All right, we're we are good to go.

Good evening, everyone.

Uh welcome to uh tonight's uh planning commission meeting for the city of Belmont.

Uh today is Tuesday, April 21st.

Um, and I'm gonna go through some instructions uh for both participation um and for commenting.

So firstly, um folks can uh follow this meeting uh on uh Comcast Cable Channel 27.

It's also streamed live via the city's website at Belmont.gov.

And finally, as has been the case for the past six years, um one can participate uh via Zoom, and the instructions for doing so are included in the agenda.

Uh for public comment, um members of the public can comment in person in chambers by submitting a speaker slip to our clerk coming up to um the lectern, and you have three minutes to submit your comment.

Um again, one can uh participate virtually by using the raised hand function in Zoom, and the instructions for doing so are also included in the agenda.

And lastly, um uh public comments can be submitted uh in writing to uh our email address uh so long as those comments are received by 4 p.m.

today.

Uh and if those comments were received by that deadline, um we'll have those comments summarized or at least referenced uh for uh the record.

Um with those instructions, I think we will uh turn to a roll call, please.

Okay, good evening, roll call.

Uh Commissioner Takahashi.

Here.

Kramer?

Here.

Chair Coolidge?

Here.

Majeski.

Present.

Okay, and absent tonight is Commissioner Adam Kevich, Twig, and Jadala.

And I do want to welcome Commissioner Takahashi to the uh commission.

Thanks.

Not on tonight's agenda, but I'm taking liberty of doing so before we uh welcome aboard.

Thank you.

Excited to be here.

Yeah, very excited to have you and and uh congratulations and welcome.

Thank you.

Great.

Uh so uh having concluded agenda item one point five.

We'll now move to item two, which is a pledge of allegiance.

Everyone please stand and I'll uh lead the group in the pledge.

The flag is here.

I pledge allegiance to the flag, the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands.

One nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice as well.

Great, thank you, everyone.

Um turning to item three, which is our community forum.

Uh this portion of the meeting is reserved for members of the public wishing to address uh the commission on uh items uh either, I guess in this case, just not on the agenda uh within the uh purview of the commission.

Um so I'll see firstly if there's anyone uh in chambers wishing to comment uh on item three.

Um I've not received any speaker slips in house.

Great.

Okay.

Anyone on Zoom uh wishing to comment on item three?

Um no raise hands on Zoom.

And I'll see Director De Mello has anyone submitted any written comments to our C dev website for this item.

They have not.

Greatest portion of the agenda.

Thank you.

That concludes item three, our community forum.

Uh next we have commissioner announcements and agenda amendments.

I'll first turn uh to my colleagues in the diasp to see if there's any announcements.

I guess I could have used this opportunity to introduce our new commissioner, but I didn't.

Um see if there's any additional uh announcements.

Maybe starting here.

No.

Nope.

Okay.

Maybe staff uh see if there's any agenda amendments.

We have none for tonight's agenda.

Great.

Thank you.

That concludes item four.

And then we have item five, which is our consent business.

We have uh three items on the consent calendar, uh, item 5A, 5B, and 5C.

Uh these are in order the meeting minutes from uh November 18th, 2025.

Uh, and then 5B is December 2nd, 2025, and item 5C is February 3rd, 2026.

I guess we can take these one at a time and see if anyone has any questions, comments, or corrections for uh item 5a, which is the meeting minutes for November 18th, 2025.

I can approve them as written all three.

Okay, maybe make a motion to uh to approve.

All right.

Uh no one no other comments.

No.

All right, I'll offer a motion that we approve the uh three sets of meeting minutes as written.

I'm gonna do them one at a time, but I guess we can just bundle them.

I'll I'll second the motion is presented.

As presented, great.

Yes, you could approve the entire uh consent.

Consent calendar if you'd like.

I'm I am at mercy of the motion, so it's been moved and seconded.

Okay.

Um Commissioner Takahashi.

Confirm.

Uh Kramer.

Uh I.

Chair Coolidge?

Aye.

Majeski?

Aye.

Okay, motion passes four zero for items five A, B, and C.

Um motion passes.

Great.

Thank you so much, Madam Clerk.

That concludes um our consent business.

And we now turn to the meeting of the agenda.

Um item six.

This is our study session, and we have uh two items under item uh six, and we'll start with uh item seven A.

I guess as a matter of course, I can ask if there's any uh ex party communications or recusals to the extent that is applicable in this matter.

None for me.

I can't think of anything.

Yep, nor I.

Okay.

So that's uh I think we're ready to go for item six A, which is the draft safety element uh update review.

Great, thank you, Mr.

Chair.

I'm Adrian Smith, uh principal planner with the city.

I'm also the project manager on the city side for this safety element update effort.

Um with me tonight is our uh consultant.

This is Eli Crispy with Placeworks, so he's gonna be helping me out tonight with the presentation.

Great, thank you.

Um this is actually my first project in front of the commission tonight uh since joining last year, so I'm excited to be here.

This is also one of my first projects that I took over last March.

So this is a real coming together of that effort.

So it's great to be here for this first step of the public review process.

Thank you and welcome.

Thank you.

So very quickly, uh, where are we going this into this presentation this evening?

We're gonna start with an introduction and just go over what is the safety element, why are we updating it, and what has been the process that's uh taken us through.

So we'll go through the parts of the safety element as well, how it's organized.

We'll talk about public outreach and what we've heard.

We'll also go through updated goals, policies, and actions.

And to wrap, we'll talk about timeline and next steps, and then we're gonna present a few discussion questions for the commission to consider.

All right.

So with that, I'm gonna pass it over to Eli.

Thank you, Adrian.

Uh good evening, Chair Coolidge, members of the commission, uh, Eli Crispy with Placeworks.

Uh, we are the technical consultant that is helping the city to put together this effort.

Uh so the safety element update for Belmont is really part of a regional effort, uh, the Peninsula Resilience Planning Project.

This is a joint effort of the county and eight incorporated jurisdictions who are all working together on issues of climate resilience and updates to their safety element.

And by taking this multi-jurisdictional approach, we are able to have uh all nine participating communities share analyses, underlying data, uh work together on community engagement, and even though the safety elements themselves are all separate and all tailored to each community.

This also allows us to have some shared policies and strategies that are intended to foster multi-jurisdictional collaboration because natural hazards do not stop at city limits.

It's really beneficial for us to have all communities being able to work together in solving some of these challenges.

So the safety element is a required part of the city's general plan.

It is required by state law.

And the basic role of the safety element is to identify hazards of concern, primarily natural hazards and other related challenges and emergency issues, and then to identify and enact policies to help protect the community against these hazards.

So we'll get into some of the more specifics in a moment, but in general, we are updating the safety element to be consistent with some new state requirements and to address the topic of climate resilience.

So since the safety element, or since the general plan was last adopted, uh there have been a number of changes to state law.

It used to be that the state was quite permissive in what they allowed for the safety elements, and the the guidance was fairly limited.

And in the past 10 years or so, there have been a proliferation of state legislation.

There's been a lot of new things that the state now requires in the safety element.

One of those is that the safety element has to be reviewed and updated as needed, generally alongside the housing element, or at least once every eight years.

So Belmont is due for an update.

Another primary requirement is that the safety element now has to look at climate change, consider how climate change will affect the frequency and intensity and severity of natural hazards, and provide some planning for that.

So that is one of the major issues that we are addressing with this update.

Another large change that we are making, or at least another significant change that we are making, is we are incorporating as appropriate the 2021 multi-jurisdictional local hazard mitigation plan.

And that is a joint effort between the county, all incorporated communities, and special districts in San Mateo County.

It's a very technical type of plan that identifies and assesses the risks from hazards and includes some short-term policies to protect against these hazards.

So it does not, it's not precisely the same as the safety element, but there is quite a bit of overlap.

