All right.

Good evening.

I would like to call the or call to order the Oak Grove Planning Commission regular meeting for Thursday, October the 2nd at 6 p.m.

And we'll begin with our land acknowledgement.

We honor, respect, and acknowledge Elk Grove's first inhabitants, the Plains Miwok, who lived as sovereign caretakers of this land and these waterways since time immemorial.

We commemorate and advocate for their descendants, the Wilton Rancheria tribe, the only federally recognized tribe in Sacramento County who endure because of the bravery, resiliency, and determination of their ancestors, tribal members, and leaders.

Will you please silence your electronic devices?

At this time, and I have a personal laptop here for reference if needed.

Will the clerk please call the customary greeting?

The City of Elk Grove Planning Commission welcomes, appreciates, and encourages participation in the meetings.

The commission reserves the right to reasonably limit the total time for public comment on any particular notice agenda item as it may deem may deem necessary.

If you wish to address the commission during the meeting, please complete a speaker card in the back and give it to the clerk, me over here, to for consideration of the agenda item.

Thank you, Antonio.

Will you please call the roll?

Commissioner Poole.

Present.

Commissioner Singh, present.

Commissioner Singer, present.

Vice Chair Ocon, present, and Chair Fernandez present.

Thank you.

I will invite Brianne to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the board of the United States of America.

And to the Republic or just one is the liberty and just withdrawal.

And will you now please join us in a moment of silence?

Thank you.

Do I have a motion for approval of the agenda?

Chair Fernandez, I move to approve the agenda as presented.

I have a motion and a second.

A second.

Vice Chair Ocon.

All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

None.

5-0.

Moving on to our public comment.

Members of the audience may comment on any item not on the agenda that is of public interest and within the jurisdiction of the planning commission.

The planning commission cannot take action on non-agendized items raised under public comment until the matter has been specifically included on an agenda as an action item.

Antonio, are there any public speakers registered to speak?

I don't have any public speakers for this item.

I will close the general public comment and I will ask for consent calendar item 4.1.

Oh, there are no consent calendar items.

Uh I still need a motion.

No.

Three again.

May I have a motion for no calendar consent items, please?

So moved.

Do we have a second?

Second.

Moved and seconded.

All in favor?

Alright, five-zero.

Okay.

Now we will move to the public hearing items.

And will the clerk please call 5.1.

Item 5.1 is Lazy Boy Design Review and Map.

Project number PLNG 24-049.

Good evening, Mr.

Chair and Commissioners.

My name is Kara Killingsworth, and I'm the project planner for the Lazy Boy Design Review and Map Project.

The project consists of a major design review, antenna parcel map, and a tree removal permit for a 13,000 seventy 13,078 square foot commercial building, associated site improvements such as lighting, landscaping, and parking.

It also to subdivide the one parcel into two parcels and removal of 10 trees of local importance.

The parcel is currently vacant.

It is on the low on the southeast location of Elkgrove Boulevard and Laguna Springs Drive.

It is surrounded by commercial and office space, auto commercial, vacant property, as well as the newly improved or yeah, approved office medical office complex on the south end, the Allen Ranch project.

The project is zoned shopping center and is in the regional commercial general plan land use designation.

The applicant is requesting to subdivide the existing parcel into two parcels.

Lazy Boy will be situated on the north side and will be on the set on the first parcel, and the second parcel will be on the south, which will remain vacant.

The second parcel, we don't know who or what will be going in that.

They will have to come back through a design review.

There will be two driveways, one on the east side, and it'll be a shared driveway with the existing auto commercial on the east side, Les Schwab, and the second driveway will be on the southwest side, and that will share with the Allen Ranch project.

There is a condition that between parcel one and two, the driveway will have the applicant will go through a reciprocal access agreement for access and parking.

The design review is for one commercial building for Lazy Boy.

It's again about 13,000 square feet.

There'll be 75 parking spaces between the two parcels.

It will have a variety of landscaping existing and new.

The materials will be a stucco, a stone, and aluminum for an accent.

It's consistent with the newly approved medical office building to the south, which had warm colors as well of browns and tans.

The application went to the trails committee on September 15th, and the Trails Committee reviewed a new trail that's along Elk Road Boulevard.

Currently there's a temporary trail, and so the new trail will improve, follow the new improvements for the bike master plan.

It would have 10 feet, it'll be 10 feet wide concrete material and have two feet on each side of DG material, as well as the new landscaping.

The one question that the trails committee had was is the tree on by the bus stop remaining?

