comment on this item this is again um it is item nine a and so if you are in chambers uh live uh in in person or uh on zoom please go ahead and raise your virtual hand or fill out a comment card uh we will go ahead and keep the uh limit the time limit at three minutes uh if you're in uh well both in chambers or virtually um and there's going to be a 30 second warning uh that's a beep so when you hear that beep you meet it means you probably need to wrap up and we're going to have to uh cut you off at three minutes uh so madam clerk let's go ahead first and take any public comment here in chambers please in that case we'll begin with Sven Edland followed by Alison Tencatt ate.

Hi hi thank you for taking the time to listen to me uh tonight my name is Sven Edlin I live on Hiller Street and I live about a block away from the project and um you know I just wanted to say tonight that I really appreciated the Belmont village specific plan when it first was developed I was really a big fan and a supporter of it.

I really wanted to come on out and and walk the streets and and and enjoy, you know, be part of the thri thriving community that was pictured in the b in the plan.

I think the plan was an excellent vision.

And it seems like ever since it got f finalized, it's been just torn out and torn down by the state, or you know, from all the various various things that go on.

And so now here we are looking at the very first uh anchor project or the first project that's going to highlight your Belmont Village specific plan.

And this is, you know, something that was supposed to be accessible to the general public, engaging to pedestrians walking by.

And it's it's not, you know, and it's your your first shot out of the gate, and it's not gonna be uh it's not gonna be the what we are promised to the neighbors.

I know that the height limit was you know something we had out of our control, density and things, all that kind of stuff was, you know.

I didn't want it to be five stories high, I wanted it three stories just like a the plan said, but um, you know.

So now here I am looking at this, you know what what you've described is this warm and engaging uh, you know, architectural plan, you know, no disrespect, but I I think I'm looking at a castle that's being built in my neighborhood that's gonna tower over me by five stories.

You know, and then I have no, you know, what am I gonna do?

Just I mean, I feel like I'm in Monty Python, uh, you know, just uh the search for the holy garrel when they're looking at the the castle in front of them with the the French man up there and says I fart in your general direction.

That's what we're doing here.

I mean, I feel like this is the kind of off our start.

This is our beginning of our village uh specific plan.

I'm really disappointed.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Allison?

And I'm followed by Giuliano.

Okay, Alison Tencate, I'm a Belmont resident and the executive director of the Carlmont Academic Foundation.

And I just wanted to say that um Prometheus Real Estate Group has been a supporter of the foundation, and I expect that they will continue to be, and that's a demonstration of their good neighborhood.

And as a resident, we all know that we do need more housing, and I just I wanted to advocate for more housing in Belmont.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Juliana Carlini.

Hi, folks.

Um, do I have mixed feelings about this?

I wasn't coming here, planning to chat about this, but hearing about it.

I guess my first feeling is deja vu all over again.

Um, we seem to get some bait and switch here in Belmont with these projects.

Firehouse Square was supposed to be mixed use, it was supposed to be a very different project than what it ended up being.

Now it's happening again.

Um affordable housing is fantastic, especially where this is located.

This is less than a thousand feet from the Caltrain station.

This is where we should be building this sort of thing.

Um I don't know how much parking is being provided.

I fear that uh it's got gonna be more than is necessary given its proximity to the train station.

Um, but folks need a place to live.

We don't have places for uh places for folks to live in Belmont.

I mean, we need to build more.

We need to build more on the peninsula.

You're to Watacoda, right?

And this is here, it sounds like um y'all are in a tough spot.

We have plans for a whole lot more in the future.

Please let's figure out how to not get into this situation again.

We were here with Firehouse Square.

We're here with this one.

Let's not do this again.

Thank y'all.

Thank you.

We'll move on to Zoom.

The first speaker will be caller number seven.

Caller number seven, you've been on mute, or if you could unmute yourself, you can begin speaking.

Hello, please confirm you can hear me.

Yes.

Hello, good evening, members.

My name is Michael Everett, and I wanted to lend my support to a project that uh 5580 Methodic Way.

All right.

And the ability to have walkable housing to cow train is even more important.

This project complies with the penned objectives of the Belmont Village Pacific Plan.

And most importantly, it actually complies with the spirit behind that plan.

I don't think you're even going to delay this project.

Um I won't bore you with anything else.

Uh thank you, members, for your time.

Thank you very much.

Caller number five.

Caller number five.

Can you unmute yourself, please?

Yes.

Can you can you hear me?

Yes.

Good evening, City Council and Mayormates.

My name is Sandra San Vito.

I've been a Belmont resident for about 18 years.

And I've been following this project from the beginning.

And I just wanted to express my support of Prometheus and it proposed 580 Masonic Way.

I feel that they have not only complied fully with the Belmont Village specific plan, but they've been responsive and very generous to our community.

And I think that Belmont is really fortunate to have an experienced local family-owned developer who's been very invested in our community and creating new housing and affordable housing, and that I hope there's no obstacles to the opportunity to have them complete this project.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Caller number nine.

Hi, caller number nine.

If you can unmute yourself.

Okay.

Caller number nine.

Okay.

We'll move on to the next caller and maybe come back if they're still there.

Um that is the last one.

You were unmuted if you'd like to begin speaking.

That'll be the final speaker, then.

Okay, caller number.

Oh, there we go.

Go ahead.

Alright, I'm here.

Here we go.

I I thought I was unmuted before.

Hi.

Michael Craig.

I have a feeling those last two callers probably don't live in Sterling Downs.

But uh seeing as I actually ran for city council on the trail talking to everybody who lives in Sterling Downs about 580 Masonic.

Um I spoke with over 500 residents in this district.

And every and everybody I talked to who lives in this neighborhood who actually owns is dead set against this.

But I kind of, you know, also changed my mind when I heard they were going to be putting uh some businesses on the ground floor.

It does feel like to most of us a real imposition and a quite a bait and switch.

Um, you know, I guess maybe they can use some legal lease to get around it, but the Belmont Village Specific Plan, as Doug Riggett's pointed out, was supposed to give something to the community.

There really isn't any community benefit.

There's so much traffic, which I also would question the traffic report.

It said the traffic's going to be less.

That was laughable at the last meeting when they talked about there'll be less traffic, which is which isn't which is just bizarre.

Anyways, uh I am with Doug Ricketts on this.

I think we should really look at benefits.

I think there are people who will be willing to rent it.

I don't think it's that horrible.

Um, and I'm glad somebody brought up that we should talk to the tenants that are there.

When we had a nail salon there before, maybe a nail salon would be happy to go in there.

We had a sushi restaurant in there before.

Maybe we could get another sushi restaurant.

We had a chiropractor in there.

Are you saying there's no way we can get anybody in there?

I just find that hard to believe.

We are losing everything for all these affordable housing units that are going up all throughout California.

We're losing community benefits in every city city that they're being built on along the El Camino.

Losing restaurants, we're losing places that people would go hang out and have coffee at what cost.

Um there isn't the ridership increase that that's actually anybody can point to.

It's the same ridership with all these new buildings that have gone up.

It hasn't changed the percentage of ridership on Caltrans.

One percent, not even one percent.

So I get it, but uh uh it feels like we're being forced to build these very expensive quote unquote affordable housing units at the uh cost of everybody who lives in the supposed poorer side or the east side of Belmont.

And uh to me, it feels like we're getting steamrolled.

Um 200 people had signed up in our neighborhood saying to stop all the building, all in our neighborhood.

I still think we should really if we're gonna have this here and suffer, we should at least be able to have a place to hang out and have a cup of coffee, or maybe that Indian restaurant would like to stay there.

I don't know, but we shouldn't be giving up so much.

Um that's all I have to say.

I hope we can get back to what the original plan was in the Belmont Village specific plan.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you.