So we are wanting to make sure that the safety element is in alignment with that countywide plan.

And part of why we want to do so is that when we incorporate the two, when we are able to align the two, that helps to make the city more eligible for certain grant funding, including some grant funding from FEMA.

It also makes a city eligible for increased disaster relief funding from the state, should that be necessary.

So we want to make sure the city has that opportunity.

We are being consistent with the city's emergency operations plan, which is a detailed plan for how the city will respond to emergencies, uh, how city uh staff are responding to emergencies.

And then, of course, there is a climate action and adaptation plan, which is in progress, which you'll hear more about a little later this evening.

That plan does include a lot around climate adaptation and resilience, you know, again, preparing for natural hazards that are affected by climate change.

So we want to make sure that the safety element and the CAP are in alignment and working together.

We have coordinated uh pretty extensively with One Shoreline, which is the countywide group responsible for planning and protecting against sea level rise and flooding.

Uh they have been a core part of the uh steering committee for this multi-jurisdictional regional effort.

They provide a lot of the data that underlies the sea level rise and the flooding analyses.

So they have been supporting us in helping to identify best practices and to make sure that the policies that are in the safety element around flooding, sea level rise and related hazards are really in sync with what else is happening in the county and it best aligned with the current science and practices.

They have also reviewed the draft safety element and provided comment.

Those comments are already addressed and folded into the document that's before you tonight.

This is the project schedule.

We started this about three years ago.

It has been a fairly extensive, detailed process of analyses and community engagement.

Uh, here you can see some of the key milestones.

I will stress that there's been community engagement really throughout this entire process.

I will talk more about that in a moment.

And right now we are in the public review phase, as are many of the other communities that are participating in this effort, with the idea that we will be moving forward with public hearings for these safety elements over the next few months.

Dr.

DeMelo, can I just interject really quickly?

Just I just want to put this on the record.

Um, so my office and I specifically represent one shoreline and provide legal legal counsel to one shoreline.

Um I don't think there's a conflict in the sense that the uh sounds like their comments and their input.

I did not advise them on on any of the input they provided it in this for this matter, and it does appear that what they provided has been folded into and is consistent with what is being presented, but I did want to make sure that's on the record in case questions arose later.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh with that, I will go into a little more detail about what is included in the safety element.

Uh the safety element contains a lot of information around the nature of the hazards that are present in the community, a lot of what we call the background information.

What have what these hazards are, where they occur or where they are likely to occur, how they have occurred in the past, and how they are likely to change.

You can think of this as what are the threats to Belmont.

Going along with that, there are quite a few maps in the safety element, data tables to really provide some more information.

Where are the risks, where are the vulnerabilities that are that the community is facing?

And then the sort of meat of the safety element are the goals and the policies.

You know, what will the city do about these hazards and these challenges that we've identified?

And alongside the goals and policies, there are what we call the implementation actions.

And these are the specific steps that are directing city staff to enact the goals and policies.

So they are very detailed, focused actions that city staff will be taking once a safety element is adopted to fully implement it and carry it forward.

There are some high level goals that we were keeping in mind as we were drafting the safety element, uh, both for Belmont and for the other participating communities.

Uh, first and foremost, perhaps climate adaptation and resilience, you know, responding to this idea that the hazards that have occurred in Belmont and their frequency and severity in the past is not going to be the same going forward, and that the city needs to protect itself or be protected against a set of hazards and a hazard regime that is distinct from what it has experienced in the past.

We want to make sure that the city's emergency response is effective, that it is equitable, that everybody in the community is protected, uh, including the people who are already most at risk and who have the fewest resources and maybe most harmed as a result of these hazards.

Something that we heard throughout the community engagement were concerns about infrastructure in Belmont, and frankly for that matter, most of the communities in San Mateo County.

So there was a very strong need in this to make sure that those infrastructure systems are strengthened as best they can and that they can continue to function and provide community services, not only in regular day-to-day conditions, but also as best as possible that they can function during and immediately after an emergency to provide services to those who need them.

And then we also do want to make sure we are carrying forward the desire to work together with regional partners with uh one shoreline, with the county, with the the other cities in San Mateo County, building an approach to ensure that everybody is moving in the same direction on these hazards and climate resilience as much as it makes sense for the community.

Every community does have some unique sets of considerations, unique issues, and unique challenges, but there certainly are some shared hazards, some shared uh challenges that are facing most, if not all, of the communities in San Mateo County.

Uh in Belmont, the hazards that seem to be of particular concern or the issues of particular concern were wildfire and issues around evacuation, which of course is not linked to any one particular hazard, but which could occur as a result of many of them.

There was also a relatively, I don't want to necessarily say new hazard, but a hazard of increased concern that was you know not really on the radar so much last time the safety element was prepared, and this is sea level rise and the challenge of emerging groundwater, which is linked to sea level rise.

We have gone through the safety element and done a pretty wholesale update of the policies.

We have developed a lot of new policies, uh, we've also modified existing ones, making sure that these are all consistent with community values and priorities and the requests from the community, uh responding to current challenges, and complying, of course, with state law, including the policies that we have to have in there.

There are also a number of policies in the safety element that were great when they were first written and they're still effective now.

We we don't need to change them, so we've just kept them as they are.

And then we have also added into the safety element more of those implementation actions, those specific directions for our city staff.

Uh I'll now go through what we heard at a high level from members of the public during the community engagement activities.

Uh so community engagement was conducted, as I mentioned, throughout the project in multiple phases.

Uh it involved all participating jurisdictions, and it was done through a mix of both in-person and virtual activities.

There were a series of community workshops that were held in 2024 and in 2025.

There were meetings with key stakeholders, which included some of the environmental groups, utilities, uh, the countywide service providers, and so on.

Uh we had some online maps and tools and resources that were made available.

And there was still the project website, which has been open and active throughout the project and is still available today for people to review information.

The summary, this is a very, very high-level summary of what we heard.

And there is a nearly 300-page report on community engagement that is on the project website, should you desire more detail.

But at a very high level, what we heard from the communities were that there were concerns about communication gaps during emergencies, making sure that people could get information that was timely and accurate and that they could act upon.

And this was particularly the case for community members who don't speak English.

So wanting to make sure that this information was available in multiple languages in the multiple formats.

The need for infrastructure improvements came through very strongly from the community, and they particularly identified damage to roadways, some blocked or inadequate storm drainage, and concerns about the reliability of the power systems and the grid in San Mateo County.

There was a desire from the community for more emergency preparedness, making sure that resources were available to community members, and that there was training provided to community members so that they would know what to do to prepare for an emergency and then what to do once one occurred.

In general, in general, there were concerns about flooding, sea level rise and wildfires.

And as part of that, there was uh express request for greater equitable distribution of resources, again, making sure that resources are going to the people who might need the greatest assistance or the greatest support from the city.

You can see a summary of the list there on the right.

Uh they echoed many similar concerns of the community.

Again, concerns about infrastructure were quite common and a need to make sure that members of the community had access to information, training, and resources about how to prepare for emergencies and about what to do once an emergency occurs.

Service providers also identified some barriers to uh safety and resilience that they found in San Mateo County.

This includes uh limited funding and limited staffing, a lack of key data on some hazards or lack of knowing how to make that data available to the public or to the groups that they worked with.

Uh, and some service providers also discussed needs for simplified permitting or for improved and more effective regulation around some of these hazards.

So, in addition to the improved infrastructure and the enhanced community engagement community education, we also heard from some service providers that they would like to see stronger uh interjurisdictional coordination with Belmont and with other communities on addressing adaptation and uh more specifically implementing nature-based solutions, you know, using plants and trees and other natural systems to help protect against hazards, and this was particularly the case for flooding and sea level rise and for cooling and for protection against extreme heat.

Uh so in the updated element that is before you this evening, you will see a handful of entirely new sections that are not in the adopted safety element.

