Good evening and welcome to the Thursday of November 14, 2024 5.30 p.m. Planning and Design Commission meeting.

This meeting is now called to order.

Will the clerk please call the roll to establish a quorum.

Thank you chair.

Members if you please unmute your microphones.

Commissioner Zhang.

Yeah.

Commissioner Chase is absence.

Commissioner Lomas is absence.

Commissioner Buckley.

Here.

Commissioner Caden.

Here.

Commissioner Hernandez is absence.

Commissioner Maseus Reed.

Here.

Commissioner Young is absence.

Commissioner Blunt.

Here.

Commissioner Reschke is absence.

Commissioner Thompson.

Here.

And Chair Wallace.

Here.

Thank you.

We have quorum.

Thank you.

All right.

I would like to remind members of the public and chambers if you would like to speak on an agenda item, please turn in a speaker slip when the item begins.

You will have three minutes to speak once you are called on.

After the first speaker, we will no longer accept speaker slips for that agenda item.

We will now proceed with today's agenda.

Please rise for the opening acknowledgments in honor of Sacramento's indigenous people and tribal lands.

To the original people of this land, the Nisanan people, the southern Maidu Valley, and Plains Miwok, Putuan Wintin peoples, and the people of the Wilton Ranchuria, Sacramento's only federally recognized tribe.

May we acknowledge and honor the native people who came before us and still walk beside us today on these ancestral lands by choosing to gather together today in the active practice of acknowledgement and appreciation for Sacramento's indigenous peoples, history, contributions, and lives.

Thank you.

Is there any standing for the pledge?

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 with liberty and justice strong.

All right, first we have the director's report.

Thank you, Chair. One item that I should have announced at the last meeting that I forgot is on October 22nd, the City Council adopted the Stockton Boulevard Plan, which the Commission had made a recommendation of approval on, and it will be effective on November 21st, so we look forward to that.

That's all I have tonight. Thank you.

Thank you, Stacia. All right, first order of business is approval of the consent calendar. Clerk, are there any slips for this item?

Thank you, Chair. I have no speaker slips.

All right. Okay. I have any motions from the from the the Dias commissioner, my CS read.

I'll make a motion to move.

And second from Commissioner Blunt.

Yes, I second.

Thank you. All right. Let me take the food.

Thank you, Chair. Commissioner Zhang.

Aye.

Commissioner Chase is absence. Commissioner Lamis.

His absence. Commissioner Buckley.

Aye. Commissioner Caden. Aye.

Commissioner Hernandez is absence. Commissioner Maussee's read.

Aye.

Commissioner Young is absence. Commissioner Blunt. Aye.

Commissioner Rechke is absence. Commissioner Thompson. Aye.

And Chair walls. Aye.

Thank you. The motion passes.

All right. Thank you.

Moving on to the next item. Item number two.

Applicant appeal 860 Ardenway, CUP, major modifications, Z23-078.

A presentation from Garrett.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. Good evening, Chair Wallace.

Members of the Planning and Design Commission.

My name is Garrett Norman, Senior Planner in our Community Development Department.

I'm here presenting on Jose's behalf as he enjoys some more deserved time off.

All right.

So to re-array everybody, the site is located at 860 Ardenway in North Sacramento

and is roughly one half mile east of Del Paso Boulevard,

directly adjacent to the Royal Oaks transit station.

The site contains a gas station that was first established in the late 1960s.

And in 2014, the City Council approved the conditional use permit

to allow for the sale of beer and wine.

Late last year, the owner submitted a request for a major modification

to their conditional use permit to allow for the sale of spirits or liquor

in conjunction with beer and wine.

Staff presented our recommendation for denial to the zoning administrator

hearing on April 11th where the zoning administrator denied the request.

The applicant appealed the zoning administrator's decision,

which brings the item to the Planning and Design Commission for a final decision.

The item was first presented to this commission on August 8th

and after robust discussion, the commission ultimately continued the item to September 12th

after two failed motions and a lengthy and because of a lengthy agenda that remained.

On September 12th, the applicant requested a continuance to October 10th.

On October 10th, the commission resumed discussion and failed the past two motions,

one to approve and one to deny the request.

The commission did pass a motion to continue the item to November 14th

with direction to bring back a condition of approval that would result in a zero net gain

and alcohol shelf space.

There were two conditions on their current CUP that address shelf space.

The first requires all refrigerated beer and wine to be limited to seven coolers.

The second requires unrefragrated wine to be limited to eight square feet of shelf space.

At our site visit, we discovered six coolers are currently being used to display alcohol

and 18 square feet of unrefragrated wine is being displayed.

Staff found that each cooler is 39 cubic feet in size

and on average can accommodate 45 square feet of shelf space

depending on the product being sold.

In order to achieve a zero net gain in overall alcohol shelf space,

the seventh cooler shelf space can be reallocated to unrefragrated shelf space for wine and spirits.

This would result in 53 square feet of unrefragrated shelf space using the existing eight square feet permitted

plus the average of 45 square feet of shelf space within the six coolers.

Staff continues to recommend denial of the major modification to the CUP.

Staff is recommending denial because we are unable to make five of the required eight findings of fact.

The five findings we are unable to make are listed on the screen before you

and have each been thoroughly analyzed within the staff report.

If the commission chooses to approve the major modification,

staff requests that the commission provide reasoning for each of these five findings as part of a motion

and to include two modified conditions of approval related to shelf space

as the zero net gain as worded currently in the staff report.

This concludes my presentation and both the applicant and staff are available for questions.

Thank you.

Let's care it really quickly.

I forgot to do disclosures and recusals.

Does anyone have any disclosures or recusals for this item?

I have a question.

Okay.

Which one should I call first?

Thank you, Chair.

I had a conversation with a stakeholder consistent with staff report.

Commissioner Caden, did you have any?

Okay.

I also had a couple of conversations.

markt, community members and the council member elect all consistent with staff report.

Anyone else?

Anyone else?

All right.

Okay.

Let's do a public comment.

Are there any speakers for this item?

Thank you, Chair.

I have several speaker slips on this item.

Our first speaker is Dale McCluskey, followed by Darryl Roberts.

Good evening.

I agree with you.

I agree with the presentation.

I have been a resident of Wood Lake for over 50 years.

I did move into the neighborhood in 1971 at four years old.

Aside from a short marriage, I've been there all of my life.

I've seen a lot of changes, a lot of really good changes, and a lot of very poor decisions.

That have affected our neighborhood in an adverse way.

One of the reasons why I'm speaking is because there are several speakers that will follow

me that will have really good, many supporting information about why this should not go through.

I'm not sure if this should be denied.

I wanted to make sure that you saw me and I'm seeing you.

You know that if something negative or you saw something because you have seen something

that has been coming a long time coming, negative things a long time coming

because you've seen this history in so many other neighborhoods about alcohol

and about crime relating to alcohol and alcoholism and this particular situation of our neighborhood.

If you take it to your own, if you think that if you can take it to your own situation,

would you want to have someone, a business that's two blocks away from you, selling hard alcohol,

following something that was against the city plan,

and somehow squeak through the city plan on some sort of variance or some sort of exception

to guidelines at that time, but just because that got through that time doesn't necessarily

mean that it should go through this time.

Thank you so much.

Thank you for your comments. Our next speaker is Darryl Roberts, followed by Akram Chandry.

Good evening. Darryl Roberts, resident of District 2,

liver 2396 Ericsson, which is about five blocks away from the gas station.

I came at the last meeting supporting Mr. Singh's application.

I stand before you again with the same request.

Because of the work that I do, I don't normally stand in front of you in these spaces,

but I think in this case I stand in front of you because I realize that progress sometimes

means you may look seem uncomfortable in being the space that you're normally not at.

I'm here tonight because I think that the request from Mr. Singh to simply sell liquor at his spot is doable in the variance.

It makes sense. It's not as if the majority of the folks who are buying liquor from there will come from the neighborhood.

But if it does, there are laws against that as well.

We have things in place to address it.

I think our neighborhood is growing up in a positive way.

So I simply ask for your support of your application.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Our next speaker is Akram Chandry, followed by Jake King.

Hello. Good evening, everybody. My name is Akram Chandry.

I'm here to support Mr. Singh's application for the approval of his permit.

and those who cannot drive.

A lot of people in my own business, I see people when they are growing up in age.

Eventually they are not having license. They cannot travel.

They cannot find anybody to even take them to nearby store.

And it's hard to find help in that age group.

But if they can walk and they can buy what they want to buy, if they want to feel to have reasonable purchase

of the liquor, then people should be allowed to do so.

Because people are buying anywhere. We are not stopping.

In those places, I don't think there will be negative impact to a degree on the community.

They will also have a larger and a larger picture, a very positive effect.

Because there are jobs being created.

I think there are many people who are not familiar with the community.

I think there are many people who are familiar with the community.

There are many people who are familiar with the community.

There are many people who are familiar with the community.

There are many people who are familiar with the community.

There are many people who are familiar with the community.

Thank you for your comments.

Our next speaker is Jay King, followed by Pat Sayer-Handley.

Good afternoon. My name is Jay King.

I'm the president and CEO of the California Black Chamber of Commerce.

I stand before you today to support Mr. Singh's request to expand his liquor license at Art and Chevron, located in North Sacramento.

Mr. Singh has been a long-standing respected member of our community and a reliable small business owner.

Over the years, he's shown time and again his commitment to not just running a successful business, but also to contributing positively to the local community.

His properties are consistently well maintained and he ensures that businesses he operates are both an asset to the area and a reflection of his strong work, ethic and dedication.

Expanding his liquor license at this location will allow him to continue to serve the community in a way that is responsible and beneficial.

This expansion will not only bring more variety and convenience to our local consumers, but will also strengthen the economic vitality of our area by supporting local employment and encouraging responsible business practices.

I fully support Mr. Singh's request, knowing that he has the community's best interest at heart and will continue to be a reliable positive force in our neighborhood.

What I do know about Mr. Singh is that if something is wrong, if something isn't working outright and we ask community members, go to him and tell him that this isn't working the way we thought it would, Mr. Singh is reasonable enough to make appropriate changes to correct that.

Thank you and I appreciate to service you all due for our city.

Thank you for your comments. Our next speaker is Pat Sayer, Handley, followed by Elaine Jackson.

Hi, I'm speaking again. I'd like to, oops, sorry. Oops.

What I'd like to remind you of the location of where you are going to put a place where they're going to be selling liquor.

This is a YouTube presentation. Hopefully. Oh, no, maybe it's not going to be.

Sorry.

There was a robbery across the street with pistol whipping and the police have not been able to find the perpetrator.

Sorry. This is not the right location. I'm about opposed to alcohol.

I drink myself, but I think that this particular place is not appropriate.

As we mentioned before, it's right near a school. I was walking by the school and there was a drunk bragging that he was drinking alcohol on a Sunday at the school.

So I don't think it's just the right place to have hard liquor. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Our next speaker is Elaine Jackson, followed by Sasha Vot.

Yes, I would like to ask all of you a question. Why do you think this is okay?

I will explain why I'm saying this. Sacramento City's general plan is against this.

RT is against this. The school board is against this because children cross the street right there.

It literally right adjacent to this property. We have over 200 signatures.

I know you guys have were all sent this from the neighborhood surrounding there from across the street and the neighborhood next to it.

Over 200 signatures. I personally spoke to 100 people which 90 something percent are against this.

So my question to all of you is why would you consider this with all of these factors?

I don't understand that. I wish one of you or two of you could explain this. He's not bad person.

Some of the people who get up here and talk are friends with him.

I personally went to go take photographs on September 9th. There were three sheriff's deputies parked across the street and someone who was drunk walking in the middle of the street right across from this location.

I've seen I also saw somebody who was drunk right next door to this location. This is a terrible location for this.

I just want to ask you why you would consider this. Are you friends with him? Are you getting pressure from outside from a politician?

I mean seriously. The whole community is wondering how you guys could consider this when we have over 200 signatures.

Mr. Roberts got up here and is supportive. I don't know why because I've spoke to so many people who are against this.