That will be our final caller.

All right.

If there are any other members of the public who have not yet spoken who wish to make a comment on this item, either in chambers, online or on the phone, um, please go ahead and let us know now.

Otherwise, we'll go ahead and close the public comment.

Um, Madam Clerk, any hands?

Anyone?

Okay, no other slips.

Uh, then we'll go ahead and close public comment.

Uh, and we now have uh I think it's the appellant rebuttal or closing remarks.

Um, three-minute limit, so maybe the appellant um and if your attorney's still on, that's great.

Let's just have you uh have both of you use that that three minutes at the same time.

Thank you.

Perfect, thank you.

I'll just remind you we had a hundred and five residents sign the petition this weekend.

I asked them not to call in, but please consider their review as well, and I'll pass it to Mark.

Thank you.

Yeah, I think I just want to quickly address um some things that the city attorney was saying.

I mean, I think uh we've been set up with something of a catch 22 here.

If you look at page eight of your staff report, it says alternatives at the bottom, and it says if council does not support staff's analysis that the project meets the objective standards, the council may approve the project with an incentive granted to remove the ground floor active use requirement.

We read that, and all we said was sure.

If you do that, you have to follow the procedure set forth in section 26 of your zoning ordinance, which says, and I will read that any applicant requesting a density bonus, incentives or waivers under the state density bonus law must provide a written proposal to the city.

The proposal shall be submitted prior to or concurrently with filing the planning application for the housing development and shall be processed in conjunction with the underlying application.

What I heard the attorney do is read uh a portion of the uh of SB 330 or the HAA that says, well, and it was an accurate reading, I will say that uh when the project submits an application, the city community development director reviews it and is supposed to identify any standards with which the project is not consistent and let the applicant know.

And if the CDD doesn't do that or misses some of them, the standards are to be deemed comply with, which the city attorney is saying therefore negates the possibility of uh having to go back and apply for waivers under Title 26 of your zoning code.

The catch 22 is if you think about it, there has to be review of the CDD's consistency determination by an elected body, namely you.

That is a bedrock principle of California zoning law that significant land use decisions made by appointed officials must be appealable to elected officials, and there has to be public notice and opportunity to be heard that it's basic due process.

And so if the project is submitted that complies with no objective standards is a complete disaster, but the CDD just happens not to have gotten a letter out on time.

It cannot be the case that those objective standards are automatically forevermore deemed complied with, and there is no recourse by you or by the public.

The last thing I'll say is that by the so what we're doing here is appealing that.

That is what we are doing is we are disagreeing with the community development director's consistency determinations here, determinations of non-applicability, and we are bringing this question to you, and you have plenary authority under the uh planning and zoning law of the state of California to override the community development director's decision.

To be told that you are powerless to do so is categorically false.

Finally, I don't live in Belmont, so I don't have Sandy to do this, but it seems to me that you would want to enforce the AUFO, that uh so much work went into crafting.

Uh any reasonable doubts here should be in resolved in favor of applying the standards because that is the overarching intent of your planning regime.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right, uh, the applicant.

Uh, yeah, I'll I'll just say that um we believe and maintain that we are abiding by the letter of the law.

There is the legal context, the statutory process that was outlined uh tonight in the staff report in the presentation uh by the city attorney.

Um we're happy to address any technical questions or issues in that regard.

Um we have our land use attorney here, and I'll leave it at that.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

All right.

Um I I think we should soldier on, we've got momentum.

I can give us a bio break maybe between um between these and the next um item, but um I think we should bring it back to the council for deliberation.

Um I think we've heard a lot tonight, and I just want to make sure that we we frame this conversation and we set the table so that we focus on what is before us right now.

Um, and I will start by saying that back in 2017 I was vice chair of the planning commission, um, council member McCune was the chair, and so we lived and breathed the BDSP for quite some months.

Um, and uh and since then I think uh the the uh following uh planning commission's uh councils we all are very engaged and very happy with the vision that we put into the BBSP.

And um I will even go as far as to say that I I think if I took the temperature of even those council members who have not yet spoken on it, that ground floor retail was something that was envisioned that was embraced and is something that the neighborhood and the community also uh uh embraced when we talked about the BVSP and got so much of the community um input on the BBSP.

That was also a long time ago, and it seems like in the last eight years, state has come in and done a lot, and basically the whole world has changed in terms of um how much cities are able to do.

But I I wanted to maybe set that and frame and and and make that known to get that out there that retail at ground floor is still something that is a valuable vision that we had and and a value we have in our community.

That said, what is before us now and city manager, I mean city attorney, let me know if I'm incorrect, that we as the council has as a body have to determine whether or not the the good disagreement here is whether the CDD determination uh was correct and whether or not we should override that or somehow that's the discussion that we should that we have.

It's not it's not about necessarily the retail on the ground floor, which I think is important to for all of us to say yes, this is something that we value and that we wish was still part of the project, but but just framing the discussion of what we are supposed to be doing tonight, is it whether or not the the community development directors um determination that uh with regard to the objective standards and the density bonus law was appropriately applied?

I actually don't think that that's quite the way to think about it.

Um I think that the discussion about how the decision was made is important because it explains why staff uh made that determination in the context in which it was made, and the fact that it was driven by staff's considerable understanding of how the BVSP and the Sonya ordinance worked together the interactions with HCD and the requirements for adoption of the housing element and uh the actions that were taken in January 2024.

That's all to provide background as to why the staff determination was made.

Um but really what's before you tonight is this is a by right project, so this is a ministerial uh determination and council essentially has to follow a law.

Uh, if if the and part of the law that the council has to follow is the housing accountability act, and as I read a few moments ago, um the and why I said that it that's not so much the the question as you posed it.

It's the the question now is the uh are the elements that are being brought up for uh reconsideration, if you will, are those elements that were not that were identified in a compliance letter or not.

And the answer to that is they were not identified in a compliance letter.

So under the housing accountability act, you can't go back and revisit those.

So I would not frame it quite that way.

I would say within the lens of the Housing Accountability Act, that's not the question.

The question is within what they were told they were in compliance with at the point when they received that letter.

Does uh is there any other elements of uh have they've checked all of the ministerial boxes to receive an approval at this point?

It's not to go back and revisit the interpretation.

I would say to do that would be inconsistent with the housing element and would expose the city to substantial penalties and attorney's fees costs.

Does looking at my council colleagues, do we understand kind of what the what's before us in terms of the what we're discussing?

Okay.

Uh, that question.

Yes.

Because within 30 days, it was not questioned.

Is that right?

Because the the compliance, the decisions by the community development director were not questioned within 30 days, they're now in stone.

Because the in that process, staff didn't provide a written document to the the applicant telling the applicant that they were not in compliance with something, whether the staff was right or wrong, it's actually at this point academic.

We and the staff's interpretation I think is a very reasonable interpretation of the code, but that's academic at this point.

What mattered is what was in the letter.

I think to a certain extent there is a degree of frustration that's been expressed about this particular aspect of the Housing Accountability Act, and it is for certain a component of the act that takes away substantial local control.

This ability to have a reasoned examination of these issues is is no longer part of the process.

And I respectfully disagree with the comments of the applicant's attorney on in this respect that the council has the ability to override that.

My advice is that you do not.

Okay.

Um that kind of sets the the baseline.

Does anyone want to um go first with regard to deliberation comments, and then of course, if you have questions uh that come up, please feel free to answer ask those two.

We'll just do it in a one fellow swoop here.

Councilmember McCune.

Yeah, um, subjectively, I what the mayor said was absolutely right.

You know, some years ago when we were working on the BVSP and the zoning ordinance, uh, a lot of people really wanted to develop this ground floor retail kind of environment, so that we could over time develop a kind of cohesive small downtown.