And yes, it is the applicant's requesting a tree removal permit to remove 10 trees.

However, staff worked with the applicant to look at the trees, locations, the site improvements, and um at the staff is recommending that a condition be added to save one tree out of the 10.

As you can see, the of the colors, so the light green are secure trees, those are street trees, street street trees.

They're not Valley Oaks, they're London Plain.

The green are the trees that the applicant is saving, preserving, and that includes the number 9299 that is a 22 inch, and that's the one that's being conditioned to be saved.

And then the orange is the trees that are being requested to remove.

To go in the more detail, so in the staff report, there was a chart, table number three.

It had a number of trees, and so this chart shows that those numbers equivalent to the tag numbers.

So there are 15 Valley Oak trees.

Five of the trees are less than six inches in diameter in our code 19.12 says that if you're six inches or diameter or less, it's not a local importance.

So of the 15 trees, nine trees are requesting to be removed.

One is an extreme health, and extreme health, according to the Arborst report, is there's not much you can do to save that tree.

Six of the trees are major um health.

Sorry, five of the trees are major health, and if preserved, they would need evaluation again to figure out: is it structural, is it health?

And most of the time it's structural, and some those cannot be preserved as either.

But major of a few of them that the reason for those trees is the future lazy boy building is where one tree is located right in the middle.

Two of the trees on the east side are north of the shared driveway.

Those are close to a tree that's being preserved.

Another tree on the east side is exactly where the shared driveway for Les Schwab is located.

Two the trees are for parking.

Another tree is close to a tree that's being preserved.

And then again, we are conditioning a tree to be preserved.

With that, also as new landscaping is being planted.

Nine of nine of the trees being new will be oak bally oaks.

Staff finds that no further environmental review is needed for this project as it's consistent with 15162, the Laguna Ridge Pacific Plan EIR, and 15183, consistent with the general plan and zoning code.

Services and it's under the city's threshold.

With that, staff recommends that the planning commission find that there's no further environmental review per sections 15162 and 15183 and approve the ten of parcel map design review and the tree removal permit for nine trees for lazy boy design review and map project.

And this the applicant is here for questions, and that concludes my presentation.

Staff is available for questions as well.

Thank you.

Thank you, Kira.

Commissioner Poole, do you have any questions?

Render?

Commissioner Singh?

None at this point.

I had actually a long conversation about trees with staff, and uh I'm very pleased that they are saving one of the more than trees 9929, and the fact that most of the trees being taken out are in either major or extreme health issue.

They have major issues.

So I'm glad that it is not uh a large scale reduction or massacre of trees.

Thank you.

Commissioner O'Connell?

No, I have some questions about the trees, but staff answer all my questions.

So, nothing at this time.

Thanks.

Okay, very good.

Um, I had some questions for you about um the process of reviewing tree removal permits, and I'll probably take much of my questions into commission deliberation.

Um, but um, is it normally staff procedure to uh that the company from which the tree removal assessment is given by, and how frequently do you the staff um check on the credentials of the company that is uh providing the tree removal recommendations?

Well, part of the submittal process is you have to submit an arborst report to show all trees.

Even if you're not removing any trees, part of the submittal process that you provide a RBRS report.

As for credentials, um I don't know if CJ would like to.

Um so I will say specifically yes, we do look for certified arborists that's requirements.

This firm that prepared the report does have certified arborists on staff.

Report was prepared under their preparation.

It's also a firm, and the individual signing it is an entity that we've had a long history of working with.

We know them and have been working with them continuously.

So we have in this particular case, faith in the report is presented.

Um there was one other question I was gonna ask you about the reporting party, and I'm drawing a blank on it.

Um perhaps it'll come come back to me later.

All right, thank you.

If no other questions for staff, then I will move to public comment, and I will ask the or invite the applicant to speak if they would like.

Good evening, commissioners.

Thank you for your time tonight and hearing this um project.

Um I am Adam Lovern, L-O-V-E-R-N.

I'm the architect with RMW Architecture and Interiors.

Um, I am just representing the client tonight.

Uh wanted to thank Kira and the planning department as well for the job and the time that they spent on the project.

I think we've moved through this project very expeditiously with their help.

Um, and it's been uh a really good project, and so we're excited to be presenting this in front of you guys tonight.

I don't really have anything to present, I just want to thank you guys.

We're in agreement with all the conditions at this point, did have a couple of questions for Cura, but we're handling those offline.

Um, at this point, um I just want to thank you guys.