This includes sections on the climate change impacts in Belmont, a section on sea level rise and the associated emergent groundwater hazard, uh severe a severe weather section, and a section on human health hazards.

There uh we have taken the existing section on seismic and geologic hazards and split it into two so we can deal with those hazards separately.

Uh we have also revised a number of the other sections that were already in there to add new information and and details uh to kind of fill out uh the amount of information that was included in the safety element, and the maps have been revised and updated throughout the element to again use the latest and greatest data sets.

Uh on the policy side, we have, as I mentioned, revised existing policies and actions and added new ones to make sure that we are being responsive to community concerns, consistent with the regional framework, and that we are doing what the state now requires of a safety element.

So there are new policy sections for sea level rise, emergent groundwater, and extreme heat, and then a number of other policies and actions have been either revised or added in the various other sections of the safety element.

We have also made some more minor updates to the conservation element because that document does include topics that are relevant to the safety element.

So in the conservation element, we have added a new section on drought hazards, and we have revised sections on climate vulnerability and the harm to wastewater infrastructure.

Then there have been some other very minor revisions just to ensure that the two documents are consistent.

And with that, I will pass it back to Adrian.

CLA, so just a few more slides, and we're almost at the end.

So what comes next?

We're going to be incorporating feedback from this ongoing public review period.

That period ends on May 14th.

So you have a little while to go.

And then finally, we hope to proceed to final uh planning commission and uh city council adoption hearings.

I'm actually just gonna scoot here and then I'll go back.

Um so we do want your input.

How do you and how can you provide it?

Definitely starting tonight, share your comments uh during our discussion period.

You can contact me uh as the project manager at the city anytime, visit the project web the county project website.

We have our own dedicated city website as well, which uh lays out all the the documents and sort of background information.

And then, of course, we have a few uh upcoming public hearings as well.

So city council will be meeting next week for their own study session.

Uh Planning Commission is going to be meeting hopefully on June 2nd to consider a recommending adoption to council, and then council will come together for their final meeting as well.

And to finish up, we just have a few questions that you might want to think about as you go through this.

Um, are the proposed goals and policies aligned with Belmont's uh priorities?

Do these policies address your safety concerns as commissioners?

And then if there's any other additional community resources that you think would support resilience in this process, you can let us know about that as well.

And finally, anything we haven't thought about, anything you want to raise with us tonight, this is a really good opportunity to discuss.

So I'll leave those questions with you and we can begin discussion.

Great.

Thank you.

Thanks.

We'll start with some commissioner questions to the extent they're already.

I I have a couple.

Through I was reading through the attachments, um attachment A.

Uh there's one policy 6.6 regarding it says require existing and planned developed located within the fire hazard severity zones to follow the code requirements in chapter 7a of the California Building Code, and require buildings to be constructed of ignition resistant materials and methods.

Uh my question is is yes, that's part of the code requirements and enforceable with building permits for new developments.

What I was curious about was the existing.

Um how does that get uh educated to uh people in the wild fire severity zones, and how is it enforced for them to do improvements to it?

Uh thank you for that.

I believe in those cases the idea would be when a existing development is up for some kind of uh redevelopment or reconstruction activities, or if there's a like an ADU or an expansion of an existing use, then some of those standards would come into play.

It's not asking people to you know go in and remodel their homes, for example.

Okay, because of the way it's written, at least in the draft form, it says require existing and planned.

So it's really just new developments.

Okay.

And is there uh is and I wasn't quite clear too for for those who are in the uh fired hazard severity zones, how do those residents get informed and educated that they are in the zones in the first place and what they can do to help prevent hazards?

Well, fortunately, since the new maps were adopted, we've been downgraded to a high of moderate fire risk.

So it's actually been a net improvement for for the community from that respect.

Um do you mean in terms of how do people know if they're in a moderate?

Yeah, for example, you know, the Calfire has all these recommendations that if you're in these zones, this is what I suggest to do, right?

And they're and they're good examples of how to you know better improve um risk of fire.

So how does that message get conveyed to those in those zones?

Uh what can the city do to help uh foster that information and help educate and and have residents do something about it.

Um thank you.

Appreciate the question, Laura Russell, Deputy Community Development Director.

Um the way that we have our responsibilities laid out with FIRE is that they take the lead in those items and they have reviewed the draft safety element and provided feedback on it.

That being said, if the commission has specific recommendations, I think, especially because Commissioner Takahashi has experience, right, and in architecture and design, we'd be very happy to receive those comments and and integrate them and review them with the fire staff.

Okay.

Okay.

And then uh attachment B, I had a question uh because I I don't know the answer.

Uh it was in regards to the storm drain lines.

Uh with and it was mentioned that Belmont has 80% clay uh pipes.

Uh what I didn't know is it is that a risk?

Because I I don't know how old they are.

And I know some of the old ones, they have problems where uh tree roots grow into it and and they become invasive to the pipes and they break and so forth.

But I wasn't clear in the report.

Is that an issue or not an issue?

Do we know?

It's not can be.

Okay.

Do you want to say uh it it certainly can be an issue?

Uh as you mentioned, the issue with the the tree roots.

There can also be some increased seismic risk uh from some of the clay pipes.

I would I would have to say that public work staff might know a little bit more about those specifics, but it in in general we want to try and disclose that sort of information when we have it.

So that's why there's that note in there.

Yeah.

So I yeah, I just didn't really know if that was a risk and a liability issue and have more attention to it or not.

Uh that's what I was just questioning because I didn't know.

Okay.

Yeah, that's all the comments I had.

Can I just ask one just one level set question?

This is my first draft safety element that I've reviewed.

Um, and um could someone just talk about um practically from a planning perspective, these policies and this plan affects our decisions, for example, you know, as a planning uh commission and the city council.

So, like how actually does this affect kind of you know planning?

If if is it simply just um I mean most of it is I is identifying certain areas, either high fire severity areas, high flood risk areas.

So if someone could just talk about just like I don't know, uh safety element 101, like how this actually works with kind of planning.

Well, when we go through project review, we have to make sure um our major projects have general plan conformancy.

And so we do take a look at that.

We don't we look at the different elements and look at the different policies and make sure that a given project is in conformance with those policies.

So it does actually come into real world play.

It's not just like you know, an element that we put on the shelf and kind of forget about.

It really does matter.

So that's from the planning perspective.

That's how we often interact with it when us planners are doing project review.

Great.

That's super helpful.

Thank you.

Um to build on that, so in a current planning perspective, we're gonna check for general plan consistency, then um the safety element will normally have a number of actions that help us to guide future policy development.

So areas that we identify, oh, this is something we should study uh more in the future.

So that's part of our general plan implementation to look at those actions and implement them in the future.

Um and then the other way we look at it is the maps become important, like they're general plan maps, right?

So we may refer to them for other studies or other analysis or potentially for SEQA analysis in the future.

Great.

Thank you.

And then you you explained uh that's that's comment.

But I guess you explained also there's a benefit or um one of the other purposes is to the extent we have a compliant safety element that helps with FEMA funding and kind of responses to emergencies and things and things like that.

So in addition to the the planning benefits, it sounds like that's also a practical uh thing that it does.

Uh okay, thank you.

So we all kind of understood kind of why we were kind of doing this.

No, that's a good question.

Thank you.

Cool.

Thank you.

I I think it's a question.

Um I was very glad to see that we uh cooperated with our neighbors in the county.

It's obviously earthquakes and things don't know what the borders are.

Um it seems very efficient.

But uh we have our own building department, we have our own police department.

We share our fire and rescue with several other communities.

It didn't seem to line up exactly with uh the the perp crew and the and emergency medical services is countywide.

Was it addressed how that stuff gets prioritized in the um disaster scenario or coordinated?

So I appreciate that question.