Uh maybe a little bit like our neighbors to the south have with pedestrian um in kind of environment.

Um those projects have gotten built here and in other cities like Belmont, they have frequently sat empty for lengthy periods of time.

And when the developers finally reduce the rent enough that somebody rents it, it frequently rents to occupants like law firms or insurance agents or tax preparing, you know, CA unit firms.

Those are important businesses, they're important services to the community, but they don't drive the kind of foot traffic that you know we we envisioned or thought about so um so objectively looking at the record of what was done, it is a very complex interaction of local regulations we've passed, local plans, and this plethora of state laws have been dumped on us, um, but in analyzing it, I I don't see anything where I think the staff or the planning commission acted improperly.

So taking all of that read together, um I can make the findings that are listed in the draft resolution.

Um and I can support the draft resolution that's been presented, which if that if that resolution passes would have the effect of allowing the project to go forward.

Okay, thank you.

I can hold my nose and vote in favor of it.

Okay.

Because I would love to have the ground floor review.

Okay, okay noted.

Thank you so much.

Um anyone else, Councilmember Jordan?

Uh Ice Vice Mayor and anyone else any other comments.

Please, Councilmember Lademarlo.

Um I want housing and I want all the housing that you're proposing.

Um, I love the very low-income units.

I love the additional residential units.

That said, I think that the way this project has been handled by the owners and the developers since the beginning is a case study of how to really piss off a community that you're walking into.

You opened by suing the neighbors and now have finished by breaking your four or five-year long words of the community.

Um I have issues with your explanations, I have issues with your ethics, particularly given that you're a B corporation and the B corporation is one which publicly declares its commitment to not only its customers but its chosen community.

I don't see that here.

Legally, however, particularly with all the new state laws that have been passed down since 2019, and the ability of developers, as we've heard earlier tonight, to take advantage of each bill to become law.

I think they're I think they're within their rights.

Um I understand the community development director has the authority to make those determinations around ground level active uses and those other objective standards.

He did it, it could be considered reasonable, and it was not questioned within the time allowed.

So I think the way all of this was handled was not ideal, but I think it still has the legal right to be done.

Okay, thank you.

Anyone else?

I I can go.

Um I agree with my my colleagues.

Uh I I think that we don't, you know, we don't really have the options.

I think that the staff report and the analysis is correct, and I agree with that, and I think you know it is something we need to move forward with.

That being said, I you know, I do have uh a few comments.

Uh yes, we need housing, and it the housing is in the right place.

So I think that that's a good thing.

And I know Giuliano may disagree with me, but I'm glad that there's a lot of parking because some of the comments we did get from the community is that other new residential projects that have gone in ha didn't have enough parking, and we're overflowing into the neighborhood.

So I I appreciate that thoughtfulness there.

Um, there are bike spaces too for our um bicycle uh riders.

The change, I understand the the economics behind not having a commercial property um on the ground floor.

I do wish that there were.

I I do think that the lobby is excessively long, but that's nothing we have any control over.

This is just an opinion that I'm stating at the moment, and I'm hoping in the future that there's some way that we can make it make some more active use to the for the community because honestly, the community that's coming out, they're not opposed to the housing, right?

They just want more active use for themselves in the neighborhood.

And we've heard from different communities on other projects, right?

That they don't even want the project.

So this community wants the project.

They just want some active use for them since they are losing some businesses that they otherwise would walk to at this point.

Um, given that we have no flexibility beyond that.

I do think that they have met all of the legal requirements to move this project forward.

So I I would encourage and thank you for being uh a supporter of our academic foundations.

I think that that's a great thing, but I I do think we're gonna have to do some mending with the community to try to figure out how we can continue the partnership, and I I do hope that in the future we can explore some type of active use that goes beyond just the people who live there.

Okay, thank you.

Vice Mayor, did you have any comments?

I can make the findings.

I'm not happy about making the findings.

Um I really would like to encourage you to rethink the commercial use, the active use, try find a way to do it.

I don't believe for one second that it would not be rentable.

My chiropractor, Dr.

Crane, is in that that place.

The last time I talked to him, he said he was still looking for some place to move.

So I don't believe that it would not be rentable.

I I would love to see you try and give the community what they are asking for.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you to all of my colleagues for your your comments.

Um, you know, as I as I mentioned earlier, uh, you know, the the we I was part of the development of the BVSP and and the vision, and I was very happy to see uh retail coming in to this neighborhood.

Um and remember community members talking about a bakery or coffee shop, ice cream store, things that they were hoping that maybe they could walk to.

Um, and I think you know what we're seeing uh tonight and and the discussion that we're having really symbolizes something very important, which we also talked about at the study session, which is the balance between local vision and state mandates isn't always ours to strike anymore.

And um, while it would have been appreciated if the applicant had kept the retail commercial space on the ground floor, they are within their purview to decide not to do that, and the state mandates us to um to accept that, and that is why in 2024, staff with the uh council's uh approval at a civil council meeting, um, went ahead and removed the the uh requirement for CUP.

Uh despite the fact that the BVSP was really a product of our values, and um the city council and community um put our heart and soul into making sure that there was something that could be in the Belmont Village specific plan that would really um you know strike that balance between housing, which even in 2017, when no one else was talking about this and the state wasn't really doing anything about it, we said was a priority, and we were trying to strike strike that balance.

Um so where we still have discretion, uh, although I know again with the study session, it's getting more and more limited.

Um, I want our city to continue to seek opportunities for public facing ground floor activation as much as we can.

And I hear the community, and please understand that's a value of ours to also understand uh sat our you know, our leaders in Sacramento are making that harder and harder for us.

Uh, but for this particular project, the legal reality is that it meets the state's housing compliance requirements, it meets our current zoning standards.

The time to object on those design grounds would have been uh it's passed, and and it sounds like even if it hadn't, the project applicant could have obtained a waiver to achieve the same outcome.

So while this is not the ideal expression of that vibrant street level experience we once envisioned for every corner of the village, it is compliant.

Um of course it is also needed housing, and so uh I agree with my colleagues that I'll go ahead and deny the appeal and approve uh the product, the project at 580 Masonic.

And unless there's anyone else who has any other follow-on comments, um we can entertain a motion.

I move approval.

Wait, I move approval.

Second, roll call, please.

Councilmember Jordan, yes.

Councilmember Lauderlow?

Yes.

Councilmember McCune.

Yes, Vice Mayor Pang Maganares.

Aye.

Mayor Mates.

Aye.

The motion passes five zero.

Thank you.

All right, thank you very much.

Oh, and I definitely wanted to thank the appellants, the applicants, the community, our planning commission for all your hard work.

And uh let's go ahead and take a five-minute break and come back at 9.40 to continue the meeting.

Oh my gosh, we still have a lot of time.

From our break.

We're back from our break.

Uh we are now at item 10, which is general business.

These items are considered separately, typically in the order listed, and the chair will call for public comment on each item when the body considers that item.

Uh, our first item under this uh first uh under the general business is 1301 shoreway development agreement terms.

And I think we have with us assistant manager Kathy Kleinbaum.

Good evening, members of the council.

So I will be giving you a brief presentation on the draft term sheet for the 1301 Shoreway Commercial Development Project.

So this project is being developed by Four Corners Development, who submitted their planning application originally in June 2022.

The project includes the redevelopment of an existing office building along Shoreway Road into a 542,000 plus square foot campus for office and/or biotech use.

So it's going to be flexibly entitled.

The project is requesting a rezoning to a PD district to accommodate the proposed height and FAR of the project.

This project is pretty far along in the entitlements process.

The draft EIR was published in November 2024 and has been before the Planning Commission.

Also, there was a study session with the planning commission previously on the project.