And if you have any questions, our arborist is here as our civil engineer, and then I'm here representing the architect.

So anything that we can answer, let us know.

That's it.

Thank you.

No questions of the applicant.

Okay.

Uh Antonio, any buddy registered to speak.

We have no public speakers signed up for this item.

No public speakers signed up.

There was one written comment specifically about the tree removal permit.

Um, suggesting that we uh well there was one written comment.

Um if there are no public speakers and if there is no question of the applicant, then I will declare the public comment opportunity closed, and I will move to commission deliberation on this item.

Any thoughts?

Commissioner Poole.

Commissioner Singh.

No.

Okay.

So I went to the location and I looked at the trees personally and walked the property and looked at them, and I agree.

Some of them are diseased, and they probably uh would represent a safety hazard if they were to even attempt to be retained.

Um, and I'm glad to see that there was another tree, one of the oaks that was retained.

Um, however, I I would have liked to have seen maybe a little stronger effort to retain a couple more that are along the concrete wall with Les Schwab.

Um those parking stalls up against the the wall are probably not oft to be used, and I my personal opinion opinion would be to uh give up a couple of parking spots to save some local oaks.

Um it's not lost on me that there are two icons on the city logo behind me, um, one of which being an oak tree.

So it is, I think, in the city's best interest to try to preserve them wherever possible.

Um, and I think I will save the rest of my comments for deliberation.

If there is no further question or action, I will ask for a motion.

Uh okay.

Um, Mr.

Chair, I move that we adopt a resolution finding that no further environmental review is required under state sequel guidelines section 15162 and 15183 and approving the tentative parcel map major design review and tree removal permit for the lazy boy design review and map project based on the finding and subject to the conditions of approval contained in the draft resolution.

I have a motion.

Do I have a second?

Second, seconded by Commissioner Poole.

All in favor?

Any opposed?

Nay.

Four to one motion passes.

All right.

All right, good evening, Chair and Commissioners Christopher Jordan.

Um on your uh items, I'll run through upcoming matters first, and then a couple of other uh items to point out.

Um, recent council actions.

Uh last week the council did approve the Luna Point amendment for the home home to sweets Hilton project.

This is up at the corner by uh BJs and Five Guys and the Vitalents uh former blood source building.

Um, and then uh council did approve the milestone 2 project, which you saw back in August.

This was the second read, and so now they'll be uh working through to get the improvement plans and uh final map prepared for that project.

Um confirm matters for October 16th is the Elk Rove Subaru project for your items.

So we'll be back here in two weeks from tonight for that, and then we are continuing to work through a couple of other items that we're hoping to have ready for November 6th, uh Wellington Crossing Amendments and Bartholomew Winery Amendments and some updates uh to the general plan required by state law by the end of the year.

Uh zoning administrator is tracking three items for October 20th.

This includes the Elliott Springs clubhouse as well as a map extension and uh prepainting for the proposed or forthcoming interlude kitchen and bar.

This is a former macaroni grill site, also up at the corner of Laguna and Elkor Boulevard.

Um that concludes that.

Two other items I'll mention.

We did on Monday received an appeal for the Maverick project.

Your action on that uh like the last meeting, so the city council will be hearing that item.

I think we're currently targeting the November uh city council meeting for that, but we're still working through digesting the basis for the appeal and preparing the necessary materials for that.

Um, the other item I'll mention.

I did have a conversation with a few of you over the last few days regarding the commissioner briefings.

My apologies for all the confusion on it.

Uh, heard your feedback on it, and so we'll be keeping the normal schedule that we have.

Um, and certainly if things change in the future, we can keep talking about it.

But thank you for uh presenting your concerns and you know hearing me out and hopefully be able to work through something at a native later date.

Um so with that, I believe that's everything we have.

Happy answering questions.

Uh if I may, Mr.

Chair.

Uh, I do have a question.

When you said you're keeping the normal schedule, are we reverting back to the old schedule?

Um, I think on it we will keep the the let's call it the pre-September uh system where we were calling you individually.

Okay if I know for you, Commissioner, we had that new time on Tuesday.

If you would like to keep that time, we can keep that time.

If you'd like to go back to the old time, we can go back to the old time.

Oh, I'd love to go.

I'm sort of like Pablo's dog.

I'm I know that if I have my meeting, my staff prep meeting, then the next day is the planning commission meeting.

Okay.

We'll have staff follow up with you on everybody's calendar.

Thank you.