I don't know if it's because people get our friends with him if they're getting contributions to nonprofits.

I don't understand if this is government pushing this. But I would ask you all to consider the 200 signatures of the community next to this location.

We could have got more. We just stopped collecting signatures. But we could have gotten more signatures.

So please consider this when you make your decisions because none of us understand who you guys are working for if you don't listen to the community, the city, RT and the school district.

I mean we really don't. I mean can one of you tell me why you would consider this?

Okay. Well I just hope that when you vote today that you please consider this. I worked on the streets of Sacramento for 29 years as a firefighter and an arson investigator.

And I know what goes on. North Oak Park closed their two liquor stores.

Thank you for your comments. Your time is complete. 15 years ago.

North Oak Park closed those stores and we have a lot of.

Thank you for your comments.

Our next speaker is Sasha Vogue followed by Willie Minci.

Good evening planning commission. My name is Sasha vote. I'm the area 7 trustee for the Tumor Resunified School District.

I represent three schools that are in close proximity.

Let's send a mile mile and a half from this site including Wood Lakes Elementary School where we have 329 students attending each day.

We have only about between 95 and 100 if fluctuates not including special ed our walkers or they take public transportation to the school.

We have maybe another 50 depending on schedules that arrived by car but the majority of them walk.

We are very concerned. I don't know if you received the letters that we sent. We never got any confirmation that those were received but they are superintendent at the direction of the board did some research and reached out to you with concerns regarding this and we do not support it as a board.

We have some of the reasons that were outlined in the letter were proximity to the school safety concerns, the negative influence, the negative community impact and just a myriad of other concerns that may have struck you or may sound like they are in the abstract.

We have a lot of questions about the reality. The reality of the current situation for our students walking to and from school each day and arriving via light rail we actually have students that take public transportation from that site over to two buses that are closer to Grant High School which is about four miles away.

We have students that use that as a site for transportation to MLK junior high which is an additional 750 students approximately 300 of them are taking the train over to catch a bus to get closer to the school and to come back each day.

As a board I can tell you we were proud to stand in this chamber a couple days ago to celebrate our partnership and our achievement with the city council partnering to ensure protective factors for our students.

Our students face a myriad of challenges we've worked really hard to mitigate adverse early childhood experiences that contribute as we all owe to the aces on the trauma score that impacts not only our community but our students as individuals and we've just worked really hard to combat all the things and still protective factors.

I do want to point out that this particular light rail station completely adjacent.

Thank you for your comments your time is complete our final speaker is Willie mincey.

I do have the letter here anybody interested I would encourage you to please raise them before you make this decision.

gas stations value why they wanted so much money and first they looked at the get the volume of the gas and the sales and I can tell you without a doubt that that location is a terrible location for gas station because it's so hard you look at the gas stations this whole so hard to get in and out of it I drive by it and I'm saying don't I'm in the community for about 23 years you know I have a house I have a property on 9.3

and I have a property on 9.75 that's going to be my second point anyway so I say that to that's why we're here today because I can tell you two other gas stations that with a lot of volume the city has set no to so that's my point it's a terrible location for gas station so the whole bunch of other things to keep you going but my second point is that for that neighborhood you know I own 9.75 Cal day that I own six properties on every no five properties on every green which is less than maybe set six hundred.

So I'm going to set up a hundred feet from that property and being in that area we're in a transit district you know it's swancentess transit district and what the city has done they they have a limited what I can do on my property you know I own to

four of the properties for 25 years and my brother stays in one of them I'm there every day I own the last one that they restrict you know when you are in a transit district they restrict what you can do you know the property I had was and I'm paying taxes on it being commercial but the city looked at it and it said okay we want this to be MRX and I said well wait a minute that's a different value from what I pay taxes but the point I'm making is this is there's a lot of people over in that swancentess

district that have been impacted by these transit rules and so I'm in favor of getting rhythm not just for him but for me too because I'd like to use my property but this you know the city planner told me when I said hey look this seems to be unfair she said well the city has made a great investment and I said it's been 30 years and you have not you know because when they put in the

constant transit district I mean I was on the study 30 it was in 2009 nothing has been built she said that's okay because she said not and I respected it I didn't come here and I said because she said sometimes it takes a while thank you very much

motions they like to make I think we have a bit of discussion to have again

any questions or comments from for the staff or for the applicant from the commission I have a question for staff

at our last meeting we had a proposed motion that failed that articulated this sort of zero sum

analysis and we had developed some criteria to address the findings can you share that because I

do not have it recorded yes I can briefly summarize I believe it was commissioner

young that had established that motion and the first finding was related to consistency with the general

plan and so he cited some economic development policies the other four findings he established that it

was a net zero change as the reasoning as to how they could meet those findings and so that was

part of the direction from the the motion to continue it till this evening was how can we achieve a

net zero in the shelf space and so that's what we returned but those other four findings looking

back on my notes were specific to the net zero game because it's an existing alcohol license there

so even given that that analytical approach the staff are still recommending denial correct

looking for motions

commissioner john thank you chair I want to first thank all the people who came out to speak

whether you're in support or against the approval of the CUP I think that this conversation has been

thoroughly discussed and it's not a reflection of the owner in fact he gave me a very warm smile

out in the hallway I think he's a great guy but you know I think that the general plan gives us

a guide and I think there are times when exceptions can be made if they're if the business was

providing a service or a product that is missing that there's a void in the community but based

on their findings from the staff report there are other existing establishments that offer these

products so I think being that there isn't a void in this community and hearing how strongly the

community has come out to oppose it I am inclined to take that into consideration these are the

folks who live in the community so you know it's my voice is shaking because it's such a hard one

but after hearing all of the speakers and just even in the past sessions I would like to make

the motion that we support staff's recommendation to deny the CUP.

Is commissioner john can you discuss it?

Seconds

Commissioner john I have a question for you. Oh,

Commissioner Thompson.

Sorry I think the part that I've been stuck on in the multiple times we've gotten to hear this

is the fact that this is looking for modification of CUP that shouldn't have existed to begin with

and it's basing it off of general plan requirements that were already

adjusted to make the original and then the request especially in what we asked to bring to the

table last time was the net zero was to say how are we comparing this in the statement of you

know this is a transit oriented area or the you know all of the components are typically

we're adding to or we're bringing something new and this one I've just struggled with where's

that baseline where we're going to say this is doing and I'm still honestly starting with like how

the wording when I'm reading through your report which thank you very much for putting it together

um if I read it just straight out of the basic request of the upgrade does not or not even an

upgrade but just the basic request does not align with the general plan absolutely uh

so I don't I think that's actually just a statement I'm still mulling this over it's

it's a tough one to bring because I'm again unclear in how that that proof component comes in

to play when it already exists I guess I don't know if you have anything to help with that but that's

that's about where I'm at is trying to prove this out off of a case of it's already there

a couple comments I could um maybe share is that the alcohol sales is not in conflict with

with being in proximity to light rail that is an allowed use subject to a conditional use

permit so there's no non-conforming conflict there um we do have a new general plan we have not

previously had the environmental justice element that had these specific policies before so we

are evaluating this project under the new 2040 general plan and so that is where we are really

diving into that that policy analysis and and explains the what we put in the staff report if that

helps. Sorry can I go back so I completely agree and as a part of that general 2040 plan I'm so

excited about it and I'm so excited about what it's bringing to the city but for this specific

situation again it's just where is that baseline if that baseline already contains the thing that

we're trying to prevent is where I'm stuck I guess if we deny it's still happening so all of

those conditions are still occurring against what we've already approved so yes sorry

or must see us read so gosh okay a few things um thank you to the community for your comments um

I respect you just being here at all um it's you know especially on a rainy evening like this it's

sometimes hard to get out so for everybody who spoke this evening thank you for coming out

um I when I can tell you in the past I've probably been at the dias here the longest and what we

have done in the past is looked at and this is going to be a question to staff um as you know we

oftentimes are going through policy changes here at the city and those policy changes as we're

making them oftentimes um you know applicants who are applying for things like modifications or

new conditional use permits or new uses could could be impacted by those changes right and all

for good reason right that's the reason why we had these processes we go through the general

plan update we had these environmental justice additions added because we thought they were

important invaluable to our communities um but what we have done in the past is um you know

provide exceptions for the people who are already in that process because you know for new applicants

it is certainly listen this is the message we're sending as a city and as a community and we want

to make that clear um so my question to staff is you know one of the things that you know again we've

done in the past is make um an exception and I'm not trying to say that we need to make the exception

but I think again based on what we've done in the past here at the commission I think it's important

to ask when the change um when the general plans was in effect and was their application already

in the process prior to the general plan update is going into effect correct the uh the application

was submitted late last year um so and the general plan was adopted earlier this year so the

application is already in process but there was no carve out um when council adopted it to grant

immunity if you will from the general plan for in progress. Sure right right so there is no carve

out for that per se but in the past because when people have pending applications right we have

said okay right we've had this issue and I gosh I wish I could recall the last time this came up

because I just can't um but I think that you know is a hard thing for for for me and for us

to do what we do because um you know what happens is somebody submits an application

on the added that you know these are the policies right that they're going to be that their

application will be reviewed and potentially either approved or denied under and during that

process, those policies change. And I think that's a really inconsistent message that I don't like

to send to people. And I think for me, it's that process that is really challenging. And I think

that's a part of why, you know, and then going back to your comment that I'm just having a really

hard time with this decision. And I mean, obviously, we, you know, we don't have a lot of items

that have gone through this, you know, process of continuation, but we have. And they're never

easy decisions. And I would say to the comments, you know, and to some of the, you know, the people

who are in the, in the audiences, these decisions turn out easy. They're incredibly difficult.

And so I'm going to yield my time for now. But I want to continue this discussion. And just to be

clear, we have a quorum at seven. And we need a vote of seven to get approval one way or the other this

evening. Okay. Thank you.

If I may just jump in to address the policy, the policy does it discourages particular uses

within specific areas. It doesn't prohibit. So it kind of leaves open for some discretion. And

certainly, as you can tell from our report and all the discussions, it's a factor that we consider.

It's not the, the sole basis. But also, you're right, there was no, as Garrett points out, there was

no carve out for projects in the pipeline, which is sometimes done with new ordinance amendments.

So what is, what this, the findings should be evaluated based upon the policy that's in place at

the time you're making this decision. Thank you, Stacia. Commissioner Kaden.

Yeah, I thank you, Chair. I think I agree with some of the comments that Commissioner

Macias read just expressed. And I think like Commissioner Thompson, I'm struggling still, I think,

with just this existing component, you know. So I don't, I don't think my position has really

changed since the last time we heard this item. I think just this combination of it existing

today, they already sell beer and wine, right? It's a gas station, it's a small site. So,

you know, if the point is to kind of discourage this business because it's not conforming

under the new general plan, which it seems like essentially that's what we're saying.

I think it's just far more likely that the site just sits vacant, then it's actually redeveloped.

I mean, it's a, again, small site with a gas station, there's a ton of environmental

remediation for that type of thing. Like, what are the chances that this actually becomes

TOD in the future? It's weird for me to say, I know, but I just, it's hard to imagine it anytime soon,

I guess. And again, I think we're, you know, we're not even talking about an increase in the area

of the store that's dedicated to alcohol with these new changes. And that's not to mention kind of

that the timing, you know, grandfathering type of comments that you just made, Commissioner

and Mrs. Reads. So, again, I don't think my position has changed. I'll yield my time for now.

Thank you, Commissioner Hated. Commissioner Buckley?

Thank you, Chair. I also like, thank the folks came out to speak on this and for the staff's

report, really appreciate it. I wanted to speak to the comments made around, you know,

why is this such a challenging decision for us? And I don't know, as Commissioner and Mrs.