The entitlement hearings for this project would likely happen sometime early 2026 time frame.

The project entitlements would include a development agreement, which covers the extended entitlement time frame being requested by the developer as well as their community benefit contribution.

And that's what I'm here tonight to go over.

But first, because you guys have not seen this project before, I'm just going to give a very brief overview of what the project looks like so you have a sense.

So these two images show you various aerial views of the project site.

It's located actually across some lane from the city's courtyard, very close to a lot of the developments in repertoirs just down the street from Oracle.

Here's a layout of the site.

So there's two buildings as well as a public parking garage, and it also includes some public improvements along the Belmont Creek.

This is the overall development program.

I'm not going to get into the details of it.

The tallest building, building one will be about 128 feet tall, eight stories.

And again, it is going to be used for office or life sciences and includes on-site parking for cars as well as for bicycles, although those are not listed here.

Here are some renderings.

This is building one, which is as it can be seen from the 101 freeway.

And you also see to the right of it the public parking garage or a portion of it.

This is from the back of the project where you see building two, another view of the public parking garage all the way to the left, and then the public improvements along Belmont Creek.

Those public improvements include an upgraded shoreline public access trail with interpretive signage.

The trail would include two fitness nodes, those little like exercise equipment installations you see along trails, and then public parking spaces dedicated just for those outdoor uses.

It would be accessible to the members of the public during all daylight hours, but maintained by the property owner.

So the development terms that are before you today include a request for a 10-year entitlement period, which is really needed given the uncertain commercial market.

I'm sure you're all aware that there's very high vacancy rates right now in both office and biotech uses.

For the first seven years, that development term would be granted granted outright, and then the developer would have an option for years eight through ten, where they would be prepaying their community benefit of $50,000 for each year that they extend their entitlement beyond that year seven.

And if they walk away and never build it, we get to keep that funding.

Their total community benefit contribution is based on the community benefit program that I brought before City Council in February 2025, so just a few months ago, where the developer and the city are sharing in the residual value created by allowing them to build taller and with more intense FAR than the base underlying zoning.

And I should add the reason why they're doing a PD zoning is we are anticipating these type of changes being allowed in the RC zone that would have tiered zoning options, but because we haven't completed the SQL work on that yet, that option's not available to the developer.

The proposed community benefit contribution is proposed to be 6.3 million if it's built in years one to seven, and then it would escalate to 7 million in years eight to 10.

That's the equivalent of 13 dollars per square foot in years one to seven, which goes up to 14 per square foot of building space in eight to ten, which is on par with what we're seeing, including a recently approved project in San Carlos just last week or so.

And that funding would be provided to the city with the flexibility to use for any of our community benefit priorities as they exist at that time and divided among those.

Currently, our community benefit priorities include things like upgrades to recreation facilities, which could include the community center uh at Barrett or could include other parks, include things like infrastructure improvements, not directly related to the project, child care, supporting city services.

So there's a wide array of options, variety of options available to the city.

Um the development agreement also includes some pretty typical terms for development agreement, such as setting the impact fees at the time of entitlement.

So if we make changes to our impact fees, those won't affect the project, but the impact fee rates would increase by CPI on a year to year basis.

In addition, the public art fee requirement for this project either requires the art to be built on site or for the developer to pay a 1% in lieu fee.

Staff has requested, as part of this term sheet that a minimum of 50% of the public art requirement be paid as an in loop payment that could be used citywide.

Um so that could benefit us for public art installations throughout the city.

In addition, the developer has made some labor commitments, including agreeing to a union signatory general contractor, and also to make good faith efforts to meet the 30% local hire goal and to participate in apprenticeship programs.

So what we're looking for tonight is just any comments and feedback on the proposed development agreement terms.

Once we have your input, we will go forward and actually negotiate the development agreement document itself, which will be included as part of the entitlements, which will be back before you for approval.

Okay, thank you.

Council, do we have questions for staff on the presentation?

The term sheet.

Okay, same head shakes.

Uh how about public comment?

If we have public comment on this item when we are on item 10A, um, please fill out a comment slip or raise your virtual hand.

Uh Madam Clerk, any comments on this item?

I have one slip and one hand at the moment.

Okay, let's take the uh in-person comment first, please.

Juliano.

This would be a spectacular project.

Uh office buildings that we're looking at could be spectacular projects.

Um Lord knows, you know, we need a much healthier tax base.

Um the problem is as I often go on about the parking.

Um it's way too much.

If every office building that y'all are going to be seeing in the next few years as this level of density for parking, you'll be seeing about 50,000 or more car trips per day.

I don't know where we are today, but uh 50,000 is going to be an awful lot more.

You think Nosboot was a disaster when you were there to uh get to?

Just imagine another 50,000.

Um council member Jordan.

Um, in response to your we have had other projects that did not offer enough parking.

I ask you to consider why.

And my take on it, actually, a fairly fairly well researched take on it, is because we only support cars.

People are smart, right?

They will take the easiest, fastest, most convenient way mode possible.

A few wackles don't.

You want folks to you want us to reduce greenhouse gases, you want to reduce climate change, you want a more livable city, you want youth autonomy, elder autonomy, you want equity.

Cars ain't it.

You're gonna have to prioritize something else.

And that makes means making it safer to take other modes, make it possible to take other modes.

I know that our some of our senior staff disagrees with me on this, but they're they do not have the experience that I do writing.

It is plain not safe.

I think you all agree.

Our city documents all say we have to mode shift.

You all have to be willing to actually set policy that mandates it and then follow through.

All right, guys.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker will be caller three on Zoom.

Hi, good evening, caller three.

If you can unmute yourself.

Good evening.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council.

I'm Scott Peele, business agent for UA Local 467, and I'm representing over 2,000 San Mateo County households.

I'm also representing the San Mateo County Building Trades Council with more than 10,000 men and women working in the construction industry, many of whom live in the city of Belmont.

I want to acknowledge staff and the council for the work you have done to make sure this project will create value for our members and Belmont residents as a whole.

As you may know, we have had concerns with the project largely stemming from this developer's refusal to meet with us to discuss workforce-related community benefits this project could bring to the city.

Such a refusal is highly unusual.

We are pleased to see the labor provisions and the term sheet that do begin to address the issues we would normally discuss with the developer.

Belmont deserves to gain the construction workforce-related benefits that other cities are gaining with similar projects.

We have two suggestions related to the labor provisions.

First, that the developer will meet with the building trades council prior to the issuance of building permits.

The only way the labor provisions have the chance to be realized is if we have constructive dialogue on how to meet those stated goals.

Since an apprentice is 20 to 70 percent less costly than a journey person, there is no need to have qualifying language that commercially reasonable, good based efforts be made.

With these two modifications, we can fully support the approval of this project.

Thank you very much for your time.

Thank you.

Hi, caller number four.

If you can unmute yourself, please.

Hello, can you hear me now?

Yes, we can hear you.

All right, there we go.

All right, good evening, Mayor, city council, and staff.

Uh, this is John Medina, uh, another business agent.

I represent the Fire Sprinkler Fitters UA Local 483.

And I'm also an executive board member with San Mateo County and Building Trades Council.

Um we like you heard, we represent 10,000 San Mateo County men and women working in the construction industry, many of them who reside in the city of Belmont and in the neighboring cities like me here in San Mateo.

I want to thank the staff and the council for working with the developer for corners and taking like serious steps for community benefits for these construction projects.

As you heard, we had concerns about the project, which were mostly stemming around the developable unusual refusal to meet with the local labor and discuss the workforce-related community benefits outlined in this project and what that could do for the city.

Um I am and we are pleased to see the labor provisions in the term sheet that begin to address the issues that we would normally discuss with the developer.

