Good evening and welcome to the November 20th, 2025 City of Napa regular meeting for the Planning Commission.

Roll call, please.

Commissioner Ebach, present.

Commissioner Masaro.

Present.

Commissioner Myers.

Present.

Vice Chair Owen present.

And then Chair Shotwell.

Present.

Please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance.

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

One nation under God.

Indivisible.

The Planning Commission conducts all meetings in accordance with the Ralph Milton Brown Act.

California government code sections 549-50 et sec.

And pursuant to the city's rules of order for planning commission meetings, policy resolution 10.

Staff any changes to this evening's agenda or supplemental reports?

There were no changes to the agenda.

Commissioners, any proposed changes?

All right.

Public comment.

Public comment provides an opportunity for members of the public to directly address the planning commission on items of interest not otherwise noted on the agenda.

Each speaker's comments will be limited to three minutes and will comply with the rules of order for planning commission meetings.

Do we have any members of the public who wish to provide public comments on non-agenda items?

Okay.

Consent calendar.

These routine items may be approved by a single vote.

However, any member of the public or commissioner may remove an item for consideration during the public hearing portion of the agenda.

This evening we are reviewing the planning commission regular meeting minutes for November 6, 2025.

Is there a motion to approve?

Motion to approve.

I'll second.

All in favor?

Aye.

We have no consent hearings.

Public hearings or appeals.

These are items that are formally presented to the planning commission and provide an opportunity for members of the public to comment.

Applicants or appellants are allowed 10 minutes to present testimony at the beginning of the public hearing.

And if needed, five minutes to present rebuttal at the end of the public hearing.

All other speakers will be limited to three minutes.

Tonight we have the following item.

Okay, we'll start with disclosures.

Commissioner Ebach.

No disclosures.

Sorry.

Um I drove by the site.

Okay.

No disclosures.

No disclosures.

Uh, I drove by the site, and I also spoke with staff.

So uh we will now um hear a report from Ryder Dilly.

Thank you, Chair Shotwell, members of the commission.

This is for 2415 Trower Avenue variants, which is an application for variants requesting a reduction to the required front setback from 20 feet to 12 feet, and a reduction of required parking spaces from 3 to 1 at 2415 Trower Avenue.

Applicant is the city of Napa.

Just referred to the project site 2415 Trower Avenue is located approximately 250 feet west of Linda Vista Avenue.

It is part of the Linda Vista specific plan area on site.

There's a single family dwelling with an attached carport, is a three-bedroom, one bath.

As part of the fiscal year 1718 budget, one of the improvements was a Trower Avenue Complete Streets project, which identified a portion of Trower Avenue, approximately 250 feet, like I said, west of Linda Vista Avenue that called for street widening and improvements that are similar to the improvements you see out there today, which are required acquisition of approximately 22 foot sections of four properties, and this is the the fourth of those four tonight.

The request is a reduction in the front setback of the single family infill zone from 20 feet to 12 feet and a parking space reduction from three to one.

Um typically, there are two spaces required for every single family residence and one addition for every room in addition to two that are added.

And because of the acquisition and the street improvements in the widening project, this would bring that specific property into conformance and kind of assist in the future of rights for that property.

This exhibit here shows the existing site.

You'll see both dimensions from the existing right-of-way line.

One thing I would note is where you see the existing street improvements to the east of that.

You can't see the ones to the west, but it helps paint the picture of the improvements that you'll see down the road.

This exhibit here just shows where the three parking spaces could be located.

Obviously, one space in the carport, two spaces outside of that, still both outside of that front yard setback of 20 feet.

And this shows the variance exhibit.

So requesting the 12 foot front setback and then just one parking space.

Just a closer up image of that.

In consideration of approving the variants, you would have to make the findings as established in 1764060.

And staff recommends that the planning commission determine the project is exempt pursuant to section 15305 of the CQA guidelines.

With that, staff recommends the planning commission adopt a resolution approving a variant authorizing a reduction to the required front setback from 20 to 12 feet and a reduction in the required parking spaces from three to one for property located at 2415 Trower Avenue, and determining that the actions authorized by the resolution are exempt from CEQA.

If you do have any questions for us at this time or any questions of our public works department, we have both Julie Lucido and Jessica Lowe from Public Works Department.

Thank you.

So uh the applicant will Julie will not be speaking unless we have questions.

Okay.

Great.

So Myers.

I don't have any questions.

I don't have to chair.

Okay, Commissioner Masaro.

No questions.

And Commissioner Ebop.

I have no questions.

Would someone like to entertain a motion?

Excuse me, uh Commissioner.

You might want to not like anyone's here, but you might want to ask if there's anyone who wants to speak at public comment.