Reads mentioned, this seems to always be a challenging one for us. And it's not just your

circumstance, it's, you know, we had the AMPM over there at 80 and Truxel. And it's just a

challenging decision. And I've said over the course of decisions that I think that the way

that we seem to come into this and no faults to staff, I think staff is doing their job and

making the analysis based on what's what the city rules are. But I'd say that it doesn't feel

like an equitable decision. I remember the first time that we talked about it, I asked about the,

my, one of my children went to Crocker over on Riverside Boulevard and right down the street,

there's a Valero that sells wine and beer and I asked staff and again, this is not disparaged

staff, but I asked staff, you know, how did that come to be? And there wasn't really a clear answer

on that. And so as we make these decisions, it doesn't feel like we have a true north

and how to make these decisions and that becomes challenging. Your inputs, really helpful.

I think it's helpful to hear also from the school district. So thank you for coming out.

But I just wanted to explain why that's challenging. We don't have any, we don't have any

stake other than being community members and caring about the community. I don't think any of the

other folks who came out to, to endorse a project, have any other stake besides caring about the

community. But I just wanted to explain that because I think it's a fair question and it's been

an ongoing challenge for us. But I will say that I am also challenged by decision. I know that's

not welcome news, but it's one where while there are a lot of equity issues here, it never feels

like we're quite making the decision entirely fairly to the community or the business owner.

You know, if the gas station folks have come to us over and over again and say, hey, we need to

get to our bottom line. We're trying to figure out a way to make our business work and alcohol

sales is one of those one of the ways to make that happen. But then we also hear mixed support

from the community and opposition from the community about the impact on the community. So

it's just to tell you it is a challenge and we try to contend with it the best that we can.

Let's all chair. Thank you, Commissioner Buckley.

I will echo a lot of what's been said here. I definitely, I appreciate the additional

information that I wasn't supposed to hear about the number of students here using light rail

at that stop. And I think that, you know, I grew up kind of in an urban area and I recognize that

kids do what they do. And I don't like the idea that folks would feel that those business owners

are not following the law. And we've done, I think we've done what we can and have actually made

an improvement in some ways to what was happening previously in the proposal that Vice Chair Young

provided last hearing. However, I can count. And I know that we need a unanimous vote tonight

in order for this to go forward in either direction. So we are once again at a bit of a stalemate

because of quorum issues. And so I would like to know if there are things either from the community

or from the commission. That's possible. Okay. That would make this more palatable.

You can come up and say if there's something that would make it more acceptable.

I just wanted to confirm with everyone that we have nine, I've spoken to many, many community

members and it's over 90% of the community. And also going from beer and wine for a community

to liquor does change. North Oak Park closed their liquor stores 15 years ago because of criminal

activity. Del Paso Boulevard has had a lot of problems on the two liquor stores. There's a big

difference. It's not just for beer upgrade. It matters. And there's a lot of transients hanging

out at the light rail. That's another problem. They go right there to the store. And this is the

reason that light rails against this. And it is the third highest on crimes at this location.

The third highest in the light rail at a light rail stop for light rail. It is the third highest.

So these are the reasons. It's not just one thing. It's many factors. It's on a busy street. If

you're drinking hard liquor and encourage people to drive in there. You know, I'm just

explaining. Can you say the third highest? I'm just not clear what. Crime activity at a light rail

station calls at a light rail station. And that's important too. This is at a really bad location

because like I said, transients are there getting off. It's just really bad. It's on a busy

street. High call volume. A car volume going back and forth. It's just at a really bad location.

And it's definitely matters drinking hard liquor versus beer and wine. It's a completely

different thing. I mean, I've worked on the streets of Sacramento for 29 years. And I know

because I worked in first as a first responder and as an arson investigator. And I've seen a lot.

And I know this is true. I'm sorry to tell you this, but it's true. You can ask any police officer

any firefighter. It matters. So thank you. Sorry, I just wanted to tell you that.

Thank you. And I'll do my best to keep it brief. Which is a challenge for me. Not only am I this

twin rivers unified school district trustee for the area, but I have lived in the area on both

sides of Ardenway. And also up on Del Paso Boulevard for over 35 years raised my children. My

youngest is 18. Walked as a parent up to Darrell Roberts site every day. I was on his board for 10

years. My kids were part of, were the inaugural group of kids that were there. And I have to say,

and I shared with them earlier, love him to death, but I have to agree to disagree because there's

a world of difference between driving a van back and forth along that route each day full of kids

and children actually walking. We were fortunate in twin rivers unified school district to get a

grant for safe routes to school. So we could provide a crossing guard at Ardenway, at Arden and

Royal Oaks for our children because they not only have to contend with two light rail stations,

but also four lanes of traffic, which is one of the highest accident intersections in the county

right now. They're talking about declaring a state of emergency as you know for pedestrian traffic

in the city. Our crossing guard has been accosted, not physically assaulted, but verbally assaulted

multiple times while while trying to protect children and get them safely across the street due

to the vagrancy and the high number of intoxicated individuals already present there. Any day of

the week you can go out and see people just outside the light rail, outside the perimeter of the

gas station, panhandling with signs, going to the bathroom, shooting up, sleeping. We were there

today. I witnessed two, what appeared to be drug deals on the gas station property on the outer

perimeter, but still at the edge of the light rail station, along with an open container at the

light rail station as students were coming back from school and another individual just lying out

there. That is the reality. This is nothing personal against Mr. Singh, but he cannot control what

happens outside of the perimeter of his gas station. Chandos has had a shooting. They've had a

stabbing. Somebody was pistol whipped there last week. That is not, he has no control over that,

but that is the environment that will be adding more alcohol to. I also want to say in this case,

to me personally, and part of it is because I'm so passionate about our kids, this does nothing

to enhance things for children and many things to make it to exacerbate challenges that already

exist. This is about personal profits. I'm in that many market every week, and there are not,

there's not fresh produce. Occasionally there will be some bananas on the counter. None of the

baby items as a single mother in a food desert without transportation. I pushed my stroller up and

down the boulevard looking for places to buy diapers, to buy formula. This is not that establishment.

Maybe he can work with the community and make it that, but right now it's not. This is about Mr.

Singh's personal profits over the welfare of our children and our community. So again, I said

I would be brief. I do want to differentiate. So the statistics that I gave about it, that particular

station being the highest crime run, that was actually the latest report from Los Rios, but it's not

current statistics. I would imagine that they've gone higher by now, but those are for nuisance

crimes. The violent crimes are just a few yards down the track, actually a couple hundred yards

at the Arden light rail, which is the third highest for violent crimes. And our students and the

traffic going back and forth from the gas station is impacts there. That is a second hub. If you

can't catch the light rail up near Mr. Singh's, you go down the street and you can get anywhere.

That plugs into the whole network. All three lines. We've had shootings. We've had multiple drug

odys. And again, are those Mr. Singh's fault? No, but alcohol is not going to do anything to

improve those circumstances. So briefly, you asked the question and I just wanted to add,

I understand the legalities, but this does not benefit the community to the extent that it's worth

the other potential harm. That's all. Thank you.

I just wanted to add that there is not another light rail station in the county that sells hard alcohol

with adjacent immediately to that station. So that's another thing to consider when we're thinking

about our transit plans and and precedence and policies and whether or not things are an alignment.

This would be an anomaly. It's not the only one. I mean, it will be the only one. And the

three highest all have alcohol within proximity, but not directly adjacent. Thank you.

Thanks for that additional information. Again, I can call for a continuation. Or we can have some more discussion

on the bias. Anyone made this worse? Commissioner Zhang. Thank you, Chair. I don't want to speak for

everybody up here, but I know that I myself am a strong supporter of small business. I think

that's one of the reasons why it's very hard to because you are a contributing member to the

economic vitality of that area and you're providing jobs, which I think is highly important and appreciated.

But the proximity to the sensitive uses and again, when we when the city posts notices to the

to the community so that folks can come out and voice their concerns or their support or their

opinions, I think that this is a good opportunity for us to hear what the community is feeling and I

feel like it's it's overwhelmingly what I'm hearing is that they're in support of staff's

recommendations. So to me, that weighs a lot because they're not the ones that I ask for the

exception. The applicant is asking for the exception. So as much as I'm for small business, I think

that it's important to also listen to the community voice. Thank you, Chair.

Thanks, Commissioner Zhang. I'm going to call I'm going to second your motion and I will call

the role unless there was additional discussion that folks wanted to have because we're just going

to continue. Okay, let's call the role. Thank you, Chair. Commissioners, if you could please unmute

your microphones. Commissioner Zhang. I. Commissioner Chase is absent. Commissioner Buckley.

Aye. Commissioner Caden. No. Commissioner Hernandez is absent. Commissioner Maseus Reed.

Aye. Commissioner Young is absent. Commissioner Blunt.

Aye. Commissioner Rechke is absent. Commissioner Thompson. No.

And Chair Wallace. No.

Okay. So the motion feels? I think the motion. One moment. The motion passes.

Yes. We have four yes votes and three no votes out of the seven members. We have to have seven.

Oh, my apologies. Thank you. Thank you for the correction. Yes, the motion fails.

Okay. I don't think we should entertain this any longer. I think what are our options?

You could make a motion to continue this item to the December hearing date, which is I believe

December 12th or you can continue deliberating and try another motion. But there you might have

perhaps better luck at the next hearing when there would be more attendance.

So you would need a motion and a second to move to December 12th.

Right. Commissioner Maseus Reed. I am going to make a motion to continue this to the

ex- was it December 12th? December 12th.

I have to reapply.

When we have more of a quorum because we're we're it needs to be unanimous. So we're it's in

a it's in a tough position. So I'd like to make the motion.

All right. We have a motion to continue to December 12th.

Commissioner Buckley. I'll second. Right.

Okay. Any discussion? I heard a question from the audience. I don't think they have to reapply.

But staff can clarify. Okay. Yeah. This is just a continuation of the continued discussion.

I'll clarify. Please call the roll. Thank you chair. I'll now do the roll call vote.

Commissioner's please unmute your microphones. Commissioner Zhang. I.

Commissioner Chase's absence. Commissioner Buckley. I. Commissioner Caden. I.

Commissioner Hernandez is absent. Commissioner Maseus Reed. I.

Vice Chair Young is absent. Commissioner Blunt. I.

Commissioner Reschke is absent. Commissioner Thompson. I.

And Chair Wallace. I. Thank you. The motion passes.

If you know they don't have to reapply to ABC and that's still.

I believe that I had heard at the last hearing that they there was going to be another

application to the police department for a letter of public convenience or necessity is that I

think that's what what would require a new application.

But not not this the planning decision the planning application will go on to December 12th.

We can speak with the Garrett if you don't mind answering questions in the hallway. Yeah.

All right. Garrett will be in the hall to answer questions or help with folks questions on the

on that item. We're going to move on to item number three. Is it Zayou? Zayou?

Communicate the communication facility B24 021. Are there any disclosures or recusals for this item?

Seeing none. Go ahead, Sierra. Good evening, Chair and Commissioners. My name's Sierra Peterson,

associate planner for the community development department. The item before you is P24-021.

For Zayou telecommunication facilities located at 20426 Street. This application is for

a conditional use permit and site plan in design review to establish a telecommunication facility

for a new fiber optic equipment building on a portion of a 0.23 acre lot within the heavy

commercial zone and central city special planning district. The scope of work includes a placement

of a new pre manufactured pre-wired 846 square foot building for fiber optic equipment.

The building contains equipment to regenerate the fiber optic signal to maintain the signal

quality and speed that will enhance internet services in the area. The fiber optic equipment is

considered telecommunication equipment. However, this use does not include a telecommunication tower.

Only ground mounted equipment is included in the scope. This project was noticed to all

residents, property owners and neighborhood associations within 500 feet of the subject site.

The site was also posted with the public carrying notice 10 days before the meeting. Staff has

received three public comments. All the comments are available through e-comments. While staff

receive three comments, two of the comments are from the same person. So there's two comments.

People that submitted comments. The concerns raised include access to the inactive

community garden. That was the previous use of the site that is no longer being used as a community

garden. Parking in the general area traffic as a result of the use and operations on site.

Staff recommends that the planning and design commission approve the requested entitlements,

subject to the findings and conditions of approval included in the staff report.