Um we ultimately would like to finally see the developer meet with us and the building trades council or San Mateo.

Um, you know, the only way that we could feel that these labor provisions have a chance is if we have a collective dialogue on how to meet the stated goals.

We were hopeful of like area standard prevailing wages using skilled and trained workforce, obviously with the local hire and the apprenticeship goals.

Um we hope that this good faith efforts are gonna take place in the future with this project and with these provisions, we can fully support the approval of this project.

So thank you, everyone.

Thank you.

That is our final speaker for this point.

Thank you very much.

All right.

Uh moving back to the council.

Um, I just want to ask staff, it was my understanding that uh the developers uh representatives didn't have a chance.

I think to connect uh with labor at least for some initial discussions.

So um Raching from the development team is here, and so I'll let him respond to that.

Yes, so uh so we actually I actually did speak to several representatives of the microphone just to make sure he's facing you.

Thank you so much.

Yeah, perfect.

Um sorry, yeah.

So I actually did speak with several folks from the unions.

I there were several, there were many that actually reached out to me and I tried calling many people back, and I actually connected with two people in particular, and I don't remember specifically um who they represented.

I think one was actually the carpenters, and there was another person that was working for a law firm that actually represented a bunch of different um trades, I guess, but it's not a matter of that we refuse to meet with them, but there were many, and I we did return every call.

So okay, thank you so much.

I apologize if there was not that connection.

Thank you.

All right.

Um other suggestions from council to uh staff at this time.

Vice Mayor?

Mm-hmm.

Thank you for this development agreement.

I think it is outstanding.

And I think that you and staff work extremely thoughtful and pulling all of these together.

So kudos to all of two staff who worked on this.

The only place that I struggled with was with the labor provisions.

I don't feel good about it's a good faith effort to achieve 30% local hire goals.

It doesn't feel strong enough to me.

Local hire is good for Belmont.

Local hire is good for San Mateo County, and I would like to see the developers make a good faith effort to meet and to discuss.

I love the idea of before permits being issued that they developers actually sit down and a real dialogue is had.

I love that idea.

But other than that, I think this was very well thought for thought through and put together.

Any comments, Councilmember McKin?

No comments.

It seems seems good to me.

Okay, on this end, yes, please.

Um, I think it sounds uh great.

Usually, with art requirements, I'd be like, oh, we really want to keep it in the area, but it doesn't make as much sense to like let's split it between the area where you're at and then the rest of Elm.

I think that makes more sense.

Councilmember Jordan, any comments?

No, thank you so much for the presentation.

Uh okay, great.

Thank you.

I I am very happy to see this um project come before us and move along.

I know it's been a number of years in the making, and I know we've worked uh closely with uh the developer on this.

I know at one point um we certainly thought this was going to be built a lot sooner.

Um, and so I just want to make sure we are daylighting the fact that we are talking about um 10 years.

And so um to the extent that uh we can take the comments that you've heard tonight, go back to the developer and and craft some messaging around this, but understanding that uh obviously there's 10 years that a lot may change.

We need to keep things a little more flexible too.

The flexibility is in obviously some of the language, the the terms that you've um provided us are uh I completely wholeheartedly support them.

So I wouldn't want them to be changed very much, except if it's going to be additive, if that makes sense.

Um, and then I also just want to um point out that I think you know, one of the things that came up when we were talking about some of the projects that were going to actually be starting to be built, you know, a few years ago when it looked like we were going to get a lot of development in not quite, you know, in this area, but then also in the HIA.

Uh we were talking about building labs, and I think I I can I think it was Councilmember McCune who talked about not wanting to have uh potentially these buildings full of labs that would potentially just sit there if the economy changed.

And so the EIR did look at uh office space as well as labs, and I'm very glad that that's how we studied this because um that now gives us the flexibility to uh if since life science unfortunately sounds like it's it's it's at a standstill right now.

Uh we can pivot to we meaning the the developer uh team uh could pivot to offices and so uh just want to make sure that that's um called out as well.

But looks like we won't be likely not seeing any actual building on this for the next 10 years, so um, and that's I'm a I'm assuming that's kind of standard uh was what you're seeing now from the ask of developers.

Um I mean the ask is to have up to 10 years, but it doesn't mean it won't be built for 10 years.

There's the possibility the markets turn, markets turn all the time, and I mean I would be surprised if it's built in the next three years or five years, but um it doesn't necessarily mean ten.

And now with with this, they'll be ready if it does.

Okay, great.

Thank you so much.

Thanks for the presentation.

Um thank you to the applicant for coming tonight.

All right.

Uh we need to do we need, is there resolution?

No, this is just uh, okay, great.

Then uh we are moving on to 10 uh B, local amendments to 2025 California building standards codes.

Do you know this here?

Good evening, Mayor Mates and members of council.

We're here this evening to introduce the 2025 California Building Standards Code with local amendments in accordance with state law.

The proposed changes go into effect January 1st, 2026.

Staff has included an ordinance with the staff report, which outlines the proposed amendments.

The proposed amendments consist of mostly fire and life safety and administrative provisions or procedures.

The majority of the proposed amendments are a continuation of previously adopted amendments from prior code adoption cycles with new amendments to the building code for fire sprinkler systems and higher fire resistant measures for roof covering systems contained in the 2025 California building, a California fire code, excuse me.

This spring the state fire marshal issued maps recommending that certain areas within the city and Belmont Fire Protection District be designated as fire hazard severity zones, which the fire department subsequently designated by ordinance as recommended by the state fire marshal and the city ratified.

The proposed city ordinance continues those designations and separately makes them by the city.

Nearly all of the amendments to the plumbing, mechanical, and electrical codes are administrative and do not affect building standards.

The administrative amendments to all the three codes continue the local amendments previously made to these codes.

Some of the amendments from previous code cycles are water hammer resters and the plumbing code, patio covers to block high winds and enhance the outdoor experience, sound transmission in mixed-use occupancies such as accessory dwelling units and protections afforded by the swimming pool safety act in single family dwellings.

Tonight's council meeting is an introduction of the ordinance, and we're requesting and we're requesting council to set a public hearing for November 25th, 2025, and a second reading of the ordinance.

All right, thank you so much.

Um do we have any questions for staff on this item?

No.

Uh, how about public comment?

If there's any public comment on item uh 10B.

Uh there were no requests to speak.

Okay, anyone online?

No.

Great.

Then brings it back to council for any deliberation or comments.

Um I think we have if we are going to entertain a motion, I think city attorney has to read it, read the ordinance.

Is that right?

Or you'll do that next time.

We could do it the next time.

Okay.

Do we need a motion to be like, oh yeah, we'll see it on the 25th.

Yeah.

If you I think you remove staff recommendation, you'll be fine.

So just move to the staff.

So we can entertain a motion to move the staff recommendation.

If anyone carrying.

Thank you.

Uh roll call, please.

Councilmember McCune.

Aye.

Councilmember Jordan.

Yes.

Councilmember Latimerlo.

Vice Mayor Pang Manganaris.

Hi.

Mayor Mates.

I and this motion passes 5-0.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Thank you.

All right.

Moving on to 10 City owned property disposition update and exempt surplus land declaration.

I think we're also going to be hearing from our assistant city manager on this item.

All right.

Thank you.

I'll launch right in.

Um, so as a brief background, the city currently owns and manages three small residential properties, which were originally purchased by our redevelopment agency and then transferred to the city during the dissolution of redevelopment.

Those are 730 El Camino, 503 Crestview Avenue, and 1000 O'Neill, otherwise known as the Emmett House.

So I brought this before the council a year ago.

We have had some challenges continuing to operate and manage these properties.

Cities generally aren't set up to be residential property managers.

It's not in our wheelhouse.