Uh it is true that not every community in San Mateo County participated in this, including not all of Belmont's neighbors.

Uh however, uh fire and the countywide agencies have reviewed the safety elements.

Uh they have made sure that it's consistent with their approach and with their framework.

Uh so even though yes, San Carlos, for example, is not participating, even though City of San Mateo is not participating, uh, we are still in alignment with kind of the overall uh countywide effort.

Uh and hopefully when as those uh other agencies, as they go through their own safety element updates, they will also uh work with the county and with participating jurisdictions to all be in alignment.

So we're all hopefully moving in the same direction, even if people are going at slightly different speeds.

Is there a consideration of of of pooling resources across those communities?

For instance, in an earthquake could be great if we could borrow building inspectors, red tag buildings and have nine times available as opposed to just our own.

Absolutely.

And a lot of those frameworks are already in place.

They're already uh countywide and region wide, uh, and even statewide, uh, what are called mutual aid agreements.

And so as the need for resources becomes available, uh San Mateo County, through their emergency management group, will coordinate that effort uh within the county, and then if there's a need for resources from with outside the county, there are divisions of the state office of emergency services that can provide that assistance.

So we have also made sure to be consistent with that.

And as you heard from Adrian, uh the safety element has been submitted to the State Office of Emergency Services for their review as well.

Thank you.

I don't have any questions, but I have comments when we're there.

Okay.

Um I mean it's a it's a study session, but I mean I guess we can have public comment first, and then we can chime in thereafter.

Okay.

Yeah.

Um I think we can probably um take public comment at this point, unless there's any follow-up questions.

Okay.

Um first see if anyone in chambers has any uh in-person comments.

Um I've not received any uh public speaker slips for in-house.

Um as well, no raised hands on Zoom for this item.

Anything, Director De Mello, uh, we received in writing by 4 p.m.

today.

Uh no, but you have a comment for your next item.

I saw that.

Thank you.

Okay.

Okay, well, uh back to you then.

Okay.

Um I guess uh I I like a lot of what's in here.

I appreciate a lot of good work.

It's nice to meet you and thank you for joining our team.

Um good report.

It's good to get this uh into the public record.

Um in my personal experience uh in design and being from a rural area that dealt with wildfire and also talking to a lot of people in the community about their concerns for our community.

Um I think wildfire, the impact of regional wildfire smoke, um, having places where people could go who maybe don't have like uh like the kids get sent home from schools a lot of times because the air isn't good in the school necessarily.

Well, if you're getting sent home to a home that also doesn't have good air and you don't have a place to go, that that's probably bad.

And I think that's something that we should be planning for for those sorts of kind of regular regional impacts that seem to I don't know, it doesn't seem like we have a solution to not have them yet.

So I think that's something that we should definitely be thinking about.

Um I think in tandem with that is thinking about wildfire in our community.

Um and I think that directly applies to two things you brought up uh in terms of is getting worse because of climate change, but also uh public utilities was a top concern in your survey.

And I think that probably the main one is electrical utilities and their contribution to wildfires.

And I think that's something that we should be thinking about very seriously.

I think undergrounding utilities makes them more resilient in just about every uh serious event, earthquakes.

It's just a more resilient system.

But in these events like wildfire, if the uh utilities are now cutting off your power, then you lose your heating, you lose your filtration of your air, all the different things.

And it kind of hits all at once.

And that's what we found out during our last wildfire smoke sessions.

Um we don't have a resilient grid right now during an event.

And I think that's a top concern of our community.

And we I think the community would like action taken on that.

That's my comment.

But great.

Thank you for all the other amazing stuff in there and the work on that that is in there.

So thank you.

Gentlemen, you want to any further comments?

No, thank you.

A lot of good hard work.

Um I feel safer knowing that it was done, but I don't have much to add to it.

Thank you.

Yeah, I'll just add, I mean, you know, I think that this idea of you know multi-jurisdictional collaboration is is critical.

To your point, I mean, the event center is a community resilience center.

So it it's it's uh an evacuation center, it's a cooling facility, it can be a haven for kind of these, you know, high smoke situations.

So I think you know, being more um kind of obviously aware of these resources that we have that we're sharing with our our partners and letting folks know in the public that these things exist, I think is is super important.

Um I guess to answer your third bullet there.

Um and then like I mean, this is for me like the essence of of government, right?

It's like we are kind of on a routine basis trying to find out today where where our biggest threats are.

You know, eight years ago, these weren't threats, or they were, but they weren't as significant.

And so um, you know, obviously this is required by state law, and obviously it's gonna, you know, it's folded into our general plan, and there's benefits we get from doing it, but just I feel like it's it's it's obviously very important, and it's and it's pretty neat because this is what government is here to do, right?

Identify these issues, adapt to these issues to the extent we can, and figure out policies and and solutions to these problems that are like existential.

Um so I think that's super cool, and uh I appreciate all the hard work that you all have put into it, and and uh it's a looks like a really good product, so thank you.

I guess that then, unless there's anything further from staff, anything you anything else you need from us that concludes this item.

I think we're good.

I mean, yeah, I think we're fine.

Thanks for your feedback tonight on this item.

That we bring to the council.

And again, thank you for the presentation.

Thank you, Adrian.

Thank you, everyone.

Thank you, Eli.

Great, thanks.

Oh, can I ask what sorry?

I I it's it's a thing, so I can keep going.

Um what have we done about these issues of um kind of language accessibility and um and the concerns raised about how we actually uh conduct outreach to uh folks who don't have reliable access to cell service that don't speak English you know fluently.

Like what have we done along those lines to kind of address those concerns, which I think are obviously important um when a grid shuts down and things like that.

So yeah, it is quite critical.

So there are policies in the safety element that direct the city to make sure that those notifications are available in multiple languages uh in languages other than English that are spoken in Belmont, and also to make sure that it is distributed in means that are accessible to people with different access and functional needs and through different media, be it uh online, television, radio, uh various other systems.

Uh as to what the city is doing right now, uh I would I guess have to defer to city staff, but I do know that there are uh this is something that the county is looking at pretty holistically, and they are updating uh and making sure that their alert system is able to accommodate this.

Uh so this is not just a unique issue to Belmont, but it's something that the entire county uh is trying to work together on.

Thank you.

And I'm happy to opine on that also.

So um Kathy Kleinbaum, Assistant City Manager.

So the city for the last year and a half or so has had an on-call translation service that's available that we can um take advantage of, both for translating written materials as well as for taking in phone calls or answering inquiries that come in in other languages.

And that service is available in 30 plus languages.

Although, for the most part, the language that we use the most is Spanish translation in this community.

Cool.

Thank you.

Okie dokie.

We are now on to uh item 6B, which is our climate action and adaptation plan, draft measures and actions review.

Again, I can't think of why this would be a thing, but I'll just ask if there's any uh next party party communications or kind of basis for recusal.

None for me.

Can't think of any.

And none for me.

So thank you.

All right.

I am going to get us started here remotely and then turn it over to the folks in council chambers.

Good evening, commissioners.

Uh we are joining you tonight to discuss the climate action and adaptation plan update.

Next slide.

We'll be kicking off tonight with a project overview and the baseline conditions, forecasts, and targets for greenhouse gas emissions here in Belmont.

Then we'll transition to some new content since we last met with you and talk about the shared roles in climate action between the state, city, and community.

And then we'll go over our measures and actions at a high level, including how they're structured into these four buckets you see here.

And we'll wrap up with a summary of the community outreach that we've done so far in our next steps.

Our team for this project includes Kathy Kleinbaum, our assistant city manager, myself, my name is Karen Clark.

I'm with the City of Belmont and am the manager for this particular project, and Jeremy Ruiz from Community Development is also joining us on this project.

We've also brought in RingCon Consultants for technical support in this update.

And we're primarily working with Ryan Gardner and Olivia Mendoza.