This concludes my presentation. The applicant is also an attendance tonight and we are both

available for any questions you may have. Thank you. Thank you. I think I have a question for the

applicant. You can come to the podium. We have some speaker slips. Okay. Sorry. Oh yeah.

Yes, I am the applicant. My name is Rex Atkinson with the five nine design group

where the architects and engineers who represent the telecom company for this project.

Great. Yeah, I'm going to do commissioner comments and sorry commissioner questions for staff

and the applicant and then I'll do a public comment and then we'll come back to the desk.

I had a question for you because I have some friends who are using that site for the community

garden and there were some comments on the e-comment about sort of the design of the site and whether

or not they can bring in their wood chips and stuff like that. I don't know if that had been

addressed at all and if you could speak to that. It had. My original design was hoping

to utilize the existing curb cut that was at that site for deliveries but when I had submitted

I got comments back from public works that that existing curb cut was not in compliance with

current code. So any construction that would take place on that site would have to bring that

entrance up to a commercial entrance which would utilize a lot of the buildable area of the site

whether it was regarding or for this telecom building. So the recommendation from public works was

to take out the curb cut entirely because then it would bring it up to code of having just a

sidewalk versus a curb cut that was not up to the current city code. So that's why the design

had changed on that. It had nothing to do with the gardener just because of the size of the site

it seemed to be the way to maximize a developer area, usable area of the site was to get rid of the

curb cut. Okay so they'll have to come up with another solution basically if they want to continue

the garden. Well if they want to access the space for direct deliveries. The street itself is

a cul-de-sac that has parking at it so there's still access through the gate. If it was ever

a concern I guess the question is legality. I don't know if trucks are legally allowed to drive

onto the site to drop off wood chips or mulch anyway so this kind of more brings it up to code

since it was now being reviewed by public works. It's not against me personally I'm fine with

them driving trucks and dumping whatever they want on the site but it's not my site and I'm not the

one enforcing any rules on the site. I'm just building a fiber optic building on the corner.

Okay well thank you for that additional information. Any other and I don't have any other questions

does anyone have a question for the applicant? I don't see any any questions for staff.

Okay thank you. You have a question? Okay Commissioner one.

Sorry so one of the questions from the e-comment were addressing issues regarding

I live in the area and there are issues with it's a cul-de-sac it's like a very small quiet community

so I guess my question is is like how much traffic are you anticipating to this fiber optics?

Very minimal. The building itself operates autonomously it independently without any people there

whatsoever. People only come there to maintain the building and upgrade any equipment it's less

than once a month so traffic should be very minimal once the initial construction gets done

there'll be additional traffic for about a month and a half it's a pretty quick hit of a project

because the building itself comes on a truck bed so it's just a you know leveling the site putting

in a foundation and then setting it on that foundation and attaching it and then it basically

basically done so traffic once that's done should be minimal. Okay thank you. How you?

I was just refreshing my recollection of this area and there's like some artist buildings over

there and other stuff okay. There is the artist but the one thing kind of nice is it is right next

to a railroad track and I'll exactly how often that train track is used but a little less ideal

property for for building things always having it right next to a train track isn't the most

valuable land for retailer residential or something. Right. Okay and then other questions I think we

have some public comment and then we'll bring it back to the diet. Thank you.

Clerk are there speaker slips on this item? Thank you chair I do have one speaker slip on this item.

Thomas. Good evening. I'm Thomas Tom Quasabarth, a member of the Marshall New Era Neighborhood

Association Board and I just want to say opening that we have no objection to the

facility itself we really just have an issue with the access to the adjoining facility.

This place was this parcel these two parcels were used as a community garden for 14 years and

they were it was closed down last October the owner has offered it to a nonprofit to

continue its use at least the remaining portions of the parcel as a community garden and my

Neighborhood Association is considering taking this on as a lease and it becoming an amenity to

the community which it was before. The plans originally for Zayou showed a double swing gates

and the driveway access and as the previous speaker mentioned that was removed I understand there

were public works issues with that the issue we have is that the garden relied on

four to five to six deliveries a year of topsoil and compost we also took wood chips from the city

arborist and spread them out and that the revised plans now show a four foot mangate which would

preclude any dumping and really these are these trucks don't even really go on the site they just

back up and dump it inside the fence and then the gardeners move the material around the city

planner suggested or informed me about the public works issue and suggested that the access be

moved back to the alley there's an issue there that it there's an oak tree an existing oak tree

that would preclude I think dumping material there there may be ways around it by trimming the

trees or reconfiguring some of the garden plots but bottom line is my association would like to

do this and in the best interest of the gardeners future gardeners would like to have the ability to

bring materials in there you know for their gardening activities and so we're requesting that

this conditional use permit be conditioned on providing equivalent access to what that was

there before thank you thank you for your comments chair I have no more speaker slips

thank you clerk okay commissioner opening for commissioner comments questions discussion

commissioner missus read can you speak to that last comment about keeping it because obviously

public works right is requiring that it's not took it's not to current code right what is it now

it's what is it like 23 feet or something yeah well I was thinking about it a little bit um the

commercial drive might have been and I don't have to talk to public works and hammer this out but

the commercial drive might have been because the telecom or building was considered commercial so

my question to public works would be if originally I put in a double gate for the telecom building

and a double gate for the the garden as well because it's kind of an unusual curved gate right

now at the site so I kind of squared it off and put on two double gates public works said that

I need to put in a commercial drive for my building so I took out my double gates the question

back to public works is if we don't touch the curb cut and we leave the the double gates for the

garden and don't do any sort of double gates or there's not going to be any drive in access for

the telecom building because those equipments can be dropped off and and rolled in whether that

would be acceptable and that would be acceptable to me I just don't know how public works would

understand no I understand and I think I don't understand why why that wasn't discussed prior

or it was allowed because it would certainly rectify the situation yeah yeah and I'm not trying to

make it more difficult on myself to get this approved um it was just trying to come up with the

solution that would be the you know best solution for all parties and the most affordable too

because it is not cheap to it's good point I don't actually want to build the sidewalk I guess

I didn't wouldn't think that from a cost perspective you would um so yeah Karlo if you wouldn't mind

speaking on that a little yeah thanks good evening Karlo Felix senior planner with community

development so from my understanding the community garden closed in October 2023 and we are not

aware or the property owner has not informed us of that use continuing on in the future and as

development occurs we do require that non conforming items be brought up to current standards in

this case my assumption is that you know the driveway location on the curve is a safety hazard

there's potentially some issues with this proximity to existing property lines as well as a

potential issue with turning due to the required fencing around that structure additionally if we

were to upgrade to full standards to allow for a you know for deliveries you would have to pay

those areas to reduce track out near the public right away so there are some additional costs I

would have to be burdened a ton of additional costs we were talking like a I don't know off the top

in my head but you know something like a 20 foot wide 24 foot wide easement I don't know if it's 24

or 30 foot deep of asphalt that would go into the site which is why I took everything out because I

didn't think anybody wanted 20 feet of asphalt 20 by 24 feet of asphalt correct yeah now I understand

I hear you know what the community is trying to accomplish but it sounds like there's not even

an actual agreement moving forward that that use is going to continue and I would certainly not want

to you know stop your project from happening for those reasons so you know I hope that there's

a solution that could be figured out in the future but I would like to make a motion to approve

staff's recommendation thank you commissioner musty as read commissioner cated second all right

I need a discussion seeing none let's call the vote thank you chair commissioners if you could

please unmute your microphones commissioner Zhang I commissioner Chase's absence commissioner Buckley

I commissioner Caden I commissioner Hernandez is absence commissioner mossy as read I

vice chair young is absence commissioner blunt I commissioner Rechke is absence commissioner Thompson I

and chair Wallace I thank you the motion passes hopefully we can find a solution that works for

the community garden too thank you for the presentation coming on to our discussion calendar

I have number four the 2025 planning and zoning work program in 24-012

okay good evening chair Wallace members of the commission Greg Samlin planning director with

the community development department tonight I'm coming back to the commission with the latest draft

2025 planning and zoning work program just briefly in the purpose process this is a process where

the commission can provide input to identify and prioritize policy focus areas and action items

for the annual planning and zoning work program which is approved by council each year in January

so back in september 26th I presented the draft work program to the commission

got plenty of comments and questions from the commission and tonight we are recommending that the

planning and sign commission forward the planning and zoning work program to council for approval

attachment for of the staff report has a summary of commission comments and questions as well as

staff's response commission feedback in september focused on amendments to the tenant protection

program tree planning requirements and considerations small developers boot camp that we're

kicking off this year the role and composition of the housing policy working group the missing

middle housing effort and ways to further encourage its development 102 acres city owned site

and 80 you financing and impact fees so the 2025 work program has been modified since the last

meeting key modification was to include hyperlinks for easier references to websites in the city code

we did have a request that the work program be modified to include an initiative

to amend the city's local building code in order to apply the residential code to five and six

unit buildings and allow for single stair buildings in consultation with the urban design manager

Bruce monigan and he also checked in with other architects our understanding is that in california

local jurisdictions cannot adopt building codes that are less restrictive than the state building code

however as noted in the staff report staff is committed to exploring other options to reduce

building costs and promote missing middle housing including helping inform state building code

amendments and some of those statewide building code amendments that are being contemplated include

applying the residential code to five to six unit buildings allowing for single stair buildings

but also not requiring commercial to residential conversions to have current code supply

exploring modifications to condo liability laws that maintain consumer protection while reducing

liability and cost for builders architects to encourage more multifamily condos and also

lastly there's a AB 529 working group with the state housing and community development department

to create recommendations for reducing building costs and Bruce monigan is on that working group

so again we are recommending the commission forward the 2025 planning and zoning work program

the council for approval and that concludes my presentation i'm happy to take any questions or

further comments

thank you

do we have any speakers for this item thank you Greg thank you chair i have no speaker slips on

this item all right then we'll bring it back to the dice commissioner cated

yeah thank you so i want to make sure i understood you there are you

was the suggestion that there is there is no path for a local government through

an alternative materials and methods requests an a mmr to enact reforms to the building code on

single stair or which building code applies well on one off projects you can do alternative

means and materials requests for the building official to consider that but to change the local

building code across the board to allow the residential code let's say the plan of five to six

unit buildings our understandings we can't do that under california law and and likewise for allowing

for single stair projects right okay all right that i guess that would be news to me because there's

there's a whole sort of advocacy movement around doing exactly that in california through

liberal communities initiative and so i'd love to just like continue exploring the legality of that

yeah i'm open to you know alternative perspectives on on that law but i mean Bruce checked in was

the prominent architect working on these statewide code issues and those are response he got as well

okay yeah all right well yeah let's i'd love to just continue having a conversation on it

but otherwise the program looks great thank you thanks commissioner kaden any other questions

uh commissioner Thompson not a question just comment uh i'm aware of the the law issues with the

code um i don't know the ones that you're talking about and i actually would like to learn more

about what that is uh but i am on the side uh i'm working with the a and i know that that conglomerate

is pushing hard to help make a lot of these changes in the code and the legislation to push these

initiatives forward uh and in the conversations that i've gotten to participate in on the state level

i've been so thrilled to be a part of a city that's pushing it the way that we are and saying like

yes these are things that we're talking about here that are moving towards the state so just

kudos to you guys in your effort so that's all thanks commissioner Thompson uh any other comments or

motions do we need to move review and comment you have to move yes okay all right then i would like

anybody having more to say or want to make a motion commissioner buckley thank you for the

presentation appreciate not move approval all right there's motion commissioner ms c s read uh second

i just second from commissioner ms c s read please just have anything you wanted to say commissioner

black okay uh please take the vote clerk thank you chair commissioners if you could please unmute your

microphones commissioner zong i commissioner chase is absence commissioner lamas is absence

uh commissioner buckley i commissioner caden i commissioner hernandez is absent commissioner read

i am osius read my apologies okay um vice chair young is absence commissioner blunt

i commissioner rheshky is absence commissioner Thompson i and chair wallis hi thank you the motion

passes thank you all right item number five planning and design commission 2024 annual report item

in 24-005 big share thank you chair i'm commissioner so i'm back this evening with the second