So the operating expenses for these properties, given their uses, which are all affordable housing related or congregate care, exceed the current revenue that we get for the properties, and so they're therefore subsidized by our affordable housing fund.

The properties all have significant deferred maintenance and repair costs, and we aren't really able to raise the rents given the uses of the properties.

Additionally, our staff has pulled in many directions, so it's hard for us to oversee the maintenance and upkeep.

And as a result, the properties carry some liabilities of us owning them and not always being the best of landlords.

So in October, the council did provide direction to explore the disposition of the three properties.

At the time, we discussed transferring 730 El Camino Real to its current nonprofit operator, transferring 503 Crestview to either its for-profit operator or looking for a nonprofit option that could lease back to that operator.

And then we looked at two options for Emmett House, including selling it for market value to fund future new affordable construction, like we did with the prior properties in 2022, or transferring it to a nonprofit for housing use.

And then we came back to the council in February 2025 with a procedural step declaring these properties as exempt surplus land under the state surplus land act.

We are continuing to work towards the disposition.

There's a lot of steps in the process.

So we've gone market rate appraisals for the properties.

We're working on right now the reuse appraisals, which essentially take into consideration the restricted uses that would be deed restricted for these properties.

Also, we have been working with San Mateo County, who forgave a $260,000 loan that they had for 7 30 El Camino Real from back when it was originally acquired.

And we've been working with outside council to draft some deed restrictions and have done a lot of due diligence discussions with the various property owners.

So I'm going to provide an update on the status of each property and where we are as part of this presentation.

And just as a reminder, so the big remaining step to actually go through with the transfer of these properties would be to hold a public hearing where the city council would adopt the reuse appraisals again that that appraisal with the restricted uses and approve a purchase and sale agreement.

So starting with 730 El Camino Real, this is a group home for development developmentally disabled residents who actually live independently, and it's been operated since 1999 by Kynos, who's here tonight.

And the deferred maintenance on this property is well over $113,000.

That's we think a conservatively low estimate.

The market appraised value was $2.17 million, and the preliminary draft reuse value is zero because the cost of operating this type of facility exceeds the value of the property.

So we have done our due diligence and believe that Kynos has the capacity to assume ownership of the property and to cover the deferred maintenance expenses through their fundraising.

So we do recommend that we move forward to transfer the property to Kinos with deed restrictions that would require the current use to stay in place or a similar use to take over.

And that property would be transferred for a dollar, so not a nominal value.

And if the council still supports that recommendation, we would bring this back for actual formal action, potentially as early as your next meeting, but unlikely at this point, so more likely January.

This one's a skilled nursing facility.

So the population here is actually both has developmental disabilities but also physical disabilities that require like 24-hour care.

It's operated by Family Home, which is a private for-profit business that operates several of these homes in the peninsula.

The monthly rent to the city for this one is lower, it's 1,000 per month, and the deferred maintenance is higher.

It's $160,000, which again we think is on the low side.

The market value of this property is $1.9 million, and we believe the reuse value will also be zero or even negative.

So for this property, given its sort of unique for-profit operations, we are exploring an operating partnership between the nonprofit Brilliant Corners and the Golden Gate Regional Center, which is an umbrella organization that oversees a lot of these facilities in San Francisco, San Mateo, and Marin Counties.

And also there would be a deed restriction also requiring that type of use to stay in place.

They have applied for the Golden Gate Regional Center and Brilliant Corners in partnership have applied for state funding that would cover the deferred maintenance, plus some sort of advanced maintenance to make sure the property is good for an extended period of time.

And we would transfer the property again for one dollar.

And we have worked very closely with the families of the residents whose children who are now adults but still their children occupy this property, and they're very supportive of this approach.

They're actually some representatives are here tonight as well.

For 1000 O'Neal, the Emmett House, this is an important historic property of the city.

I'm sure many of you know is originally located in Ralston and trucked over.

Apparently, it was quite the event.

I'm sorry I missed it.

So the city converted it to a duplex and it served as a rental property for moderate income residents.

It is now currently vacant, and it also has pretty extensive deferred maintenance.

The market value is estimated at 2.23 million, although I think that's a conservative estimate that it might even get more on the open market.

So for that particular property, staff is recommending selling that at market value and then using the proceeds to fund either new affordable housing developments or other housing programs.

So they would be restricted to housing uses.

It would require the loss of those two affordable units, but that funding could leverage development.

Just that property loan of like a hundred plus new affordable units.

And you know, currently our affordable housing fund is pretty limited because we haven't had a lot of commercial developments, so we're kind of reusing the same successor agency money, but we don't have a lot of funds available to fund additional housing developments.

And we do understand the historic character is very important to the city, so we would put deed restrictions in place to make sure that those could be the historic character would be preserved by limiting exterior modifications and prohibiting demolition, except probably under extreme circumstances.

And then moving on to 780 El Camino Real.

This is a teeny tiny 0.12 acre lot that we bought back in 2008.

The cities tried to develop it multiple times, but it's so small and it's sloped.

So that's very challenging.

So honestly, the best possibility for this to be developed would be in consolidation with adjacent parcels.

And one of those adjacent parcels has recently expressed expressed interest in selling their property.

So it might be possible if someone's looking to buy that property that they would also be interested in this property to create a larger site.

So because of that, we are recommending that we just preemptively go through the surplus land stock process and declare this as exempt surplus land.

It would sort of save three months off of a future process for disposition of the property, but does not require us to do anything at this point in time.

So we could go through that process and then hold on to that parcel for another 100 years.

So it's just sort of knocking off a procedural step, but it doesn't commit the council to any future action, and any future action would come back to the council.

So those are our recommendations.

So there's a recommendation listed here for each property, and we're seeking council confirmation that we're moving in the right direction.

And also a formal action to approve the resolution declaring 780 El Camino Real as surplus land.

Okay.

Thank you so much for the presentation.

So council, I think we have seen this before maybe about a year ago, and we had some comments then, and so thank you for bringing this back to us.

Any questions for staff at this time?

I had a question on Emmett House.

I know the uh direction for council last time was to see if there were any nonprofits that might be interested, and I know that you kind of did some due diligence.

Can you just for the benefit of the new I wasn't on the council last time?

So, we had preliminary preliminarily talked to a few nonprofits before even going to council last time, and a couple of those have since either gone out of existence or no longer um operating some of their properties.

We do think, and no other nonprofits have since come forward expressing interest in that site.

Um we think it would be really challenging for a nonprofit to take over because not only would they need to cover the deferred maintenance, the property as it stands as a duplex would need significant renovations to serve a different use.

So it would require pretty significant investment to convert from its current use to something different.

So I think that's pretty cost prohibitive.

So just to follow on to that though I think that as if I recall last time I think I and maybe one other council member had asked to just make sure that there were no other did we between the time that you first brought it to us and now did did we also look to see if there's anyone else who wanted Emmett House well no we've we've sort of kept our eye out but we haven't um identified anybody else who might be interested.

We did approach quite a number in initially and um you know there was articles in the paper and publicity and no one came forward since okay.

Any other questions for staff yes yeah.

Something I just thought of here on 730 El Camino Real and 503 Crestview.

You know those have a combined market value of about four million dollars.

And I think it's I think it's fine to transfer them to you know nonprofits who are doing good work there.

Would it be reasonable to include in the contracts the fact that the city has first right of refusal to buy them back for a dollar if those entities ever went out of business.

We are I've I've dealt with enough property that every now and then somebody goes into a deal with the best intentions and something goes bluey.

You know they it just goes sideways or some crazy thing happens where they take a powder and you know if we wouldn't exercise this if they continue to operate but if they disappear you know we could get our property back for a dollar and then sell it at market value.