And I'm sorry, we didn't have a chance to discuss that, but if we went back to the original plan, that works perfectly for me.

All right.

And would you please make sure that we're all uh made aware of when the Maverick proposal is uh before the city council?

You said a date in November.

Uh there's only one council meeting in both November and December.

Oh, and by code, we have I think 60 days in the date of filing in order to hear it.

If I'm bringing the date correctly, so um the November date would be the ideal one.

Okay, and that would be the they meet on the first and third Wednesday.

Second and fourth.

Second and fourth.

So it would only be the second Wednesday would be the only opportunity because of Thanksgiving.

Yes.

Okay, thank you.

Um, okay.

Uh Commission Matters.

Anything for this evening, Commissioner Poole Rinder?

Zoom on you're going to be able to do that.

All right, something so we can wait for that.

I do have something.

So the true removal permit on the item that we heard 5.1, caused me to do a little bit of investigation into what is required to become a uh certified uh independent tree risk assessment qualification um provider.

And the qualifications, um, ironically don't require a um specific bachelor's degree in botany or horticulture.

It's a two-day course um that is administered by the um institute of International Society of arboriculture, our borough culture.

Um, so I started thinking about um the entities that provide the the true removal permits for the applicant, um, and they're paid for by the applicant, and so it would seem that it's in the applicant's best interest that the tree removal permit be as broad as possible to facilitate construction as quickly as possible.

And it made me think again, going back to the two icons on the city logo.

Um, should that be an outsourced entity in Auburn, or should that be a city role with more oversight from the city uh either public works director or planning director?

So I don't know that that is within our purview to make that decision.

Perhaps we can make a recommendation to city council that that change be made for anything greater than maybe five trees or something like that, that there be a city person that provide additional input on the tree removal permit.

But it just it made me start thinking and actually consider getting my TRAQ certification myself, Christopher.

Chair, if I can jump in.

So the city standard is for a tree report to be prepared by an ISA certified arborist, not what you're describing.

Those are two different things.

Certified arborists required to hold themselves to a code of conduct and code of ethics, they're required to take an exam.

They're required to go through regular training.

So I think what you were describing was someone that's just doing an evaluation of trees.

That's not the standard of care that we look for.

Two, it's city policy that an applicant is given a choice of either having any technical studies prepared directly by the city through our consultants, or they can prepare at the cost, prepare and it would be prepared at their cost in that case, or they can prepare a study, technical study on their end, subject to peer review by the city or its consultant team.

We have a consultant on board that provides tree analysis, tree review for us on a requested basis.

They are called out for every tree removal permit that we have that's for a non-entitlement project, like you're someone looking at doing pruning or removal of a tree on a residence that protected tree, our certified arborist goes out.

There's a cost associated with that.

The city actually carries a lot of that cost that's above and beyond what our con what our um cost of service is to an applicant for that.

In the case of an entitlement project like this, staff would do the initial review based upon its review, may consult with uh the city's arborist on a case-by-case basis.

I can tell you we had a case recently down off of Bruceville where strong engagement from our contract arborist was appropriate for that project.

We brought them in, they came out and did multiple field reviews and even were out as part of the pre-construction process for that project to make sure that everything was lining up appropriately.

So we have procedures and practices in place in order to cover those things.

In the case of the project this evening, it was prepared under the authority of an ISA certified arborist, which is the city standard.

I need to defer to the rest of staff around the review that was done conducted at that point, but oftentimes there's a consultation that happens with our contract arborist as part of that peer review to make sure we're not seeing anything different.

Um, but in the case of this project, again, as I said earlier, we felt comfortable with it and we're bringing the project forward to you.

Happy to talk offline more about the specifics and the city policy about how we deal with consultant services like that if you'd like.

Sure.

Um, this particular company, the um California tree and landscape consulting, the two um principals, um, neither of their uh ISA certifications are current.

Um, the gentleman that did submit the report though, uh, Mr.

Tyler Thompson, um, does still have a current um California tree and landscape certificate through the end of the year.

Um, so he since he was the individual that submitted the report, his um certificate was uh still valid, but the two principals of the company, just FYI, their certificates have expired.

Um, so yeah, perhaps we can discuss a little bit more.

Um, and like I said, you know, the the parking stalls along the concrete wall um will probably be very seldomly used, and it would be nice to have seen uh greater effort to save.

Um, I can't see the number on it, but there are a couple of other 1878, I think, um, a couple of more of those uh trees of local importance that I would have liked to have seen preserved.