version of the planning and design commissions annual report for 2024 and just for anyone who might

be watching or just as a refresher the goal of this annual report is to make sure that all boards

and commissions are able to communicate their priorities and their accomplishments to both

counsel and to the public and so this annual report will first be reviewed by the commission itself

where you'll be asked to make a recommendation then it will go to the personnel and public

employees committee and then on to city council so since this item was heard at the commission's

september 26th agenda for reviewing comment tonight i'm just going to focus my comments on what's

changed in the report and and updates that i've made since we last spoke in september i've updated

the project numbers in the report to reflect the actions taken by the commissions on hearing items

in october so that's all been updated um not really any sort of substantive changes there just a

couple numbers moving one way or the other uh the chair's message has been added in the supplemental

version which is online um on to page five of the annual report and you'll see it in there

all in red so it's easy to identify um for review this evening and once um council acts on the

planning and zoning work program that we just heard about um then it will be added as appendix a

so there's still a placeholder there for the planning and zoning work program so i have two items

specifically that i want to address to follow up on the conversation in september and the first was

is commissioner mcis reads concerns that she voiced and i've also heard echoed from other commissioners

regarding the consideration of conditional use permits for alcohol sales in light of both the

number of use permits in 2024 but also the new environmental justice element policy

that discourages the issuance of new alcohol use permits within disadvantaged communities

in pedestrian priority areas so within the background of the staff report i added some more

discussion and some additional analysis just to provide some context and i couldn't resist the

opportunity to look back in the years to see is the number of use permits that we heard this year

truly remarkable is it somewhere in between so i went back through to 2018 you can see the

table that included in the staff report itself went back to 2018 so i could get kind of pre-COVID to

look at the number of use permits that the commission heard each year when we were here in september

the number i was anticipating for 2024 was eight since that time we've had one project that won't

make it by the end of the year so we'll finish the year out with having heard seven use permits

so looking at the numbers it's not it doesn't really strike me as being out of the ordinary in terms

of the number of use permits it's on the higher end but it's it's not unusual i did think it was

interesting that the majority of the use permits this year had to do with small convenience

markets and with the exception of the one tonight on ardenway not gas station convenience markets

they were standalone markets which i thought was interesting it was unusual based upon what i had

seen in the previous years and four of them were in the central city one in north in atomas and

one in upper land park and then the one in north sacrameno so none in airport men of use south

sacrameno or frid broadway area which was also different from previous years so and interesting

i'm not sure that there any conclusions i would draw from that but i thought it was curious

and so i would mention it so to speak more to to what we consider in this question of of consistency

so we look at the same factor for when we analyze a use permit however the circumstances

of the permits are different the the location and the license type are always different so we

attempt to lay out the results of our analysis in our staff reports and in our presentation in

order to give the commission an understanding of of what we're basing our recommendation on

and what we'll do is in the future moving forward really make sure to pay special attention to

being very clear about what those factors are so that you can feel certain that you're evaluating

the use permits based upon a consistent set of factors however they will be different based upon

the location and the type and that is where the discretionary permit gets its special function

so some of the factors that we look at are we look at the type of license so what privileges are

conveyed is it an onsite license an offsite license is it beer and wine does it include

spirits is it a bar is it a wine bar they're kind of these are different the privileges based

upon the license type we look at proximity to sensitive uses and what those sensitive uses are

and this speaks directly to the findings that we're supposed to make as part of that use permit

we look at the healthy places index score so this is something we started doing in consultation with

the commission about two years ago now and so that is an additional factor that's now taken into

consideration when we are evaluating the balance of the use permit I like to think that we're also

continually bettering our tools and and so it's it would be difficult to evaluate a use permit

granted 10 years ago in light of today's policies that's challenging to consider the mall to be

equal because ultimately the communities change and evolve in our policies change and evolve so

sometimes it's difficult to compare the two we look at the number and type of licenses that

are proximate to the location and that speaks to that concentration question again in the findings

we talked to the police department some of the some of the sites require a letter public convenience

or necessity and some do not but we're we are always in consultation with the police department to

see if they're going to grant that PCN or if there are any special conditions that they want

we're listening to the community whether it's emails phone calls letters whatever those are

for our early outreach that we do we're looking at the nature of the business is this a bottle shop

where primarily what they're doing is selling alcohol is there some other function that goes along

with it so that kind of is a factor that we consider and by the way these are in no order of

importance it's just kind of a list we look at the policies in the general plan the community plan

if there's a specific plan or any other sort of guiding document that encourages or discourages a

certain type of business in a particular area like you might look at a bar that's outside of

golden one to be different from another location because of the the circumstances and then we look

at whatever conditions of approval might be available to allow us to make those findings of fact

and that might include things like limitations on shelf space hours of operation

let's see conditions that are like related to litter lighting security all of those things that

address the secondary effects of alcohol sales so the environmental justice policy is another factor

that you would weigh as part of your decision making as part of this discretionary permit so it's

on balance you would make a recommendation based upon all those factors so if you would like

to direct staff to agendize a future item to be able to discuss alcohol permits in depth it

would be very helpful to us if you could flesh out what you would want to know or discuss so that

it kind of points us in the right direction in terms of preparing because it's a broad topic and

we could probably talk about it forever but if you it would help us and to prepare what would

need to be prepared so then the second item I want to address was also commissioner mcus read

suggestion about the city consider reducing the number of members of the commission from 13

members to some lesser number that does require an amendment to title two of the city code so if

this is a recommendation that the commission would like to include in the annual report document

I'd ask that the commission include this request as part of the motion that hopefully you'll make

tonight to forward this on to pmp and then I would add that into the annual report document so

that's it in conclusion we're asking for your action this evening to pass a motion to forward

the 20 or the the 2024 annual report to pmp for consideration and with that we're open for

your comments and questions thank you thank you thank you station um

clearly have any any speakers for the item thank you chair I have no speaker slips on the

item all right no have commissioner comments and questions commissioner mcus read

t

time for session that we're having um

I have thought a little bit about yeah what workshop and what we can do and what does that mean

obviously from tonight's continuance there needs to be a deeper dive on this and unfortunately

we have seven commissioners here um so I don't I'm not sure exactly if what that looks like and

I would like to open this up to some of our policy wands here on the dius um who would have

suggestions on what that would look like but I do want to make some comments before we we we go

I think obviously tonight we've seen right that we have you know a new general plan that we've

worked on for many many years to get to that point um and I think you know when we talk about

terms like concentration which we've talked at nauseam about even related to cannabis land use

we still don't have a definition of what that means and that makes it really hard to do our job

um so we can say well there's over concentration here but you know we've

tried to even identify what that looks like on a map and yet it's been determined that there's

no undue concentration from the cannabis group I'm I'm not just saying this is alcohol related I'm

really talking about the same situation we dealt with and trying to identify what um concentration

or over concentration or undue concentration means right from a land use perspective and I'm

the only thing that we recently addressed this um on was the cannabis issue and so for me I'm

just struggling with with using that as a factor right because we haven't determined what that means

um and yeah I mean thank you for breaking this out stasha because yeah when we look at the

number of permits it's definitely not out of the ordinary I would say though what what is out of

the ordinary is sort of like you know the difference in change in policy right discouraging and

healthy uses and although I 100% agree that that's what we should be doing as a city I'm curious

like how does that translate to the applicant and you know because really for me it's like you know

discouraging a use we're saying we want to make it difficult that we want to

persuade against an action so for me I look at that as well then why don't we determine factors

and criteria from which we just want to do that instead of saying we're discouraging it um I'm

just trying to find a way to get to more exact language um so that it helps us make better decisions

when we have the current situation that we're in so that we can make a determination on where we go

you know I thought on the report there are three alcohol CEPs currently and progress are expected

to be heard in 2025 well are we going to end up in the same situation that we're in now like yes

everything every application is different every site is different in site specific but I think

it's really really important to have really clear policy direction and for me discouraging is

still leave some ambiguity there and I again same conversation we're still having with cannabis

there's still some ambiguity there I do see you know under policy eJ you know 2.16 that we're saying

you know discouraging establishment of drive-thru restaurants alcohol permits for off-site

sales and tobacco sales near food deserts schools and pedestrian priority areas but again my

question goes back to if we're discouraging or would like to leave out the ambiguity there

and just really come up with and formulate a plan of like okay we're we're actually don't want

those uses there um and I get my other questions this is a question to staff is like how

this is new I understand but like how is this translating to applicants like when an applicant

is already in the process do you guys go to them and notify them and say hey just let you know your

application for your uses in the process but the requirements from which we are going to

subject to you to your application has changed like do we do that you know and I bring that up

because I think that's really important right I think it's it's if we're wanting to have a fair

process then we need to really have that conversation about our we are we being fair um

um you know and so it is concerning for me as we move forward with like these future CUPs when we

are I think we've continued this current item what like three or four times now um so I don't

know what a workshop looks like I'm open to suggestions but that's just kind of where I'm at um

so that's why I brought this to attention here and I'm happy to open up the conversation but before

I move on from that I also wanted to address um really quickly that the issue about decreasing

the members on the commission I want to start by saying that we've discussed this in the past when

we were talking about streamlining the process um and it is in no way because I think we just I

want to get rid of certain members of the commission just fall disclosure there I think every one of

us brings something to the table I'm just I'm an operations person I'm an efficiency person and I

think about it in like terms of well um you know we are the largest body and um clearly from a

financial standpoint that is an impact it might not be a huge financial impact to us but it cost

more money to operate a 13-member body um and also it's a lot more work in time for staff and

for the applicants right to reach out to 13 members and from and staff can also clarify this but

since I've been on the commission there's always been at least one vacancy I think there was like

maybe a month or two where we had a full 13-member body and so we've actually been operating at less

than a 13-member body and I've been on the commission since 2019 so there's clearly an opportunity

for us um to move in that direction and I will say that um one of the things we discussed when

we were talking about streamlining was to reduce the number but also we had those four P and P E

positions where and even our positions right our our appointments were in expressed I believe

the term was an expressed interest in land use planning or you know anything related and then

we had those four professional seats right that were you know related engineering construction

and all of those things right that we wanted to have and rightly so on the commission um

but I do want to say that again for those who weren't there we in 2012 they created they

combined the design commission and the planning commission into one and we started doing design

review at commission um and that was a streamlining effort right so then as we were streamlining even

further over the last five years we said well it's too costly and to have really robust design

change and design recommendations at the time of planning commission right when they're already

so far along the process let's create this design review committee which now has been you know

run by staff now for I want to say it's been probably about four or five years and we're getting

design review not just from our design review manager but from committee members on projects

again early on at submittal and so I feel like that design aspect of that design

need that design professionalism I don't want to get rid of it that's not when I'm

suggesting but I think that we've really made strides towards addressing that

already and therefore being called a planning and design commission you know is something that

we could consider changing um and so again would love to open the conversation but I really think

that I would love to consider um pushing it you know 11 members or you know there's an

opportunity they do nine or 11 and I'm kind of pushing it to 11 because I think it would reduce

the number and we already have one vacancy that's really always been unfilled essentially um and

so my request would be to push us down to 11 members and you know directly um this would be

to the P N P E committee I think I'm saying that right P N P committee that we do not fill that

vacancy and that when one of the other seats becomes due for vacancy that we also don't fill it

we leave the other two P N P E positions there because they do have um you know I think some

really important insight um and what those two seats are again the the commission can discuss it

um but that's my recommendation and I'll yield

I'm assuming I see I should read so is it or you can hear motion? Oh I'm sorry you're right I

I should well before I make a motion I would really like to open it up right I open it up to the

one conversation I want to hear who you raise his feedback on a potential workshop or how we

address this issue that we're all kind of you know struggling with and also um what your thoughts

are on on reducing the commission it's just for efficiency in my head so yeah thank you