So I will turn the presentation now over to Ms.

Mendoza.

Good evening.

Can you hear me?

Hello.

Um good evening, commissioners.

Uh happy to be here tonight.

I'm Olivia Mendoza.

Um, just to give a little overview of what is a climate action and adaptation plan.

This is really the strategy on how Belmont plans to address climate change in the city.

And there's two major pieces to this.

We have mitigation, and on that side, it's how are we reducing greenhouse gas emissions?

And on the other side, there's adaptation.

So we know the climate is changing.

We're already seeing those impacts, and we know they're going to get worse.

So now we need to adapt and plan for those changes.

So this plan builds on the 2017 climate action plan that the city adopted.

And there's been sizable improvements since that plan.

Um it's currently being updated now with new data, current best practices, and incorporating adaptation.

So the first plan was only focused on the mitigation side.

This plan will do both.

Um we're also updating targets to align with current state legislation, such as SB 32, which is for the state to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 40% below 1990 levels by 2030.

Um, and then the longer term target of AB 1279, which is to reach carbon neutrality by 2045.

And by aligning with state targets, you bit you um become more competitive for things like state funding.

So we kicked off the CAP in March of 2025 and then completed the forecasts and targets over the summer.

We conducted the first round of community engagement in September, as well as introduced the project to you all in city council.

Um, based on the inventory, the forecasts, and the targets, as well as the community engagement.

We began drafting the measures and actions relevant to Belmont.

We reviewed the measures and actions with relevant city departments and made revisions based on their applicability to the city.

We then did a brief measure quantification to understand which strategies get us the highest emissions reductions in Belmont.

Next, we conducted our second round of community engagement to get feedback on the drafted measures and actions.

And then finally, today we're here with you all to review the drafted measures and actions and make refinements before drafting the CAP in preparation for adoption in the fall.

And a quick note that this presentation mostly focuses on the mitigation side as we aligned the adaptation side with the safety element, which you just saw.

So on the mitigation side, here is the pie chart of emissions and where they come from within Belmont.

And right away you can see the two biggest emission sources are transportation and natural gas.

And this is pretty standard throughout California, with one major noticeable difference of carbon-free electricity from peninsula clean energy.

So you can see electricity only represents about 1% of emissions.

In places that still use PGE and other sources, you'll see more of a split between natural gas and electricity.

So this is an important note that since your electricity is so clean, if you can convert something from natural gas to electricity, those emissions essentially go to zero, and it's a really easy way to decarbonize.

So after looking at the current and historic emissions, we did three forecasts.

So we did the business as usual.

And that's if you take the average person's emissions and grow them at the general plan in RENA growth numbers, you can see that's that blue line, and it sort of just continues going up as more people move into the city.

And then there's that legislative or adjusted forecast, and that's that red line.

And it accounts for state legislation.

And you can see it offsets most of the population growth, but still trends upwards towards 2045.

And then there's that target pathway, so the green line.

So the gap between the adjusted forecasts and the target pathway is really what we're trying to close with the measures and actions you'll see today.

So this slide explains how climate action actually works on a local scale in California.

And there's three main roles here.

There's the state, which sets the roles of the road.

Sorry.

They establish the greenhouse gas emission reduction targets, they set bid building codes like Title 24, they require zero emission vehicle sales, and they mandate organic waste diversion targets such as SB 1383.

They also provide funding and rebate programs that make local action more affordable.

And then there's the city, and Belmont sort of works within this framework to implement and accelerate solutions locally.

Things like adopting building and development standards, improving infrastructure for electric vehicles, bikes, and pedestrians, and expanding composting programs and running outreach and incentive programs.

And then there's the community.

So the decisions made by residents and businesses, whether to upgrade electric appliances, choosing how to get around sustainably, composting food scraps, so these individual choices that really help move the needle on the greenhouse gas reductions.

So before we get into specific strategies, it helps to understand how the measures and actions are organized.

So this plan is built around three levels.

On the top is the systems, which is how everything is grouped and can sort of be thought of as the chapters of the plan.

So because we're talking about mitigation and adaptation together, the systems cover both of those.

And there's four main systems.

We have healthy and resilient buildings, mobility, electric vehicles, and urban ecosystems.

And together they cover the main sources of emissions and climate risks within the city.

And then there's the measures, and those are the broad goals and outcomes we're trying to achieve.

So today we'll share some of the top few measures from each system.

And underneath measures, there's actions.

So those are specific strategies led by either the city or community that supports each measure, and we'll also share a few of these.

Buildings are major infrastructure in Belmont, so it's important that we make them more efficient and resilient.

This system focuses on reducing natural gas consumption and shifting to electric systems.

And the same upgrades make homes more comfortable during heat waves and outages as the climate continues to change.

So to hit the 2030 target here, we're focusing on three high impact measures which reduce cumulatively 12,000 metric tons of CO2.

The first is cutting natural gas in existing buildings by 18%.

The second is leveraging Peninsula Clean Energy's carbon-free electricity.

And the third is targeting 90% all electric new construction.

So specific strategies for buildings that the city and community need to focus on within that get us the highest greenhouse gas reduction is implementing the 2025 Title 24 building energy efficiency standards and updating local codes to ensure that 90% of all new construction is electric.

Supporting the implementation of Bay Area District Rules 9.4 and 9.6 to ensure that all new and replacement space and water heaters meet zero NOx standards.

So zero NOx standards advance all electric solutions to improve air quality, public health, and climate outcomes.

Next is evaluating the feasibility of adopting a non-residential AC to heat pump ordinance to increase energy efficiency and reduce emissions in new construction.

Next is working to identify grants and other funding sources to support the development and implementation of heat pumps space heating rebates for existing buildings.

So that's on the city side.

For community actions, residents should be choosing all electric appliances and new homes in major reservations, and replacing aging gas furnaces, water heaters, and ACE units with high efficiency heat pump systems.

So next is the mobility system.

So on the greenhouse gas reduction side, the goal is to reduce vehicle miles traveled by supporting active transportation and public transportation.

On the adaptation side, it's ensuring that public transportation is feasible and comfortable during extreme heat events.

So the top measures here is increasing public transit mode share from 4.4% to 7% by 2030, which gets about 3,000 metric tons of CO2 reduced by 2030.

And the next is increasing active transportation from 0.5 to 1.5% by 2030, which gets about 100 metric tons of CO2 reduced by 2030.

So on the city side, the focus here is on making biking and transit safer and more reliable.

So doing things like converting high stress roadways into safer bikeways, like adding signage and lighting, and partnering with Caltrain and SAMTRANs to improve service and connections.

There's also an action to upgrade bus stops with shade and seating features for extreme heat events.

On the community side, it's about behavioral shifts.

So things like choosing to bike to work once a week and using SAM trans for school commutes instead of driving.

Next, we have the electric vehicle system, which is the main goal here is to replace internal combustion engine vehicles to zero emission vehicles, which supports cleaner air and grid resilience.

So currently, Belmont's at 12% passenger electric vehicles in 2023, which is one of the highest we've seen in cities throughout California, which is great.

It shows the ability for Belmont to really make this switch.

And that helps get about 9,000 metric tons of CO2 reduced by 2030.

Currently, there are at or Belmont's at about 70 publicly accessible EV chargers.

So on the city side, like I said, the focus is on scaling up electrification, adding those 200 chargers, strengthening EV requirements in new developments, and phasing out small gas-powered city lawn equipment starting in 2027.

On the community side, it's about making the switch to electric vehicles and replacing your own gas-powered lawn equipment with electric equipment and taking advantage of rebates along the way.

And then lastly, we have the urban ecosystem, which is focused on reducing organic waste sent to landfills and increasing carbon sequestration.

These strategies also help reduce extreme heat and support soil health through tree plantings.