Is there anyone from the public that would like to speak on the subject?

Seeing that there is no one.

Do I have a motion to close public comment?

So moved.

I'll second.

All in favor.

Aye.

Would I would anyone like to entertain a motion?

Sure.

I move that the planning commission adopt a resolution approving a variance authorizing a reduction to the required front setback from 20 to 12 feet and a reduction in the required parking spaces from three to one for property located at 2415 Trower Avenue and determined that the actions authorized by the resolution are exempt from CEQA.

I'll second that motion.

All in favor.

Motion passes.

Thank you.

Julie, I have a question for you.

It has absolutely nothing to do with that agenda item.

Okay.

I'm I'm very I'm delighted with all of the improvements to the streets.

I just noticed today because it was one of the first times I've walked, I've crossed an intersection with the new striping when the pavement is wet.

It's a little slippery, the white marks, the big fat white marks in the intersection.

They're slippery.

That's but you have an is that a question?

I'm letting you know they are slippery.

So we put them in probably in the last, I don't know, two to four weeks.

Um it's thermoplastic.

Um there are some reflective beads that are put on that.

I did receive a similar um comment recently.

We will take a look at that.

Um, these are the typical stripes.

They are wider for the traffic safety, high visibility, so people see them.

Um, but we will be keeping an eye on if they're slick, because again, I had one comment um that is the same.

But they look great.

Thank you.

Great, and they're functioning well.

Can I chime in for him too?

Absolutely.

I think anyone can.

So I have to say, thank you, thank you, thank you for finally putting some temporary markers on Third Street.

As in you know, I drive up and down that two, three, four times a day.

Um, but I would say it's made a huge improvement for the pedestrians that are crossing there because with the white markers that are showing like the crosswalk now, the drivers now are noticing people actually standing there ready to wanting to cross the street.

So thank you for doing that, and looking forward to getting that finished out and striped.

It'd be great.

We are too.

So we have a contractor tentatively scheduled for the um beginning of December.

Um, it is a street, it's a great street to have paved.

Um, we are making some improvements for traffic safety as well with our new striping.

Um, and so getting that contractor here on the ground, but in the interim, we thought it was important to um double down on those temporary delineators.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Anyone else have any compliments, comments, questions for Julie?

Okay, thank you.

All right, we have no administrative reports unless something's come up since this was printed.

There are no administrative reports.

Okay, great.

Um, any comments by commissioners?

Any comments by staff?

Yes, uh, whereas we're nearing the end of the year.

I want to remind the commission that we're uh we have two appointments that are becoming up.

Um uh commissioner Myers brought up last meeting that he had already applied, so uh Chair Shaw.

Well, your appointment is up, so you have until December 5th to submit your application if you haven't already done so.

Thank you for the reminder.

Molly, welcome to the Molly Radigan, Director of Community Resources and Development.

I have just a few project updates for you since sometimes you ask, and I I thought it would be worth um sharing a couple with you.

First being several of you were in the room, uh, but Millie and Robert uh from La Petite Elephant will have their building permit come Monday.

Uh at the latest, they were just here.

Uh so that project is moving forward.

And then uh First Street, first and main street, first street phase two as we call it, uh, received their structure permit earlier this week.

So they are gonna start.

I call it the Lincoln Logs.

I'm sure there's a better name for it, and they're gonna start building the structure pieces.

But I what I really wanted to share with you today is if you um if you're bored tomorrow and you want to go either to the top of the Pearl Street Garage or the Archer Hotel starting at 3 a.m., they're doing the first of three foundation pours.

Uh, and it's several hundred cement trucks coming in and doing that we call the wagon wheel in and out, staying off of first and f off of main street and starting the first of the uh pours.

So it would it'll be quite a thing to watch uh with lots of trucks.

It's estimated to end it by about two or three PM on Friday afternoon, so tomorrow afternoon.

So if you want to see it, I would recommend going to see it in the morning.

Um bringing donuts.

See what the operation looks like.

Um, yeah, and I will share um writer got to make his first hire.

They accepted.

We're not allowed to announce who it is yet, but we do have another planner coming in.

So we look forward to getting that complete and then uh writer will send you that announcement.

But writer did a great job.

He ran a recruitment in which we received a hundred and eighty-five applications, I think was the total number.

Uh he had uh to go through all of those.

He got to do about 45 phone screenings and then interview about 10 people in person.

So it's a big number.

So uh he's made his first hire, and we're very excited about it.

That is exciting.

Thank you, writer.

Thank you, Molly.

All right, well, there we have it.

Um the next regularly scheduled meeting for the planning commission of the city of Napa is December 18th, 2025.

The December 4th, 2025 Planning Commission meeting is scheduled to be canceled, sadly