Commissioner Buckley thank you chair um I wanted to um talk a little bit about my hobby horse

our difficulty in figuring out alcohol cells um thank you station I'll for work you put into this

and thank you commissioner C is read for saying it loudly enough for us to get to talk about it again

in this context um you know I don't I don't have a lot of brilliant direction even though I

complain about this all the time um but I'll say that the policy seems to feel out of line

not not universally but often out of line with what we hear from the public there's a lot of

discussion of things that aren't part of planning staff's consideration um and while that could

just be part and parcel of public policy and the hard work you do and on a and a commission like

this um if there's an opportunity to and I know a lot of work went to the EJ element to the general

plan and all those things but um it's just really hard to contend with how inconsistent this decision

feels over time um but also you know recognizing that an issue like environmental justice has a long

history of people making public policy about it and then on a case by case basis completely ignoring

that policy and um I know this commission doesn't want to be part of that history um I think we are

all earnestly trying to be responsive to the folks that are coming to us on this um

and I also conflated with the cannabis discussion too when I think about things like um

concentration um you know it's just it's it's like tonight right tonight was an interesting case

right where we had uh folks in the community who might have been part of the EJ and EJ discussion

coming up and supporting um they increased alcohol sales and then and then folks who

probably weren't part of that discussion coming forward and opposing it for similar reasons that

you might find in an environmental justice discussion um so it's just it it seems like um it could

just be hard but maybe there's a way to continue to try to find some alignment with what we're hearing

in these discussions and and and much like the cannabis discussion like trying to find some alignment

between the discussion that happens on this dius and um the decision making process the staff goes

to get to those places so it just feels like they often diverge and it feels like that with cannabis

and it feels like that with alcohol sales and that's not pointing any fingers but I'm just

you know can only speak experientially um I hear your point on compare comparable over time like you

know by brother bring up my Valera station right next to my kid school the cells um beer and wine

but I do think that it's hot you know I feel like this this group could see a similar set of

circumstances that we saw tonight and voted different way and that just keeps happening over time

and doesn't feel right again maybe that's the hard work of being on dius like this but if we can do

something that starts to bring things in the conformity a little bit better I'd be interested

in exploring it and so the only idea I have is um I think that our discussions have been instructive

on what the challenges are so um you know maybe looking back at the discussions we've had the

issues that have come up how we voted on those issues in different circumstances just might be

helpful for this commission to think about okay well this is what we've been doing on this um these

are the trends we've seen and maybe there's something that could come out of that um so that's

that's my only idea is I hear your charge sort of flesh out what you should be considering and that

that could be helpful um and that's all I have thank you

Mr. Buckley uh Commissioner Thompson on the alcohol conversation and yes the cannabis combo is

good because I think the the crux of it and come on sure but they actually you've said it before

and it's rings true is those decisions feel very emotionally planted and it's such a complicated

place to make an emotionally emotional feeling decision on something that shouldn't be uh with

a bunch of people from the community that we care about all of them pulling in that emotion piece

uh what I would be interested in I don't even know if it's a viable option but as far as a workshop

is concerned uh on just a strict behavioral piece when you're trying to stop a behavior

nothing ever just stops right and we're hearing I think some of the conflict and where we get stuck

in this emotion is the desire for the commerce and promoting small businesses and the livelihood of

of the people that are bringing these questions to the table is in conflict with the other parts

about the neighborhood so there's a fight there and and both of those things

were professing to support uh so if we're saying we want to stop not discourage but stop alcohol

use of these things can we then provide a replacement and we've talked even today uh Commissioner

our chair wall is you you brought up like alternate solutions and we often bring up alternates but

I would be really interested in a workshop to start to talk about some alternates that can be

brought to the table um for these business users understanding they're trying to promote their

livelihood and if it's in a situation especially like the ones we've been hearing where the timing

is just crap or they ended up in a place that wasn't that way to begin with and now it is

how are we as a city and as a commission bringing them some other pathways that they can explore

instead of just having to say no which I think is where we're struggling or as a part of it

that's all. Commissioner Thompson uh I'm going to hop in here really fast Commissioner John um I

think this is a conflict and someone said it it's a conflict between economic and environmental

justice and those are concentrated in the same places and so I think that we actually need to hear

from the community about whether or not they would like us to focus on one or the other and I

think we should look at who those like incidents are approximate to and because what I don't want is

when people use issues that are not necessarily their issues to argue for the thing that they

want to see or losing that they want to stop like NB using things to stop affordable housing

right um and I think bringing it up and in that kind of a frame and then bringing it back to the

community and saying like so which how would you like us to proceed um would be a cool way to

try some community-led planning um and maybe the workshop involves people from those communities

that have that conversation as well. Interestingly we we did attempt with the with the ad hoc

streamlining in 2020 we did bring forward a um proposal to delegate offsite alcohol sales

decisions for these new use permits to the director level because what we were seeing was we weren't

seeing a lot of controversy related to these items and so we were looking for ways for use

permits that could be either delegated down or removed entirely and part of that effort we did a

lot of removing of use permits but also delegating down to the zoning administrator. The one proposal

that got on a lot of community pushback was the alcohol use permit we heard from neighborhood

group members across the city that they felt like the proper location for making a decision

like that was at the planning and design commission because it's very visible you have representation

from across the city and there could be that people could feel heard when they come up to the

dias they didn't want that at a director level so that's my impression of where I think that

would land is that people in the community said very clearly at that time we want the planning

and design commission to deliberate and to come to apply their best judgment to these use permits

we think that's where it lives and then you know if we don't we also have an opportunity to

appeal that to council if we think that that isn't you know what what personally want but this

was the body they put their faith in to make those decisions. That's a nice of them.

It is it is it is a great honor to serve this community I didn't mean that in any flip-it kind of way.

Okay thanks for that that's good information I will pass it off to commissioners on.

Thank you chair so so I have a question regarding how to define concentration is is the idea

from the city with not putting a very succinct definition on that is that on purpose that we

can be fluid in that decision or I'm just trying to understand like what what what is a basis for

that because I think that there's a value to having competing markets because I feel like that

the residents who would be consumers would benefit from that one markets compete you know there's

there's a benefit to keeping prices lower and things like that but

so I don't want to limit but then at the same time it's kind of like well then there's a

concern with concentration and how do we had I don't know I guess what is a city's basis for

leaving it kind of generic I've never known those findings to be anything other than what they are

and that's not to say that I suppose this commission might not suggest that over concentration

as it shouldn't be a factor maybe maybe you don't want it to be a factor that you have to base

a decision on maybe you might think that that finding isn't relevant in today's conversation

that doesn't mean that members of the community might not or they folks would still come up and

say we already have you know three of these within walking distance why do we need another but if

the concern is that it doesn't seem like there's a circumstance where over concentration really

should be a factor I guess that would be one solution as you could suggest to eliminate that from

the findings that would need to be made I do think there is there are some probably some

locations where that type of synergy is desirable you know where you have multiple venues that sell

alcohol and that is what is desired and that's the circumstance where you won't see staff

recommending denial because we think that that's a good thing we had one earlier this year that was

a bar that's right outside of golden one and we said you know we recommend this one for approval

and we've had others similar over the years where that would on you're taking into account

little snippets of all those factors that I mentioned so there's not any one that is usually the

the tipping factor it's taken as a whole and we do tell just to also speak to when the rules change

you know discussing that with applicants whether the rules change or not if we're recommending

denial or we're leaning towards not supporting we tell people as early as possible so I guarantee that

you know applicants knew early early on that staff was not supportive for whatever reasons

because we understand that this is their business this is their money this is their livelihood

in a lot of cases and we want to make sure that we're being as clear as possible and sometimes that's

a big topic of conversation recall with the general plan there was a carve out made for drive

through restaurants that were in the pipeline within what was it a half mile of an existing light

rail station so there is one site for example that has an active application and for as long as

that application is active that use can can go forward so you may see that in the future here

thank you for that station and then my second thing is um

uh regarding reducing the number of commissioners I think um I would defer to um

commissioner messias read through her experience that uh I would be supportive of that if the

comparison is that during the times when it was a smaller commission it was more effective um

I definitely would um defer to you and support that thank you

so

is commissioner's on uh commissioner buckley

thank you uh chair I just wanted to say uh to staff that I think I endorse the idea

that these decisions come to the planning design commission I think that's right I think

someone needs to be accountable to very concerned public and putting that all on um

on the director or director level decision just doesn't feel quite right so I think that's

the right direction to go I'm not challenging that at all I would say um and the over concentration

issue is kind of why I'd like to go back and do some um do some research on where we've come down

on that and just per my suggestion before because I feel like if we went back and looked at that we'd

find that we don't seem to vote on the over concentration issue much and I'd like to kind of see

where we end up or where this this commission has ended up over time on some of these issues and

it might be instructive as to to changes to make or things to think about more um and so another

thing that comes to mind there is the uh whether the person's a good business owner um comes up all

the time right and we seem pretty swayed by that honestly in my experience and so does the public

we hear a lot about that and I know it's not on the list uh but we sure do seem to consider it so

again bringing these things that we seem to be considering what the public seems to be considering

into conformity without a decision making seems like some good work to do.

The issue of whether someone is a good person or a bad person depends on where you are and if you

stand to benefit from what it is that they're proposing and also you know you that I would

I would feel uncomfortable making a decision based upon like that type of decision based on their

character. That's an interesting I think it's something we always would continue to hear and it

is persuasive I've noticed that the commission does feel um you know empathy related to those arguments.

Yeah and I'm not suggesting we codify it but I just want us to kind of deal with what

the process we seem to be going through here and just be able to confront that as we discuss

changes we might want to make.

It's Commissioner Buckley. Commissioner Blunt. Thank you. I do want to talk about the um

reducing the numbers the number of members. I've been thinking about this a lot

because it is something that's come up before and when I've talked to other people and throughout

the state they're quite astonished at the number of members that we have on this commission

but at the same time I took a look at the great work that St. Shaddid and I don't really see

the economic impact like being a major issue. I just I don't and I also don't see the efficiency

being a major factor. I don't support it just mostly because I get a lot of value personally from

all of the the voices here particularly how diverse we are as and as a large pot and I would do

I am concerned that if we started that trend to become a smaller body we wouldn't have as many diverse

voices so yeah that's just my thoughts on that. Thanks. Thank you, Commissioner Blunt. Commissioner

Katie. I think you know I so similarly I think the the number is less about the efficiency and I think

to me the the like compelling argument is that we keep running up against this bus stop needing to

get seven votes and we've consistently not been able to get that. Part of that is I guess on us to

have better attendance maybe but I think it's it's been a struggle and it's been it's made

passing controversial items very difficult and I think we just need to like reckon with that

reality so I don't know if the solution there is reducing the number I mean I think I think that

probably would make it easier if we had an 11 person body to pass things because I think there

is a reality around like well there's 13 people like maybe maybe one if I don't show up like other

people will be there will be fine but I think that's happening a little bit and so it could be

reducing the number to 11 I think it could be something else though too it could be like having

the vote threshold be half the commissioners that are currently appointed if there's a vacant

position or two or it could I don't I have no idea what the legality is here but like half the

commission that's present I don't know if that's possible but like that clearly to me there needs

to be some kind of change to this seven person vote threshold so that we're more able to actually

pass things and get things done. There are certain entitlements that by state law have to be

passed by a majority of the members of the legislative body I don't have them off the top of my head

but we could potentially distinguish between those that require and those that don't.

That is interesting.

Commissioner Mocee has read.

So good point because I actually forgot that I wanted to bring that up because obviously it's an issue.