So the biggest one here is reducing organic waste to landfills by 75% below 2014 levels, which gets about 3,000 metric tons of CO2 reduced, and achieving procurement requirements and planting new trees cumulatively gets about 650 metric tons of CO2 reduced together.

So on the city side, it's reviewing and updating as needed the city's waste taller franchise agreement with Recology to promote alignment with SB 1383, and including a dedicated fee to fund staff oversight on organic waste programs and compliance, and also supporting public education on proper sorting and composting.

Also, the city plans to plant and maintain 125 trees per year through 2030 in all Belmont parks and properties.

So those were the top drafted measures and actions.

Moving on to community engagement.

Throughout the entire CAP development process, there have been several touch points with the community, including a dedicated project website, two community surveys, two workshops, three pop-ups, and outreach to key community organizations.

So phase one of outreach, which was conducted in fall of 2025, was really used to raise awareness of the CAP update and understand key community priorities.

So themes we heard here, the top climate hazard concern we saw was 75% of people concerned about wildfire.

Next was air quality and smoke at 51%, followed by drought at 50%.

There was also strong interest in healthy and resilient buildings, especially around incentives, clear guidance, and learning more from others.

And lastly, food waste stood out with 80% of respondents willing to compost and reduce waste.

And then phase two of outreach was conducted through winter starting in winter through spring of 2026 and was used to solicit feedback on the drafted measures and actions you saw today.

So after the meeting today and with city council next week, we'll plan to incorporate all of the comments we heard throughout our outreach.

So for healthy and resilient buildings, we saw a strong interest in electrification with 62% of respondents open to installing solar or battery, with financial incentives cited by 73% as the biggest motivator here.

Survey respondents, they said that transportation behavior they were favored transportation behavior changes with minimal cost or incentives, particularly combining errands into a single trip and choosing businesses that were close enough to walk or bike to.

Many respondents, 56% of them were interested in purchasing or leasing an electric vehicle with financial incentives as the primary motivator.

And then workshop participants emphasize that upfront costs remains a major barrier to EV adoption.

For urban ecosystems, we saw a high willingness to act.

84% of respondents are willing to separate organic waste, but people want clear guidance on composting and recycling practices.

So overall, we saw a few clear themes here.

Number one is that cost is the biggest barrier, especially for building upgrades and EV adoption.

At the same time, people are very interested, but want simple and practical guidance on what to do and how to do it.

We also heard that infrastructure gaps are limiting behavior change.

So there's an interest in walking and biking, but safety and convenience need to be improved.

Another key theme is that hands-on support matters.

So people want help navigating programs, finding contractors, and actually implementing their projects.

But on a positive note, many sustainable behaviors are already happening in Belmont, especially around waste and EV adoption.

So the next steps after today's meeting and next week with City Council, we plan to update and refine the measures and actions from all the feedback we've gotten.

Also finishing the measure quantification on the measures and actions and then comparing them against our set targets.

And then we'll begin to draft the plan and make it available for public feedback before we bring it back here in the fall.

Thank you.

Are we doing questions?

Yes, I think we should do questions.

All right.

Good questions.

I'd love to ask some questions.

So uh it seems like our our stated goals are not trying to fill the gap to make it to the 2045 goal.

Not even not even like a third of the way to that goal.

Like if we do all the things we claim that we want to do in this, it looked like we were gonna cut about a third of what you'd need to cut to get to the 2045 goal.

Is that correct?

Are you talking about the red line?

Well, we're currently at the red line, right?

That's with uh adopted state legislation.

Okay.

And then we are also proposing additional things on top of that, is that right?

Yeah.

And it looked like those additional things definitely don't head us towards the 2045 goal for sure.

Am I correct about that?

We what we covered in the presentation were the 2030 targets.

So we didn't hit on what percentages those would need to be at for 2045.

Um, but like, you know, like like the things, the emission things you were doing for gas, like gas is 38% of the problem, right?

And if we did the things we're talking about right now, we're gonna take a little chunk out of gas.

But if you wanted gas to be a zero problem by 2045, there's absolutely no way to get that without essentially having a program to replace everyone's furnace before 2045.

And we're clearly not doing anything even close to that.

So we are definitely not trying to reach the 2045 goal.

Am I clear?

Yes.

I would say we're we're and same thing with cars like transportation by auto.

We have a goal of 30 percent.

That is basically hoping people buy cars.

Yeah, I think the key here, the c I think you're um sort of on the right track, but I want to one caveat is that the strategies in this plan are the same strategies that will get you to carbon neutrality, right?

Like the answer to decarbonizing buildings is electrification, and the answer to decarbonizing transportation are electric vehicles and VMT reduction.

Absolutely.

So the measures and strategies are there.

I think what would need to continue to happen is maybe additional actions.

Um, but making sure that people are replacing these pieces of equipment as they fail is the most cost-effective way that we can work.

We're not technically requiring that, right?

Like in existing homes, if someone has an existing gas furnace, not a report.

There is no requirement to do that.

So tomorrow, my gas furnace could well, I already replaced mine with electric.

Um, yeah, no, and I do believe in this stuff.

I want to start by saying that I really like the goal, but um it's very clear we're not trying to make the 2045 goal with the goals we're stating today.

Yeah, add a little color to that too.

And so, you know, there's a lot that changes.

Um since 2017, when we adopted the last version of the CAP, so much has changed in technology, in state law.

This is not the kind of document like a general plan where you can adopt a 20-year plan for climate mitigation, right?

So this CAP will be good for the next five to 10 years, and then we're gonna need to look at updating it again.

So you could you could say if we wanted to meet a goal that's happening by 2045, there's no way of doing it without doing certain things in the next five years, which we have we are not requiring.

It it's a really challenging situation because um I don't know that any city I'm not saying it's possible.

I just want to be clear.

And I and I think that's what we're doing.

You're absolutely right, and it's not possible in this climate action plan, and I don't know that any city is really able to achieve that, especially um there's been recent state law, for example, that limits the ability to adopt um any sort of local amendments to the building code that relate to housing.

So, for example, a lot of cities were considering amendments to the building code to really push existing housing through renovations to be more electric, and the state is now outlawed that possibility.

Yeah.

I'll just add on to that that there is um a Bay Area Air District rule that is moving forward right now that would require all residentially sized systems, uh gas furnaces to be replaced with a zero NOx alternative in 2027, or sorry, 2029 for furnaces, 2027 for water heaters.

Um so if that rule does continue to move forward, which it does appear to be moving that direction, that would be a regulatory requirement for the phase out of those gas appliances.

So there are some things in here that are moving this ahead in in a substantial way.

Um and then the other pieces when we talked about kind of those three rules and our three roles in what the state and the city and community can do.

Um, as Kathy's talking about, there are some limits to like regulatory requirements that the city can pass.

Um the community actions that we're gonna include with this plan, if people were to follow those, that would result in a carbon neutrality for like those households, right?

So I think again, like the pieces are here, it's gonna be kind of that iterative process over the next 20 years on how we actually move towards that carbon neutrality goal.

Yeah, on some of the items that Ryan was mentioning about, you know, we we can't directly do it, we can't directly make the decisions, but we can certainly educate folks and make it easier for folks and provide those resources that are also being um promote those resources that are being provided by community partners.

So um also on some of the some of the items um like we were talking about the reach codes for a moment there.

There are certainly some actions in here.

There are at least three that um are to evaluate feasibility.

So even though we have some challenges right now in state law, we can certainly evaluate the feasibility of certain reach codes, which would either incentivize or require certain electric upgrades.

Yeah, and also there's you know, the City of Berkeley decision with the Ninth Circuit said that we cannot under REACH codes require in certain circumstances in certain ways, commercial um electrification.

So obviously that there are things that are beyond our control that we have to contend with, um, which kind of brings me to my question, which is um, you know, with the draft uh safety element we talked about um you know the fact that disasters don't recognize jurisdictional boundaries, climate change, I imagine is the same.