So we are looking at a a provision of that nature although we would account for investment made by them so if we give it to them for a dollar but then they have to spend you know 150 to 200,000 dollars to renovate it to meet the deferred maintenance that we didn't do it's not fair for us to then get it back for a dollar.

But we are looking at some sort of provision of that nature.

Yeah I'm just I'm just thinking about the unexpected eventuality of that buyer not you know going out of existence or some of the crazy things that can happen.

Yeah.

That will have a covenant on them that will require that they be used for uh the affordable purposes and that will be spelled out what that means and but to Kathy's point too is that you know part of when they when these properties are required that they'll they may it maybe get more complicated if they have any debt against the property and and we have to think carefully about how we set up a tale coming back to us and and not unduly restrict their ability to take advantage of of um uh traditional uh tools to uh finance the real property that's a great point thank you so much for bringing that up um any other any other oh you I'm sorry I don't no okay just said nicely done oh great uh yes thank you for that uh any other can we move to public comment any comments on this item I have one slip in front of me uh for Andrew Frisch.

Great.

Nice to see you here.

I was here a year ago uh with Kathy's presentation then and uh since then had the pleasure of meeting counseling women at Marrow at 730 um El Camino.

I'm with the Kinos Home and Training Center where uh Redwood City base but uh your neighbors um nonprofit organization that's been around for 50 years uh serving adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities we're so grateful that we've had the partnership with the city of Belmont for the past uh 25 years uh where uh six to seven men have lived independently um at 730 El Camino uh they've worked over those years locally at Safeway, while Spargo uh currently at Gray's paint and the PAST right next door at IP area restaurant.

Their families are all um from the local area um so just want to thank you for the past partnership.

And obviously, we're uh very excited about the prospect of owning the property um so we would ensure that these residents would be able to continue to be uh living in this house and residents of Belmont and just commend you on um your efforts to preserve diversity, affordable housing, and a sense of community.

Girl, if there's any questions, but thank you so very much.

Thank you.

Any other comments on this items?

Moving on to Zoom.

Excuse me, caller 10.

Oh, why don't we sorry?

I don't think we knew that there was another count uh chamber comment.

So we're happy to hear.

Let's just see.

We did ask caller 10 on the phone.

So let's just see if just give us one second.

Hello.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Good evening.

Thank you, Mayor and City Council.

Nice to hear from you as well.

Andy, this is Sean Galvin from the Golden Gate Regional Center.

I am the director of community services.

And you know, we're looking forward to partner.

We serve individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Our trusted partner, Brilliant Corners.

We've been partnering with them for 20 plus years on affordable housing and uh the state's buy-at-once model, so we're able to leverage some of that community resource development program monies for those renovations.

Um so just wanted to thank and support and uh the opportunity to ensure that these individuals that grew up at the um at the home on Crestview continue to have the opportunity to live there, and we thank you for your time and consideration.

Thank you.

Okay, if you want to go ahead.

Good evening.

I'm Carolyn Whitman.

I'm one of the parents of a client at Crestview, 503 Crestview, and I am one of the developing parents who, well, 30 years ago developed Crestview.

It was a nonprofit.

We ran the home ourselves for about 11 years until it was taken over by a for-profit because it was very difficult to run uh with five five parents to do that.

But I I really want to thank Belmont for all you have done for to keep this home in and everyone involved.

You don't know how much this means to us to know that um Belmont really cares about the people that live here, and so thank you.

Thank you to staff, because they've been great.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I have a million quarters of it.

They're online.

Hi.

I'm not doing anything different.

They call it.

It's okay.

Okay.

All right.

Any other public comment on this item?

Not at this point, no.

Okay, thank you very much.

Uh bringing bringing it back to uh council.

I'm sorry, hold on just one moment.

Is it any of these numbers right here?

There, um, sorry, the hold up is that there was gonna be a speaker from Brilliant Corners, but he's not online, but just another speaker thanking the city council for their consideration.

Sounds good.

Um if it turns out, they just need to raise their hand.

Uh if it turns out that um they still want to submit comment, they can also they can do they raise their hand email.

So I do have the number, um, but I don't have a raised hand.

I I can allow the um the last four numbers are zero two five five if you'd like to speak.

You can unmute yourself, I believe.

There you go.

Can you hear me okay?

Yes.

Oh, thank you so much.

Um, Mayor Mace and members of the city council.

Thank you for this opportunity.

This is Serena Fields.

I'm from the Senior Director of Housing Development and Management at Brilliant Corners.

And we are just delighted to have this opportunity to continue to partner with Golden Gate Regional Center and to preserve this housing model.

So very much part of our mission, and we're excited for the next steps ahead.

So thank you so much for the time this evening.

Thank you.

I also have um 7660.

If you would like to speak, I will un allow you.

And while the clerk is determining that, Mayor Mates, I just want to point out it's 10 30.

Okay.

So why don't we go ahead and quickly see if there's a motion to extend the meeting, and then we'll go back to that caller and make sure we oh can we let's let's hear the caller first since there I hear them.

It's uh go ahead.

Oh yeah, thank you.

Thank you very much.

This is William Pickle.

I'm the Chief Executive Officer of Brilliant Corners, and great to hear um some other familiar voices.

Sean over at Golden Gate Regional Center, our partner uh for 20 21 years now.

Um and Andy, who um I know from Kinos way back in the early days of Brilliant Corners.

Um as Runa said, we're really delighted to be part of this opportunity to preserve and enhance uh the property on Crestview, which I toured I think back in 2017.

Um and the buy it once model is something that we're very proud of.

I think we're heading toward 300 um licensed residential care homes that we have helped the state to create around um the California um in partnership with all 21 regional centers.

And the beauty of the model is we bring some good public policy and affordable housing values to the work.

Um we handle soup to nuts uh whether it's you know emergency repairs or long-term asset and property management, and we de-district our homes in perpetuity uh for the population of people with developmental disabilities that we uh were bounded to serve.

So, you know, thanks to everybody on the council and to the mayor and to staff um for working through this um this position, and I think it's a really exciting opportunity to preserve and enhance the property.

Thank you very much.

Any other public comment?

Um that will be our final speaker.

Great, thank you.

Want to make sure we get everyone an opportunity who wants to speak.

Um so we are at take that motion.

Uh I think let's just go ahead and do a quick can we do a quick extension and then um so does is there, does anyone want to motion to extend the meeting?

Move uh we extend the meeting until 11.

Seconded.

Roll call, please.

Council member Jordan.

Yes, Lauder Merlow?

Yes, McCune.

Yes, Pang Meganaris, Mayor Mates.

Hi.

And the motion passes for 30 minutes.

Great, thank you.

So we are back to item 10c.

We do have a resolution.

Um can uh unless unless there's other deliberation or is there one more public comment?

Why not?

Oh, was there one more public comment?

Of course, anyone, yes, this is the go ahead.

Please feel free to speak if you would like.

Hi, I'm Laura Bliss, and I am one of the original families.

Uh my family is one of the original families, and um that put this together at uh, you know, Crestview, um, and because we wanted our families, our kids to live where we lived, and you know, to experience the same settings that we did, and we wanted to be near them so we could just see them.

At the time, there was just I mean, you if you needed a placement, you had to go away out of the county.

You had to go down to Santa Clara and farther, and that just wasn't gonna work for us, so um, and now um I just want to thank also the city of Belmont for your oh I um I'm just overwhelmed.

You know, for you wanting to to take care of the of our kids too, that you wanted them to remain people that live in in Belmont.

That's where my husband grew up, and um, we still you know we just had a wedding a family wedding at Twin Pines.

So this is a important place for us, and I want to also thank um Sean and I I didn't catch the name of the brilliant corners, but um I I know Bill Pickles and he's he might have been the one that talked.