So two things one I believe it's title two and we would have two so I guess I would like an

answer to know is that codified specifically for us is it codified just for all commissions like

how is where where do we go and what do we need to do would that be a recommendation to update title

to to be the majority of the of the commissioners or how would that how would that process move forward

we can always come back to it but I just you know I think that we would you would make a

recommendation to the City Council to modify title two and possibly the council rules of procedure I'm

not sure what's in there. And I recall from our prior discussions about this part of the

commission itself can't initiate a change to title two so you're basically asking

council to initiate it. So that's where the recommendation is important if you wanted to include

that in your okay understand thank you so I'm going to be clear that I would like to make that

recommendation when I make the motion and then also like I appreciate the feedback from everyone

on on the reduction and it's not about diversity at all I think this is probably the most diverse

that we've ever been and I am proud of that we had a for the first time in history of a chair

in a vice chair let me know women so we have come we had made strides in terms of diversity here

and I'm proud of that is nothing to do with the diversity it has everything to do with the fact

that for almost six years that I've been on the commission we have always had a vacancy so we've

always been operating as a 12-member body it's not the money I mean the money is nominal I think

the impact is nominal to us I think it's really about I'm an operations person and I'm very much

always thinking in terms of how can we be more effective and efficient and then I don't think

it's all about efficiency it's effectiveness I think it's ease for our staff for ease for us it's

ease for just so many things I mean we're over here splitting chairs and microphones I mean there's

just so many things that I'm thinking of and I again I'm an ops person so forgive me but

you know for me I really think and we're not losing PNPE seats here well we would lose two but I

think we should be able to to determine and recommend a city council what that would look like

right what what are going to be most important to us to have on those two P and P E seats and then also

of course the appointments that come along with it but I want to continue to you know add in the

motion that we move to a 11-member body and we do have a vacancy right now and I'm requesting

that that doesn't get filled because really it just hasn't been and so I want to include that

I'm going to circle back to the discussion on these you know concentration right I think

has been a big topic of discussion here I would also say I'm not quite sure

Stacia if you have the clarity you need to move forward and and if we had a workshop at commission

what that would look like I mean we're still having a conversation around cannabis uses and

what that looks like and so perhaps when that comes back to commission because I know that it

will be coming back to commission perhaps we have that conversation about how we are considering

our policies as we approve the CUP's for alcohol and for cannabis and sort of do a deep dive

along with that item I don't know if that makes sense but I'm just I'm not sure if you got

which you needed out of out of this conversation or if it was helpful

I mean I got a lot of

here's what here's what I heard I heard what does concentration what does or could concentration

mean and can it be defined I'm summarizing but that's kind of how it how I heard it how can we

make the EJ policy less I wrote squishy but because discouraged doesn't really give distinct

criteria to evaluate when you should be discouraging or when it might be that you should support

so discourage added a layer of uncertainty perhaps to that conversation

looking look at decision trends where where has over concentration been an issue in staff's

recommendation or where might we have

based it maybe had different outcomes on staff recommendation or decision based upon

concentration or over concentration or maybe number of sensitive uses within proximity of

of a location consider how to deal with the issue of an applicant's character being

a point of advocacy from the community's perspective as to whether to

support or deny a use permit so that's what I have

if you wanted to jump in commissioner Buckley please feel free yeah okay great um so I would just say

I wasn't so much thinking about character the community seems to also be

they seem to be attempting to be supportive of solid like business owners and their community

that they think will make the right choice so I just that's the only friendly amendment I give to

that it I don't think it's like just a character question but it seems like when when it's framed in

that sense of whether or not this person is a value added to bringing something to our community in

terms of like a strong business or a safe business there might be some environmental justice overlay

with that and so that's the way that's like is that change up okay and I think oftentimes when

that comes up right what happens is and I and I know I've said this right is you know because you

know we all have experienced the planning rate and development but not everybody here does and

they don't understand okay well what's title 17 right I'm just here to talk about what I don't like

about this applicant and it's affecting me and they don't know what title 17 is but when we're

looking at these decisions that is the premise of which we're basing our decision on and so oftentimes

I have said you know I just wanted to be clear that I appreciate you talking to us about the character

lack thereof maybe or whatever your opinion is but really what what our decision has to be based

on this evening is specific to land use title 17 and these findings and so I'm not sure if it's

something that we work out or if it's just I don't know how to work that out right because it does

come to us often times and what I have found myself doing is just making a comment to be clear with

our public the community that as much as I understand and hear their concerns it is not

evidence that I can use to base my decision on and so yeah if there's another way to handle that

I'm all ears two things come to mind first because we're talking about this as being very similar

to the cannabis discussion and the concentration discussion perhaps we do let that conversation

develop I know it will be coming back and maybe there might be something we glean from that

conversation that can be similarly applied to the analysis of alcohol permits again since it keeps

coming up as being a similar thing and there's been a lot of resources put into that conversation

already maybe we see how that develops and and then decide what if we want to how we it might

point us in a direction related to the alcohol and then the other thing that kind of occurs to me is

maybe staff needs to kind of think about are there some tools that we can or conditions that we

can develop or recommend to the commission that might speak to the land use issue like for

example I'm thinking about a project we had a couple years ago in the south area that we added

conditions related to healthy foods and the incorporation of square footage of healthy foods

it was very detailed conditions about what is a healthy food and how much square footage you had

and that enabled us to support a use permit that perhaps under other circumstances we would

would not have so maybe that is oh we can kind of think on that as a way to address the

EJ policy which is actually under a goal related to healthy food and that might be a tool that could

bring you know bring everybody closer idea so I think still on me sorry I feel like I'm doing

way too much talking but I guess we I have to make a motion so bear with me okay so I am making

a motion to have this conversation come back to commission along with the cannabis item policy

update conversation is that because I don't want to lose sight of us addressing the alcohol

CUP issue because as we all maybe need to remember that we have another continuance on the item

this evening so you know that's you know we might end up in the same position next month so

yeah if your motion is to and Leslie can correct me for me to

do for the 2024 annual report to P and P with direction to staff to return at a later time

related to the alcohol conversation I think we I understand that this would be maybe after

the cannabis conversation okay and then an update to be determined by preceding the cannabis

updates okay preceding or subsequent to okay oh excuse me subsequent to I'm sorry apologize yes yes

okay are we also asking council to initiate revisions to title two we are initiated yes thank you

so the second step would be to initiate changes title two so again uh

Leslie if you wouldn't mind I believe now it is we are just at seven members to make a decision

and to help us with our quorum issues to um get us to a majority you want to reduce the number

of members of the commission or just it was a two year oh go ahead it's a twofold um I'm requesting

the reduction to 11 um and the so that's titled two and then a reduction or excuse me and a change

from the quorum issue of seven votes you want a majority of the present present correct required

to pass a motion yes thank you one possible

get everything I think I got everything

all right so we have a motion

commissioner blunt I still I support the you know folks present and then that being the majority

I think that's a good idea absolutely I still don't support the reducing the number of

of commissioners I can't support that so

could I offer a friendly to that to your um your initial the just the part relating to the number

of commissioners would you would you be willing to change it to request that the count the

which is the PME committee exploring consultation with the commission reducing number of commissioners

and then including all that others have about why and then the parts about um the majority of the

body present versus whatever it was that you just said Leslie I'm sorry

yeah is that okay for language change commissioner blunt yeah so the friendly

amendment is to have the discussion around the reduction I would only ask to that again since

we've been operating as a 12-member body um that we the PNPE since this is a recommendation to them

that they hold off and and just don't I mean I don't think they have it in their their work plan

to do so but just to hold off on appointing anyone until we have that discussion to make a

determination as a as a body and I think we are good to move forward cool all right so we have

a motion we have a friendly amendment was accepted uh I don't think we have a second yet so

commissioner Caden I'll second the motion great um I think we've had good discussion thank you all

for this this was great and let's call the vote please clerk thank you chair commissioners if

you could please unmute your microphones commissioner Zhang hi commissioner Chase is absence commissioner

Lamis is absence commissioner Buckley I commissioner Caden hi commissioner Hernandez is absence

commissioner Maasius Reed I vice chair young is absence commissioner blunt I

Mr. Reschke is absence commissioner Thompson I and chair Wallace I thank you the motion passes

go in so okay um onto number I don't know number six public review draft parking strategy revisions

to vehicle and bicycle parking requirements project thank you good evening commissioners

um Vic Randall a senior planner on the city's long range planning team um here to give you just a

brief status update on the revisions the vehicle and bicycle parking requirements project and more

specifically to share the key recommendations of the draft parking strategy which is available

for public review at this time um so just to give a little background on the city policy direction

work on the parking strategy began prior to the adoption of the 2040 general plan um which was

adopted this past February and initially the project was scope to consider parking

parking minimums however the removal of minimum parking requirements was included in the general

plan and therefore took effect already in late March 2024 the parking strategy is rooted in

policy direction included in the city's housing element to explore instituting parking maximums

along established transit corridors the climate action adaptation plan also includes policy

direction to develop parking maximums and require parking management based on available transportation

options and land use and the 2040 general plan includes a wide range of related policy recommendations

and key among these include managing parking supply to align with the objectives for reducing

vehicle miles traveled improving air quality supporting economic vitality and fostering a high

quality of life throughout the city the general plan also calls for the continued deployment of

parking management strategy that optimizes the use of the existing parking supply minimizes the

need for the construction of new parking facilities and promotes shifting trips from single occupancy

vehicles to biking walking public transit and high occupancy vehicles so the key focus points

of this this strategy that's out for public review right now include expanding the application

of parking maximums throughout the central city and along transit corridors continuing to improve

the parking service divisions uh exceptional management of parking in the city through the development

of a parking management toolkit uh increasing bike parking requirements in new developments to support

the projected increase in the number of trips made by bicycle and Sacramento and so just to kind

of recap the work that's been done on the project this project kicked off in 2023 initiating coordination

across departments and with the consultant team supporting the project early in the project the

city formed two working groups consisting of 12 individuals each drawing on representatives from

a range of organizations neighborhoods and interests one working group was focused on parking policy

residential development while the other was focused on non-residential development and i'd like to

thank the working group members for their time and input which has been invaluable as the project

team has formulated the draft parking strategy uh i'd like to thank commissioners chase and cadence

for their work representing this commission on those working groups i'd also like to note that the

city hosted the first set of community conversations this past January together input on preliminary

recommendations uh the city hosted a second set of parallel community conversations yesterday and

today so uh we wrapped up that second conversation uh today at about seven o'clock so i came down

straight from uh from that meeting um and so we were able to present and facilitate public input on

that draft parking strategy really trying to encourage folks to uh submit comments through our

online community workshop and uh through uh through uh through email to this this project team um so

wanted to give a overview on our vehicle parking strategy recommendations uh there five key

approaches uh that are recommended to better regulate uh vehicle parking this include new parking

maximums and two zones establishing criteria to allow projects to exceed those maximums mandating

unbuttled un-muntled parking uh further shared parking and updating EV and disabled parking

requirements i'll just get into a little bit more detail on each of these so the first strategy

involves establishing those new parking maximums and two redefined uh parking district zones

and these are the central city um and areas within one half mile walking distance of a high frequency

transit stop uh and these two zones are detailed in this map here and just to note the central city does

is does reflect the boundaries of the central city's specific plan um and so the project team evaluated

data on projects completed over a three-year period uh from 2021 through 2024 and that data really

informed our proposed maximums um with more stringent maximums proposed for the central city

unless restrictive maximums proposed for areas within that half mile walk of existing high frequency

transit um existing citywide maximums for offices warehouses and manufacturing will remain unchanged

uh we also recommend establishing criteria that would allow projects to exceed maximums where

deemed necessary in order to ensure that parking maximums do not inadvertently prevent quality

new development so we propose to enable projects to exceed maximums by up to 25% through an

administrative permit process with requirements that the additional parking above the allowed maximum

be publicly accessible provide other public benefits uh projects that wish to exceed maximums by an

additional 25% would have a pathway to approval through a discretionary review process

strategy three uh involves mandating that parking spaces be unbundled and sold separately from

the rental or purchase of residential units uh which can reduce the cost of housing for residents

that choose not to own a car with lower lease and sales costs expected to encourage households with

fewer vehicles to locate to these units because of their increased affordability this approach also

increases turnover and efficient use of parking spaces reducing the need for additional new

parking in the city strategy four um allow uh is to allow the city to require shared parking

note the AB 2097 enable the city to mandate shared parking within a half mile of a major transit stop

the draft strategy recommends expanding this authority to require shared parking anywhere in the

city for discretionary projects enabling the city to require shared parking outside of transit

quarters will give the parking services division added flexibility to manage parking supply in

certain limited cases where there's demonstrated need for shared parking and strategy five uh involves

updating eb uh and disabled parking requirements so a key goal would be to reflect updated public

right away accessibility guidelines uh which are anticipated to be adopted in 2025 to ensure the

adequate disabled parking spaces are provided um we also include some recommendations for

bike code reforms uh current bike parking requirements and Sacramento are are somewhat low compared

to other cities and only consider conventional bicycles so the parking strategy includes a

recommendation to increase requirements for bike parking and new development uh these requirements

would include adaptive bicycles cargo bikes and electric bikes you know would also support

improved comfort and maneuvering areas within larger new bicycle parking areas um so this is

quite an elaborate chart um i just want to take a brief look at the proposed bike parking requirements

the two left columns include uh recommended long term and short term bike parking requirements in the

central city and transit oriented districts the second two columns include recommendations for the

rest of the city and the fifth column specifies the percent of long term bike parking spaces that

should be able to accommodate cargo or adaptive bikes uh and then the final column includes

requirements for charging for electric bikes and long term spaces um and just wanted to share that

uh an example 80 unit to volume unit in the central city would be required to provide that 1.125

long term bike parking spaces per unit yielding 90 long term bike parking spaces in total