And so what have we done to work with coordinate with our neighbors, the county um regionally um to ensure that the things we're doing are consistent with the things that others are doing because I drive through San Carlos every day uh in my non-electric vehicle.

Um so I'm contributing to climate change and pollution, not just in Belmont, but obviously up and down El Comuna Real.

So what are we doing to kind of make sure people like me behave better at a regional level?

One of the one of the things that the city does participate is these monthly meetings with the county RICAPS program, which Rincon here is very familiar with.

They are contracted with the county to facilitate those meetings or contribute to the meetings.

And that's a place for different cities throughout the county to get together to send a representative from their city and find out what's going in the county, if there are joint grant applications or new incentives that we should be promoting.

So that's one way we're coordinating.

Yeah, and I was I was gonna talk about the RICAPS program as as well.

Um and a lot of the tools that we used to help with the climate action plan for Belmont came through that RICAPS program.

And in that program, we're working with CCAG and we're working with PCE and other regional stakeholders to kind of come up with some of these strategies.

And in our measures, a lot of what we're pointing at is you know, Peninsula Clean Energy Electrification Concierge Program and their incentives and CCAGs programs to reduce VMT and the um boulevard initiative.

So like these kind of regional approaches are kind of pretty well baked into this, and a lot of it is because there is such a strong uh coordinated effort in San Mateo County.

Thank you.

Any additional questions?

I do.

Great.

Um as Kais mentioned before, I am an architect, and uh we're at the forefront of fighting the climate change and electrification and so forth.

Um so this is very near and dear to me.

So a lot of the uh reading through the draft measures and actions.

Uh there's a lot of comments about you know providing guidance and you know encouraging uh citizens.

I'm kind of curious, how are we educating and how are we providing that information to residents so they're more informed?

Uh, because for even ourselves, even within the architecture community, uh I've had to do seminars just to educate our our own architects on how to do it.

And the normal citizen are even further less educated.

So, how are we how are we educating our citizens to be to first know what is the problem and what to do about it, right?

Um, so that to me was the biggest thing, and uh I'm not sure what our policy wants to be to help educate.

That's yeah, so there aren't um there are a number of measure um actions in this plan that do address that.

Um, and sometimes, as we mentioned, to get the needle to move.

One of the best things the city can do is educate people in the community about making those decisions.

Um so there are a lot of ways that the city gets out information currently through our weekly e-newsletter, through our social media channels, um, through flyers on park bulletin boards, um, announcements at city council meetings.

Um we certainly would be looking to get this out in a number of different formats, and it would depend on the sort of information that we're getting out as well.

Um, we're talking at targeting certain types of businesses and making sure they're aware of the resources that are available to them, even if they're not directly provided by the city.

Okay.

And I just to add a bit to that, I think going back to the regional approach, there are also some really great efforts going on regionally to educate folks about electrification.

Um the county did a really great marketing campaign around health and safety and electrification, Peninsula Clean Energy is doing a lot of work.

Um I think there still needs to be quite a bit of work done around some of the costs and and assumptions about costs and how much this work actually costs.

Um there's some confusion both on the good side and the bad side about like how how all this actually works and how it pencils out.

Um but because of Peninsula Clean Energy in a lot of cases, there are quite a few incentives still in this region, um, even as some of the federal ones have gone away.

Um and with electricity costs um that you pay for PC, the on bill actually works out really well as well.

Um so those are some of the things that I think we need to do, uh continue to do a better job of getting that information out.

Okay.

Um and then there's a couple of I items where it has uh ask builders and contractors about electric, all electric design options and so forth.

And I I would be an architect, I would add architects, engineers, uh, especially sustainably focused architects, engineers, and contractors.

So I would want to add on to that.

Let's see.

Okay.

Some of the other things that I would suggest, at least for city developments, uh, to consider that the city does all electric themselves and hit lead targets.

Uh lead being the key indicator program that measures sustainability.

So I would suggest that you know the city at least make targets for themselves for that.

Um I would also suggest that uh perhaps they it's the city themselves, like use green seal products uh within their own operations to be more green.

Um I'd also like because some of the other cities in the county just try to interrupt, yeah.

I I think it is fair that these are kind of these are obviously comments, not questions.

Um and again, we have a little more, I think flexibility because this is a study session as opposed to uh a public hearing item.

Um but um maybe just if if there are additional questions that you have, we can focus on those first and then we could turn to public comment and then kind of dive back into your uh your your comments, which are super helpful, but just to make sure that we're kind of you know operating at the right um in the right way.

Okay.

Um yeah, I mean if you want to follow back, we can have any more questions before we turn to public comment.

Yeah, mine are all other comments about policy that could be added so far.

Cool.

Okay.

I am good for questions.

Thank you.

I'm good for questions.

Okay, with that, maybe let's um then see if we have uh any uh public comment on this item uh 6B.

Uh and we'll see first if there's public comment in chambers.

Um I have not received any speaker slips in-house.

Anyone on Zoom wishing to comment on this item?

No raise hands on Zoom for this item.

And we did receive one uh public comment um that was um sent earlier in uh I guess last week rather.

Um Saturday.

Yeah.

So which has been provided to us that will be available for the public.

Uh any additional public comment that came in by four o'clock today.

We have received no other comments on this agenda item.

Okay.

Okay.

Well, that concludes public comment, and we bring it right back to your uh your comments and and uh about the policy improvements.

Um for bearing with me on that.

No problem.

Can I?

These are great them coming.

Can I jump in on a comment?

Um I've been a lead accredited professional since 2004.

I would strongly recommend not incorporating LEED into our building requirements.

I'd rather I'd rather see us use the highest level of the green building code and not introduce a private.

You know, I think the building council will lost their way a few years ago.

Um it gets very, very expensive for a commercial building to incorporate it.

So people start doing lead equivalent, blah, blah, blah.

So just thought I'd put that out there.

Uh my experience is achieving lead doesn't necessarily have to cost.

Um sometimes just part of your development, just the hit building to building codes here in the California, it's pretty easy to hit at least lead certified.

Um doing the highest tier on green building code, uh that's actually can get pretty expensive too.

So uh Right, but it doesn't surrender the the city function to a quasi-government agency that changes things.

And also it's kind of impossible because you have to go back and do some auditing a year later.

So it gets very difficult.

Um I I would say that it can work.

Actually, most of the buildings that I do as an architect are lead.

Actually, I have very few that aren't.

Right, but it's not required by the city.

Correct.

But in terms of trying to promote better sustainability, it's achievable, and it's something I at least would suggest.

Sounds like the cat the city should practice what it preaches.

And whether it's lead or whether it's the green building code that we should um aspire to have uh you know environmentally conscious uh buildings if we're gonna ask our citizens to do the same thing, which I think is what you're both saying.

Yeah.

Heard, thank you.

And um, I will say we've been working on upgrades in our existing facilities and those considerations, not lead, but um certainly environmental uh considerations have been incorporated into the future design of Barrett Community Center.

Okay, great.

Um in regards to sidewalks, um I think it'd be good for you know, because Belmont has a lot of streets that don't even have sidewalks uh to to promote people and to be able to walk and safely uh like to consider if there's like when improvements are made for streets and such that you know we at least consider adding sidewalks to make the city more walkable.

Um and for safety, um, because I I used to be a runner that used to run down Ralston all the time.

Um I know where every single crack and and unevenness there is.

Um so I would promote um looking at and helping property owners understand where they should be able to uh repair sidewalks were not compliant with ADA regulations.

Um for people who are visually impaired, that's pretty significant safety issue.

Uh just walking, walking here.

I there's you know, there's a lot of broken sidewalks and so forth.

So I think that would be good.

And I know the county of San Mateo is currently going through that where they're identifying sidewalks in their jurisdiction and helping identify pri the property owners of issues so they can repair it.