So with that, yes, sir.

If I add just a little bit, uh, because I spent a lot of time and I had a conversation with the director this week about these trees and tree removal.

One change I would like to see or suggestion I have uh for consideration by staff is that the tree removal removal table, table three, actually tell you which tree number is being talked about, because it's if would you be so sweet and show us the table you just showed up on trees?

Are you referring to the one that was in the staff report?

Yes, okay, understood.

Yeah.

Versus the one she just showed this evening, where it tells me the tree number and the tag number.

Yeah.

Because then when I'm reading the staff report, I mean I went berserk trying to figure out which was which.

Understood.

Okay, that was one comment.

The other comment which gets me is I'm looking at the lay person, somebody's reading this report.

And then it comes down and we talk about see the issue of the six-inch tree, six inch over, six inch under, it's not uh tree of local importance, quote unquote, uh, but when we start looking at at it, I look at how many trees he's removing.

Can we sort of move the trees which are under six inches or saplings now talking as a horticulturist, not be in the report just be putting as a footnote that trees under six inches, there were six or eight of them.

Because when I look at it and I started looking at this thing, I looked at how many trees are being removed.

That's the first thing you look at is how many are being removed.

You say, Oh, wow, this then you realize a lot of them are uh following my conversation here, a lot of them are under six inches.

So I'm yet grappling with what you do, the tree of local importance, which is locally important, but is not of any significant size worth keeping.

It just adds it makes it sound like we're willingly cutting trees.

I hate to put it that way.

Yeah, no, so again, the so city ordinance is for anything six inches or larger is subject to it.

We want to see all trees on site listed on the report, though, to verify the dimension that's out there.

Because if someone's driving by and says, Oh, that one looks to be 10 inches, but it's really only five and a half.

We need some documentation in order to support that, and so I would continue to want to have all trees be listed regardless of their size, but include the size information, and from that we can then distill what's applicable to the ordinance and what is not.

To facilitate, I mean, my life maybe it's only mine, but can we then put an asterisk where these small trees are, and underneath the asterisk says that these are uh because when when it says is it a tree of local importance, and it says no, but then I look at it and it is a value or kind of saying, but it is a tree of local importance, it's just a small one.

So I understand that that's six inch issues there, but most people and most lay people won't understand that the six-inch uh uh sort of line in the sand is is what uh breaks it.

So if there's an asterisk which says but these trees are not in consideration because they're under six inches.

I'm I think that's what the intent of that column though is to demarcate because when it's saying no, it yes, it's a species it is, but when it says it's no, not a local thing, it doesn't meet the threshold.

I think it's accomplishing the same as an asterisk would.

Okay.

I I understand the concern you're having, and I think we could talk with the Arborist community maybe about other ways to prepare the table.

Could you list them separately?

So yeah, one table is clearly those that are subject versus the rest are listed at the bottom, or things are you know, there's a uh subheading to the table or something.

There's other ways we could maybe look at it to make sure we still have all the information, but to aid the reader as you're describing.

So it's something we can look into.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen.

Okay, the reason I say that again when I look at uh table one on page fifty seven.

It tells me trees proposed for removal becomes 15.

It sounds like we're removing a lot of trees, but actually, the staff report only talks about 10 trees of which one is going to be salvaged.

So it's nine trees, as opposed to when I look at the landscaping report, it makes it sound a lot more dire.

I hate to put it that way.

Uh and and the on the other hand, I agree with what uh the chair said regarding any time we can save uh a specimen or a tree which would which qualifies to me as a specimen tree, it could be good, but uh the fact that we're only removing ten trees on the outside, actually nine, not counting nine, nine two nine, uh, versus the fifteen, the object tells me.

I I mean, I'm having a disconnect trying to get table three of the staff report versus table one of his report.

I I see your concern.

So some way to rectify this issue so it doesn't sound like a wholesale slaughter of trees.

Sorry.

So thank you.

The one other thing that I might mention is that the shared driveway is problematic.

I presume that is the only way to have allowed egress from the property onto Oak Road Boulevard eastbound.

Since the items close, I hate to go too much deeper into the design questions, but the simple answer is yes, there's no other way to have a driveway at without the shared access.

Right.

And the more beautiful tree that's there at the bus shelter.

So at least that one is being preserved.

At first, when I saw the that tree when I when I went there, I was like, that one better not be on the list.

Um okay, well, I think you've heard my concerns.

Um if there's nothing else, I will declare the meeting adjourned at six thirty-four p.m.