We met a long time ago, and they're um they've done this for us before and the regional center together with um and I just I can't thank you all enough because you know I get up every day and my family's all around me, and I am so grateful.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right, thank you so much for the public comment.

Uh if there is anyone else who'd like to speak um on this item, now is the time.

Okay.

Um, so I guess we can entertain a motion.

So, sure.

I think if we isn't there a res adopt a resolution, the resolution only applies to the vacant laws.

780.

I believe that's true, right, Steph?

Yeah.

Okay.

So it's move approval of resolution number 2025.

And then continue on the path.

Do you need anything from us for well?

So I um if you can put my slide back up.

So we would need you to adopt the resolution, which would be for 780, and then if you can just give a nod to items one through three about um the proposed direction for each property.

Oh, okay.

Can I yes, please?

Um thank you so much for taking me on the tour, Andy.

It was so lovely to be there and to see um the residents and interact and you see their their rooms and their posters, and um it's so clearly home, and I'm really um I really want you to continue your work there, and I really don't want there to be any disruption for the residents.

So this this is great.

Um it was so great meeting with some of the parents um and talking to you, and if you guys, I know you've been part of the solution.

Kathy was telling me that you guys have really facilitated some of this solution.

So if you guys are cool with it, I am also very cool with it.

Um and I just want to give a shout out to Kathy for this.

This is all you really, like this is you've discovered that there was these um these uh properties that had these amazing uses on it, and you really wanted to do right by the people who lived there, and so I appreciate you.

Um yeah, right?

Um, and then yes, sells Emmett House, and yes, make 780 Alcamino surplus.

Okay, thank you.

Any other comments?

Um I just want to uh comment on I agree with everything that everyone said and it's late.

Um my only comment is on the Emmett House that um that I'm glad we're going to kind of put some provisions in it to kind of keep the historic nature of it.

I mean, I I want to um just give credence to the councils before us, especially the council that actually physically moved it.

I lived in Belmont when it happened pretty late at night.

It was an interesting thing.

But um to just know that I know we talked about it that you've looked at all these other different possibilities, and there's really nothing we can do.

I mean, I had even talked about can we do something with it since it's so close to Twin Pines Park, but because the nature of of it being an affordable housing project, we we would have to pay back the housing uh the affordable housing fund, and we don't really have those funds.

So I'm glad we're putting some restrictions in it, but I I approve of everything else.

Any other comments made by my fellow council members and also with regard to Emmett House.

I would suggest to staff that you go back to the original documentation that was done, uh, the historical evaluation of the house and things like that.

That should be able to have the information needed to guide the historic covenant as to uh what on the exterior features are historic and should be um kept, and I think one through three, we've we have discussed this, it makes sense.

It's very meaningful for us to also hear the impact that the city and our decisions have on you and your families as well.

So with that, I can go ahead and support staff's recommendations.

Alright, I think we have a motion by the vice mayor.

And did we have a second?

Oh second.

More call, please.

Councilmember McEwen?

Yes.

Bang Maganaris.

Hi.

Vladimirlow?

Yes.

Jordan?

Yes.

Mayor Maids?

Yes.

And this motion passes 5-0.

Thank you very much.

All right.

For our last item, well, of the under the general business, we have approval of amendments to employment agreements for the city manager and city attorney, and we have our administrative services director and Ritzma presenting.

Come on.

There it goes.

There we go.

Good evening, Mayor and members of the council.

We're still awake.

We're still going.

Oh, move through this quickly.

I can get where am I going?

So just for everyone's information, the city council is responsible for the appointment, evaluation, and establishment of compensation for two direct employees, the city manager and the city attorney.

Following annual performance value conducted in July of 2025, the council appointed a subcommittee to review the compensation for each of those positions.

And they considered the incumbents' performance, the cost of living, and the city's position within the regional market.

The subcommittee then met with the appointees and developed recommendations for the council's consideration.

And on October 14th, the city council met in closed session to review the recommendations and provide a direction for amendments to each of the employment agreements in the open session this evening for discussion and approval.

So we've done the performance evaluation, the compensation review, and we have the recommendations for amendments to the employment agreements.

The proposed amendments that are before you tonight implement adjustments to the base salaries for the city manager and the city attorney that reflect the cost of living adjustments and merit increases consistent with the market practices and performance expectations.

These amendments are consistent also with the city's philosophy of aligning executive compensation with regional market benchmarks and recognizing strong leadership performance in meeting the council's key directives and retention value while maintaining fiscal responsibility.

You should note that the amendments do not alter other material terms of the existing employment agreements beyond salary adjustment and allowances.

Tonight you have before you two options.

You can approve the resolutions or adopt the resolutions approving the amendments to the employment agreements for the city manager, which would be the third amendment, and the city attorney, which should be the second amendment, or provide direction to modify the proposed amendments, and I can return it at future meeting.

Alright, thank you very much for the presentation.

We have seen this before, and we've had uh closed session about it.

So, but uh if council members have any questions at this time for staff, um please let me know.

Questions for staff at this time?

Okay.

Let's go to public comment.

If you have any public comments on this item uh which is 10 D.

And there are no public comment uh requests.

Alright, then we can go ahead and bring it back to the council for any deliberation or comments, or we can um uh think about uh uh uh entertaining a motion.

I can move approval.

Thank you.

Second.

Roll call, council member Jordan.

Yes.

Latimerlo?

Yes.

McCune?

Yes.

Fang Menganeris.

Hi.

Mayor Mates?

Okay.

Motion passes five zero.

Thank you.

All right, great, thank you.

And with that, we move to item 11 brief verbal reports from members and staff.

11A is a verbal report from council members on intergovernmental and subcommittee assignments.

Does anyone have anything to share with us on that end?

Yes, go ahead.

Very quick one.

Uh at it's the board meeting, Peninsula Clean Energy voted to change its name.

So if you start seeing information from West Light Energy, that's the clean energy.

It's just a new name.

Not a name I personally I voted against that motion, but my colleagues uh West Lighty.

West light.

All right.

Okay, thank you for that.

But for better or for worse, that's that's the new meeting.

Okay, no, that's actually very helpful to know.

Um, anything else?

Any other updates from council members?

Nope.

I have an interesting fact.

Uh okay.

Public safety committee.

Our chief says that over the past 30 days, 2.5 million license plates were read in the city of Hama in just 30 days.

That's amazing to me.

We're a happening place, happening.

All right.

Thank you.

Any other verbal reports or updates?

Fun facts.

Uh then looking at our assistant city manager.

Any verbal report from the city?

I'll just be very quick.

Um, I just want to briefly commend the staff, especially our events team and parks and recreation who have been working really hard to prepare for the boobash tomorrow night.

Hope to see everybody there.

I'll be in a ridiculous costume.

Well, all right.

Hopefully, you will be there also in costume.

And then the last item, um, just briefly, is I do want to provide an update that it's looking very likely that 678 Ralston is going to be awarded tax credits for this application round that they just recently applied for based on their scoring.

So they're on the preliminary recommendation list.

It's usually just based on points.

They seem to reach the cutoff.

So with that, once they're formally awarded the tax credits, they'll be racing off to get their building permits and should be under construction probably by May.

Oh wow.

Wow.

All right, okay.

Okay, thank you for that.

Yes, we hope to see everyone tomorrow at the Bubash in Twin Pines Park.

Um, we do not have any matters or of interest or clarification under agenda item 12, so that will move us to uh item 13, which is adjournment until our next regular meeting on November 11th.

Till then we're adjourned.

We don't have a meeting on the 11th.

Oh, that's right.

November 25th.

Oh, so we are adjourned until November 25th.

But we will have a veterans memorial event on the 11th.

Right, but no council meeting.

All right, thank you.

We're adjourned.

Okay.