So I throw that out as a suggestion.

Um, the city auditing or the resident understanding both.

Okay.

Thank you.

Um also I'm I'm a proponent of having uh more of a downtown environment.

Um, because I believe in you know, as a more sustainable way, you know, you have you know, you you have your restaurants and your entertainment where you work, and so uh Belmont doesn't have much of a downtown.

Um so you know, a lot of people they they go to San Carlos, Redwood City, San Mateo, but not here in so much in Belmont.

Um so trying to incentivize more, um, maybe by zoning, trying to create more of a downtown environment would be better.

Um also wonder if there's suggestions about or thought about banning gas leaf blowers.

Umbeit the state has already banned the sale of it, doesn't mean you can't stop using it, but a lot of cities already are incentivizing residents to switch to battery and providing actual um in financial incentives to switch over.

Um San Carlos is doing that, San Mateo is doing that.

I think Berlin Games doing that.

So throw that out that maybe Belmont could do the same thing.

Um just also somewhat in line with the encouragement of and educating uh citizens.

I know like some of the cities have more dedicated uh people or departments and sustainability.

Um like San Carlos has a dedicated person.

I think Redwood City has one.

Um I think San Mateo actually has a whole committee uh for sustainability.

Um and maybe some Belmont could do something similar to help promote better for sustainable practices and be a point of source for citizens to help guide them.

Okay.

So uh those are my comments.

Great.

Thank you.

I have a couple of thoughts.

Um by all means, sure then.

Uh so it encouraging uh using organic waste.

I think this is still true, but Palo Alto at least used to um not allow any garbage disposers, including in commercial installations, which is super irritating.

But now that we have a pretty good infrastructure for composting, it would be possible here.

And something that anyway, it's something to consider.

Another thing, when I uh bought our elect first electric car, we put in a level one charger, and I got two quotes.

One to put it in, $500 to put it in with a permit a thousand dollars.

And um, you know, it's only half days work, and getting it permitted is another half day's work.

So if we could figure out a way to expedite that would help because I think charging at home is still gonna be the biggest hurdle.

Um my observation when I I was a contractor at an estimator.

In new construction, going all electric tends to pay for itself because you don't have to pay for the new utility cost for the gas.

And that's something that the city can encourage by making it expensive.

Um but the big challenge in all this is I haven't looked at the latest, but a few years ago, the of the top ten most expensive metro areas to build in the country, three of them were Oakland, San Jose, and San Francisco.

And uh San Mateo can actually be more expensive than those because there are anybody.

So a lot of these things are great, but undergrounding electric and replacing all the all the clay pipes and um having somebody come to your house and swap out an obviously inferior 1965 uh uh furnace with a uh a heat pump makes all the sense in the world, except you gotta pay somebody $300 an hour to do the work if you can find them.

So my comments.

Great.

Thank you.

Yeah, I'm sorry.

I want to kind of yeah, add a bit of nuance to what you were just saying.

And I I think that um in California and in many liberal places, we have a tendency to add really positive environmental regulations to the point of creating unaffordable housing.

And you know when I install a heat pump hot water heater for people, it costs a minimum of double what a normal hot water heater costs.

And it's hard to ask the average citizen to pay double for an appliance.

And they don't last as long, unfortunately.

They're more complicated, they have more sensors.

Um we're doing that to a lot of pieces of houses.

And the only place we're actually requiring it is in new construction, where it actually has the least impact.

Um where if we were gonna take California's money and try to have a big environmental impact, we'd be trying to provide really sensible renovations to the old housing stock.

So I I agree with Kramer's point that we can go straight to hell with good intentions.

Um we're right there with housing costs in our area, and it's hard to say it's positive to add any housing cost, if anything, I'm for simplifying.

Um it's not to say I don't think we should encourage people.

I think when people can afford it, we absolutely should.

But to deny someone housing to make the house more affordable uh environmental uh hurts my soul a little bit also.

Thank you.

Yeah, and I'll we'll be sure to bleep out your your own.

I don't think that's a word on that isn't said in the kidding.

I'm giving we are live, so um yeah, I appreciate everyone's comments and I and thank you for the presentation.

Um, I mean, I think I agree with what everyone says, but I mean what it comes down to is so much of it is responsible citizens.

And like we can create the right incentives and and we can do all we can do at the local level, but gosh, some so much of it is out of our control from a regulatory perspective.

I mean, it's depends on who's in the White House, depends on which judges are on the Ninth Circuit, and depends what the governor and the legislature are doing in the state, and all we can do is the best we can do with what we have.

And so I think that creating the right incentives and in particular educating our our citizens about kind of ways they can be good citizens and do the right thing, um is is really kind of the best we can do, right?

I mean, we all live here for a reason.

Um it's not it's beautiful, and you know, there's there's I think people here who want to be good people, so anyway.

Um go ahead, one more comment.

Yeah, please.

Uh uh I I'm not a runner, but I I walk my dog a lot, and um uh when you do have a sidewalk, people tend to park on them and build on it.

And when we get uh new houses proposed, um people come out and speak about their fear of evacuation that if you add five houses at the end of this lane, then we won't be able to get out the next time there's a wildfire.

And this wouldn't be very popular.

But if we had more red curves and uh didn't enforce not letting people build walls and fences in the public right-of-way where people might step off the street when they think they're gonna get run over as two cars pass on our 20 foot wide streets, um, it would be safer evacuation wise, pedestrian-wise, and you might be able to get people to walk and run more.

Okay.

Well, thank you.

Um everyone up here for your helpful comments, and thank you to staff for the presentation.

Is there anything else you want to add or anything else you need from us at this point?

No, not at this time, but we do have um these draft measures and actions um up on the website for anyone from the public who would like to review them through April 30th.

We will also be presenting this information to the city council next Tuesday, the 28th.

Great.

An opportunity for folks to learn more about how they can be good stewards.

Um thank you so much.

Um that concludes uh item 6b.

And uh we have no public hearings, so that will um strike through item seven, and then uh item eight is other business and updates, and I'll see if staff has anything to present uh on that item.

Yeah, just two items.

Uh reminder for the commission if you didn't know already, the mayor is doing her state of the city uh for Belmont.

Um speech.

Um it's on Wednesday, May 6th, 5 to 7 p.m.

and it's taking place at the Artisan Crossings property, 1325 Old County Road.

Um so there's an opportunity for you to attend in RCP.

I'm not sure if we've hit the um because the program's limited to the first 100 registered attendees.

I'm not sure if we're there yet, but we could, but it's certainly an item uh uh an event that's that's worthy of attending.

Uh if you'd like more details, I could forward it to you.

But it's coming up quick.

So Wednesday, May 6th.

And then the city in its uh quest to make updates to our website.

Um we are naming our new chat bot, and we're also taking feedback, and I think that that survey is closed, but there is a uh still time to test our chat bot for our website.

And if you're interested in that link, I could send it to you.

Um and it has some good feedback opportunity uh within the prompts of that.

So if you'd like, I could forward that just to you, and then uh it's certainly good to get any sort of public feedback as we try and streamline our operations and allow for some AI generated stuff.

So has our chat bot been named?

I'm not sure if we have a name selected yet, but I know we have a bunch of selections already.

But the survey's been closed.

So all right.

But you can test the functionality of the draft chat bot um via the link that I will forward to you.

So great.

Uh no other announcements other than we will be having a May 2nd meeting.

Uh we have a couple of single family design review projects that are scheduled for that.

I'm sorry, May 5th is your next meeting.

Um Cinco de Mayo.

Kind of exciting as well.

So um hope that you can all be there.

So that's it for me.

Nice to convene again with the commission.

I know it's been a while.

So good.

Well, this was thank you for a good meeting.

And uh with that, I believe we are adjourned at 8 37.

Thanks, everyone.