10% or nine of these spaces would be required to accommodate cargo or adaptive bikes

and 18 outlets would be uh need to be provided for e-bikes and that just to note that long term

bike parking would typically be off street and secure and the same 80 unit development would be

required to provide uh 0.375 short term bike parking spaces per unit for a total of 30 short term

bike parking spaces and again these short term spaces typically would be outside such as a bike rack

would be visible and accessible to visitors and in addition they're required amenities for

certain land uses uh this is a common practice in many cities particularly for office or industrial

uses where there are a lot of employees and uh recommendations also include updating the bike rack

design and placement design standards guidelines that would be a separate uh downstream project

and this would involve looking at components of both short term and long term bike parking

and uh a core element of the strategy is the parking management toolkit so the city's parking

services division is really a leader in municipal parking management and the parking strategy

toolkit identify seven key recommendations to further improve on those best practices

notably notably much of the city's parking management is focused in the central city

uh the toolkit includes recommendations for expanding those management practices

this would enable the city to increase the efficient use of parking infrastructure which has

additional importance in light of the city's removal of minimum parking requirements through the

2040 general plan so i'd like to walk you through the highlights of the parking management toolkit

these include updating the residential parking permit program to align the number of

residential parking permits issued to on-street spaces within a zone limiting the number of permits

issued per address phasing and pricing to support cost recovery and demand management

and developing a tiered price structure so the second third and fourth permit per household will

cost marginally more actually let me go go ahead of myself here so uh the second recommendation is

evaluate and expanding the supplemental parking permit program um this is something that's

being tested now in a few locations in the city where multi-unit developments are coming in

this will establish market rates by zone with periodic adjustments to manage demand

getting ahead of myself again let's go back so the third recommendation is expanding and

involving the SAC Park meter program and i apologize we have this set up as a larger

presentation where we have an individual individual slide for each of these recommendations

so the SAC Park meter program would deploy parking meters in additional locations where they

were there needed to manage demand primarily so this is not not a revenue generation but really

about managing parking demand and ensuring adequate turnover and then expanding other

permit offerings and programs including permits for low-income residents employees or to encourage

the use of city parking facilities that are currently underutilized um fifth recommendation is

investing in parking enforcement services and this would be intended to be focused enforcement where

it's needed to support uh efficient parking supply um sixth recommendation is expanding on

street car share parking and then advancing the implementation of context sensitive mobility hubs

so we'll be building on the work that SACA currently has uh in development around uh

um uh a rural mobility hubs and um want to note that the city has made the parking strategy

available for public comment directly in the document via the online community workshop this

can be accessed through the project website listed here uh cityofsacremento.org parking

revisions um and uh comments can be submitted by email through through city council consideration

in 2025 or the 2025 but we will be closing the online community workshop on December 2nd.

And at that point we will, let me sit back, the city hosted those two virtual community

meetings yesterday and let's see. We'll be considering input from these community

workshops and the three city commissions. So we attended Disabilities Advisory Commission

last week and will present at the Active Transportation Commission next week. Following

close of that public comment period we'll take the, we'll prepare our final draft strategy,

take that to the Active Transportation Commission planning and design commission and city council

in early 2025. And so just want to encourage anyone that wants to get more background on

the project. They can find more information at cityofsac.mo.org, again, backslash parking

dash revisions and we will accept comments at this project website, parking revisions

at cityofsac.mo.org. Thank you so much.

Okay.

Okay.

Quickly, do we have any speakers for this item? Click.

Thank you, Chair. We have no speaker slips.

All right. So this is a review and comments.

Any comments? All recommendations to the staff on proceeding or clarifying?

Commissioner Caden, if you want to say anything about your experience.

Sure.

Feel free.

Yeah.

Well, thank you. And, you know, my first job at a college is working in the parking management

department. I see Oakland and my boss used to say that there's no politics like parking

politics. And that is true. It really activates a reptilian part of the brain for a lot of

people. So I know you've had your hands full with this. And I think you've done an incredible

job, you know, bringing people along in that working group. I think there were a lot of

perspectives in there that I think you managed very well. And I think the compromises that

you came to, I think make a ton of sense. I guess a couple things I would just, and I

mentioned these in the group, but I just wanted to mention again for the record is, so

well, actually, first thing is I was reading through some of the comments and I did want

to uplift one of the suggestions that I thought was a good one, which was perhaps on the

minimum bike parking. There's a minimum threshold of project size at which that starts kicking

in, like specifically for some of the like the long-term parking, which is going to be

required to be indoors. And so I know we've been talking missing middle right and like

part of the whole impetus of removing parking minimums, vehicle parking minimums for missing

middle projects is because the sites are so small, there's not a lot of room to actually

accommodate that. Totally supportive of like requiring bike parking in the public right

of way and all of that, but like I do worry if we have a somewhat stringent like indoor

long-term minimum parking requirement for like cargo bikes and e-bikes maybe we're running

into the same sort of issues that we were running into with vehicle parking minimums for missing

middle projects. So maybe it kicks in at 10 unit projects, something like that. I don't

know what the right threshold is, but just wanted to uplift that comment that I saw in the

public review draft online workshop that I thought was a good one. Another one that I wanted

to mention and I said this in the group was about we were at one point exploring parking

benefits districts as an idea, which is essentially this idea right that you charge for parking

on the street or through our PPP program or whatever the program is and then some of that

revenue is redirected towards like public services in the neighborhood that it's collected.

And you know this is a classic Donald sheep example, but he frequently references the

Pasadena parking benefits district and they have found there that I think folks are a lot

more willing to tolerate pricing the street if they can visibly see like that money going

towards improved sidewalks, benches, landscaping, bike parking protected bike lanes, right.

So I know that the current language is kind of focused specifically, especially in the

RPP and I think there's this like this strong I think temptation to kind of limit the cost of

these permits to just the cost to administer the program and I understand there's like legal

ramifications on all of that, but parking benefit districts are just something that I love for us to

continue to consider moving forward where you know RPP the supplemental, what is it called,

the supplemental parking permit program that you're talking about which is innovative and

great, SAC Park meters, you know price those accordingly and have that money be sort of

reinvested to sustainable infrastructure and city beautification.

So and then along the same lines so you know just for the benefit of other folks that like one of

the key conversations in these working groups and all along here has been the parking maximum's

conversation and I think where we landed makes sense I think there are a lot of people that wanted

those maximums to be higher some that wanted to be lower. There's a lot of folks who are worried

about development feasibility others that wanted to like prioritize the environmental benefits so

it's this is like kind of the dividing line there and I think where we landed makes sense and I think

you know we're really not you know if we can reassure folks we're really not frankly impacting

most projects the vast you saw in the statistics right the vast majority of projects are already

below the maximum that we're proposing so it's not like we are going to see a dramatic shift in

the amount of parking that that's being provided. I wanted to comment though on the 25%

the pathway essentially for developments to exceed the maximum by 25%

as long as those parking spaces are available to the public and put into city management and I guess

I would just just to kind of go along the same lines of the parking benefits district what if we

essentially threw it in administrative permit could allow for that to be exceeded via a fee

that is then again reinvested into a parking benefits district or some sort of

outlet for sustainable transportation infrastructure and city beautification so I think

similar theme there but otherwise I think this is a fantastic plan I think again you've

done an amazing job so thank you. If I could chair I just want to also acknowledge Ryan

Dodge who's been the project manager on this project through the bulk of the process he has

accepted a temporary assignment supporting our public works transportation division so I

really want to give Ryan credit for excellent work managing the project.

Thank you and thanks to Ryan. Any other comments questions from Commissioner Macias Reed?

I agree with a lot of the common-set commissioner, Kaden made great job. We've been discussing this

yeah that commission for a long time so we're finally there so thank you to you know Commissioner

Chase and Kaden for participating and it's really an important conversation. I think I've

mentioned this once before I think the the M2-16 the shared parking like policy that we passed

a general plan is like is really important so going back to strategy number three I think that's

like we really need to highlight the fact that that we have existing parking structures that are

being underutilized and that we really need to you know the city has already has partnerships

right with the state on some of their underutilized you know parking structures to have the city

manage and operate those I've been in conversations in the past as well with Department of General

Services trying to get some of their underutilized parking structures to be you know included in some

of the shared parking right or future shared parking options for some of our future development.

I will say that we ran into an issue with DGS and then it just the the conversation fell flat

where we one of the issues about the city taking over ownership and operations of one of the

underutilized parking structures was because the technology to have people that you know weren't

state employees after hours to come in they didn't have the technology and they didn't have the

funding to pay for the upgrade and so I think you know if we're talking about what options do we

have to raise funding to obviously go back to the city but but also to maybe pay for some of these

upgrades so that we can use some of the underutilized parking structures I think is going to be really

important because you know you the concept of it is great but then when it comes down to implementing

it's always around cost right so anyways I just wanted to mention that but overall I think this

is a great direction good job. I had a similar thought and I forgot this earlier today when we were

doing our briefing but I had thought about that issue with the wine bar over on 12th street

and the parking lot was leased by Cal Fire and they did not want to work with them on parking

because the land owner not the Cal Fire because they were like well they might be coming back

to work so if they're okay with it we're okay with it so I don't know what the

like what what the city's authority is in that and I know there's a bunch of complications

because the state pays tax doesn't pay taxes does pay taxes you know various issues but there's

an incidence and an impact issue that like could be discussed with DGS I think sort of like broadly

to support state workers coming back to work economic developments and then also just parking

minimizing parking and impacting the impacted neighborhoods so did that make sense?

I know you're like I don't know what you were talking about we had this wine bar that is on 12

we approved their permit there's a COP they're on 12th and S and they the neighbors were concerned

about the impact of that bar to the parking in the neighborhood the residential parking and it

is a really small street and there is a small parking lot directly across the street from the

wine bar but it is leased by Cal Fire which is on the other corner and there was just it just

shut down all dialogue once Cal Fire is that we don't want to do anything about it and I would hope

that actually like our state partners would be willing to collaborate with us on issues like that

and I think there may be a lot more parking lots like that in Sacramento.

Yeah and I'm not familiar with the specifics but that is a discussion I'll have with

and I also want to acknowledge Dacey Overmail from the Parking Services Division who's been a

core member of our project team and so she was notable to join us tonight she would I think

probably have answers to the specifics there but that's certainly a discussion I'll have and I

think that relates to overall the relationship with DGS. Yep great. Okay anyone else have any comments

questions recommendations? No? Okay well then I guess we are done with that conversation and

congratulations on really good work for the long time coming but I think it was the right time

there's enough of the conversation in the community around you know the cost of housing and

decoupling and there's some support from the state to like make it happen in the way that we

tried to do this five to ten years ago would have been much more difficult so cheers. All right then

next item we have is to make sure our comments ideas and questions. Anybody have any comments ideas or

questions? No? Okay public comments matters not on the agenda. Look do we have any slips?

Thank you chair I have no speaker slips. All right then we're adjourned.

Thanks everybody.